I am so blessed she is such a great sleeper. God knew what he was doing when he gave us Peyton-the non-sleeping newborn. I remember people kept talking about babies sleeping all the time, and I was so confused because my little man did not sleep at all. 
Isn't he adorable? He is the most laid back dog God ever created. He is so loving and LOW maintenace. Don't get me wrong he can be mean-especially to men, hence why most people don't know he exists. 
These are the best pictures I have ever taken of him. Normally he turns his ears down when the camera comes out. 
He was drawing a "contraption".
Alli is back up to birth weight. Do you know what that means???? I don't have to wake her throughout the night any longer. Hooray!!!! She is only waking up 2 times on her own and that is WONDERFUL!!!!!
Poor girl is so little we had to tuck her outfit under her. 
When we did this with Peyton he was wide awake. Not Alli (or Emily) she was snoozing away.
She is patiently waiting for her popcorn to finish.
Can you see the joy on her face? Matthew wanted me to note that Peyton wanted me to wake him up not Matthew. Ha Ha
I survived my first day home alone with 3 kids. Matthew took Peyton to school but I had to wake him up, per his request. Nothing like mommy laying in bed with you for 15 minutes to wake up huh? I took Alli to her 2 week appointment. She is up to 6.8 pounds. Not back up to birth weight but she is gaining a little over a 1/2 ounce everyday which is good. I picked Peyton up from school. Then during rest time the floor guys came to finish up our awesome looking new floors. It's taken 4 years for these floors, and they are officially done. Then after rest time I took the older 2 outside to play which meant Mommy walked up and down the block 50 times while they rode various bikes, scooter, cars and a jeep-whose battery died in the neighbors driveway so I had to push that huge thing back into our garage. I will consider that my first work out since being pregnant. All 3 are sleeping and I hope to join them in the next hour. Lets see how tomorrow goes......
I know the bow is a little big, but these were the same size I ordered with Emmy. Evidently Emmy has a much larger head than Alli. Unfortunately I have to admit Emmy got her large head from me. 
Then she realized she was suspended in warm water. 
To say the least she ate really well after this experience.
Y'alls prayers are working. Alli fed so much better last night. I decided not to wake her right on the dot every three hours and let herself wake up. She did so much better. She still ate 3 times, but she was ready and it went beautifully. Thank you, Thank you for your prayers.
Today has been rough with Miss Alli. She is so sleepy she will not eat and that has to be the most frustrating thing in the entire world. You know your child has to eat to gain weight or there will be more medical intervention needed but she won't. I had to pull out my tubing and tube feed her with my finger. It's a great trick my lactation consultant taught me with Peyton and luckily I was smart enough this time to order new syringes and tubing. Her 5:00 feed went better tonight but that might have been because she received her first bath and screamed her head off for 15 minutes so a little sustenance was welcome.
Things are going well here with 3 little ones to take care of. Alli slept well throughout the night except from 2:00-5:00 she was a little gasy but sleeping next to mama seemed to help. I actually took the girls to Babies R Us today before we picked Peyton up from school. I think the NICU experience showed me I need to be grateful for the little daily occurances (errands, reading Brown Bear Brown Bear 20 times a day, fixing 15 million meals a day etc.) because when they were taken from me I so desperately wanted them back.
Aren't they cute? Peyton and Emmy keep fighting over who can hold her.
She is so in love with her baby sister. Believe it or not, Emily did a great job holding Alli. She sat there for about 20 minutes patting her tummy.
Allison curled up in her swing. 
Of course I had to put an adorable bow on her. 
Proud Daddy bringing his little girl home
Peyton has done an excellent job today. He has been so loving and helpful. I am so proud of him.I can't believe she is home. It was a total shock this morning. Last night she was moved to a lower level NICU, basically where babies go to grow. After spending 16 hours at the hospital yesterday I was a bit exhausted and felt overwhelmed by the thought of having to do that for the next few days. The doctor came in this morning and told me Alli could probably go home Tuesday or Wednesday-I was a little discouraged, but we kept talking. After finding out this was my third baby, that I had successfully breast fed my other two and that I have a great pediatrician he decided we could monitor her weight from home and he released us. Praise The Lord!!! What an amazing feeling to all be under the same roof.
Her lungs are doing great and she has slept peacefully all day. Thank you so much for all of the prayers, emails, phone calls and words of encouragement. We could not have made it through this without y’all.
Allison is having another great day. I arrived this morning for the 8:00 feeding and I have fed her every time. She is such a strong eater. Even the doctors agree she doesn't do as well on the bottle. So they have asked me to stay all day and feed her through her 11:00 feeding tonight. If I do that they will give her a bottle at the 2:00 and 5:00 feedings and that means she will have eaten all of her meals by herself today!!!!
I found out last night she gained a few grams so we are almost there. Her nurse today said if she eats all her meals they might talk about discharge tomorrow or Monday. Please pray Alli stays strong, keeps eating well, and gains some more weight. I am so excited about the thought of her coming home, but a little nervous as well. When she comes home thre aren't any monitors telling me she is breathing well or alarms going off to alert me when there is a problem.
Keep checking the blog, hopefully the next time I will announce her homecoming.
I walked in today to discover they were replacing her feeding tube. Her nurse decided we would take advantage of it being out and try nursing her. And she did it!!! What a relief-all of my close friends are laughing now because they know how passionate I am about breast feeding. 3 of her meals today were not tube fed-that is huge!!! Once she takes all of her feeds by bottle or breast and gains some weight she can go home.
They removed the canula (spelling???) that means she is breathing completely on her own. The neonatologist said if she stays off of it tomight they will remove her pulse oxygen thingy. Matthew and I are both a little hestitant about that, it's kind of nice knowing exactly how she is breathing.
Keep praying folks it's working!!
I wanted to post the story of how Allison arrived. This past Saturday September 1, we had gone to the Harbor for dinner. We had about a 20 minute wait and decided to take the kids down to the water and let them play. As I walking down the ramp I started having some MAJOR pain. It progressed all through dinner and when it was time to leave I could barely walk. I laid down at home for about 2 hours and it kept getting worse. So after calling Deb (I always call Deb first-most of y'all know that) she told me to call my doctor. I did as I was told and he infomed me that he wanted us to come to the hospital. Now my doctor is very cautious so I was not surprised, but I started getting upset because I just knew he would send me home. We tried for 30 minutes to find someone to come sit with our kids because at this point it was 9:30 at night. In frustration I grabbed my keys and informed Matthew that I was driving myself, since I knew it was a waste of my time to go to the hospital. Well, I made it about 2 miles down the road and had to turn around. At that point in desperation I called a friend who had just bought her first house and was moving in that day-Megan we love you!!! Then as I was driving back to my house I saw Shelley's husband painting outside and I decided to call shelley and ask her to come to our house until Megan could arrive-we love you too Shelley!!
So we are racing down Forrest to get to the hospital and for the first time that night I realized I was having a baby. We got to the hospital and hooked up to monitors and discovered I was having weak consistent contractions. Since I have had 2 previous c-sections they couldn't let me leave so they decided it was best to get her out as quickly as possible.
Allison Rebekah was born on September 2, at 1:16 a.m. weighing 6 lbs 13 oz, and she was 19 1/4 inches long. Not bad for 3 weeks early. She was doing great at first, so great the nursery nurses left the room with Matthew holding her. But a few minutes later she started choking and they took her immediately to the nursery for observation. She started turning blue and they admitted her in to the NICU. Once she was there they determined she had premie respiratory distress syndrome and she had swallowed a considerable amount of fluid.
She has now been there for 5 full days and we have no idea when she will come home. We are prepared she could be there for 3 weeks, but we're hoping and praying she could come home next week (not that anyone has told us that).
Okay I am posting a short message because I just sent an email stating I would update this. But I just looked at the time and I have 20 minutes to pump and then I have to head back to the hospital. I went to see Alli this morning and discovered they had moved her to a big girl crib. She hasn’t had to use the warmer for two days so they “upgraded” her. She is still on oxygen and fluctuates between room air and 30% oxygen. We have attempted to give her a bottle twice today to see if she could handle sucking, swallowing, and breathing but she is sleeping so hard she won’t do it. I am heading back up for 2 evening feeds and then I can update y'all and add some pictures.
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