3 Month pictures

Now that Adalyn is 19 weeks old, I thought it would be appropriate to finally post her 3 month pictures from our photoshoot with Jes.  I've had the pictures for a while and keep forgetting to post them! OOPS!  Jes wrote a blog on her website and added a few pictures also.

It's so hard to choose which ones to post.  They are all so sweet...

 We attempted to do the same pose that we used in her baby announcements but she would have nothing to do with laying on her tummy.  I can't believe how much longer she is in this pictures than her newborn one!

A Year Ago Today...

Today is a momentous day.  I will always remember March 24th for the miracle that God worked.  If you have been reading my blog or know me, then you know what I'm referring to.  Last year I went into my OB's office for a routine ultrasound for a D&C.  This day one year ago was the day that I heard my baby's heartbeat for the first time.  It was the most amazing sound I had ever heard. Even now, thinking about it makes me cry.  It's amazing to think that I am now listening to her giggle and "talk".  It was an absolute miracle.  I'm so thankful to God for sparing my sweet baby.  And I'm also thankful that God gave Jonathan the wisdom to have us wait a week to do the D&C and not go ahead and have it the week before (as my Dr. had suggested so that I could get over the miscarriage and start another round of fertility drugs as soon as possible).

March 24, 2010 I wrote this post :

I don't even know where to start! Today Jonathan and I had a routine ultrasound before the D&C on Friday. We had come to terms with the miscarriage and weren't expecting anything other than to hear the details for the "procedure" on Friday. Well, the ultrasound tech asked if I was bleeding or cramping and I said no that the only thing that had been wrong with me was some serious nausea. She said that was a good sign and I thought that was weird... a good sign for what? We already know there is no baby and that the nausea was from the high levels of hormones from the drugs I was on. The Doctor told me last week to let others know about the miscarriage because there was less than a 1% chance they would find something this week. She wanted us to have a support system in our grieving.

WELL... The ultrasound tech (who was playing K-Love and I found out goes to my church!) said that she could see the heart beating!!! WHA??? HEART? THERE'S A BABY?? Oh my goodness! We couldn't believe it, but we were watching it with our own eyes! We could see the baby and see the little heart pounding and hear the heartbeat. God is good, isn't he? She said that "things sometimes can't be explained." My Doctor came in and was flabbergasted. She didn't seem to know what to say at all. She apologized for telling us to tell people and for not being optimistic last week. But we assured her that we saw the empty sac too. So they are changing my due date to November 9th (which ironically was the day that baby Eli was due). They said that the baby is measuring 7 weeks and 1 day, where last week from their count of my cycle I was 7 weeks. They said this could be why there was no heartbeat last week because it was too early. But it still does not explain why there was no baby last week! Nothing that the Dr., tech, or we could see at all! We should have seen a blob of something like the first ultrasound I had.

God is awesome! He has absolutely answered prayers in miraculous ways! We of course would have announced our pregnancy a little further on (after 12 weeks) in a more fun way, but we will take this! So here it is.... WE ARE HAVING A BABY!!! I am trying to be cautious until after the 12 week mark just because I know what a heart-break it is to "lose" a baby even if it was only for a week.


Thank you again for all your kind words of encouragement and prayers. We love you all and are so excited for you all to walk down this new road with us!

Wow.  What can I say? It's so awesome to be in the "future" and look back to what I was feeling and the emotions that were running through my body.  I never want to take my sweet baby girl for granted.  She is an absolute miracle.

This is part of my story and I need to remember that God allowed this story to be mine for a reason.  I don't ever want to forget the grace and power of God.  I grew up in a Christian home, went to a Christian school, left home to go to a Christian college.  I didn't have much of a "story".  My life was pretty easy...nothing bad had ever really happened to me to cause me to completely rely on God.  I think sometimes through the roughest patches and the deepest heartache is when God is able to reveal Himself because we have to solely rely on Him to get us through.  Jonathan and I have had a lot of trusting in God time in our marriage (not with our marriage) and this was one of those times.  Every baby is a miracle from God, but Adalyn is a special miracle and I will never forget God's faithfulness to us.

Giggles

Some pictures

Here are some pictures from the past week (Adalyn is 19 weeks old today!):

Playing with Daddy and Sophie!

She's all about her jungle gym.  She has so much fun playing with the animals.

Stylin' on Saturday.  Oops mommy took a picture without my UK flower headband on! Good thing UK won anyway:)

First Taste of Oatmeal

Saturday Adalyn tried oatmeal for the first time.  I'm not sure how much actually got swallowed.  She wasn't quite sure of it.  But she made some adorable faces.  We got a video of it but it's long and I think only the grandparents would appreciate it.  Here are a couple pictures:

Such a big girl! Doesn't it look like we are deep in a discussion?

We tried more oatmeal on Sunday and here is a short video (please excuse my crazy voice) and "after" picture: 

Sunday Pictures

My two favorite people before church. Both in argyle.

Like father, like daughter. Isn't that how it goes?

This dress came with a matching argyle hat and it is so big on her that it covers her eyes! Good thing she likes bows! :)

A visit from papa and grandma!

My dad had spring break this past week so he and my mom decided to come visit us.  They babysat Adalyn on Thursday while we were at work.  It was really hard to talk them into it, but they finally gave in:)  Then on Friday I took the day off to spend with them.  My mom and I did a few things around the house and ran a few errands that I just hadn't gotten around to. We always have such a good time together!

Saturday was the Shamrock Shuffle and my parents witnessed a race first hand.  I think they were shocked by the sheer number of people in green running.  After we left the race we decided that we all needed some breakfast so Jonathan stopped at Spaulding Bakery. If you are from Lexington I need not say more.  Spaulding donuts are legendary. They usually have a line out the door and down the street but when we got there it wasn't yet out the door! Yay us! (I'm pretty sure the donut defeated the whole running thing but I couldn't NOT have one!)

Sunday we all went to church and then out for some Fazoli's and then we introduced my parents to the gloriousness that is Orange Leaf! Yum Yum! For those who don't know, it's a self serve frozen yogurt (froyo) place and it is quite amazing.  The owners go to our church and always have Christian music playing and I'm telling you it IS the place to be.  We waited for the place to open at 1:00 and let's just say we weren't even the first ones in the door and by the time we were paying, the place was full! On a Sunday afternoon!  There are somewhere around 16 flavors to choose from along with yummy toppings and I think mom and dad fully enjoyed it!

Then grandma and papa got to babysit while we went to a bracket party for Jonathan's work.  I don't really think they minded to have more one on one two on one time with Adalyn!

Here are some pictures from after church: (And yes, I'm aware that the bow is bigger than her head. I saw it in the store on Friday and thought she needed it to match this outfit. So over-the-top! I think she has some room to grow into it. Don't you?)

We had a great time and were sad to see them leave.  We so wished that they lived closer to us!

We love you guys!! :) Adalyn already misses you:)

Shamrock Shuffle 2011

Saturday I "ran" (I use that term extremely loosely since it was way more of a jog) in my first race since my first trimester! Billie and I have run it for 4 years now and I decided it would be a great way for me to get back into running.  (I'm very addicted to running races because of my competitive nature!)  Billie ended up not being able to run with me, but my old coworker and friend Nevada drove back into town to run it and contacted me to see if I was running it.  It was so great to see her!  I finished the race. It was only a 3K, but I have to start somewhere!  I have decided that until I get new running shoes I will not be running again.  Last weekend I had my feet measured at the running shop and yes, they grew an entire size! (I'm still holding out hope for them to shrink.) So needless to say my feet were on FIRE after running in shoes a size too small. (The running store didn't have my style of shoes in the correct size so I couldn't buy them.)

Here are some pictures.  I pretty much look awful since I'm not at my ideal size and I have no makeup on, but I am posting them anyway because this is my scrap book and I want to be able to look back in a few months to see how far I've come. (How do you like that inspirational thinking?)

I've got my number on and ready to go!

My best cheerleader (althought my mom was there and she is a good cheerleader too:)! {This is probably the only time on my blog that you will see my husband without his hair done!} :)

Adalyn was really excited to come to her first race! Can you tell?

Nevada! When she first started running this race 2 years ago she had just had a baby. Crazy that her 2 year old was at the race cheering for her and now I have the baby!

In action - finish line in sight!

Last year at this time...

I've been doing a lot of "One year ago today..." thinking lately.  It's just amazing to me to think about how much has changed in one year and my thoughts and emotions from last year compared to this year.

The last week of January we have a big project every year at work and my department (2 other people) and I spend a few full days in a big conference room working on this project.  Well I remember so clearly that last year during that week I was so upset because I once again found out that we weren't pregnant.  I had put a call into my doctor.  While we were in the room working, my phone rang and I hurried out trying to find a private place to talk to the nurse. I told her that I needed to come see the doctor so that we could make a plan because I just couldn't keep going with this infertility stuff month to month.  She told me that my doctor wanted me to stick to what I was using for just one more month and after that they would send me to a fertility specialist.  Just one more month was all it took!  Sitting in that room this year working on our project really made me think about how God's plan is bigger than ours.  This year instead of sitting in that room near tears and losing hope, I was sitting in that room having given birth to a precious baby who I love more than I could have ever imagined! Just one year ago...

Last year on Valentine's Day Jonathan made a special day of it and took me out to lunch at a bookstore cafe and then out to a romantic dinner.  This year on Valentine's day I was looking back to the pictures I took last year on my phone.  I so remember the pain that I had deep down.  Will I ever be a mom? Why is this so hard for us? (Those pictures also reminded me how skinny I was a year ago before baby weight took over my body! {although I would have never called myself skinny...now I know that I was compared to what I am now!})  I remember having a wonderful date and a wonderful day spent with the love of my life but I remember the hurt.  This year on Valentine's day, Jonathan still made the day special and we went on a date the weekend before (when we had childcare) and then had a fun non-romantic Valentine's day. 

Last year when I ran the Shamrock Shuffle (post from this year's race to come) I was having serious morning sickness but we hadn't told our friends yet that we were pregnant so I was hiding my prego-pops that I was sucking on after the race.  This year Jonathan stood at the finish line with a precious baby girl in a stroller.

I looked back in my post archive and found this post that I wrote March 12, 2010 (and although I hadn't posted yet, during this CRAZY time, I had just found out I was pregnant prior to leaving for our trip that I mentioned!):

My CRAZY week!

Hello world! It's been many a day since I have even logged into Blogger! If you know me well, you know that there is something wrong with that! Even if I don't write a blog every day, I always read the blogs in my dashboard...that is, until this week. I feel like I've been through an emotional and physical rollercoaster ride in the middle of a tornado. Like the visual?

If you all remember in my last post we were in Texas for "vacation" and found out that our house had sold with being on the market for less than 3 weeks. We were floored and then scared! We expected a few months to get ready for this type of change. As soon as the wheels of the plane hit the tarmac we were off on a crazy whirlwind of an adventure to find a house in order to not end up homeless! (Of course our wonderful friends offered up for us to stay with them, but it's always better to only have to move once!) We searched everything we could find online and came up with some houses we wanted to walk through. We ended up walking through houses Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights until 9:30 to 10:00. Needless to say we were so exhausted each night mentally that we went straight to bed when we got home!

Do you know how sometimes God asks you to trust him and you feel like you're being stretched beyond? But you know there is a reason and that God has a plan? Well I kind of felt like that. (I feel like I've felt like that a lot in this past year...) We just couldn't find the right house for us in the end of town that we wanted to live. And I was getting a bit emotional about it. I usually like to think I have a level head in most circumstances, but this was just too much!

After many prayers we put an offer in on a house and after a couple negotiations back and forth, they eventually accepted our offer! YAY!!! We found out last night and it was such an amazing feeling. We offered what we had agreed would be the most we would spend, which was quite a bit lower than their asking price, so we thought they would give us an immediate NO WAY(!!), but after 3 or so hours we got a call that they had accepted! God is so good! This house is perfect for us and I'm thrilled! The owners go to our church and so do the next door neighbors, although since it's such a large church, I don't know either couple. Everyone here at work that knows them, says that they are both wonderful couples! I'm so excited to have nice neighbors!! :) That makes a big difference in a neighborhood!

I know I reminisce a lot on here, but I can't help but look back on last year at this time, when Jonathan was working at a temp job, I hated my job and we were scraping by. There would have been no way that we would have believed that we would be moving to a beautiful new house (with a basement! for some reason most houses here don't have basements) in just a year! God has been so good to us. I feel like we've been through some serious growth in this past week learning to trust. Isn't it funny that learning to trust is such an on-going thing?

I'm sure life will be crazy over these next 3 weeks due to packing and moving, but hopefully I can get some time to relax and catch up on my blog reading! I feel so "out of the loop" not knowing what all my blog friends are up to! :)

{photo courtesy of Jes Meeker Photo}

This is why I love blogging.  Last year I looked back on 2009 and this year I'm looking back at what I wrote in 2010.  I love that I can easily be reminded where I was and see where God has brought us.

4 Months

Adalyn turned 4 months old on the 9th! She is getting so big! We have so much fun interacting with her.  She is constantly carrying on conversations and the more fingers she can fit in her mouth, the better.  She giggles at us all the time and it is just music to my heart. I just adore her.  She has still not rolled over yet but she is oh so close! When she plays under her jungle gym she turns up on her side to get to the butterfly.  She also likes to sit in her bumbo to play with her toys and watch her doggie:)

This past weekend my mom helped me switch over all of Adalyn's clothes.  She is now officially in 3-6 month clothes. (Except for her white onesies she is still 0-3.)  She is still in size 1 diaper.

Adalyn had her 4 month doctor's appointment on Thursday and Grandma Nan even got to go with us!  Adalyn did great for her shots.  She had stopped crying by the time I picked her back up. And was even smiling at Grandma before the nurse left the room. Such a sweet baby!!  We were told that we can start solid foods!  We haven't yet, but we will soon:)  Here are her stats:
Weight: 12 lbs 13.5oz - 25th percentile
Length: 25.5 in - 90th percentile
Head: 15 1/8in - <5th percentile

Lots of laughs!

She's all about holding onto her hands

Those flailing arms are constant

So much drool

Kiss those cheeks!

I cannot believe it's been 4 months.  I can't imagine my life without this precious bundle.  Just remembering last year at this time when I was just finding out that I was pregnant is crazy! I love her with every ounce of me!! We are so very blessed.

16 Week Pictures

Adalyn turned 16 weeks on Tuesday.  This is the last week of pictures!  Our onesie stickers went from weeks 1-16.  So after this week we'll only be taking monthly pictures. Adalyn is still wearing size 0-3 clothes but mommy needs to give it up and switch over to 3-6 month clothes because the 0-3 are getting ridiculously small.  (She wore her first 3-6 outfit to the hospital to meet Avery on the day she turned 16 weeks old!) We are headed to some consignment sales this weekend and hoping to find some cute clothes!  She is still in size 1 diapers.  She has lost a bit of interest in nursing and I'm hoping it's just a phase because I'm not ready to stop that yet.  Lately she is really starting to explore and reaches for our mouths and noses.  She still mimics us and tries to move her mouth the way we do. Love it.

Here are some pictures:

 I couldn't help but look back on the week 1 pictures...

 Happy girl!

 This picture makes me laugh.  She was very aware of her feet and legs and kept rubbing the bottoms of her feet on the sheet and then she just lifted her leg into the air and was staring at it. It's so cool to watch her discover.

 Pretty much every.single.picture she had her hands in her mouth.  This one she is smiling through the fingers:)

We are so blessed.

Welcome Baby Avery

Tuesday Tim and Lindsy welcomed baby Avery Cate to the world! She was born at 12:00 and it sounds like it was a really fast labor! As Tim said, Lindsy was a champ!  We are so excited for them.  Kennedy now has a sweet little sister! Avery is such a little peanut! She weighs 6lbs 5oz which is quite a lot smaller than Adalyn was when she was born so she just seemed extra tiny! We went up to the hospital to visit them and meet Avery and we ran into Billie, Derek and Eli while we were visiting them.  So we got a few pictures:

 Look at all of that dark hair!

 She was so alert and kept looking at me and playing with her mouth and tongue. So sweet.  Newborn skin is just so sweet:)

 Eli loves to give hugs and when he saw Adalyn he ran over to her to give her hugs.  Of course we couldn't get it on camera.  This was the closest that we get.  At one point he went right for her face.  Yep, he's smitten:) hehe! So sweet.

 Adalyn looks like such a big girl! This was the first of many pictures of these girls together.  How sweet! How funny is it that Adalyn look bald with her blonde hair and then Avery has a full head of dark hair! :)

16 Weeks... Already?!?

Today Adalyn is 16 weeks. Not to be confused with 4 months which won't be until next Wednesday. We will be taking her 16 week pictures tonight and I will post them later in the week.  I just couldn't get through today without posting that my child is seriously already 16 weeks.  Now I'm going to go hide under my desk and cry because life is not fair and I don't want to wake up tomorrow and have her moving away to college only for her to stay 5 hours away from home and never move back to me. (Sorry mom. Now I really do understand!!)

And because we must have a picture of my child in every post:) here is a picture from before church on Sunday.  Adalyn has really gotten into pulling on my necklaces. Can you tell?

In other news... Lindsy is in the hospital having the baby right now...as I type!!! And I'm so super excited for them! I want to call every 5 minutes to get a play by play but I also don't want to bug them.  So I'm just waiting by my phone hoping for an update!!!  Soon we will know if Adalyn's new BFF will be a girl or a boy! I'm thinking girl:)  And they will be exactly 16 weeks apart. How fun will that be growing up??  I can't wait to hold a newborn again.  I know Adalyn will instantly feel like a big girl compared to the new baby!  OK, going back under my desk for some dry-heaving.  I can't handle this whole growing up thing.