A few pictures from the last week

Hi everybody....not sure who that applies to but hopefully there's still a few of you out there reading this blog! 8)

The past week has been great and a huge adjustment at the same time. To make it much easier, Jenn's mom has been here helping us out tremendously! Here are a few pics of J.P.....enjoy!


J.P. and mom


J.P. and Nanny


J.P. expressing displeasure with his camera happy daddy 8)


J.P. mellowed out after a big meal 8)

Please....welcome to the stage.....

Here he is....the long awaited J.P. Claus, born on Christmas Eve at 906am, weighing in at 7lbs, 3oz., 20.25 inches long.


Labour went on for nearly 2 days for Jenn, but not really progressing very fast. On Saturday, she had contractions all day long, but they never really got any closer than about 15 minutes apart. So I went to work that evening, just working at the front desk in case I had to leave. About 3 hours into my shift, at 830pm, I got the call from Jenn that the contractions were about 7 minutes apart. I rushed home and within an hour we headed to the hospital with contractions within about 5 minutes of eachother.

At about 1am, the contractions were about 90 secs apart and intense enough that Jenn was ready for the epidural. That slowed things back down and she was soon put on a Petosan drip. By 630am she was fully dilated and her water was broken. About 650 she began pushing and that went on for over 2 hours with contractions between 1 and 2 minutes apart. Jenn worked like a trooper and I was gushing with pride watching her!

At 906 J.P. was born and it was all I could do not to ball like a baby! He's a beautiful, perfect creation of God and we are so thankful!

The last couple of days have been a huge learning experience but we've had family helping us along...Jenn's mom is here for a week and it's hard to imagine doing this without her here helping us out! Last night was our second night at home and we actually got quite a bit of sleep! The second picture is of baby, daddy, and great-opa.

Well, I hope you all had a blessed Christmas....it's certainly one we will never forget! BTW, if you want to know J.P.'s full name, just send us an email at allan_claus@yahoo.ca and we'll fill you in! 8)

This just in.....

Well....Jenn's been hardly sleeping the last couple of nights, especially last night as sporadic contractions have been keeping her awake. Today, the contractions are varying from 10 minutes apart to about 30 minutes apart. She's soaking in a hot bath now to try and help things along and all of our bags are piled by the door. Still a little unclear if it's going to happen tonight or not, but I don't think I'll be going to work! ---- Al

3 weeks to go!!!

Wow....the pastor at church this morning reminded everyone that it's only 22 days till Christmas....all I could think about was that minus a day was how long until Jenn's due date! It's coming really fast now but I think we're as prepared as we can be. All the bags are packed for the trip to the hospital and the baby's room is ready. Jenn feels like it might come early and the way the baby's kicking she's hoping so! The little one likes to kick and stretch Jenn's tummy out sideways...she tells me it hurts...it just looks freaky to me! 8) We had an ultrasound a couple weeks ago when Jenn's doc wanted to make sure there was enough amniotic fluid. We were a little nervous going to that as we had heard that if there wasn't enough fluid the doc may want to induce labour right away. Under such short notice, neither of us were quite ready for that, but everything was fine! As I type this Jenn is upstairs baking like crazy....her nesting phase might make me chubby!

Here are a couple pics from a few days ago. Jenn wanted to put the Harley Davidson tattoo on her belly...wasn't my idea! 8)

Cute little tummy 8)

Biker baby...

It's been a very busy month, as usual. I've worked a lot of overtime and Jenn has been busy prepping her staff to keep things running when she's gone. Being away from her store will be a challenge for Jenn, but I imagine her time off will fly by! We had a good time at my work Christmas party a couple of weeks ago, a very classy affair! I've also started playing hockey, for the first time in about 20 years. I'm playing in our platoon league at work which can be pretty competitive. Our police service has quite a few former professional hockey players...one of the guys on my team played for Boston, the Leafs, and won gold at the World Juniors. So it was a bit intimidating stepping onto the ice with virtually no experience except for the year I played in Grade 8 (I think I had about 3 shifts the whole season). Anyhow, my very first game, I got run over by my own teamate at the blue line and I scored the opening goal! I ended up getting the first star, even though we lost. In game 2 I scored again on about the ugliest (so I was told) breakaway ever. So I'm really enjoying that , though I don't know how long I can keep the scoring streak up!

We also had a nice visit with Nick and Melissa Alkhoury and their boys recently when they dropping in for a visit. It had been a long time and we're looking forward to seeing them again soon as they are staying a bit closer now than Sudbury!

Well, we hope all is well and who knows, the next update might be from 3 of us. We hope you all have a blessed Christmas and New Year!

Al