Sick

Harper has been one sick little girl for the past couple of days. It hasn't been pleasant...to say the least.

It started Wednesday night...Harper woke up in the middle of the night screaming. We blamed it on teething or even a nightmare. Thursday she was home with Will and he said she seemed to be fine, just sleepy. Thursday evening we met a dear friend for dinner on the hill. She cried the.entire.time. She moaned in her carseat on the way home. We got her in our house and her fever was 104.8. I freaked a freak, called the doctor, changed her diaper, put her pj's on her and flew out the door. The doctor called back as we were pulling into the ER. She said we were doing the right thing. 2 hours later...Harper was diagnosed with hand, foot, mouth disease. The doctor (who was amazing!) could see ulcers in her throat. We went home with instructions to give her Motrin and a mixture of benedryl/Maylox AND as much ice cream as she wanted. She ended up sleeping thru the night Thursday night...thank god!

I stayed home with her on Friday because all she wanted was Mommy and I was EXHAUSTED from the 2 nights before.

Harper trying to sleep off the pain in the ER.

Relieving her throat pain with some DQ

Ready for the Olympics opening ceremony

Taking a nap on Mommy. All she wants to do is sleep on Mommy!

Lately, Trooper and Harper have become very best friends. It actually brings me so much joy. I think this past week Trooper has sensed Harper hasn't felt well. He has stayed very close to her. Yesterday, I caught her loving on him. If you know Trooper, you know this is a big deal.

 Saturday night brought ANOTHER long night. She was up for 3 hours in the middle of the night. Which is so not like Harper. I think she was just hungry. She hasn't been eating well and she must of woken up starving. I had to give in and give her a bottle. She has been off bottles for 8 days...but I was desperate. She fell asleep immediately after the bottle. I wish I would have thought of it 2:30am instead of 5:30...

We spent the entire weekend in our house. Needless to say, I had cabin fever. And the best/worst part of this...Will has the same virus! He had to go to the doctor on Saturday morning. AND-Harper never ended up getting blisters on her hands and feet. So we think she just has a form of the hand, foot, mouth virus..not the full blown thing.

We were hoping today would bring a healthy week, but Harper didn't sleep well last night and woke up this morning SCREAMING. I gave Will the honors of staying home with her today. And now I'm getting texts from Will saying he is miserably sick again. I need a vacation! 

One whole year

From this....

To this...

Birthday weekend recap

The much anticipated first birthday has come and gone! :(

We celebrated all weekend. I will let the pictures do the talking. 

Silly me! I only took a picture of the ingredients, not of the actual cake I baked for Harper. I baked a HOMEMADE red velvet cake. I'm talking homemade cake and icing! It was fabulous. I requested my mom's red velvet cake every year for my birthday, so I thought I would start that tradition for Harper. We invited our neighbors over to share cake and ice cream. We had a great time.

We took Harper to Outback for her birthday dinner. We picked Outback because A.) after being in labor for 12 hours I requested Outback immediately after having her and B.) It was one of the first restaurants we took her too.

Someone got her first Tiffany's box for her birthday. What a lucky girl!

Showing off her new outfit from Aunt K.Hart.

Kennedy visited Harper on her birthday and brought awesome gifts. Harper has always been the "baby". She is the baby of the family, she is the baby at the babysitters house, etc. But when Kennedy came, she acted like she knew exactly what she needed to do to be a big sister. In the above picture she was making sure Kennedy was buckled tight to go on a bye-bye.

Daddy couldn't resist these baby Toms for Harper. I have to admit, they are adorable.

We surprised Harper with a dozens of balloons in her bedroom when she woke up the morning of her birthday. That girl loves her some balloons! When she woke up Will and I greeted her, but she was too excited about the balloons! She gave us a nice little birthday gift by waking up at 8:30am! We were so happy!

So close to walking! She only needs to hold one hand now. Here she is just walking out of Tiffany's. She is growing up too fast!

Just a couple of things about Harper:

1.) She no longer takes a bottle...at all! On Saturday night (her first birthday was the next day) we laid her down without giving her a bottle. And she hasn't needed one ever since. I'm so proud of her and me for breaking from the bottle.

2.) I think she is very close to walking. She stands up alone. When she does stand, she can bend down and pick things up and stand back up without falling. She can push her push toys with no problem. And she can walk holding just one hand. And of course, she cruise around all the furniture. Just yesterday when I picked her up from the sitter's house she took 3 steps on her own before falling down. So she is getting there slowly but surely.

3.) She eats ALOT. Most of the time we have to cut her off. Just recently she has decided to not eat her veggies. She literally throws them to Trooper. She is a meat and potatoes girl. And Mac and Cheese! Mac and cheese is her favorite. She still loves her yogurt, chicken, pancakes, waffles, eggs, avocado, watermelon, peaches and blueberries.

4.) She is on 100% Whole organic milk. She takes it out of her sippy. She also drinks water. I don't give her juice at all.

5.) She used to love bath time. Then she hated it, screamed and cried the whole time. But for the past 3 nights she has played and played in the bath. So she may start enjoying it again.

6.) She has a whole new love for reading books. She loves when I read to her at night now. She loves her touch and feel books. And the books with the little finger puppets in them.

7.) She says: Momma, Dadda, Dog, Bye, yea. I can't think of any others, but she tries to repeat anything I say. She repeated her name once and said "per". It was adorable.

8.) If you tell her to "peek-a-boo" she will throw her little hands over her eyes and play. May be the cutest thing I have every seen. Sometimes she gets a little lazy and puts her hands over her ears! Either works...Haha!

9.) She went from not climbing one stair to climbing three flights in one day. Our poor house is constantly a mess from the barricades. She also went 11 3/4 months never messing with our TV...now she knows how to change the channels and mess with the cable box. It's a constant battle.

10.) We love her to the moon and back.

One year ago...

I became a mommy to the most beautiful little girl I know.



She has taught me more than I will ever me able to teach her. She has shown me what unconditional love is, given more patience than I ever knew I had in me and shown me compassion.

Harper, you are the apple of my eye. You have filled my heart with so much love, I sometimes think it will explode. You have made me a much stronger person and made me a believer in miracles. You are my miracle and I'm beyond blessed to call you mine.

Harper, I love you to the moon and back. Happy Birthday my sweet baby!

Harper's story

Harper doesn't technically turn one until Sunday, July 22nd. But I won't be around much this weekend, so I'm going to go ahead and celebrate here.

Let's recap shall we?

Will and I knew we wanted to try for a baby the minute we got married. We were still "fresh" off his deployment and we knew exactly what we wanted. We figured we would start trying on our wedding night. We obviously didn't get pregnant that night or even that month. We tried for a couple of months after that and nothing happened. I got frustrated and said..."what will be, will be". So we just went about our lives. I took many pregnancy tests just waiting for that positive. I "just knew" I was pregnant, but never was. Will would get so frustrated with me and tell me to just "chill out". So I did.

On Dec. 12th 2010, I woke up and thought I should pee on a stick. I had no reason what so ever to believe I was pregnant. We weren't really actively trying, I didn't feel weird, but something in my head told me to just do it. I took the test and waited about 15 seconds and bam....PREGNANT!

I flipped out and all the sudden found myself scared to death. What have we done?! I go wake up Will to tell him, and didn't believe me. His reaction.."how? when?" Good question...we have no idea when it happened! Will advised me to go to work and grab a digital pregnancy test on my lunch break. I sat at work and so many thoughts were going thru my head. I couldn't even fathom how much life would change. But honestly, I was scared to death to go the doctor...I knew it would mean blood work! (how funny now!) I zipped out of work at lunch and ran to CVS and literally ran thru the front door to the guest bathroom. Sure enough...PREGNANT! I took a picture on my blackberry and sent it to Will. His reaction..."you have to be shitting me?!" Nice, huh!? :) I immediately called the doctor to make an appointment and started to fret about telling my parents! I went 26 years actively trying NOT to get pregnant and now I feel like I'm going to be in trouble! LOL...

That evening I had plans to go to a cookie exchange party at a sorority sister's house. On my way there I was talking on the phone with K.Hart. I remember her asking me if I had any baby updates. It took all I had not to shout it from the roof tops. But I remained quiet..barely. I make it to the party and of course, my friend is waiting on me and hands me a glass of alcoholic cider. Oh crap! I take it and she notices I'm not drinking it, she then asks, "are you pregnant"...I reply "no, I just have to work tomorrow and have to drive home". Shew...dodged the second bullet!

My toughest lie was that Saturday. We had booked a hotel room in DC to celebrate Maggie's birthday. We were going to paint the town red! As we were driving into town we couldn't stop talking about the future and all the fun things that were going to happen. From the moment we even talked about kids, Will had already picked out the stroller he wanted us to use. So we were driving and saw a lady push a stroller across the street in front of us. I couldn't hold it in any longer, I needed to tell my mom. Will begged me not too, because of course he felt like we would be in trouble (seriously?! Will!). And he felt like it was still too early. I called her and told her to start saving her money for an Orbit. She laughed and said some day. I said nope...seriously, you only have 9 months! She was more shocked than excited I think. We never mentioned we were trying. Of course my dad figured it out quick. I asked him what he had planned for his birthday in August, he said, "why, are you pregnant?!" Haha, oh Grandy!

I ended up telling Maggie that night because I can never get one past Maggie! She shed a tear or two from excitement. Will and I were on cloud nine!

The next seven months ended up having so many ups and downs. I had a miscarriage scare, I was hospitalized twice for kidney stones (one 4 day stay during Easter!), PIH, Pre-eclampsia, etc. I think it was God's way of getting me over that needle fear I had before Harper. I was certainly a pro with needles by this point.

When I was exactly 35 weeks pregnant I found myself back in the hospital. My blood pressure was high and I got strict orders to stay off my feet. I was distraught thinking I would be stuck in bed for 5 weeks! I was advised to follow-up with my doc in 2 days. Will and I went to our doctors appointment on Thursday, July 21st as a family of two and left as a family of 3! They took me straight over to the hospital and starting inducing labor ASAP. I was scared to death, my baby still had 5 more weeks to cook. They prepared me for the worst and told me no matter what she would have to stay in the NICU because of her gestational age. I was just praying for a healthy baby, but I was mentally prepared for the NICU stay.

12 hours of labor later, I was wheeled into the operating room for an emergency c-section. At 6:50am, I met my daughter for the first time. All 6 lbs and 11oz of her. Unfortunately, meeting her was a blur. I was very nauseous and hazy from the 12 hours prior.

But I will never forget wheeling into the NICU to see my daughter. She was just perfect. So peaceful and content.

Harper and I were released from the hospital three days later and that is where our life begins....

To Be Continued....

Turning One

I have very mixed emotions about Harper turning one. I'm thrilled my little girl is healthy and growing just perfectly. But I'm sad she is will "technically" no longer be my baby. Although, she will always be my baby.
Either way, Harper turns one on Sunday, July 22nd.

We celebrated her birthday on Saturday, July 14th. Will had military duty in WV that weekend, so I thought we could kill two birds with one stone and have her party that weekend. Plus, I thought I would do our families a favor and have it WV so they wouldn't have to travel.

We arrived in WV at 2:30am on Thursday morning. I wanted to wake up and be there so I could have the whole day to prep. My mom and I ran a few errands and worked on and off all day on the prep work. But Will, Harper and I had to call it an early night from sheer exhaustion.

Friday we had to pull out the big guns and get to work. Aunt Kara, Grammy and Mommy worked until 2:30 Saturday morning cooking, baking and hanging decorations. Thanks for all of your help..I appreciate EVERYTHING. You helped make Harper's day so very special.

I woke up Saturday and started blowing up balloons. And the prep seemed never ending. But somehow, we did it and it looked awesome!

Here are a few pictures of the big day. It was hot and steamy on Satuday, but Harper still enjoyed her party. She was very moody at first, but after she ate the BBQ, she was good to go. She loved her cake and cried when we took it away. Speaking of cake...her's was awesome! The bakery did a fabulous job.

Now picture overload...

Crawling around trying to figure everyone out

The damage she did to the smash cake

After the smash cake

Giving her Great-Grandmother kisses

LOVING the cake

I can't resist those pretty baby blues!

Trying to figure out the cake

Beautiful Harper

Can't stop won't stop with the cake

Eating BBQ

Learning how to use her spoon

MAD we took the cake away from her

Playing with her BFFs, Emmalin and Max

Isn't that outfit cute?!

Discovering her cake

Reserved for Harper

LOVE

Her owl favors...Mason jar owls

"I hope you had a real hoot! - Harper"

Front door

Grammy made that awesome "1" wreath out of cupcake liners!

Her AWESOME cake..it tasted awesome too!

Entry table

Presents!

Taking in her party!

Dog days of summer

It's a common theme on the East Coast...it's hot as H-E-double hockey sticks! It doesn't matter where you go or what you do, you just can't escape it. I know it's summer time in Washington, DC and heat and humidity shouldn't be anything new, but I still HATE it. I absolutely HATE summer time here.

Here are a couple of pictures of the Cutlip's trying to beat the heat...

Sunbathing...IN THE AIR CONDITIONING

 We made sure to stay hydrated on the 4th of July!

 And swimming!!!!

I'm Happy to announce that I'm....

DONE PUMPING!

Words cannot describe just how excited I am about this! It was a spur of the moment decision yesterday (July 1st).

Harper is down to having only 1-2 bottles a day (morning and night) and I have about 3 months of milk stored up in my deep freezer...so I thought "why not"! So she will still get 100% breastmilk in her bottle, but it will just be from our deep freezer, not freshly pumped. I've had a couple of moments of sadness, but all-in-all, it's a HUGE relief. I feel like I own my body again. I plan to keep it that way for awhile. The thought of pumping again for another baby wears me out just thinking about it. Let's hope #2 decides to latch on and I won't even have to get my pump out the first 3 months.

So this also means...this momma is going to tie one on at the beach in September! :)

I have alot to update everyone on, but I couldn't resist this post. It's something I've been looking forward to posting for the past 11.5 months!

I can't wait to tell you about our (me, Harper and Aunt Maggie) trip to visit Aunt Kristin and Uncle Mike in New Jersey for her 30th birthday!

I also have all kinds of cute pictures of Harper swimming in her pool. Her friend Micah came over and played with her.

AND...Harper is {thisclose} to walking. I orginally was hoping before her 1st birthday party, but I'm thinking it might close to her actual 1st birthday. Which her Daddy took off work that day so we can enjoy every second with Harper.

One more thing...if you haven't RSVP'd to Harper's party...you better do so quickly! You can text, call or email me! I hope we see you there! It's going to be awesome weekend (yes, I said weekend) of celebrating Harper's first year of life and mine and Will's first year of parenthood!

Last but not least....I'm sending our thoughts and prayers from Ashburn to the state of WV. The storm on Friday night has caused so much damage. I hear things are getting better!