Weekend of Fun!

Very rarely do Jason and I have free weekends - it always seems like there is something going on! So we thought after two weekends in a row of being out of town, we would finally have a relaxing weekend at home as a family- and it did happen...sort of:)

My best friend Jodi was home for the week visiting with her family so I knew that was on the top of my "to do" list and what an awesome time that was! I finally got to meet Makenzie Riley Potter and she was SO sweet! I started out the weekend by meeting Jodi and her mom for lunch at a new italian restaurant over in Ashburn and then went back to their house in Belmont to visit for the rest of the afternoon. Then Joy came by for a visit when she got out of school and finally all three of our babies finally got to meet - it was so special! Then that night, our old softball team had asked Jason if he wouldn't mind filling in to play so I left Jodi's and headed over to the fields to meet him and visit with everyone again. It was so cold out but Noah did great and was even forgiving since we kept him out past his bedtime.

On Saturday, we finally had the chance to lay around and do nothing which was great! Of course Noah diligently stuck to his new sleeping schedule (9pm-6am), so I was up with him bright and early at 6am watching the sun come up while Jason got a few more hours sleep. Thankfully, I took a nap later on since none of us have been getting a lot of sleep recently with a hectic family schedule. Later in the afternoon, my dad called to say that our relatives were in town visiting my grandmother at the nursing home and asked if my aunt and uncle could come meet Noah. So my parents and them stopped by for a visit and then we headed to dinner to celebrate my aunt's upcoming birthday.

Finally, Sunday we had been invited to two things so we were just hoping Noah would have another good day out since we knew we'd be gone quite awhile and he was super sweet again...as long as we were feeding him of course! We went back over to Jodi's parents house and met up with Joy and Brian so all the guys could meet the babies since they didn't get the chance on Fri. It was so wonderful being all together and sad that it can't be like this all the time. Jodi said "if I lived here we could have playdates every week" and her mom said "more like everyday for a sanity break" from our fussy babies:) My mom also stopped by to give Makenzie some presents and see Jodi also. Then we headed to the Sinclairs to watch the Redskins take on the Browns and thankfully won the game even though it was way too close for a game we should have won. Noah once again was totally spoiled and got to be held by his grandparents, Ed and Carolyn, John and Sherry (new grandparents to twin boys Jack and Ryan!) and Marjorie from church! Below are a few pictures to share from the weekend:)

All in all, it was a fabulous weekend! Jason and I feel so blessed to have so many wonderful friends and family and next weekend we're hoping to make the trip out to beautiful Harper's Ferry WV to see the leaves change and take the ghost tour through town in honor of Halloween!

Jodi and Makenzie

Daddy and Noah

In Honor of Noah

Since my blog is primarily to share with family and friends about my beautiful baby boy, I thought it only fitting to start from the beginning. "And in the beginning God created man..." haha I'm sure just the beginning of my bad jokes :)

I never felt compelled to blog or really even share about my pregnancy 13 months ago because well quite frankly, my pregnancy sucked! I didn't really start to show until about 5 months so those first few months when I wasn't sharing, I just looked like I was getting really fat and at the same time having morning sickness EVERY day. Yes, that's right-my morning sickness decided to last for the full 9 months - fabulous! But on the positive side - those first few moments when Noah started to kick and I felt those butterflies in my stomach I just kept reminding myself at how awesome God's grace was to grant me this child and I decided to stop complaining.

At the 30 week mark of my pregnancy I noticed some bleeding but later found out false alarm but thankfully got me to the doctors office where they decided to hook me up to all those fun machines and realized that I was having contractions 2 min. apart although they were very small and I could not feel them so they sent me straight over to Reston hospital for observation and were very concerned because it was way too early for him to be born. Thankfully they got me on medicine to stop the contractions and even let me go back to work on mild bedrest.

Then I hit my 36 week checkup - June 9th to be exact. The doctor took me off the medicine and within an hour the contractions had started back up and my blood pressure was through the roof and I was entering preeclampsia. They sent me back to the hospital and this time said I had to stay overnight and that was it, I was done with work (I only had 3 days left-but had planned on it being a busy 3 days so pretty distressed to say the least)

The next morning my doctor came in and said she couldn't let me leave because at this point my body was headed towards toxemia - which can be fatal for both mother and child and so just like that she said, "you're gonna have a baby today" and they started to induce me! Of course I completely freaked out and water works started flowing because I was NOT READY and of course God was looking down at me and laughing and saying this isn't your timing -it's mine. But it was certainly difficult to realize I thought I had a month to go and there I was in the hospital with no bag packed, no clothes washed, no nursery finished and all I wanted to do was see my cat! I know the nurse thought I was quite odd on that account.

Without all the "details", the rest of the day went pretty smoothly. I feel bad saying that but it's really true. After all we had been through the past 9 months, baby day had arrived! They started the potosin at 9am, broke my water after that (while Jason was at home getting a bag together), rocked in my rocking chair for a few hours with my parents and Jason and my guardian angel of a nurse Katie by my side. My mom finally convinced me to call the anesthesiologist around lunchtime (don't try to be a hero Kim) when the contractions were so close together that I could no longer take breaks and they had me take a nap and rest up and sent everyone away for my body to "get ready." Around late afternoon, the amazing news came that I was completely dilated and ready to start pushing. And so we did...for 2 hours we did. I thought this baby would never come and I was ready to put him back! I knew the whole pregnancy that he was head down and REALLY down but what I didn't know was that he was face up and not face down which is much more painful and harder to get him to cooperate -one last bit of fun for me but finally at 7:34pm Noah Carter Watlington arrived safely weighing in at 6lbs 14oz and 20.5 inches. Here are some pics to share that special time. Of course look forward to many fun Noah posts in the future!

No Longer Spam

So after entering the wonderful world of blogging, Blogger decided to consider my page a possible spam blog and locked out my page for the past week. I guess they received my not so friendly message at the help center. So I'm back and sadly you haven't gotten rid of me yet - of course you can always just close out the page but then what fun would that be!

Happy Blogging!

Here's to You - Bunco Ladies!

So I've been an avid myspace fan for quite some time now (funny story how that came into being) and eventually joined facebook...just because. But had made it pretty clear that I was solely a myspace girl and didn't need another vice! But now that I'm a mom - yes I can hardly believe it myself - I have ALL this extra time on my hands...yeah right:)

So I was sitting at my monthly bunco group encouraging one of the girls from my Providence crew to "jump on the bandwagon" and join facebook also because well "everyone is doing it!" which led to my explanation behind the two sites and the main reasons why I like myspace better:

1. You can select music to play on your page-you cannot on facebook



2. You can change your background with different templates -you cannot on facebook



3. You can view people's pages that you don't necessarily want to be your friend-you cannot on facebook (unless of course you're one of those obnoxious people that makes your page private)

Which they all replied...you get should a blog then! So there you have it...I'm officially a blogger! So thanks for checking out my site and getting a glimpse into our family- Jason, Kim, Noah & Serenity (the cat)