Jack

Baby Jack was born Tuesday, August 12 at 8:15am. He weighed in at a whopping 9 lbs, is 20 1/4 inches long, and has a head full of almost-black hair.


Sadie is meeting her little brother for the first time. She wanted to poke out his eyes! Overall, she was pretty excited. But, much like other toys or activities, she got bored and said "Bye bye baby. Bye bye Jack." when she had enough.


Here's Daddy with his two babies
We came home yesterday morning and "survived" our first night at home (with little to no sleep) and are all doing well. My brothers are in town and have been a big help with Sadie . We'll update you with tales of our survival later!

Jack will be here by the end of this week. Dr. Theis said he wanted to see me Monday, if I haven't already had him before then, he'll schedule an induction for the end of the week. He didn't think I'd last till Thursday, so we'll see.

In the meantime, I'm going through a myriad of emotions. I'm excited to meet my new little one and am ready to get to know him like I know Sadie. I look at her and all the joy she brings to me and Jared and I think of how that joy is about to double. But at the same time, I feel like i'm betraying Sadie in some sort of way. She'll have to become a little more independent and learn to share Mama and Daddy. It'll be good for her to have a little brother, I know. The feelings are complex. I also look at the little bassinet I set up in our room each morning and its a reminder of the lack of sleep I'll be getting when he arrives. I'm also afraid of being trapped inside for the next month with two babies. It took time to learn to incorporate Sadie into my life, and now I can't imagine life without her. I'll have to learn to do the same with Jack. I'm just nervous.

Do you guys have any pointers for me? Have any of you felt this way?

Tag. 6 words that describe me.

Since Jenn Tagged me...

6 words that describe me:

Sensitive

Emotional

Creative

Nurturing

Compassionate

Anxious

This would probably work better if I had someone else write 6 words to describe me. If anyone wants to give an honest reflection of who they think I am in 6 words, feel free! I'm curious.

Badge of honor

I was in the lucky 20%. Not a single stretch-mark from my pregnancy with Sadie. Sometimes I felt a little guilty that I escaped so easily with out them when so many of my peers were not so lucky. But then, tonight, while doing my routine after-bath tummy inspection, I noticed a cluster of squiggly little reddish-purple scribbles on the left side of my belly button. I tried to make sense of them. They weren't there last night. Maybe they are just left over debris from where I bumped my belly on the corner of the table? I stared at them, they stared right back.

My initial reaction: "Nooo!!! This baby needs to come NOW! I can't have these! They'll get worse if I get any bigger!"

I believed that God knew I couldn't handle feeling any more insecure about my appearance than I already do, so He spared me in the stretch-mark department. So why do I have them this time? After a little bit of thought, I realized that I'm not as upset as I thought I would be. Horribly insecure and body-hating Courtney would be devestated. Yes, I'm not thrilled with them, but I think much of my initial reaction came from a place that thought I should be upset with having them, rather than a place of true feeling.

The marks remind me of an aerial view of where the ocean meets the sand. Little wavy lines gather at the shore of the island of my belly button. Its okay.
Maybe I have them now as a sort of badge of honor. God knows that now I'm stronger, a tiny bit more secure, and ready to accept being flawed. Maybe I'll let them remind that our bodies are beautiful even when imperfect and that they can do amazingly miraculous things (like grow another human being).