Thank You Grandma!

Well....Grandma has gone :( and the house feels quite empty. Linnea really misses her, too. Especially when I was giving Aaron a haircut and Linnea cried for her half the time! Yes....we miss you grandma!

But I sincerely want to say thank you for all you wonderful help, and not to mention wonderful mother/daughter time (and I suppose son-in-law time, too :)). It was SO fun just having you here to talk to and be with, and then to share with us the moment our daughter came into the world and her first few days of life. The house looks immaculate thanks to your hard work, and the dishes are piling up faster now that you are gone. And we now have keys to our closet dooe thanks to you! :P Thanks for all the fun laughs and for letting me win Ticket to Ride a few times :). Thanks for holding Linnea when she was especially fussy. Thanks for being such a wonderful grandma to our little one.

Mom, you truly are a living example of a godly mother and have raised me to love the Lord, so that I would one day want to raise my daughter in the same manner. I praise God for you in so many ways! I would be overjoyed to be able to follow in your footsteps by the grace of God. I love you mom!

...Linnea pooped really loud during our photo shoot....it was really funny :) (look at her face)

I think she is smiling....precious

snuggle time with Grandma

We miss you mom...and can't wait to see you and everyone else in a couple of months. We love you!

Linnea's First Night Home

Welcome to the World Linnea Joy!!!

Wow.....where do I begin?? Well, I suppose from the beginning. And I hope you don't mind all the pics ;) ....I figure the more the better for family and friends who can't be here to experience it in person. Now, I am VERY serious when I say don't read this if you are not one for labor details...I couldn't resist, and don't have a clue how to condense a story. I suppose I could just not write about the whole labor, but it was all so crazy and exciting to me, I just can't help myself.

I woke up at about 3:15am on Tuesday, August 18th and most definitely did not return to sleep. I think I had a few contractions that were 4-5 minutes apart, but after that, they were even closer together. Anyways.... :) .... In less than an hour I realized the contractions were really close together (probably 3 minutes), but didn't waste my time coutning knowing that we needed to get to the hospital. I took a shower and woke my hubby up at 5:15. My mom and him got everything packed up and into the car, and we were on our way by 5:45.

I decided to time my contractions with my cell phone during the 30 min. car ride (well....more like 20-25 min....let's just say Aaron wasn't exactly driving slow). They were 2-3 minutes apart. Now, as a side note...we were in a hurry because they wanted me at the hospital in the beginning of labor in order to get two doses of a drug in me. I have GBS I think it's called, which is vaginal beta strep (sorry to be detailed...I hope it doesn't gross you out). Each dose can only be given 4 hrs. apart. GBS doesn't affect me at all, but there was a slight chance of infection to the baby, which could have dangereous ramifications.....SO, all that to say, we tried to hurry.

By the time I got a room, my contractions were no more than 2 minutes apart and many times less. My initial thinking was there is NO WAY I can do this for many more hours, and since I assumed labor lasted a long time, I thought I had many more hours to go, and just happened to have my contractions really close together. At about 8:00am (I think) I started to have 2-3 contractions on top of one another and then a rest. I laugh at how I groaned I think through every contraction. I remember telling my husband that "relaxing is a joke, becuase it is impossible". My body was being taking over by extreme pain that made me shake and throw up. I was thinking "this is crazy! I thought this wasn't supposed to happen until transition (right before the pushing stage) and there is no way I am at that point yet!" Boy was I wrong!

Because I thought I had hours to go I told my husband that I couldn't do this anymore. He said "yes you can, honey, one contraction at a time." I didn't say anything in response, but I "knew" I wouldn't be able to go much longer without an epidural. The last thing I remember before asking the nurse to check me is having four contractions in a row without a rest period and pushing periodically during those contractions. The nurse checked me and said my bag of waters was "right there" meaning I was ten cm. dialated and I think fully efaced, but my water hadn't broken.

The next few minutes were the most unbearable waiting for the doctor to get there to break my water. He finally arrived, and didn't have time to put his blue scrubs on before breaking my water. This part is somewhat humorous. He rolled up his collared shirt as much as he could and broke my water, which went everywhere! Then he stepped aside to actually put his scrubs on, which felt like an eternity of time since all I wanted to do was push and all the nurses kept telling me not to. I won't go into detail, but I pushed like 6-8 times and she was born at 9:37!!!!
She is/was 6 lbs. 5 1/2 oz. and 20 3/4 in. long. Tiny but long! I only got one dose of the drug in me, so they had to take her blood the next day to test her for infection from the GBS, but she is perfectly healthy, so that is a praise!

That is a total labor of 6 hrs. and about 15 minutes. This is the part where you are not supposed to get jealous but rejoice with me ;). God is SO good and gracious!!! I just never expected it to be like that (nor that painful). Yes, I thought I was going to die, but then there was an end to it and the Lord definitely carried me through (with the amazing help of my husband and his sidekick, my mom). And the Lord's grace and MANY blessings have only continued!

I am amazed at the miracle of a child and have literally enjoyed EVERY minute of being a mommy and seeing my husband be a daddy. Linnea is SO precious, even when she cries. God has been so gracious in giving us a daughter who is absolutely beautiful :), nurses well, is healthy, and has pretty much already adapted to night and day. My mom has been a wonderful help and Aaron's mom is coming next Thurs! My heart is overwhelmed with joy and thankfulness to the Lord for abundantly blessing us.

Thank you all for your prayers and excitement with us! Enjoy the pictures of sweet Linnea Joy!

One minute old

A very happy grandma and mommy!

Daddy trying to give you a size perspective and touching his precious daughter's head.

Daddy bonding with Linnea.

Our new family of three (sorry Linnea is a little blurry)
Resting after her first bath.
Hannah meets her baby cousing for the first time!
Grandma's lovin on her!

I could kiss her all day!
All ready to go home :) (Thanks sis for the adorable outfit!)
VERY excited to be going home from our long three day stay at the hospital.
Readu for her first car ride!
Yes, she makes funny faces quite often that I think are just adorable
Welcome home Linnea!
She has really long fingers and toes!

Precious...

So tiny....

Any Day Now!

It's the truth....we are patiently waiting for Linnea to come at any time! Well....trying to be patient :). It's not easy because I've been having lots of contractions, just nothing that has turned into labor. I keep telling myself that God is in control of the perfect time for her to come, so I have no need to worry, be anxious, or try to coerce it to happen. Although, at times I am tempted to do all those things!

Aaron just snapped this picture today!

My mom has just arrived :) which is very exciting!! And she insisted that I put pictures on the blog of the baby's room! I finished the canopy a couple a little over a week ago, and my handy dandy husband figured out how to mount it to the wall. I finally took pictures of it at 1:00am this morning (I know...you were probably sleeping :)). I took another one today in the daylight, which looks much better!




God has been very good in sustaining me! Some days are harder than others, but God's grace is always sufficient and I get through each day!!

We just had our hospital tour on Sunday, which was fun and quite encouraging, but afterward I got a tiny little taste of what it will be like when we are in the hospital. We ended up sticking around for a couple hours. I wasn't sure if my water had broken (well...I didn't think it had, but didn't want to be wondering), so we talked to our friend who was a labor and delivery nurse, and she said we needed to get it checked out. We didn't expect to have to stay for so long if my water hadn't broken (which it hadn't). The worst part were the two straps they stuck around my belly. They are very uncomfortable!! So I am now able to mentally prepare for that! It was also really hot in the room we were in, so we now know to pack a fan! So that's a blessing.

Aaron and I just got together a pile of things we will be taking to the hospital, so we feel quite ready, and are just waiting to go into labor! It's soo exciting knowing that we are going to get to meet and see the beautiful face of the little girl God has been knitting inside my womb for the past 9 months! Wow! I can't believe it has been that long! We'll keep you posted!

Slow and Fast....

The title of this blog is how I feel life is going right now. Each day seems slow, and if I think too much, I feel like I still have a long way to go until the birth of our baby. But at the same time I look back and feel like time has gone by fast and Linnea will be here before we know it!! I have a feeling I am going to get a lot bigger, but trying not to dread it as I already feel so uncomfortable and exhausted!! Praise the Lord this is temporary...and I know it will be totally worth it (as I have heard from EVERY mommy I know!).

Just to catch you up a little, we had a fun fourth of July with our family and another couple from church. We played some games, had some yummy food, and ended it with some pretty good fireworks!

Linnea still LOVES to move and exercise (Aaron can tell you she was probably doing jumping jacks inside earlier today!! She must have been so excited today was Sunday!

Monday night was my baby shower, which was an incredibly sweet blessing from the Lord. The ladies that threw it did a beautiful job, and my sister-in-law put some hard work into making YUMMY cakes that were beautiful. Thanks Kimiko! And I have to tell you an example of a servant in the body of Christ...a woman who just became a member of our church who I hadn't really even met made TONS of beautiful tarts for my shower! She also made Linnea a huge beautiful baby blanket!! All this from a woman who I officially met AT my shower! What a blessing and an example of love and service in the body of Christ. I'm looking forward to getting to know her more! :)

I was greatly encouraged by the many women who came to shower their love and gifts upon our family. The living room was packed and there was plenty of laughter and fun!
I can't say enough how blessed I felt and thankful to the Lord for the body of Christ!

I put some pictures below which were taken with our new camera! It was our "baby" gift from Aaron's parents so we send lots of pictures and videos to them!!! And boy are we grateful! Thanks mom and dad!!

It's funny talking so much about gifts and things after hearing our sermon tonight about materialism. It was a GREAT reminder of where material things should fall on the importance list, and it's pretty much at the bottom. Material things should never move our heart away from the Lord...they should be used for the Lord since they are from the Lord. Material things...whether it be an abundance or lack of...should never determine our contentment. Our contentment lies in the Lord, who is ALWAYS good and never changing...therefore we have reason to always be content! It is my prayer that I never get caught up in worldly possessions, but seek to serve the Lord with what he has given me by serving others.

" Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content."
1 Timothy 6:6-8

Aaron and I at the beach!

A checkup...and a place I am all too familiar with! :) At least I always get to hear my daughter's heartbeat. That is my favorite part!!

The 4th of July. Yes...I think it's a little awkward to be holding my stomach :P

The beautiful dessert table at my shower
This one is blurry, but it gives you an idea of the full house! All those kids on the floor are from one family who also brought friends!! haha.
Count your many blessings!!....and blankets....
Kimiko and Hannah...too cute to pass up!

Apparently she likes to stick the body of her ducky in her mouth when she takes a bath!
Also, I want to say that God is SO good and for those of you who don't know (which is probably only a couple of you)...we officially have two beautiful new nephews!! My sister and her husband just arrived home on Friday from Ethiopia with the newest additions to the family. We are overjoyed at the AMAZING work God has done and can't wait to meet these precious boys!! Praise the Lord for his faithfulness and GREAT goodness!! If you want to see some pics, just click on the blog "A New State of Mind" at the top right of this page, or to my sister's blog, "Just the Clay".

In This You GREATLY Rejoice

Well...I promised I would post a picture of Linnea inside my tummy and outside my tummy, so here they are! Sorry about the magnets...I took a picture of the ultrasound picture while it was on the fridge :) As you can see, that is her blurry face (I think she looks like a Parker :)...well, ok...I guess you can't really tell) and her foot is covering her mouth and nose. If you look closely, you can see what I think are three of her fingers below what I think is the umbilical cord.

32 Weeks Old!

This was taken in March...lol, and I thought I had a belly THEN!

Now THIS is a belly! :) 7 more weeks (give or take some) to go!

God has been SO gracious in sustaining me! I don't usually sleep well, so it's quite easy to start my day off somewhat depressed after a long night of tossing and turning...BUT, I know that is NOT how I am to start my days nor continue in them. I decided to take a little detour from Romans yesterday morning, and read in 1 Peter. This is what the Lord reminded me of!

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ; and though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith the salvation of your souls."

Should the salvation of my soul not cause me to rejoice EVERY morning!? And even every moment I lie awake at night?? He saved ME according to his great mercy, and I have so much hope! Who am I to wake up and start complaining?...about anything! So...as you can see God graciously gave me a little kick in the pants and a great encouragement that could not have come at a more appropriate time. The cross of Christ and the hope of seeing Him some day gives us so much to rejoice in, and I am ashamed at how often I live in a "me" world and forget this GREAT truth and His GREAT love!

May we never stop rejoicing!

Great Time Away!!

Well...it's the middle of the night right now...and no, I don't do this on purpose! :) One joy of pregnancy for me has been many nights of broken sleep. Having to go potty, can't find a comfortable position, hungry, thirsty (which is really bad because then I have to go potty even more!)...I'm sure if you have any children you have probably been there! :)

So! I thought I would update you on a wonderful trip. Resolved was absolutely AMAZING! There were truths I learned from the scriptures that weekend that I have never known or realized, and I would love to go into a little more detail, but I shall save that for another time if I get the chance. I will tell you one thing though that I am very excited about! After having three days straight of solid, passionate preaching from the Word, Aaron and I decided we would like to start listening to more sermons habitually. So, as a start we are making Wednesday night a "Sermon Night." We started with John Piper's message "What is the Recession For?" which gave us MANY things to talk about for the rest of the night, and to chew on and pray over for the weeks and months to come. It was also greatly convicted us in our heart priorities. I would highly recommend it for those of you who are not very busy (that was a joke:)), even if and maybe even more so if the recession has not hugely affected your financial situation. You can listen to it here. Grab your husband (if you have one), and make a Sermon Date out of it!

After Resolved we had a wonderful time in Arizona with family! We went bowling, shopping, swimming....played games, and just enjoyed being with His family. It was quite refreshing! Here are just a few photos!

Aaron was taking this one...

We played knock-out in the pool and on dry ground, and I think I lost every time! :)

We celebrated father's day early at a very yummy restaurant....AND the waiter brought us out a free desert sampler at the end....mmmmm, it was tasty!

Well, I think my daughter is now resting after running a marathon...you should have seen my stomach moving a few minutes ago!!! And I think it's time I try and go back to sleep...I guess my side-profile belly shot and pictures of our sweet daughter's face (with her foot covering her nose and mouth) will have to wait for another day. ;) Her foot is up there because she is in the breech position...so PLEASE pray with me that she flips! I spent a whole day worrying about it, and knew that is NOT the response the Lord wants me to have, nor does it do me any good. I am not to worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself! And God is totally sovereign over what position my baby is in. She still has wiggle room to move, too.

Alright...I'm checking out and going to bed. Sweet dreams for the present and have a blessed Saturday!!