Thursday, March 5, 2009

Happy Birthday, big girl!

(Look how tidy she is...she HAD to have a spoon.)

Ella is one-year-old today.

She's seemed so big for awhile though. She's been a quick crawler and very curious. She loves to get right in there with the big kids and play, so it's been hard to think of her as a little baby for at least a few months now.

I think it's safe to say she's pretty much the apple of the family's eye. I think sometimes that title can be a little daunting for her though. Imagine 7 people vying for the chance to dote on you and carry you around?

Still, she has such a funny, easygoing demeanor. In fact, poor monkey has another ear infection today. But she's generally happy and giggly still. She knows she needs this attitude to live in this house, I guess.

Actually, McKay had JUST started his running when we found out we were *surprise* expecting her. We'd even had the police bring McKay home once, a couple days earlier, so it seemed like impossibly bad timing to be expecting another baby.

And then all of the fear and drama that had popped up during Garrett's birth resurfaced. (He was 10 lbs 6 oz, born at 39 weeks gestation and no one realized that until after he was born...after having gotten VERY stuck. It was quite the dramatic few moments and he was born not breathing and needed to be recussitated. Needless to say, the thought of that kind of dangerous situation happening again scared me to death.) So I spent most of the pregnancy trying to figure out how to make sure that didn't happen again.

When I was about 36 weeks by blood pressure started to go up and the doctor's figured it would be a good time to induce anyway, since size might be an issue (all of our kids have been big for their gestational ages) so we did an amnio and induced the next day. I felt so much worry over things I had no control over that I started to cry in the middle of labor...mostly reliving Garrett's birth.

Even with all of my fear, things went pretty smoothly, with the exception that Ella kind of hung out and stalled all day and I barely progressed all day and then once my midwife decided it would be safe to go in and help out with a c-section, she decided she was coming at THAT moment. The midwife barely had her gloves on before Ella was born.

But once she was here safely, all of MY stress and fear was gone. She was such a peaceful baby. She slept well, but even when she was awake, she just looked around and took everything in peacefully. Certainly, life kept being busy, but Ella just added a much-needed peaceful feeling.

She's such a fun kid.

Happy Birthday baby!

7 comments:

Kathryn said...

March is a lovely month to have a baby girl!! :) Our oldest girls turn 15 (yesterday) and 18 (Saturday) this week.

Enjoy sweet Ella - the time surely flies.

Helen said...

Happy Birthday sweet Ella, and Garrett too. Can't wait to see you all! (We have spring break at the end of March.) :D

Cathie said...

Happy Birthday Ella. Seems like yesterday she was born!

Jon and Jacque said...

One year already! Happy B-day Ella!

Kim said...

Happy Birthday Ella! She is such a sweet girl, I can see why her brothers and sister smother her with love.

Megan said...

It must be Birthday season. Happy Birthday Ella. You have grown so fast. Have a great day and get rid of that ear infection.

Anonymous said...

Happy Birthday to your sweet baby. She is beautiful! I'm glad she has been such a blessing of peace in your life. I chuckled at the "apple of everyone's eye" part....we do the same thing with Garrett. They just seem to know how to handle it all. Amazing.