Sally Rose is 2!!

Sally Rose is two years old!!!

This is late. I'm sorry. Things have been, well, different around here.

Two years and one week ago, our darling Sally Rose was born. We got to celebrate with family, which was awesome and uncommon, so very special. My mom was in town to help with the new baby and Wendy, Jesse and Coleman were able to come up for the weekend, which worked out beautifully. On Saturday, we threw together a last minute party for sweet Sally. We went to the park and had dinner, cake and ice cream, played, and opened presents (most of which were provided by grandma extrordinaire). It was a great time. On her actual birthday, we had lunch in the park with grandma and Daddy. Sally liked that as well. She had lots of "happy cake" and kept saying "Happy Mommy" or Happy other people- making sure we were all having as good a time as she was.
The following is a slideshow/video of her special party. The cool bike was a present from grandma and grandpa. It is awesome and she loves it! We got her a sandbox, which will be shortly assembled. It will be cool I hope.

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Here are a few Sally pics taken over the last week. I'll give you just a few Sally facts.
Sally knows all her letters. She's starting to learn the sounds each makes, but just barely. she can identify all of them. She loves lining things up- cars, animals- you name it. She also loves stacking boxes. I'm hoping this is a sign of organization skills she did not get from me.
She is really taking to her new role as big sister. She LOVES Alice and always wants to hold and kiss her. We do need to work on the gentle factor a bit still, but she is doing amazingly well!

Sally is a very affectionate girl. She loves to give kisses and hugs to all our family. She can also count to ten. Her mouth is slowly filling up with teeth, it's so strange for me to see other kids her age with all their teeth. Then I realize that is normal. Sally's favorite songs right now include "Lay Down Sally" (to which she will always lay down- she also sings this to toys- lay down octopus, or lay down duckie), Castle on a Cloud, I'm Bringing Home a Baby Bumblebee, and Jesus Wants me for a Sunbeam. It is SO great to see her grow up. I love playing with ehr and actually have conversations. I would write more and more about how great she is, but I am needing sleep in a major way. Just know that she is the coolest little girl. I love her.

I couldn't resist putting up a few pictures of our sweet little Alice. She is doing great! I'll be giving more info on her soon.

Alice Marie Nicolich

Meet our newest addition, little miss Alice Marie. She was born five short days ago, on October 7th at 8:20 in the morning. At 7 lb 11 oz, she was nearly a pound bigger than her big sister! So far, she is a sweet, sweet little girl. She eats like a champ-she gained 5 oz in one day! She isn't too fussy, and is spending longer periods of time with her cute little eyes open. She loves her little hands up by her face and has found her thumb a few times to go in that adorable mouth. She loves to be held and has a perfectly round head.

Getting baby Alice here was an adventure. In the 24 hours before labor began, the following measures were taken. Lots of evening primrose oil, my membranes were stripped, we went on a walk, the use of the "marriage bed", the use of a breast pump, eating eggplant Parmesan, eating some balsamic vinegar, pressure points, and drinking some raspberry leaf tea. I'm not sure what exactly did it, but when we sat down to watch the Work and the Glory at about 8:30, I started feeling a little something every so often. I definitely didn't think it was the beginning of labor, but did mention the feelings to Bill and my Mom. By 12:30, we were talking about getting to the hospital.

We finally got there and were admitted at about 2:30. I labored with Bill alone till about 7:00, when my mom, who had dropped Sally off with a friend, came. I was planning on trying the natural way again, which went pretty well. Again, as with Sally, when I got to about 8 cm, I was going a little nuts and requested in my nicest voice, to get some medicine. Again, I received some fentanyl, which made it so I could cope a bit better. I had an awesome midwife, Jack, (the only 6 foot 4 midwife around, as he says) who was very willing to let me do my thing. I walked the halls and was in and out of the bath during the labor. When it came time to push, he also let me do it my way.
My way involved Bill in a big way. He was my rock throughout, but really shined during the actual delivery. I was kneeling on the bed with my arms wrapped around him. When I would push, I would kind of push against the bed and lean into Bill with all the force I could muster. Meanwhile, I was full on screaming with my mouth about an inch away from his delicate ear. He was talking cheering me on and coaching through every contraction and was just SO amazing throughout. The delivery was surprisingly fast. I was shocked when I was told the head was out. My mom was asked to put on gloves to help, but it all happened a little too quickly. Sorry mom. I am incredibly grateful she was able to be there to see little Alice come into this world.

The feelings of love were immediate as they handed me this perfect little bundle. She was so sweet and warm and just perfect. Tears filled my eyes as I held this little miracle for the first time. She had all ten fingers and toes (I counted). Her little face was so beautiful, her spirit so strong. I was a little afraid my that the motherhood key to my heart had been opened with Sally and that Alice would have to share that space. It turns out, there is another chamber all her own.
Sally has been pretty sweet when it comes to little Alice Marie. She enjoys loving on the baby (listen to me, sounding all southern) and helping with diaper changes and the like. She is even getting a little better at staying gentle, but we will have to work on that one for a while. When Sally was first looking at Alice, the baby stuck her tongue out. Sally thought it was so funny and continues to go up to Alice and stick her tongue out lizard style and says, "Baby do it." She tries to share cookies and the like with Alice. We still have some adjusting to do, and things might get worse, but she's already handling it better than I expected!

In the above picture, you may notice the big cast like business going on on her sweet little arm. That was her unfortunate IV. After she was born, sweet baby Alice had quite a bit of fluid in her lungs that they had to suction out. A little later in the day, they told us she was breathing quite a bit faster than she ought to. She had to endure a whole slew of tests while they determined the cause of the rapid breathing. After blood tests and x-rays, they decided she still had a bit of moisture in her lungs. The doctor was afraid she might aspirate some milk if she nursed, and wanted her to be on an IV to receive fluids. I only wasn't able to nurse for a few hours, though, which was good. They had to keep her in the intermediate nursery that first night. She kept getting better, though, and by noon the next day, she got to come in with us.
Now, she is strong and healthy. She did have some high bilirubin levels, but they are coming down. We had to go back to the doctor to get those levels checked on both Friday and Saturday. On Friday, she weighed 7 lbs 10 oz, very near her birth weight. The next day, she weighed 7 lb 15 oz! The nurse didn't believe the results and weighed her on a different scale. She is definitely a healthy and strong girl. I mean, how many four day old kids lift their head like this? Seriously.
Anyway, I know this was long, but very edited from what I actually wanted to post. I will leave you with one more picture of our sleeping beauty, little Alice Marie Nicolich.

Three Days till D-Day

I have three days till I'm due. I am SO ready. Well, not really. There are still quite a few things to get done, and yet, here I sit on the computer. My body and mind, however, can't get her here fast enough. I never really got to this point with Sally- I enjoyed being pregnant to the end. And beyond in her case. This time, however, I just feel achy and uncomfortable. This child really loves pushing against my ribs. Sally Rose never did that. I know I have it pretty easy when I compare to other pregnancies I've heard of, this one is just a bit harder than my last. So we're cheering her on to get here! If any of you have ANY tips on getting a baby to come any faster, let me know. I'm willing to try pretty much anything. My mom comes in tomorrow, and I've been waiting to try some of the "riskier" methods till she gets here. But the time has come, so bring on the old wives tales!

I hope her dandelion wish is for her baby sister to come. This dress is reversible and awesome. It's probably my favorite article of clothing Sally has and guess what- Bill bought it for her. He got it at the Utah Art's Festival when he was in SLC. He did a good job.

We took this last night. Pretty big, right? My stomach is actually measuring a little small. People also act surprised when they find out how far along I am- but I do look pretty huge, right? I certainly feel ready to pop.

Just a belly shot- oh what a belly it is.

Sally has been SO sweet these last few days. Her whining has been minimal, and she's been super affectionate. She loves kissing my belly and giving all kinds of big hugs. She also is in love with these big legos. We got them at a garage sell last week- a very good purchase. The other garage sale find I am excited about? A mini glider. So Sally and I can both rock our babies at the same time. She is just so dang sweet. Check out how smart she is here.

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Camping, well, sort of

Last weekend a bunch of our friends went camping. I really wanted to camp as well, but we ultimately decided it a little unwise to camp when you are almost 39 weeks pregnant. We did go up Saturday afternoon and had a lovely time.

This was the most important part, I think. I'd never thought to do steak over a campfire, but it turns out SO good! Oh, and that's the Lunt's food getting all fancy with bacon wrapped shrimp kabobs. I did have a shrimpy, and it was magic.

Braden warming up after playing in the cold water
Mom, do you see all these ghosts?
Julie never hides.
Layne and Braden- they are serious buddies.
We didn't come prepared to play in the water, but Sally really wanted to. She loved digging and just splashing around. It was cold at first, but you quickly became accustomed to it. It was FUN for all.
Cute friends, Bella and Bailey
Layne reminded me of a kid out of Lord of the Flies here. He would have survived.
Stacy warming up sweet Sally Rose.

This is a little water Macarena by Bella and Halle. Very nice.

Sally's Music

These pictures don't really relate, but hopefully, make things a little cuter.

You have to click on this to see how cool her hair is. Sometimes she'll allow me to do fun things to her hair, other times, not so much. She was so dang cute this day, from head to toe.

My cute, cute family

Sally has gotten VERY particular about the music we listen to. I get a kick out of it. She's very opinionated and will let you know her opinions right away. She quite likes Radiohead, but only certain songs- I think 15 Step is her favorite of theirs right now. She's also discovered Finally Friday. She can be a real ego boost in that world. When the solo in Merry-Go-Round comes on, she says that it's pretty and beautiful. How sweet. She doesn't, however, like to listen to Catch a Glance.

She has fallen in love with cellos. I've had hopes for her to be a violinist, but if this love persists, I might have to let her follow in her uncle's footsteps. Whenever she hears any string music, she thinks it's a cello, and will tell you that a lot. She can, however, tell the difference when she sees them. We were at a violin shop a while ago and she just wanted to stay in the cello room the whole time. Since then, she loves looking through catalogs like Shar and pointing out the cellos.

I LOVE her eyelashes. She's one lucky girl to have them.

Sally Rose is also very opinionated about the songs we sing. Right now, she adores castle on a cloud, and we usually do it at bed time. She has to be in the right mood for I am a Child of God, and is pretty much "over" Head Shoulders Knees and Toes. I go into the nursery to do some singing each week, and she's started the others (for a total of three) on a not so nice habit. When I suggest a song she doesn't like, she immediately chimes in with No's and floor rolling and the like. She's turned the other kids on to that too, so with each song, there's at least one child doing backup of No No No. We're working on that one at home.

I love that she is tuned in to music and actually cares about what we listen to. She also likes a lot of classical music, especially if there is a cello involved. I hope to continue her love and passion, and hopefully broaden her musical horizons

Bath Time Fun

So, Sally and I were taking a bath this morning, (that's okay, right?) and she did something very funny. She was struggling with some stacking cups, trying to but a larger one in a smaller one. I was trying to tell her how to get it to work and said, "Put the blue one on the bottom." She immediately stood up and put the cups on her own cute little bottom, which is exactly what I had told her to do. I couldn't stop laughing, as she held those cups on her bum for quite some time. So clever and cute.

My Daughter Rules

This is just a post of some pictures from recent times. Sally is so amazing. I am excited (and scared) to see her make the transition from only to big sis. She is so fun to play with right now. You can actually hold a conversation of sorts up if she's willing. I love her SO much. I can't wait for my heart to expand for her little sister. If she's anything like Sally Rose, I am in for treat after treat.

I was trying so hard to get a picture of the two of us. Sally Rose was climbing on the couch and being such a cutie, but a very active one.
I really can't believe she's almost two. And, almost a big sister. It has gone by far too quickly. (but these next few weeks can fly by if they want- I am READY)

This does not serve this incident justice. She was COVERED. She was wearing shorts and a long sleeved shirt when I found her, I should have taken a picture while she was still clothed, because she looked like a smurf.

You can see here how she got her thighs too.
She just looks so grown up here. 2 Going on 20, is what it feels like.
We were cleaning out a storage area and Sally decided this box was her house. We'd knock and...
She's swing open the "doors" to greet us. Way cute.

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Here's a little diddy of us singing. Again, she can't look away from herself in the viewfinder. I love it.