And Baby School Begins!

I don't think Marley ever dreamed she would be starting

school so early! But she took it like a champ!
Today MaKieley informed Marley they would be
learning about capital letters!

They also learned about where to use capital letters.
Example: Names, Places & Beginning of a Sentence.
Marley paid very close attention and MaKieley was
very patient and a great teacher too!
:) Oh what the future holds for these two! :)
(MaKieley has learned that she has to capitalize
on the times that Marley is actually awake!)

MaKieley's BIG Find!

Last Night when MaKieley and John went out back to throw out the trash, MaKieley found that our "Big Bush" had bloomed! We had noticed that the two small bushes had grown into one HUGE bush a couple of weeks ago. But we never thought it would bloom! If you look at the little bushes around the big one you will see how it started out as. You can also see that since Marley has come along I have not been out to trim off the dead blooms! It is amazing how God made things work!

6 weeks old!

Marley is 6 weeks old! WOW!

She has changed so much in that short time! She recognizes mommy, daddy and MaKieley! She knows mommy is her food source, daddy is her sleeping buddy and sister is all about fun (and sometimes is irritating)!

Her 0-3 months clothes are coming closer to fitting but they still swallow her so she just sticks to her preemie clothes.

Marley loves water in any form! She loves showers, floating in the bathtub and just hearing it run! Our good friend Jennifer found her a sound machine that has the sound of rain on it and Marley just loves it! Thanks Jen!

Marley takes naps in her cradle as well as sleeps there some nights! She loves the bendy (the thing that curves around her and makes her feel like she is being held) that we got when MaKieley was a baby! It makes her feel like she is not so alone. I almost hate to say this because it will jinx us or something......but Marley has been sleeping at lease 7 hours a night the past several nights! Does this mean we are finally settling in? Probably not! It probably just means she is in a growing spurt right now! But we can hope!

When Marley has air bubbles in her tummy that just will not come out she loves to use the blue device you see in this picture. It is "The Original Bed Buddy Sinus Pack". My mom had loaned it to us or given it to us (I'm not sure which) a couple of years ago and it sits in the freezer for when I have a migraine! (So much for my migraines now!) In a moment of brilliance (or maybe it was desperation) I remembered it being in the freezer and wondered if it could be heated as well as frozen. Well sure enough it could be heated! I think it is filled with rice - you can freeze it or heat it to use on your sinuses when you are not feeling well. No Marley's sinuses are not in her abdomen! She just likes the warm feeling on her belly and it helps her to be more comfortable.

Marley now likes to watch Baby Bach and Baby Mozart! Most times she watches for about 10 minutes and then clothes her eyes and listens as she falls asleep. Finally something that allows me to go to the bathroom by myself at least once during the day!

We are all finally starting to settle in I think! MaKieley sleeps through any crying at night and loves helping with her baby sister! She also loves to hold her - it does not matter if she is crying, happy, squirmy or still! ANYTHING to be close to that baby sister!

MaKieley in the Maze! Or is it the Maize?

Today MaKieley's 1st grade class went on a field trip to The Maze! (The Maze is owned by friends of ours from church, the Simpson Family.)
Before entering the Maze all the children (and adults) attended "Corn School". At Corn School, Ms. Patti, taught everyone how the Indians were the first people to plant corn. However, they did not call it corn they called it Maize. MaKieley thought it was "AWESOME" that the two names were the same (Maze and Maize)! Ms. Patti also taught everyone the parts of a corn stalk. MaKieley says I must list these parts now: tassel, stalk, leaves, shuck, cob, silk, corn and roots. MaKieley also says to let everyone know that a tamale is wrapped in a corn shuck.After Corn School dismissed we all went to the entrance of the maze. Here we were given a piece of paper with questions on it. When we came to each number we had to answer questions to determine if we should go left or right. There was also a popcorn trail in case we got lost.We made it through the maze easily since the kids were so smart when it came to answering the questions. I am posting a picture of the actual maze from the air.

After making it through the maze we went to the petting farm. There were little pigs, a miniature horse, and baby goats with their mom, a turkey and several chickens. From here we went to the pumpkin patch! I do mean the patch! Not one of these things you pass on the side of the road that has pumpkins lined up all in rows! This was the actual place where the pumpkins grow! This is one of MaKieley's favorite places to go this time of year. You walk out into these huge patches where all the pumpkins are still on the vine growing! You pick your pumpkin out and then a guy comes by and cuts it right off the vine for you! MaKieley picked out two really nice pumpkins - one for her and one for Marley. Yes, Marley went to the Maze too. She was asleep when it was time to pick out pumpkins though.



After we were done getting our pumpkins from the patch we went and had a butterscotch corn sucker by the large pond. Then we left to come home. It was a good thing it ended when it did because Marley was getting hungry!

What a day! It was hot and windy but we had a lot of fun!

One month old!

I am now ONE whole month old! I have finally made it back to my birth weight (plus 2 oz.) but I am not any taller. I can sleep through the night now but that is really no fun! I try to throw in several nights of waking up just to keep mom and dad on their toes. When I see they are getting really tired I give them a break for a night or two and do the boring thing of sleeping 6 or 7 hours straight. It is amazing what a good mood they are in the next morning! I have discovered that I am like my mommy and I like to sleep on my tummy! But mom only lets me do that at nap time. I like my MaKieley, Daddy and Mommy to sing to me and I like the water. They call me a water bug!

WOW!! One whole month went by really fast!

Marley and the Practice Baby

MaKieley has a practice baby named Emma. We always knew Emma was a BIG Baby -- especially when John or I ended up carrying her after church or half way through our shopping trip! I decided to find out exactly how big Emma was compared to Marley. Here are a couple of pictures to show you exactly what they look like next to each other. Marley is 19 inches long and her head is 13 1/2 inches around. Emma is 21 1/4 inches long (1 1/4 inches longer than Marley) and her head is 15 inches around (1 1/2 inches bigger). WOW!! I never realized when I was lugging Emma around (frustrated that I had let MaKieley bring her along again) that the baby I was carrying inside me would be smaller at birth! Emma the practice baby can wear clothes that swallow Marley and the clothes Marley wears will not even fit on Emma the practice baby!

MARLEY

John and His Girls!

John and his girls!

The Sisters!

MaKieley is enjoying her sister! She loves to help in so many ways! She especially loves to hold Marley!
Marley is now sleeping around 6 hours a night (most nights :) )! She stays awake for an hour to two hours at a time during the day and loves to look around!
She is not quite back to her birth weight but she is almost there! This Thursday she will be 4 weeks old! We can hardly believe it has gone by so fast!
John has been off this whole month and it has been wonderful! It has made everything so much easier! I'm not sure how things will go when he goes back in October, but I guess we will have to figure it out! Until then we will just enjoy our time!

It's a .......

Family and Friends!
We would like to introduce you to our new baby Girl, Marley Caroline. Marley was born at 8:16 am on August 31st, 2006 (today of course)! She weighed 5 lbs. 14 oz. and was 19 inches long! Her big sister MaKieley is so excited to finally have her OUT where she can hold her! Everyone is doing great and should be going home in a couple of days! Thank you all for your prayers! Make sure you check back because we will post more pictures later (probably after we get home - Sunday or Mondayish)! Have a great holiday weekend!

MaKieley's Exciting Week!

MaKieley Started Her Week by bringing home her first 100! She was so excited! Later in the week on Thursday I went to pick her up and she grinned at me! Her tooth was missing! She informed me that it had fallen out at lunch and landed somewhere on the floor! She could not find it anywhere! Being in the hormonal state that I am right now I started to tear up! THIS TOOTH, THAT WAS LOST ON THE CAFETERIA FLOOR, WAS MY BABY'S FIRST TOOTH TO COME OUT!! AND NOW WE WOULD NEVER HAVE IT FOR A KEEPSAKE!! So her momma told her the one next to it, which was just as loose as the other one, had to come out before she went back to school the next day. Was that momma mean? I don't think so! So after several hours of crying and discussing it and trying to get it done she decided she wanted to try dental floss! On the second try it popped right out! Neither one of us really knew that it had come out but I thought it had felt different that time. So I said show me. She did and it was gone! Oh no! Had we lost the second one too? I was looking around and then all the sudden I remembered there was blood in her mouth! I stuffed in the paper towel we had waiting and went back to looking for that tiny baby tooth! Then ------ there it was! Sitting right on the front of her shirt! So we put it in a baggy so it could not get lost!
When John got home and MaKieley showed him that she had lost 2 teeth he fell over in the floor! MaKieley thought that was GREAT! She put her tooth under her pillow and this morning when she got up the Tooth Fairy had brought her $4 ($2 for each tooth she lost!) She was so very excited and ready to go to school and show everyone!
What a week! We hope to have a calm weekend before we have another WILD week next week!

Fun Day!

MaKieley had a great day today! Today was the shower for the baby. Several friends from church gave us a great party!
There were yummy cookies, fruit and dip, cake, nuts, jellybeans, and punch! MaKieley thought it was the best thing since sliced bread.
There were three of MaKieley's little friends there and I felt as though I were in a snow globe! The four of them were opening the presents at an absolutely crazy speed!! There was tissue paper flying everywhere! They had so much fun! So many cute things!
WE are now on the count down! 9 days left!

The News!

At our Dr.'s appointment yesterday we found out more news. Nothing to definitive though!! Here are the details:
1. On the 29th we will have an amniocentesis done first thing that morning. We will know by mid morning if the baby's lungs are mature enough to join us out in the world. If they are mature...
2a. We will have the baby the evening of the 30th. We are scheduled after the 5pm c-section. So that means somewhere between 5:30 and 6pm. Of course there is the possibility they are not mature, and in that case...
2b. I will receive steroid shots to help mature the baby's lungs. Depending on what the levels are we might have another amniocentesis a week later. If the levels are borderline the baby will be born on the 6th without another amniocentesis.
I hope that is not all too confusing! Please keep this all in your prayers!

MaKieley is finishing up her first week of 1st grade right now! She loves it and has been bringing home lots of things to read to us! I think however that we are all ready for the weekend!

Love to all!

The FIRST day of FIRST GRADE!!

The First day of FIRST GRADE was yesterday! MaKieley is in Ms. Gooch's class! She was very excited to get there! It was a very different first day of school this year! MaKieley was out of bed at 6:15 and dressed by 6:16! She wanted to make sure I had a picture of the back of her head to show everyone! (Hmmm----I wonder why!)
When we got to the school we walked around and delivered the 4 apples she bought for "Special People". First we gave one to Grammie, then Ms. McDaniel (the principal), then Mrs. Wuensche (her Kindergarten teacher from last year) and finally Ms. Gooch (her First Grade Teacher). We then took her to the library where all the first graders go if they get to school before the 8 o'clock bell. They were watching a movie so she hugged and kissed the three of us (4 including the baby) and went to watch it! That was it! No tears or clinging like last year! She is growing up, I guess!
When I picked her up the school was a mad house with all the other parents trying to pick up their kiddos too! She told me she had a great day ---- They talked about the rules, colored, went to PE, and learned a poem called Marshmallow Toes.
She was very excited to go back this morning! She was ready to go back to her routine of meeting Grammie out in front of the building so that she could help pick up the 5th graders before running off to her class. So that is exactly what we did! I dropped her off at the front of the building where Grammie was waiting and off they went for an awesome 2nd day of school!

The FINAL Pictures!

Well these are the final pictures before we see the person in person! Our Dr. wanted to move our delivery date back one week because she was concerned that the baby was so small. Only in the 24th percentile. We still do not know if we will have to push back delivery but at the sonogram today they were happy with how the baby had grown. We will find out next Thursday what our Dr. wants. In the first picture the baby's eyes are closed and it's arm is up across the bottom of the face (covering the mouth and chin). The second picture shows the baby's profile with eyes and mouth open. The baby is now in the 30th percentile, heart beat is great and moves all the time. My blood pressure is great and we are so thankful! Please keep our family in your prayers as we add this little one.

The Building of the Stroller!

Today we took one step closer to being ready for the baby! Thanks to Pudden and Pap, MaKieley and John had a stroller and car seat to put together this afternoon! It kept them busy for a little while and they did such a great job!

Only one more week of summer for MaKieley! This time next week we will be making sure everything is ready for the FIRST DAY of FIRST GRADE! Can you believe it? Because I cannot! My big first grader Cooper Pirate! She told me today she was ready to go back because that meant the baby was about to come!

This week will be a busy one as we will be involved in Vacation Bible School this week and we have our final sonogram on Friday morning! If we are able to get any pictures we will post them then. We are so far along at this point I am not sure any of the pictures will have much to see.

Please keep our friends Keith and Stephanie McCord in your prayers! Especially on Tuesday! Tuesday he will have another round of CT scans. This is a very definitive time in the course of his treatment. He has had very little pain in the last week or so and he feels good about what is happening with this disease. Please pray for their peace to continue!

Playing Catch Up

Wow! Only about 4 weeks left! The baby will be here before we know it! We are trying to play catch up...you know...the room, picking out a name and so forth. The room is coming along...we finished painting and got the bed together. I am working on the bedding and other finishing touches. WE have really got to sit down and decide on a name for this baby! The way we are going we are going to be in the hospital deciding! That may be the easiest way to go! WE will definitely both be there! John is going to take a month off when the baby comes! We are all very excited about this!
MaKieley has a week and a half before school starts again! She is really excited (most days) about going to first grade! She has three loose teeth on the bottom and has been eating a couple of apples a day trying to lose them! Nothing yet! We will keep everyone updated though!

MaKieley, the Baby and another Sonogram

MaKieley is so ready for this baby to come! She follows me around and takes care of the baby and me constantly! I took her earlier in the summer to Target and Babies R Us to register and she thought that was the GREATEST thing! She is trying to help with everything to get ready for the baby. Last weekend she helped paint the baby's room! Now she is looking forward to putting the babies bed together next week! We just cannot slow her down!

We had another sonogram today! Since the baby did not participate last time we all gave the baby a pep talk before going in and it worked...somewhat! I also had some coffee and juice and ice! So if the pep talk did not get the babies attention my added ingredients did. The baby of course is still head down but instead of facing back -- we were facing forward with our face to the turned to the side! They were able to get all of the pictures they wanted this time and said the heart looked great and everything inside the babies head looked great too! These were the best pictures of the face they could get since the baby has dropped and does not have a lot of fluid around the face. 6 and 1/2 weeks left!

VACATION!! Second stop!

Our second stop was Sea World! We all had a lot of fun, especially MaKieley! In the morning we went see several shows...The Sea Lions, the Dolphins along with a lot of acrobats and water dancers and, a 4-D Haunted Lighthouse move where you got squirted with water and air and things seemed to jump out of the screen at you! During the afternoon we went to the water park to stay cool! MaKieley loved the wave pool and also the water playground! In the evening we went to see Shamu's new show Believe, the night show of the Sea Lions and Shamu Rocks Texas. At Shamu rocks Texas John decided we needed to sit in the splash zone. Needless to say we were soaked with freezing cold salt water after the sun went down! It was cold! MaKieley and I would hide behind John every time they would come to splash us! Since we were on the 4th row the water would still get us! It was a lot of fun though! Our last stop before going home was Franklin and the Farm! MaKieley shelled a ton of peas with Pap and picked tomatoes and flowers with Pudden! She also rode around in Pudden's new Putt Putt, played with the dogs and looked at the chickens and cows. Also while we were there we went to a wedding and MaKieley saw Katie and Buddy, her "cousins"! We had a great visit there.

VACATION!! First stop!

Our first stop as I said before was Fredericksburg!! We stayed in the Log Cottage, a bed and breakfast John's parents own. We swam and went to town to look around, John played tennis and, MaKieley rode a horse affectionately named "Big Tex" (otherwise known as Samar). She rode this horse instead of her pony because her pony had given birth only three months before and had not had a rider or been worked with since. If you want to check out the cottage you can see pictures of it at
http://www.fredericksburg-lodging.com/log-cottage/

Catch Up Time!

Wow!
The summer is flying by. Let's see if I can update.....then I will go back and hit the important parts that have pictures to go along with them!
MaKieley and I have been hanging out at home a lot! Reading and playing outside and doing workbooks!
Our last sonogram was almost a waste of time! The baby (which has been head down since 3 months) was as usual head down but also face back and in my back! They could not get all the pictures they wanted! They poked me and I turned on my side for a few minutes but she would not move for anything!!! I guess we know mid morning is going to be a great naptime for us!!
The doctor says everything is progressing well! I did end up being diagnosed with gestational diabetes again but have had no problem keeping it in control with a strict diet! MY BLOOD PRESSURE has stayed LOW!!! Most of the time it is around 104 over 65! That has been the biggest blessing of all! Despite the doctor not wanting me to travel ... she allowed me to go on vacation as long as I took along prenatal records in case of a needed trip to the hospital!
Vacation was great! MaKieley had so much fun! First we spent a few days in Fredericksburg...we swam, John played tennis and, MaKieley rode not HER horse but one that suited her just fine. Then we went to Sea World for a day! What fun! MaKieley loved every minute of that. It was a lot of walking though! Then on to the Farm to see Pudden and Pap! MaKieley shelled a lot of peas with Pap and picked tomatoes and flowers with Pudden! She even got to ride on Pudden's new PUTT PUTT!
After vacation it was time to rest up! Especially for Mom!
We ended up at the hospital almost a week after we got home! I had had a migraine for three days and the baby had not been moving like normal so they sent us to the hospital for a NST (non-stress test) to check the baby out. They said the baby looked good and gave me a shot to help get rid of my headache and sent me home!
Tomorrow we have another sonogram so hopefully the baby will participate this time and we will have pictures to share with everyone! Well I guess we are getting down to the wire so we better get busy on the nursery and names!