1 Month

Just like that, Leigh is already a month old, and her sister is still beyond eager to hold her, cuddle her and smile for a picture with her!

 

Baby Leigh

Leigh Dearing
December 9, 2013
7 lbs 15 oz, 21 inches

 

Before the details fade and before I get too exhausted to remember, I want to write about Leigh’s birthday.  Most know that I desperately wanted to avoid another c-section.   Many women love the ideal convenience of a scheduled c-section.  I am not one of them.  I wanted desperately to avoid the challenges of a major surgery and be back on my feet as quick as possible so I could love on my girls and hopefully, take some pressure off David.  Not all doctors will agree to a VBAC, but because I was the ideal candidate to attempt one, my doctor was willing.

In the early fall, we were assured that we had overcome my bout with fifth’s disease and settled in to enjoying the last trimester.  Ha, who am I kidding?  I love the end result of pregnancy but am not one of those women who “glows” for nine months.  In reality, we enjoyed a few weeks of a “normal” pregnancy.   Then, December came and my due date approached, which brought me closer and closer to my c-section date that my OBGYN required that I schedule.  Leigh had to come before that date, or she was coming out c-section style!   Further, she had to come with the right doctor on call.  We had to arrive at the hospital at just the right time, and labor had to show continued progress towards birth.    After days and days of fretting that the details of Leigh’s birth would not fall into place to avoid a c-section, I finally gave in and gave Leigh’s birth over to God.  (Yep, my need to be in control is a huge, huge challenge in my faith.)    No sooner than I had finally given Leigh’s birth to God than my water was breaking, and I was having contractions that were close together.

Sweet little Leigh arrived 3 hours after my water broke!  Every detail fell into place in such a surreal way!  We were blessed with an amazing head delivery nurse who managed me through a WHOLE lot of pain med free labor while she worked to get me admitted and paperwork complete.  I must have asked 20 times if it was too late for an epidural, as birth without an epidural had NOT been in my c-section free birth plan, and yeah for us, I got it just in time to push!  We were blessed with a sweet friend who got up in the middle of the night and left her family to be at our house when DM woke up and get her to school.  We are blessed with family and friends who are still giving DM extra “big sister” love and are feeding us.

Of course, Leigh is perfect and beautiful, and we are completely in love and so fortunate.   We have never seen DM as excited and proud as she was the day of Leigh’s arrival.   Pictures from Leigh’s birthday are HERE, and her newborn pictures are HERE.

Edited 1/21/14

Life!

While we are enjoying this sweet season of life, it is quite a busy one for us!  We have had so much fun with birthdays and pumpkins and friends and baby preparations that little time remains to blog about it, and with only a few weeks remaining before the arrival of #2, I want to focus on preparing our family for our new blessing and savor our last moments as a family of 3. 

Therefore, we're going to step away from the blog for a while!   Now don't worry grandparents, I'll continue to upload photos regularly to Picasa (on the right)!  :)

Sweet August!

August is gone, and I realize I haven't posted in a long, long time.  Our past few weeks have been busy with preparing for #2 and living every day life.  Because this little blog has primarily had the purpose of being a place of sharing with our close friends and family about what is going on in our lives, I rarely share what is heavy on our hearts.  I prefer to keep things light and  am always wanting to protect our family, right down to the horrible cat.  I firmly believe that once something is out on the Internet, it can't be undone.  Social media, even little family blogs that "seem" tucked away, can be damaging.  Oh, how I wish more of our youth (and adults) understood this!  I digress! 

The point I am trying to make is that please don't ever think that what you see happening here is always our everyday!  We face real struggles!  (First world, YES, but struggles to us!)  Over the next few months, we will make some key decisions that will impact the girls and all of us (even Cat!) over the next few years.  All along the way, we are so, so praying for the slightest wink from God and trying to remember that His plan is much, much better than any plan this super planner, controlling Momma can begin to contrive.

So while I think I wondered around praying and thinking in a fog for most of the month, we did get a few pictures and a few moments of savoring this sweet season of life!

*  DM started dance.  It was a rough start, as transition to the unknown is hard, but she is warming up to it.

Really not so sure on the first day!

 

But we did survive and even got a sticker!

 

By the second week, we were almost smiling leaving class.

*DM moved up to a new class at school.  The morning drop-offs have brought many tears as she tries to transition to her big girl room, but they quickly disappear!  She has also moved out of the nursery at church and on to Kidz Zone. 

* With all the rain, our pools have remained a bit chilly so we've swam very little this summer.  We've had LOTS of park play dates instead.

 

 



 

* Football season is here!  We may find ourselves grateful to have the baby to distract us from it in the end, but for now, there is no telling DM that UGA is off to a rocky start!

 

* And #2 is 3 weeks away from being dismissed by the perinatal specialist!  In the end, I have loved going.  The appointments are always quite efficient, and anyone who knows me can guess how much waiting on a doctor annoys me.  I never wait more than 10 minutes to see the doctor, have always received very thorough, scientific explanations and every statistic has been broken down to how it can be applied to our situation.  

 

A Baby Boy or Girl?

Several weeks ago David and I had a special date night!  Our date was the evening of one of the first days that we could get an accurate ultrasound indicating the sex of #2!  We had an early evening ultrasound to get the baby's sex and then headed to dinner in downtown Roswell to celebrate our little surprise!  Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures that night, but we had a great time.

We then kept our mouths shut for two weeks until we could get our parents together to tell them!  On July 3rd, we finally had all the grandparents in one house, which happens about every couple years!

 

AND . . .

 



This will make the fourth girl in my family and the third in David's family!  Yeah, PINK!

Due to some early (minor but stressful to us) complications, I get to visit every week via ultrasound with this little love for the next few weeks and bring Dad weekly photo updates!  And oh, how she has had so many prayers and positive thoughts sent her way over the past few weeks.  She is already so blessed!



Grandma and Grandpa Come to Visit!

Grandma and Grandpa came to visit for the week of the 4th!  Like most of Georgia, the constant rain put a damper on our July 4th week so we made do with lots of indoor activities, including an outing to the ever-reliable aquarium and Johnny Rockets!  DM had so much fun watching the fish with Grandma and Grandpa.  I think she would have sat in the observation room all day if we'd let her! 

 

We worked on our letters and numbers on the juke box at Johnny Rockets afterwards!

Grandma is a much more patient painter than me, so we enlisted her help to start working on DM's big girl room!  She is so, so good to DM.  Even let her "paint" with her! 
(Yep, it is white; I currently want to paint the entire house white!)

The rain broke just long enough on the 4th for us to go to the parade!

  This was DM's first parade.  In typical fashion, she just watched and observed everything!

We met up with Mimi and Papa to watch a Gwinnett Braves game.  Again, this was a first so there was so, so much to take in!

We finished the week with some flag art, which reminded me I am many years removed from my teaching days, as our hand prints didn't exactly end up in rows or even as complete hand prints.  Oh, well!

 

It was wet, but it was a Happy 4th and a happy week with Grandma and Grandpa!

DM's Big News!

Our family is growing, and it is not the second golden that I've been asking for for the past two years!  DM will be a big sister in early December!  Now that the shock has worn off, the excitement is growing.  It has been strange, as we are surrounded by so many, who for one reason or another can't have children, and we have been blessed by this little mini-surprise. 

Now yes, we both realize what causes children.  :) But after being told by one of my doctors that this could take a while, we were beyond surprised about our little mini-surprise!  As cliché has it sounds, this little one is definitely on His timing.  The pregnancy has been interesting to say the least.  This sweet little peanut is being watched after by so many doctors, and so far, so good!