Life is Better than Good.: One Year.

Gage Timothy is officially one! I CANNOT believe how time flies, like seriously, a year?! Although I don't feel like I was just pregnant, I do feel like Gage was just sleeping peacefully in his swing on and off ALL day and waking up every 3-4 hours. I am posting from my perspective of this past year, but I know that Erik would agree. This has BY FAR been the funnest, most emotional, life changing, exciting, challenging, and amazing year of my life. Erik and I knew that we wouldn't wait very long to start our family after we got married. When I found out I was pregnant (right after our year anniversary), I was nervous because I did not know what to expect. I have 6 nieces but I didn't have my own, what am I going to do, what are we going to do?! Well.....I couldn't have asked for an easier pregnancy...well, until the end. I did not get sick once, I was able to work up until the day I had him, I was emotional from time to time, but other than that, I was so thankful for a smooth pregnancy. Towards the 38 week mark, I became REALLY swollen. I remember it like it was yesterday. It was Monday, March 19th and I worked that day. The Friday before that my feet were hurting so bad and were so swollen that I had to go lay down in the nurses office at school. Well on the 19th, I had my 38 week appointment. I raced to get there after school (we don't get out until 4:10) and Erik met me there. I sat down on the table, blah blah blah and the midwife took my blood pressure. It was really high, like I think it was 180 over 120, or is that possible? Maybe I'm way off, but it was REALLY high. I told the midwife that I had to rush to get there on time so maybe thats what it was. They told me I had to wait there for 20 minutes and they would check me again. Well, after I was checked again, it was still REALLY high. The midwife told Erik and I that I would have to be checked into the hospital so they could regulate my blood pressure. At this point I was sorta relieved because the midwife said after my blood pressure went down, they would send me home and I would be put on bed rest until it was time for Gage to make his appearance :) I was pretty excited about not working and getting a chance to rest before Gage came. Well.....we got tot the hospital and my FAVORITE midwife, Cathy was on call. She came in and said, "Well, you ready to have a baby tonight?!" Um, excuse me? The midwife at the doctors office said I would be sent home, I don't have any of my stuff?! Well....come to find out, I had preclamsia....basically high blood pressure that can cause the baby anxiety so the safest thing was, was to get him out. That's when I started to get nervous. I was in labor until his was born around 5 that next morning. I threw up a few times, got 2 epidurals, and ate LOTS of popsicles! I pushed for 45 minutes (GOOD LAWD, that was tiring) and out came our little miracle :) Seriously, babies are miracles. The whole process of a baby growing inside of a woman and being pushed out and BAM, you have a baby! Totally a Miracle. Anyways, after Gage was born, all of our family was hungry. I told them to all go eat and I would order room service. I seriously ordered E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G. on that menu. I mean it was "free" right?! Meemaw stayed back with me and helped me :) It was a rough stay at the hospital. With the preclamsia came sickness, lots of meds, and a catheter, ugh. I couldn't get out of bed for 4 days, talk about miserable. I was quite emotional at times because I just wanted to go home. I was supposed to go home that Thursday but Wednesday night I spiked a fever of 103 so I had to stay ANOTHER night.

So then our year began! The worst night was the second night we were home with Gage. He did NOT want to sleep. I remember thinking, "what did I get myself into?!" After that, he was a great sleeper. He got up about every 3-4 hours. After I stopped breastfeeding (right at 7 months), he started consistently sleeping through the night. Once he started teething, that was all out the door! He now gets up in the middle of the night about 2-3 times a week.

Now to the mushy stuff. I don't know what I did to deserve such an awesome miracle from God, but Gage has really taught me so much about life. Besides God, my husband, family, and friends.....nothing else matters. Nothing matters but spending time with my family and making memories, even if Gage won't remember them right now. I know that I use to "bring my work home". Not.Any.More. I come home and any bad moods are completely wiped away. Seriously, when I see him, I realize that nothing is worth stressing over or worrying about. Life is to short. Gage is always smiling and will laugh at ANYTHING :) He is laid back, "tougher than a set of woodpecker lips" (Who do you think came up with that one?!), but busy, busy, busy. He will make you work but he is TOTALLY worth it. He brings so much joy to our lives and we couldn't imagine life ANY.OTHER.WAY.

Here are some things Gage enjoys doing:

crawling on the dishwasher door when I am unloading it
taking everything out of the cabinets
slobbering on my phone
slobbering in general, boy goes through at least 10 bibs a day
taking a bath
drinking water....that boy loves water!
drinking whole milk...we are so close to NO formula, yay!
watching Mickey Mouse dance (Thank you Aunt Alicia!)
watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Doc McStuffins
pulling the bumber off his crib
giving open mouth kisses
crawling at 50 mph
crawling all over Daisy
Saying Mama
Saying Dada
Roaring like a lion :)
Listening to a CD our church gave us (if he is fussy in the car, I turn that thing on and its instant silence)
Laughing