Look Who's 1 Month Old Today!

While the past month has been a blur and a blessing, I don't have time to recap the whole month right now.  I couldn't let today pass without acknowledging the fact that ELH is one month old today!  Here are a few pictures that capture just how busy this little lady has been as well as her parents.

Mommy and Emma meet in the NICU

Aunt Heidi gives Emma her first pieces of life advice!

Emma is getting tight with Daddy already!

Watching the monitors in the Progressive Nursery kept us alert!

Molson waiting patiently for Emma to come home!

Emma flashes Aunt Heidi the signal to stop taking so many pictures.

Homecoming Day

Sleeping peacefully in her new home.

Admiring how much she's grown.

Celebrating our 5th Wedding Anniversary with a special delivery!

Taking Grandma out to dinner!

Just a smile and a wave!

Happy Little Patient at the hospital, but we hope we don't do that again!

4 weeks old.

One day I will find the time to sit down and post a more thorough update, but for now these pictures are worth more than a thousand words that I could use to describe how happy we are that this little lady has blessed our family and our home.
We love you to the moon and back Emma!

Homecoming

It took me almost two weeks to get that last post about E's arrival written, so I should probably get one or two more done while I can to get you caught up to speed.  Her birthday was just the beginning of a life I once had only dreamed of.  And now my real life has one more component, life as a mom!
The first week of her life and ours as parents was full of excitement, love and anxiety as we went to go see her in the NICU each day.  The first time we asked, "How long do you think she'll be in here?" we got the standard answer, "Until your due date."  What????? Are you kidding me, you want me to leave my baby here for 6 weeks?  I knew we had to do what was best for E's health and safety, but I had a very hard time believing that this little lady that  my sister nicknamed Wonder Girl would need to stay that long.  Every nurse and doctor in the NICU said what an amazing little girl she was and they were all in love with her. I secretly think they wanted to keep her for 6 weeks so they could enjoy her for that long, not because she needed to stay that long! :) But everyday we went to see her we continued to get good news and hear how great she was doing, she was the biggest and healthiest baby in that NICU.  Which I felt incredibly blessed when I saw her neighbors that only weighed alittle over a pound and were born somewhere around 24-28 weeks. A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.  is all I can say.  The emotions I felt for the next 4 days cannot be described.
I was getting discharged on my 4th day in the hospital, and as soon as we "checked out" of our room at CMC we went down to the NICU where we were greeted by E's nurse who delivered wonderful news, E was being transferred to the Progressive Neonatal Nursery!

Hanging with Aunt HK in the Progressive Nursery

 That meant she was one step closer to coming home, although I knew it wouldn't be that day with us. The next 3 days we traveled back and forth from home to the hospital, each day they'd tell us she was coming home soon.  My sister left on Friday, which was so sad, for her and us.  But the next day, one week after she was born,  we were told Wonder Girl was being discharged!

We're Going Home!!!!

She's Here!

June was an exceptionally BUSY month and it ended on a high note!  While I wasn't due to deliver our baby girl until August, she decided she just couldn't wait any longer to make her appearance!  Here's how it went down.
Saturday, June 29, 2013 I woke up at about 8:20am, ready to accomplish many things on my long to do list: get the car washed, get a pedicure, wash more baby clothes and put away more gifts, finish my thank you notes from my baby shower, and the list goes on and on.  And then pick up my sister from the airport that afternoon as she was coming for a short visit.  Our plans involved shopping for the baby, getting massages, and hanging out, it had been a year since we'd seen one another so this visit was so exciting.  Well, those plans all changed when I came back from the bathroom that morning... Me: "Kevin, I think my water just broke!"  Kevin still sleepy: "What? What do you mean?"  Me: "Well, I don't think I'm still supposed to be gushing fluid after I just peed."  ( I know, TMI, but you know that's true!)  I called my doctor's office, spoke with the nurse very calmly, and waited for a call back from her with further instructions.  When she called back her instructions were this; "Get yourselves together and go ahead to the hospital, Dr. James will meet you there, and they'll be ready for you when you get there."  My initial reaction was to gather up some belongings, say clothes, etc. but then I thought, ' I've got 6 more weeks until I'm due, I'm sure they're just going to send us home."  So, I told Kevin to go ahead and take a shower, I put on some clothes, we ate some breakfast and we were off to the hospital.
Upon arrival, I was checked into Labor and Delivery, by the nicest nurses I'll mention!  A few moments later the doctor arrived to assess the situation and sure enough, without any hesitation, he said, "Yep, your water broke! You're 4 centimeters along. My recommendation is to go ahead and deliver the baby, the risks of delivering at 34 weeks are far less than the risk of keeping you pregnant."
Without hesitation Kevin and I began calling family and friends to let them know the exciting and surprise news!  The nurse came in and had me fill out some paper work and then things began to move VERY
quickly.  Because I was only 34 weeks and 3 days along, I hadn't yet had the Strep B test, so the first IV was for penicillin, and then the next order was to start Pintocin at about 1:30  in the afternoon to get labor moving along.  My thoughts at this moment: "Great! I just need to get a hold of my sister who is on a plane to let her know I won't be there to pick her up!"  Let me just add here that my Type A personality was completely thrown out the door and I was so relaxed and easy going about this whole day that I felt like I'd been taken out of my own mind!  Kevin called the only family we have locally, his cousin Meghan and asked for two very big favors... 1) Can you go get Molson from our house and keep him for a few days? and 2) Can you go pick up Kristen's sister at the airport around 3:30 this afternoon?  Thank GOD for Meghan and Frank, because we hadn't even made arrangements for the dog yet, and while my sister could've cabbed it from the airport to the hospital, it was better to have a friendly face to greet her with this exciting news!
Fast forward a few hours... my sister arrived at the hospital elated and shocked as she got my text greeting her as she got off the plane to let her know her niece couldn't wait to meet her! The rest of the afternoon was pretty uneventful, as every time the doctor came to check me, I wasn't any further along, and they cranked up the Pintocin full blast.  So needless to say at 9pm on June 29th (yes, we're still on the same day here.) the doctor came to check me again, and to no avail I had not made any progress, so a C-Section was the final decision.  Let me mention again how I shocked myself with how calm and relaxed I was about everything ( and, no there had been no pain medicine in me). So once again, Kevin got on the horn to let everyone know the next steps.
At 10:24pm, Emma Lawrence Hahn graced us with her presence with all her fingers, all her toes, and a set of lungs to let us know she was okay!  For 6 weeks premature, she was a healthy 5lbs. 3 oz. and 18 inches long. Kevin got a quick peek before the NICU team whisked her away.

This was the first time I held her the next day.