Home at last....

    It feels like a long long time ago since I managed to sit down and update the blog.... but I will admit the last week has flown by... and yet has been one of the longest weeks of our life.  I last wrote on Thanksgiving morning when we were anticipating going into hospital the next morning for the expected birth of our second daughter, our miracle baby, Ava Grace.  And little did we know anything about how the following week would progress.  It's probably a good thing we didn't know all the ups and downs of the journey to this little one's arrival but God has been gracious and carried us through and as I write, Ava is happily swinging away with a full tummy and her sweet sweet face all scrunched up in sleep.  I'll probably fill the post with pictures of our little one since I've finally sat down to upload all the pictures we've snapped over the week.

     Ava Grace joined us in the early hours of the morning on Thursday, October 12 and we were so so ecstatic to hold her in our arms.  As my sister Rachel (my faithful sidekick on this blog) gave updates on our progress... I won't go into all the details of our epic journey to when she made her appearance but having gone through nearly 48 hours of preparations before she did finally greet us, we felt like we went through an obstetrical procedure journey, involving some things we knew about and many that we didn't, so many many ups and downs.  Now this is working and now it's not, now she's head down and now she's not, here's your three choices.  As we reminisced in our hospital room on Thursday morning and reviewed the whole process, we felt like our labour and delivery story was one of multiple choices and choose your own adventure.

     We know that ultimately God was with us in those decisions and that we were so grateful for because we sure didn't always know if we were doing the right thing - do we do the ECV?  do we proceed with c-section despite our fight to not have one?  Do we do an epidural now?  In the end, all things actually went relatively quickly - she was born after just six massive pushes as her heartrate was starting to be affected by the contractions as things had progressed so rapidly in the last hour.  I was slightly panicked to have the lights flung on, the doctors paged in, additional hands were there to help, Timothy was roused quickly from his nap and I was instructed "Mom, you're having this baby now!  Push!".  Well, I'll tell you, I pushed for all I was worth and was alarmed when the resident told me to stop.  "I'm doing my best here to follow your commands!"  and then she said, "Open your eyes, Mom, she's here!"  And to my great surprise, there she was - all 5 pounds and 6 ounces of her!   We were astounded as to the speed of her arrival in the end and it was heavenly to hold her, to breathe in that sweet, sweet baby smell, count her long fingers, feel her skin, marvel at her long long legs (nearly as long as Martha was when she was born, incredibly!) and in general breathe a prayer of thanksgiving (three days later than the holiday) for her safe arrival.

     Praise the Lord and Amazing Grace were my whispered lullabies to our sweet baby daughter.  She has a delicious little cleft in her chin and a little dusting of dark wavy hair, the sweetest round face and tiny head, long long long legs that she loves to kick up in the air and a very sweet disposition.  She barely cries, eats well, loving her bottles and has been treating us very well in general.  Everyone who meets her, falls in love and I'm not being biased... our little meisje, our miracle girl.  Who could fathom that four months ago we were fearful of losing this little one...that she might not have made it through my surgery... that we might never meet her.  All those fears were absolved as she made her appearance in the wee hours of the morning, bringing light and hope to her parents and family, to her friends, to the community around her which stretches around the globe.  As I watch her rock, I'm thinking that she has no idea how many people hold her up in prayer and our family.  We are truly amazed and overwhelmed by the care and love that we feel daily in so many ways (I know, I know, I say this a lot but we are so grateful!!)

   A little bit of baby Ava picture overload but I'm sure no one minds really...
    The rest of our journey has been a bit more rocky - we hoped against hope to go home on Friday after she was born but a variety of things kept us in hospital - first dealing with stabilizing Ava's sugars and temperatures - nearly necessitating a NICU trip but we avoided that narrowly for which we were so thankful.  She learned how to eat quickly and is doing so well in fact now that she's gaining already!  Good girl!
     For me it was also a rough road, I'm the one who kept us in until late Sunday evening.  Some issues with bleeding, low hemoglobins and heart racing and pain made things a bit more complicated than the average delivery.  It's hard to put the cancer diagnosis totally away - it always always lurks in the background and leaves its mucky footprints through the clear waters of our happiness at Ava's birth.  That shadow is hard to dispel and combined with post-baby hormones has made for a lot emotional ups and downs post baby but I'm keeping a good tab on things and I have a wonderful hubbie and friends and family to support... And we have our heavenly Father, who knows our struggles, who has sent His Son to be our comfort and joy, who knows our enemies and will defeat them for us and so we cling in hope to Him and pray for His peace and joy in this interim time of waiting.  We read about Jehosephat this evening for devotions and how the Lord fought for Judah and defeated their enemies before they even entered the battle field and we pray that the same Force that fought for Judah will be our protector and warrior in our battles!