Jason's Shoulder Surgery

Jason had to be at Ft. Stewart yesterday at 9:30 am to check in for surgery.  We left the house at 8:15 and got checked in just before 9am.  They took us right back to a room so he could change into his proper attire, answer all the needed questions, get his bracelet, etc.  It was then a hurry up and wait game.  We were expecting that, as they couldn't really give a starting time for the surgery, since it totally depended on how long the surgery before his went.  We stayed busy loving on Stella and playing checkers.  There was a tv in the room, but the cable was out.  The last hour of our wait Jason got a roommate (I guess all privacy goes out the window when you become a soldier).  All we had separating us was a curtain so we could all fully hear one another conversations.  We did get some entertainment out of our red neck neighbors though, as they were talking about how the first place they were going after surgery was Hooters!  Ha!  I'm pretty sure they were serious too.  We laughed when the guy had a long discussion with his nurse about why he couldn't wear his underwear in surgery.

At 11:30am they came and got us, taking us to the surgery prep room.  I was shocked they let me come back with Stella but I was glad we could stay with Jason as long as possible.  In this room he got his IV put in and then the doctor came out to answer any questions we had and to sign his name on Jason's left shoulder, assuring they cut into the correct arm.  We had another good laugh about that!  They checked all Jason's vitals, put cuffs on his feet to keep his blood circulating, then gave him his first dose of anesthesia.  (Once they took him back he'd receive his 2nd dose to put him out and then they would be administering a block in his shoulder.  At that time I was told to say my good byes and was sent to the OR Waiting Room.  

They told me that best case scenario his surgery would take 1 1/2 to 2 hours to get in there and fix the labrum tear they found on a previous MRI.  The MRI was 7 months old, so we knew there was potential for them to find more once they got in.  I spent the first hour downstairs in the hospital, eating lunch in the cafeteria and walking the little PX/Shoppette in there.  I headed back upstairs at 1pm to sit in the waiting room.  It wasn't until 4pm that the doctor came out to talk to me and let me know the surgery was done.  I couldn't believe it ended up talking 4 hours.


Before I start explaining what they did let me remind everyone that I am no doctor and that my explanation will in no way be perfect!

The first words Dr. Sedory said were that Jason's shoulder was pretty beat up.  In addition to the labral tear, they also found a chondral flap/lesion that they had to completely remove.  He did a "Glenoid Microfracture" to fix that, which is essentially drilling into his bone to cause it to bleed and fill in that empty space, hoping that it will create new, good cartilage in place of the defected cartilage they removed.  This chondral flap/lesion was not anything they were expecting to find.  It is a pre-curser to arthritis.  They also fixed the anterior/inferior/low posterior labral tear shown in the MRI he had done 7 months prior by inserting 3 screws in his shoulder to anchor the labrum back to the bone.    One was a posterior/inferior anchor and two were posterior anchors.  Four total incisions were done in Jason's shoulder to be able to do the needed repairs.  He'll be in a sling for 6 weeks and his recovery will take anywhere from 4-6 months.  Once we get moved to Benning at the middle of next week he should begin PT and OT and will have his sutures removed.

Jason came out of anesthia well, minus some pretty strong nausea when he got up to go to the bathroom. They gave him some meds for that and soon after his temperature dropped so they laid him down and covered him in blankets until it came back up.  I went down to the pharmacy to get his meds and then he had to drink some liquids and eat a little jello and crackers and he was discharged.  They wheeled him downstairs while I pulled up the Yukon.  He slept on the drive home.  I was glad he slept, as Stella was not a happy camper on the drive home!!  I'd carried her in a sling all day and I think she enjoyed being so close and cuddling with me all day having one on one attention, so she wasn't happy to be put back in a car seat!  It was a relief when we arrived home.  Gavin and Gammy were on the sidewalk waving, greeting us back home!  We got Jason moved inside on the couch so he could rest while I fed Stella and Starla finished dinner. We had meatloaf, potatoes, rolls, and beans - yumm.  Jason slept while we ate, but he got up a couple hours later and finally ate real food or the first time of the day.  After that he took his first dose of percocet, as we knew his block would wear off sometime in the middle of the night and we wanted to stay ahead of the pain, not allowing him to wake up hurting at all.  We all ended up sleeping in the living room, having an alarm set to bring him his meds every 4 hours and to re apply ice to his shoulder every 3-4 hours.  The first night actually went well!  His block did totally wear off around 4:30am so we were glad the percocet was already in his system.

He's doing well this morning, staying propped up on the couch and sleeping most of the time, except to eat and use the restroom.  We'll see how the rest of the day goes.

Hanging out with Stella before surgery... how cute is she !?!

In the surgery prep room, with his IV.  This was just before they sent me out and took him back.

After surgery, ready for discharge.

When we got home and Gavin saw Jason's arm he said "Thats a biiiiiiiig bandaid, Daddy!"  

Then, this morning when we were all talking about Jason's surgery, Gavin said "I have a hurt too, everybody."  He pointed to a blister on his foot.  He apparently wanted some of the sympathy that Jason was getting!  Kids are so funny...

February 16th

Whew, what a busy day!  Jason got up in the morning and made another trip to Ft. Stewart for his pre-op appointment with his surgeon.  They discussed the surgery he'd be getting the next day and the recovery process.

After that, he went to work to completely finish his outprocessing and start leave.  He's officially all done at Hunter Army Air Field.  He's taking along some good memories from here, most notably his time with 3 Bravo.  He's ready to move on, but it's bittersweet for me.  I love Savannah, our first home, the amazing men and woman we've met here, and the fact that both our babies were born here, etc.  I love how child friendly this city is.  But, i'm also so excited to be moving on to a family friendly phase of our time in the military.  Knowing that Jason will be non deployable for the next 6 months is so exciting for me.  He'll get to see Stella's first 6 months of life (he was deployed when Gavin was 3 weeks old until 5 months old so he missed that), he'll get the needed time to recover from his shoulder surgery, and I LOVE that he'll get to come home for breakfast, lunch, and dinner on most days while he's in this course.  We have so many friends stationed at Benning as well, so there won't be any hard time adjusting for me.  Every time we move I have a hard time until I get settled and meet people and start to get busy.  I'm glad I won't go through that this time.  My brother and his wife will also be stationed there for a little while we are there, so it will be nice to hang out with them again too!  We've never really gotten the chance to really know his wife, Cara, since we didn't live there when they were dating, so we'll finally get to know her!

My biggest goal for our time at Benning is to get back in shape!  :)  We're thinking about taking a family vacation to Florida over the 4th of July weekend and I want to happily get back in a swimsuit for that.

While at Benning, we're also looking at maybe putting Gavin in a couple mornings a week pre school program if we can find one.  I want it to be on post or at a nearby church, so we're going to research what they have available.  We think him spending some time in a structured environment with other kids his age will be really good for him.  It'll also give me a chance to have some one on one time with Stella and to run errands with just one child!  What a treat that will be!

While Jason did all his morning tasks I worked on getting the kids fed, cleaned, and dressed and then worked on cleaning the house and unpacking from our trip to Ft. Benning and getting laundry caught up.  Not sure I'll ever be caught up on that or have a totally clean house again!  The weather was great, so Gavin got to play outside in the back yard while I worked on the living room and could see him playing out there.  He loves days that the weather is nice.  At 1pm I got Gavin put down for his nap and then fed Stella.  I'm not sure I really accomplished a lot in those morning hours, but I sure felt busy!

At 1:30pm Jason got back from post and I got to head to Lavendar Hill Salon and Spa for a 1 hour theraputic massage.  Lindsey and Gavin gave me that as a gift after I had Stella - how awesome is that?!?  The massage was awesome, I recommend it to any new mom!  An entire hour of silence and getting pampered, it was perfect after a c-section!  She said afterwards that my neck, upper back, and calves were really tight but she was able to work some of it out.  I knew my neck and upper back would be that way from nursing so it didn't surprise me much.    She said to go home and relax (ha!) - maybe she didn't realize I had a 2 1/2 year old and a newborn at home! Thanks so much for the treat, Lindsey, I enjoyed it so much.

I came home right after since we had our meeting with the lawyer to close on our home refinancing.  They were able to send a "mobile lawyer" to our home which was awesome so that we didn't have to take the kids out.  It took about an hour and I think we signed our names about 200 times each, but it's a relief to have the closing finished.  Our house payment will go down $251 dollars a month starting in April and we skip the March house payment.  Can't beat that!  Since we have a renter moving in and starting payment in March, we essentially have a renter paying our full mortgage for us, plus the monthly fee for the property manager.  I'm thrilled that we won't owe any money out of pocket each month (we actually make about $9 a month by having a renter).  As long as he takes care of our property, we'll be squared away.

After that was finished, another family in battalion (The Leclair's) brought dinner over for us.  They brought salad, a broccoli and cheese chicken casserole, bread, and a peach crisp for dessert.  They also brought a 6 pack of Stella.  The dinner was awesome!  They have 4 kids themselves, and each kid wrote Gavin a letter about being a big brother and they gave him a bag of army toy soldiers to play with.  So cute & creative...

To finish the night off, we got to head back to the Savannah airport to pick up Gammy again!  (She is going to be so relieved when our crazy February is over and she can return back home to peace and quiet!)  She came back to keep Gavin for us while we spend the 17th at the hospital for Jason's surgery,  to drive Jason's truck to Ft. Benning (he can't drive for up to 6 weeks after the surgery), to help us unpack and set up our Ft. Benning house, and to love on her two grandkids some more!!!  When we got home from the airport she let Gavin open up a bag she brought and inside was a "Life is Good" baseball hat for Gavin and a pink hat for Stella too!  He put Stella's on her right away and declared that she was now the catcher.  So funny!

Fort Benning Housing

Monday, Feb 14th, we took a trip to Ft. Benning to sign for housing.  We knew they had a house available and we didn't want to miss out on it, so it was worth the trip.  We also were able to get our DITY move taken care of and got that out of the way.  We loaded up all our Christmas stuff (tree and a tote of decoration, books, etc), a desk, our kitchen table and 4 chairs, some storage totes, and some of Jason's army stuff on a trailor and attached it to the Yukon.  When we got to Benning we put all our stuff in a storage unit since we wont need any of that stuff while we are stationed there.   We didn't arrive until 4pm so we set up our meeting with housing for 9am the next morning.  Traveling with two kids and pulling a trailor made for a long trip!  We stopped half way and let Gavin play at a big playground while I fed Stella and then we all had lunch at Burger King.  

When we arrived we went straight to the storage unit to unload everything.  We then drove out to Buffalo Wild Wings to meet Joe and Cara for dinner.  This was the first time they had met Stella!  After dinner we drove to post to check out the house and visit with our friends, Jessica and Austin Miller.  They live two doors down from our new house so we were able to see how they had their downstairs set up.  It got us really excited about the new house.  Next we went to another neighborhood over to see Joe and Cara a little more before calling it a night!  We found out that the lodging on Ft. Benning was full so we had to drive off post to find a hotel.  It was really nice and had a continental breakfast.  Gavin has enjoyed lately getting to do things "boys vs. girls" - we race getting in carseats, etc. and he loves it.  We told him there was a bed for boys and one for girls so he liked getting to sleep with daddy.  We tried to race to see who could fall asleep first, but he wasn't motivated to win that one!

In the morning we had breakfast downstairs and then went on to post to sign for our housing.  We got all the paperwork taken care of and then went over to do a walk thru of the house.  We made note of anything that needed to be fixed before we arrive and asked them to have the house sprayed for any bugs/spiders once more before we get there, as we found a spider in the basement.  We paid our pro-rated rent for the remainder of February and got the keys!

It's such a relief to have a house, and a decent one at that!  It's a 3 bedroom house with a basement.  The house has wood flooring throughout and the kitchen , dining rooms, and bathrooms are fully remodeled. We have a huge screened in front porch and will probably rent a fence for the back yard while we are there.  It'll be much easier to have a fence for LT and for Gavin to be able to go outside and play without worry about him running in the street.  (Our house sits on a pretty busy street.)  It's a very old house and is a dulpex, but we just love it!

Front of our Ft. Benning house

View of the side

Back

Kitchen

Kitchen

Kitchen

Dining Room
(It comes off the kitchen and goes out to the back yard)

Downstairs 1/2 bath
(comes off kitchen)

Downstairs 1/2 bath

Living Room, view 1
(If you walk through that door way it takes you to the kitchen and 1/2 bath)

Living Room, view 2
(That doorway will take you to the basement or the dining room)

Upstairs full bathroom

Linen closet across the hall from the bathroom

Left side of master bedroom

Right side of master bedroom
(the door on the right goes to Gavin's room)

Outside view of Gavin's room
(it's bigger then it looks)

Inside view of Gavin's room
(left doorway goes to hallway, middle door way goes straight into the master)

Stell'a room - left view
(it's SUPER tiny)
We will only be able to fit her dresser and crib in there.
The dresser will go in the cove to the left)

Stella's Room - right view
(Her crib will go here)

The basement has a "mud room" and full bath
(Toilet and shower are in the doorway ahead and to the right is a big closet)

Basement
 (There is also a laundry room off the basement but I didn't get a picture of that)

Gavin's Big Boy Room

We decided that the move to Ft. Benning was the perfect time to transform Gavin's room to his "Big Boy Room".  He is so excited about this that he asks every morning if it's time to move yet so he can get his baseball room.  We found the baseball bedding (pictured below) on sale at Pottery Barn Kids.  It's just perfect for him.   It's mostly blue and green, allowing us to keep some of the other coordinating things he has in his room now (his name sign my mom had painted, his green pottery barn kids chair, and his green basket liners).  We also finally found a solid mahogany twin bed on sale.  It was $200 off with no delivery fee, and I got an extra 10% off since I put it on my Pottery Barn Kids registry.  All we need to get now is a twin mattress.  We'll eventually get the coordinating night stand and dresser, but for now both of those can wait.  

Once we move and get his room all set up, I'll post pictures!  For now, here are some I copied off their website.

Catalina Twin Bed in Sun Valley Espresso

Gavin got this lamp and shade for Christmas from Gammy and Pop - it'll look awesome in his new room, as long as we can convince him that it is a LAMP, not a BAT!!

Stella's 1st Bath

On February 9th, Stella's cord stump finally came off, allowing her to get her first bath!  It was so cute to finally see her little belly button.  She did great with her first bath, not crying and staying calm.  She liked it!  Gavin wanted to be involved, helping and giving her toys.  Everything was great until I got her out and wrapper her up in a towel, walking out of the bathroom to get her dressed.  She pooped and it went straight through the towel and on the floor!  We had a BIG laugh and Gavin exclaimed "OHH NOOOO!"  She didn't like having to get back into the tub to get re-rinsed, but was happy to be wrapped again in a clean towel!  

All clean, hanging out in big brothers room!

The Road to 20/20 Vision

Who knew so many meds would be required after PRK?!?

Monday, February 7th - Jason, Stella, and I got up early to make the drive to Ft. Stewart so that Jason could get his eye surgery (PRK) done.  We had to be there by 7:30 am for him to check in.  When we got there we learned that 15 other people were also getting eye surgery done that morning and they were going to do them all in alphabetical order.  We did a lot of sitting around!  He was finally taken back around 12:30pm and was out at 1pm.  The surgery itself only took a few minutes, but he had to keep ice packs on his eyes for 15 minutes afterwards.  He came out feeling great and was shocked at how well he could see.  By the time we got to the car, the pain started setting in and he was really light sensitive.  He wore sunglasses and had to cover his eyes with a blanket for the ride.  When we got home he took his meds and went to sleep for the rest of the day, only waking to take meds, put in his eye drops, and to have dinner.  (Starla made spaghetti, one of our favorites!)  We all sat at the table in the dark eating dinner so Jason could join us :)  While Jason slept, I made out a chart of all his medications and drops.  There were so many and all were on different time schedules!  

While we were at the hospital all day, Starla took Gavin to Monkey Joe's again - it's quickly becoming one of his favorite places!  We've had so much rain lately that outside play hasn't really been an option, so it's a good thing for softplay and Monkey Joe's.  They had pizza for lunch at Monkey Joe's and then came home so Gavin could nap.  

The next day we had to be back at the hospital for an eye recheck.  I drove him out to Stewart and then stayed in the car with Stella while he had his check done.  His left eye looked great, but his right had a fiber in it, under the flap.  The doctor said it would work its way out.  The fiber explained why his vision in the left eye was so much better then the right.  Day #2 was still very painful for him and extremely light sensitive.  The best advice given to him was to keep up with all his medications on schedule and to sleep as much as possible, keeping his eyes closed.  We could really tell Jason was in great pain that day, as Starla made one of his favorites for dinner (pinto beans and corn bread) and he barely touched it, instead opting to lay back down.  

By Wednesday, he felt so much better.  There was still pain and light sensitivity, but it was so much better then the previous two days.  We ended up heading to post for awhile so that I could drive Jason around so he could get more out-processing things done.  CIF was the biggest task that day!

Starla took Gavin to the mall so they could do soft play, lunch, and a little store browsing.  They stayed out for awhile, allowing Jason, Stella, and I to catch naps when we got back from Hunter.  That was a nice treat!!  Another treat was that she made Chicken and Dumplings for dinner - they were so good!  

Wednesday was our last day with Starla here.  We can't thank her enough for all the help over the last 3 weeks.  She completely took over cooking (and always made plenty of left overs so that we'd have meals stocked in our fridge/freezer after she went home), cleaning, laundry (and there was a LOT of it), and Gavin while we were in the hospital with Stella, and then afterwards while I healed from the c-section.  It took so much stress off us not having to worry about Gavin one bit, knowing he was being well taken care of and spoiled by his Gammy!  We were thankful she was able to stay a few extra days after we found out about Jason's eye surgery date, so that Gavin could stay home with her while we did all our trips back and forth from Ft. Stewart and did LOTS of sitting around in the waiting room!  Thanks a million, Gammy!      

Day #2 of recovery

Superbowl Sunday

Sunday morning we relaxed in our pajamas and even managed to catch little cat naps here and there!  It's always nice to snuggle when the time allows!

Jason's friend, Andrew, came over that afternoon to watch the game and they had a wing cook-off.  The plan was to each make a batch of their own wings and it be a competition, but they ended up just coming up with all sorts of different ways to make 80 wings and they worked together on the project.  I was a little unsure of how this would turn out, but the wings were actually really good!  They made 4 different flavors - one was extremely hot, one was a chipolte raspberry BBQ, one was a type of hickory smoked honey mustard, and the other was Jason's "special sauce" that he won't give the secret to!  Haha.  Some were baked, some fried, and some grilled.  They also made bacon wrapped shrimp and we had some cut up veggies.   

It was a nice day at home.  Both Jason and Andrew were rooting for the Packers so the evening ended with smiles!   

Jason's special wings

Time to dig in!

What was left of the wings...

Adjusting to Life with TWO!

My, what a busy month February is proving to be for our family.  On the 1st, Jason took off to Fort Benning for the day to be there to watch my brother get his Infantry Blue Cord during a nice ceremony, which was followed by a dinner.  I was so thankful that Jason was able to be there for the special event since the kids and I couldn't do the traveling.   Jason had a really nice time.  He was also able to visit with a few friends of ours there and to meet with people at the housing office and someone at the Career Course so he could get permission to get shoulder surgery completed before coming to the course next month.  (He's needed this surgery for a year now, but due to deployments and training it has had to be put off.  They have continued giving him steroid injections to keep the pain away, but I believe he's reached the maximum number of injections allowed.)  It was a relief for him to get permission to get the surgery completed, as the career course will be a wonderful time for him to recover before he goes to another unit and takes command.  The kids, Starla, and I stayed home and had a pajama day while Jason was gone.  Gavin tested his limits a little, but overall things went well.

Joe and Jason after the blue cord ceremony!

Stella's shirt say's "I can't wear pink everyday"

On the 2nd, I had a followup with my OB to have my incision checked and to receive the DTaP vaccination (mainly just for the Pertussis part, to prevent passing anything to Stella).  Everything with that went great and I go back on the 22nd for my next checkup.  I'm really pleased with how well the incision is healing.  The doctor did the internal dissolvable stitches instead of staples, so I was relieved about that!  My doctor couldn't believe when I told her I was only taking one motrin a day (just for back pain while sleeping, I had a hard time getting comfortable that first week and my back got really stiff as a result).  She gave me permission to start driving again and to begin light housework, but no heavy lifting still.  We also discussed many birth control options.  I'm thinking about the Mirena, anyone have any personal experiences with that?

The 3rd was Jason's last day of paternity leave.  We slept in that morning and then when we got up he made all of us french toast for breakfast!  We didn't do too much that day and just enjoyed most of it at home.  Gavin enjoyed playing baseball in the back yard for awhile - the weather was actually enjoyable!  Jason did end up taking Gavin to the gym for a couple hours in the afternoon which was nice, Gavin loves getting to play basketball with Jason on the big court!  I just cuddled on the couch with Stella while they were away at the gym.  I love my baby girl!  She's such a cuddler!  For dinner Jason and Starla made salmon for them and grilled chicken for me and we had roasted red potatoes, asparagus, and rolls.  DELICIOUS!  Joe also graduated from IOBC Thursday - we're so proud of you, brother!

Snuggling :)

French toast!

Gavin enjoyed it 

Our baseball boy

Pitcher

Great throw, buddy

Now he's the catcher... he's got all positioned covered!

Hanging out with Gammy... love how she holds her binky!

Sleepy time

Dinner

Friday, the 4th, was Jason's first day back to work.  We hadn't been out in quite some time and Gavin was really missing his friends, so we met up with Neelee and Max at Monkey Joes that morning.  We were only able to stay for an hour because I had a cleaning team coming to give me a quote on a "move out cleaning" before we have our renter in (more on that later).  Gavin had a great hour though and really enjoyed running around with his buddy, Max.  It was nice to see Neelee too.  I couldn't believe how big Ace has gotten.  Our cleaning quote went great, I'd called around to several companies and was glad to finally have one picked out for a reasonable price.  We later enjoyed Chicken Noodle Soup for dinner!  Gammy is a good cook!  After eating, Gavin and I called my sister, Kaylee, that evening as it was her BIRTHDAY!  She was out enjoying dinner at Old Chicago - we wished we could have been there to help celebrate.  Happy Birthday, Kaylee!

After a wash cloth bath, wrapped in the robe from Aunt Lindsey

Morning nap, snuggled in a blanket from Neena... Love her yawns!

Ready to take big brother to Monkey Joe's!

We also got word that Friday that our house was rented!  We were pretty sure we had it rented, but his security deposit and application were received that morning, making it official.  He's a major in the army, coming to HAAF.  We're thankful everything worked out just in time at a price that works out for all involved!  It's such a stress off our chest knowing that we having someone coming in right after we move out.  We're giving him the last few days of February rent free to have time to move in and get situated before he starts work on the 1st.  We've spoken several times, and we think he'll be a responsible renter.  An answered prayer!

Saturday, the 5th, we ran around town getting errands done.  We took advantage of having three adults and took turns running in places so the kids didn't have to keep getting out!  We stopped at UPS first so Starla could mail off Savannah pralines to Jeff in Afghanistan, her parents in Tennessee, and Jeff's dad in Ohio.  I know they will all be excited to get their treats!  We then went to mexican for lunch - delicious!  It's one of the easiest meals out to do with kids, I think.  They are so quick and Gavin loves snacking on chips and dip.  He's getting really good at always ordering his own meals when we go out now and usually uses his manners too, saying please and thanks.  I love hearing him order at mexican "Ummm, I want rice and beans please."  Then he tries to order a "Weet Tea" because thats what all of us get, but we convince him to get milk!  Sweet tea and Gavin are a bad combination - he gets WIRED!  After lunch, we drove around all the furniture stores in Savannah.  Jason and I have been on a hunt for a big boy bed for Gavin, we want something that is solid wood and will last a LONG time.  We only need the twin bed now but want to eventually get a matching night stand and dresser.  We've also been looking for a new couch and love seat, as the ones we have now are falling apart.  We bought them early in our marriage when we had no money, so we got a cheap set with no warranty.  The seams are ripping, there is a large hole in one of the cushions, and all the stuffing continues to fall out.  They have worked out for us for the last few years, but we aren't sure they can handle another move!  We eventually ended up at Haverty's, where we found exactly what we are looking for - a BEAUTIFUL Italian leather set.  It's really rustic looking.  We asked all about the extended warranty options, full payment information, etc and went out with all the information so we could talk it over and think about it for awhile before making a big decision.  We also wanted something that we could have delivered to Fort Benning once we got housing, to avoid getting it just to have to move with it right away.   Thanks Gammy for keeping the kids entertained in the car while we did our furniture research!!!  After finishing up with the furniture stores, we went to the commissary for groceries.  This time, I stayed in the car with both kids.  Gavin had fallen asleep so he napped and I got to nurse Stella while Jason and Starla shopped.

Bear shaped pancakes!  (Neena brought him a bear shaped skillet when she came to visit)

Trying out one of the bows from Erica!  Her hair isn't quite long enough and Gavin kept pulling it out!

Love how her sweet little feet come out the bottom of her jammies

Awake for a change!

Our first five days of February flew by.  Gavin is adjusting well to being a big brother and Stella is just perfect.  She's a wonderful sleeper at night.  We have her in bed with us for about 1/2 the night and she sleeps in her pack n play the other half.  She wakes every 3-4 hours to nurse and get a clean diaper, then goes right back to sleep.  I couldn't ask for any better of a baby!  She nurses great, though its still a little tender for me.  It's getting better though!  I'm so thankful for no mastitis this time around.

I have fallen more in love with Jason through becoming parents all over again.  As I've written about before, I never had that classic father/daughter relationship, but I can see that Jason will always be Stella's hero/role model.  They love to snuggle.  There is just something different that Jason has with her then he does with Gavin. I love it!  I can't wait to watch how their love and bond grows over the years.