Brady's 12 month checkup

Well, we had our 12 month checkup this week! How did we get here?! We were excited about the checkup to see how our boy has grown over the last year. The doctor said he looks great and is growing perfectly! He weighed a little over 22 pounds and was about 30 inches long. He's almost tripled his weight since he was born. Big boy!

The bad part about this appointment was that he had to get four shots (yes, four!) AND he had to get his blood drawn. It was so sad. And to make it worse, the lab called yesterday and said they didn't get enough blood and that we have to go back to do another blood draw. Waaah! 

If that's not the saddest thing you've ever seen... thank goodness Daddy was there!

Happy Birthday, Brady!

I can't believe today is Brady's 1st birthday! My goodness this last year has flown by. In some ways it seems like Brady has been with us forever, but in many ways it seems like it was just last week that he was born. He has blended perfectly into our family and has been the source of so much joy this year. I can't imagine what our life was like before he came along! 

Brady is such a happy baby and has been fairly easy throughout his first year. He sleeps well, eats well, and doesn't really complain about much. We are definitely very lucky and we know it! 

Lately Brady has been doing this over-the-top fake laugh which gets Blake and I rolling which makes him do it even more. It is so funny. One of my favorite things right now is the way Brady's face lights up when he sees me... whether it is when I come in the door after being gone for an hour or so, or when I walk into the bathroom while Blake is bathing Brady and he spots me... his eyes get big and he smiles with his whole face and it just melts me! He makes loving him pretty easy :)

Brady and I love to dance together in the mornings while he's eating breakfast... well, it's more like he sits in the high chair and watches me while I pull out every dance move I've ever known trying to make him laugh. Talk about a workout! As soon as his little lips break into a smile I know I've done well! I cherish those moments when it's just me and him. 

This is the face I'm going for. Every morning, all the time. Laugh for me, little buddy!

Some of Brady's favorite things to do include:
1. Eating. Always.

2. Playing with Willa. Again, always.

3. Walking, He also does a pretty sweet little spider monkey crawl these days. I think that's part of his transition from crawling to walking for some reason... or his poor knees are so calloused it hurts him to crawl so he has to use just his hands and feet!

4. Opening drawers and cabinets and pulling everything out. Seriously, everything. He also likes to open and close doors... all this opening and closing occasionally results in a smashed finger.

5. Playing with remote controls (see picture above!)

6. Climbing on everything! He loves to climb over boxes, furniture, people, Willa... and he likes to climb under chairs and anything else that has an opening for him to wedge himself into. He pushes chairs, boxes, and his highchair around to create his own obstacle course:

And another makeshift tunnel from inside the Cole Haan store:

And climbing on his new chair... well, you get the picture. The boy loves to climb.

7. Puckering up his face for a kiss. Cutest thing ever. I'm sure I have a picture of that somewhere... better yet, here's a video!

And here are a few 12 month pictures we tried to get tonight... I'm glad these month by month pictures are over... it's next to impossible to get him to sit still long enough for me to take a picture without trying to eat the sticker!

It has been such a fun year full of more love and happiness than any of my previous 29 years. I am so lucky to be Brady's mama! Happy birthday, little buddy! We love you more than you can imagine!

Brady's birth 9-22-13

Brady was born on Sunday, September 22, 2013, at 12:03pm. He weighed 8 pounds, 2 ounces and was 20 3/4 inches long. The day he was born was far and away the most emotional and fulfilling day of my life so far, and I want to make sure I remember it, so I wrote a timeline of that day and the days before a few months ago while it was still somewhat fresh in my memory. I figured what better day to share it than his 1st birthday!

Friday, September 20

I had a doctor appointment that morning and my doctor checked my cervix to see if I was dilating any. I was only dilated 1.5 cm and my cervix had softened a little. She stretched out my cervix (ouch!) and said that would help speed things up if my body was getting ready at all to have the baby. I told her I thought that maybe I was losing my mucus plug the day before, but she said that didn't necessarily mean labor was close. My due date was the following Thursday, September 26, so we thought we'd give the baby a chance to come on his own and scheduled to be induced on October 1 if he didn't come before then. 

After the doctor appointment Blake and I went to eat at Le Peep, which was our little tradition after my Friday doctor appointments. The blueberry pancakes there are to die for and are a perfect pick-me-up for a 9-month-pregnant woman.

Saturday, September 21

Saturday morning, Blake went hunting with one of his friends from work. Willa and I slept in and cuddled in bed before getting up and waiting on Blake to get home.

That afternoon, Blake, Willa and I went on a 2 1/2 mile walk. We saw the hospital while we were walking and talked about how exciting it would be when our baby was born. We thought we were still over a week away. Little did we know!  

Once we got home from walking I took a shower and did some things around the house while Blake went to get hamburgers to cook that night. Courtnie and her mom came over to see the nursery and luckily her mom made us get a pregnant picture together (the only one we took together while we were pregnant! I'm so glad her mom made us do that). After they left Kate and Steven came over for dinner with their daughter, Fiel, and Kate's brother, Paul. We ate hamburgers and hung out and Kate and I talked about the birthing process and what I had to look forward to (she had given birth to Fiel just three months earlier, and had the same doctor as me). 

I had noticed earlier that afternoon that I was leaking fluid, but during the evening it got a little heavier so I texted my mom and she said to call my doctor just to make sure I didn't need to go to the hospital. Luckily my doctor was on call that weekend and she called back and asked me to describe what was going on. She said it sounded like amniotic fluid and told me to go to the hospital to get it tested. I told Blake we needed to head to the hospital and we both got pretty excited.  We hadn't packed our hospital bags yet, so Kate helped me figure out what to take while Steven helped Blake put the car seat in the car. I was so excited/nervous/anxious and felt like I was walking around in a daze. Finally, about 11:00 Saturday night we said bye to our friends and headed to the hospital. When we pulled into the garage Blake pressed the intercom button and said "Um, yes, we're here to birth a baby!!" I couldn't stop laughing. When we got to the lobby he pointed at my belly and told the guy at the desk "We're headed to the third floor." (the labor & delivery floor). As if that wasn't obvious. :) He was so proud and excited.  

Once we got to the third floor, they took us back to a room where a nurse came in and told us what was going to happen: She would test the fluid to see if it was amniotic fluid and if the test was negative we would go home and wait for the baby to come later, but if it was positive we'd be admitted to L&D and wouldn't leave the hospital without a baby!  She took a sample of the fluid and put the testing stick in it then asked a bunch of questions while we waited for the results. 

It took about ten minutes before she told us it was positive and that we would meet our baby some time in the next 24 hours! We texted my parents and they were on the road shortly thereafter. The nurse loaded me onto a bed and rolled me to the L&D room, where we would spend the next 12 hours. Blake and I were both giddy with excitement. 

Sunday, September 22 

Another nurse met us in the L&D room and asked a bunch of other questions, gave me my IV (the most painful part of the whole process), and hooked me up to a machine to monitor my contractions. My doctor could also monitor the contractions from her home so she knew when it was time to come to the hospital for the birth. 

Monitoring contractions.

The nurse gave me a small dose of pitocin and a bit of pain medication to help me sleep through the contractions. The pain meds sent me into a laughing fit which was funny for Blake to see. I couldn't stop laughing. The nurse said she'd never seen anyone react that way. It was pretty funny. Actually, it was hilarious. At some point I stopped laughing and got a little bit of rest.  I could feel the contractions and the nurse offered the epidural but I wanted to feel a few more contractions before I became numb. They checked my dilation a few times throughout the night. I think around 3:30am I was 4 cm dilated and my contractions were 1-2 minutes apart. I had the epidural around 6am when I was about 5 1/2 cm dilated. At 8am they checked again and I was 9cm dilated so we thought it was almost go-time. My sister had left Grapevine at 5 that morning so we thought she was going to miss it! Luckily my dilation stalled and we sat at 9cm for a few hours.

Once everyone got there (Mom, Dad, Kerri, Dex, and Anna) we just kind of hung out in the L&D room and talked and laughed. This time is kind of a blur for me, but I do know that it was such a happy time. I enjoyed having my family there and was looking forward to meeting my boy soon! It was such a special and exciting few hours.

The nurse came in to check me around 11:30am and said it was time to push! She gave me breathing/pushing instructions while everyone left except Blake and Kerri. My doctor got there and we started pushing. 33 minutes later, at 12:03 pm, we saw our son for the first time. It was surreal. I will never forget touching his tiny, slimy body for the first time and looking into his pretty blue eyes. I couldn't believe he was the one in my belly the whole time. There are no words to describe that feeling.

The first picture of our family of three.

I look at this picture and feel like I'm back there. I can remember so vividly all the emotions rushing through me. Relief/love/terror/excitement... the most emotional moment of my life. I still can't believe he's mine. 

Brady's One Year Pictures

Kerri was able to take some pictures of Brady last time we were all home together. I am in love with these pictures!! I wish I could post every single one of them. They turned out so good. Thank you for the awesome pictures, Koko! www.kophotoblog.com

The boy loves to eat...

...and he's not very clean about it! Some of his favorites: white donuts and blueberries!

His face in these pictures makes me melt. I can hardly stand it.

Playing ball with Willa

No one is more excited than Willa that Brady is learning how to play ball. He still has some learning to do (see videos for proof of this!), but she is very patient with him and is anxiously awaiting the day when he can lob the ball across the yard for her.