Author Archives: Julie

Painted Ladies

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For Alyssa’s birthday we bought her a Butterfly Pavilion. We sent in our coupon and received 10 Painted Lady caterpillars. Lucky for me my mom was here when we started this process and helped walk me through it. While the process is amazing to watch it is also a little gross. We made a calendar and noted every time we saw a change in the caterpillar. When they emerged, we kept the butterflies in the net for a few days then decided they would like their remaining 8-10 days of life better outside. This evening we enjoyed reaching in for each butterfly and holding it for a minute before it flew away. Megan yelled at hers when it flew away. We also had a couple who decided their life was short so they better get started with their sole purpose. These two butterflies did not come apart or fly away, so we placed them on a flower out front. 2 hours later, I checked and they are still there together. How sweet. See more

Visitors

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Ice cream in the evening


Making Papa smile

We have had lots of fun around our house over the last two weeks. My mom and niece, Blakely, were here for a week and my dad joined at the end. The girls had a great time together, and I just enjoyed having one of my girls occupied 24 hours a day by someone other than me. Alyssa and Blakely would disappear into her room for hours at a time. They would come back dressed alike in some way pretending some random game. They were even able to sleep in the same room all week. Usually we have to move one of them, but they finally figured out how to be quiet. They were up before anyone else in the morning quietly playing in their room.We all drove to Chattanooga on Saturday for the Acquarium and then they headed out Monday.

Tuesday, Kedra and her kids joined us for several days. Managing four kids is difficult enough, so we didn’t ventured out of the house much…or did we at all? But we had fun just being together. We could not get Lauren and Megan to be friends. They just walked right by each other and refused to take a picture for us. Kedra and I are 6 months apart and have known each other since about that age. Our girls are 7 months apart and will be friends whether they like it or not! Thank you for making the effort to see us. It is not easy to be away from home with young kids for very long and I welcome your visits anytime; crying, disobeying, sassing, vomit and all.


Are they actually playing?


Our walks for some peace and quiet


The best we could do as a group


Mommy-made outfits

Hope

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18 weeks

It is rare that I don’t know how to start a post. Usually, I am classifying events by blog worthy or not. I am thinking of what I will actually say before I even sit down. This past week has been different. While I wanted to post this last week, something held me back. But today, I am here to share. Last Wednesday, I received a call from my doctor that revealed some disappointing news about my recent quad-screen test. In simplest terms, I had a 1 in 30 chance of carrying a baby with Down Syndrome. I didn’t know exactly how they come to that number, but that didn’t matter. The fact was that my hope in a healthy baby was shattered. And it didn’t matter what happened in the days to come, everything had changed. You can only walk the naive path that your baby is healthy for so long. We were scheduled for an ultrasound that was to get a better look at the baby and give a better idea of what we were facing. That ultrasound was today. We had 5 days to struggle with the unknown. 5 days to wonder “why?” 5 days to question God. 5 days to be mad. 5 days to worry. And we also had 5 days to cast our burdens to the Lord. 5 days to share the fears with friends and family. 5 days to trust. 5 days to hope.

I went into the appointment today believing this: “Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. ” – Romans 5: 3-5

The more I read this, the more I truly believed it. My sufferings, past and present, have produced hope. Therefore, I guess they produced perseverance and character along the way. All that was keeping us going this weekend was hope that this baby would be healthy. And if we received news that the opposite was true, we would have hope that God could heal. And if God chose to not heal, we would have hope that we would cope and we would survive. Hope does not disappoint.

After sharing our sufferings of last week, I can now share the joy of the Lord. I can shout it as best as possible through the internet that God is good. That God hears the cries of his children. The ultrasound today revealed only good news. It showed a healthy baby girl that measures right on track and shows no sign of Down Syndrome. That’s right a girl! The doctor reduced our risks to 1 in 90, but in his 25 years experience thinks that is still too high. We are scheduled for ultrasounds every three weeks to check her progress and make sure nothing appears in the future, but we are satisfied tonight. We feel the peace of God resting on our shoulders — holding our hands, saying, “I will take care of you.”

Chuck E Cheese

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I regret to say that when your children get older, they begin to have their own opinions. It has started with us from clothes, to color of bow, to where she wants her birthday. I had to eventually let my control issues go and give her the party that she wanted. And I am so glad I did, she had a blast. And of course, having cousin Blakely here helped. My mom and Blakely arrived yesterday and they have been inseparable ever since. Today we had a great time celebrating her birthday with family, some old friends and I am so happy to say some new friends. I told my mom today that she was going to be impressed at how many friends we have made. Thank you all for coming and making this day special for Alyssa. Party pics

Her cake at home on the 4th

“I love Tennessee”

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I hear those words from my husband at least once a week. Usually relating to the weather or the scenery. Today we went to Percy Warner Park in Brentwood to enjoy some nature. They have a really good nature center displaying the birds and wildlife that can be seen in the park. We saw everything from a baby skunk to snake skins. There are several trails to follow and we choose one of the shorter ones so we wouldn’t end up carrying two kids back. The girls had fun just wandering the path, seeing wild strawberries, spotting chipmunks, squirrels and birds. We stopped and threw about 15 dozen rocks into a creek and enjoyed a picnic in the Tennessee breeze. I think that is when I heard, “I love Tennessee.”

The other thing Ethan loves here is that his patience for birds has finally paid off. After staking out his bluebird box for months, keeping it free from sparrows, we finally had a bluebird couple move in, make a nest and lay eggs. Though Ethan found one of the tiny blue eggs on the ground with a hole in it [stupid sparrow], mama bluebird is still guarding the other eggs. You can see her flying back in the bluebird box after I scared her out of it. She didn’t go far, but watched her eggs from our fort waiting to return.

Then with no help from us, robins made a nest on our front porch. It is great, because we can watch them from my office window without bothering them. Here are a few shots from in the house, then I decided to go outside.

I was able to get a good look at the four babies, and mama sat nearby watching. Then I think she had enough. I don’t know that she was really coming for me, but it was enough to scare me back inside. I guess her plan worked.

16 weeks

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I had my 16 week checkup this week. Pretty normal and on track. Well, if you consider threatening the 5 yr old and stuffing goldfish in the 1 yr old normal. JoJo’s heartbeat was 158 for those who think you can predict the sex by that number. My 20 week ultrasound is scheduled for June 25th. So frogs or flowers will have to wait until then.

P.S. Along with some of Megan’s other cute phrases like “stawbrr tortkak” (strawberry shortcake), “ank ooo mommy” (thank you mommy), and “ear ooo go, mommy” (here you go, mommy), she now can say “baby JoJo”. She has no idea what that means, but that is beside the point.

Photoshoot

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It is simple. We were headed out for the day with Daddy and I thought they looked cute. “Let’s go outside real quick and take a picture before we leave.”


“Look at the camera Alyssa.”


“Alyssa. At me.”


“Meeeegan! Look at mommy.”


“Got it.”

Nope, I just Photoshopped it. (Yes, I am good at it.) But something prevents me from printing these type of pictures to keep for myself, because the event I have supposedly captured didn’t exist. The other pictures actually tell a more accurate story of my kids at this age.

They do a little better individually.

And this is our bunny who usually eats breakfast with us.

The Class of 2008

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Preschool graduation that is. They had a very cute, elaborate ceremony for Alyssa’s school allowing each kid to walk the stage and receive a certificate. They marched in to the typical graduation theme song and preformed a few songs for us. Most of the kids preformed…okay maybe all of them but mine?? They sang three songs and Alyssa told me early that week that she was only going to sing “I am a Promise”. She did not lie. She stood very still and solemn during the other, but jazzed right up on cue for her song. I couldn’t help but smile that she actually did one song. Oh, did I mention that she is the only kid without her cap on? At least she was easy to spot. Afterwards, she walked down, shook her teacher’s hand and received her award. As silly as it seems, I was very proud of her. Immediately following the ceremony, we walked down the hall to get her cap that she chose not to wear, and she insists on putting it on and proceeds to wear it the rest of the evening. She also showed me all the moves and sang along with her preschool songs on CD the next day, but forbid me to video … ugh! She is definitely a non-conformist.

Baby A.K.A. Jojo

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Here is the post you have all been waiting for. You are saying to yourself, “What’s the deal? She tells us she is pregnant and we don’t hear a word about this new baby.” Without further ado, meet Jojo. (I decided we needed to give the baby a name, and Alyssa picked it out)

8 weeks

11 weeks

Okay, so I have done this four times now, but I was truly amazed at how much the baby grew in three weeks. At 11 weeks, we are still only talking about 1.5″ long, but the picture seemed to show a true jump in size. I just don’t think you ever get comfortable with the idea of pregnancy. The whole miracle of it all. I am still amazed when I see that form on the screen.

I visited with my doctor last fall. I scheduled a consultation with her and we just talked about Noah and what I may want out of another pregnancy. I really liked her from the first visit. She had the right balance of compassion, professionalism and knowledge. I am able to treat this pregnancy however I want, really. I am not considered hi-risk, I wasn’t with Megan either. But I told her that I may need the extra monitoring toward the end for my peace of mind…then again I may not. Either way, so far I am very satisfied with my care and the office.

As of today, I am 14 weeks along. If I stop to think about it, I guess I have felt better in the last 2 weeks. For the last 10 or so, I have felt worse than with any of the others. Which doesn’t say a lot, because I was not a bit nauseated with the others. This one hit me different though… manageable, just annoying really.

Alyssa is calling the baby a boy and is really wanting a brother “on Earth”. We have had the conversation that God may decide we need another girl, but we can drive that home if we find out it is a girl. Until then, I may just let her hope it is a boy — her and her Papa. So for now, everything is good on the baby front. I will continue with the 4 week checkups and will keep you all posted.