Home At Last

... and a post at last. Hopefully lots of pictures will make up for my lack of posts. :)

We "roomed in" with Avella right before we took her home. We had to stay for 12 hours with her still hooked up to all of the monitors. We couldn't see the screen, the nurses watched it in the nursery. It was so weird not hearing constant beeping. And if you are thinking the room looks familiar... You are right! They put us in the same room that I was in for the two weeks before I had her. I just about had an anxiety attack when I walked back in that room. It brought back all of the feelings I had there, mainly the day I had her, it was a scary moment. I would be fine if I never walked in there again. :)

She weighed 5 pounds 3 ounces when we left.

Her first picture with no wires or tubes!

She is finally starting to look and act like a newborn. We have entered a whole new phase and it is so fun!

Avella came home on March 13th! We are so excited to finally be home together as a family. Ethan and Trevan LOVE their baby sister. I thought the excitement would wear off after a while, but she is still the most exciting thing in the house.

The night we brought her home the boys slept by her bassinet up in our room. Ethan woke me up in the middle of the night in between her feedings and said, "Mom Avella has a dirty diaper she needs it changed." He also woke up and helped me with each of her feedings. It was so sweet. Monday he told me, "Mom, if a rock was going to fall and crush Avella, I would save her and I would die." I could have cried. It was sweet to see him express how much he loved her. Trevan heard Ethan say that, and the next day he told me the same thing. Cute boys.

Trevan kept bringing blankets to whoever was holding her Sunday night saying, "She's cold, she needs another blanket." And if he noticed it wasn't on her a while later he would insist she was cold and needed another one. The first thing Trevan does when he wakes up is say hello to Avella. He loves to touch her cheeks and he says they are "so cute". If only he realized he has those same adorable cheeks.

It is so fun to see how much they love and adore her. I'm happy she has two brothers who will always be looking out for her.

She came home needing oxygen when she ate. She is now totally off of oxygen and doing well. At her doctors appointment on March 23rd she weighed 5 pounds 10 ounces. She gained 7 ounces in one week which is pretty impressive.

When we brought her home it felt like a normal birth would have felt. It is like starting over and it's as if we just had her. My body was finally to the point that it felt about what it would have felt like had I just had a baby. And we had to get used to the schedule Avella wanted to be on which meant we were up a lot at night just like any normal birth when you first bring baby home. And we are loving every second of it. It is so nice to feel like things are finally back to normal. I love being home and not going to the hospital every day. I had been there every day from January 21st until we brought her home on the March 13th. People have asked if I'm going crazy being stuck at home. No, I love that I can't go anywhere and I get to be with my family all day. :)

It is crazy to think that today was my due date and in four days she will be two months old. The weirdest thing is holding her and trying to imagine her still in my tummy. I guess I should be grateful my face and ankles never got chubby. I suppose there were good things that came out of this. :)