Joyful Jonah

Jonah first showed us his sweet smile at just 4 weeks old, but today Neal was finally able to capture his joy. Watching him smile only makes us smile even bigger, hope it does the same for you!

Christmas Blessings

At Christmas time it is hard not to get consumed with all the hustle and bustle of consumerism, but we are all guilty. Sometimes we just need to stop and be thankful for what we have and not what we have yet to receive, count our blessings and be thankful for our health and the roof over our heads. I am so thankful and so blessed to have such a wonderful husband who works so very hard to provide for his family and has given me the two most precious little beings I have ever set eyes on....my sweet, sweet children.

O Christmas Tree

Sunday, the 6th we continued our family tradition of heading out to Cedar Lake Christmas Tree Farm in Iron Station, NC to pick out our tree. It seems like only yesterday we had ventured out to the farm with a little 4 week old Sophie, but that was 3 years ago and now we have a 3 year old and a 5 week old! It was fun picking out the tree, but super cold, about 35 degrees....a big change in temperature from 3 years ago too when it was 70!!!

Sophie has been itching to put the ornaments on the tree, and could not wait to go and pick out our tree, so naturally when we got the tree home she wanted to immediately start decorating. For anyone that has ever had a real tree you know that the branches have to fall or settle back into place after being wrapped up, but try explaining that to a very anxious, very excited 3 year old. So while she was napping Neal brought the tree in the house and go it situated so that when she woke up we could start decorating. Note to us, put the lights on with out said 3 year old around, because she could hardly contain herself while Neal was putting the lights on and messing with the ones that had burnt out. Sophie thought that she would try and help speed the process along and "help" Neal put the lights on the tree. Eventually, Neal found enough strands of lights that did not have burnt out bulbs and the tree was lit and ready to decorate, Sophie was in heaven and we could not get the hooks on the ornaments fast enough for her. Christmas morning is going to be a blast I can tell already!

So excited about Christmas trees!

This is the closest we could get to a picture of the two of them...it was so cold!



Stoked on candy canes!

Finally Some Pictures

We are slowly and I admit, very slowly getting the hang of two children over here which is why it has been a while since I have posted some pictures. As crazy as some of our days have been each child is such a blessing and we are rolling with the punches and doing our very best to take just one day at a time.

Today both kids had their well child visits with our fabulous family doctor. Jonah is now weighing in at a very healthy 10lbs 11oz and is 22 inches long. Sophie is 32 lbs and 37 3/4 inches tall.

The Birthday Girl

Today at 4:02pm my sweet, sweet Sophie Ann turned 3 years old! I can't believe that she is 3!!!! She is so big and so grown up and now she is such a good big sister. All she wants to do is love on and give Jonah kisses. My sweet little love seems to have grown up overnight, she is coming into her own with her own little quirks, sayings, and personality shining through. Each day she amazes us with something new that she says or does, our sweet little love.

This morning we started the birthday off with a bang, she got dressed in her Princess Aurora (aka Sleeping Beauty) costume complete with wand, and her light up "I'm 3 years old today" button and made our way downstairs where she found a Sophie-sized Princess castle balloon tied to her chair, she was so stoked! Then we moved onto the playroom where Daddy had stashed all her presents and then she was really excited, I think initially she was more excited about the balloons all over the floor, but once she started ripping into the presents she was equally as excited about those too! She is really into cars and farms and imaginative play these days so we got her a Little People Farm and Garage with a few extra Little People and cars....she played all morning.

For her birthday breakfast she chose french toast and then she had a birthday doughnut, she thought it was great that we stuck candles in it, she didn't stop smiling all morning. Later in the afternoon, we headed outside to enjoy the fresh air. Since it was a beautiful 69 degrees here in the Carolinas we even brought Jonah out with us, Neal brought the baby swing outside and Jonah happily swung back and forth for over two hours while we had birthday lunch, birthday cake and Sophie and Neal played in the leaves! She had no idea that she was getting a birthday cake today, let alone the cake that we surprised her with, a little mini Cinderella. The look on her face when she saw the cake was priceless.

It has been a wonderful day sharing lots of love, smiles and laughter with my family. God was smiling down on us and blessed us/Jonah with the gift of lots of sleep today so that I could devote much of time to my first little angel and sharing in the celebration of her birth.

Happy Birthday Sweet Girl, we love you so much!

A self portrait with Daddy

Eagerly awaiting the surprise Mommy and Daddy claim to have.

She played in the leaves for over an hour shouting 'It's My Birthday' at the top of her lungs, it was great!

The Story of Jonah

Picking up where I left off with the first post.....around 2pm we made it outside for a walk, I think we made two passes up and down our street before the contractions were coming too hard and strong for me to walk anymore, not to mention the baby was now pushing down on the nerves in my legs making them almost numb. We headed back inside around 2:30pm and decided that it was time to start setting up the birthing pool. It took some time to get the pool blown up and then filled with some nice hot water. At around 4pm the pool was all set and I was very eager to get in as the contractions were pretty intense at this point. I labored in the pool with some really good, long contractions that seemed to come harder and stronger with each new change of position. Neal was a fabulous support, physically and emotionally. 6:30pm rolled around and I started feeling the need to push with my great big contractions. Up until this point everything had been bearable, the contractions were certainly not pleasant and they hurt, a lot, but pushing while having a contraction was a whole new ball game. Since, Sophie was born in the hospital and I had an epidural, my body had never really felt the pain of labor before since the epidural masked it all and it was a pain that was clearly overwhelming. I was sick with the pain that each contraction brought and was throwing up and pushing all in one, I actually missed several good contractions/opportunities to push because I was too busy throwing up. My energy was depleting fast and I ended up dozing off in between contractions only to be awoken by the midwives and Neal reminding my of the work that needed to be done. I can remember feeling so drained and that I really had nothing left to give to get this baby out and I could hear Neal praying in my ear that this baby would come quickly. I changed positions and locations a lot. I started off in the pool changing from sitting to standing to squatting, then moved to the bathroom, because I thought I needed to go, but I was not having my baby on the toilet so we got out of there quickly! Then I moved onto the birthing stool (a U-shaped stool that puts you low to the ground in a supported squatting position) then onto laying down on my side on the floor, where some good progress was made, my hips started hurting so I moved back to a squatting position only this time Neal was my support, he sat on our love seat and I squatted in between his legs. This was the last position change, I have no idea how long I pushed in this position, but that is how and where Jonah Michael Slimick entered the world at 8:59pm surrounded by love and the Glory of God on our living room floor (which was well protected with chux pads which are these awesomely absorbent little plastic backed pads.....think puppy training pads except a lot softer and for humans!) All in all I pushed for 2.5 hours with a grand total of 16 hours in labor.

The midwife stayed overnight and by 7am the next morning she determined everything looked good and gave us some final instructions and was on her way. She will be back on Thursday the 5th and the 12th to check in. Around 1pm Jonah's doctor came by to give him the once over, everything looked great. Sophie came to visit her new baby brother at 6pm and she was over the moon excited she could have cared less to see Neal or I it was all about the baby! She was so ready to get up on the bed and hold and him love on him. It was sad to see her go and she wanted to stay, but I was way too tired and still too weak to be anything but a log in the bed. Neal and I decided that she would stay one more night with my parents to give me just a little more time to recoop and get mobile. She will be back with us tomorrow probably after her nap sometime in the afternoon and we will get our first taste of being a family of four!