Carmon Avery Coker

She's finally here!!! I can't believe I'm the mommy of a sweet, beautiful little girl! Here's how it all went down!

I was 39 weeks pregnant and everything had been perfect so far. I left each doctor visit a little more pessimistic each week thinking that this girl wasn't going to come out on her own. Cam had 1 week between his spring semester finals and the beginning of Maymester at FMU.

At my 38 week appointment on Tuesday, I was told that things were favorable for a successful induction and that if I had not gone into labor on my own by 39 weeks, that I would be a good candidate for an induction. When I went to schedule my appointment, they had nothing available

until the following Thursday! That meant, I would have to endure the

whole week, go to the doctor, schedule the induction, and hope that they could do it before Cam had to go back to school!

My cell phone google searches for the past 2 weeks looked a little like this:

"Signs of labor"

"Natural ways to induce labor"

"Foods to induce labor"

"Exercises to start labor"

"What do contractions feel like?"

and a few more that I'm too embarrassed to type here.

I decided to start calling every day so see if they had cancellations for the next week (reschedule dr appointment...FAIL!) in hopes I could see a doctor before Thursday to buy us a few more days. The waiting hours were spent WALKING! Mall walking, walking around the block, walking on the treadmill. Of course the idea of walking this baby out sounded better in theory, than in reality. I was fat and tired! We tried just about every other thing too (short of castor oil...YUCK! and horseback riding...which would have been a good option if we had a horse!)

Here is a yucky Easter pic just so you have an idea of the huge-ness I was experiencing.

I was sleeping horribly and trying to stay in tune with my body for any hopeful signs of labor. Around the weekend I started noticing tightening in my belly. It wasn't really an new feeling. In fact, I had noticed it all along, but just thought it was the baby adjusting herself. Now I was really paying attention, I figured it might be contractions. They weren't painful at all, but it at least gave me hope that things were moving along. This was the most uncomfortable period of the whole pregnancy, I was waking up every hour of the night and started sleeping on the couch so that I didn't disturb Cam or Jac.

Early Wednesday morning, things got painful. I was ecstatic! I tried to lay down, but each contraction woke me up and I walked around until they settled. Finally, around 4 or 5, I got up and started doing some laundry, sweeping, mopping, washing dishes, and anything else I could think of to stay busy.

Cam woke up around 6:30 and I broke the news to him then..."I think we might have a baby today." I was calm and collected, but I knew that things were getting crazy. I had been timing my contractions for a while, and although they weren't really consistent, they were between 7 and 10 minutes apart. We started getting our things together. After Cam showered and I got Jac's bag packed, Cam took him to his mom's house so we could go to the hospital and hope for some good news.

We got to the hospital around 9 am. The nurse told me that I was about 3.5 cm dilated so they would monitor me for a while and check again later. I guess it was around 45 minutes total before they came back. The monitor showed that they were still irregular, but when she checked me again, I was 6.5 cm dilated. I think we were all taken by surprise that things had moved so quickly, but we knew then, the baby would be here sooner than we thought!

By the time we made it up to labor and delivery, it was close to 11. The doctor came in shortly after and broke my water. At about 1:30, I decided it was time to push!

It's GO time! We're about to have ANOTHER baby!!!

At 2:14 PM, Carmon Avery Coker made her debut! She came out crying, Cam cut the cord, the doctor put her right on my chest, and I was in awe. It was officially a girl! I was finally convinced! After they wiped her down and wrapped her up, they gave her to Cam. She had stopped crying and just stared. She was so content!

8 lbs 1 oz and 20 in of BEAUTIFUL!!

We were in the hospital only 24 hours after delivery and we headed home. Carmon has only been in our lives for a month and I can hardly remember life without her.

Big Bro, Jac has adjusted really well. He's really been craving lots of attention, but you can tell he really loves his baby sister. He has a really hard time understanding why she can't swim with him and play with him, but he loves holding her (briefly), kissing her, and helping with her.

Carmon seems to already know she's the second child. She is such an easy baby and very straightforward. When she cries, she's hungry, dirty, or sometimes just wanting to be held. Everything about this kid seems the exact opposite of her brother. Jac really made us work hard when he was a baby and still does! We are so extremely thankful and blessed for both of our kids and their unique personalities!

Now we're one biggER, happy family!

"Other things may change us, but we start and end with family." -Anthony Brandt

Bandwagon Blogger???

Alright, all this blog talk lately has got me thinking about hopping back on the bandwagon. I don't intend on this being a lengthy post, but I thought it was about time I updated a little.

The last time I posted, was over 6 months ago I guess. In light of the new year I thought I'd do a little month by month review of 2010 to get caught up.

January: Happy New Year! I gotta be honest, one year ago???? I having a hard time remembering what went on. I do know it was a tough month celebrating the holidays and then having to separate back to our two different states...again!

February: Jac's temper tantrums were in full bloom at this time. We were suffering from recurrent ear infections and separation anxiety. 2 hour long tantrums on a daily basis were the norm. Mommy, Daddy, and Jac were at wit's end. We began meeting with an ENT to schedule tubes.

March: Cam begins terminal leave followed immediately by Jac's surgery. No down time here. We got all of Cam's stuff moved back all by ourselves and fell in love with a cute little house we found online. After one day of house hunting and a few phone calls, we made an offer. 24 hours later, offer accepted, time for paperwork.

April: We closed on the house and moved in. Pretty sure we had everything we owned in the house and unpacked in about 3 days. So excited to have a home of our own! In other news, Cam finally made it his EAS date. Our official exit from the USMC!!! Big sigh of relief!

May: School's out for the summer...for me at least. Cam meets with a VA rep from FMU and finds out he can start school during Maymester. Kinda put a damper on my summer plans, but in hindsight, he had an extremely productive summer!

June: Things are settling down. Cam's still attending summer school and during his brief break, we took a family vacay to see the Packard's in Richmond. Jac's tantrums have finally settled and are now few and far between. Life as the mother of a 2.5 year old is finally starting to cut me some slack!! Cam has a birthday and we agree to expand our family to include a new little furry girl. It would be a few more weeks before we could take her home.

July: Cam's still in school and didn't get to go with me on the church mission trip to VA. (Big sad face!) We celebrated our 4th anniversary in two different states (which was much better than celebrating our 3rd anniversary in two different countries with months to go). Darby joins our family at the perfect time and reminds me what it's like to be a Mama to a newborn baby. We quickly learn that English Bulldog/Boxer mixes DO NOT make good inside dogs.

August: School starts back, much to my dismay and with it I've put on about 20 pounds since January. I'm getting asked on a daily basis if I'm pregnant. Lo and behold, I take a pregnancy test on the the 26th (my birthday) and it comes back positive! What????!!!!!! Are we ready for this again? I just thought I figured this motherhood thing out! Oh yeah, Cam starts his first normal semester (and thanks to Military credits and Summer School, he started out as a Sophomore!).

September: Pregnancy tests every week. I was too scared to call the doctor and find out all of this was false so I lived in doubt and disbelief for a while. I finally scheduled an appointment when I was around 9 weeks and all was confirmed. I still can't believe it!

October: Time for pumpkin shopping and Halloween costumes. I dressed as a marathon runner, Jac was Superman, and Cam got really creative and dressed as a "nasty civilian."

November: I'm really putting on some weight early on and getting ridiculously large! We have a lot to be thankful for this year. New house, the pieces of our family put back together, Jac's ears and tantrums seem to be fixed, and a new little one on the way! False alarm at the doctor's office hoping we would get to find out the sex of the baby and learning that we would have to wait until December for that. We celebrate Jac's third birthday with baseball/Toy Story party at the park on a beautiful fall day and take off on the day after Thanksgiving for some crazy Christmas shopping.

December: We had a blast decorating our house for Christmas (I was so excited about it, that I technically had all my decorations put up before Thanksgiving), and enjoyed our cozy little bungalow with our fake fire and all. Jac was getting super excited about Christmas and so were we. In fact, I listened to Christmas music non-stop (and I don't even like Christmas music). We had lots of opportunities to talk about the Christmas story with Jac and he made lots of connections with it because Mary had a baby in her belly "like Mommy!" We went to the doctor for our anatomy ultrasound and found out that we were going to have a little girl! Jac wasn't super excited, because he had told us all along that it was a girl..no surprise to him. We had a couple of meltdowns because of no-naps and late bedtimes, but Christmas day was a success for all! The best part of it was the late Christmas gift we got...snow cream on the 26th! What a perfect ending to 2010!

So there it is, a year in review: 2010. A little more wordy than I intended, but I can't really describe how awesome it is to be in one place with my family. Life couldn't be sweeter right now! I can't wait to see what all 2011 has in store for us!