weeks 1 and 2...

graham was born on a tuesday, and i was discharged home the next sunday. going home and leaving our baby there at the hospital was one of the hardest things i've ever had to do. when i was in the hospital i could go down to the nicu whenever i wanted and see graham. now it was going to be much more difficult to see him. for one thing, i couldn't drive this soon after my surgery. also, jesse was back at work. (we were so incredibly blessed that he had been off work the whole time i was in the hospital so he had been with me.) when we got back to our house our sweet neighbor mrs. laura had made dinner for us. it was so good and so thoughtful of her. it was also so great that we came home to a spotless house. two women from our church, tricia and marie, had come all the way out from fayette county and cleaned the house...and that was quite the chore...i had not been feeling well at all for a couple of weeks before i went to the hospital, so the house was a disaster! the next day my mom came and helped with some laundry and then she and dad took me up to the hospiatl. when we got there graham had been taken off the vent and put on the oscillator. i was really upset about this because the oscillator is more intense than the vent. the nurses reassured me that this was not unusual and it would be ok. each day we were going to have to figure out how we were going to get to the hospital to see graham. if i tried to think past the next day i got overwhelmed, so i just focused on the day we were in and the next day. on tuesday jesse dropped me off at the hospital really early. when i walked in i immediatly noticed that graham was on his belly. this was the first time i had seen him laying on his stomach and he just looked so comfortable. all of a sudden i realized he wasn't hooked up to the vent!! he only had oxygen on! the nurse told me that he had pulled his et tube that morning and he was doing well so they left him off the vent. i was so excited!!!

graham edward boyd...

so we've had some major changes in our family since i last posted. most of you know that i delivered our little boy on november 19, 2013. we have had a huge amount of people praying for graham and checking up on him, so i decided to dedicate this blog to updates on his NICU stay for awhile. first, how we got here...

we found out i was pregnant on july 4th. the first part of my pregnancy was so easy. i didn't have any morning sickness or any other issues. i did start having a lot of swelling pretty early on though. i know that at my 12 week visit i already couldn't wear my wedding rings. when i went to texas in october with my mom and sisters i was really starting to feel uncomfortable. from there on the swelling just continued to get worse and worse. i was about 19 weeks then. around week 23 i made an appointment because the swelling in my feet had gotten so bad. i had to see another dr that day because my dr wasn't in. he said my blood pressure and my urine looked fine so there wasn't anything to worry about.

on friday november 15th i was at work and could tell my blood pressure was elevated. (i've been on blood pressure meds for about 5 years) i had a girl check it and it was really high so I called dr. mullenix. he said i needed to go to the hospital immediately. i was so stressed out! we had planned for me to have graham at st francis bartlett, so that's where i went. around 3:00 they told me they were going to admit me because of my blood pressure and my lab work. at this point i was still asking when i would be able to go back to work...i was in denial as to what was going on. they started me on a medication called magnesium sulfate. it made me feel absolutely horrible! i had a headache and the chills and was very out of it. i also had to have a foley catheter the whole time i was on it, and that was no fun.

the next morning the dr told me that i had to be transferred to methodist germantown. he told me that if i had the baby at this point (25 weeks), the NICU at st francis would not be able to take care of him. so...we got in an ambulance and headed to germantown. i was pretty much just hanging out there until monday night when everything started going downhill.

on monday night i started dropping my oxygen levels and was short of breath. they did a chest xray which showed that i had fluid on my lungs so they started me on lasix (so i would get rid of the fluid). the next morning they told us the bad news...i would be having a baby that day. i just kept saying "it's too early...it's too early", but they weren't listening to me. my mom and dad were in texas with julie who was having june that very same day! someone called them to tell them what was going on and they immediately came home. unfortunately, they didn't get to meet june before they came home.

when they took me into the operating room i was so scared. they thought i was going to have to be put to sleep for the c-section so jesse couldn't come back with me. the anesthesiologist really wanted me to have an epidural, but the nurses didn't think i could lay flat for that long because of the fluid. he kept telling me to lay down, but i couldn't breathe! i would try, but then i would have to sit up to catch my breath. i was terrified by this point. i think i was a little irrational...i kept thinking that i was going to die and i'd never see jesse again or get to hold my baby. (i apologized to my dr later for acting a fool! haha) they did eventually put me to sleep.

when i woke up i was in ICU. i don't remember much of that.  jesse says that when the nurses brought graham out of the OR all he could see was his little head. the nurse was bagging him and jesse says that he just kept thinking, "get him up to the NICU!" i didn't get to go see graham that night because i was still on the mag and they wouldn't let me get out of bed. jesse got to see our little miracle that afternoon. graham edward boyd was born on november 19, 2013 at 12:28 in the afternoon. he weighed 1lb, 12oz and was 13inches long.

graham was so tiny that jesse's wedding ring fit around his arm.

the next day i finally got to see my baby. at this point i was still feeling out of it, so it was hard to take everything in.

 

as you can see, i was still extremely swollen at this point.

jesse and i stood and looked at this beautiful son that God had given to us. jesse said that he couldn't believe that there are people who want to abort babies at the same age that graham was. this made me so heartbroken.

so, our little man made a grand entrance into the world. i'll go into his time in the NICU in the next post. as i write this graham is 3 weeks and 3 days old and up to 2lbs, 6.8oz.! God is good.

abby turned 9...

abby turned 9 on october 18th. her birthday festivities were spread out over about a week, and she loved that! the first thing she did was spend the night with gee and papaw on the tuesday before her birthday. the next day she and gee had brunch at cracker barrel and then did some shopping. on the 21st (dad's birthday) we went to gee and papaw's house for a birthday dinner for papaw. while we were there they gave abby her birthday gifts. she also got her gifts from jenna and jett and memaw and papaw reed.

 we had the "official party" on the saturday after her birthday at our house. abby and i decided it would be fun to do a cooking theme. when the girls came in they decorated their chef hats, then they headed to the kitchen to make pizzas. while the pizzas were cooking we played a fun little game where they had to figure out what kitchen utensils were in a bag (without looking at them). next was the best part...eating the pizzas! we followed that up by opening gifts and then the girls got to decorate their cupcakes and eat those. i think everyone had a fun time.

the last of the birthday fun was the allen family birthday's on sunday. jesse made an amazing cheesecake (abby's request) and abby got lots of great gifts.

busy, busy, busy...

well, it has been quite some time since i've posted onto my blog. we had an incredibly busy summer, and fall is moving in that direction as well. we have had a big change since my last post...we found out the day after i last posted that i am pregnant! i am now 20 weeks and things are going really well. we are having a boy, graham edward boyd, and he is due to be here on february 27, 2014. everyone is so excited to meet this little man! i'm going to try to quickly do a recap of some of the things i haven't written about...

in june i took kylie and abby to new york city. we had so much fun. it was a blast showing them around the city and seeing them experience things like the subway for the first time.



at the end of july i said a sad farewell to stella, my mini cooper. we knew that we had to buy a larger vehicle to accommodate our growing family! i've been really happy with the nissan pathfinder that we picked out.

abby and jared started back to school in august. abby is in 3rd grade and jared is in 1st. this post is so behind that they are actually on fall break this week!



this year we did christmas in august at our house. it was fun to host our annual party and everyone had a great time!



we found out in september that our little peanut is a boy! it was a fun night telling everyone : )



also in september, jesse and i celebrated our one year anniversary. we went to hot springs for the weekend and stayed in the best bed and breakfast. it was great to get away and spend time with each other.



mom, stacy, katie and i went to texas to spend some time with julie the first week of october. we went to canton and shopped and then went to dallas and shopped some more! it was a great trip and i had so much fun hanging out with my mom and sisters.



this past weekend we took the kids to the priddy farms pumpkin patch. we all had a good time and they loved getting to pick out their very own pumpkins. 

well, i think that's about it...i'm going to try to do better about keeping up with this blog! 

random stuff...

here's a little more of what we've been doing this summer...

jared finished up his baseball league with a pizza party at the ball fields.

we went to the zoo one saturday. i was really anxious when we got there because the parking was full, so we had to park on the street. it really wasn't that crowded in the zoo though.





we played over at allie and taylor's house. we were actually there for my mom's retirement party but i didn't get any pictures of that. : /



family va-cay...

i realize i'm WAY behind on my blog...this has just really been a busy summer so far! and looking at my calender it doesn't look like it's going to let up at all. so, i'm going way back to the last week of may to tell you all about our family vacation! we went to utah to visit jesse's sister jaemye and her family.
the kids got out of school on a thursday, i had an exam at work that friday, and we headed to little rock that saturday. our plane was leaving the next morning at like 6 in the morning, so i convinced jesse to let us go up that saturday and we spent the night.

we all went swimming in the hotel pool and the kids had a blast!

the next morning we were on a plane, bright and early. it was jared's first flight so that was exciting.

as soon as we landed jaemye, brian, kelsye and gavin took us to park city. first we rode a roller coaster through the mountain, then we rode a slide down the side of the mountain. it was SO fun!!!



after our fun on the mountain they took us to this great burger place called smashburger. the sweet potato fries were amazing!
the next day (memorial day) we started our day by going to this breakfast place. i thought i was in heaven when i ate the scones with honey butter. in case you can't tell yet, we did a lot of eating on this trip, and it was all really good!
after breakfast we all headed to downtown salt lake city, ut. jaemye and i had both recently read a book, the 19th wife, about mormonism, so we were really interested to see all the mormon places. we saw the tabernacle, the temple (which we weren't allowed to go in), the museum and the honey-bee house.

it was all really interesting, but very sad to know that people believe this and put their salvation into this false religion.

we did a little shopping before heading back to the house for a cookout....and of course, once again...the food was amazing.

the next two days we didn't do a whole lot because the weather didn't really cooperate.  it was nice to be able to just hang out with the family and spend time with them.

we headed back to memphis on thursday. it was such a nice get-away and just what we needed! thanks so much to jaemye and brian for letting us come visit!

it's graduation time...

this past monday jared graduated from kindergarten! it was such a sweet time. all of the kindergarten classes came together in the gym and sang some songs they had been working on.

luckily we knew where to look to find our little guy.

after the ceremony we went to a reception for the graduates. the teachers had made a memory book for each student that showed a picture of them on the first day of school, their handprint, and how they wrote their name. at the end was all of the same information to show how they had grown/progressed. it also had lots of cute pics from activities they had done throughout the year. jared's book is so cute and i love it!

jared with his cousin houston

mrs. chastity was an amazing teacher

jared was excited that granny got to be there

me and jesse with the graduate

so handsome! he looks like a mini-jesse : )