Happy First Birthday, Emma!

This very night, one year ago, I started feeling stronger contractions. They were consistant for awhile and then were not at all. So, by midnight, I decided to go to bed. I told Kevin, who was working in the dining room, that this could be the night!

Sure enough, about an hour later, I woke up with much stronger contrations. We called my parents shortly there after and told them to hurry over to stay with Lea. Immediatley after hanging up the phone, we knew we didn't have much time (my folks live 30 min away). So, we called a friend to hurry over. Amie got there and we rushed to the hospital.

By now, it was a little after 2am. As I sat in the waiting room, Kevin was checking me into the hospital nearby. My contractions were very strong and about a minute apart. When the front receptionist noticed, she immediatley called to get me a room. Nurses showed up with a wheelchair, but I wanted to walk. I got about halfway to the room (which was very close) and had to stop for a huge contraction. I could see the door to my room.... like I said, it was close, but it seemed so far away! I made it to the doorway and another strong contraction hit me. I told the nurses I needed to push! They were calm and told me to get on the bed so they could "check" me. Just as I was about to sit on the bed, I felt like I needed to pee. So, I went to the restrooom.... no pee. I slowly made it back to the bed and climbed up. It was very uncomfortable sitting. Just as a nurse was about to "check" me, my water broke and I was pushing!

Kevin didn't even get me checked into the hospital and my midwife hadn't even arrived. After a few pushes, Emma was born!

Emma Margaret born on May 1st at 2:49am

(Here's the original birth story that tells what happened right after she was born. And, some update posts about her while we were still at the hospital are here and here.)

Emma has quite possibly completed our family... she is such a beautiful blessing!

Happy Birthday to our little cuddle bunny!!

Lea's First Haircut!

My 3 1/2 year old, Lea, had her very first haircut today. I was extremely anxious and thought about cancelling her appointment several times. But, I went through with it... Lea did fabulous and her hair is still just as beautiful as ever.

Here's a cute picture of the girls playing with a worm in the backyard. It's also a "before pic" of Lea's hair. :)

 

She's ready to go!

She said it tickled to get her hair washed!

 

Snip Snip

Lindsey blew it dry with a round brush...

and it was beautiful!

 

As we were leaving, Lea said she wanted to get her hair cut again! lol :)

11 months old

Yikes! It's been two months since I last posted. :(

I hate "catch-up" posts for several reasons... it's overwhelming, I never know where to begin and I always leave something out. So, I am just going to ramble a bit...

Let's start with Miss Emma, shall we? She is almost ONE!  I can not believe an entire year has passed since she was born. She is finally cruising around on the furniture. (I say "finally" because it took her a lot longer then it did Lea....but that's ok.) Emma is very cautious and careful. She is not a big fan of thrills or lots of action (the opposite of Lea). Actually, Emma is pretty much the opposite of Lea in almost all aspects! She keeps us on our toes.

Emma's first time pulling up to standing - 10 months old

Although Emma is pretty quiet, she babbles a lot, quietly. It's adorable! She points at everything and says, what sounds like, "That?" as if to ask "what is that?" She knows who Mama, Dada, Lea and Bailey are but hasn't really tried calling any of us by name yet. She nods and shakes her head all the time. Just recently, she has started doing it at appropriate times. For example, when I ask her if she is hungry, she always nods!

Emma is still very petite. I am guessing she weighs less than 20 pounds. She can still fit in some 9 month size clothes but is mostly wearing 12 month. Her feet seem small...she wears size 2 and/or 3 in baby shoes. I think she might have an "outie" belly button! When she stands or stretches out when laying down, it pops out ever so slightly. I love it!! She looks more and more like Kevin every day. I think the only thing she got from me is my large ears. :)

Emma LOVES books!

Miss Lea is an independent, strong willed and sometimes bossy 3 1/2 year old. She is so energetic. She loves action and can not stay in one place long. One of her favorite things to do is to run in circles through our kitchen and living room after dinner... every single night.

Sassy

Lea is still in preschool two days a week. She loves her class and her teacher! It's usually hard to get her to actually talk about school and what she does, but I love getting her little works of art each week... everything from finger paintings and drawings to a homemade candle and the life cycle of a frog collage. :) She has made several new friends, most of them all boys since she is one of three girls in the entire weekly class! Her best friend, Jackson, is in her class, too.

Emma's first Easter was a lot of fun. Like all holidays, we got to have three "celebrations"; once at our house, once at my in-laws and once at my parent's house. Lea went on several Easter egg hunts...and Emma enjoyed playing with the plastic eggs. I made a large, crocheted bunny for Emma just like the one I made Lea a couple years ago.

 

We recently took a nice, long trip to the zoo with my brother and sister-in-law. We were there from 10:30am until almost 5:30pm. What a looong day! We had a blast, though, and both of the girls were such troopers. There was a special, animatronic dinosaur exhibit there that Lea really enjoyed. (As much as Lea loves princesses and jewelry, she equally loves dinosaurs and Spiderman!)

Lea was serious about reading the map!

The highlight of our zoo trip was definitely the gorilla and chimp babies. We spent a lot of time watching them. The two gorilla babies were being slung around by there moms while the HUGE, silver-backed dad stayed close by. The chimp baby slept safely in his mother's arms while she rested her chin on his little head. I think she purposely sat right at the window so she could show off her baby!

 

Exhausted family!