Family Portrait

Alia with just some of her Christmas presents (more pics to come later)

Priceless

Here's my little chatterbox!

2 good nights in a row! And.....Go Illini!!!!

Alia slept in her crib last night for the first time and she slept for like 7 hours! :)

This is Alia's new friend over at Grandma's house.

Thanksgiving was good. Alia had yummy formula. She also got to spend a night with just Grandma. The dogs behaved themselves. Anytime Alia made a weird noise they had to check to see if she was all right. One of these days I will get a good picture of her and both dogs.
Her doctor's appointment was today. The doctor was impressed with her ability to open her hands. Apparently she is in the 75th percentile for weight, height, and head size. She received some vaccines today. I don't think the actual shots bothered her all that much, but she really didn't like being manhandled. She won't have to go through that again for another 2 months hopefully. :)

This is what Alia is doing right now. She was on the couch with me, but she had kicked herself (by kicking me) to the end of the couch. So I thought we'd try the gym today. Sometimes she likes it, sometimes she doesn't.
This is one of my favorite sights. I sit right next to the edge of the couch and prop a pillow beneath her and she likes to sit on my side and fall asleep. So cute!!
Alia decided that she wanted to visit Grandma for Thanksgiving so we will be traveling to Branson on Wednesday. Her next appointment is December 3rd.

This is what Alia does in the morning when I'm eating breakfast and finishing getting ready. She flails about and talks to the celing fan. By the time I took this video she was almost tired of the whole process, but still super cute.

Pic #1: Looking at Dad; Pic #2: Happy Halloween; Pic #3: Sitting in the computer chair
Alia will be 2 months old on Thursday. It hasn't really felt like that long. I have no idea how much she weighs. Her next appointment isn't until December. We continue to have gunk in our eyes. She still sleeps pretty well. Last night she slept for like 8 hours. She's pretty tired today too. Today, Alia went to her first basketball practice. She'll be playing before I know it. :)

Alia did great her first week of daycare! She was really tired the first couple of days, but I think she is getting used to being around all those kids. We haven't gotten any phone calls during the day and when we pick her up in the afternoon they always say what a good baby she had been. Here's to hoping she stays good as she gets older. She is B and I's child though. There's a potential for either goodness or mischievousness.

"Aunt" April

Cousins Calvin and Harley

So happy to be back home! (Actually, I was tickling her!)

Alia took her first trip this past weekend. We went to Illinois with my mom. Alia got to meet many members of her family and was really well-behaved. She also met her future husband (my friend's son), and had her first visit to Monical's.

We are one month old today!
We like getting in our car seat...at first!

Here's the swing that my Aunt Beth gave us and my mom fixed up. B added the ugly dolls for her to look at.

Jules wanted more pictures. I'm a little biased, but I think she is pretty darn cute! Nothing really exciting is happening except for the fact that we have a baby! :) She's pretty calm and not that fussy and we get pretty good sleep at night. I just have to wake up to feed her, but she's been going right back to sleep lately.
She really seems to enjoy baths right now. She holds her head up very well for a newborn I think. I did notice she has started to grab things and hold on...like my hair and shirt. We're going to a volleyball game tonight at my school.

We went and saw the doctor this morning. Alia now weighs 9 lbs 10 oz. Woo! We are past our birth weight. She's doing great. There were no problems. At our next appointment we will do some immunizations. So looking forward to that. She has slept really well the past couple of nights. I'll stop waking her up to feed her around 2:00 and we'll just see how long she sleeps. Wish us luck!

Just wanted to say that we had another successful night last night. Alia went to sleep sometime after 11:00 (I fell asleep while B was holding her) and she pretty much slept the whole night. I had to wake her up to feed at 2:00 and then she woke herself up for a feeding at 5:00. She's eating a lot more frequently at the moment...I'm thinking maybe a growth spurt. I love my baby!

Alia's umbilical cord scab came off today. Yea!! We had quite a morning. We went to Mommy's work and then to Daddy's work and then Mommy had to swing by the doctor's. Sometime we will get more pictures up here because she is even cuter now than when she was born. She is still unpredictable at night, but we're getting used to it and getting good at taking shifts with her. She's really a relatively good baby so far. She cries if she is hungry, needs changed, or needs burped. All in all things are really good. :)

Alia is a week old today. I'm tired. More later!

BABY TIME!!!!!

Alia Ren Lowery decided it was time to join us on Saturday September 6th 2008. She weighed in at 9 lbs. 6 oz. and was 22in long. She's a big'un! The short of it all for now. We went to the hostpital around 9:15 friday night cause rachel's water broke. fast forward a few hours and we had a baby! Mother and child are both doing well rachel had some issues after she devlivered but all is well and we should be heading home monday afternoonish :)

Thank you all so much for your prayers and gifts and thoughts. we love you guys.

and i would probably get beatn up by quite a few people if i didnt post some pictures so enjoy!

-b (wow im a dad)

Ok...the appointment this morning was fine. I'm fine and she is fine. The bad news is that I have not progressed any since last Tuesday. I'm still at 3 cm and the doc said that was even iffy. The good news is that she went ahead and set an induction date. My blood pressure has been on the high side lately and I'm still measuring big (stomach-wise) so the doc doesn't want me going past 40 weeks. So, if I have not gone into labor by Wednesday, we are going in at 7:00 Wednesday morning and they will induce.

Well, Alia passed all her tests yesterday. She is doing fine and is healthy. I'm still having small contractions, but nothing special. Hopefully, there will be more news on Friday after we see the doctor.

38 weeks...she's still in there. Next ultrasound is Tuesday. Next doctor appointment is next Friday.

Woo...what a day! Before our appointment this morning, B and I went to Waffle House for breakfast. It was yummy! Everything was good at the doctor's. Yesterday I kind of realized I was having contractions, but they weren't very intense and were like 3 hours apart and I only remember feeling three of them. Because of this though I had the doctor check to see if I was dilated, and she said I was at 1.5 cm. After this, B and I went in to work and then we had to come back at 3:30 for a biophysical profile. At the ultrasound part, Alia did everything she needed to do except we didn't catch her practice breathing. The technician said that wasn't a big deal since this was the first time. After the ultrasound I was hooked up to some monitors: one that monitored Alia's heart rate and one that monitored my contractions. Apparently, I was having a lot of contractions. They didn't hurt though. Also, they said that Alia wasn't as reactive as they would have liked (she really just wanted to go to sleep!). They called my doctor with the results to see if she wanted them to send me downstairs to OB triage for more monitoring. Of course, that's what my doctor wanted to do. When they got me all hooked up at the hospital, Alia was doing exactly what they wanted her to. I was still having a lot of contractions though so they checked to see how dilated I was...this was around 6:00 and now I was 3 cm. We decided to stay there a little longer and have them check again to see if I had advanced any. The doctor came back at 7:30 and I was still at 3 cm. Hence, we are home now after getting food (I hadn't eaten since 10:45!). We'll, uh...just see what happens now. :)

Everything was fine at the appointment yesterday. I'm not diabetic, but there is a little concern because it seems like I'm borderline diabetic, and the doctors want to keep an eye on my amniotic fluid level and the size of the baby. I found out yesterday that I am measuring 7 in over where normal people are supposed to be. So, I'll just have weekly ultrasounds. I don't really think I've had any contractions yet. I do hope she'll be ready to come out soon though. Our next appointment is Tuesday morning and then the ultrasound is Tuesday afternoon.

Highlights from the baby shower from people at church!
The gym we registered for!A really cool burp cloth!

Cute clothes! The one on the left says "My Dad Rocks" and the one on the right says "Party at My Crib 2:00 AM"

A pirate book!

We also received a ton of diapers and many more things. This afternoon B and I bought a changing pad, some monitors, and some blankets. Doctor's appointment tomorrow. :)

Well, we have made it to the weekly appointments now. Had the ultrasound yesterday and found out that Alia is just big. The tech estimated 7.5 pounds already. At our appointment, we found out that nothing is wrong with me. All the tests that were run two weeks ago were normal. She told us that the doctor we had seen was testing for preeclampsia, but I don't have it. Things are all still pretty good. I'm tired all the time again. It's hard to walk around and shop at more than 1 place. Also, I noticed at church that when I stand and sing I run out of air very quickly. I consider myself lucky that that is all that I have to complain about.

More treasures from B's coworkers!

Plush Cthulhu

Another blanket that matches!

One of B's favorites

We also received a pretty hefty Target gift card. Thanks everyone!
Our next appointment is Tuesday and we also have an ultrasound planned that day. The last baby shower is August 17th with church people.

Pictures from last night's baby shower. There were a lot of other cute presents we received, but I just didn't take pics of all of them.

This says my child will be a big tipper.Nike's!!!!!!!!

Boppy

This was the cake that Michelle made. She made the monkey just for me! :)

A blanket that Jules made

Books!

A toddler car seat

Diaper Genie

Thanks to everyone who hosted and came and gave us wonderful gifts. I appreciate my friends and coworkers!

Crib time!!

Thanks Andy for helping!

Here's the last of the new furniture we bought last weekend. This is what is in our closet.

Last night was our last child-birth class. Our normal teacher wasn't there. :( It wasn't bad though. The sub talked about all the parent resources here in Columbia, what to check if you're baby is crying, how to bottle-feed and bathe your child(while the cord is still attached). Stuff like that. Most of the information we already knew, but it was nice to hear things like..."If you've tried everything to stop your baby from crying, it's ok to put her down for 10 minutes while you recoup." There were lots other nice things she said, but then this post would get really long. Next week, B and I have 2 baby showers!!! Monday night is the shower for my work and our friends here in town hosted by Jules and Michelle. Thursday around lunch is the shower at B's work. I hate to say it, but I'm looking forward to getting things! 6 weeks left (or less, hopefully not more)!!!!