6-7, Heading to bed for the night.

Today marks 2 weeks since Katherine was born.  It's been a great 2 weeks, even though we are operating on less sleep than normal.  With the other kids away in Alabama on vacation, it's been like a vacation.  I don't have near the work load around here that I usually have, and I can take naps when Katherine is napping.  She has done exceptionally well with breast feeding, and with riding in the car.  We are getting two long sleep stretches out of her: one at night and one during the day.

6-8, Running errands with Momma.

I have always liked the newborn stage.  They are so cuddly, and no one minds if you stay home to rest and snuggle babies.  They eat all the time, but other than that they really aren't any trouble.  You sit them down, and they don't roll or crawl or run off.  They don't back talk or destroy your house when you are in a different room.  And did I mention just how cuddly you are.  I had forgotten just how soft they are, and how the smell, and the way they just fit so perfectly on your collar bone under your neck.

6-4, Katherine's first Sunday at Church.

Don't get me wrong.  I miss my sleep ALOT, and I have NEVER enjoyed breast feeding.  Though I will say it's not so bad this time, as I remember.  The recovery from birth this time has been tougher than it was with the others.  And I know there will be a stressful learning curve when we add the three oldest back into the mix, and I finish taking back over the household chores and routines from Gary.

6-5, Momma and Kate.

I've always liked the newborn stage, but this time it's all the sweeter. I mentioned the following morning after Katherine was born that "not everyone gets pregnant who wants to, not everyone gets to keep the babies they get pregnant with, not everyone gets a rainbow baby after enduring a loss, and being acutely aware of that this pregnancy made today all the more special." There has been so much joy with this baby.  And the relief at her arriving safely, was seriously like going from standing in the bottom of the Mariana Trench with a sack of weighs in each hand, to bouncing around on the Moon with practically no gravity. There really just aren't enough words at the relief it is to hold her, and known that she's ours to keep, and she's not going away.

6-4, Daddy and Kate

Labor this time, like our pregnancy was very emotional.  I didn't know what to expect, and in all honesty the last two weeks, I was more anxious and stressed than I had been before with the exception of the week in pregnancy that we lost Abigail.  I was so afraid that we had come all this way, to the point that we could safely relieved a baby, only to wait too long and lose another one.  Even during labor, it was hard to remember the three healthy births we had, I could only remember the terrible outcome from the last labor.  I can remember telling, maybe more asking Gary, that this wasn't Abigail, and that it wouldn't end that way would it?

5-31, Daddy giving the girl her first bath.

Having Katherine here has also been healing to my heart.  I still miss Abigail, and I still wonder who she would have been.  But having the chance again to mother a baby and see her grow has given me a sense of peace that was still alluding me.  It's not that she's replaced Abigail, and I don't think like some loss moms, that I am getting Abigail back again in Kate.  Rather, she has brought hope back in our life.  And, just in case, this is our last baby, I am soaking it all up.

6-3, Cuddling in the bed.