Beginning Adventures

Nov. 19, 2006

We are home...

Thank you all so much for your thoughts and prayers over the last few days. I apologize that I've left you without an update until now, but things took much longer than we expected and it took major amounts of medicine to get my body to kick into labor.

Joshua (God is salvation) Michael (Who is like God) finally arrived Saturday morning at 10:02 a.m. after a very long induction process. Our Peanut was perfect in every way and weighed only 8 ounces. He was on his way to being another tall Ballard boy though at 11 1/2 inches. Andrew and I are home now and while we are very tired, God has remained true and saw us through the most difficult few days we have ever faced together. We are sure there will be difficult times ahead, but with all the love and concern we have been shown this week, I have no doubt that we can see it through.

Thank you again for EVERYTHING!!!

Oh, and I'm sure most will figure it out, but we chose Michael as a middle name for it's meaning as well as for his momma's name. [Wink]

Michele (Andrew and the kids)

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Nov. 16, 2006

Sad Update

Posted in Joshua Michael

Dear Family & Friends,

Yesterday was my 24 week ob appt. It started off great with the midwife going over the results of our ultrasound from a few weeks ago. Everything measured on target at that point and Peanut was a wonderful healthy little boy. However, when we proceeded to my exam, we were unable to hear the heartbeat so they did a quick ultrasound in the office and didn't like what they saw. I went to the hospital and they confirmed that our little boy is no longer alive. I will go in tomorrow morning (Friday) for delivery. We are doing okay, still in shock and very disappointed, but we know that God's timing is always perfect. Your prayers are much appreciated and I will keep you updated as I can after tomorrow.

Much love,
Michele & Andrew (and the kids)

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Oct. 17, 2006

It's a boy!

Posted in Joshua Michael

We had our ultrasound last night and God is blessing us with another son!!! Christopher is very happy and Erin was bummed for about 10 minutes and then said that another baby boy would be great! I'm very excited to meet this little guy and maybe we'll have a name ready for him when he gets here!!!

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Aug. 28, 2006

Guess who I got to see today!?!?

Posted in Joshua Michael

Peanut #4!!! My appointment was at 1 and I got there a little earlier. The doctor I saw was SOOO sweet. He was just a giant teddy bear of a man. He got a little worried when we couldn't hear the heartbeat...looked at his watch and said "what the heck, we have time. Want to take a peek?" SURE!!!

I will admit I was really nervous because I had horrible dreams all night last night that we couldn't hear the heartbeat today and when we did the u/s there was no baby! But...after about 15 minutes of probing (he did an internal u/s ew) here he/she was - and we did get to see the heartbeat!! Again with the nervous because it took a couple attempts to move the u/s wand in a way to see the heartbeat. The doctor was really surprised at how high up the baby was and asked if I've ever been told I had a tilted uterus. Um...no. Said it was nothing to worry about just to remember to tell them at my follow up appointments.

DH was relieved. There was only one baby! HA! We've had SOOOO many people tell us that they had a dream we were having twins, it was getting to be a little too weird. So if there are two...we could only see one. LOL (The doctor wouldn't commit to there not being two! LOL Poor Andrew)

Just wanted to share my excitment. I feel so much more relieved knowing everything seems to be ok! I got some new meds for being sick and we'll see how that goes. I'm on an antibiotic too for a UTI. BUT I did loose 5 more pounds. So 13 weeks and I'm down 15 lbs. HA! I'm not worried. I had it to spare and I usually make it up at the end.

WOO HOO!
Michele [Woohoo]

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Aug. 22, 2006

Baby Announcement

Posted in Joshua Michael

Most of our friends and family know, but I figured it was time to make an official announcement here! We are expecting our 4th baby in March of next year! We are ALL VERY excited about having a new brother or sister around and things seem to be going well with the pregnancy. I've had horrible morning sickness for the last 5 weeks or so. I'm hoping I'm over the hump soon and can get back to normal living...just in time for school. LOL

Praise God from whom all blessings flow...

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About Me

I am a mom to four wonderful blessings--Sean Patrick (2), Erin Grace (4), Christopher Matthew (5), and ^Joshua Michael^ stillborn (11/18/06) Wife of 11 years to Andrew. We are beginning our adventure in homeschooling using Sonlight Curriculum.