Happy Thanksgiving

Here are some highlights of our trip to The Woodlands for Thanksgiving. We had a great time but I think my parents enjoyed having Annalise at their house even more!




Freda did a good job sharing the way back of the car while we were on the road. She is still pretty jealous of Annalise.



Annalise was all smiles...





Some of the highlights of the week were...

• watching Mythbusters and football
• eating out at Chuy's, Rudy's, and Honey Bee
• relaxing!
• Jon and Freda getting to go running in the cold weather
• a delicious Thanksgiving meal
• lunch with Dixon and Liz
• listening to Christmas carols the entire ride back to Fort Worth

November Excitement!

Jon and I are getting really excited to go to The Woodlands on Tuesday for Thanksgiving! It will be our first car trip with Annalise and Freda in the back, so I am sure it will be very interesting.

Here are some exciting things that Annalise has done in November so far...

Pooping! She makes the most hilarious face when she is trying to go.

Her first bubble bath.

The first run in the baby jogger, it was cold out! I had no idea that it would be so hard to run with out your arms since I have to hold onto the stroller the entire time. In spite of it being so hard, it has been really fun for me to be able to get back into running.


Annalise has also started to have a lot of fun with her toys! She really likes the Exersaucer even though her feet just dangle out of the bottom because she's short little legs.






And, this was very exciting for me, she is now old enough to go to the nursery at church! Here she is in her Sunday best...

First Two Weeks

Our first two weeks at home went very smoothly. Annalise loves to sleep at night! We have only had two or three nights total (in the two months since she was born) where she kept us up at night. We are so thankful she is a good sleeper. She had a little bit of jaundice so we had to do some "sunbathing" in our windows.


My Mom stayed for an entire week and it was awesome! She was such a great help, I didn't want her to leave.

Three Generations!

We had some more visitors. Jon's Dad came first. He goes by Bud so I want Annalise to call him "Buddy." I think that will be super cute. He was very excited to meet his only granddaughter.


After Bud left, Jon's Mom came. She stayed for a few days and helped fix up our front porch so now it is nice to sit outside. We are so glad she got to come visit!



Annalise also met her future husband Grayson Westerfield! He is 22 days older than her and his parents are me and Jon's best friends!




Annalise also had her first bath!



Towards the end of the two weeks, Freda realized that this noisy baby was here to stay and decided to do some investigating...

October Highlights

October was full of many exciting "firsts!"

Here is her first date with Grayson...


Her first smile...


First time to share with her Uncle Thomas...



First day to dress up to be out on the town...



First time to sit up in her Bumbo chair, which she loves...


First time to be long enough to wear her footie PJ's...


First Halloween- She dressed as a ballerina and Grayson was a penguin. Freda also borrowed her costume...

Coming Home!

We were very excited when it was time to leave the hosptial with Annalise, especially because there had been a small possibility that she would have had to stay in the NICU for several days. My parents and brother were there to greet us when we got home.





Also, our dog Freda was there and wasn't too happy about meeting her new little sister- the attention hog! Little does she know that Annalise will be her very best friend when she is old enough to start dropping food on the floor from her high chair.


A few photos of our first afternoon at home. We can't believe how cute and tiny she is! Also, we quickly learned that she loves to snuggle.

Whew! It is hard work being a baby!!!

My First 48 Hours... the NICU!

When Annalise was born there was a team of nurses from the NICU in the delivery room with us. They were concerned that she could be hypoglycemic because of my diabetes. They checked her blood sugar right away and it was low. So the nurses had Jon feed her a bottle.


The bottle didn't help to raise her blood sugar enough so they decided they needed to take her away to the NICU. I knew it was a possibility that she would have to be in the NICU but I assumed she would not have to go because my blood sugars had been under such great control while I was pregnant.

It was a little sad when the wheeled her away, she was only about an hour old and we had only been able to hold her for just a few minutes each. An hour or so later the doctor from the NICU came in our room to give us a report. She said that Annalise was doing great and that we could come see her whenever we wanted. She also said that she would have to be in the NICU a minimum of 24 hours but it could possibly take up to 2 weeks to get her blood sugars under control.

At about noon, the nurses came and got Jon and I because our other hospital room was ready. While they were moving us to our new room, they took us by the NICU to see Annalise. She had an IV in her head and was attached to lots of monitors.


We got settled in our new room and had some more visitors. It was kinda sad when people would come by for Annalise to not be in our room. But, we were allowed to bring visitors down to the NICU one at a time. So, when people came by, Jon would take them down there. You have to scrub in like your about to preform surgery.




When we were down in the NICU later that evening one of the nurses told us that they would feed her at 12, 3, 6, and 9 and that if we came during those times, one of us could feed her!


Having her in the NICU the first night after she was born was AMAZING! We both slept for 12 straight hours. I was so exhausted because by the time I went to bed on the 12th, I had been awake for 24 plus hours.

Annalise stayed in the NICU till about 11pm on the 13th. She spent the night with us on the 13th in our hosptial room and on the 14th, we all got to go home!