Thursday, August 21, 2014
Friday, August 15, 2014
Happy Birthday Sweet Leah Anne!
Baby Leah (top) had a head full of dark hair and such a cute little chin. Big girl Leah loves to see those same things in her newest little sister (bottom), who shares her birth month!
Leah is SIX. She continues to be a sweet, sensitive girl who loves to nurture and mother younger kids, especially her little sisters. She loves to be a helper and I'll often find her sweeping the floor or wiping the table without being asked.
She just learned how to ride a bike and is slowly but surely learning to swim! She describes herself as an "inside girl", who prefers the comforts of home to having adventures outdoors. She loves to read, color, draw pictures, and especially play board games.
Leah has many adventures ahead of her in first grade and we can't wait to see how she grows this coming year. We love you, Leah Anne!
Tuesday, August 12, 2014
Friday, August 8, 2014
Hospital Visitors
We were moved to a corner/end of the hallway recovery room that was huge-- and a good thing, too, because on the afternoon of Evie's birthday, she had four really important visitors to host:
And both sets of Grandparents!
Fluffy hair after her bath:
Posing nicely for some pictures while we waited for discharge papers the next afternoon:
Time to head home:
Her Birth Story
On Thursday July 31 I came home from my afternoon OB appointment and started having contractions every 5-8 minutes. So Steve and I decided to go walk around the mall for an hour to see if we could get things moving a little faster. The girls were spending the week with their Mom Mom and Poppy, so we were free to go have a free date walking around and around and around the mall.
They were coming regularly and were decently strong, but no exaggeration-- as soon as I walked out the door into the parking lot, they stopped and I didn't get ONE lousy contraction for the rest of the evening.
I went to bed sad, but not surprised that we'd had another false alarm. Or was it? At about 3:45 am I woke to really sharp contractions every 5 minutes. I timed them in bed for an hour, and woke Steve up at 5 am to tell him I was pretty sure I was in labor.
It was my due date, too, imagine that. Things were happening right on schedule for the second pregnancy in a row.
We called my doctor's office and had to wait on the OB on call to call us back. After a quick breakfast I decided not to wait around at home for the return call; the contractions were coming closer together and I had to stop and breathe through them. I also had Group B Strep, so that meant some antibiotics before delivery. We drove [across the street] to the hospital and got a call back from the OB while Steve was parking in the parking garage. We agreed with her that I should come in :)
The nurses let me skip triage (hallelujah!) and get to a room right away before all the monitors and IVs went in. I was at 5 cm and it was 6:20 by the time I was settled with the antibiotic dripping. News on the Labor and Delivery hall was that some girl in room 307 was in labor and didn't know if she was having girl #5 or boy #1-- the excitement was mounting.
To make a short story even shorter, things progressed quickly (I'm blessed that way) and Steve was soon making a hasty exit so that I could get my epidural without him having to witness it. Then the waiting came. I was close to 10 cm but they wanted me to wait until they could begin my second round of antibiotics started at 10:20. That way the baby would, technically, not have to be observed after birth. Thanks to the epidural, waiting an hour and a half to push wasn't horrible-- just kind of boring. I was paralyzed and had to lay flat on my back.
Everyone anticipated that it wouldn't take long for the baby to be born once we had reached the magic hour-- so when the doctor walked in at 10:19 as the nurse hooked up my next dose of medicine, she calmly suited up and gave me the go-ahead to do my thing. The baby was born at 10:28 so I think it took about 3 minutes to meet her once I started pushing. Did I mention that I am blessed?!
And of course, as expected, Steve announced "It's a girl!" and there was much rejoicing. I even got to cut the cord, which was a first for me. Evelyn has lots of dark hair like Leah did, and we enjoyed having a baby during the morning hours (another first for me!) so that we had all day to look at her and get to know her!
They were coming regularly and were decently strong, but no exaggeration-- as soon as I walked out the door into the parking lot, they stopped and I didn't get ONE lousy contraction for the rest of the evening.
I went to bed sad, but not surprised that we'd had another false alarm. Or was it? At about 3:45 am I woke to really sharp contractions every 5 minutes. I timed them in bed for an hour, and woke Steve up at 5 am to tell him I was pretty sure I was in labor.
It was my due date, too, imagine that. Things were happening right on schedule for the second pregnancy in a row.
We called my doctor's office and had to wait on the OB on call to call us back. After a quick breakfast I decided not to wait around at home for the return call; the contractions were coming closer together and I had to stop and breathe through them. I also had Group B Strep, so that meant some antibiotics before delivery. We drove [across the street] to the hospital and got a call back from the OB while Steve was parking in the parking garage. We agreed with her that I should come in :)
The nurses let me skip triage (hallelujah!) and get to a room right away before all the monitors and IVs went in. I was at 5 cm and it was 6:20 by the time I was settled with the antibiotic dripping. News on the Labor and Delivery hall was that some girl in room 307 was in labor and didn't know if she was having girl #5 or boy #1-- the excitement was mounting.
To make a short story even shorter, things progressed quickly (I'm blessed that way) and Steve was soon making a hasty exit so that I could get my epidural without him having to witness it. Then the waiting came. I was close to 10 cm but they wanted me to wait until they could begin my second round of antibiotics started at 10:20. That way the baby would, technically, not have to be observed after birth. Thanks to the epidural, waiting an hour and a half to push wasn't horrible-- just kind of boring. I was paralyzed and had to lay flat on my back.
Let's get this baby out, already!
Everyone anticipated that it wouldn't take long for the baby to be born once we had reached the magic hour-- so when the doctor walked in at 10:19 as the nurse hooked up my next dose of medicine, she calmly suited up and gave me the go-ahead to do my thing. The baby was born at 10:28 so I think it took about 3 minutes to meet her once I started pushing. Did I mention that I am blessed?!
And of course, as expected, Steve announced "It's a girl!" and there was much rejoicing. I even got to cut the cord, which was a first for me. Evelyn has lots of dark hair like Leah did, and we enjoyed having a baby during the morning hours (another first for me!) so that we had all day to look at her and get to know her!
Monday, August 4, 2014
Wednesday, July 30, 2014
Ten Years Ago, He Popped the Question
Today marks the ten year anniversary of our engagement. Look at these happy kids back on July 30, 2004 ~
In case anyone could forget the scale of Steve's proposal, I found this picture in a photo album this morning. I walked into my parents' house after spending a week camping at Keen Lake (looking stunning in a pair of old lacrosse shorts, a tee shirt, and my hair up in a pony tail) to find the house completely full of flower arrangements and notes, and a bedroom filled with daisies and a note to find Steve at a local park. When I arrived (thankfully in one piece, I may have run a red light or two) I absentmindedly left the car running on the side of the road and walked over to meet him. Neither of us really remember his exact words, but it ended with a big "YES!"
Happy, happy memories. Today we'd tell those excited kids, aged 20 and 22, that-- even with some future hard and sad mixed in with the fun and happy-- it all gets even better as the years go by.
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