Catch Up...

Well, once again, it has been over 2 months since my last post. Life has been continuing to keep us busy, as is expected with a 3 and 1 year old.

Avery is now 3 and almost 3 months. She has always been our agreeable girl - we never experienced the "terrible two's", but during the last couple of months, she has definitely entered the "testing threes."  She has decided that she has opinions and preferences and when they are not met, as she sees fit, she is not afraid to express her disappointment. It usually shows up in the form of crying and whining, and occasionally collapsing in a pitiful heap on the floor. It's all very dramatic, but that's not surprising, as she has always had a dramatic "flair."

However, she continues to be our happy (for the most part), overall wants to please Mommy and Daddy, and mostly sweet older sister.  She continues to go to dance class once a week, and is getting better at not being easily distracted by her classmates. I'm crossing my fingers that she actually participates at this spring's recital.

She loves to play with her baby dolls most of the time, busily putting them to bed and feeding them, and asking Mommy to help her wrap them up or put them to bed. And occasionally, she prefers to be called "Mommy," instead of "Avery."  She is getting good at praying at meals and at bedtime, making sure to bless her friends and family and praying for gentleness towards Evelyn.

Evelyn is almost 16 months. At her 15 month appointment, she was 20 pounds, 1 ounce and 32 inches tall. Although skinny like her sister, she is not such a peanut anymore, as she has shot up the charts in height! She's even taller than Avery was at her age. She got 3 shots at her appointment and cried for about 5 seconds and then was totally over it. She's a tough cookie.

She loves playing with whatever her older sister is playing with, which drives Avery nuts. She is also in a stage of being incredibly rough. Mostly with friends that are her size or smaller (including small babies). We are working on getting her to understand her own strength, as even when she is hugging, she is squeezing as hard as she can. Anyone who knows Evelyn can attest that she is freakishly strong. She has also started hitting, although I think she thinks she is patting. It's just plain smacking.  I'm worried that soon she won't have any friends!

She likes to pray, finishing with an emphatic "Amen!"  She is obsessed with books and if given the chance, she'll grab one and back herself up onto a willing lap, exclaiming, "Buh!" It's hard to say no to that! She is still a little dare-devil, constantly finding things to use as stools so she can reach things she's not supposed to and climbing things like bookshelves and the back of the couches. She is steady on her feet, though, so she rarely gets hurt. When she does get hurt, she rarely cries about it. She likes to count to "free."  A month ago, she said nothing but "no," but now, she loves to respond to questions with a sweet little, "Yeah" and a nod of her head.  She is going through the normal separation anxiety that is typical at this age, which drives me crazy, as I can't be out of her sight without her screaming. She has pulled the long fence out of the concrete basement wall for the second time.

We have moved both girls' bedtimes to 8:00, as this way, they sleep until about 7:00 am, which is much more doable for Stephen and I. Before 7:00, we are just zombies and grumpy. With them getting up a little later than 6:00, I can actually get up before them and shower and eat breakfast and the day starts much more functional. I have learned that kids' schedules are constantly changing and needing to be adjusted. Especially when they are so young. Avery still naps every day, but they can't be in their room together for naptime, so she naps on the playroom couch. For the most part, she does go to sleep. Evelyn has been napping just once a day for a few months already, but I recently got her to stretch until noon. The past couple of days, she has napped for two and a half hours, which is amazing. I'm hoping it becomes the norm.

Even though they are so skinny, they both want to eat every two hours throughout the day. Needless to say, I am tired of preparing food! I feel like I'm constantly in the kitchen, making snacks and cleaning up.

Their favorite "shows" right now are Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, Curious George, and Cinderella. We will be canceling our cable in a couple of months (after basketball season is over), so I'm learning how to stream things. It's pretty slick. We should have canceled cable a long time ago.

All in all, things are good with us! I will not look back on these days and miss all the screaming and fighting, but I'll try to remember how sweet both girls can be, and how their curiosity and innocence makes them so cute. God has truly blessed us with our babies.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas...

We have been busy lately, with the usual things that keep us busy this time of year...plus some colds.

Avery had her first dance recital at the mall. I would put the video here, but Blogger is being stupid again and doesn't like it, for some reason. Sum up: Avery freaked out because of all the people and shut down, spent most of the performance at the side of the stage, crying with me, and I got her to go back out, but her teacher pretty much carried her around and then she finally danced the last 10 seconds, maybe. It was still really cute, though!

This girl got her hair cut. Before: 

 After:

For the first few days after her hair cut, she was constantly running her hands through her hair and commenting on how much she loved it.

We had Thanksgiving at my parents' house. My Grandpa John and Grandma Nancy made the trip up to see us, so it was fun to be with them, too.

Avery turned 3! I can't believe I have a three year old, but it's true. I do. We asked her what she'd like to eat for her birthday dinner and she said, "A cheeseburger." So, we headed to Red Robin.

The day after her birthday, we had a small birthday gathering with all her grandparents that were in attendance: Bompa, Gramma, Grammie, PawPaw, and Great-Grandpa John and Great-Grandma Nancy. She was in heaven all night, as all the attention was focused on her!

 She LOOOOOOOVES to open presents.

 Evelyn made sure some attention was focused on her.

Then, this week, I've been slowly getting Christmas decorations put up, Christmas cookies made, and lots of Christmas music listening done. Today, we had a great quiet family day at home. During Evelyn's almost 3 hour nap (I KNOW!!!), we decorated a gingerbread house with Avery. That was a huge hit!

It's only going to get busier these next few weeks! I'm trying to take the time to remember what we are really celebrating, and just enjoy my time with my sweet ones.

A Year Ago Today...

 Evelyn was just 10 days old!

Wordless Wednesday...

Evelyn's Birth...One Year Ago, Today...

**Disclaimer: I tried and tried to upload a couple of videos to this post, but Blogger wouldn't let me. :( So, I will be exploring moving over to WordPress very soon.

In the wee hours of the morning on October 21, 2011, I woke up with the need to use the facilities, of course. After all, I was just 5 days from my due date with my second baby. Waking up at 2:05 am to pee was not unusual. So, I did my thing, went back to bed and had a mild contraction before falling asleep.

About 25 minutes later, I woke up again, with the urge to go again. That was kind of weird because what the heck, I just peed!

I conducted my business and when I stood up, I had my second contraction. It wasn't a "ooh, my belly just tightened, but it's not so bad yet" contraction. It was a full blown, "Holy moly, that hurts, that hurts, that hurts!" I stayed in the bathroom, gripping the towel rack and trying to take deep breaths until it was over. As soon as it was done, I walked into our bedroom and told Stephen, "Baby, I just had a really painful contraction, just so you know." As soon as I finished the sentence, my water broke. "Um, and my water just broke."  He rolled over said, "Okay," and rolled back over to go back to sleep.

See, we were really gonna do it this time! I was going to have an all natural birthing experience! I had read the Bradley method book, made Stephen read it (yes, he kind of griped the whole way through it), did my breathing exercises, read tons of articles and blogs about it - the whole nine yards! I was just determined that I could do it. So, according to the Bradley method and most of modern science, once you start contracting, it will most likely take your body 4-6 hours before you should have to head to the hospital (if you choose not to do a homebirth or something.)  When I told Stephen I had a painful contraction, he was thinking, "Nice. Wake me when something exciting starts to happen."

Well, since I had the next excruciating contraction maybe 2 minutes after that first one, I woke him again right away. I said, "Okay, these aren't very far apart! I'm going to try walking around the house to see if they slow down." So, I walked out to the living room and had another one. I started yelling. Then, I walked into the kitchen. And yelled a little louder. Then, I walked back into the bedroom, stopping again to yell at the top of my lungs. "These are right on top of each other! I think we need to go in now! Call the doctor, call my mom, then call Mandy to come over until my mom gets here!"

Like the good husband he is, he did not argue with me. He did as he was respectfully requested.

My amazing, good friend, Mandy, came over immediately, leaving her own three kids and husband at home to sit at our house while Avery slept (yes, I can't believe she slept through all the yelling) until my mom arrived from her hour drive. I vaguely remember Mandy standing in our living room, excited for us that this baby was coming, and confirming to Stephen that indeed, we should get going. She could tell I was in a lot of pain and contracting exceptionally fast.

So, off we went to the hospital. I was so glad we only live 3 minutes from the hospital because oh my goodness, the bumps. Bless Stephen's heart, he was driving as smoothly as he could, but I was yelling every time we went over the tiniest bump. It hurt!  He dropped me off at the ER entrance while he went to park the car. When I walked through the automatic doors, the front desk person could tell just by looking at me that I needed to go directly to maternity check-in and buzzed me right in. Right when I got in the room, I had another contraction, prohibiting me from speaking to the sweet lady behind the computer, and just doing my best not to holler my head off. She was lovely, just patiently waiting until my contraction passed before asking me a gazillion questions to get me checked in. Thankfully, I think she gave me the shortcut check-in, since I'm sure it was obvious I was in active labor. The worst part about getting checked in was they wanted me to ride in the wheelchair to get to the labor & delivery part of the hospital. If you don't ride in the chair, it's a looooong walk and up a couple of flights in the elevator, so of course, I had to ride in it, but again, it hurtsobad!!! Thankfully, they had an open room ready for me, brought me in, and immediately checked me. It was about 3:30 am and I was 6 cm dilated! They hooked me up to monitors right away to check on things and everything was so rushed, I didn't even get a hospital gown on. I was still wearing my Peterson Family Reunion pajama t-shirt. 

Looking pretty!

Anyway, they checked me again 15 minutes later and I was 7 cm. At that point, I started to freak out. The contractions. were. crazy.  I was in my "window" for an epidural. If I waited much longer, I wouldn't be allowed to get it. The contractions were bad enough, I was terrified of what it was going to be like to actually birth the child without some happy juice. Stephen tried to encourage me to continue without any paralyzers, but I basically told him to shut up and be supportive! He quickly backed down and said, "Whatever you want to do, baby!" So, I requested the epidural ASAP.

Thankfully, it didn't take the anesthesiologist long to arrive and insert that big, fat needle into my back. And thankfully, I am not scared of needles. And thankfully, it started working within about 15 minutes and I was in a very happy place. They checked me again and I was 8 cm - and now, I couldn't feel those contractions that were still just as strong! However, not long after getting my epidural, I noticed I was losing feeling further and further up my body. My arms and hands were getting cold and tingly. I said something to my nurse about it and by the time she had the anesthesiologist back in the room, I was numb all the way up to my chest! I freaked out again, since that was way too much numbing. They turned my epidural off so my body would drain it out of my system and then they would turn it back on not-so-strongly. It took about a half hour for it to wear off, so then I was back in the very bad place, feeling all the pain again. They checked me again, and I was 9 cm! So, they turned the epidural back on and it was all perfect and wonderful and they had me start pushing. I was going to have this baby by 5:30 in the morning, they were saying!

So, I started pushing. And pushing. And pushing. No matter how much I pushed, I still wasn't effaced. I was fully dilated, but not effaced. At all.

Then, the baby's heart rate started dropping with each contraction, especially while pushing. They had me stop pushing for a while to wait and see what the baby would do, but even with the epidural, I was having an intense urge to push. The baby's heart rate continued to dip during contractions, but not as badly as when pushing. My doctor came in and said to try pushing a few more times and see what happens. She said she might have to use the vacuum, but she would be back in a little bit. She was next door with another patient, who was about to have her baby. My poor doctor was going back and forth!  So, I pushed a few more times, Dr. P. came back and said, "Alright, it's time to see what in the world is going on in there!" She examined me (which was quite painful) and discovered that the baby was coming out sunny-side up (face up) and head was turned to the side and looking up, so the baby was coming out nose, eyes, and forehead first! My doctor immediately said, "We need to get this baby out now. It is not coming out this way."

I am normally calm in high-stress situations, but I just freaked out again. I never thought I would ever need a c-section. I hadn't emotionally prepared for a c-section. I was worried about my baby, most of all.  Dr. P. said all the nurses were glued to my charts at the nurse's station, and they and my doctor's partner, Dr.  M. all agreed that an emergency c-section was necessary. I was scared out of my mind, but Dr. P. put me at ease when she assured me that everything was going to be okay, and she was going to be there through the whole thing. They immediately wheeled me to the operating room.

Stephen stood behind my head the whole time, holding my hand and talking to me and kissing me. He was my rock, assuring me that everything was going fine, and my doctor talked to me, too, throughout the surgery. The amount of pressure and pushing and pulling was more than I thought it would be, but when I heard my baby's cries for the first time, I had the biggest sense of relief I have ever had in my life. And then, at 9:29 am, when I heard Stephen exclaim, "Baby, it's a girl!" I loved my little Evelyn Grace Naomi more than life itself, instantly.

And then, they wrapped her up and Stephen brought her over and laid her on my chest. I wrapped my arms around my little Evey, looked into her swollen and bruised eyes and knew she was a fighter.

She stopped crying when she heard my voice saying, "Hi, baby. I'm so glad you're here and safe."

Stephen left with Evelyn to go get weighed and get her bath taken.

 She was a little peanut - 5 pounds, 15 ounces, 18 inches long.

After they finished sewing me back up, I went to Recovery and was soon greeted by Stephen and Evelyn.

Such a little sweetie from the beginning, with her little pink bow, but also making it obvious she would like to try nursing for the first time, I fed her and she did it like she had been doing it for ages. She was a pro!

Shortly after we got to our private room, Big Sister Avery and Gramma came over to visit for the first time.

 We introduced the sisters, and it was love at first sight.

Avery was so interested in everything.

 Our first family photo

Evelyn just gazing at her big sister. We could tell she knew Avery's voice.

 Meeting Gramma for the first time (my dad was there, but I have no picture evidence! He is in video, though.) Sorry, Dad!

 Avery had gone shopping and picked out a hanging duck for the car seat and a monkey lovey for her new sister.

 Evelyn was so alert all day!

 Wrinkly, little feet

Grammie and PawPaw came up to visit after work.

 Meeting Grammie

 Meeting PawPaw

After all that, the birth of my second baby girl was a life-changing day that I will never forget. A year later, I am still in awe that I have two daughters, and I am in awe that it's been a year since our precious Evelyn entered this world. She is a spit-fire girl, full of determination, strength, and zest. She lives every minute of every day, exploring and trying to get to things she knows she's not supposed to touch. She brings us so much joy and at the same time, challenges us every day to be the parents that God gave her.

We love you, Evelyn Grace Naomi!