the slide show.

for those of you who do not know to check the sprinkle of grace website, now you do. there resides the slide show of gray's photo shoot yesterday morning. i LOVE it! the only bad part of the experience was i got attacked by ants and mosquitoes. i had to get up in the middle of the night and cover my feet with anti-itch cream and then put band-aids all over them to keep from scratching.

but, oh... so worth it.

even though he's not singing it, i think the shout out to elvis in the song choice is pretty great. don't you, dad?

run out.

i can't come up with any more compliments for jenny's work. i've plumb run out.

sigh...

three whole weeks.

disconnected.

these days, i have the privilege of blogging and working from my husband's beautiful macbook. a couple months ago, my own trusty apple laptop died a complete and irreversible death. it flashes blue and black screens. no hope. landon typically leaves his laptop at the house during the day. he also has a super awesome desktop at the church that he can use so i can blog, email and write and report stories while at home with my babies. he has, however, taken his laptop to work for the past THREE DAYS. and, until tonight, he has LEFT THE LAPTOP AT THE CHURCH at night.

i have been suffering terrible internet/blogging/emailing/web surfing withdrawal symptoms. like, seriously, i've been depressed. sad, i know.

luckily, he brought it home tonight.

here is some of the buildup:

• grayson has a newborn photo shoot scheduled with sprinkle of grace in the morning. sunken gardens, morning sunlight, naked baby butt, jenny pressing the shutter. i'm so excited.
• wendy -- i'm on track for your five weeks of soreness. week three today, and i'm still miserable. blah!
• ellie stole my nursing pad while i was feeding gray this afternoon and stuck it on her chest. silly girl.
  
• i'm having a TERRIBLE time getting ellie down at nap time and bedtime these days. she literally sits in her bed for more than an hour, refusing to sleep. this afternoon, she was screaming bloody murder instead of taking her nap. all this through practically closing eyes because she is so tired. finally, i spanked her. after a little bit more protest, though significantly less intense, she finally gave in. i guess it worked.
  
• during the same nursing session that she pulled the nursing pad silliness, ellie was climbing on the couch and yanking on the blinds. i, obviously, with an eating baby in my arms, could only scold her from the chair. she just stared at me and kept going. after 14 reprimands, i raised my voice. she frowned and then hit herself in the butt twice and said, "no! no!" she spanked herself! she mocked me! and kept messing with the blinds! oh, my, my, my. it was so hard not to laugh. i have my hands so full.
• i feel like all my friends have gone back to school or have kids that have gone back to school. i know it's post-baby hormones, but i feel terribly left out. i want to smell freshly sharpened pencils.
• i love going to heb. but somehow i always manage to spend at least $60 every time i go. that makes going 2 or 3 times a week a really bad habit.
• i only go to heb after 10 p.m. with grayson. i still haven't tried to go shopping with both kids.
• oh! i still haven't gotten my cell phone switched at sprint so my cell phone availability has been way down too, adding to my disconnectedness.
• cowboys played their last preseason game tonight. a week-and-a-half and until the regular season opener! smu football opens their season with new head coach june jones (of the great u. of hawaii turnaround) at the helm this friday at rice. pony up! go mustangs!
• landon just informed me that he hoped by taking his computer to the office this week, i'd be more productive. "it didn't work. in fact, the opposite came true. you went into hibernation." i guess he's getting that from the piles of laundry in the hall and the fact that EVERY dish in our kitchen is dirty in the sink or, because of overflow, on the counter. hmm. that'll teach him.

here are some pictures. no rhyme or reason. just "some." i've been getting requests.

ellie loves watching the baby channel in her orange chair.

daddy loves grayson.

i love this picture.

last thursday, two weeks old.

pa loves grayson too.

ellie loves pizza!

ah, family photos.

sweet kisses.

"anyone need mylicon?"

playstation boys.

love-hate: sticky diaper tabs.

i do understand and appreciate the need for diaper tabs to be very sticky. what good would they do if they weren't? the babies' diapers would fall off and disaster would ensue.

however, why is it that these super sticky diaper tabs always get stuck to my poop-filled wipe while my other hand is occupied holding flailing baby legs and i'm desperately trying to move the poop-filled diaper and replace it with a clean one before the boy pees all over the place? i'm trying to yank the wipe lose and end up flinging the not-yet-wrapped poop-filled diaper in my haste.

and he ends up peeing on my pillow.

poop, indeed.

amen. twice.

gray's heart.

yesterday grayson had his echocardiogram and ekg at the heart center. the echo was first, and we were ill prepared. he needed to stay still and quiet, and, since the test is a sonogram on his heart, he obviously needed to be undressed. he gets real annoyed when he gets undressed. we should've undressed him, then wrapped him with his chest showing and gotten him back to sleep before we were in the room with the technicians. but we didn't. so, after about 10 minutes of trying to calm him with other methods, the gracious techs stepped out so i could nurse gray into submission. after that, he did quite well. there was one guy doing the test and another who appeared to be studying the pictures. i asked him, "are you gonna tell me what it looks like or not?" he said, "we're just gonna take some pictures and then let the doctors look at them." figured that. dangit. the ekg was lots of little sticky sensors on his chest, arms and tummy with clips and wires attached. the sensors were apparently cut into half the size of typical sensors so it was hard to keep all the clips attached at one time. once one was reattached, another would fall off. gray sucked on my finger during the process, and ended up doing quite well with that test as well. the lady running the ekg kept saying he was so perfect and beautiful. i have to agree. after the tests were over, we were told they'd be sent to a pediatric cardiologist in san antonio who would look at them monday and get back to us by tuesday or wednesday. so we wait, continuing to pray for gray's heart.

unreachable.

if you've tried to call me today, my phone is dead. it has been mostly dead since we came home from the hospital because my charger was somehow lost in the shuffle. i have been charging it in short intervals on the car charger, but i never get it very charged up 'cause i'm never in the car for long. i will go tomorrow to switch over to delana's old phone, which does have an available charger. then, i will be reachable again.

the day that hardly was.

zero sleep from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m. + not much sleep in the hours surrounding that + super sore girls -- bordering on legitimately unbearable at times + constantly eating newborn + 18-month-old energy and drama + the 16th day of interrupted sleep patterns + pouring saturday rain = delirious exhaustion.

luckily, about 4 p.m., delana, david, nanny and papaw came for a visit and subsequently offered to take ellie so i could nap.

oh, thank heaven.

i slept -- with a few nursing sessions throughout -- from 4:30 to 7:30.

i feel so much better.

the day, however, has come and gone, and i have done LITERALLY nothing besides cook tortellini (reminded me of dinner as a kid) and garlic bread for landon and i. it almost feels like the day shouldn't count. i was sleep walking before the nap. i felt hung over -- nauseous, head pounding, disoriented.

grayson slept most of the day, but we kept him awake from 7:30 until now. really, i should try to go to bed since he's sleeping now, but i think i ruined it with the nap. maybe i'll try anyway. we cannot have another night like last night. tears were involved, people. and i started getting so frustrated that i felt myself getting mad at the baby, which makes me sad 'cause i can't be mad at a 16-day-old baby boy.

like i said, delirious exhaustion.

here's hoping for a better night. and a better day tomorrow.

full belly, full heart.

for the past two weeks, i've been receiving the yummiest meals from some of the most wonderful friends i could ever ask for. everything has been so, so, so good. the bounty has been so plentiful, i've been eating lunches on you guys as well! thank you to crystal for organizing as well as cooking and to esther, mari, christal, melissa, sara, jenny and angela for all the culinary goodness.

i really am so thankful. you've made me feel so loved. and so satisfied!

oh, and gray says thanks too. "no wonder my mommy's milk is so good! her friends are so nice to feed her so well!"

:)

beat it, carlos.

is it just me, or is it super weird for "carlos' lawn service" to ring my doorbell excessively -- like five times in a row -- at 9:30 a.m.? yes, i need my lawn mowed. no, i am not going to answer the door to a stranger with babies in the house.

in fact, ringing the bell five times in a row makes me less likely to answer.

weird!

fruits of blog surfing.

there are some benefits to postponing the shower and surfing the blogs while eating pretzels and drinking diet coke. i'm not sure if i'm just sleep-deprived, but i just cried through this entire video.

i think it just makes the world seem smaller and is a reminder that we're all made to dance.

despite many, sometimes-difficult-to-take differences, we're all made to dance.

feelin' it.

today i'm feelin' the two-kids-18-months-apart thing.

it has taken me until now to keep everyone fed and get everyone bathed (myself NOT included) and sleeping (sorta -- ellie's quiet but kicks her crib every now and again..) at the same time.

it's nearly 5 o'clock.

ellie is needy today. gray is endlessly hungry. all i want to do is sleep.

i should be taking a shower right now, but i decided i'd take a moment for a snack.

pretzel sticks and fat-free cream cheese, a diet coke and just a few moments on the blogs is making me feel better.

i should watch john & kate plus 8.

jack-in-the-box waltz.

grayson is having one of his episodes, as i like to call them. he eats for just a few minutes, falls fast asleep, unable to be awakened by any enticement of milk, feet tickling or otherwise, is laid down swaddled tight, waits for me to settle comfortably under the covers and then promptly wakes up, angry, as if he's being starved.

gotta love newborns.

after, literally, five ups and downs, i decided to stay up for a moment to be sure he's good and asleep. he's been sleeping in our room, and, admittedly, he's been in the swing quite a bit. but nothing in that room is working for him at the moment, and landon's grouching isn't adding to the situation. he's been hopping up and down with ellie several times tonight as well.

so.. i decided to nurse gray -- once again, for 2 minutes -- and, for the first time in his little life, lay him in his crib. i have one of those memory foam wedge thingies that ellie slept in from the moment she was born. he was actually (sorta) awake when i laid him in it. i came to get a drink, read a couple blogs and as i'm typing this, i hear nothing.

knock on wood.

---OK...totally unrelated interjection, but my neighbors behind me are setting off fireworks this very moment. i'm not kidding. i have just observed several loud cracks and shoots of sparkling light out my back patio window at 5:30 a.m. on a tuesday. how unbelievably strange.---

anyway, i think i'm gonna finish this drink and tiptoe very slowly to my warm covers.

it feels sorta weird with gray sleeping in the other room.

but if i can manage to get even an hour of sleep before he fusses again, i'm sure i'll be over it quickly.

resisting the urge to google.

grayson had his two-week checkup today. yeah, he's only 11 days old, but, close enough i guess. he weighs 8 pounds 13 ounces -- that's an 11-ounce gain from last monday when he weighed 8 pounds 2 ounces. hungry boy.

last monday when we were there, we saw the nurse practitioner who spent just a little bit too long listening to gray's heart. she didn't say anything though so i didn't worry about it. today, when the pediatrician listened to his heart for what seemed like an eternity, i did worry. eyes closed in serious concentration, he listened for quite awhile when he put down his stethoscope and left the room, saying, "hold on." um, scary. i prayed a quick and pleading prayer over gray while he was gone. he came back with a smaller stethoscope. "that one was too big for his chest." OK. more listening. finally, after it took everything within me to be quiet until he was done, he told me gray might have a heart murmur.

a heart murmur.

the doctor said it's sometimes hard to distinguish between a heart murmur and the blood moving through the baby's lungs. experience tells him it's probably nothing. but if he could be 100 percent sure, he wouldn't send us for the ekg-whatever test that we're scheduled for on friday.

even if it is a heart murmur, lots of people have those and it's nothing.

but there's that small chance, the one i know about even while resisting the urge to google, that it could be something.

i spent all day at delana's, which helped keep my fingers from typing into the search box and my mind from getting carried away.

i know God is taking care of my baby. even though i hate the appointment card that says, "at the heart center" and "ekg & echo" with my son's name on it, i know everything will be OK.

right?

happy birthday, mommy!

today is my lovely mom's birthday. i wish so bad i could spend it with her. here she is holding grayson right before we left the hospital.

mom, thank you for everything you do. case and point, i felt so much better about this morning's news after i talked to you. i will forever be able to put on my brave face to everyone but you. that's a nice thing, you know. it's what mom's are for, and you're the best kind. i love you so much. happy birthday! i miss you so.

blah.

• i have some allergy/cold issue. dripping nose, sneezing, junk running down my throat and a sinus headache.
• ellie has an ear infection.
• i cleaned the stone family building the past two days and am paying for it now.
• grayson spits up at least three times after every feeding. sometimes as many as six times. it frustrates me and my sore parts to nurse him so often when it appears he's spitting up the majority of what it's pretty painful to get out. he also has a stuffy nose, which makes it hard for him to nurse. i'm not sure if the nose issue is because of flowing milk/spit up that ends up coming out his nose or because he's sick too.
  

adios maternity.

i fit in pre-pregnancy pants today. it's not really that big an accomplishment since i only gained 10 or 12 pounds with gray. but it's nice to not have to wear elastic waist bands.

now only 14 pounds left from ellie to lose and the 10 or 15 i wanted to lose before i got pregnant with her.

awesome.

smiles.

even if they are only gas bubbles or dream-induced, it's still an amazing sight to see your baby smile. it makes you imagine of all the things that will provoke that most-perfect smile in the months and years to come, hoping there are so many.

i would've taken a picture but i was much, much too busy admiring.

one whole week.

today is my due date. i'm definitely glad we induced. just seven days later, and i can't imagine life without grayson. i do sorta wonder when he would've made his appearance on his own. but not enough to wish for a do-over, that's for certain. he's already blessed my life in so many ways. i can't get enough of his perfectly soft skin or his intoxicatingly sweet baby breath. he's such a good baby, and i feel like i've been able to simply enjoy him a little more than i could ellie. only because i realize that, with God's help, i'm well-equipped to supply everything he needs. i'm more relaxed this time around. with such amazing family and friends surrounding me, a loving, supportive husband by my side and my two blessed children in my arms, it has been one of the most wonderful weeks of my life.

i know these all look sorta the same, but he's just so cute! i already had to limit myself to just five...

six days later, she asked to hold him.

i was nursing grayson this morning, and ellie was practically pulling him out of my arms. i asked her if she wanted to hold him. she said, "uh huh." i told her to wait until he was done eating. then i sat her down in her little orange chair so she could hold her baby brother for the first time.

here's the photo evidence.

dinner at the henry home.

a girl who refuses to take off this hat, and her orange baby brother.

day 5.

today is my first day alone with both kids. landon is at work, and all my family has gone home. it's going pretty well so far. it seemed i was running non-stop until noon, and the only things i can think of that i accomplished were getting a five minute shower and getting ellie bathed.

grayson is so incredibly precious. he's super skinny and strong -- wiry, i like to say. he hates to have his diaper changed and has this super sweet cry. his cry sounds like he's sad. i remember ellie's cry sounding more like she'd order a hit on you if she could. he's eating like a champ and sleeping pretty well too. the last two nights he's eaten about every two hours, but he goes right back to sleep. i can handle that. i love to touch his soft hair and his long feet and toes. he's had his eyes open a little bit more lately. he always has a very intense look on his face.

here are updates on two hot topics on day 5 of grayson's life:

nursing:

holy smokes. talk about sore. ellie had trouble latching on and we used a shield during the early days so i never got this sore. grayson has NO trouble latching on; he's eaten like a piglet since he emerged from the birth canal. for the past couple of days i have been in some serious pain at the beginning of each feeding. but all my information says the soreness should only last a few days, and, by golly, i am feeling tons and tons better today.

on gray's side of the meal, as it were, he seems to be eating quite well. starting sunday, however, when my milk was good and in, he started spitting up after each side -- if you can call it spitting up. this is not just a little dribble out the corner of his mouth. he is shooting the stuff up. and it rather large quantities. reflux has crossed my mind except that he doesn't appear to be in any pain whatsoever. also, my mom said i spit up like that as a baby. ellie spit up like clockwork after every feeding, but it was not this much or this intense. i guess i'm just going to settle in for lots of laundry and not worry as long as he doesn't appear to be bothered by it. one thing i tried last night and so far this morning is feeding him for only five minutes on each side. he feeds a little more often (every two hours) this way, but it seems that he doesn't get as full and therefore doesn't spit as much if i limit his intake a little. my milk is literally overflowing, and i don't think he knows when his little belly is too full.

ellie:

big sister has been pretty needy since grayson was born, but i think she's getting used to him. she excitedly exclaims, "baby!" any time she sees him and brings him peace offerings every now and then. yesterday while i was nursing him, she brought him a stuffed animal. another time, when he was crying, she offered him a goldfish. she likes to kiss him, but we've yet to get a brother-sister photo 'cause it's only quick kisses and she's done. if you try to help her hold him she shoves him away. i think she's going to be fine though. we're being very diligent about including her and loving on her a whole bunch and not scolding her unnecessarily. she's still a baby herself so she needs a little time. every time i go to put her to bed, i hold her for a few minutes before i lay her down. her body that really seemed so small a few days ago seems so big and solid now. but her chubby little arms draped over my shoulders and her sweet face resting against my cheek makes me cry every time. yes, every time i've put her to bed since her brother was born, i cry. i cry and thank jesus for the amazing children he's blessed me with. it's overwhelming. they are so wonderful.

other little stuff:

• food tastes so good. especially snacks from the pantry and homemade meals. real food.
• gray has some jaundice, but he's in the low-risk zone so he should be fine.
• besides sleepiness and sore girls, i'm not really feeling much physical pain related to delivering a baby. it really was quite easy comparably speaking.

this might be the strangest blog post format in history. talk about random.

a few pictures.

i know you're all thinking i'm not blogging because i just had a baby and all, but that's not it! my internet (...) has been on the fritz, and i'm dying here! this morning, however, it's working. yay! expect more blogs to come today. for now, since i'm dying for some breakfast, here are just a few pictures i love.

"gray day."

he's here. the most beautiful boy that ever graced the planet is here. he was 8 pounds 9 ounces and 21 inches long. he was born at 12:43 p.m. he has a perfectly squishy face and light brown hair and sweet little lips and squeezed-shut eyes. oh, and a big nose. he nurses like he's never done anything but nurse. he ate minutes after his birth for 20 minutes on each side! i was worried about inducing, but i'm glad i did. five-and-a-half hours -- just 4 pushes -- is a labor i can handle. the only drama was when i got my epidural. it hurt way more than i remember and after i got it my blood pressure dropped way down. 89-over-36. i don't know much about blood pressures, but i know i felt like i was gonna pass out and throw up at the same time. i got a shot of ephedrine though and things were quickly restored. i remember being happy after ellie was born, but i was so extremely exhausted that i don't remember much else. with gray, i was euphorically happy. like, for hours. it was the most wonderful feeling. he is the most wonderful son i ever could have asked for. here are some pictures courtesy of crystal and her fantastic camera skills. so much more to come.

i love you, grayson reed. simply put, you are perfect.

thurday. baby. induction. woah. woah. woah.

this is one of those posts you've all wrestled with -- there are things to say, but the proper way to formulate your thoughts is as elusive as all get out.

so, we'll stick to the cold, hard facts. maybe the feelings and surrounding details will miraculously form themselves eventually.

the news is this: grayson will be here in no more than two days.

either he will decide to be born today or tomorrow or he will come when we gently prod him to do so beginning thursday morning.

yes. i'm having an induction thursday. it's elective. i'll be 39 weeks.

i am not 100 percent settled with this decision, but i'm somewhere in the 90's. that combined with the fact that the extent of my readiness for this child to be outside my body and in my arms cannot begin to be conveyed, and we're going for it.

there ya go.

mark it on your calendar.

grayson reed will be available for autographs later this week.

what better to do with garage sale money than spend it on more stuff, and other tales from the henry master bedroom.

after the garage sale wrapped up and i got some food in my belly, it was off to hobby lobby with delana to spend some of the money i made. i've been looking for something to hang on the wall between the closet and bathroom doors in our bedroom for awhile, but nothing was jumping out to me. or if it was, it was jumping with much too expensive a price tag. wall hangings were 50 percent off this week at the hl, and i got both of these for $35. it was sorta hard to photograph them for some reason -- this is the best i could do. they're chocolate brown and metal. the design is raised from the background, if that makes any sense. what do you think?

next, i'd been contemplating this idea for over our bed for the past couple of weeks. i was unsure of how it would turn out, and i'm still sorta unsure. the bed is in the corner so your typical picture-over-the-bed wasn't going to work. these are clear christmas ornaments (about $3 on sale at hobby lobby) that are hung from the ceiling with ribbon i had in my craft closet. the brown was used in decorating for our wedding, the ivory is from the wrapping of a fancy wedding gift and the green is random. what do you think? landon seems to be pretty impressed, but i'm not sure if it's cause the whole thing cost $3 or it really is cool.

close-up. it's sorta like an adult mobile.

and finally, i am LONG overdue on posting about this. this is grayson's cradle and super perfect and neutral cradle bedding. our sweet, sweet students bought it and surprised us with a mini shower a couple weeks ago. they got us clothes, baby bath stuff, stuffed animals, letters and a way cute play stroller, carrier and baby doll for ellie in addition to this beautiful piece of furniture and its bedding. isn't it just gorgeous? kylah is already plotting to steal it for her babies when i'm done.

i really am overwhelmed with thanks every time i look at it. such thoughtful kids, i'll tell you. it's all ready in the corner of the bedroom for the first few months after grayson's impending arrival.

all i have left is a mirror for over my dresser and possibly a piece of glass for the top of it. my mom said she has some mirrors, so i'm going to scope her collection before buying anything. i'm really happy with how things are coming together in this room.

the bathroom, however, is another story.

stay tuned.