Welcome to the Family

Well June 4, 2009 was quite the day. We welcomed Avenlea Gayle into the world at 3:00 pm only 34 weeks along. She weighed 4 lbs 11 oz and was 17 inches long. She is just as cute as the first one was. We are very thankful that she seems to be a healthy baby. Normally I would say she is a happy baby too but she seems to cry quite a bit so far. Cuddling with her mama seems to be the sure fire solution to calming her down. For those of you who are scratching your head on how to pronounce her name, I will do my best to help. a-ven-lee the "a" is the short sound like in apple or astronaut.

Nichole had an OB appointment in the morning. She had been having some leaking over the past day or so and the OB told her that she should have me come in as well. We were very afraid that they were going to keep her at the hospital on bed rest. Who knows how life was going to work if that happened. When I got to the hospital Nichole was waiting by the elevators to let me know that instead of bed rest we would be having a baby around 2 pm. Quite the mind blowing news. Completely unexpected and nowhere close to prepared we are the proud parents of this beautiful little girl. It is amazing how your plans can change so fast and so drastically.

Nichole should be discharged on Sunday. She has started to get up and move around over short distances. She hasn't gotten much sleep and is still feeling some discomfort from the surgery and the different drugs she has been on. As of right now we are guessing that Avenlea's stay in the hospital will be a little bit longer than Nichole's. She hasn't shown much interest in eating which is very normal for babies born this early. They have put her on an IV to help her stay hydrated and have put in an NG tube to get food directly to her stomach. She is also in an incubator to help her keep her body temperature up. The purpose for all of this is to help reduce the amount of energy that she has to use for these things so that she can rest and grow. We're not sure yet how long they will keep her here but it will probably be a couple of weeks. It's really just a matter of when she is ready to take on these things by herself. Like her big brother she will be a fighter.

Although we hated to see the NG tube go in we know that it is the best for her. It was also funny how much it brought back memories of what Jackson looked like early on. When Avenlea was born it was hard to say she looked like any of us but now we can see how much she looks like Jackson as a new born. As before we will deal with anything that we have to, and although we may not want to, we know that we are capable of doing it.

Thanks to all for your help, prayer, and support. It is very much appreciated.