A Cupcake without Calories!
What better way to celebrate your birthday than with a Thirty-One cupcake coin purse! Leah got this for her birthday as well as an MP3 player which fits perfectly inside along with her ear buds!
Leah Grace Page
Tomorrow my “baby” will turn six. SIX! Everyone always tells you how fast your kids grow up but you never really realize how true that is until you experience it for yourself. I miss having my kids at work with me, being able to hear their laughter down the hall and knowing exactly what they were doing each day. Our school system uses an online reading program that I love because it send me email notifications when they complete a lesson. I love getting those emails and having that small link to my kids and knowing what they are doing right there at that moment.
Leah had Transient Tachypnea of the Newborn. A very observant lactation consultant asked if she could take Leah to the nursery and said she would be “right back”. Ed went with her and so he kind of knew what was going on but I was shocked when they came back and told me she had been hooked up to oxygen. At times she was under an oxygen hood and at other times she received oxygen through a cannula.
Truly the hardest thing for me was that we couldn’t talk to her or hold her because they didn’t want her to be over-stimulated. Although I pumped and was able to nurse her within a few days, the fact that we really didn’t have any time to bond before she was taken away was very hard for me. I remember coming home without her and when I saw her bassinet by our bed I just lost it. No mom should ever have to go home from the hospital without her baby.
That being said, trust me when I say that I KNOW how fortunate we were. Leah only had to spend a few days in NICU, many children spend months there and many others never make it home. As a children’s center director for an inclusive center where half of our children have some type of special need, I am well aware of the challenges many children and their parents face. I know how quickly the excitement of a new baby can change to fear and confusion. Many parents have to mourn the “death” of their idea of what their child would be like before they can rejoice in their precious child’s life and discover all the ways in which their child is special and unlike any other child on earth.
We were very fortunate and thankful to have a Pediatrician who had experienced TTN with her own child so from the very beginning we were not concerned with any long-term effects of this condition. I don’t know if it is related or not, but pretty much once a year since she was born, Leah has had a respiratory illness that caused her to need breathing treatments. Other than that, she is perfectly healthy and happy.
Leah loves imaginative play and you can often hear her having conversations between her barbies or some other small toys. She loves Taylor Swift, she would watch movies all day if you let her, she loves cats, she still likes to snuggle, she sometimes talks in a sweet baby voice that alternates between being really cute and really annoying, she would happily eat chicken nuggets every day, she likes to say the blessing, she is great at Tae Kwon Do, and she is an excellent reader. And she is SO EXCITED about her birthday. She tells me that she is most excited about getting ice cream for her birthday! Did I mention that she is easy to please?
A few more pictures:
Going Home!
Sisterly Love
Living up to her nickname, "Monkey"
Leah LOVES Scooby Doo
First Day of Kindergarten
Future Thirty-One Consultant
Leah and her 5th Birthday Present, Bo
