Christmas

A Christmas post is long overdue! We had a wonderful and mostly quiet (except for Annelise crying) Christmas season. I had intended on taking the girls to the mall to get pictures with Santa, but changed my mind when I realized it would be silly to pay money to get a picture where both girls were crying. Annelise would cry because she always cries and Hadleigh would cry of fright (she might not have cried...but it was up in the air). Hadleigh did get to see Santa twice. The school that Hadleigh attends had a breakfast with Santa Claus. We joined Matt, Steph and Jacob, as well as Brea and Brennan at the breakfast and all three kiddos seemed to be a little nervouse about the big man in the red suit. We did manage to get Santa to stand behind us for a picture. In Dave's hometown Santa rides around on a firetruck on Christmas Eve and stops at all the houses where there are children to pass out peppermints. We actually jumped up when we heard the sirens and got Hadleigh out of bed to run outside and see Santa.

I think that one good thing about living far away from family is that you have to get Christmas shopping done early so presents can be sent. I was motivated to have everything done by the first week in December and apart from Dave's present I accomplished my task.

We enjoyed celebrating Christmas through worship at Intown through the Sundays in December. Our Community Group had a wine and cheese party, and there were a couple other little things we attended.

Dave's office was closed the week of Christmas, so we had extra fun having him home for almost two weeks in a row. Our little family celebrated Christmas on the 23rd. I made coffeecake for breakfast and Hadleigh got up to open presents. She enjoyed it, but wasn't as excited as I thought she might be. After church Dave started working on dinner while I kept Annelise mostly quiet. Our Christmas dinner tradition includes roast duck, which was amazing as always.

Christmas Eve we got up early, loaded up the car and drove up to Knoxville to Dave's family. Annelise cried all but 45 minutes of the 4 hour ride...good times...we just kept driving and only stopped to feed her and get fries and a vanilla shake.

Christmas day, Dave's sister, Angie, and her boys, Jonathan, Josh and Jacob, and Dave's grandmother all came over. We opened presents, and then had a yummy lunch.

It was really fun to see Hadleigh with her cousins and grandparents. The boys are so sweet with her and she was following around Josh giving him high 5s and fists. She also loves her Grandma and Bapa. She will occassionally pick up the phone and start talking to Bapa...so sweet!

We drove back down to Atlanta on Thursday and the trip went so much better. Dave sat in the

back in between the girls and Annelise slept the entire ride home...truly amazing.

I was thankful for the entire experience of Christmas. Christmas in Germany was such a different experience, and there are things that we learned while living there that we hope to keep in our lives. While I do enjoy getting and giving presents, I really hate for that to be the focus. I am thankful for our families who honored our wishes for toys that don't make noise, and also who got our children nice things without going over the top. I guess it is still nice for us because Hadleigh is too young to understand the whole gift thing, maybe things will change more when she gets older. One of the gals in our community group was asking me about Christmas and if we got Hadleigh and Annelise gifts. I laughed because we did not buy them gifts. They certainly do not know the difference and we certainly don't need any more toys, etc, and I figure we buy a lot of other things for them...like zoo memberships, etc. One day I might buy them something, but right now we are going with the less is more philosophy.

Miss Hadleigh Claire Gets a Haircut

My little Hadleigh Claire has been looking a little rough lately. Her hair is trying to grow, but it is all uneven and had grown into a bit of a mullet. She won't consistently keep a clip in her hair, and it is generally filled with static and standing on end. Something needed to be done!

Yesterday I took her to CJ, the woman who cuts my hair, and she did a wonderful job of making her hair even. She sat in my lap for the cut and did a great job, though she was mildly distracted by the truck CJ gave her to hold. Also, she saw a reindeer on the wall and started calling it a giraffe. I hated the thought of cutting it, but I am hoping that this will help it grow out into a nice bob of sorts. Dave thinks the cut makes her eyebrows more pronounced and so her facial expressions are very vivid.

The Elf is 2 Months

Today, our little elf, Annelise, is two months old. And as I type she is sleeping in the swing next to me. It has been a long 2 months, but I think the worst is finally over. Over the last week Annelise has begun sleeping in her own bed at night. This means I can feed her and immediately put her back in bed and she will sleep 3 hours until she is hungry again. Major accomplishment! She still likes to be held during the day, but tends to tolerate her swing for her afternoon snooze. I am actually able to get something done! Today I made cookies because my buds, Kris, Alex, Zack and Kate are coming over tomorrow to decorate them. And I am also going to make chicken pot pie tonight because Courtney and Jeremy are coming over for dinner.

Our little elf is eating well, every three hours around the clock, and seems to be growing. She is now smiling which has helped us to enjoy her more (hard to like someone when they are always screaming at you). She has kept most of her hair, but it seems to be getting a little lighter. She has red eyebrows, so I feel just certain she is going to have red hair (seems to fit with her personality). A lot more folks are saying she looks like me, but it seems to change everyday.

She loves her baths and could sit in the tub for hours.

Right now she is sick. Some wretched soul gave Hadleigh the bug and while we managed to keep her away from Annelise, Hadleigh managed to give her sickness to us, and we in turn gave it to Annelise. It is really sad to see such a little one sick. She is coughing a lot trying to get the junk out of her lungs and just looks miserable. Poor thing.

Next we hit the doctor's office for the 2 month visit, so I will know height and weight soon. I am going while Hadleigh is in her morning class...made the mistake of taking both of them to the dr.'s last time...NIGHTMARE!

Look Alike?

Some folks think Annelise looks just like Hadleigh Claire and some think they look complete opposite. Here is a recent pic of Annelise and a pic of HC when she was 8 weeks. One thing you may or may not be able to tell from the pictures is that HC has almost no hair, while Annelise still has wuite a bit of dark hair on her head. You decide...

Annelise

Hadleigh

Annelise

Hadleigh

Intown

I am just sitting here at the computer, paying bills, balancing our check book and organizing the massive amount of papers sitting on my desk. I came upon a letter from our new pastor, John Tinnin and as I read it I became overwhelmed with thanksgiving. My family is lucky to be involved with Intown, and I am so thankful that the Lord brought us back to Atlanta.

We have been able to hear wonderful Gospel centered sermons that have challenged us, and that we talk about during the week. I have actually been amazed at how often during the week I will hear someone mention the sermon. What a blessing to have a pastor who can preach the word, and to have the Holy Spirit continue to use those words throughout the week to prick hearts!

I was also thinking about the Lessons and Carols service this year. Lessons and Carols is an entire service where the Gospel is presented through nine passages of scripture (beginning in the Old Testament and continuing into the New Testament) and nine carols. Dave and I chuckled as we thought about the Lessons and Carols we had in Germany where one of the carols was Feliz Navidad.

We are so blessed through the folks at Intown, and I am so thankful to be back here again.

The Angry Elf

When Dave and I first were married we had many discussions about Christmas family traditions. One of the traditions that needed to be hammered out was which Christmas movie were we going to watch on a regular basis. Dave was voting for "A Christmas Story" which I hate (except for the part where the Dad gets the box and says "Fragile, it must be Italian"). My vote was for "Christmas in Connecticut" which is a wonderful classic. Our first married Christmas we saw the movie "Elf" in the theatre and decided it was a good compromise between the two movies and it has been our family Christmas movie ever since.

I have two fav parts, the first one being when Buddy freaks out "Santa! Santa! I know him!" and then when he realizes it isn't the real Santa he says "You sit on a throne of lies." And the second one is when Buddy comes dancing into his dad's office while they are hearing a story pitch from a little person. Buddy mistakes him for an elf and asks him if Santa knows he left the workshop, etc. In the end Buddy says "Oh, he's an angry elf."

We know have a second nickname for Annelise, besides the purple baby, we are also calling her the angry elf. Dave says he feels better about calling her the "angry elf" because it makes him laugh instead of getting angry when Annelise cries all the time.

Well...stop the presses...I just wrote that entire story to say this one thing...my angry elf is asleep in the swing. Shut it! After she sat screaming in her bouncy seat for an hour while I wrapped presents, I transferred her to the swing...and only after about 10 minutes she fell asleep. That means I am currently typing with both hands and no baby.

OK, I must run and get something else done before she becomes the angry elf again.

21 Months

So, what did you do to celebrate your 21 month old birthday? Hadleigh Claire celebrated in style!

Our Baumholder buddies, Grant and Jess, were stationed at Fort Benning this summer and we have enjoyed seeing them from time to time. Yesterday they invited us to Columbus for the annual Tower Jump (I don't know if that is what it is called officially). Ft. Benning is where all infantry soldiers are trained, all enlisted soldiers have their basic training there, and all officers have their different schools and training there. It is also where any soldier who is "Airborne" or a "Ranger" is trained. Grant was telling us a little about each school while we hung out, but apparently there is a whole technique to jumping out of a plane (go figure) and becoming Airborne. If you do it wrong some bad things can happen, so there is a lot of training that goes into becoming Airborne (just in case you are wondering, Dave did not assume the correct position, but will be practiced up for next year).

There are different towers through Ft. Benning where the soldier train and practice their jumping techniques before jumping out of a plane. They have two 34 foot towers that are used, and once a year they open up the towers and let friends and family jump out of the towers. According to research 34 feet is the scariest height. Any lower and you are lower to the ground and any higher and you can't really tell the difference of being higher.

Dave was excited when Grant mentioned the Tower Jump this summer and we planned to make the trip to Columbus for the occasion. You basically get hooked into a harness, are given a helmet, and then are hooked into two ropes (so it is similar to being hooked into a parachute). You jump out of the tower and fly down a zip line. As Dave's turn was coming up we saw all these little kiddos jumping out of the tower, so Dave asked if they would strap Hadleigh Claire to him for the jump. They agreed!

So, for Hadleigh Claire's 21st month birthday she jumped out of a tower with her Dada. It was apparently no big deal to her. She didn't freak out, and seemed to like the experience. I think she would walk through fire if Dave did it with her, so no big news there.

On other 21 month news, she is saying all sorts of words which is so fun. My favorite word currently is bus, which she pronounces "buts" It makes me giggle.

She is a super big girl and such a big helper. She is definitely not a prissy girl and is unafraid of getting dirty and playing in the dirt. However she does appreciate cleanliness, and LOVES to wipe off her face often while she eats and enjoys picking up random crumbs off the floor and throwing them away.

She loves Annelise and always wants to help rock her, or give her the pacifier if has fallen out. She is a huge help. The other day I was changing Annelise and the phone started ringing. Hadleigh was with me, but left the room, went to find the phone and brought it back to me. Wow! I was impressed! And I didn't even ask her to do that!

She still loves planes, trains, cars, trucks, buses, etc. She loves her stuffed animals, Elmo, Bear and Giraffe.

Since we haven't had a TV in months, Dave found a Sesame Street website that has little games and stories with Elmo. Now, whenever we are on the computer she comes up and says "Melmo, Melmo, Melmo".

Another of my fav is that when we give her something to eat she will say "Mmmm, mummy". She continues to eat anything and everything we give her. She still has her super porridge for breakfast and LOVES it.

One of the best things about having family here after Annelise was born was that Hadleigh had suh a fun time with everyone. Now, she really seems to know them and asks for Papa, Nana and Grandma (Mahmaw).

I have no idea how much she weighs, but Dave calls her the 50 pound giant. After coming home from the hospital with Annelise, she just seems huge. I don't think she weighs 50, but she is probably pushing 30.

1 Month

Annelise is now one month old! We have all survived!

She is now weighing in at 9lbs. 12 oz. and is 22 inches long. She still has her dark brown hair and blond eyebrows, so we will see what becomes of that.

She has her days and nights in the right order, so we have been getting sleep the last week or so. Her longest stretch of sleep is 4 hours, which I gladly accept.

Dave and I tend to refer to little Annelise as the "purple child". Since her arrival, we have noticed that Miss Annelise has a bit of a temper. She often gets really upset (like when she is not being held) and will become purple from head to toe and scream until the situation is remedied. So, that leads me into her obsession with being held. Nothing will be sustituted for being held. The swing has been rejected...the bouncy seat will be tolerated only if you are there making it bounce, and only then it only lasts for about 15 minutes. Forget all slings, baby bjorns or infantinos. I can get her into a deep sleep (as in head back, floppy arms) and I will put her into her Moses basket and she will wake up within 10 minutes. I am trying to enjoy this time and her desire to be held, but some times it is hard. As you can imagine with Annelise's desire to be held, she is sleeping in our bed. I LONG to get her into her own bed, but at this point sleep for all of us is winning. Baby Wise shmaby wise.

Annelise loves her sister Hadleigh Claire. She will often stop crying when HC rocks her violently in her car seat or in the bouncy seat. Ah sisters.

My favorite thing about Annelise is when she sleeps in my arms. It is so hard to be still, especially with HC running around, but it is a precious time. When I hold her in my arms she generally rests her little hand on my chest and holds onto my shirt. It is super sweet, and I know will only last for a short time.

OK, this is short because it is hard to type with a sleeping baby in your arms. Enjoy.

Annelise

Preparing for Christmas

This weekend we began preparing for Christmas. Friday we drove north to a tree farm and cut down our tree. This is the fourth Christmas that we have cut down our own tree (of course now that we are back in America we paid a little more than 5 euro for it). Two years ago we had quite an adventure which involved a recent ice storm, a mile hike in the snow at 8 months prego, and a tree that Dave had seen the Christmas before...you can read all about it in the archives of our blog.

This year was fun for Hadleigh. Annelise rode in the infantino, and slept through the whole thing. Hadleigh was able to ride in a wagon down to the lot and then feed the goats after we had picked out our tree. As we were picking out the tree, she kept exclaiming "twee" and then when she saw the goats yelled "puppy". It was really cute.

Hadleigh helped us decorate the tree and has been great about the ornaments (not that we have put anything breakable within reaching distance).

Today Hadleigh and I made cookies. We had a great time, and she liked saying each object as she cut the cookies out...twee...tar (star)...etc. As a side note, we finally taught her the word bus. She had been calling buses "guck" (truck), but today on the way home from church she said "buts" for bus. Dave and I giggled as she continued to laugh and "buts", she was close.

Miss Annelise Meets Grandma

We have been super fortunate these past weeks to have had lots of help from our families. My mom was here for two weeks and then Dave's mom has been down twice to help. We have had so much help that I actually didn't have to be on my own with the girls until this past Wednesday. Now some of our friends are making meals for us, so all of this has helped make the transition a bit easier.

As I mentioned, Dave's mom was here for three days before Thanksgiving and then again for two days last week. She cooked her amazing lasagne (the best in the world), played with Hadleigh, met Annelise, did massive amounts of laundry and overall was a fun companion to have around.

She also purchased Hadleigh's Christmas present early. Dave put it together on Wednesday evening so it was all ready for her when she woke up on Thursday. When I got her up in the morning I told her that she had a special present waiting in the living room. She went running in there and immediately squealed "Whoa!" and then ran over and got in the swing.

Miss Annelise Meets the Franklins

Miss Annelise and Papa Froggy

Nana Patti and Her Granddaughters

The Franklin Women

Annelise, Great Grandma Gladys, Hadleigh Claire, Ami, and Aunt Kathy

Aunt Kathy and Annelise

Great Grandma Gladys and Annelise

Aunt Kathy and Hadleigh Claire

Miss Annelise has met a lot of important people in her short life. My mom came to help and visit for two weeks, and during that time my dad was able to visit for 5 days and my Grandma Gladys and Aunt Kathy were able to fly down from NYC to visit for a weekend.

Miss Hadleigh Claire Meets Great-Grandma Gladys Claire

A week or so ago my Hadleigh Claire was able to meet her namesake, Gladys Claire, my grandmother. Great-Grandma Gladys Claire was able to fly down from New York City to visit and meet Hadleigh Claire and Annelise her only great-grand-daughters. It was a special visit.

Not So Generous

I have been a little hesitant to post, but Thursday evening was spent with David Stoddard, and I have felt a little better about my conclusions. Recently I read Brian McLaren’s book A Generous Orthodoxy. To be honest, it has been a difficult read, especially because I do not know anyone else who has read it, so there wasn’t anyone I could talk to about the book.

As I mentioned David S. was over here for dinner on Thursday night, saw the book sitting on the end table and asked me what I thought. I was a little nervous to say anything, and finally my Dave exclaimed “that book angers her.” Yes, it is true…I have thought about throwing it against a wall, so that was a fair assessment. David S. asked me why and I dove head first into my reasons. I was worried because David S. is WAY smarter than I will ever be, has read WAY more than I will ever read, is a seminary grad, a pastor, a missionary, etc. As I finished my explanations I realized he was nodding his head, as if he agreed. Was I ever relieved! Not just because he agreed with me, but because I felt a little validated in my concerns.

So, anyway, this isn’t a book I would recommend…if you want a good non-scary…non-angering book check out Radical Reformission by Mark Driscoll. I am not going to go through all the reasons why I didn’t like McLaren’s book, but I will mention one. I can slightly appreciate why someone would not want to be pigeon holed into a belief system…and stereotyped by it. However, while I can appreciate not necessarily wanting to be called Reformed or Wesleyan, or dispensational, I think there are some non-negotiables and we should not be afraid to say these things. For example, I would say, and believe that scripture is very clear that there is not salvation apart from Christ. Will there be people from other religions in heaven, only if they claim Christ as their salvation. Now, McLaren might believe that, but he doesn’t make that distinction and seems to take pride in the fact that no one can nail him down. To me, there are some things that are too important to play around with.

If there is anyone else who has read the book I would be interested in talking with others and hearing other thoughts.

Come On Fred

So, now for the story you have all been waiting for…yea, yea, for all you squeamish folks, you can skip this post. Welcome to my labor story.

I’ll give a little background, so you can see my absolute desperation leading up to Annelise’s arrival. As we approached and passed her due date, and with my family coming, we tried EVERYTHING to put me into labor. Castor oil wasn’t that bad…I was afraid of having a “Dumb and Dumber” experience…ya know when Jim Carey is sitting on the toilet…but fortunately it wasn’t quite that bad. I did have good contractions for about 6 hours after taking it, but no dice. We headed to Scalini’s Italian Restaurant to eat their eggplant parmesan, which is guaranteed to put you into labor within 48 hours…no dice. I did all the “normal” things that everyone tells you to do…long walks up big hills, etc, but again nothing.

When I went to my first post-due-date appt, my midwife commented that it was the first time she had seen me stressed about the situation. She actually redeemed herself as we talked about the options and advised we wait as long as possible before inducing since I had a desire to avoid the epidural. We scheduled the induction for Friday, November 2 at 7.30. She also suggested that I begin taking Evening Primrose Oil in the morning and at night…I was willing to try anything!

As we neared Friday I became more anxious. I had a ton of people praying that labor would just begin on its own, and I also had a lot of folks reassure me that induction isn’t always the devil (though everyone who had taken pitocin had also had an epidural). My friend, Sar, had her baby Jill on October 30th and ended up being induced and had an epidural. It was very reassuring to talk with her and hear that she was happy with the decision (after having a natural labor with her first baby).

So, Wednesday night (Oct 31) I started having contractions, regular and 10 minutes apart. I was able to sleep through some of them, but was up a lot of the night with them. Thursday morning came, and the contractions continued, though they stayed at 10 minutes apart. We had our family fun day and took HC to the park and the contractions continued through lunch and then died. Ugh! Fortunately late afternoon they started up again. I felt like things were progressing, so at 6.30 we started timing the contractions and were 7 minutes apart. And they were REAL labor contractions, like stop what you are doing, don’t talk, etc.

So, during this time I continued to pack my bag, make sure all was set with Hadleigh’s bag as she would be spending the weekend with Bif and Kris, and I started cleaning the house. Jeanie will laugh, yes, I did scrub the kitchen floor, clean the bathroom, etc. I also took 2 baths and 1 shower to help with the pain and to make sure this labor was real. By 10pm I was having irregular, regular contractions that were 4-6 minutes apart and getting stronger. I called Laura and gave her the word that she might need to be ready to come over and stay the night with Hadleigh. At midnight we finally decided we needed to get to the hospital, so Laura came and we headed out.

Wouldn’t you know that as soon as we got to the hospital my contractions started to die…ugh…but they hooked me up to the baby monitor, called my midwife, and started me on fluids…I had hoped to not have an IV, but am Group Beta Strep (GBS) positive, so I needed antibiotics during labor. My midwife checked me and I was 4 cm dilated and 80% effaced. Yea! I was sure that the labor would be speedy, as I had gone from 0-10 cm in 4 hours with HC. Finally at 3am all of my monitoring and antibiotics were complete and I was released to walk the halls and sit on the birthing ball and do whatever needed to get the baby out. At 4am I was 6 cm and 90% effaced…at 6am I was 8cm and 100% effaced…and then labor stalled out a bit, so they broke my water which was cool with me. The only problem was that I continued to GUSH water for the next 3 hours…I remember sitting on the birthing ball singing “I’ve got a river of life flowing out of me…”

At 9am I was still 8 cm and 100% effaced, my contractions had slowed to 7 minutes apart and I was exhausted. They suggested pitocin to finish the job and I was READY to get it done. The really hard thing at this point was the midwife said “We’ll start the pitocin and I’ll come back and check on you at noon” (which was 3 hours away). I was so upset at that thought of three more hours, now tied in bed and hooked up to the monitor and IV of pitocin. I began to contemplate just getting the epidural so that I could sleep (instead of laboring) and have energy to push. Fortunately after 20 minutes on the pitocin I had a HUGE contraction and called for the nurses because I was ready to push. Everyone came in, I gave a big push on the next contraction that sent everyone in a tail spin because apparently the baby was "right there" (side note: "right there" to me meant one more push and she would be here...but that is not what it meant to them). After everyone geared up I was able to begin pushing. I swear I pushed for at least 3 hours, but they tell me it was only 20 minutes. I was hooked up to oxygen and instructed not to scream while I pushed…holy crap…it was intense. I will not soon forget that pain. It was WAY bad. But little Annelise Louise was born at 10.18am…funny side note, after she was born they kept saying 10.18, and I thought that was her weight and freaked out a bit...of course there are only 16 oz in a pound, so the 18 part would not have worked. Fortunately she was only 8lbs. 5 oz. but 21.5 inches long. Both of my nurses commented that it was the best natural birth they had ever seen…which meant I did not yell or swear or hit anyone. I do not know about the hitting part, but the only reason I probably did not yell or swear was because the midwife told me not to make noise (so as to use all of my breath and energy on the task at hand…pushing the baby out).

Dave was able to help pull the baby out, cut the cord and then the midwife showed him the placenta, which he touched with his bare hands (something he had been looking forward to for many months).

After she was born and I held her for a while Annelise received a bath and was then whisked off to the nursery where she had blood tests for GBS. Meanwhile I apparently turned green because of blood loss and my blood pressure dropped to something over 39. After some fluids and a little soup and crackers I started feeling better. I really struggled with managing the pain after the birth and even with narcotics had a hard time sleeping, but by Saturday mid-day I was feeling much better.

The crazy thing is that everything with Hadleigh’s birth was easy in comparison. I was in active labor for 8 hours with Hadleigh, and 16 hours with Annelise. I pushed for 20 minutes with both babies, but Hadleigh seemed to pop right out without feeling much of anything, while I felt intense crazy pain with Annelise. After Annelise was born I thought myself a little foolish for having a normal labor instead of getting an epidural, but overall I am happy with the outcome. However, IF there should ever be another baby that comes from this body I will strongly consider kicking back with the epidural…2 normal labors might be enough for this little lady.

Playing and Bath Time

We have had a busy last 10 days and I will write more at some point, but thought these pics were worthy of a post.

Miss Annelise lost her umbilical cord (those things are SO nast) and received her first bath from Dada. She hated it at first and then sat in the warm water and relaxed for a while. We are pretty deprived of sleep these days, but look forward to this stage being over in a few weeks. Why is it that babies sleep better during the day and at night want to stay up?

Miss Hadleigh Claire continues to be a good helper and absolutely hilarious.

More Pictures

Here are some more pictures.

Happy to be in labor!

Happy to be out of labor!

Introducing the Sisters

Baby Annelise

Going Home

Family Fun Day

Here is a picture from our last Family Fun Day as a fam of 3. Since Dave has Fridays off, we generally take the day and do something super fun as a fam. We enjoy going to the zoo, the aquarium, or trying out different parks in the area.

Because my induction was scheduled for Friday morning, Dave decided to take Thursday off so that we could have our last Fam Fun Day with only Hadleigh. We found a SUPER park in the area that is especially designed for 2-5 year olds. She had SO much fun! She was climbing to the top of the slides by herself and was laughing and screaming with joy.

I actually was having contractions the entire time we were out, but they since they were 10 minutes apart and not really going anywhere, we were still under the impression that I would be induced in the morning.

Finally a Baby!

Annelise Louise McNay

We thought she would NEVER get here (OK, I thought she would NEVER get here), but with a flare for the dramatic (wonder where she gets that from), Annelise Louise McNay arrived Friday, November 2 at 1018am. She was 8lb. 5oz. and 21.5 inches long.

We were within hours of being induced when she decided pitocin sounded too scary and that life would be better without it. Labor was long and intense, but we all made it in one piece, and are SO thankful for everyone who was praying for a normal labor, the Lord is so gracious.

Annelise means grace and favor of God, and Louise means valiant warrior. We chose her middle name for our favorite place in the Canadian Rockies- Lake Louise, where we vacationed shortly after we were married.

More pictures and stories will be coming in the future.