Welcome Francesca Elizabeth!

On December 28, 2006 @ 2:39 AM, we welcomed Francesca Elizabeth Fanco ("Chessie") into the world at St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She was born only a few short days after her due date, after an ultrasound and non-stress test on Tuesday showed her as very non-reactive (she wasn't moving her fingers, toes, etc and her heart rate would not accellerate), causing my doctor to move up the induction date by almost a week . She weighed in at a tiny 7 pounds, 5 ounces (almost 2 full pounds less than her older brother Teddy!), and is 20 1/2 inches in length. Sporting a full head of hair and pretty blue/green eyes, she is such a blessed addition to our family!

For those who are wondering about the name, many of you know that our name choices for a girl had been narrowed down to Felecia or Adelaide. However, as we were looking at her after she was born, Jeff looked at her and said "She looks like a Francesca". This was not a name we had even considered, so I had Jeff borrow the nurse's computer to go online and find out the meaning of the name, as well as making sure it wasn't in the Top 100 most popular names (a requirement for me that our kids don't have popular names). We settled on the name after learning that it means "Free spirited" (so with Elizabeth, which means Oath of God, she is a free-spirited oath of God).




Mommy with her little Francesca

Proud Papa looks at his little Chessie


Look at that hair


Hey, I'm trying to nap here.


Chessie with her pretty hat.


Big sister Meg gets to hold her new sister


Big sister Anna gives Chessie a kiss


Proud big brother Teddy promises to protect his new sister

Merry Christmas from the Fancos

Though this picture will be outdated in about a week once we add our newest family member, we wanted a family Christmas picture from 2006. MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Christmas morning at Home

We came home for the late service at KCC on Sunday night and then woke up for Christmas morning at home in Byron Center. Because the service was at 11, we didn't get home until after midnight, so the kids actually slept in until around 8:30! Meg read the Christmas story for us out of the Bible, as has become her designated job the past few years, and then we did stocking and presents. We have been so blessed this year!


Teddy and Anna checking out their stockings.


Meg found the candy first in hers, and enjoyed it as she opened the rest of the things in the stocking.

A big present for Teddy- his own GFS truck! Ever since Jeff started working here, Teddy recognizes the 18 wheelers on the road everywhere and exclaims to everyone who will listen "My DAD works for GFS!". So now, he has his own truck :-)


A very tired Jeff after all the presents had been opened. He is snuggling his new MP3 shower docking station for his IPOD.

Christmas Eve

We had the traditional Polish Christmas Eve celebration at Jeff's Aunt Louise's house (or Aunt WEEZ, as Anna says :-). The kids love playing with the extended family, as Jeff has several cousins who are the same ages as them. It's a wonderful way to celebrate Christmas Eve!


Teddy and Anna spending some time with Grumpa


"Mom, I see presents!!"


Matching outfits- too cute!


Anna LOVES Christmas!

Merry Christmas from the Fanco Kids!

A few pictures of the kids at Rick & Judi's before we left to go to family Christmas Eve dinner at Aunt Louise's house. It's amazing how much these kids have grown since last year's pictures! I will say though, that it is JUST as difficult as it was last year to get pictures where they're all looking at the camera, with a pleasant expression, at the SAME time!

Similar dresses for the girls- Anna LOVES to look like her big sister!


A very grown-up 8 years old!

As Teddy could be heard telling everyone while he was wearing this hat, "Ho, Ho, Ho... HAPPY Christmas!"


The littlest princess.


It's hard to tell from this picture, but Jeff and Teddy's shirts and ties match :-). Teddy loves to look like daddy (Actually, he tells everyone that Jeff is wearing a "Teddy shirt")

"Christmas Morning" at Nana & Grumpas

We spent Saturday night at Jeff's parents so that the kids could have a "Christmas morning" with Nana and Grumpa. They enjoyed waking up early and finding presents for them under the tree :-)
Meg received several Barbie dolls which she had asked for, including one that apparently comes with a cat and a litter box- you feed the cat water, it pees, and it comes with clumpable sand to put in the litter box which you then scoop out. Why this appeals to an 8 year old, I have NO idea!!!


Teddy was thrilled to receive another train for his Thomas wooden train set.


Antoinette designated herself as the official present-distribution person :-)


Anna received a pretend shopping cart from Nana & Grumpa which included a seat up top for her "baby". She played with this the rest of the day- going around the house "shopping" and taking things off bookshelves, etc.

Happy Birthday Anna!

Antoinette celebrated her second birthday on December 23. We gave her presents at home (including a new trike which Teddy keeps trying to take from her). Then, that night we had a cake for her at Nana & Grumpa Fancos. It had chocolate shavings on the outside and she had fun digging into them before we'd even finished singing to her!

A Campout on the floor

The Friday night before Christmas, the kids decided that they wanted to sleep out in the living room under the Christmas tree. Here are a few pictures from that fun night :-)

Meg reading a book to Teddy


Blankets and pillows everywhere- they each emptied off their beds and brought everything into the living room.


Night- Night!

Belly Picture

Alright, so 2 certain people who will remain nameless have been hounding me to put a pregnant belly picture up on my blog. SOOOOO, here it is. This was taken last night before bed (please pardon the wonderful sleeping attire), and according to my doctor at the appointment today, I'm at 38 weeks (so 2 more weeks until my due date). I'm not quite sure WHY people want to see this, but I'm giving the crowd what they want, so enjoy! :-P

The Fanco Family Christmas Tree

This weekend, we decided to brave the snow and 21 degree weather to go to the Red Flannel Tree Farm in Cedar Springs to get our Christmas tree. This has become a tradition with the kids- they enjoy the hayride out into the fields, choosing the perfect tree, "helping" Daddy cut it down, and then the ride back up to the barn (and the hot chocolate and cookies waiting for them there). It was FREEZING cold, but we had fun :-)
Ready for the hayride out to the fields to pick the perfect tree.

Anna, just thrilled to be out in the snow.


Wandering around, looking for just the right one.....


Jeff cutting down the chosen tree. We have 15 foot ceilings in our living room, so the past few years we've gotten a tree around 14 feet tall- it's a lot of fun to get such a big tree home :-P




Walking back to the path (the tree is behind them) so the haywagon can pick us up. We went after nap time, so it was pretty dark by the time we cut the tree down and got back to the barn. I'll post more pictures later once we have it up and decorated!

More Finished Projects

OK, so one of the projects we've been meaning to do since we bought this house 3 years ago was to replace the carpet in the upstairs. It was really stained and nasty looking, and a professional cleaning did NOTHING to make it look better. However, it hasn't been in the budget to fix, so we dealt with it.

Well, a few months back Jeff's parents recarpeted their house, and the carpet which they tore up from their sitting room and library, though used, looked a MILLION times better than what we currently had in the room. Sooooo, they gave it to us when we asked for it :-). This week, we had a professional come in and lay down new pad and the carpet from Rick & Judi's house. The rooms look so much better now, and all we had to do was pay for the labor and the new pad (MUCH more within our expendible budget right now). Below are a few pictures from the process :-).

The sub-floor in the entryway to Teddy's room- after Jeff and I moved the furniture out and pulled up the old carpet and pad.

The subfloor in our room- also after we pulled up the carpet and pad (and pulled all of those pesky staples out of the floor- we saved a lot on labor though by removing the old carpet ourselves).



Yay! New carpet :-) It's nice and soft and squishy!

Jeff and Teddy assembling our new bed frame. This was my early Christmas present from Jeff. We've never had a NEW bed frame. We slept on an air mattress on the floor for the first 5 months after we got married, then bought a wooden frame at a yardsale which broke pretty quickly (my husband FLOPS into bed when he's tired, he doesn't crawl in nicely). So, for the past year our bedframe was being held up by car jacks. Jeff took me to IKEA and had me pick out a new bedframe as my Christmas present. It felt like a whole new room to us, between the new carpet and the new bed (and we rearranged the furniture too).

Indoor Snowman

Teddy has officially gotten fed-up with waiting for a real snow to fall, so he decked himself out in his boots, hat, and gloves and set to work building a "snowman" in the house out of balls. He never was quite able to balance a third ball on top for the head, but he had fun trying :-) 

Potty Training

Antoinette is very proud to display her princess "big girl undies". It's wierd with the house becoming diaper free (if only for a few weeks at least!). Teddy has been accident free for over a month now, and I would put Anna at about 90% trained (still working on occasional peeing accidents and every now and then not being dry at night). I think it's actually a HUGE blessing, since I am getting to the point that crawling on the ground to change Anna's diaper is getting a bit impossible for me! :-) 

Cutie-Poohs!

Some of you (relatives mostly) will be getting wallets of these pictures with your family newsletter/ card which I will get out sometime after the baby's born, but I wanted to post them so everyone else could see the super-cute kiddos :-)


Margaret is a 4th grader this year- I feel so old! She loves her new haircut, which is super-easy for her to take care of.


Jeff said Teddy needs his hand in his shirt in this picture and he'd look like Napoleon. For whatever reason, Teddy and Anna pose best for pictures when they're allowed to put their hands in their pockets. I think it's cute though :-)



Does it GET any more adorable than this?!


OK, OK, so I had to post 2 pictures of my camera-loving youngest daughter!

Sisters :-)


I didn't order any of this picture, since Teddy looks concerned and I'm not quite sure what that expression on Anna's face is... but this is the only picture we got the 3 of them to sit still for, so I wanted to post it. People always tell me how dark-skinned my children are, but I didn't really see it until I saw this picture (Anna especially- the girl looks like she's gone tanning in this picture!!). Anyway, thanks for letting me indulge in a proud-mommy moment :-)