Two Sweet Girls

Our family friends youngest daughter is 8 and she is absolutely one of the sweetest things in the world! I was in college when Avery was born and I was pretty smitten! She was one of sweetest most content babies. I have LOVED getting to watch her grow into the sweet girl she is today! We have gone on family vacations to Florida, lake trips, Taylor Swift concert, she was in our wedding, long summer days swimming, pedicures......just to name a few of the things we've shared. She was so excited when we told her we were having a baby and even more excited when we found out it was a little girl. At Christmas this year she would watch my belly for as long as it took for Ellie to move. She told me things like when I got to big she would help me paint my toenails :). Last Saturday she came over and spent the day with us while her family was at her brother's track meet. She LOVED spending the day with Ellie and we LOVED having her she was such a big helper. She is the youngest of three with her siblings being 19 and 13....so being around a baby was new for her but you would have though she had 2 younger siblings! I can't wait for Ellie to grow up and have Avery in her life!

Funny Faces

Playing with Carson

Sweet girl

Taylor Swift!

4th Birthday

Opening Taylor Swift Tickets

Holding Ellie for the first time

Last Saturday...I LOVE this picture

Steven and I are both so thankful for so many sweet friends in our lives but we are extremely thankful for Avery and her family!

Newborn Pictures

I thought I would share the link to Ellie's newborn pictures should anyone want to take a peak. We are in big trouble.....I want them all :)

www.sweetberryphotography.com

go to client proofing
password egf10

Things I never thought I would think about.....

I came across this on preemie message board. It is so true how these things now apply to our life. We are so thankful and blessed by this sweet little girl. We knew our life would change but it has now changed in ways we never imagined! Having a baby prematurely has definitely shed some light on things and made us take everything from a different perspective.

The post was titled understanding preemie parents. I am so thankful our NICU stay was as 'short' as it was as I know it could have taken a much different path. I feel so blessed to be at home now where the highlights of my day are playing with my daughter, giving her a 'real' bath, playing dress up, feeding on our own schedule, etc versus the NICU where the highlights of our days were changing diapers that were finally poopy, learning that the diaper weighed enough so they could stop measuring them, only holding her for 20 minutes at a time and being forced to put her back to bed even though she was wide awake, etc.

Here is the article....

so, we may go a little nuts

about having a preemie...
losing our full term pregnancy and...
losing our "ideal delivery"...spending too many hours in the nicu...
not spending enough hours in the nicu...
leaving the hospital without our babies...
holding our babies for the first time...
all the acronyms you can imagine, and some you can't: C/S, IVH, PDA, NEC, ROP...
the privilege of changing diapers...
caring for our baby...
about germs in general...
the wonderment of a baby nipple feeding...
pumping all the time...
our babies' isolette linens matching...finding preemie clothes that make us feel like we have "real" babies...
having a baby shower- at all...
finding the perfect carseatstrollercribrockingchairnursingpillowfillintheblank...
taking our babies home...
not having a monitor to tell if they're ok...
not hearing beeping for the first time in months as we watch them sleep...hand sanitizer...
your "allergy cough"...
your runny nose...
about germs in general...
cigarette smoke...
anyone under 5 feet tall being within 5 feet...
strangers wanting to touch our sweet babies...
about germs in general...our babies gaining weight...
our babies' matching clothes...taking pictures...
the march of dimes...termie moms complaining...
doctors' appointments...
insurance bills...
showing the nicu we appreciate them...
reading everything we can...
message boards and blogs...
experiencing parenthood...
trying to connect with other people in our situation...
adjusted age...
developmental issues...
about germs in general...
future pregnancies...
future everything...

about cherishing every single moment.
and all of this is completely normal.
for friends and family, please just give preemie parents a crazypass. we deal with many things that termie parents can't imagine. we carry worry, guilt, doubt, fear and a sense of being overwhelmed with us almost every hour of every day.

1 month old

Pictures to come!

I can't believe our sweet little angel is one month old today!!! It seems like just yesterday I got the phone call from the doctor saying she needed to come today!

We had a check-up with the peditrician today and all is well. She weighed in a 6lbs 8oz. She was 20 1/2 inches long. When we were discharged from the hospital just over a week ago she was 19 1/2 inches long. Such a long skinny girl!!

We will go back to the peditrician for the standard 2 month well baby visit where she will receive her immunizations. We discussed development milestones and he said not to worry if she seems a little behind on somethings due to her prematurity. He said that typically the delays average out by the time they are 2 years old and it is absolutely nothing to be concerned about. She passed her first hearing screening with flying colors but it is standard for NICU babies to have their hearing re-checked at 6 months and 1 year so we will get that scheduled as well.

He is also checking with our insurance on the RSV vaccination. She isn't technically in a 'high-risk' category but at the same time she is. Insurance will automatically cover for babies born at 35 weeks who are under 3 months of age. However, by the time RSV season rolls around she will be 9 months of age. He doesn't feel that they are absolutely necessary but he feels that they can't hurt so it's worth a shot to see if insurance will cover them. If insurance doesn't cover them they come with a hefty price tag of $1600/month and babies need them for the entire RSV season which last for 6 or 7 months depending where you live!!!!

Right now we are working on getting our days and nights straight. It can be frustrating but he encouraged us to remember that most of the things done in the NICU were done overnight. Her bath was typically at 9 pm or 12 am and all of her bloodwork was done at 3 am. So during all of those times in the NICU she was woken up and kept awake for some period of time. He says that over the next couple of weeks things should start to even out!

So overall we had a great appointment. I can't stress how much we love our peditrician and how happy we are with our decision to use him!

Home!

We are all home and adjusting well....even our sweet Carson is home! Surprisingly he really isn't too interested in little miss he just leaves her alone and has been minding very well. It's pretty funny every time I put her down during the day he gets in his kennel and waits for me to shut the door. Someone must've told him to nap when the baby naps too! Steven went back to work today which was definitely strange after him being off for such a long time! My mom has taken the week off to spend time with us. We are SO thankful for lots of vacation time and both having a flexible boss!

Ellie is doing well she went to the pediatrician last Friday and weighed in at 6lbs 2oz. When she was discharged from the hospital on Tuesday she weighed 5lbs 14oz so a nice little gain. The pediatrician felt like everything checked out just great. When we were discharged the neonatologist had Ellie on 2 feedings of high calorie formula (Neosure). She would eat it but you could tell she wasn't too much of a fan! We talked to our pediatrician and since she was eating larger portions of breast milk and much smaller portions of the Neosure he felt that she wasn't really getting too much of a benefit from it so we got permission to stop! THANKFULLY....it was high in Iron and was not the best smelling stuff and you can only imagine what it did to her little tummy! We will have one more check this coming up Friday and then she won't go back until her 2 month check up! I also can't recommend our pediatrician highly enough as I know a few of you are expecting feel free to email me for his information!

We have lots of pictures to share but these are just a few that the sweet Melissa Wood took for at the hospital! Melissa LOVES newborn photography and sweet hospital sessions! She had offered to be there for Ellie's birth. Well seeing as how things happened so fast that just wasn't possible!!! So we waited until she was off all the 'equipment' in NICU and got their permission for Melissa to come up! However, by the time all of it was squared away and scheduled Ellie was released to room in with us!!!!! Here are just a few sneak peek pictures we can't wait to see the rest...THANK YOU Melissa for capturing these sweet moments! Melissa also took my maternity photos....I would share but I don't think anyone is interested in my bare belly

Of course we have ton more pictures to share but we will save those for another posts!! Speaking of pictures if anyone needs family photos, senior photos, anything I can't recommend these three people highly enough!!!

Our sweet friend Dia did our engagement pictures, my bridal portraits and our wedding!!! Maybe I should post some finally! She is adopting a sweet little girl set to arrive May 24th! I can't wait for sweet Ellie and Makenna to grow up together....book now before she gets busy. You can contact her through her blog and she will send you samples of her work:).

As I've said Melissa did my maternity and hospital photos. We took maternity pictures at Kaisers Ice Cream downtown and they were so much fun!!

We had newborn pictures taken by Trish at Sweetberry Photography! She is amazing to work with as well! We also have scheduled a watch me grow package with Trish which you can read more about on her website! We can't wait to take them!

Yes I know I think we will have plenty of pictures :) But I wanted to put the information out there for anyone who might be looking for a photographer for something!

The Shortest Post Ever

WE ARE GOING HOME TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!