Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Happy 7th Birthday Heidi!

Heidi's birthday is exactly one week after Macey's birthday, and the day before mine!  The best birthday presents I ever received were in 2001 and 2003 :).  It is definitely a busy (and expensive!) time of year at our house, but I love sharing it with these sweet girls.

Heidi's birth day was very different from my other kids who were all born by emergency C-section.  She was born only 2 days before her due date, and I got to experience the whole water breaking, rush to the hospital, and labor thing.  She was born with a full head of thick, black hair, and the nurses all fought with each other to be the one to wash that hair.  That day was so special to me, as she was my only baby that I actually got to see being born.  We love Heidi so much, sometimes my heart just aches with how much I love her.  She has a very special purpose on this earth, part of which is to teach Scott and me some very important lessons about love and life.  Happy Birthday sweet Heidi-Bug!

Here is Heidi throughout the years...























Monday, December 6, 2010

Happy 9th Birthday Macey!

Macey turned 9 last Monday, November 29th.  I CANNOT believe that I have a nine-year-old!  We celebrated her birthday by having a yummy shrimp dinner (at her request) and birthday cake.  We will have her birthday party in a few days.

Scott and I are so proud of the little lady that Macey has become.  She is such a sweet sister to her siblings, always offering to help them and me and playing silly little games with them.  It can be hard on her sometimes to be the older sister of twin toddlers and a child with autism, but she never ceases to amaze us with her sweet spirit and understanding.  We are so very blessed to have her in our family!

I was thinking back to the day she was born and how crazy that day was.  I was only 34 weeks and was at work, and I started having contractions.  It had been a very difficult pregnancy already, so I decided to go get things checked out just to be on the safe side.  Scott met me at the hospital, where the nurses checked me and said I was contracting regularly and already starting to progress.  My OB was at his own appointment right down the street, so he told the nurses to give me a shot of terbutaline to try and stop the contractions and he would be over after his appointment to check on me.  So I got the injection, and I immediately began to feel very very sick.  In the meantime, my doctor's doctor was running behind, so he decided to head over to the hospital and check on me while he was waiting.  About 10 seconds after he walked into my room, I passed out cold and Macey's heart rate started to drop.  Scott said my doctor watched the monitors for a few seconds and then said, "Get her to the OR, we have to get this baby out!"  So Scott went from being in a room with me and about 10 doctors and nurses to standing in a room all alone wondering what was going on.  They wouldn't allow him into the OR because it was an emergency and the didn't know what was going to happen.  The next thing I remember was waking up with some pretty severe stomach pain, and not knowing anything else.  Scott was there and held up a picture and said, "Here's your daughter!"  It was a very surreal experience.  Tiny little Macey weighed 4 lbs 14 oz, and spent 5 days in the NICU before coming home with us.  It was nice to have a few days to prepare for her arrival because we didn't have everything ready yet!  I can't even tell you how grateful we were that my doctor decided to come check on me when he did, he is an angel!  And he was able to do an emergency C-Section and still make it back for his appointment.

I just cannot tell you how much I love this girl, or how absolutely amazing she is.  Happy Birthday Macey!

Macey through the years...













Friday, November 19, 2010

Fun at Freestone Park

I took the kids to Freestone Park a couple of days ago for a photo shoot in this amazing weather with Harmony the service dog.  We had such a good time, and the pictures turned out gorgeous!  Our photographer was my friend Tiffany Hatch, and Brian from AZ Goldens took some shots too.  I must say, my kids are pretty darm photogenic!  Maybe that is because they are just beautiful kids anyway :).  Here are some of my favorites, enjoy!