And Three Became Four

Friday morning we got up bright and early to get to the hospital. I tried really really hard to have everything ready ahead of time. I stayed up until midnight, got up at 5:30 and we were still almost 20 minutes LATE to the hospital!! We walked in and the nurses were all laughing because my family beat me there, which I already knew because I saw mom's car in the parking deck when we were coming in. I walked into the room and saw not only mom, Alicia and Rebecca, but Aunt Susan AND Uncle David, Aunt Beverly, Michelle and Cooper (some of my family from Oklahoma City!!) They ALL made it before we did. We took one last family photo and I changed into my gown, got into bed and went through all of the preparations for our c-section.

Cooper and Lydia waiting for Levi

We rolled back to the OR around 8:30. I was super nervous about my anesthesia because we had a not so good experience with the spinal when we had Lydia. My wonderful nurses had arranged for our head attending anesthesiologist to come for the procedure. It went off without a hitch and from then on, I was completely relaxed!! Levi was born at 9:04 am. I kept waiting to hear the "It's a Boy" announcement, but none came. Necon went to look at him and take some pictures. When he came back to me he eased the fears I had over the last few weeks and said we had a precious baby boy. Everyone was taking bets on how much Levi weighed. They ranged from 7 lbs even all the way to 8 1/2 lbs. I guessed 7 lbs 6 oz...the final total was 7 lbs 5oz.

Lydia seeing her brother for the first time

Our sweet baby boy

Lydia giving kisses

Repeat C-Sections are MUCH better than post 17 hours of labor C-Sections

My AMAZING nurse (and friend) Heather

Pop and OG

Necon's friend Derek and his wife came to visit. Guess we didn't get a picture of Michele...

Pawpaw Bass

Dr. Terry did our C-section with Dr. Wendel AND Levi's circumcision.

That is why Levi looks SOOOO sad...

First Razorback Game Day

We woke up Saturday morning and got ready to watch the Razorbacks. It wasn't the game we hoped for, but we all had fun anyway!!

Lydia showed up around halftime and was even more excited to see her brother than we expected!! She couldn't quit loving on him...so cute!

Feels strange to refer to having kidS, but I couldn't imagine anything being more fun

Family of Four

Quick peek at Levi Stafford Warrior!

Levi was born friday morning at 9:04 a.m. He is 7 lbs 5 oz. and 21 inches long! We came home yesterday and everyone is doing great. Thanks for your prayers, visits and calls. More photos to come.

A Visit From Ike

We woke up Sunday morning to see this as we were leaving for Church:

We lost a portion of our HUGE Bradford Pear in the spring and had a really hard time deciding if we should cut it down or try to let it regrow. Necon wanted to just cut it down since most of the tree was now leaning toward the house. I just couldn't bring myself to cut down such a huge beautiful tree. Now there was two sections of branches left: one hanging over Levi's nursery and one hanging over Lydia's nursery. We had no choice. We went to church, ate dinner at mom and dad's and dad was going to meet us at our house to help Necon cut down the tree. When we got home there was a team of workers in the front yard clearing out the tree. Dad, John Reese, Jim Ashley, David Tipton and Barry Strevig (along with Necon of course) got the tree cut down and piled up in just over an hour. What a blessing to have such a wonderful church family!!

Here is what our house looked like when we bought it...



Here is what it looks like now. It makes me sad everytime we drive up!!

I know we are going to miss the wonderful shade we enjoyed for the last two years...

The lantern has also been a point of contention between Necon and me since we bought the house. I think it is dumb and reminds me of The Chronicles of Narnia. Now it looks even dumber and I think it should most definitely be removed...

I have been trying to get in touch with Maumelle Public Works to get the brush pile picked up, but they are super busy with all the storm damage, there is no telling when it will happen. I am really excited to bring our sweet Levi home to this laying in the front yard...

Showers for Levi

Despite months of me explaining how much I didn't need a shower for Levi since I JUST had one for Lydia, I was unable to escape the kindness of my friends!! I just felt weird inviting people to another shower to buy us more stuff when everyone was so generous to us last year. Quick story to illustrate just how recently I had showers for Lydia:

JoEllyn got us a picture frame that holds a handprint, a footprint and a photo. I was so excited to get the frame because we had the same one for Lydia and had just gotten it all assembled. It is really really cute. I was surprised she had gotten it for us because we hadn't registered for it with Levi. When I told JoEllyn all of this, she was confused and kept telling me it was in fact on our registry. A few minutes later Jill came over and started telling us how funny she thought it was that when she went to Babies R Us and asked for a print out of our registry, they gave her Lydia's. She said she had never known anyone with kids so closed together the first registry was still active!! Then JoEllyn and I realized she had done all of her shopping off Lydia's registry!!

Anyway...we had two showers in the past week, and once again our friends overwhelmed us with their love and generosity!

Jennifer, Jill, Holly, Stephanie and JoEllyn gave us a shower at Jennifer's house on Tuesday night. I never ceased to be amazed at Jennifer and Stephanie's creativity! They made the vases, letters and tablecloth/runner to match Levi's bedding. Jennifer also made us two canvases that match his bedding EXACTLY for us to put in the nursery! What a blessing to have such wonderful friends...

These are the canvases Jennifer made us...still gotta get them on the wall

Not sure there is room for another cousin...

Sweet Bear from Annie

Grandpa, Annie, Aunt Becca and Tia got us a double stroller

Pa Chief and Grandma Beth getting Levi ready to be a little Razorback

Last Wednesday my wonderful friends at work gave us a shower. The cake was AMAZINGLY yummy, and all the gifts were so thoughtful! It makes it easier to go to work because I get to work with such a fun group of women!!

It's also really nice to work the same place as Necon...

The new girls were so sweet to participate!!

Deb, Shannon and Karla

Ms. Jackie (who thinks she and my husband will one day run off together...)

Mrs. Redious and Susan

Rheba and Evelyn

Tiffany and Deb

This is Karen...she was my preceptor when I first graduated nursing school! She taught me everything I need to know and has been a great support and encouragement through the last two and a half years...

Debbie and Lydia eating animal crackers

This is Debbie, our lactation nurse...she made the super cute door hanger that is in the background. We didn't have one for Lydia since we were at the hospital on such short notice, so I am really excited to have one for Levi. It says his name and birthday on the streamers!!

We had a hard time getting some of the toys away from Lydia

Oh...we couldn't keep her out of the cake either!

I think she is enjoying her last few days of being the only one...gonna be a lot to get used to!!

Game Day

We took Lydia to her first Little Rock game this weekend. Besides it being ridculously HOT, we had a really good time! We watched the players walk in, and Necon got to see Coach Petrino and say hi to Andrew. We visited some tailgate parties then watched the first half with Necon's parents in the Letterman's Club.

Apparently I really offended her, because she wouldn't look at the camera for one single picture the entire day. At first I thought it was a coincidence, but I have about 15 pictures that would suggest otherwise. Oh well...

Necon stuck his hand in the picture just for proof he was this close to someone quasi-famous...

Lydia practicing her lineman stance...



She loves to cuddle with Pa Chief...

Facing Forward

We dropped Lydia off with Jill last week along with her gigantic new combination carseat. This means her carseat can go both rear facing and forward facing. Since she can stay rear facing for up to 35 pounds, we have still been keeping her that way. Apparently Necon did not let Jill in on this peice of information when he gave her the carseat, so naturally she put the seat in forward facing and Lydia enjoyed it very much. We had been contemplating the switch anyway because she absolutely HATED her carseat and we thought it might make it better if she could see out and look around. Because I really didn't want to miss seeing her riding forward for the first time, I had Necon take some pictures. (Yes this means he was driving AND taking pictures at the same time.)

As you can see she really does love riding in the car this direction. She likes to look at us in the rearview mirror and talk and sing to us. So sweet!! I just can't get over how big she looks in the seat! I am also sad because she is losing some of her baby fat. I knew it would happen once she started walking, but I just didn't expect it to happen so soon. I am hoping it is not because I am starving her to death. We are getting ready to switch to whole milk from formula and she already eats pretty much whatever we are eating. I am worried that I am not giving her enough good nutrition. Any suggestions would be more than welcomed!!

Rocking Chair Update

I was really excited to get Lydia her very own rocking chair for her first birthday, it was my first birthday present AND she LOVED playing with the rocking chair at my Grandma's. I just knew she was going to LOVE her present. If you read the blog from her birthday you remember...she absolutely did not. I was really sad about this and thought I had spent all the money for the perfect gift and it was going to get NO use! Plus, I was planning on taking her 1 year old portraits with it, so that was going to be ruined too. The other night we heard her playing and singing in her room and here is what we saw...

She loves her chair sooo much, she wants to eat it. Big shocker!!



She can climb up in the chair by herself, but sometimes gets scared to turn around. So she just sits like this and says "Rock, Rock" over and over! It is so cute!!