Happy Gracie

Matt and I are ready for Happy Gracie back.

The IV stick went really well yesterday. Matt said she didn't even cry and actually fell asleep while the lady was digging around in her hand for a vein. Apparently they put a little sugar water on her paci and in an infant this young it really helps them not feel the pain. I'll have to google that when I get a chance.

She woke up much better this morning. Still pitiful but better. She has a lot less mucus intruding her airways and has had a little bit of awake time (we're talking 10 minutes tops). She even smiled at me and Matt once or twice. Usually she smiles every chance she gets. Especially when I make pooting noises. She's still having trouble eating and is still on the oxygen. The doc said that we will most likely be here until Saturday. They removed her oxygen to attach a humidifier and in the 20 seconds it took to hook everything up her oxygen levels dropped. That means she'll need to be weaned off of the oxygen. The encouraging thing about this whole situation is that the doctor says it is all very normal. Well, not normal, but what they expect to see in an infant as young as Gracie.

Because of all the wires she's hooked up to I haven't had much holding time. I'm experiencing Gracie withdrawals and sleep deprivation which does not make a very happy Kelly. Please pray for Gracie to get better quickly and to feel more like herself. Please pray that Matt and I can get some sleep and have the chance to play with our Happy Gracie soon.

Note to Gracie:

You smile and my heart melts. All I want is to make you better but I know that only God and time can do that. So I will keep praying and trust that God is giving you pleasant dreams while you sleep. I love you!

To Get My Mind Off of Things

I'm writing this post to try and keep my mind off the fact that my baby girl is having an IV put in right now. Matt went with her to the "Treatment Room" for the procedure. My plan isn't working...I can't stop thinking about how much the IV hurt me before my C-section and I can only imagine how much it will hurt her dainty little hand, arm, foot or head (let's pray they don't have to resort to the head).

This is Gracie's second night in the hospital. She came down with a virus on Saturday and when we went to the pediatricians office on Monday they sent us to the hospital when the breathing treatment they administered didn't seem to help. The doctors here say that it's going around. They're treating many kids with the same problem, bronchiolitis. In a baby as little as Gracie the mucus that is generated from a virus clogs her bronchioles causing very labored breathing and subsequently low oxygen levels. The whole thing is causing her to not have much of an appetite (I don't ever have one when my stomach is full of mucus either) so they're worried about dehydration. So my poor little 12 weeks old is on oxygen and and IV. I feel for any parent who has ever had a child in the hospital. It is heart wrenching. She has hardly opened her eyes today and just sounds pitiful. She's too exhausted to cry out even. She just coughs and moans and groans.

Keep us in your prayers. We all need lots of rest and a full recovery.

Note to Gracie:

I cried when I saw how pitiful you looked in your little metal hospital crib. You looked so tiny with the oxygen tubing and big hospital sleeper on. They only had blue so I thought seriously about putting a bow on your head but decided it really didn't matter. :) Remind me to tell you about your E.T. toe one day. I love you so much and pray that you never have to go through anything like this again. Ever.

She's a Thinker

Gracie is now almost 10 weeks old. She has changed so much since I last posted. It seems as though every day holds some new way in which she makes me smile. It also makes me a little sad that I have a hard time remembering those first few weeks in the hospital and at home as a brand new family of three. I told Matt the second week she was home that I wasn't sure I wanted to go through it all again. Now I'm sure that I would do this again in order to allow her the chance to have a brother or a sister.

Those first few weeks when things seemed so hard flew by so fast that I almost wish I could go back and focus more on all the little things. I feel like I can't take enough pictures or make enough notes about all the milestones she's reaching. How can something so tiny bring so much joy to my life?

If I wrote all of our happenings out in paragraph form this would probably be the longest post ever (and it's already pretty long) so I'm going to list them.

First smile
First time to sleep 6 hours
First time to decorate a Christmas Tree
First road trip (to Louisiana and then Texas) to meet the entire family
First blow out (on the road to TX)
First laugh (at the dogs on Grammy's back porch)
First splash in her baby tub
Lots of smiling and talking with Mom, Dad and the whole family
First time to see the outdoors for more than five minutes (it's too cold her in Indy to get out much)
Slept nine hours in one night (just happened last night)
She's bringing her hands to her mouth to suck on them quite a bit, I'm expecting her to really find them soon
She's enjoying playing on the floor and can even entertain herself for a bit, Granny said she looks like she's directing traffic the way she flails her arms and legs, does that mean she'll be a leader one day?
Napping in her papasan while Mom showers
Napping in her swing while Mom blogs :)


We go to the doctor for her two month check up tomorrow. I'm excited to see how much she weighs and how long she is. She's already in 3-6 month sleepers! I have a feeling she'll be tall. Her hair is still red (especially in the sunlight) and her eyes are still blue. We've got a good little routine in which she eats and then stays awake for about an hour and then goes down for a nap. Sometimes she naps on our lap and sometimes in a swing or a papasan. She really doesn't like to sleep in her crib during the day. She has a bath around 9:30 and gets her last meal of the day at 10 and falls right to sleep after that. Of course, she has a few off days here and there like any baby (or adult for that matter).

I am continually amazed at how fast she is growing and how much she seems to be learning. I am always wondering just what she is thinking and I am convinced that she is a thinker. The new picture to the right is one of those moments that she looks like she is in deep thought about what is going on around her. We were all on the back porch at my parents house and she was enjoying the warm weather and cool breeze. She was watching the dogs and just a few moments before this photo was snapped she laughed for the first time. She is probably thinking about all the new things she is seeing and hearing and smelling.

In a few years she'll be thinking about all the things she can learn from the people around her. And a few years after that she'll be thinking about what she wants to be when grows up. And a few years after that she'll be thinking about how to make those dreams come true. My prayer is that through all of those years she will be thinking about what she can do to make this world a better place for someone else. Even if it's just one person at a time. My prayer is that God helps Matt and I guide her to those thoughts.

Note to Gracie:

Gracie girl, I am so blessed to be your mother. You make me smile absolutely every day! I can't wait see the light in your eyes and the joy in your smile when you experience all of God's blessings in this world. I am excited to share so many firsts with you and I pray that the wonder of this world does not fade as you get older but that you find new blessings every day. I love you Gracie Girl!

Four Weeks!!

I can't believe that Gracie is 4 weeks old today. About a week ago I was telling Matt that I'm not sure if this has been the longest few weeks of my life or the shortest. Now I'm determined that time is going by way too fast. Gracie is definitely getting bigger, she's starting to make more noises besides crying and she's alert a lot more.

She is starting to take her world in and it is neat to see. She likes to look at everything while she's awake. The neatest thing she does now is look at me and Matt. She can focus on our faces and I'm pretty sure she recognizes them. She also recognizes our voices and will calm down if she's crying and we call to her to let her know we're coming.

This is what her first month has looked like:

Two glorious weeks of Grandparents :)
One ride in the car to drop them off at the airport
A move from mom and dad's room to her nursery
One trip to Target
One trip to Walmart
Two trips to church
One trip to the Sellers (some friends from church)
One trip to the Ferguson's for Thanksgiving
One Aggie game on TV
Lunch at Don Pablo's
Several visitors
Lots of peeing on mom and dad
Her first bath in which she didn't sob the whole time
Time on her play mat
Lifting her head while she's on the mat
Lifting her head while she's looking over mom's shoulder
A few bottles (one from dad)
Lots of eating
Lots of sleeping
Lots of burping and some spit up
Lots of kisses and hugs from mom and dad
endless love growing in our hearts

What's on tap for this month:
Decorating the Christmas tree
Road trip to Louisiana and Texas
Meeting the rest of the family
Especially her Cousins (Brady and MacKenzie)

I have posted lots of pics on flickr page and have now started to take video too. The videos are all on my Vimeo page.

Overcome by Love

Gracie is two weeks old and 1 day today. These weeks have not been easy. I've had to adjust to my role as mommy while getting very little sleep. Mostly because I have a hard time sleeping while she's dreaming loudly about her new world. :) Gracie had a few all-nighters so Matt and I took shifts so we could at least get a little sleep. We moved her to the crib in her room on Saturday and she's been sleeping really well there. We've decided she knew that's where she belonged all along and was trying to tell us. :) Which brings me to the title of my post. No matter how many nights Gracie keeps us up she is still perfect to us. Becoming a parent has opened my eyes to love.

I find myself more in love with Matt than the day I married him. He is such an amazing daddy and has been so helpful and involved that it brings tears to my eyes. Gracie is the embodiment of that love. Without our relationship, our marriage, our commitment to one another she wouldn't be here. She is a daily reminder of how much Matt means to me. A reminder of the commitment we made and another reason why that commitment will last forever.

I also have a new appreciation for our parents. Don't get me wrong, I have always loved them but becoming one myself has helped me to see just how special the relationship is. There is nothing that a parent wouldn't do for their child. There is nothing that a child could do to lose the love of a parent. I have to stop here and say, "Thank you!" to our parents. They were such a huge help while we were in the hospital and after we brought Gracie home. The first two weeks would have been a lot harder without them.

Well, Gracie is napping now which means I better take this opportunity to clean up. :)

Hooray for Poop!

I have been getting emails throughout my pregnancy from BabyCenter.com and I got this list in one a few days ago. I'd read it before Gracie came and now that she's here I see how true it is.

1. You finally stop to smell the roses, because your baby is in your arms.

2. Where you once believed you were fearless, you now find yourself afraid.

3. The sacrifices you thought you made to have a child no longer seem like sacrifices.

4. You respect your body ... finally.

5. You respect your parents and love them in a new way.

6. You find that your baby's pain feels much worse than your own.

7. You believe once again in the things you believed in as a child.

8. You lose touch with the people in your life whom you should have banished years ago.

9. Your heart breaks much more easily.

10. You think of someone else 234,836,178,976 times a day.

11. Every day is a surprise.

12. Bodily functions are no longer repulsive. In fact, they please you. (Hooray for poop!)

13. You look at your baby in the mirror instead of yourself.

14. You become a morning person.

15. Your love becomes limitless, a superhuman power.

Gracie is home and doing absolutely wonderful. She is beautiful, amazing, tiny, sweet, precious...this list could go on and on really. Right now she has her days and nights mixed up a little bit but she'll get it figured out eventually. One thing I really worried about before she came was the sleep deprivation that would be inevitable. I really enjoy my sleep and tend to get sick if I don't get enough of it. I'm definitely sleep deprived but there is just something about Gracie that makes me not even realize it most of the time. She could keep me up for weeks and I would still look at her and melt.

She is peacefully sleeping in her cradle right now so I better take advantage of the time to catch up on that lost sleep. I'll keep posting as often as possible. She's changing daily and I'm trying to capture it on camera so keep checking our flickr page for Gracie's life in pictures.

Sidenote: #12 on the list is my favorite because I was holding Gracie in the hospital and felt/heard her poop and exclaimed, "She's so cute even when she poops!"

She's here!

This is Matt posting on behalf of Kelly, who's doing great and is almost recovered!

Yesterday Kelly and I welcomed Emily Grace Dean into the world at 2:47 pm on a beautiful November day. Carol, Kelly's mom, won the weight and height pool at 6 pounds 10 ounces and 20.25 inches. We're very excited and I'm sure Kelly will have a much more in-depth description of the experience in her next post.

Until then, check out the pictures on our Flickr page.