At Home...

Our neighbors stopped by saturday along with some friends from karate, and our families. Turns out Miss Mia is quite popular. They brought along beautiful flowers and some nice gifts for baby. And, my mom cooked!!! Bonus! Miss Mia is very blessed to have her family and friends so close. It's even better that she gets to have a relationship with her great grandparents. Not many people can say that these days!

Alexander and Mia

Going home

We got to leave the hospital yesterday evening to head home and start our new adventure with Mia. We had a houseful of family waiting to welcome us home which was awesome. Alexander LOVES his sister and kissed her on the head all night. Our homecoming was even better because Grampy and Pappaw brought Bob Evans fried chicken. I didn't stay to party too long so I could get some rest. I hadn't slept in 2 days...no joke! So, Ricardo stayed on Mia duty all night and I finally slept. I felt like a new person by 3! Now Ricardo is fast asleep and I'm dosing myself up on coffee. Ha!

Meet Miss Mia

Little Mia decided to arrive today instead of Friday. I wasn't mad about it, I can tell you that! She weighed 8 pounds and was 21 and 1/4 inches long. So far she's a good little lady but I distinctly remember saying the same thing about her brother and he was a pistol once we got home!!! She's just as cute as can be and we're just loving every minute of her. Her brother is trying to adjust but he's already pretty protective. I hope they're great friends! 

It's the final countdown...

I can hear the song 'It's the final countdown' by Europe playing in my mind as we quickly approach our Mia being born. Being pregnant isn't my forte and being pregnant for as long as I have has been quite a challenge for me. I was pregnant for 11 weeks at the beginning of 2014, miscarried, and then had weekly doctor appointments for 8 following, then got pregnant 4 weeks later. If you do the math, I've been pregnant to date for 49 weeks over the past year and I'm not even technically due yet (fyi...that's just 3 weeks shy of a whole year). And over the past year I've been to the doctor well over 75 times, had 12 ultrasounds, probably been pricked 30-50 times, had to pee in a cup probably 80 times (one time for 24 hours at home), and had not one, but 7 non stress tests (2 of them at the hospital), 2 glucose tests, and had to monitor my blood pressure at home, been on antibiotics 3 times, and had one Rogam shot. All I'm missing here is a partridge in a pear tree. Thankfully we don't have wait any longer for this little lady to arrive. If so, I'm fairly certain I'd lose my mind! If someone else utters the words 'this has gone by fast'...I might end up on the bad end of the news! 

Who doesn't love a good surprise?

My good friend April went out of her way to organize a surprise baby shower for me today with our competition team moms and their daughters. I honestly had no idea and teared up a little when I realized what was going on. They had a nice room set up in a restaurant complete with yummy mints, cake pops and lots of super nice gifts! I got everything from homemade blankets, spa gift cards, wine, to old mother Goose to a bunny dressed in a competition Gi with a blackbelt for Mia. It's times like these when you get to feel how much people care about you and go out of their way to make your day. I just can't thank them all enough!

Maternity Pics with Mia on board

We decided late January we probably should get some maternity pics taken while I'm pregnant with Mia since she might wonder why her big brother had them and she didn't. This time however we decided not to spend a gazillion dollars on them and just head to Target. The pics turned out really nice...thankfully my kid is super photo genic and we don't do too bad either. Although what is funny is that in most of the pics of Alexander and my belly he is squatted down quite a bit because he's incredibly tall. If not, his head would be up past my chest which wouldn't make much sense given these were maternity photos.

My Champion

Another karate tournament ensued yesterday and Alexander was in top form. We were really proud of his performance...turns out private lessons really work! And, when they're free it works even better! Ha!!! The whole team did awesome. Ricardo is really proud of all his students and the competition they bring to the tournaments. There's something to be said when in one division our kids took all the medals!

School pics

One thing I do like about school these days is that they take pics at the beginning of the year and then again in the spring. Alexander's pics in the fall weren't exactly stellar and we didn't do retakes for some reasons. Anyway, these turned out pretty good...good enough to see how handsome he is! 

March 1st, really?

I've been waiting for it to be March for what seems to be a life time. Now when it finally arrives, there's a foot of snow? Geesh! My mom was having some fun shoveling and watching Alexander play. Our sweet neighbor was kind enough to snow blow the drive. I think we owe him a gift card?