Merry Christmas

From our family to yours....

Merry Christmas!

Its been a fabulous year and we wish you all the best and have a wonderful safe Christmas and New Year

Pictures taken by: Jeff Weinekie

Words of TJ

I decided it would be good to record in writing how TJ says certain things. That way I can always look back and see how he said certain words.

Some of his words are said like the sound they make:

• Horse: eee aw
• Monkey: eee aw
• Cars: Vroom
• Train: Choo Choo
• Lions, Tigers, and Giraffes: Roar

Some are just strange:

• Penguins and really any bird: Rat...yeah beats me?
• Love you, Thank you, Excuse me, You are welcome: is all said the same... See You

Then here are just some words:

• Bright or something being hot: hot
• Drink: Tea, no matter what the drink is
• Hungry or I want to eat: Eat or I eat
• Please: Pee
• Anna: Nina
• Gracee: Grotchy
• Bed: Might Might
• Bath: Bah
• Home: Ome
• ABC's: See Nah
• Amy: Mimi
• Jeff: Joe
• Buz: Bebe
• Dinosaurs: Choo Choo (He gets this because of Dinosaur train on pbs)
• Football, baseball: PoohBall
• Snack: Nack
• Ally: Chally
• Uncle Terry: Chally's Daddy
• Church: Chip or Papa's Chip
• Movie: Vee or Wee
• Milk: Moe
• Help: Up
• Song or Music: Show
• Guitar: Trow (like show)
• Cold: Burrr

I can't think of anything else right now but I'll keep adding to this blog as I remember or as things change.

Anna is One Month Old

Today Anna is one month old.

She is doing great. She is getting so big and spends a lot of hours during the day awake. She takes her naps in her bed so when I go back to work her bed isn't foreign to her. At night she only wakes up twice. She sleeps for anywhere between 5-7 hours at a time and then wakes up again 3 hours from the first time she woke up.

At first she would take forever to eat. I mean a good 45 minutes to an hour. It didn't take me long to speed her up. At first when she would eat faster she would spit up a bunch but she learned to control her eating and swallow better. She is getting so good at eating that she actually doesn't have to burp every time she eats.The one thing that annoys me is that she is completely fine with not eating every three hours.

She is successfully going to sleep on her own. I'll blog about all that at a later time. We had a stomach bug a few days ago and I held her a lot and I was worried that she wouldn't go to sleep on her own for her naps and bedtime, but she didn't skip a beat. I would lay her down and she would pass out.

When she was first born she would make these sweet baby girl noises. Well those are long gone. She came home and she makes so many noises while she sleeps. I thought TJ was loud, but this girl grunts, sighs and breathes sooo loud while sleeping. It took me a while to tune them out but I can finally sleep without waking up at every grunt. When she is ready to eat she uses the lungs the Lord gave her and I'm up feeding her.

She is pretty easy. She only fusses when she has gas or is hungry. There is the occasion that she fusses when she has been up too long and just doesn't know what to do with her self. She can be dirty or have a completely full wet diaper and she won't make a noise that it bothers her. She does start to fuss if the dirty diaper leaks.

There isn't much to talk about since she is only a month old. She goes to the doctor on Tuesday so I'll have her measurements and weight then.

 Hours old

 1 Week Old

 2 Weeks Old

 3 Weeks Old

1 Month Old

UPDATE: Anna went to her appointment and she weighs 10 pounds, 9 ounces and is 21 3/4" long. The doctor said she was doing well and she is looks great.

Anna's Baptism/ Dedication

Anna's first Sunday was the day we decided to get Anna baptized/dedicated.

The word baptism brings many questions to people when mentioned. We use baptism as a symbol and an act that we are dedicating her to Christ. We step in for her since she isn't old enough to make her decision yet. We promise to raise her in the ways of the Lord. To teach her about Christ and about His teachings. We claimed her for the Lord and that the enemy has no place in her life.

With TJ we did his baptism/dedication when he was a few months old when family would be in town. With Anna since it was the weekend after Thanksgiving most of the family was able to be there, except Aunt Mimi. She had to go back to work. We missed her being there.

This is the gown that my brother, me, my sister, my cousin, TJ and Nate wore at our baptisms

 

 This is where we were asked if we believe in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Do we renounce Satan and all his evil ways.

Papa gave her shoes as a symbol to walk where the Lord leads her and she would walk and sow the seeds of life.

Anna's Birth Story

Here it is... this is a birth story so I will be discussing labor and delivery.

My doctor scheduled my inducing for Friday the November 19th at 5 AM. I tried so hard to get a good night sleep. I went to sleep fine but woke up at 2:22 and couldn't go back to sleep.

Friday November 19th I went in to labor and delivery at 5 AM to be induced. They were all ready for me. I was all dressed and hooked up to the IV by 5:10. I had to be monitored for 20 minutes before they could start the inducing medicine. They started the pitocin at 5:30 and we settled in for a long day.

I started at a 2 when we got there. The contractions weren't bad. After an hour of the pitocin the contractions were 4-6 minutes apart. The plan was for the Doctor to break my water at around 9 when she came in. They won't give me an epidural until I'm at a 4. The contractions just felt like what I had been having the weeks before then. They didn't get bad until 9ish and got to 2 minutes apart. The doctor ended up getting there at 9:30. When she got there I was at a 3 and 80-90% effaced. Once she broke my water the contractions were hard enough that I asked for the epidural. Since I was close enough they agreed to give me the epidural instead of just the pain medicine I asked for right before the doctor came in.

the bottom part of the screen are my contractions

The epidural was in by 10:30 and by 10:45 I was at a 4-5 and 90% effaced. At noon I was at a good 6 and could start to really feel the contractions through the epidural. They weren't really hurting just felt like rough braxton hicks contractions. 12:30 the contractions were a minute and a half apart and I could barely talk through them so they came in and gave me more. At 12:45 the nurse came in to check me and see how I was doing. It was BABY TIME. In 45 minutes I went from a 6 to a 10.

My doctor told me to have the baby before lunch time. I didn't make it before noon but it was baby time right at her lunch time. She came in right before 1. I started pushing at 1, pushed 3 times and Anna was born at 1:05

I knew I just needed a little push and she would come quickly. Tim won't let me say my labor started at 5:30 when they gave me the pitocin because it wasn't really labor till about 9 am (right before the dr came in and broke my water). From 5:30 it was 7.5 hours of labor, from 9 it was 4 hours. Either way it was quick!

Minutes after she was born

Me and My Anna, minutes after she was born and cleaned up.

Anna Katelynn

I would like to introduce my daughter to you

Anna Katelynn

She arrived November 19th 2010 at 1:05 weighing in at 7 lbs 13.6 oz and 20 inches long.

She is doing great. She is a pro at eating. She also makes little cooing noises. I think she is the most beautiful little girl.

 us within a few minutes after she was born

 TJ meeting Anna and Daddy's first time holding both of his babies

 Papa and Nana with Anna

G-Paw and Sweetie (Papa and Wee, as TJ calls them) with Anna

Sigh of Relief

Well I just got home from my 3rd doctor appointment in the last 7 days.

At my last appointment (Monday) she stripped my membranes which can induce labor in itself. Well I had insane contractions all night on Monday night and all day on Tuesday. They started to slow and stopped within 24 hours of starting. I really thought I might have had her Monday or Tuesday. The contractions were so strong I couldn't talk or walk through them and changing positions wouldn't make them stop.

I went to bed so frustrated and mad last night because I felt fine and was having no contractions. Tim and I went to bed at 8:15. I didn't want to think or do anything else. I just wanted to sleep.

This morning I woke up feeling pretty good but NO contractions what so ever. I knew my appointment today would be a bust.

Well, I gained a pound. Not so bad considering I hadn't gained any weight in a couple of weeks. Finishing off 10 pounds less than I was with TJ. I progressed a tiny bit. But the major thing was that she could feel Anna's head. She had moved down drastically. Yah, that means I'm ready to be induced.

So unless I have her in the next 36 hours, I will be induced Friday morning at 5 am. I'm still hoping and praying I have her before then just so I don't have to go on that dreaded pitocin but I'll do anything to get her here safe and sound.

I'll post a blog once we have her but remember I'll be posting updates on twitter.

Here is the link to my profile: http://twitter.com/#!/katieleckie and here is the link to Tim's profile: http://twitter.com/#!/timleckie 

Birthing Updates Via...

Ok. I’ve decided I needed to let people know how I will be updating on the birth of our Miss Anna. I’ll be updating a little on facebook but the problem with this is I have people from work that are my friends on facebook. They don’t need to know about the early stages of labor because it will only worry them and they’ll leave me discouraging notes because none of them want me to have this baby until thanksgiving or later.

The doctor and the rest of us want us to have this baby as soon as possible.  Some of you may or may not have heard of twitter. Well I have a twitter account and normally it is on private so I don’t have random people following me or being able to see what I’m saying. Twitter is where I’m posting comments regularly and will be posting most of the comments. It’s quicker to load on my phone and I can even text in updates if I need to post a quick one.  

Anyways... I wanted to let my blog followers know about my twitter account so you can go to my profile and see if anything is going on.

The link to my profile is: http://twitter.com/katieleckie

Say One for Me

Well my doctor appointment went well today. I hadn't gained any weight but Anna was much bigger. It probably again had something to do with all the walking I had been doing.

I progressed a little but not enough to schedule the induction. She stripped my membranes and got me dialed more. She is hoping this gets some more contractions coming and I either go into labor or progress enough for my next appointment to get induced. I go back in two days, on Wednesday.

I feel lots of contractions now, and I'm just praying her out. I'm praying the contractions just keep coming tonight to where I need to go to the hospital tonight or tomorrow.

If I don't have her on my own and I progress more by Wednesday then she will schedule the induction for Friday or Monday. I know being induced is not fun and I'm praying I go soon on my own.

Your prayers are appreciated.

38 Weeks and Ready to See Anna!

My appointment on Wednesday was a huge disappointment.

I had been walking 2 or more miles every night since Sunday night. I was hoping for a little progression, I mean anything would have been good, but NOTHING. I am at the same as I was last week. She wanted me to go back earlier this next week so if she needed to see me again before scheduling an induction date she could. I'm guessing if I progress any on Monday she may go ahead and schedule the induction.

As of right now everyone that is in our baby labor plan is out of town. My parents are 3 hours away in Oklahoma and Mike and Heather (who will be watching TJ) are in Houston. We do have a back up plan in place. We knew if we told everyone to stay in town because we might have the baby that we would be even more disappointed when we didn't have her.

The plan this weekend is to do what we can to let gravity do its job. We plan on walking and keeping busy this weekend. I've done my research on what foods help prepare you for labor. Pineapple I've had twice, I had spicy food last night and I'm thinking about convincing Tim that we need to eat Chinese food for dinner. And as I write this blog, I'm sitting on an exercise ball. I did some more major cleaning this morning and then helped Tim get leaves picked up in the yard.

The only good thing I heard at the appointment on Wednesday was that I lost a pound. That may have been from all the walking I had been doing but I'm fine with that. With TJ my last appointment was the Wednesday before I had him at 38 weeks. So I was 37 weeks, 6 days for that appointment. On Wednesday I was 37 weeks and 5 days and I weight 11 pounds lighter than I was with TJ. Go ME!

Ok so my only request is that you keep us in your prayers. The doctor still thinks she is going to be big and she really doesn't want me to go too long but can't do anything unless I progress by myself or just have her early.

I'll post again to update how the appointment on Monday goes. For now, I'll be busy this weekend doing my best to help gravity out and get her moving down.

The Room

I know the anticipation for pictures of Anna's room is growing stronger and stronger since everything went wrong about half way through the project.

I decided after completing 95% of the room that I would post an update with pictures. YAH!

We had most of the room done when the a/c incident ruined the flooring and we had to start all over. After getting the a/c we began the room again.

One of the first things I did for her room was we painted these. The dresser was donated to us by my parents and Amy. This was a dresser Amy had in her room. For whatever reason they never painted it and then a coke spilled down the side that was soooo very hard to cover with paint. The toy box we bought at a garage sale for $15. A deal! They both turned out great.

Here is a picture of just the flooring. It looks great. This is after we redid the flooring from having to pull it all up.

This is the wall that the door is on. I really like the dresser, we were going to go with a different type of style of knobs but these turned out great.

The bow corner. I made the bow holder in the frame and a friend of ours made the other one. I have all the regular bows hanging in the frame and then the flower bows hanging from the other holder. Then there are some of her toys and shoes.

As you can see the toy box also looks great. Aunt Mimi got her these amazing chairs. I thought they were so cute. Anna will be using TJ's mattress we just need to get TJ's new mattress and bed switched to a full size bed. We also still need to get the bedding, here a picture for the visual:

I can't wait to get this to finish out the room. The mattress, bedding, curtains and possibly a new light is all that is left to complete the room.

The theme in her room is Pink High Heals. It was really fun and not my style what so ever, but I thought it would be fun to go completely girly with her room. And what is a girls room without a pink shag rug?

And to finish it out, here is a close up of some of the pictures.

We really like the way it turned out and I hate that in every picture the green looks different. The coloring is the truest in the crib pictures. Now we just need her to get here.

Nesting

Well my nesting instincts have been in existence for the last month or so but this weekend they have really set in.

It all started yesterday, I had a pampered chef party yesterday and since my dad was out on a TXAPN journey my mom didn't have a car. She was just going to spend the afternoon at out house until TJ woke up. 

After getting the party all cleaned up she started to nest for me, she got my entire kitchen spotless and then started sweeping my entire house. The house looked great because it was already clean from hosting the party so it was looking great. Then my mom went and took me to get a pedicure and my eye brows waxed. She did this for me with TJ and then I had him that week.

Today I woke up ready to get the house completely ready for this baby. I'm really wanting to have her this week so I knew I would need to get everything done at home this weekend. Our church changed our 1st service of the month to a Friday night so we had all day to get everything done. I created a list of to-dos and told Tim that we needed to start knocking everything out.

• All the bedrooms are cleaned, new sheets, clothes put away, swept and organized. 
• Living room cleaned and vacuumed
• Kitchen completely cleaned and went grocery shopping
• Bathrooms cleaned
• Anna's room decorations were finished and hung in the room
• The rest of the baby stuff from the attic
• Car cleaned
• Car Seat base installed in the car
• Cleaned the garage
• Last minute items found to put in the suitcases
• All the bags are in the car and Gracee's by the door
• Dusted

There was so much more done in there but I can't remember. Now I just need to get some much needed projects done and work and then I am ready to have her. TJ is spending the night with Papa and Nana so I can go into work super early to have time without anyone there to work.

I'm about ready Anna, anytime after tomorrow would be great. K thanks!

37 Weeks

Wednesday I went to my weekly appointment. It was an up and down appointment. I was excited about some things but not about others.

First of all Tuesday night we were doing some stuff around the house and I was getting ready for bed and took off my shoes to find my ankles bigger than my shoes. UGH. I immediately went horizontal and put tight socks on to push all the fluids out of my feet and ankles.

My feet and legs continued to swell all day on Wednesday. I went into my appointment that afternoon knowing they would tell me I gained a bunch. I gained 6 pounds this week. Not what I wanted to hear but I know most of that is water weight. I'm still under my weight that I was with TJ by 4 pounds. My blood pressure is still very good. I found out at the appointment that my blood pressure was going weird around 28 weeks. They never told me, I'm guessing it wasn't bad enough to let me know.

OK now on to the details. I am barely at a 1 and about 50% effaced. She was hoping I was further progressed but I haven't. She said that Anna was big. I asked "so I'm not going to have a little petite baby girl" with her reply "uh NO!" She didn't say the weight she thinks she is but at this point she should be a little over 6 pounds to 6.5 pounds. So she could be around 7 something or more at this point.

She doesn't want me to have a huge baby but she won't induce before 39 weeks. She is going to watch my progression the next few weeks to see if I'm progressing myself. Inducing when I'm not ready could end in a c-section but then waiting to see if I'll go into labor Anna could get to big and then I could end in a c-section.

I know that God has a plan for me and Anna and I have faith that everything will go as planned. I'm praying I progress enough on my own to handle the induction or I go into labor on my own. I've heard that inducing is not fun and natural labor progression is easier but I'll do what I have to do to get her here.

October 31st

Well we went cheep this year and just used the same costume as last year. It fit and last year he didn't do much and we knew we wouldn't be doing much this year. Why not get some more use out of it?

Last year we just went to one neighbors house and then went to Six Flags.

This year we decided to go to a fall fest at a church so he could go out and have some fun. He got to pet some horses, a cow, jump in a bounce house, play some games, eat some yummy food, get some candy, got lots of attention.

We also enjoyed ourselves. Saw some old friends, had yummy hot dogs, cotton candy, and snow cones.

Petting the horse

 Once we got home we went over to Pat and Patty's house, our neighbors. TJ loves them! They love him too. Pat can just be getting home from work and TJ can get him to stay out side and play with him for an hour or so while in his work clothes. Patty will roll around in the grass with him and chase him around the yard. Nice to know I have people right next door that we can count on if we need them. Patty also watches out for Gracee.

Anyways. We had a great time tonight and now we have our little boy cuddled up with us watching the Rangers play.

36 Weeks Preggo

The size of a crenshaw melon

Well we are down to 4 weeks left until my due date!

Everyone keeps saying how it seems to have flown by, it feels the same for me. It seems like yesterday that it was TJ's birthday and we were waiting on the results of the pregnancy test. CRAZY!

I went to the doctor on Wednesday and I was worried about my weight gain since at this point with TJ I had gained 8 pounds! I only gained 2 pounds. I thought for sure it was at least 4 pounds so the 2 pounds was such a relief. I'm not nearly as big as I was with TJ and I'm already tired of the comments:

"you are huge"-yeah I know I'm almost full term, but you don't have to tell me.
"she is dropping"- no, she isn't. if she was I would be able to breathe
"Wow, you look tired from carrying her"- thanks, I guess your saying I don't look good?
"how many days do you have left? Oh wow, 4 weeks!"- so your saying I'm huge, refer to the 1st note
"are you uncomfortable?"- I'm pregnant

I go to the doctor again this Wednesday. We are getting down to the wire people. I have my bag packed, got some last minute needs for once she gets here, now just need to get the car seat installed and head to the hospital.

Here is my 36 week belly shot:

October Tradition

Our October tradition continued on this year with going to a pumpkin patch it was no where near as awesome as last year when we were in New York with Josh and Dre. They took us to Old McDonald's Farm.

We took him to the same little church pumpkin patch we went to in 2008. They had it set up a little different with some different decorations so it was real fun to get different pictures. Amy joined us this year since she was in town for the night. TJ had to show Mimi all the little pumpkins.

We found ourselves a huge pumpkin that had a whole in it so Tim told the guy he was hoping to get a discount. We got it for $6 and TJ found a little pumpkin that cost us all of $.75. I know, huge spenders!

Here are the pictures from the Pumpkin Patch:

 

Us Leckies, all 4 of us!!

 

TJ and Aunt Mimi

 

Riding the hay horse

 

Searching for a pumpkin

Carving the Pumpkin:
Once we got home we started carving the pumpkin, here are a few pictures from the evening... Sorry they aren't the greatest but we had fun.

getting all the yucky stuff out. We had the tools and TJ had a sand shovel to use.

Tim getting the pattern ready

Our owl. We decided not to go with the traditional smiley face