all grown up...and yet, such a baby

As fairly warned, Bizbeth suddenly grew up this month.  She is only 16 months old and yet in comparison to the littlest sister, Abigail, she is huge! and so mature! ...that is, until she just isn't. 

While she seems so capable--her verbal skills are continuing to improve (she now has added the words "book," "ball," "baby" etc...to her vocabulary)--she is still very much a baby.  She does have a lot of moments of frustration when she can't express herself fully.  She still communicates like a baby.  She still needs to be fed with a spoon.  She still needs to be carried a lot--or must be corralled when walking on her own.  She still wants to climb onto my lap and cuddle like a baby.  Poor dear!  The transition to middle child has been better than expected but still pretty rough on her. 

She immediately started calling Abigail "Baby!" even before I referred to her as such.  She has been pretty sweet so far (mostly trying to wave to her etc...) but is so unreliable that I cannot leave the two of them alone together.  She does enjoy playing with David, and the two of them (while still picking at each other) have also seemed to bond a bit more this month. 

Despite being a bit of a tomboy (and looking like a waif half the time--her hair is at that awkward stage), Elizabeth loves to pick out her clothes, dress up, and wear bows (which only last in her hair minutes before she pulls them out and then we have a crying fit until they get put back in). 

Despite her obvious independence, she also loves to cuddle and rock with Mommy.  She is most definitely a Daddy's girl though!  She squeals in delight when she sees him and yells out "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" over and over.  She loves to climb on his lap and snuggle too.

My bright little girl is growing up and yet experiencing some of the frustration that comes with still being a baby.  Time will change that soon enough though.

a month with Daddy, Bizbeth--and a new baby

David is 47 months old this month...just one month shy of the magic age of 4 years old!  Much of this month has been documented in pictures with Daddy.  David did get a lot of Daddy-only time this month as he spent a week at the beach in NC with Daddy and the rest of the Weyler clan.  (Mommy stayed home with Bizbeth since she was 37 weeks pregnant)

Play time with sister Bizbeth also consumed a lot of this month. 

My little boy has been called to step-up and help with the arrival of his littlest sister, Alligator (known to us as Abigail).  Fortunately, much of the time he has risen to the occasion. 
Thank you, sweet David!
(PS David has gotten very good at thanking me for making him a "yummy" dinner; way to a Mommy's heart...)

At eight days old...

Little Miss Abigail is still the calmest, most contented baby.

Fortunately, after going to the doctor every two days for her jaundice, she finally passed muster and was given the go-ahead to next come back at her two month appointment. We had her 2 week appointment a little early. Her stats are as follows: 7 lbs. 3.2 oz. (25%ile), 20" long (54%ile), and like my others, a tiny head circumference of 33.5 cm (10%ile).

She is still eating every 2-3 hours but has gone as long as 4 1/2 hours at night. She still does a pretty good job eating and going back to sleep, but she does have more dirty diapers than any baby I have ever met! (and often even more in the midst of diaper changes)

She has flipped from tummy to back several times. She does sleep more soundly on her tummy (like my others), but since she is pretty content, we mostly try to put her to sleep on her back- as recommended.

She looks great in pink and still displays the sweetest smiles regularly and involuntarily as she eats or sleeps.

How aptly named this little one is! What a Father's joy!

a Belated Happy 4th of July

The model baby- an alligator

I holding my breath and know it is a bit too early to speak, but Abigail (affectionately called "Alligator" by David) appears to be the "perfect" baby that I have heard about from friends, an answer to prayers. She rarely cries and when she does, it is only for a few seconds before relaxing back to sleep again. The only problem I have is sometimes in trying to rouse her enough to get a decent feeding with her. She generally wants to eat about every three hours. When she is done, she either is asleep or if awake, is happy to just lie contentedly in bed. She is the first baby i have had who eats and then goes back to sleep without fussing in the middle of the night! Her unhappiest moments are sitting in dirty diapers. Even the diaper changes don't rile her. She is so laid-back! She appears to be quite ticklish and will often smile in reflex to being tickled.  What a little JOY! :)

Announcing a new little girl- with a name!

Well, I jokingly will say that the hardest part of the whole hospital experience has been the deciding on a name...

It began very unexpectedly with my water breaking on Sunday evening around 9:40ish.  It was not the original gush that came with David, but it was sudden enough and enough liquid that I was pretty certain what was happening.  No contractions yet, but I knew we would have to go to the hospital anyway and did not want to rush things like with E.  We gathered up our stuff and headed out the door.  We arrived at the hospital at 10:25 pm. I had a second gush of water and was quite soaked at this point...which makes it all the funnier that we waited in triage another 45 minutes to convince the nurse (Tonya, the same as with E--laugh at the issues we had before in this post) that I was actually in labor.  Backtracking a minute, the registration this time took no more than 5 minutes with no pre-registration (which had taken 20+minutes with E and preregistration, while in VERY active labor). 

I got my first contraction at 10:58 pm.  They were very sporadic and mild for quite a while.  At 11:15ish, I was only 1 cm dilated and hardly effaced.   I was moved to a room at some point and continued to labor there for a bit until I received my epidural at about 1:30 am.  I had been having contractions up to that point but still hardly any stronger than I had been experiencing at nighttime for the past week.  Do I regret getting an epidural so early?  No...I had experienced some strong contractions and pain before epidural with D and excruciating pain and no epidural with E.  This was by far the most relaxed, comfortable and enjoyable delivery of the three!  In fact, I was more comfortable in the next waiting hours than I had been in bed at night the whole previous week, due to non-stop contractions.  At 1:45 am my labor nurse Ali checked me and declared me to be 3 cm and about 50% effaced.  Some progress.  I did experience extreme chills and shaking around 2:00 am for about 15 minutes--I think in response to some meds that were given to raise my blood pressure a bit.  I snoozed off and on for several hours and at 5:00 am was checked again, only to hear that I was only 6 cm and about 80% effaced and the baby had dropped a bit.  By this time, my contractions were steady at about 2 mins. apart.  I was expecting another many hours until push time but was surprised to be checked again at 6:30 am and be told that I was at station zero (10 cm, 100% effaced)!  I was completely unaware of this, except still feeling a bit of pressure at each contraction.  (could still control my left leg but the right was completely asleep) 

The baby was apparently still a bit high, but by 7:00 am, she had completely dropped and I was ready to push.  My doctor was not on call for the weekend but was expected in that morning at 7:00 so we waited to see if he would arrive.  At 7:30 the decision was made to start pushing with Dr. Chang (dr. on call).  I pushed (pretty lightly) 3 times and then Dr. Sam walked in the door.  After pushing 9 more times (only 6 of which were "real" pushes) was shocked it was all over! 

Little Girl Weyler was born at 8:05 am on July 2, 2012 (one day early!).  She weighed 7 lbs and was 19 1/2" long.  Still no name...

I had torn a tiny bit and was struggling with recovering from the epidural and a bout of nausea (from the prescription pain med).  In the midst of all this, I found my lack of sleep from the previous night and the intensity of the delivery (in spite of the epidural) catching up with me.  I was completely worn out!  I could not focus on a name...still under debate.  M and I had mostly narrowed it down to two names, Abigail Joy and Katherine Joy.  No decision was made.  As the day wore on, we were moved upstairs to the pediatrics wing (between a very busy hospital and a serious fire in another wing, they were too full in the regular postpartum care).  I had pokes and prods by all sorts of nurses and tried to catch a snooze in between as I still felt like a train had run into me.  The name decision was put off yet again.  At one point last night we thought we had concluded on a name but decided not to finalize. 

A rough night's sleep (lots of nurse visits and a completely dead right upper thigh 24+ hours after epidural), brought us to this morning.  Prayer after prayer had gone up over this little girl's name.   We finally reached the same conclusion.

Abigail Katherine Weyler now has a name!  Over the months of discussion, I had preferred Katherine and M had preferred Abigail.  We both liked the other's choice but could not decide.  So many other names came up in discussion.  I knew "JOY" would be a part of her name in some way.  We looked up "joy" in Hebrew/Greek/name dictionaries etc...All options were considered.  It was determined we would just name her "Joy" as a middle name.  Meanwhile, Abigail (our first choice years ago, long before children even entered the picture) had been cast aside because of the popularity it has recently acquired.  In the discussions, it came back up again as a possibility.  After all, it is a wonderful Biblical name (admirable Abigail, wife of King David) with a wonderful meaning.  It means "Father's Joy."  After birth, Michael and I flipflopped on the names.  I leaning toward Abigail, he Katherine.  We ultimately decided to name her Abigail Katherine (since Abigail encompasses the Joy).  God prepared this very name for this special little girl.  She is her "father's joy" (and mother's) and ultimately, hopefully, her Heavenly Father's joy!  Our special little surprise #3!  Katherine, meaning "pure," is another desire of our heart for her.  And so it was, when the birth certificate lady came by, we told her we were minutes from deciding and would call her back.  About 5 minutes later, Abigail Katherine Weyler was made official!  Thank you, Lord, for this precious new life!

It's only a matter of time...

My water broke. We are at the hospital and contractions have begun. It is only a matter of when. God is so gracious! My mom arrived home from my sister's house only an hour before my water broke. I never take a nap, but today could barely stand it and took one. Thus, I was awake still when my water broke and also should go into the long night ahead better rested. No more waking up at night with contractions wondering whether to go to the hospital. In fact, with water breaking, no doubt about whether I am in labor (although the triage nurse is not as convinced since her litmus test did not come back as bright as she wanted- the same nurse who last year kept me in triage in active labor so long that I ended up having E without epidural.)

Stay tuned for the stats and the name we have yet to decide on.