Keira: 3 years old!

I cannot believe that I now have a 3 year old!

Happy Birthday to Keira- she has brought lots of joy, laughs, and also taught me what a roller coaster motherhood is, while seeing my little mini-me grow up!

It is hard to believe that she has been in our lives for 3 years now! I could never imagine life without her, however at the same time the last 3 years have gone SOOO fast! As the Bible says, "Life is a vapor". I didn't realize the true impact of that statement until having children. Now I realize how quickly time flies, and that I need to be making the right decisions regarding how I spend my precious time.

Things that she is up to right now:

1. She just started Cubbies at AWANA. She loves it and looks so grown-up! This was her first week, and she did a great job saying her verses. :)

2. She enjoys going to MOPS every other week and calls it "school". She is doing a great job learning to be apart of a group and play with others.

3. She is LOVING having mommy home, and consistently now says, "I want to just stay home and chill with you mom!". The fact that she says, "Chill" cracks me up! I am enjoying being able to see all the fun things she does, and play with her more. She loves doing puzzles, read books, and do crafts. However, her favorite thing currently is to play with the new Barbie house that she got from Grandma Lea. She has such an active imagination and can play for hours with her house! We have consistently heard her say she is "taking her Barbies' golfing." Grandpa Steve would be so proud!!!

4. She gets up and gets ready on her own. She has now gotten into the habit of getting up in the morning, going to her closet, and getting dressed before I even know she is up. If I am still in bed, she will go to the fridge and pour herself a glass of milk. So grown up! She has been such a helper with getting me what I ask for, cleaning, and taking care of herself now that Lainey is here. I sometimes forget that she is only 3, as she is so good at being independent!

5. She is 38.5 inches tall. WOWZER, she is gonna be tall like Daddy I think! I am not sure what she weighs, but she is very tall and thin!

6. Her Phrases: these are some that I have heard pop out of her mouth this week!

"where in the world are you going for heavens sake?!"- This is what she asked me as I was driving home, taking a different route than we normally do. She is usually very good and recognizing the routes we take, and I threw her for a loop!

"Princesses (Parises as she says) wear crowns mom!"- She is VERY big into princesses, she wants to wear only dresses that "dance really well" and wear heels, jewelry, crown, and wand to go along with. She is quite the girly girl! One morning when I was trying to convince her to wear pants to church, she got the most pitiful face and sniffled, "But I am a princess, and so I MUST wear a dress!" She also loves Fancy Nancy books and has started using words such as "ecstatic"

7. She LOVES to dance and is begging to get into dance, we are considering it...Daddy isn't too keen on the idea, he just sees $$$ signs!

8. She takes after Grandma's in cleaning. That is one of her favorite pastimes. She loves to get out her squirt bottle with water, go get a towel and start scrubbing...the walls, floor, windows- anything I will let her clean!

9. She loves her "friends"- she wanted to make sure that we invited all her friends to her birthday, so we had a "Friends" party at Playdaze and are also having a family party for her on Saturday. She is very influenced by what she thinks her friends would like.

We are so thankful for her! We are praying for her salvation and she love Jesus with her heart and use her outgoing personality to be a witness for him!

Happy 3rd Birthday Keira Deara!!! We love you so much!

Lainey Jane "Bright Light of Grace"- The Story of Her Arrival

Hi Friends!

It has been a little while, but as promised I wanted to write down the story of Lainey's birth, before I forgot! ;)

I love reading birth stories, as they are all a little bit different, but all miraculous in their own way!

So Lainey's birth was a bit different than I was expecting, as most are. :)

I went in for my 39 week checkup on Friday, December 30, 2011 at 11:00 am. My last day prior to maternity leave was supposed to be the day before, but I had some things I was still trying to finish up, so I had stayed up until about 2AM on that night before, finishing work projects up. Then they had planned a meeting in the office for management at 8:00 AM and I had some stuff that I wanted to get tied up at the office, so I went in for a meeting at 8 on Friday morning. Austin had the day off, so we planned on me going into the office for a bit, then Austin, Keira, and I going to my doc appt, and then spending the rest of the day running some errands and having a relaxing family day with just the 3 of us.

I went to Hyvee on the way to my meeting to pick up donuts and milk, and ran into Austin's boss. We were joking that he was wrong as he had guessed that she would be born on that Thursday (Dec 29). I said that I was guessing that I had at least another week- if not more before she was born. I had everything planned out- I was pushing really hard to get all of my work stuff finished, and then I was planning to have a week off of work to spend with Keira and get my house caught up on, and last minute projects with the baby etc. finished up before she arrived, as I wasn't due until the next Friday.

WELL- God obviously had other plans! I was late getting out of my meeting/ the office, so I ran home and grabbed Keira and Austin and we rushed off to the doctors office. I was planning on my appt. being about 30 minutes, and Austin was starving so as we waited we were discussing where to eat lunch, errands for the day, etc. When we went in to see the doctor, the nurse asked if I wanted to set an induction date. I said, no, as I really wanted to see if this one would come on her own- plus I was looking forward to a week to get my brain wrapped around baby before she came. :) The nurse and PA were pleasantly surprised, as most people I think want to be induced when they get to that stage. Once we saw Bridget, the PA, she noticed that the fluid levels looked a bit low in my amniotic sac, so she decided to look a little closer, and took some more detailed measurements. My fluid was measuring at a 7. Normally anything between 10-25 is in the normal range, and anything below a 5 is very dangerous. With that, she also noticed that the umbilical cord was starting to calcify, which shows it is getting old and baby is usually ready to come. She then said that she would like to induce me that day, or at the latest on Tuesday (all doctors offices/ and scheduled inductions were closed until Tuesday, as it was the NY weekend, Monday was the official Holiday for New Years Day.) I asked her if I could get induced Tuesday, and she said that made her a bit nervous, as my fluid could drop alot in just one day. So- they hooked me/ baby up to the stress test to see if she was active/ looked like she was in distress. Everything looked good, however they did notice that I was having contractions that were about 4 minutes apart, 1 minute long. Bridget asked if I could feel them, and I said "yes, but I have been having those all week off and on". With that, she said that I needed to go to the hospital that day, as they normally tell people to head into the hospital when contractions are consistently every 5 minutes apart.

I started stressing for a quick moment as I thought about all the stuff I hadn't got done at work/ home and then I just relaxed and realized this was God's timing, and I wasn't going to worry about what didn't get done. I started to get excited as I realized that our little girl would be in arms soon!

We then headed home with Keira, and got my bag and made some lunch and picked up the house a bit. We dropped Keira off at Steve and Lea's, and then headed up to Mercy Hospital around 2:30 pm in the afternoon. The doctor's office had called ahead and said that we were coming. Since it was the start of a holiday weekend, we noticed from when we first walked in, that the hospital was a ghost town! Before I even got to the maternity floor a nurse asked, "Are you Elizabeth?...we have been waiting for you!" Come to find out I was the only person in labor that day and she was my nurse. My doctor was out of town, so I knew I was going to get the on-call doctor, who ironically was the doctor I had with Keira. However, for Keira's birth he was at another hospital, so he didn't deliver her and I got a different on- call doctor. I asked if he could just come in and break my water as I thought my labor would go fast on its own if they did that, but the nurse said that she couldn't do that- only a doctor could. Since there were no on-call doctors in the hospital (they were all out at clinic), they started me on a cervix softener, as I was only about 1.5 cm dilated and not effaced when I went in. They kept giving me doses of that every 3 hours, and in between I would get up and walk the halls, etc. It was pretty interesting to walk the hospital at that time of the day, on a holiday- no one was around at all! It was nice to be able to walk, as with Keira I was stuck in bed from when I first got there. Around 8 that evening my mom and Faith came up, and then a bit later, Charity and Levi, and my Dad and Charis and Nate (who drove into town when they heard baby was on the way) all came up. It was a big family affair in my room! ;)

I had said before that if the baby didn't have a name by the time we got to the hospital, I would put all of the options up on the whiteboard, and people could vote on what they liked. So- since we were sitting waiting for baby to arrive, we put all the names up on the wall.... Lainey not being one of them. At that point, we had pretty much narrowed the names down to Kalla or Kaia. However, we couldn't agree on a way to spell Kalla, and Kaia we thought was maybe too close to Keira. I happened to mention that if I had my way, I would name her Elaina Jane, as I have liked that name since I was a teenager. However, Austin did not like Elaina at all, so we hadn't even considered it. My sister (not sure which one) said, "Well you could name her Elaina and call her Lainey". Austin then said, "I really like Lainey!" I couldn't believe that we hadn't thought of that or even discussed it! So- that is how Lainey ended up on the board. It was fun because we let each of the visitors, and the doctors and nurses vote on their pick. ;)

Around 10:30 I actually started to be in some pretty good pain, so I kicked everyone out. My mom looked dead tired so she went home to get some sleep for a bit, as we figured it would be a long night. I tried to get some sleep but by that time was in too much pain to get much sleep. Around 3 AM they started me on pitocin, which didn't affect me much, as I was already having pretty strong contractions. Around 4:30 I asked about an epidural. They told me that the anesthesiologist was in West Omaha sleeping, so it would take about 30 minutes for him to come- I asked that they go ahead and call him. ;). At this point I was still only about 3 cm dilated, but was in alot of pain and getting really tired, as I hadn't slept much that night, or the night before. I ended up getting the epidural around 5 AM, and my mom came back up about that time as well. Once I had the epidural, I was able to finally relax, and things started moving quickly. By 7 AM my water FINALLY broke on its own, and I was completely dilated and ready to push. They called the doctor, who said to turn of the pitocin and such and get ready for the birth. He called again around 7:30 and said he was 5 minutes away- but to hold me off as he was on his way! He walked into the room at 7:35 AM, and I was planning on pushing for at least an hour. However, with 3 pushes, she was out! PTL that she was born when she was, as her cord was wrapped around her neck and they had to unwrap it as she came out. Our precious little girl was born at 7:42 AM on December 31, 2011.

She was the last baby of the year born at Mercy Hospital in 2011, as no other babies were born that day. As soon as the doctor held her up I knew she looked alot like Keira as she had the same round head, and distinctive scowl that Keira had. She weighed in at 6 lbs 8 oz (perfect!!) and was 20 inches long, so almost the exact same size and dimensions as her sister! She had a head of beautiful dark hair as well. :)

Around 9:30 that morning Keira came up with Grandma Lea to meet her sister. She was so anxious, but very quiet and reverent- almost as if she thought this new little sister was SO much responsibility. She loved holding her, and playing with her toes, saying, "Look at her tiny toes!"

We spent the rest of the day resting and having family come up and meet the newest addition. In the evening, we had some visitors and our good friends Blake and Steph stayed for quite awhile and chatted. Austin ran out and got some root beer and oreos to ring the new year in with! ;)

We had planned on having a New Year's Eve Party- just not one in the hospital! However, we got our steak and shrimp dinner complete with wine, and could even see fireworks that the neighbors were doing from our room- you can't beat that! ;)

We still hadnt decided on a name the next day, so I went to shower, and told Austin to think about the name and I would think about it, and we would then convene and see what we each concluded. I thought about the name we had been leaning towards the whole time Kalla, and then thought about Lainey, which were the two I was debating between. We had kept coming back to Kalla the whole time, but I liked that Lainey sounded different than Keira, so she would have more of her own identity. I loved Elaina, but knew Austin would want to call her Lainey, so I thought about it and decided that I liked Lainey, since that is what we would be calling her, more than Elaina.

When I came out of the shower,I asked Austin what he thought, and he said, "Kalla". I said, "oh."...because I had thought he would say "Lainey" and we would have a decision! I said, "Bummer- I had been thinking Lainey". He answered by saying, "Well I like Lainey better, but thought you wanted to only use Elaina, and so I think we would fight about it all the time!" LOL- so once we got on the same page, we decided to go with Elaina, and call her Lainey. I love it, because I think it sounds modern, but elegant at the same time. It means, "Bright Light of Grace" and we are praying that is what she will be...a shining light for Jesus to the world!

She is now 18 days old, and we are loving every minute with her. :) She came home from the hospital on Monday, January 2 and it was so nice to have Austin home with us the first week! We are now adjusting to him being back at work and me being home. I am honestly LOVING being home this time and wishing my leave would last forever! Keira is such a big helper and loves having a little sister. :)