Almost 11 Months old!

I can hardly believe Laci will be 11 months old in three days!! Then, she's going to be a year!! I'm getting close to full planning mode for her party...waiting for the invitations to be shipped, then gotta mail them out! With Thanksgiving and Christmas right around the corner too, it's a busy time of the year! But it's also the best time of the year! So much going on and so much to look forward to!

Introducting Miss Laci Ann!

Sara Beth met Laci for the first time...Myley was running around the hospital room, not too interested in getting her picture taken!

Laci and Mommy's first picture!

Laci And Her Daddy!

Laci Ann Ariks was born on Friday, December 19th 2008 at 12:25 pm at Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center in Knoxville, TN. Our precious baby girl weighed in at 7 pounds, 11 ounces and 20.5 inches long. She was born with a headful of reddish hair and beautiful blue eyes! She was delivered by c-section at 37 weeks, due to constant contractions and Mommy's history with pregnancies. She is perfectly healthy though!

Okay, So I'm way far behind! Haha!

Okay, it's obviously been a while since I have posted anything on here. I guess I need to start over and re-introduce us since we have a new family member! Chris and I have been married for almost four years. I'm 22 years old, he's 21. (Yes, we were 18 and 17 when we got married, but only for a couple of weeks!) Chris is an electrician with Broadway Electric in Knoxville, a student in the IBEW apprentice program, an offensive lineman for the Knoxville Knights (a semi pro football team in Knoxville), and a wonderful daddy and husband! I'm an LPN with Trinity Medical Associates in Knoxville and I absolutely love my job! Chris and I have had a very hard couple of years here lately. We have lost two little boys, but recently had a beautiful baby girl! (I posted details in the post "The Question"-see below). Chris and I are extremely busy! Between work, church, family, friends, football, Laci, and everything else, we rarely have a spare moment!

29 weeks- 8 weeks left!!

Wow, it seems crazy that Laci Ann is going to be here in LESS THAN TWO MONTHS!! I went to the doctor yesterday and everything was great! She weighs 3 pounds, 4 ounces. She's measuring right at 30 weeks, so she's roughly 8 days ahead of me. That's not too much bigger, just shows that she's healthy and growing! I had lost four pounds, which I can't figure out HOW seeing as how I eat all the time! I have no room left in my tummy, so I can't eat a lot at one time, but I eat ALL the time! I was supposed to do my Glucose Tolerance Test to test for gestational diabetes, but I ended up throwing up before I even left the house! I drank the stuff (which is like really yucky really fizzy orange soda) and went to get in the van with Mom, because she was taking me to my appt. I stepped off the front porch and started throwing up all over the yard! Yuck!! I have to go back next Wednesday to try it again- hopefully it goes better next time! I will start going every week after that also.
We went to Babies R Us and Walmart last night to register. I love shopping for all this pink stuff! It's so much fun! We bought the paint for her nursery and Chris is going to paint this weekend.
Which brings us to the bitter part of this bittersweet journey. The nursery is still set up with all of Landon's stuff. There has been a lock on the door since January. Nothing inside has been touched. My mom, my sister in law, and Chris are going to pack all his stuff up this weekend while I take the girls out for the day. I don't think there's anyway in the world I could manage to take all of his things out of his room and pack them up. It's so tough to even think about it. We are so excited about Laci, but our hearts are still so broken for Landon. I miss him more and more each day. I know his baby sister is a blessing sent straight from Heaven, but losing him is still so hard. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we continue on our journey with Laci Ann, all the while preserving the memories of Landon and Brayden, our precious baby boys.

Third Trimester here we come!!

Well, I'm officially in my third trimester!! I will be 28 weeks this Friday (10/17/08)! This pregnancy is rolling on by as fast as can be! So much has happened and we have so much to do that it's hard to believe she is going to be here in a little over 9 weeks! Mommy and Daddy better get a move on! Chris has recently switched jobs, he's working with Broadway Electric Service Corporation (BESCO) in West Knoxville. It works out really well for us because most days we can just ride together. Chris can drop me off and then head to work and pick me up on his way home. On Monday nights he has school in Alcoa at 5:30 so I have to drive myself. We are doing really good, super excited and nervous about Laci Ann's arrival!! Which, by the way, has been changed to DECEMBER 19TH!!!! We are doing an amnio that morning to make sure that her lungs are developed and if all goes well (there's a 88% chance that she'll be ready) then we do a c-section that afternoon! We will come home on December 22nd if all goes as planned. Three days before Christmas, recovering from a c-section, with a newborn! I must be insane- but I'm excited! I will only be 37 weeks when they deliver her so they have to make sure that her lungs are going to be mature enough to support her on the outside, but they say that by 37 weeks, it's rare that they aren't ready! Hopefully, she'll be done cooking by then! Well, I'm going to get off here and get back to work!

The Question

Since it's become more and more obvious that I am, in fact, expecting a baby, people ask me the infamous question constantly. "So, is this your first baby?" Looking at it from their point of view, I can see why they would assume that this is my first. I'm 22, been married for three years. My husband and I are both young. My answer always is "No, actually this is my third baby but we have lost two little boys." Some people let it go at that, some question me more, all of them wonder. For those of you who don't know, Laci is not our first child. She's our third. We were expecting a baby boy in April of 2007, but Brayden Christopher was stillborn at 23 weeks on December 7th, 2006. In April of 2007, I got pregnant with another baby boy. Landon Travis was due on December 28th, 2007. He was born 7 weeks premature on November 12th, 2007. He spent five weeks in Children's NICU and came home happy and healthy on December 14th. On January 26th, 2008, I went to get him out of the car and he wasn't breathing. To make a long painful story really short, our baby boy passed away on January 31st, 2007, after five days on life support in Children's PICU. We found out in May that I was expecting again, which was a definite surprise for us and our family. Chris and I have three beautiful children, two are angels in Heaven and one is an angel here on earth.

Halfway there!

This past Friday, I was officially 20 weeks pregnant!! Honestly, this pregnancy has flown by!! I can't believe it's already halfway over (and that's if we go FORTY weeks!!) We (Laci and I!) are growing like CRAZY!! Chris went to Chicago this past weekend for a football game (he's an offensive lineman for the semi-pro team Knoxville Knights!) and he got home late last night. He couldn't believe how much we had grown...but only 2 days had passed since he seen us last! I don't think we grew that much that quick, but Daddy says so! I'm so excited that we are having a little girl! Life is going to be pink and frilly around our house! Daddy is already seeing visions of pink!! My neices (Joey and Kim's girls) Sara Beth and Myley will definitely do a good job of keeping Miss Laci in clothes!! Those girls have more clothes than I've ever seen! But that's a good thing, cause we loooove hand me downs!
Laci has just gotten to where she's getting really active and I can actually FEEL her now. It's such a sweet, indescribable feeling to feel her kick and move and know that she's okay! We have our big ultrasound this Wednesday to look over her whole body part by part so we can make sure everything is working like it should!! Well, more later!