A 4 year old Bean!

Maybe it is because we have a new tiny baby girl in our home right now, but I have been nearly physically ill thinking about my little Isabelle turning another year older. I am sure she was my newborn baby just a day or two ago and now she is old enough to get dressed by herself, get herself a snack and climb in and out of her own car seat. What happened? I swear I took everyone's advice and never blinked?!

We began celebrating the big day almost 2 weeks early when Grandpa Elmo and Grammie came to visit and let her open an early present. It was gardening tools and she spent the first few hours of Saturday planting literally hundreds of flower seeds in her pjs in our back yard. Grammie supervised and just let Jelly plant seeds as she pleased all over the mulch under each of our trees. (We will now enjoy watching if and exactly what may actually grow!) The funny part of this story is that she insisted that her garden hoe was actually called a foo and foo'd all morning long. Jelly was especially lucky because when the dreaded time came and her grandparents had to return home, they left her with a stack of gifts all numbered with a countdown to March 23rd so that she would have a gift to open every day until then. It was a great idea and Isabelle ran downstairs every morning searching for the right numbered gift to celebrate with.

A few days later, Grandma and Grandpa Cosby headed south for a few days to enjoy the Spring weather and to meet little Olivia. Of course being just a few days from Isabelle's birthday, the celebration continued. Since Jelly LOVES downtown, we headed to the city and had fun at the Children's Magic Theatre watching If You Give Your Moose a Muffin. We have read the book so many times and Isabelle loved seeing the story come to life! (And baby sister, just three weeks old, slept through her first trip to the city!) More gifts were opened including a new dress for Sunday and one of Jelly's favorite activities, a puzzle!

Finally the calendar actually read March 23rd and the real birthday celebration began! Jelly ran straight from her bed to ours before 7:00am and exclaimed I'm already four! She was right too since she was born at 3:23am on that glorious day! She was thrilled when she came downstairs and found My Little Pony decorations, more gifts and a donut for a birthday breakfast! Her most exciting present was waiting for her on the back porch, thanks to her Dad working to put it together well past midnight the night before...a City Center Playhouse! It has a different 'business' on each side including a basketball hoop on the back.

Olivia and I tried to make the day full of fun playing and opening a gift here and there all day long. Again we made a trip downtown at Isabelle's request for a birthday lunch at Rain Forest Cafe on the Riverwalk. Ben was able to meet us there and we enjoyed a wild meal with singing and an ice cream sundae for dessert. Jelly was exhausted after a full day of fun and hit the pillow hard dreaming of her My Little Pony party with her friends the following day.

To finish off the several week long celebration, Isabelle had planned to meet some of her favorite friends at the park for a little birthday party with a My Little Pony treasure hunt! Unfortunately, we woke up to buckets of rain but thanks to lots of work by mom and dad and Jelly's sweet enthusiasm, we decided to continue on with the party and made some quick modifications to the plans. Isabelle was out of her mind to see all of her friends and was actually shocked that they had all brought her more gifts. She had so much fun playing with each of her guests and their ponies, breaking a Pinkie Pie pinata and eating snacks and cake! We managed to keep the party under the giant pavilion until the very end when we finally let the girls run out in the rain and when it was time to go home, we stripped the birthday girl down and put her straight in the bathtub to warm up! Despite the rain, her My Little Pony party exceeded her simple expectations.

Isabelle is such a sweet daughter and sister and all of the celebrating was worth every minute of her feeling special and loved. She tries so hard to do what is right and always keeps us laughing...and running. She is so smart and we are continually amazed at how quickly she learns and remembers everything. Little Olivia already adores her big sister and cranks her head around searching for the body that matches that animated voice! What a blessing our little Jelly Bean is!

New Acquisition!

I don't know who is the most in love with new baby Olivia, her mom, her dad or her big sister Isabelle?!

Let's start at the beginning...

Ever since I found out I was pregnant I was concerned that my labor and delivery would go too fast! I showed no signs of labor with Isabelle until the day I delivered her and my mom didn't even make it to the hospital in time for all of her deliveries, having one almost at home and then delivering in the ambulance. Dr. Theis knew my history and was "on alarm" as well so when I went into his office on Tuesday the 23rd of February and still showed no sign of imminent labor, he decided it was smartest to just meet him in labor/delivery on Thursday morning at 7:00am. Luckily knowing a plan a day in advance, Grammie was able to be here from Houston and be on "Belle duty" while Ben and I checked into the hospital.

I knew I was in trouble when the first thing the nurse said to me when she got me attached to all of the machines was aren't you feeling these contractions you are having now? I was definitely uncomfortable but I would never have headed to the hospital yet based on the pain and contractions I was feeling. I could tell by the look on Ben's face that he was glad we were already in the hospital because it was going to be a busy morning!

Obviously the baby had finally decided to arrive because at check-in I was already dilated to 4cm and was well on my way! I was blessed with a very kind nurse who skipped the normal hospital procedures and forced the anesthesiologist to visit me sooner than later as I was progressing very quickly and she and I were both hoping for a little pain-relief. As luck would have it, I was able to get an epidural but the needle veered to one side, so while my left side was able to escape most of the delivery pain, my right side took the brunt of it. (What a weird sensation!)

By now, Isabelle and Grammie had made it to the hospital and had come in multiple times to check on me! Isabelle was very hesitant to touch me at all as she was skeptical of my IV, heart monitor, etc. At about 11:10am I was dilated to 6cm and I asked my nurse when she thought I should call a friend to come pick up my toddler so that my mom could be in the delivery room for the birth. She said it was impossible to tell because some people would lay like this for hours and hours while others would move a bit quicker. However, I could tell labor was moving very quickly at this point and decided it might be best to make the Isabelle drop-off soon. Ben called our great friend Jaimie and she began to head to the hospital to pick up big sister for a few hours. While Ben was out in the waiting room getting Isabelle ready to go the baby decided she was ready to come NOW and made a giant move which set off alarms and had nurses running in to put oxygen on me and monitor the baby closer. I was now 8cm dilated and about 5 minutes later I was 10cm and ready to go!

Ben came back in shock only being gone a few minutes to find me hooked up to more machines and ready to deliver. The baby was serious about being born immediately and while Ben called my mom, the nurse called Dr. Theis in panic-mode. The nurse was holding the baby's head IN and trying to encourage me to breath but NOT PUSH. She and Ben could both see her cute little head and were commenting on her hair while I laid there praying the doctor would get there SOON! Jaimie pulled into the hospital moments later and my mom literally threw Isabelle to her and raced up the stairs and into my delivery room with Dr. Theis running in right behind her. He was shouting, just let me put on some gloves, and about 60 seconds later, Olivia Cosby was born at 11:30am on February 25th, 2010.

She weighed 7 lbs and 11 oz and was 20 1/4 inches long. She was perfect and pink and cried right away wondering what just happened?! She has the same brown hair Belle was born with and looks just like her sister in the face! After getting a scolding from both Ben and the nurse about if there is ever another Cosby baby, I MUST get to the hospital earlier, with or without pain, we finally made our way to recovery!

Ben picked Belle up (big thanks to Jaimie) as she was very excited to meet her new baby sister and we spent the rest of the day enjoying the new sweet baby in our family. The quick labor and delivery agreed with both me and Olivia and we were able to return home the next afternoon. We were lucky to have Grammie with us all week (and Grandpa and Aunt Alee and Uncle Nick for the weekend) and Olivia made the transition to life outside the womb with grace, sleeping and eating just as she should. Big sister too has been charming picking out what Livi wears each day and surrounding her with toys to play with. Olivia already posed for her first photo-shoot with www.jaimiehaleyphotography.com at 7 days old and we can't wait to see the newborn pictures of our sweet baby.

Of course with all good comes some bad and on the second night home from the hospital we were up all night with Belle and a stomach bug and then a terrible head cold all week long which left her grumpy and tired. Livi has already tried out her first prescription as well for conjunctivitis which apparently goes hand and hand with ear infections. (Can I just say NO right now? Isabelle did have it too when she was a newborn if there is any connection.) However, Belle is finally sniffle free and Livi is 14 days old today and is now weighing in at 8 lbs and 2 oz so all is well.

We are so grateful for little Olivia and know that she will be a great strength and blessing to our family! She is absolutely smothered with love!

**On a side note, a few weeks before Olivia was born I had a picture frame made for Ben's office that reads New Acquisition. It just seemed so appropriate!