He giveth more grace...

...when the burdens grow greater. And they've grown. Right now, I'm not sure where I should be or how I should be acting or how I should be re-acting. I don't understand what He's doing in our life and I don't know why He would allow this at this time but He is. I just pray that I have the strength to go through it and survive. I'd rather not go through it though......

Zachary's First Visitors!

Nana & Papa Anderson

Grandpa & Grandma Henderson

Auntie Heather

Auntie Jessie

Auntie Erica

Uncle Garrett

Auntie Amy & Cousin Kaylee

Our Family!

He's Here!

Waiting For Zachary!

My mom and I

Heather, me and Jess

Us four girls

Me & My Honey!

Today's the DAY!

Today, Baby Zachary John arrived! He is 11 pounds 2 ounces! 11 pounds 2 ounces! And 22 1/2 inches long. He has a bruised little face just like his brother Cole but they say that it should go away in a couple days. He is so cute!

We were scheduled this morning for a medical induction and when I called at 6am they told me to come in at 7am! I wasn't quite prepared for that but we were able to get there by 7:30. Mike had to drop me off so he could take the boys to Auntie Amy's for the day which allowed me to get hooked up to the monitors before he got back. I asked for them to break my water and see what happened before hooking me to pitocin just to see if I could go into labor on my own. If I could do it without pitocin, then I wouldn't have to have an IV in my hand which is what I really wanted. It also meant that I couldn't have any IV pain medications which Mike was not really looking forward to but what I wanted to do. :)

After my water was broken, I laid in the bed for a while and around 11am got up to walk around with my mom. My sisters, Erica and my mom and dad-in-law were all there waiting for Baby Zach to arrive and they stayed in the room while we walked around. The contractions started to come on strong around 11:30 and I went back to the room to lay down again. Around 12pm, I went into hard labor and he arrived at 1:13pm. It was a very quick and I did think that it would end up that way.....which was why I didn't want or think I needed pitocin.

He is perfect and beautiful!

I'm so thankful that he is here and that we made it through without any complications!

God is so good to us! Our family is now complete!

Elective Induction

I pity the women (including myself) who cannot go into labor on their own. Their water does not break, they do not maintain steady contractions and nothing seems to progress. I don't know what we would have done a hundred years ago. All of us probably died or could never have another baby. And because we can't go into labor on our own, we have to settle for inductions. But not just any inductions, either elective or medical.

Well, today, I was "scheduled" for an elective induction. Oh how lovely the thought. I called at 6am like they said and the charge nurse told me to be here by eight but if anything changed she would call me. We live about 30 minutes from the hospital so we had to leave by 7:30. 7:20 my phone rings. Unbelievable! Sure enough, things had changed and they couldn't have me come in. I cried. Cried because I hadn't wanted to schedule the induction to begin with. Cried because I had thought it was going to happen. Cried because now it was postponed. Cried because Zachary isn't here yet.

The charge nurse said she would call once she had spoken to the doctor on call.

Nothing.

I call at 9am.

New charge nurse. She says that she was going to call me back at 10 but now that I've called, I should just plan my day and not even think about having an induction today. Although the doctor did say that if they could get me in before 3pm there was a possibility we could still do it. She said she would call me back at noon to let me know where everything stood.

Nothing.

Finally by 2pm, I just called back and oh wow, what a coincidence, she was just going to call me! Right. She said that the doctor was going to be pulling my chart and looking at it and then giving me a call since there wasn't a way to get the induction done today.

I wait.

The doctor calls and says that we should schedule it for tomorrow. I in no way am doing that. I asked her if there was more of a chance that it would happen if we just waited until it was medically necessary because I just can't handle up in the air plans. Drives me nuts. I need to know for sure what is going on. And I don't think that's crazy when you have to consider the others involved - a husband that works, a sister-in-law that is going to watch the kids that day, a mom who will watch your kids until you are released, sisters and friends who want to be there - it's not just about me! So I said no to any other elective inductions and we will wait to see if I can make it to Friday when they HAVE to take me! :) Wicked laugh just now! She stated that she would have to see what the schedule looked like and she would call me back. And she did call back in a nice time. And I am scheduled for this Friday. I bumped some other poor woman who can't go into labor on her own from the schedule and she is going to be so disappointed to find out.

So yeah, this whole thing hinges on the fact now that Zach isn't going to arrive on his own.

Hmmmmmmm.......I wonder if that will happen now that I'm making him wait! :)

Baby Zach is waiting...

...and waiting and waiting! He just doesn't seem to want to leave his cozy little home! :) I guess I don't really blame him. We had an appointment with the doctor yesterday and everything was the same from Thursday night so.......who knows when this is all going to take place.

Mike and I were able to go on a date last night to Mall of America where we walked and walked hoping to make things happen but again, not a movement or change! Stinker! :) We at the California Ranch and the food was really good but wow, didn't really care for the music. It made us leave the restaurant just a little sooner than we would have. Definitely wouldn't recommend it for families. But I got my Starbucks and some paper from Archivers to finish Zach's announcements and all in all it was just wonderful! I love having that alone time with Mike - so few and far between. Except when we are exhausted at night after the boys have gone to sleep but the quality as you can imagine is not quite there! :)

Daddy Knows...

...how to make them laugh! I love capturing stuff like this! It truly makes me love my husband more and appreciate the father that he is!

Labor Labor Labor

So last night I thought I was going into labor. Well, I thought wrong. I called the labor and delivery line around 6pm because I thought that I might be in labor. What would make me think this way? Oh just the fact that I couldn't walk through the pain that I was having because of the pressure on my pelvic and it would come and go along with some great labor contractions so of course, I think I'm in labor. The nurse said to come in so I could get evaluated and I called everyone (mom, sisters and friends). We get to the hospital, I have a couple more contractions, they hook up the monitoring equipment and everything goes away. Fun. The doctor was really nice and said to keep me for an hour and have me walk around and see if anything changes. I had a great nurse too. But alas, at 9pm, nothing had changed and everything had stopped. So we went to Perkins! Cause that's what you do when your labor stops! Perkins! It was so much fun though! And who knows when the opportunity will arise to go out to eat at 10:30 with your husband, two sisters, mom and dad and mom and dad-in-law. Probably never! :) And at this point, still the same - nothing! So we shall see! I have a doctor's appointment today at 3:30 and will probably schedule my elective induction then. I will keep anyone and everyone posted!

Taylor & the Toad

We went outside to play today and when we got out some toys there was a toad sitting right next to what Taylor wanted to play with. He was facing away from me so I couldn't see why he was laughing and saying that it was tickling. When I asked him what was tickling him he turned around and showed me this toad that was crawling up his shorts! I've never seen a toad do that before! The toad just kept crawling up and up and these are the pictures that I got! The last picture got a little crazy because right after I took it the frog jumped to my hand and I dropped my phone!

No movement...

...scares me. To death. Zach is a very active baby. Even at this stage in the game, he is active and moves very often and quite a bit. So much so that Sunday night my mom could see very clearly what limbs were moving while we sat and talked.

So yesterday, when he hadn't moved in over 12 hours and I couldn't get him to move, I got just a little nervous. The clinic told me to come and have a non-stress test done so we could make sure he was ok so that was today at 3:50. It was with Dr. Hessl and I found out that I am at 4cm! 4! She did some stuff to try and help any labor contractions along and proceeded to tell me that even though I have another doctor's appointment on Friday, she doesn't think I will make it to then. The stress test went perfect! He moved just like he needed to and I actually had some contractions so the doctor loved that even more! She said that they will sometimes give a patient some pitocin to see how the baby responds to contractions and this was great that they could see his movement with contractions. I had contractions all the way home and contractions for a couple hours after I got home tonight which made me call the labor and delivery line to see what I should do about them but they said to wait it out and start moving around to see if anything changes. I should only come in when I can't walk or talk through a contraction. And those kind of contractions should be for over a half an hour. Sure enough when I got up to start making dinner and get some stuff done, boom, they stopped. On a dime. So we have been having a relaxing evening at home. Waiting. And we will probably continue to wait. He's going to get here only when he wants to! :)

American Boy

I love the Fourth of July! I love all the patriotism and how fun it is and especially all the fruit desserts! Yes, this pregnancy is determining what I love right now! :)

My mother-in-law bought the boys matching jean short overalls in a really dark wash and I had some white polos so I made them wear matching outfits today for church and they looked so cute! I got this really sweet picture of Taylor! It makes me so sad to think that he might possibly grow up in a country that isn't as free as the one I know now.

May God Bless Our Country!

Teething Fever

Cole has been so upset lately and he has one of his front teeth coming in but it just won't cut through! Don't know why but it's just being stubborn!

Yesterday I looked at his mouth and started to put teething gel on the other side of his mouth thinking maybe something was happening over there and he had cut a molar! No wonder he was upset! He's so precious and he really doesn't complain a lot but now I think he had every reason. He just collapsed after I gave him that teething gel and tylenol. :) So cute!