Happy 2 Weeks!!

Happy 2 week birthday, Landrie Grace! I didn't think it was possible, but we are more in love with you today than ever before!

We knew our baby girl was growing. We saw her little chubby cheeks, and she grew out of most her premie clothes this weekend. It's amazing how fast it happened!

We had her 2 week check up this morning, and she is in perfect health! It turns out she really has been gaining! She's put on almost a full pound! Here are her latest stats:

Birth
6 pounds, 7 ounces
19.25 inches

2 Weeks
7 pounds, 6 ounces (25th %)
20 inches (25th %)

The nurse looked at Mark and I and said that she would probably move out of the 25th % soon since we are so tall. :)

She's Here!!

This is Part II of Landrie's birth story. If you missed the wild and crazy part I ("My Water Broke"), you can read about it here.

So after driving at breakneck speeds to get to Wichita Falls, we finally arrived at the hospital. I was still in my dress and heels from my baby shower!! I didn't want to waste a single second by changing clothes. We were so excited!!!

We stopped in the hospital parking lot to pray for our baby (she still didn't have a name!) and our birth mother. We also snapped this picture. It's the last picture of us before we were parents!

We were greeted by two of the ladies from the adoption agency, and we headed upstairs. Our birth mom should be the poster child for perfect labor! She looked great! She had a friend there too, and we all spent several hours together. She eagerly asked, "Well, do you have a name yet??" Mark said, "We still had 2 weeks and 5 days to decide!" :) We shared our top 2 names (well, actually, our only 2 names...) and her eyes lit up when we said, "...and Grace for a middle name." It turns out that is the one name that she had been thinking about! Before we knew it, she was at a 10 and ready to push! We headed out to the waiting room. Some of you were still awake and waiting on updates! I texted that she was ready to push. We talked and prayed with Judy (from our agency) in the waiting room. Meanwhile, our birth mom waited for the doctor to get there, delivered Landrie, and had some alone time with Landrie. Before long, her friend came out and asked if we wanted to go back. DID WE?!?! It was all I could do not to run down that hall. It makes me cry to even write about it!

We walked into the quiet room. Our sweet birthmom looked like she'd been chatting on the phone, not giving birth! In her arms she cradled the tiniest bundle. She smiled and lovingly offered her to me. Oh my goodness. Words cannot even express what we felt when we first saw her and held her.


We all stayed together in the delivery room for several hours. We passed Landrie around over and over again. All of us had our cameras going like crazy. We unwrapped her and checked out her 10 tiny fingers and 1o long, dainty toes. We marveled at her head full of hair!!

The nurse snapped the official hospital bracelet on my wrist. I felt like I was officially a mom!

We all headed to recovery rooms at about 4am. Judy stayed with us the whole time! Thank you, Judy! There was a Home Suite available for adoptive parents and parents of NICU babies, but we opted to get a room next door to our birth mom. I wheeled Landrie's little basinett into our room. We sat, just the 3 of us, and held her and cried. She's such a precious miracle! We got a few minutes of sleep before a nurse came in to take Landrie to the nursery for a bath. We groggily went back to sleep. I woke up a little while later and realized Landrie wasn't back yet. I found the nurses station and told them, "I need my baby back!" They directed me to the nursery, and there was our beautiful daughter. When I got back to the room our cell phones were ringing off the hook! We promise that we didn't mean to leave you all wondering all night long! We were just so enraptured by our baby that nothing else mattered. We had to take a quick break from the phone calls to decide on a name. We knew the middle name had to be Grace, and we loved the name Landrie, so it was finally settled!

Whew! Once again, I've written a novel, and I'm still not finished. Landrie's grandparents are due to arrive any minute. I know they are beside themselves excited to see her, so I'd better go now and finish this later!

LOTS of hair

When we went to Landrie's sonogram, we were amazed at how much hair she had. When she was born, we were even more shocked! I've loved all her hair, because I've got lots of bows ready.

Oh, don't you worry, there's more room on there for more bows! :)

Last night was that beautiful hair became a problem. Landrie was awake and squirming around. Her little hands were flying all around as she stretched, and her little fingers were opening and closing. She was a happy baby! All of the sudden, she let out a horrible scream, and it didn't stop! I realized that she had accidentally grabbed a fistful of her own hair, and was pulling it really hard. The more she screamed, the more tense she got and the harder she pulled! Mark had to pry her tiny fist open to free her hair. We almost had a baby with a bald patch!

No more pictures of our precious baby

After talking with our adoption agency today, we found out we can't put pictures of Landrie on the internet (including facebook) until our adoption is final. It will be final when she's about 6 months old. We are so bummed, but we want to do what's best for Landrie, and we would never want to jeopardize anything.

That just means we'll have to share pictures the old fashioned way, in person and in the mail!

PS- It's really a shame, because I can assure you she's more beautiful each passing day.

**UPDATED: I put the old posts back up, but I took out all the pictures of Landrie. I'm going to continue to blog, I'll just have to do some creative cropping. :) **

The tiniest, happiest baby you've ever seen

We are loving life at home with Landrie, and apparently she is too! At her early morning feeding this morning, she started smiling like crazy. I got some great shots of her with joy written all over her face.






Could she be any more precious??

I love how tiny and sweet Landrie is, and I don't want to forget it when she grows. Right now she can only fit in premie clothes. I put her in a premie gown to sleep in last night because it had those little sleeves that cover up her little hands. She's been scratching her little face. In the morning, she had wriggled out of her swaddling, and the neck of her gown was under her arms and around her chest!


There is a set of 5 premie onesies that fit her perfectly.




This is one of them on top of the 0-3 month outfit we tried to put on her.





This is Landrie wearing one of the onesies from the same set! So tiny!

Introducing Landrie Grace Long!-no pics version

I've been dying to show off our precious little Landrie Grace! Here are just a few of the hundreds of pictures we've already taken.

This is heaven. God made this baby just for us!

Look at her tiny fingers next to mine!

We did a trial run in the car seat last night. It swallows her! I love how she sticks her legs straight out.

We were doing a photo session for pictures for a scrapbook for our birth mother. At this point, Landrie was DONE with pictures.

This was the first moment we laid eyes on our little miracle! It was such a dream come true! I can't even explain the joy we are feeling. Our hearts are full and overflowing.

I had this 0-3 month outfit packed and ready for her. It shows you how tiny she really is! The snaps were at her feet when I held her up! Thanks, Mindy and Terri for letting us borrow all of the sweet preemie clothes!

This morning our birth mom signed the papers to give parental rights to Mark and me. We spent about 1 1/2 hours with her, talking, laughing, and taking pictures before we got on the road. We are home now, and enjoying our first night home as a family of 3!

The tiniest, happiest baby you've ever seen- no pics version

We are loving life at home with Landrie, and apparently she is too! At her early morning feeding this morning, she started smiling like crazy. I got some great shots of her with joy written all over her face.



Could she be any more precious??

I love how tiny and sweet Landrie is, and I don't want to forget it when she grows. Right now she can only fit in premie clothes. I put her in a premie gown to sleep in last night because it had those little sleeves that cover up her little hands. She's been scratching her little face. In the morning, she had wriggled out of her swaddling, and the neck of her gown was under her arms and around her chest!


There is a set of 5 premie onesies that fit her perfectly.

This is one of them on top of the 0-3 month outfit we tried to put on her.



This is Landrie wearing one of the onesies from the same set! So tiny!

Introducing Landrie Grace Long!

I've been dying to show off our precious little Landrie Grace! Here are just a few of the hundreds of pictures we've already taken.

This is heaven. God made this baby just for us!

Look at her tiny fingers next to mine!

We did a trial run in the car seat last night. It swallows her! I love how she sticks her legs straight out.

We were doing a photo session for pictures for a scrapbook for our birth mother. At this point, Landrie was DONE with pictures.

This was the first moment we laid eyes on our little miracle! It was such a dream come true! I can't even explain the joy we are feeling. Our hearts are full and overflowing.

I had this 0-3 month outfit packed and ready for her. It shows you how tiny she really is! The snaps were at her feet when I held her up! Thanks, Mindy and Terri for letting us borrow all of the sweet preemie clothes!

This morning our birth mom signed the papers to give parental rights to Mark and me. We spent about 1 1/2 hours with her, talking, laughing, and taking pictures before we got on the road. We are home now, and enjoying our first night home as a family of 3!

"My Water Broke..."

She's here!! Mark and I are absolutely in love with our little miracle. Landrie Grace Long was born at 1:20am on Monday, September 14th. She weighed 6 pounds, 7 ounces and is 19 1/4 inches long. She's a dainty little thing with a head full of long dark hair. It even sticks out the bottom of her little cap! If you look at the ticker on the top right, you can see that she's a bit early. I want to write down how it happened now, so I don't forget!

Sunday morning Mark and I decided to sleep in a little and get things done around the house. We finished painting the nursery, moved the furniture back in, and cleaned up around the house. My parents, my sister-in-law Christy and my 3 nieces, Abbie, Anna, and Adelynn came over after lunch to ride together to my shower.
Our birth mom and I both had a feeling she would come early, and I wrote earlier about my intense need to get everything done! Mark had the feeling too, only he was thinking the 24th. :) I was praying that she would at least be able to make it through the weekend. I wanted to go to my friend's shower and to my shower on Sunday. We needed so many things, and I was hopeful that we'd be a little more set.
I was SO excited to have another shower. Little did I know what a great day it would be!! I'll do a post on the shower later, but let me just tell you, those girls out did themselves! It was so beautiful, and we got so many sweet things. I loved seeing all you girls! One of the things I had been the most stressed about was getting the car seat. You can't leave the hospital without one, so I kept bugging Mark about installing the hand me down one we had in the car. He was secretly planning with the hostesses, and the girls got us our travel system for our shower! Many of you knew that our birth mom was dilating and starting to efface, and I kept getting reprimanded for not having my cell phone in my lap as I unwrapped gifts. :) Really?? As if she's going to go into labor during my shower...
After the shower, I got into the car with my mom and Abbie. As I was pulling away, I half jokingly asked my mom to check my cell phone for missed calls. OUR BIRTH MOM WAS A MISSED TEXT. She simply said,

"My water broke, and I'm on my way to the hospital."

The text came through at 4:30. My shower ended at 4:30.
I freaked out and immediately called Mark, crying, laughing, speeding through the rain, and trying to think ahead to everything I had to do. After I hung up, I called Christy (in the other car) and told my mom and her everything I needed packed from the shower! Abbie was screaming, "She's coming! She's really coming! We're going to have a real baby girl!" the whole time in the backseat. I would LOVE to have had it all on video!
We flew in the house, and I literally started throwing clothes from across the room into the suitcase. I think we were out the door in 5 minutes flat. I ran back in the house when I began to doubt if I packed the camera. My mom let me take hers. We prayed for our birth mom and baby before we left, and took off through the pouring rain. I peeked in the backseat and laughed. It was FULL of baby clothes, hair bows, blankets, bags, and a brand new car seat sitting at a wild angle on top of it all. We spent the rest of the trip crying and laughing as we made phone call after phone call the entire way there. My community group was meeting, and they even put me on speaker phone! I knew we'd never get to everyone, so I had my friend Megan log in to facebook and post that her water had broken.

Well, I've written a novel, and we aren't even to the hospital yet! It looks like this event is worthy of multiple posts. Look for PART II, "She's here!" coming soon! (I promise, that post will be FULL of pictures.) For now, I'm going to go love on sweet little Landrie, who is sleeping peacefully in my lap as I type. :)

PS- We LOVE all of your sweet texts, phone calls, messages, emails, and facebook notes, and I'm sorry we haven't been able to respond to all of them. We can't wait to talk with all of you!

37 weeks!!

Our birth mom is 37 weeks and 1 day today! I talked with her yesterday after her doctor's appointment. She's already 1-2 cm and 70% effaced! That's only confirms my theory that we probably won't make it all the way to October 2nd, and everything needs to be ready NOW. :)

We've been baby prepping like crazy around here! I feel like we've worked and worked, but there is still so much to do!

Mark put in a ceiling fan, moved the curtains over to the guest room, and put in new blinds.

I sewed for hours on end...

...and finally finished the bed skirt! (No, the bumpers aren't done; I was just laying the fabric out to see how it would look.)

We also got our baby dresser! Thanks, Mom and Dad!

You know it's going to be a long night when you open up the nuts and bolt pack and see this.

Mark looks awfully happy, even after seeing the million pieces there were to assemble!

Those directions never left my side!

Tah Dah! We LOVE how it turned out, and we already have some diapers, wipes, and blankets inside.

My parents are in town this weekend for my niece Anna's birthday. The trip was planned long before we got matched, but our plans for their visit changed now that we have a baby coming in less than 3 weeks. They were so great and painted the baby's room all morning long!

Here they are hard at work! We'll post some pictures of the nursery all put back together too. I can't wait to see how it looks!

How much longer did you go when you were about 2 cm and 70% effaced?? I talked with 2 girls today who said they were about that and had a baby within 24 hours!

My First BABY SHOWER!!!!

On Sunday I had my very first baby shower! My sweet teacher friends from Garland threw it for me. I loved every minute of it. :)

My friend Jessica and I came up to the big city of Dallas to do our student teaching. Thankfully, the teacher across the hall, Angela, was pregnant with twins, and I got hired! These girls taught me everything I know about teaching. Plus, they were there through my single girl days, through when I started dating Mark, and were still giving advice when I was a newlywed! None of us still teach at the original school, but we still get together every few weeks. The group has grown to include friends of friends and family too, but we've stayed close after years of not working together, which is such a blessing!!


Lyna, Angela, me, Pam, Cindy, Tonya, Tiffani, Sandra, Val, Deshaun, and on the front row, Misty and Courtnee

TWO cakes! Don't they look delicious??

We love to have "dip days" where you don't ever eat a meal, you just have all the yummy dips instead!

Sandra made us these adorable, reversible bibs! She'll have to be a Houdini to get out of these when I'm feeding her.

Is there anything cuter than baby clothes?

Look at this frog potty!! I'm hoping it will make her want to use it sooner. That's how it works, right??

She'll love her super-soft bouncer. The box says it plays Grammy Award winning music. Nothing but the best for our little girl! :)

If only I would have gotten an outfit or two... HA! Don't you love this clothesline idea? I think it's going to be quite awhile before she has her first "I've got nothing to wear!" moment!

If you look really closely, you can see the book, God Found Us You. If you know a child who was adopted, or a family that is in the process of adopting, run out to your nearest bookstore and buy it right now! It's such a sweet story that explains all angles of adoption to your little one. It's written by the same author as the similar book God Gave Us You. I was just looking around on Amazon, and it looks like there's even a twin version for your favorite mom of twins!

I don't know if you saw the little counter in the top right corner, but we only have 25 days to go!!! I'd better get sewing!

SURPRISE!!

So, a week or two ago, my friend called me and said she wanted to take me out to eat on my birthday. The day before my birthday, Mark said, "You know, I don't think I can let Bethany take you out on your birthday. I want to take you out." Yes, he made me call and cancel the day before. Thankfully, she was really sweet about it, and we rescheduled.
The night of my birthday, Mark and I got ready for dinner and headed out to eat. We arrived at The Cheesecake Factory (YUM!) and there was no line. Mark walked up to the counter and said, "Mark, party of 2." The hostesses looked at each other, and one repeated what he just said, only she way exagerated it. I thought she was making fun of him! Little did I know, it was all a code...
They walked us through the restaraunt, and we finally rounded a corner. That's when I heard, "SURPRISE!!!"

I was shocked! There was a table full of sweet friends from church! Bethany planned the whole thing, and Mark came up with the twist at the end to make sure I really had no idea. :)

Mark headed home, (as much as he would have loved to hang out with a bunch of girls...) and we had a great time!
Bethany, Lindsay, Nicole, Tracy, me, Alicia, and Amber (Shari too! She just had to leave before this picture.)
They even wrote "Happy Birthday Corrie" around the edge of the plate. :)

That night was great, but so was the rest of the day! Thanks for the cards, gifts, phone calls, FB notes, and thank you to my team for my yummy lunch! If you are a teacher, or know a teacher, you know how special lunch from a REAL restaurant during the middle of a workday is!

It's hard to believe how much can happen in one year. Last year was really tough birthday (a milestone birthday with no baby), and I didn't feel like celebrating at all. This year, I can't stop smiling!!

This weekend is BABY weekend! We'll be working on all things baby all weekend long. It's a good thing we have Monday off!