Nolan

It is high time that I officially introduce my brand new baby!

My newest son is now three weeks old!

I'm finally ready to chronicle his birth, including all of the most unflattering pictures this entails. It has also come to my attention that I have no more than eight pictures of this monumental event (apparently we were preoccupied), and all of them a little bit terrible, but I know my mother was much more diligent in that department, so maybe she will lend a hand!

First, I was due March 16th. Travis was assigned a clinical rotation in St. Louis for the month of March, but he had arranged to take the last two weeks off for the baby's birth. (That would be the weekend of my due date through nearly the end of the month.) Since he had limited time with us, and I have a track record of going interminably past my due date, we planned an induction for March 17th - St. Patrick's Day, for extra luck! My parents arrived earlier that weekend, and my mom was able to come with us for his birth.

The night before the Big Day, I laid out a box of green Lucky Charms I had found for my kids to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. And we dyed the milk green. Done and done. (Nope I don't do the fancy green-eggs-and-ham breakfast or whatever it is the supermoms do for St. Patrick's Day! Ha! Plus I was giving them a new baby brother for the holiday, so there's that.)


6 am - checking into the hospital
I know, I know - it's hard to look this fabulous at 6 am. Especially when you are 9 months pregnant and therefore don't sleep at night. Ever.

Everything went so smoothly and quickly. The doctors and nurses were totally awesome. We especially loved Stefanie, who was with me during my entire stay, and pretty much delivered Nolan by herself! She was just able to call Dr. Kramer in at the last possible second. The nursery staff missed the whole thing, though! He was in a mad rush to be born!

 He made his appearance at 11:49 am - super fast and looking pretty battered and bruised because of it! Seriously, he looked like he'd been in a fight. His little button nose was black and blue!
I remember thinking he was the most banged-up of all my newborns, but I still thought he was beautiful.

Weighing in at a solid 8 lbs. 3.8 oz

The kids were so excited to meet him!

Nine months ago when I saw that little line on a pregnancy test, I was filled to the point of overflowing with gratitude. I know I have three other children, and this is not to diminish the gratitude I feel for each of them, but I just felt like I'd been given the greatest gift at that very moment in time. These past 8 years have been hard ones, in every way imaginable and in some ways unimaginable, but the glorious little sparks of light that speckle my life (colloquially known as children) make it all worth it and keep me going. I was so overwhelmed with gratitude every time I thought of holding that sweet little new baby in my arms - it was agonizing to wait for him! But now he is here! And I can't get enough of him.

Yesterday we watched General Conference, my favorite talk of which was President Uchtdorf's talk about gratitude in all circumstances. I loved every word. It was hard for me to pick out any lines that particularly stood out, because it was basically the entire thing. But here are a few favorites:

"When we are grateful to God in our circumstances, we can experience gentle peace in the midst of tribulation."

And most importantly:

"How much of life do we miss by waiting to see the rainbow before thanking God that there is rain?"

This summarizes my own life, pretty much. I feel like I spend a great deal of time "waiting" - whether I mean to or not - and then I will be thankful for the "rainbow," forgetting to be thankful for the rain. I can't help but look forward to a time when Travis will be done with school, when we know where we will live, when we will have actual income, when he won't have to leave me alone for weeks or months at a time while goes away on clinical rotations. I certainly do not want to wish my life away, or especially my children's childhood, but it's so hard not to look ahead all the time. I am trying hard to focus on the present and be especially grateful for everything I have right now.

And right now, that is the sweet little milk-drunk bread-dough bundle of new little baby sleeping in my lap.

Oh my goodness I love him.