The Lily Pad

Hey Pretty Girl! This is how I greet you every day. Daddy and I are sure that you believe your name is pretty girl because those words will get you to smile every single time. You continue to grow and to amaze me each and every day that we spend together. I see your little personality more each time I look at you. You are a horrible napper. You hate naps unless you can take them in my arms so I sacrifice and sit in bed or on the couch with you and let you sleep until your little heart desires to wake up. This month has been full of firsts for you, as I imagine most every month of yourl ife will be for a while, but this month had so many fantastic firsts and some scary ones. This was your first Christmas. In the days leading up to Christmas you had such an exhausting routine of visiting family and opening presents that on Christmas morning when I laid you down on your new playmat, you promptly fell asleep and then you napped through the rest of the presents being opened and halfway thro...

So, yeah, I'm more than a little late on this one. What with the holidays and hospital visits. Madelyn, you will soon learn that I have lots of good intentions but sometimes life gets in the way. My dearest Madelyn, This month you smiled for the first time, you took your first overnight trip, your daddy got commissioned, you met tons of family members previously unknown to you, and on top of it all you continued to maintain your cute demeanor. Your first smile came precisely two days after our family Christmas portraits reminding us once again that you are on your very own time table. You are so guarded with your smiles and smile only for those that you are comfortable with. While we were in Asheville you revealed to us that when you smile really big you have a dimple in your left cheek. It is so precious. You also get so excited sometimes that you get the hiccups in the middle of a big smile and then you promptly get mad. It is so amazing watching you grow and change and I look fo...

There, that should catch me up for a while. Nothing in my life ever could have prepared me for the holiday we have had. From giggles and smiles at various Christmas celebrations to high fevers and overnight hospital stays. We rang in the New Year at MUSC's Children's Hospital with a toast of creme soda for mommy and daddy and IV antibiotics for baby. Without boring you with details, Thursday after Christmas Madelyn was running a slight fever and we called her pediatritian who recommended that we take her to a pediatritian the next morning in Asheville because she wasn't acting like she felt bad at all. By 5 am her fever had skyrocketed to 103.2 and we took her straight to the ER. An ER not equipped to care for 2 month old babies. She had a chest x-ray, they drew blood, tried to run a catheter twice and failed twice, and then the doctor tried to trick (yes, I said TRICK) us into letting them do a lumbar puncture (spinal tap) on my sweet baby girl. Luckily we knew what ...