A few firsts...

First Sponge Bath...

First family walk in the new stroller...

First Girlfriend (Beautiful Miss. Bella)...

(That's my Lady!)

Birth Day Stories...

My friends Bri and Christy showed me how to order your blog in book form with all the posts/pics printed, so I'm doing this more for our family's memory sake. You can read along as well, just want to make sure I remember what to tell Micah about his birthday.

Micah was due April 21st and we decided that we schedule the repeat C-Section for a week early (April 14th). If we went into labor earlier than that the plan was to attempt a VBAC. Saturday, April 10th was the Mountain 2 Mountain fundraiser hike at MMCC. I stayed back at the church to hang with the kiddos. Contractions started coming about every 5 minutes and that's when our doc said to go to the hospital. Jared came back to the church to pick us up and started throwing up. Sophia had been sick with the flu the Thursday before and we were praying that Jared was just exhausted form the hike and not getting the flu as we were going to be heading to the hospital shortly! We drove home to pick up my bag and sure enough Jared went into full blown flu mode. My contractions were getting closer (2-3 minutes) and more painful. We decided he would stay home and mom would take me to the hospital to see how things were progressing.

I was not even slightly dilated when we got there, but the contractions were 2 minutes apart. They had me walk around for a while and checked again... no change. What? They started fluids through IV and I kept in contact with my sick husband. They ended up letting me go about 7 hours later and called it an irritable uterus. :) They were good contractions, but not dilating. Possibly dehydration, infection, stress. Whatever caused it, I was relieved to not deliver without daddy present!

Jared and I went to the hospital as planned about 10:30 Wednesday, April 14th. The whole day was so peaceful. Jared and I talked and laughed all morning. As surgery time got closer and my nerves started to get the best of me, he told me in detail about the episode of LOST from the night before (I fell asleep about 5 minutes into it). I was so thankful to have him next to me, keeping me calm and reminding me of what was coming at the other end of the surgery.

They took me to the surgery room. It reminded me of that Willy Wonka big white room with the TV particles. :) Huge white room with a table in the middle. Yikes. They had music on while they gave me the spinal block. "Ain't No Mountian High Enough"... made me happy and kept me calm. Jared joined us and about 15 minutes later we heard the crying of our little man. It was so great to be coherent and not stressed. Micah was perfect. Jared brought him close to my face so I could see him.

Recovery was like night and day from surgery with Sophia. I felt so much better and aware of everything that was happening. Exactly what I'd been praying for all along.

Micah loves his sleep time (I hear the Doe boys get that from Boopa). We had to supplement once the first day as Micah's blood sugar levels were too low and I couldn't get him to wake up to nurse! Other than that he has been great with nursing.

We came home Saturday April 17 (the same day our family helped Gigi and Papa Kevin moved houses) and our transition has been fairly easy!

Obviously, Sophia is in love and loves having him home. Auntie Allie and Uncle Danny stayed with Sophia while we were in the hospital (Allie also got the dreaded flu one of those days- Danny was a superstar!).

A week later, our family of four is adjusting and feeling blessed.

Thank you Lord for our sweet Micah James!

Sophia Singing to Micah

It was one of those glorious moments.. I actually had the camera close and was able to catch these precious 45 seconds. Makes my heart melt. Sophia is the BEST big sister in the whole entire world!!

Newborn Photos

Our friend, Bri Anderson, came by this morning to take some newborn photos of our little man. She has recently taken up photography... you'd never know that she hasn't been doing this forever. She has an amazing eye! And our children make fabulous models, I must say!!

http://www.briandersonphotos.com/blog/2010/04/fresh-and-new/

Thank you for capturing our kiddos so beautifully, Bri!

Micah James Doe!

Micah James was born April 14th at 12:57pm. 7.8lbs and 20.5 inches. The whole family is doing well! Thanks for your prayers!

The last days as a family of three...

Thought I'd take some time to write about what Sophia has been up to lately since her world is about to be

rocked by a new addition to the Doe Fam.

She has facial expressions, eye rolls, eye brow raises

that make us laugh every day.

She has discovered that her parents names are Jared and Marcie. Today, Jared wiped her face and she said "Thanks Jared" and when I asked her if she wanted to make muffins she said,

"No, Marcie can make them." Gee thanks.

I love the way she says both of our names.

It's too cute.

She has quite the imagination and we love watching her play. She often pulls Devin into her world. We look outside and see them holding hands and walking across the grass.

"Hold my hand when we cross the street De-De!"

She still doesn't quite have the "f" and "v" sound down yet which is unfortunate since her name is SoPHia and her playmates are OliVer, DeVin, AVery and Papa KeVin. Speech Specialist Auntie Allie says not to worry though, It'll come :)

She counts to five in Spanish. Neither Jared, nor I taught her that.

Too much Dora?

She's starting to recognize letters and can pull out the ones in her name.

She plays with her baby brother doll. She'll make him food with her play kitchen tools and feeds him with a small spoon. And she disciplines him. A few weeks ago he went to time out for hitting mommy. Whoops!

She wakes up every morning and tells us she wants to "go home". She means leave home and she usually wants to leave in Aunt Koo Koos car.

She talks about Baby Micah and I think she's gonna be a great helper around here.

After he comes, next stop... potty training!

We love you beautiful Sophia Layne!

Happy Easter!

We were hoping Sunday might be the day Micah would decide to join us, but no such luck.

We had a fun eventful day regardless!

Can you tell I'm done with the whole "being pregnant" thing? :)

The Easter Bunny did a great job hiding the eggs in the Lawrence backyard. Sometimes it took a some prompting for the little ones to actually find the egg. Pure confusion from Sophia on this one. She just couldn't see the egg next to the gate handle.

Ahh... finally found it.

Emma, Sophia and Devin. So big!

Jonny defended his name as the Badminton Tourney Champion with a new partner this year.. none other than Jared Doe. They were awarded some sweet beach mats! While we watched the tournament mom commented that she felt like the ground was moving. We all sort of agreed then really agreed once the pool started splashing up on the sides! We felt the earth quake from Mexico... definitely a first for most of us!