Happy Easter!

B was so excited the Easter Bunny came to visit him last night! He left a great basket full of goodies!

Unfortunately I was still sleeping when he discovered his basket, so I didn't get to capture his excitement with a photo. By the time I saw it, nearly everything had already been opened into. =)

 

After church, we went to visit our sweet lil angel. As soon as we pulled up, I could immediately tell that her flowers and pinwheel we put down last week were still there, along with her Easter egg we gave her yesterday. We had a huge storm this morning so I wasn't quite sure if everything would still be there, but luckily it was, just as we had left it for her. =)

 

Easter 2013

Not how I envisioned Ava's first Easter picture to be...or ANY picture to be for that matter. =(

 

After our visit, we came home and had a nice lunch, then it was time to boil and dye Easter eggs. I had just recently found an article on Yahoo on how to properly boil eggs, so we tried it out.  Apparently I had been boiling eggs wrong for all these years. =)

We attempted to watch the movie Hop while we were doing eggs, but "someone" has watched it a few too many times. Thirty minutes into the movie it was so scratched it wouldn't progress so we're going to try again tonight with the BluRay version.

 

Just as soon as we finished up with the eggs, B's neighborhood friend came over to play. After they played outside for a lil bit (J and I cleaned up the eggs), they came back in to play B's new xbox game from the Easter bunny...Dance Central 3. I'm not sure who had more fun, them or J and I watching/laughing at them as they danced. =)

 

Here is a lil snippet of one of their dances....(They had no idea I was recording them.)

 

The last 20 seconds or so is my favorite part of the video. =)

 

Overall, we had a really good Easter. We miss our sweet lil princess DEARLY, but I think for today, the smiles and laughs outweighed the tears...for today.

 

Thanks for following along on this new journey with us. =)

Easter "Eve"

Easter Eve...although today was a hard day for us, we tried to make the best of it and do things for Ava.

B and I started the day hiding/finding Easter eggs in the house.  I love when he "hides" the eggs, yet they are out in the most obvious places. =) When I hid the eggs, I tried to use strategy by evenly distributing the eggs in the different hiding rooms so I could remember where I hid them, yet I still forgot where I hid one. =) As we were doing this, I thought Ava needs a pink Easter egg!  So after we finally found the last Easter egg (hidden in one of B's Crocs), we all got in the car to go visit our sweet, lil angel. Once we got to Babyland, I was surprised how much others had decorated for Easter and realized next year, we really need to step it up, our princess deserves the best!

After we each had our special time visiting with her, we headed to Lowes to look at their flowers. Luckily for us, they had a huge pot of all pink gerber daisies that we thought would be perfect for the front porch. Unfortunately, they didn't have any pink gerber daisies to plant, so we went with the next best color for her...yellow. After we purchased our new pretty "Ava" plants, we went to lunch, then home to plant.  Well, J and B planted while I supervised. =) J read the directions on the plants and realized we needed mulch, something we didn't get while at Lowes. Another dreaded trip back to Walmart for me.

Once I got home,  J started laying down the mulch, I decided to do a dreaded task that was long overdue...throw out the flowers we have received and clean up the vases.  All of the flowers we received were absolutely GORGEOUS and they were all just so perfect, it was soo hard to get rid of them, but it needed to be done.

Once those tasks were done, B and I decided to make an Easter treat that we saw on pinterest the day before..

Chocolate Chip Cookie "Nests" with Cadbury Mini Eggs...they were delicious and super easy to make! The best part, B was SUPER excited about them! =)



B also got a care package from one of my sisters (Gigi as he calls her), so he had a good time playing with his new goodies while we waited for our "nests" to bake. After he tasted our baking skills, he facetimed Gigi to thank her and then they did their own Easter egg hunt, virtually. He had a great time! It was so great to hear him so excited and laughing.

They facetimed/played until it was time for B to go to bed.  Bedtime is one of B's hardest time of the day and tonight he had an extra difficult time going to sleep. I'm not for sure if he just couldn't get his mind off of Ava or if it was partly the excitement of the Easter Bunny coming to visit. Either way, this lil boy was not wanting/able to go to sleep. We did our usual bedtime routine and then we said our goodnights. I stayed in his room a lil extra longer because he was in tears and not wanting me to go. After a lil while, I told him I had to go ahead and go and I would come back in a lil bit to check on him. After about 10 minutes, he texted me and said "I am not going to have a good Easter." I replied, "Why do you say that?!" He then replied with a few sad/crying emoticons and typed "Because AVA died" with more crying emoticons.  I texted back "lets not use that "d" word.  Let's say because Ava "passed away" or because Ava "went to be with Jesus"...mommy doesn't like the D word." I immediately went into his room to give him a big hug and wiped away his tears. He asked me, "I still just don't understand why Jesus had to take Ava....doesnt he know that we were all ready for her down here?? We had her room all ready and we had all these cute clothes for her that she'll never get to wear. We planned on doing all these fun things with her and playing with her." I tried to explain that we don't know why he decided to take her, but she is in a much better place, but just like me, he doesn't understand why. After a few more minutes of conversation, I decided to give him some time. Meanwhile, I texted J (who was just downstairs) to let him know that B was having a hard time going to sleep and he might need to give it a try. He came upstairs, talked to him for a few minutes then I suggested he read him an Easter story to help get his mind off of things.  Finally, 3 hours later, just short of midnight, this sweet lil boy finally decided to call it a night...

He found another pink egg for Ava. =)

Good Friday

Yesterday was Good Friday and I did my best to make it a "Good Friday", although I'm not sure that I was too successful. =)  J was at work and B and I had the day to ourselves.  B let me sleep in til 10:30...still not quite sure what he did in the 3.5hours he was alone. =) After watching him play XBox for a lil while, I talked him into going to Wal-Mart to get a few things for Easter and of course to look for the newest Skylander Ninjini. He agreed, the only catch....he wanted to stay in his pjs. His reasoning, "it's only walmart, plus its still only A.M"...who could argue with those 2 valid points?? I didn't have the heart to tell him it was still just barely A.M. and by the time we got there it would probably be noon and switched to P.M. Not up for a battle, I reluctantly let him wear his pjs, but in turn, I did make him wear his coat.  My thinking---"hide" the fact he is wearing his pjs, as though the bright green pants weren't enough to give it away. =)

 

This was my first time to drive in about 2 months.  Before Ava's birth, I was on bedrest for several weeks, and now I'm still recovering from my csection, so I had just gotten the ok to drive.  As I'm driving us to Wal-Mart, B asks me "mommy do you even remember how to drive?!?" "Yes, B, mommy remembers how to drive. I know that red light came out of the middle of nowhere and I had to slam on my breaks, but I do still remember how to drive." =)  

 

After I safely got us to Wal-Mart, the first thing we did was go to the Skylander section to look for the newest one, Ninjini....no luck. I knew it would be a long shot, but considering it was Good Friday, I thought just maybe it would be our lucky day.  Next on our list was to go to the garden section to look for some pink flowers to plant in our front yard. Neither J nor I have a "green thumb", so we were just looking for some simple pink flowers, specifically gerber daisies.  Of course, they had no pink gerber daises or anything else pink that I liked, so at this point I'm thinking to myself...can't just 1 thing go right for us on this trip?!?

Side note....Pink gerber daises are now special to us because they remind us of the only hairbow (out of a HUGE collection) that Ava got to wear.



 

Next on our list was to head to the Easter section to get an egg dye kit and a bag of the mini Cadburry eggs. As we were in the Easter section, I just kept thinking to myself, Ava is supposed to be with us! Ava should be here for Easter!  Luckily I had not yet picked out her Easter dress or I know that tomorrow would be even harder on me. I was waiting to see what size she would need and what the weather would be like before I bought her a dress, but I knew whatever I got her, it would be something pink and frilly! I had already picked out a coordinating shirt for B and had envisioned how adorable they would look together.  As I held back the tears, my face started to turn a lil red. B is so observant, he immediately noticed and reassured me "it's ok mommy, you can be strong."  I did my best to hold it together, we got our items and then headed to the dairy to get some eggs and chocolate chip cookie dough. After that, we headed to the check out, strangely one of the hardest parts of the trip. Right next to our check out lane, was two new moms chit chatting away, and of course I noticed they had the same infant carrier as we had for Ava.  Then the emotions started in my head.  I thought to myself, Ava never even got to use her car seat and she never got to see the pink padded carseat handle holder I got to girly it up. I turned my head and tried to just focus my attention in a different direction. (Of course, B noticed once again that I was just about to break down in tears at any moment and he told me "it's ok mommy, I'll explain to the lady what just happened to us so you won't have to talk".....have I told you lately, what an UNBELIEVABLE lil boy he is?!?) As I was looking straight ahead, trying to hold it together, a woman with her infant stopped at the end of our check out lane and she had the exact same pink carseat canopy we had for Ava. It took all the strength in me, to not lose it. B told me, "I know you want to cry mommy, if you can just wait until we can get to the car, then you can cry all you want." Those simple lil words, helped me hold in my tears. I didn't want to "lose it" in Wal-Mart for B's sake.

 

After checking out, it was now "PM" so I asked B if he still wanted the McDonalds I promised him.  Of course he did! Knowing that I just needed to get out of WalMart, he asked me if we could just get  our McDonalds "to go".  As we drove home I held back my tears, well, for the most part. I kept thinking to myself, why is such a simple task like going to Wal-Mart soo difficult and will it ever get easier??

 

In an effort to still make this a good day, after we ate our lunch, we headed to Kroger to get a pink rose bush to plant in our front yard. I also had a redbox coupon, so I let B rent a game. He has really been into dancing lately, so he wanted the Just Dance 4 game. Kroger was out of it, so we headed to the next nearest Redbox to rent it.  Once we got home he started playing the game (the Wii version), and he realized how spoiled he is by the Xbox Kinect. He didn't like having to dance with a remote in his hand.  Not even 5 minutes into the game, he decided to put the remote down and "just dance" with the characters. Then 15 minutes later, he decided he would just switch to his Skylanders game...waste of a $1.50 for the rental, but I did get joy out of watching him dance and giggle, those moments are priceless. =)

 

Overall, considering our circumstances, I think B and I had a "Good Friday", hope you did too!

 

My Family Introductions

Thank you for following along with us as we travel back in time and share about our sweet, lil Ava. :)

If you have not read about her birth yet, you can read it here and our night before preparation here. 

I wanted to share a few more pictures of her when she was first born that I didn't include in the last post.

I think I forgot to mention in my previous post, Ava was a healthy 5 pounds 10 ounces, and 17.5 inches long. (Oddly, the EXACT same length as Brayden when he was born.)

 

Can you believe how big her umbilical cord is?!?! The doctors and nurses were all impressed. :) Just in case you haven't read about her birth, her umbilical cord was left long so J could cut it before her first sponge bath.

Her first mommy kiss.

Our first picture of the three of us.

Although it's not the most flattering of me, here is a picture of Ava and me that I am very thankful to have. I am thankful for this picture because quite honestly I do not even remember this moment. As I was writing one of the previous post, I had asked J, "how did we transport Ava from the operating room into our room?"...He had to remind/tell me that I held her in my arms as we transitioned into the room. I had no recollection of it...I'm hoping it's only because of the medicine I was on and not that my memory of our special moments is already starting to fade me. So here is pic of me and Miss Ava going back to our room...

I know the picture doesn't show it very well, but I promise I have my arm around her. :)

 

One of the first things we did once we were in our room (after showing her to Brayden) was introduced Ava to my parents and my oldest sister.  I am SO thankful we have these pictures too...

 

 

Unfortunately, Jason's parents could not be with us this day. (I'll share their introduction to Ava on a future post, I'm doing my best to go in chronological order.)  They had already taken off work for a few days the next week to come spend with us which was Ava's original planned csection due date before we had to bump it up a week. They thought they could wait until then to see her, but Jason knew as soon as he texted a picture of Ava to his dad, that they would not be able to wait a whole week to see her....and thankfully he was right. Shortly after he texted his dad, his dad called him to congratulate him and say we'll see ya tomorrow.  

 

After the introductions, Brayden was able to open his Big Brother gift from Ava. Of course, he was so excited to get a gift. :)

 

 

He immediately had to put on his Big Brother shirt and then hold his baby sister, he was so proud!

He was diligently listening to instructions on how to properly hold her. :)

 

Seeing these pictures/video of Brayden holding Ava, literally breaks my heart each time I look at them. For anyone new to our story, Brayden was so excited, not only to be a Big Brother, but to have a baby sister as well. He was SOOO excited when we found out Ava was a girl!  He wanted a baby sister so bad and I just feel like all that joy was just ripped away from him...something no 7 year old should have to endure.  We pray that one day, he will get to feel the joy and excitement of being a big brother again. :)



The Big Day: Ava's Birth

At 8am, I went back to the operating room to get my spinal block as Jason anxiously waited outside in the hallway. After about 15-20 minutes, Jason was able to come into the operating room with me and everyone got prepared to begin. The room was completely silent so the doctor requested some music to be turned on.  The anesthesiologist turned on some music for us, and the first song played was Train's "Marry Me". Jason and I both looked at each other and immediately thought "how perfect is this?!?!" That particular song has always been special to us from the first moment we heard it at our friends Rene' and Brandon's wedding. At the time Jason and I were still just dating and I fell so in love with the song, that I would always tease Jason that it would be the PERFECT song to play when he proposed to me. Lucky for me, he found a MUCH better, creative way to propose to me....you can read about it here.

About 10 minutes into the surgery, I started feeling nauseous. At first I tried to be strong and not say anything. I kept thinking, surely I won't get sick, surely I won't get sick (if I kept saying it enough, it would become true, right?). I wasn't sick the ENTIRE pregnancy, not even once, how can I get sick on the operating table?!? Just when I thought I couldn't take it anymore, I decided to say something. Luckily the anesthesiologist was right by my side and immediately gave me some super fast acting anti nausea medicine. I decided to find a focal point on the ceiling and just focus on not getting sick. Thankfully, I was able to hold it altogether and not get sick.  About this time, Ava made her big debut.

She was such a great baby, she didn't even come out screaming. :) Jason and I both immediately fell in love with her, even more so than we already had.  :)

I LOVE this picture and how you can still tell he is grinning from ear to ear, even behind his mask. He is one proud daddy! :)

 

At this point, Jason kept trying to show her to me, but I was still needing to keep my "focal point" to not get sick, so the two of them were able to have some special bonding time as I got stapeled/stitched back up.

Jason took some really good videos with his phone of the nurse doing all of Ava's first newborn check ups. I am so thankful that he was able to take these videos because I had no idea what was going on over there while I still had to keep my focal point. :)

Here is a sweet video of our lil princess getting her newborn measurements:

On that video, you can see her huge umbilical cord...they left it a lil long on purpose, so Jason could have the memorable moment of cutting it. When you have a csection, the dads aren't able to cut the cord during the surgery, so this was the best alternative for us. He was able to cut it right before her first sponge bath.

Here is a short video of the nurse listening to Ava's heartbeat and Ava trying so hard to open her eyes for the first time...

We LOVE listening to her sweet, lil cry and could listen to it all day! One of the things we noticed and loved was how quickly she was able to soothe herself after she let out a cry.

The last song to play before we left the operating room was another one of our (including Brayden) favorite Train songs "Hey Soul Sister"....we thought that was the perfect upbeat song to conclude the birth of our healthy baby girl. :)

After the surgery, we were able to head back to our room and Brayden was introduced to his baby sister for the first time...he was SOOO excited and so in love with her too!

 

The Night Before Ava's Birth

This time two weeks ago, Jason and I were on cloud 9 full of excitement and anticipation knowing that in the morning we would be heading to the hospital for the arrival of our baby girl, Ava. Brayden had spent the weekend with my parents so he could have some special time with them before he became a Big Brother and it also allowed Jason and I time to do a couple of last minute preparations for Ava's big arrival. We were so giddy, all day long we kept counting down the hours and saying "I can't believe in xx amount of hours, we are going to see our lil princess and be brand new parents!!" We had everything ready to go for her, my hospital bag was packed, and the cameras and video camera were all ready to go. We were just impatiently counting down the hours. :)

At 38 weeks pregnant, we had a scheduled csection for Monday, 3/11/13 at 8am. We were supposed to be at the hospital at 6am, but of course since neither Jason nor I can EVER be on time, we showed up fashionably late about 6:20am. Luckily they give you some lead time. :) We were checked into our room and I had Jason take one last pregnant picture of me...

Since I had been on bed rest from week 32, I didn't really get a chance to take many cute pregnancy pics, so I wanted to make sure we had at least one picture of me fully bloomed. :)

We had a wonderful nurse that prepped me for surgery. Shortly after she had me prepped, my parents, Brayden and oldest sister all arrived bright and early to wish us good luck. We took one last photo, of the three of us:

Then the doctor came in to say good morning and check on us.

Everyone and everything was ready to go...including Jason in his "hazmat suit" as he called it. :)

Finally, it was 8am and time for us to head back to surgery...

New Blog

Oh, where to begin??? About a month ago, I decided to transition Brayden's and I blog into a new family blog, with a new name and new address. You can still visit our old blog, but any new postings will be on this blog. Originally, Jason and I thought this would be a great outlet to share and update our family and friends on our daily life, specifically life with our new, sweet, lil princess Ava, without having to flood facebook on a daily basis with her and Brayden's cuteness. :)  I had already set up our new blog, but just hadn't taken the time to post to it yet.  Tragically, after 38 hours of a healthy life, lil Ava was called to heaven on 3/12/13. Now, we will use this blog to share Ava's sweet lil life, everything leading up to her big arrival, her arrival, everything after that, and of course to still document our new life. :) Thanks for following along with us on our new journey.

Meet the Abraham's: Christie (37weeks pregnant with Ava), Brayden (7years old) holding our puppy Lilly, and Jason.