three.

Three years ago, I was wearing my favorite black maternity capris, a black shirt with a BIG skull on the front and some black wedge sandals. I was at work. Waddeling from my desk to the copy machine and back to my desk. It was a normal day, Kenny dropped off my extra big gulp diet coke (because with this pregnancy, I swore I could taste the metal in a can of coke, I could ONLY drink fountain sodas), I had eaten something for breakfast (not a lot because I knew I was going to have to step on the scale) and was having our daily briefing with the girls at the office. 10:30 am rolls around and it was time for me to head to my normal weekly check up. "See you guys in a bit" is what I told the office.

WRONG. I went to the doctor. My doctor decides to break it to me gently "how fast can you get to the hospital?" and I look at him a wee bit perplexed! "You are in labor, you are 5 centimeters" Um, ok.... I thought I was just having a reaction to the spicy food I ate all weekend. Imagine Kenny's surprise when I call him at work and tell him to meet me at the house, we are having a baby today.

We went and checked into the hospital. I thought we were in for a long ride. We checked in at 1:30. I got an epidural about 4. It never took. I felt every contraction. They hurt. My mom and Kenny were cracking jokes while I was laying there, eyes closed, trying to remember any sort of breathing technique I had read about. At 5 pm, my doctor, dressed in a pink dress shirt with a pink tie came in and said "ok, lets have a baby" Literally 3 pushes later, at 5:16pm, while watching the Governor on TV giving his "State of the State" address, Ava Jo was born. 8 lbs 1 oz, 21 inches long. She was perfect. She squeaked when she was born. The doctors didn't like this squeak, so they wisked her and Kenny off to the NICU. I had no idea what was going on and it wasn't until way later that I learned they had intibated her to help her breathe. Finally at 10:30pm, they brought my pink little bundle of joy back into my room and put her in my arms. She looked just like her sissy did. That would be where their similarities ended! HA!

Oh my little Ava Jo. You are my little dare devil. My curly headed future Johnny Knoxville. You have made me earn every gray hair on my head and I love every minute of it. Your spirit inspires me. Your hair is my arch nemisis. Your smile melts my heart. I have been blessed with two amazing little girls. What more could a mama ask for???

Happy third birthday to my baby. I love you cupcake!

five.

i remember it like it was yesterday. i was carrying my leopard print pillow up to labor and delivery, wearing my cute bright pink velour sweatsuit and just had my toes polished bright red... yes i know i could no longer see my toes, but in my mind, they were going to be one of the first things my daughter saw, so they had to be perfectly polished. i was being induced because my baby was "getting too big" and should have been around 7 lbs.

the first IV went in my arm about 8:30. this wasn't so bad. the pitocin was kicked up a few notches about 10:30. hmmmm, a little bit uncomfy. the nice nurse came in and asked me if i wanted an epidural. WHA? i can have one of those things now? even though i'm not in THAT much pain? SURE.... sign me up! i don't really remember much about the rest of the time, except for my legs being UBER numb and the dude that gave me the epidural telling me that I probably shouldn't be watching ER reruns (as they were stapling a guy's head closed) perhaps he was right, but who cares, i was in la la land!

it hit 5 pm, then the fun began. there was shift change. my very nice drug friendly nurse was replaced by nurse crachet who proceeded to turn OFF my epidural so "i could feel" everything. literally those were her words, but she could have been speaking russian as far as I was concerned because that statement literally made NO sense to me! why would they turn off this miracle juice?

after 2 fun filled hours of hard pushing, my 7 lb baby turned out to be a 9 lbs 1 ounce, perfect pink bundle of joy. she was the perfect baby. from her beautiful nose, to her pudgy little fingers, she was perfect. she slept through the night from the day we brought her home. by 3 weeks, she was holding her head up. yes, i like to call her my lil' over achiever. she has brought me so much joy in my life. i honestly don't know what we use to do without her in our lives... all i know is life must have been VERY boring.

my little punk turns 5 today... we will be celebrating at the happiest place on earth... and i for one, couldn't be any happier.

i love you aubrey grace. you are my sunshine.

happy birthday pop.

this year has taught me a lot of things... mainly it has taught me that we aren't promised tomorrow, that today is a gift, which is why its called a present. don't worry Pop, this post isn't your gift :)

to the man who had to rush into the hospital room, barely having enough time to take his gun belt off to witness my "not so beautiful" birth..... happy birthday

to the man who i use to pry open his eyes, after he worked dawns and ask "are you in there" because I had no idea what "dawns" were..... happy birthday

to the man who used his hands as a makeshift cup to hold water while i rinsed my bloody mouth out after rounding third and eating dirt..... happy birthday

to the man who annoyingly sings "we're all in our places with sunshiney faces and this is the way we start a new day"..... happy birthday

to the man who would do the "buffalo stance" while driving my friends home from slumber parties.... happy birthday

to the man who taught me about charlie worms, salmon eggs, night crawlers, how to shove an ice pick in a frozen tuna heads eye so we could put it in a crab net..... happy birthday

to the man who i saw cry for the first time when he knew what he had to do by giving his brother his kidney.... happy birthday

to the man who danced with me to "somewhere over the rainbow" on my wedding day... happy birthday

to the man who i think was in more pain than i was waiting outside the room while i gave birth to his first granddaughter.... happy birthday

to the man who lights up every time he hears "hi papa".... happy birthday

to the man who is his granddaughters best friend..... happy birthday

to the man who i am SO proud to be his daughter.... happy birthday pop. i love you.

leaving on a jet plane.

oh great. now i'm going to have that song stuck in my head! my hubby and i are heading out to catch a flight friday morning to visit our AMAZING friends the Salvino's, the Bickart's and the Nunnally's in O HI O. and the cherry on top, is when we all get to watch our STEELERS beat the CRUD out of their BROWNS.... what a fun day that will be!! so, if y'all would be so kind, could you offer up a little loving prayer to the big guy upstairs for a wee bit of traveling grace for us? we would greatly appreciate it!!!

facebook.

i graduated in 1995. that was 14 years ago, although, it seems like yesterday... i lost touch with a lot of the people i graduated with, people whom i thought i would NEVER lose touch with, even though i still live in the same town. thanks to this wonderful little online forum facebook, i have been able to reconnect with so many people. i love hearing about what everyone is doing, what they have done and what they are going to do...

tonight however, our class is walking down an all too familiar road. one of our own has passed away. Robby was so special. i can still picture him, hanging with the guys, with his amazing smile and his genuine laugh... i will be honest, i haven't talked to him since we graduated, but thanks to facebook, i knew what he was up to,what he had done and knew that he had just gotten married 2 weeks ago. i looked at his wedding pictures online and there was that smile. infectious smile. i am absolutely heartbroken... heartbroken for our class, for his wife, for his family, for all that knew him and for all those who will never get to know what an amazing guy he was.

facebook is helping our class mourn, relive memories, and let each other know how much we still love each other. in the midst of this horrible tragedy, i find myself thankful for facebook.

to the class of 1995, i love you all.

first day of school.

i knew the day was coming. we found the perfect outfit, a brand new tinkerbell backpack and the perfect princess lunch box. she was set. the only problem was, i wasn't. i did not want to let my baby go to kindergarten. i could not fathom the idea of not knowing her every move for 6 1/2 hours. would she be ok? would she eat all of her lunch? would she get along with everyone?

well, she proved to me that not only was she growing up, she also for a brief few moments, managed to show that she was still our little girl and take comfort in her daddy's arms... she let out one tear, just one, and then she was all smiles for the rest of the day... my little girl is a kindergartener. and i couldn't be more proud of her.

changes.

you may see this blog go through some changes... i get bored kinda easy, and my poor blog is going to be my guinea pig.