Santa Claus

Since Reese's first Christmas, this was the first year there were no tears when we went to see the big man. But really, her first Christmas doesn't count since she was only 3 months old.

She told him (and I quote), "I want a sheen so I can sew Cupcake somepin' somepin' to wear to the ball game next year. Yay!" Cupcake is the baby doll she got the day Elynn was born, and she wants to sew her something to wear to the ball games next year. Y'all, she's a girl after my own heart. She also wants a karaoke machine, a matching game, and a bed for her baby dolls, but the "sheen" was the only thing she told Santa about. God bless Adam, I don't think he can take 2 women in the house screaming at a "sheen."

She didn't cry, but she definitely thought he was a little sketchy.  

Then there was this....a tiny little smile.

She now is of the belief that Bass Pro Shops is the North Pole. That's going be a little difficult to explain when we go there in...oh...say...July. 

Elynn: 1 month old

Weighs between 9-10 lbs. 

Usually goes to bed around 8 or 9, and gets up to eat 2 times between then and 5 or 6 AM. 

She is very quiet and laid back. I hear that this is common in 2nd babies. She very rarely cries. We thought that Reese was such an easy baby, but compared to Elynn, Reese was high maintenance. 

She got a paci when she was 3 weeks old, but she doesn't love it. Most of the time she gags and spits it out. We finally found one that she seemed to like, but it isn't something she has to have. 

Reese on the left at 1 month. Elynn on the right at 1 month. 

Bless her heart. She is Reese's personal baby doll and patient. Here she is getting her temperature taken. She also got a shot from Dr. Reese. When I told Reese to be careful she said, "I just 'tendin'." (pretending)

Random things I don't want to forget

Allow me to begin by telling you how naive I am as a new mother of 2 little people. I attempted the impossible last night. I tried to get a picture of both of them together for our Christmas card. And y'all, thanks to Pinterest, I had high, high expectations. I have seen countless precious pictures of the older siblings with the brand new baby and they all look like they are straight out of some photography magazine. After the disaster that went down here yesterday, the jury is still out as to whether we will even have a Christmas card this year. Let's just say that there was bribing and crying and kicking and screaming. The kids were even worse, and I will leave it at that. 

 

Here is my only other attempt at getting their picture together. Yeah, it went just as well as you might suspect.

And here's a few things I don't want to forget...

Saturday night, after the Lord showed up at the Auburn game and allowed Louis to catch that ball for the game winning touchdown, I blacked for a second, but when I regained consciousness I heard Reese loudly declared, "praise the Lord!" My thoughts exactly sister. 

Sunday afternoon Reese was in the bathroom and from the living room we heard a loud bang. She immediately said, "nofin' happened." 

Reese has started loving Gogurts and when I say love I mean she wants to eat upwards of 4 of them between supper and bedtime. Anyway, I keep them in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator so she can reach them. Last night she asked Adam to help her get one and he told her she could do it herself and in the most annoyed voice she said, "No I can't. Der's too much junk in there." And she was right. There was so much "junk" in the drawer she couldn't get it closed. 

Saturday we went to Allison's for Krystal's baby shower. Within 2.5 seconds of making this picture before we left home Elynn spit up all over this outfit. Such a shame because this little piece of MeeMaw's artwork has to be hand washed. She'll probably be outgrown it before I get around to doing that.

These girls had a blast, and I bet they didn't at all make a mess in Addie's playroom.

Reese wouldn't even hold her own sister. She was much more excited about holding Madelyn.

 She said she needed this umbrella because it was hot outside.

And then there was this.

Fortunately no one was injured. Reese was so concerned about the victim of her reverse driving, can't you tell? She wasn't alone in her concern though. MaKenna's very own mother was saying, "Hold on a minute. Let me get a picture." We are all very mature mothers who put our children's safety first.

Elynn's newborn pictures

I can't even tell you all the bribing that went into get Reese to act right during this photo shoot. It was exhausting, but I was so proud of her. She constantly wants to hold Elynn, but it's more of a head bobbing, slinging her around kind of hold. It isn't something that would look pleasant in pictures. It helped a lot that the photographer had a huge swing set outside that she got to play with afterwards. 

I am still laughing at this one. I'm just devastated that she has no personality. 

The rest of our hospital stay

They no longer take babies to the nursery for their first bath. It now happens in the room with the parents which seems so much smarter to me. Less chance of an accidental baby swap!

 Reese couldn't wait to get her hands on Elynn. Most of the time if we refer to her as "baby sisor" Reese will correct us and say, "No, it's Elynn."

 Nobody is exempt from playing Reese's games. Not even my 88 year old Papa.

Elynn with Dr. Ballard. I absolutely adore her. She is the best. 

 And then we headed home...

 The only person that was happier than Adam and I that we were home was the big sister. We are still telling her how proud we are of how well she did while we were in the hospital.

Elynn Rae 10.29.13

I had an appointment last Tuesday at 10:30 with Dr. Ballard. For good measure I got up, finished packing our bags, and loaded them in the car. Just in case. I dropped Reese off at daycare, ran a few errands which included perusing the aisles of Target while drinking a Starbucks. Adam met me at Dr. Ballard's office where she informed us that I was 5 or 6 cm and 100% thinned out. She gave us the option to go over to the hospital or go home and wait for my water to break. She didn't really think the water breaking option was a good idea considering we don't live close to the hospital. My first and only concern was who was doing epidurals that day because if it was the same one who did it with Reese there was no way I was being admitted that day. Dr. Ballard called and found out that a guy named Danny was on call. Danny is the same guy who we met when we went to the birthing class when I was pregnant with Reese and I told Adam then that he was the guy I wanted. He seemed so nice which is exactly what I need when being faced with a needle in the spine. When she told us he was there I knew it was meant to be;).

When we got there and got hooked up I was having contractions 2 minutes apart. Things did not start off well when the nurse tried to start my IV, but the first one she did wouldn't work for some reason. We hadn't been there 30 minutes and I was already giving Adam the look. It's the same look I give him anytime I'm in a medical setting and I'm the patient. And from his eye rolling response, I can tell that he really loves me a lot during those moments. I wanted to go ahead and get the epidural over with, so that I wasn't a grouch the rest of the afternoon. I knew once it was over I could relax. When Danny came in the room I was already crying the ugly cry. He assured me that my first experience was not how it would go this time around. When it was over, I might or might not have told him I wanted to kiss him on the mouth. It was so much better than the one I had with Reese. It did not hurt nearly as bad, and my face didn't look like I had had a stroke when it was over. And Adam was relieved that he wasn't going to have to spend the coming years listening to me complain about how horrible it was.

At a little after 5:00, I was dilated to a 10. After a few pushes the nurse called Dr. Ballard and within 10 minutes of her getting to our room, Elynn was born at 5:29 PM. 

D.D. stopped and got Reese on her way to the hospital, and she spent the afternoon playing with her new baby doll and car seat. 

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And then the moment we had all been waiting for... She came into this world screaming! When Reese was born she had the cord around her neck several times and had swallowed a lot of fluid which resulted in no sound coming from her for a long time. That was not the case with Elynn. She cried loudly for quite a while. 

After the hour of Kangaroo Care (skin to skin contact), Adam went after the big sister who was being entertained in the lobby by Clay and Jolie. 

She weighed 7.7 lbs and was 19 inches long. (Reese weighed 7.9 lbs and was 19 1/2 inches long.)

Tuesday night Reese happily went home with Clay and Jolie from the hospital. Heather said she cried for us a little and she was really restless, but overall she did okay. Wednesday morning Heather ask if she was going to spend the night again and she quickly told her "NO!" After spending the day at the hospital with us on Wednesday she cried (and so did her momma) when Heather tried to get her to go home with her. So she stayed with us and Adam planned to go home with her that night and stay. She ended up going with Jaycie and Brooklyn to "the red store to get an icee" when they came to visit. (The red store is Target.) They met up with D.D. and Reese stayed with her that night. Thankfully that all went better than I ever expected it to. 

We came home on Thursday, and so far she has been such an easy baby. She has been getting her last feeding between 9 and 10 then waking up again between 2 and 3 to eat, and then maybe getting up again around 5. 

Reese seems to be adjusting really well other than one moment on Thursday afternoon when she was watching cartoons and out of nowhere she said, "I tired of Elynn. Call PeePaw and tell him to come get her." Later when PeePaw came over she would not allow him to take her with him, so I guess she changed her mind. Saturday night we all ended up in Reese's bed when she woke up while I was feeding Elynn and wanted me in her bed. Adam, Elynn, and I all got in her bed. She finally went back to sleep. Thankfully, Reese doesn't seem too bothered by Elynn's presence. Every now and then she wants to hold her, but otherwise she goes on about her business and occasionally asks, "where's baby sisor?"  

Reese on the left and Elynn on the right. 

I've got tons of picture to upload...which will hopefully happen before she turns 1;)