Grammy and Ops Came to Visit

My parents came to visit a week after Deacon was born. It was such a sweet time to celebrate. My dad and Matt put down new sod on our front yard, my mom entertained Noah, and I was able to love on the new little one. Meals were made and put in the freezer, trips were taken to the park, and we all had a blast. Matt and my dad were beat after 4 days of manual labor, but the yard looks awesome. Here are some of the pictures to document the visit. 

Ops and Grammy with the Grandsons

Helping Grammy plant the flowers

The men resting after hours of hard work

Helping daddy with the tilling

King of the Sod.

Happy Thursday!

2 Year and 2 Week Appointments

Last Friday, Matt and I ventured to the pediatrician to have the boys checked on. Noah was due for his two year appointment and Deacon was up for the 2 week appointment. The timing worked out perfect.

Noah is measuring right at the 50% for everything- weight, height, and head circumference. He was such a trooper the whole visit. He even had his finger pricked and shed zero tears. I was one proud mama because I absolutely hate needles. I don't think I could have been that brave. The doctor commented on his verbal skills. She said at two years old, she expects to understand 50% of what a kid says. When Noah was talking (which is at all times), she understood 100% of what he was saying. It was an awesome thing to hear as a mom. 

As of last Friday, Deacon weighs 7 pounds 3 ounces and is 20.25 inches long. I knew they had measured him wrong when he was born (nurse said 18.25). That always seems to happen to my babies. They don't like to stretch out when they come out. Deacon is 25% for weight and 50% for height. With him gaining all of his birth weight back, I can now let him sleep through the night. Last night, he slept for 5 hours. I'm not sure if it was a fluke or if the 2.5 hour fuss session before helped tucker him out- but I'll take it!

We are surviving as a family of four. There are so awesome times and there are hard times. It all takes time to adjust, so I'm not unrealistic to think that it will be easy as 1, 2, and 3. I've learned to enjoy the moments it is easy and cling to Christ when it is hard.

I'm so thankful to have Matt by my side through the journey. He has been my right hand man taking care of all the little things I can't think of. He even did a grocery run and mopped my floors after an exhausting day of research/school work.

Here are a couple more recent pictures! Happy Tuesday!

Kyle and Deacon

Where it all started....were we really this skinny? This is around 13/15 weeks I think.

Ashley and I were sorority sisters at Baylor University. There began a friendship that now 9 years later has seen two marriages( her to Luke, me to Matt) bought/sold houses, different cities, different states, graduate school, new jobs, and now four beautiful (or should I say handsome?) boys. 

When we moved to Dallas, one of the most exciting parts of the move was living ten minutes from the Baker's. When we found out in February that we were pregnant along with the Baker's, this was the cherry on top of the ice cream sundae. We always joked about trying to have the baby on the same day, but I never really thought it was a possibility. With a two week separation between our due dates and Ashley carrying Kyle very low, I figured she would for sure go at 38 weeks. 

Halloween- the night before induction

As due dates got closer and still no Kyle, I started to have dreams about us having babies on the same date but I just figured there was no way. I also thought I would go over my due date with Deacon and I knew that the longest they would let baby Kyle go was November 4th. 

I have the epidural at this point- numb legs and all. Ashley walked down the hall to come check on me!

With how I was feeling and Ashley being ready to have her baby that was 10 days late, timing started to work towards our favor. Like I said in the post last week, the doctor gave us the go ahead to induce and Ashley was already inducing on November 1st, so it ended up happening!

With having the same doctor, delivering in the same hospital, having two boys (Noah and Kaleb) that are already best friends, we quickly became well known on the labor and delivery floor. I'm pretty sure my obgyn fought for me to be induced on November 2nd because I was told I took the last induction. 

I had just had baby Deacon and was headed up to recovery. They let me swing by and hang out with Ashley while they waited on baby Kyle.

We hung out all throughout the process. She came to visit me once my epidural was going. I saw her once I had baby Deacon. We texted all the time. It was so fun!

It ended up that Kyle decided to take his sweet time and not come until November 3rd, but our babies are hours apart.

Getting ready to go home- not good lighting!

The best part was having her on the same floor for recovery. Because we share so many friends, we had a pizza party in her room with the Lewis's. We had breakfast together one morning and she helped us as we packed up to leave. It was such a sweet adventure. 

One of my top five favorite memories. Labor was much more fun having my best friend by my side.Blessed! It was truly an amazing miracle and a wonderful blessing. Deacon and Kyle  have to be best buds with this story. They have been together since the womb as Ashley and I ran miles and miles together. 

The Birth Story: Deacon Matthew

Blessed. This is the word that comes to mind as I relive November 1^st and November 2^nd. These two days forever changed my life and I am eternally grateful. I could not ask for a more perfect story. I will probably do a couple posts on this weekend just because it would be ridiculously long to fit it all in blog post. There are some incredible side stories that I want to share that go along with the big day, but for now, I will just tell how we came to meet Deacon Matthew.

The week leading up to November 2^nd I was pretty miserable. Between contractions, lack of appetite, and little sleep- I was a walking zombie. At my appointment on Wednesday, the doctor could tell that I wasn't my chipper self. She suggested inducing and I happily agreed. Although I felt a little like I was taking God's control and putting it in my own hands, Matt and I prayed over it and it became very obvious that this was God's will. Our first date of choice was November 1^st, but they had 9 scheduled inductions that day so the chances I'd get bumped were about 100%. The next possible date was November 2^nd. I was hesitant to agree to this day because I knew my best friend was already being induced and I didn't want to take away from Baby Kyle. I quickly called her to run the idea by her and she was beyond thrilled. She loved the idea of doing this together and so did I. It was set. Ashley and I would be delivered on the same day, by the same doctor, and in the same hospital. How perfect! (I will leave the rest of this side story for another post).

Matt and I arrived on Friday night November 1st to start the process. I won't go into details, but the medicine they used sent me into full blown labor (they told me this would be a possibility). By Saturday morning, I was dilated to a 3 and baby was on the way. I was consistently contracting and very miserable. I asked for epidural because I wanted to enjoy myself. I received the epidural around 9 and then began the journey. The most difficult part of the labor was the IV. I have horrible veins that do not like needles. I had 3 unsuccessful IV attempts, one that went to my bone, and they had to call in the IV specialist. This lady was incredible. She did it on the first try- no problem. Her training had been with ICU babies and IV's. She said she had to pretty much do those blindly, so my veins were no problem. I was so grateful. I couldn’t handle being pricked anymore. The first one caused me to almost pass out. I HATE NEEDLES.

Anyways, as time went on once the epidural was in, baby started to get closer and closer. It was awesome. I couldn't feel a thing and Matt and I had a lot of quality time together. I told him this was like a date night- he said it was more like the last supper. Matt is quite the comedian. I loved having him by my side. He provided so much comfort for me throughout the weekend. He was my right hand man and the best companion I could ask for. Around noon the doctor came to check on me and I asked when they would break my water. I was at a 7 and I knew that the final straw would be breaking my water. He said he would come back around 2 and after that he thought we would start the pushing.

At 2 p.m., the doctor came back and broke my water. The nurse had me switch on my side to provide a different position for the baby. At one point I asked her if it was normal to feel so much pressure. I thought the epidural was wearing off. She got this huge smirk on her face and replied that was baby's head. As I started to do the first push, the nurse quickly told me to stop. She said that I didn't need to push, the baby was already coming. She quickly called the doctor back in. Luckily, he had just stepped outside the door after breaking my water so he was able to hurry his way on back in. They told me not to laugh or not to sneeze because baby would come. The doctor got where he needed to be to catch it and the baby just naturally came. No pushing. The doctor had us guess gender as baby was coming. Both Matt and I said boy, and we were right! On November 2^nd at 2:21 p.m., we met our sweet son Deacon Matthew. He was 6 pounds 15 ounces and 18.25 inches long. This little peanut has already provided so much joy. Noah has really stepped into his role as big brother and is quite the little helper.

Praise God for a healthy baby and providing for us time and time again. We are so thankful for such a successful delivery and the experience of doing it with the Bakers.

More posts and pictures to come!

Week 39

Why hello sleep deprived mama!

Along: 39 weeks

Size of baby: The baby is the size mini watermelon. Baby is around 7 pounds and continuing to gain baby fat each day.

Total Weight Gain/Loss:  I'm still going strong at 29 pounds as of yesterday. I think I'm actually now at 28.5 but whose counting?

Maternity Clothes:  At this point, my outfit of choice is shorts and a t-shirt. I am always hot. The tighter the clothes- the more suffocated and itchy I feel. I'm so ready for A) the cooler weather to come back and B) to have wardrobe options

Gender: Matt and I still think the peanut is a boy! The game plan is to bring 3 names of each into the hospital and decide there.

Movement: It has slowed down quite a bit.

Sleep: Bad. Bad. Bad. Bad.

What I miss: I miss food tasting good and sleeping through the night. I'm at the point where nothing sounds good. I just eat because I know I'm supposed to and I feel worse if I don't.

Cravings: Powerade, Gatorade, and anything cold.

Symptoms: Round ligament pain (legitimate peg leg as I walk sometimes), contractions, dizziness, nausea, headaches, exhaustion, and sciatica.

Exercise: I have walked a lot this week between 2-5 miles every day. I thought I was going into labor on Tuesday, so I hoped walking would help speed things up. It turns out those contractions were just for fun.   

Best Moment This Week:  We celebrated the dood's birthday this past weekend. It was small and we did a lot of little things to make him special (doughnuts, parks, ice cream, all things he loves). I think my favorite part was us dressing up as a Pac-man family and going to a party with Matt's cohort. Aren't we cute?

I have also had so many special moments with Noah this week. He has been very sweet and super affectionate to both Matt and me. There are lots of kisses, hugs, and chair rocking. I think he knows he is about to be promoted to big brother/ dethroned as the baby. He LOVES baby Hannah and Kaleb, so I think he is going to be a very good big brother.