New Years Eve

         This was our last new years eve ever not being parents. We decided to live it up and party soooo hard. I’m talking a Prison Break marathon in bed and sparkling cider on capital steps hard. It was CRAZY! It was a super perfect Suzy and Todd night filled with lots of “lets not tell anyone this is what we did for new years eve”s and snack break in the kitchen laughing about how lame we are. On more than one occasion during the night Todd would bust out his awesome dance moves and we would silently dance for a minute or so until we would burst into fits of laughter because we are seriously so embarrassing. It was a perfect night of ditching new years parties and long restaurant lines and just being us. They say how you spend your new years eve is how you will spend the rest of your year. I sure hope thats true. 

Dear Healthy Perfect Miracle Girl,

 

       Thats right! Your last ultrasound showed that everything they could see was PERFECT. The hygroma has completely gone and has only left a tiny little bump where it once was. The doctor said she wouldn’t even have noticed the bump if she wasn’t looking for something and said that you looked just like a normal 18 week baby. We are elated. I was a nervous wreck for a few days before your ultrasound. I was so terrified that the hygroma was still going to be there, and be bigger. I was shaking as they turned on the ultrasound machine. You popped up just as cute as always, but this time you were huge, 9 ounces huge to be exact. I can’t believe how much you have grown in just four weeks. We asked the ultrasound technician a hundred questions and with everything we asked she would say, “yes that looks normal”, “yes that looks great”, “yes that looks fine”. As the ultrasound went on we became more and more hopeful that we might just be looking at a healthy miracle child. We met with your neonatologist and she said that is exactly what we were looking at- a perfectly healthy miracle baby. There is still a chance that the underlying cause of the hygroma was a heart issue, so we will still meet with the fetal cardiologists at Primary’s, but they were able to rule out alot of the most major heart issues. We cried and high fived and stared for hours at all your ultrasound photos from the beginning of your journey until now. You are a miracle. You are our miracle. We are going to get to meet you and raise you and try not to ruin you. I feel like a boulder has been lifted off my chest. I don’t have to sit and wonder if every kick is going to be your last, if you are ever going to wear those clothes in your closet, if your dad is ever going to get a chance to spoil you rotten and call us “his girls.” I am so grateful that we experienced this trial. We have learned from it and grown in ways that we never could have any other way. We have been touched by the love of people around us, and have felt the undeniable love that Heavenly Father has for us. We have also grown crazy attached to you little girl. Thanks for being our miracle. Love, mom.

Dear Baby

          Saturday started out to be the worst of days. Your dad had to study all day, and I couldn’t keep anything down to save my life. At 1:00 I finally decided to take a Phenergen. This is a nasty little drug that is supposed to take away nausea, but all it really does is knock me out cold for a couple hours. But, for those blissful couple of hours I am nausea free. Then, I have to wake up… I always feel stoned and awful when I wake up, and basically sit there like a zombie until its time to go to bed again. I woke up at 10:00 p.m. and decided to waste my stoned hours watching Cast Away. Your dad took a break from studying to come watch the end where Tom Hanks gets saved. We were just laying there cuddling on the couch, then all the sudden… Boom. You kicked. It was your first undeniable baby kick. I sat straight up and told your dad and we both started freaking out with excitement. It was seriously the greatest.. stoned and all it was awesome. Even though I told your dad he probably couldn’t feel it yet he finished the movie out with his hand on our stomach waiting for a cute little kick. You didn’t kick again until the next morning. Thank you so much little girl for turning our super lame Saturday into a good one, and thanks for waiting to give your first good kickaroo until I was cuddled up with your dad. It couldn’t have been cooler. You rock. Love, mom.     

O Christmas Tree

     The second best day in December (Christmas eve being the best day) is the day we decorate the tree. We turn the lights down low and put the tree up while slow dancing around to our Christmas mix on itunes. It’s the most perfect night. I have loved it ever since I was little when we would decorate at home with the Forgotten Carols playing in the background.

       We started collecting Christmas ornaments from places we’d been together when we first got married. I love hanging them up and remembering each trip and the circumstance that we bought the ornament under. Our road trip this summer added a handful of ornaments from our favorite places we stopped. We could have filled the tree just with that trip, but just stuck to our favorite places. I love the first one we got on our cruise in 2007 the most, and Todd loves the Boston one. However, I made a tree skirt this year, and now that might just almost be my favorite part of the tree. It’s strange and kind of sad knowing that it’s Todd and I’s last Christmas just the two of us. But, we are looking forward to having little babe joining in the festivities with us next year (fingers crossed).

The girls

Dear baby,

      I hope one day you get to act 10 years old with your best friends during a holiday break. I hope you laugh until you cry and talk about nothing and everything. Love, mom.

Dear love child

        We feel terrible that you don’t already have a name. We are dangerously close to agreeing on your name however. For now we call you chica, baby, or love child. We had a great day yesterday. Your heart beat was 155 just as strong and regular as it could be, and your AFP was normal. I thought for sure I had given you a neural tube defect on top of your other little issue due to my lackage of prenatal vitamins, but nope. We are 17.5 weeks along and I am still losing weight, I am super bummed and starting to get a little nervous. I thought for sure with Thanksgiving I would have gained something, but no dice. This is the week though, with a fridge full of ensures, ice cream and a force feed myself hourly plan I have to gain weight. I definitely have a little baby bump going on though, so I know you are at least growing in there. What else is growing is your wardrobe! Thanks to your friends and family. I love how positive everyone is being in their hope that you are making it here. You have to make it! You have a closet filling up with tutu’s and leg warmers and sparkly sweat suits! You’ll make it, I really truly believe you will. Love, mom.       

Not all bad…

Thanksgiving at the cabin this year meant… getting my family addicted to Swamp People -we even got a measuring tape out at one point so we could know how long Troys 13 footer really was (slightly embarrassing). Football (obviously). Shooting skeet (as you can tell by my face and Todd holding up the gun for me, I’m not a huge fan.. I’m totally loving our matching ensembles in those picture though). Little people almost outnumbering the big ones, screaming girls, pinterest crafts,the lovely smell of snow machine exhaust on everything, rummy, fudge, amazing food, snowmen, lots of plastic cups with names on them, skyping my sister, Just Dance on the Wii, ping-pong, a polar bear run to the hot tub, and a lot of exhausted kids and a lot of laughs. Amidst the craziness and sadness it still managed to be a very fun Thanksgiving. Thank you Sutton family.          

A lot to be thankful for…

          This Thanksgiving is one I will never forget. I have been more grateful this year than ever before. This year I am overwhelmed with gratitude because God gave our family a miracle.  This week we’ve been hit hard learning about how fragile life is. Wednesday morning at 6:15 a.m Todds brother Barry and his wife Karin and a friends child were driving home from the airport. There was a crazy woman driving down the freeway without her lights on. It was pitch black outside. At 65 miles an hour, the two cars collided. Barry was able to swerve a little bit avoiding a complete head on collision, but the two cars hit. The cars were flung to separate sides of the freeway, just seconds before a semi passed through the small space in the middle of them. Only the little girl was wearing her seat belt. Barry and Karin are both in the ICU in pretty rough shape. They have each been to surgery twice, with more to come. Luckily, both of them are expected to make a full recovery, but the road will be long. My heart feels like 1,000 pounds. Karin is my closest friend in the Holman family. She is always the person I want there because I feel like she knows me the best. 2 years of nursing school, and being in the family the exact same amount of time did that for us. To think of her in so much pain hurts my heart. The EMT on the scene said he has never seen anyone so courageous. With a broken arm, severely fractured legs and hip he said she was so brave and strong as they pulled her from the car that she was smashed in. I love Karin with all my heart and hate so much that she is going through this. Barry is as tough as an ox, so I have a little easier time with him being so hurt. But, it is just all so hard. They have 9 children together. I hate it, some moments I can’t even deal with it.  I hate watching people we love so much suffer so much. I do know that there will be much good to come from it, and believe that it happened for a reason. It is going to be a learning experience for all of us. Thanksgiving day my mom told us that my beloved Aunt Nadine is passing away after a hard fight with cancer. The day after Todds really close family friend Jim Westwood passed away in a car accident. This Thanksgiving I am grateful for life, for miracles, for the angels that obviously have watchful care over us. I am grateful for time, grateful for the little moments. I am grateful for my eternal family, health, the comforter, grateful for lessons learned and very grateful that all wounds can heal.   

Dear Todd

Dear Todd,

      It’s your turn to be pregnant. I’m over it.

Where have these people been all our lives?

We were all meant to be together. I just know it. Thanks Jordan for the pictures and Aimee and Hannah for the fabulous parties. Turkey Bowl game to come this Saturday. We are stoked.  

Our Love Nest

         There was a patient I was really close to, his name was Clyde. He was very sick and so I got to spend alot of time in his room. He was always offering up little pearls of advice and wisdom. One of the things he told me was that my husband and I needed to buy a house. He said there is nothing better for a young couple than to own a little house and make it their own together. A few months later we bought our cute little townhome on old station way. It didn’t make much sense at the time, because we thought we would be moving in a few years to dental school, but really felt strongly that we should buy this place. So we did, and lo and behold everything has worked out perfectly. We are constantly doing projects and changing things up. When we got it, it was really dated and only had white walls. We overhauled the kitchen and living room and have painted basically everything. Todds obsessed with can lights and tries to put them every square foot. Currently we are having so much fun making todds office an office/guest room and transforming the t.v room into a cute girly nursery. 

This is our friend Randy at South Fork Hardware. We call him “Dad” because he is always walking us through our projects. This is him actually putting together our plumbing fixture for us. We love South Fork Hardware.

A little building for Todd, a new garbage disposal and some paint swatches for me.

   

 

 

A desk we made from a kitchen butchers block, and a mantle we found at a local antique shop that we love. I love when we get on our project kicks, and love that I have a rugged husband who knows how to do all this stuff. Mostly, I just love this place. It is home, and it is happiness. Thanks Clyde you were right.    

“Cautiously Optimistic”

Dear baby,

           Yesterday we got to see you again. You look SO adorable. You had a teency bladder, and cute little fingers and toes. Your bones and your spine lit up all white and were just the cutest things we’ve ever seen. In one of the pictures you stretched out your legs as long as they could go and pointed your toes. Are you going to be a dancer little one? We’ll see. The rest of your genetic tests came back normal. All 46 chromosomes for you. The down side of the day, was your cystic hygroma was bigger than last time. Not as big as it was when it was huge, but bigger than last time. Your neonatologist said that it was not alarming, and told us to keep our fingers crossed it will be gone by your next ultrasound in a few weeks. She said that if it was gone by then we have cause to be “cautiously optimistic.” So, that is what we are being. In 10 weeks we go to Primary Childrens and their fetal cardiologists will look really closely at your heart. The hygroma tells us that it is likely that there is something wrong and hopefully they will be able to tell us what it is. How lucky are we that there is a top children's hospital right by us, so that if your little heart needs some help, the best of the best will be able to do it. Maybe there won’t be anything wrong and you are fixing it yourself. You must be working hard in there or something, because you are still making me sicker than a dog. I lost another pound, and am struggling to make it back up to my pre-pregnancy weight, but am determined to gain some weight this week. I’m debating eating a container of sour cream, then washing it down with a carton heavy whipping cream for lunch. Nothing sounds good/tastes good or stays in my stomach anyways, so I might as well put something high calorie in there for a minute or two right? Sounds delicious. Wish me luck.  Love,mom.   

Where’s Todd

Todds classroom and his own little office space. Cute little dentist he will be (in 3 years and 6 months, but whose counting)?

Worry

Dear baby,

      Happy 13 weeks. I wish you were already here. Your dad is basically M.I.A all week due to school, and I wish you were here to distract me. Instead, thoughts of you are here to worry me. Someone told me to prepare for a life of worry, because that what you do when you have kids. I’m not a big worrier typically and the fact that the worry factor doesn’t go away when you are born sort of alarms me. I guess I’ll be worrying for different reasons then though, and maybe it will be a little easier. Worry will hopefully be reduced more when we meet with your neonatologist doctor and my high risk OB doctor next Wednesday. We will do another ultrasound and see how your cute little body is developing and develop a whole plan of care for us. I’m not a worrier, but am a big planner, so a plan sounds divine. The plan for this week is for us both to survive. Me, survive a long week basically without your dad and you, just survive. Survive. Love, mom. 

Girls, Girls, Girls

       Remember that one time I went on the worlds coolest trip with my sisters and dad? And I barely gave it a nod because of all the baby craziness. Well, now that Todd and I are breathing a little easier…a little (we are getting the full genetic results tomorrow and are hoping there are no surprises) It’s time I posted a few fun pictures.  

We heart Chinatown with all its cheap perfumes and sketchy dealers that we follow upstairs into a little room full of knock off goods. We heart watches, jewelry, hats, t-shirts, scarves, sweaters, and all of the other random stuff we got.

    We heart the cape We heart the subway. We mostly heart that my dad still has all of his limbs. There were multiple times the doors were closing and not all 8 of us were on board. My dad would lodge his hand or his body in between the doors so they wouldn’t close until we all got on

    We heart time square… sorry this collage is likely to induce a seizure.

We heart NYC, and Boston… I had to miss some of the Boston part because I came home to get tests. But, it was so great to just be with my sisters and my parents. In case you thought it was all glamorous and New Yorky, this is me throwing up out the window at a toll booth, and what was even better was that I wasn’t the only nauseous pregnant lady in the crew… good times.