Look Who's 4!

Katlyn Emma, aka: Katie, Kate, Katie Bug, Baby That's right! 4 years ago this darling little princess joined our family and it's been an adventure ever since! We spent the day by making her birthday cake, having lunch with daddy, painting fingernails and toenails, and then my dear friend took some fabulous pictures of her in her new outfit. I am amazed she got so many great pictures. Katie was being a stinker and didn't want to cooperate. These are just a few of my favorites.

I had YW in the evening so we celebrated on Thursday. I finished her cake (HOT Pink and brown ladybug as requested), then we went swimming. After daddy got home from work we met grandma Laurie at Jalapenos ("The place where they put the big hat on your head and sing happy birthday.") and then went back to our house for cake and ice cream. She got a lot of fun things but I think grandma's present (Frisbee and a gun that shoots big plastic balls) was the overall favorite... well, at least for the rest of us. Katie loved her baby doll and outfit the most.

Katie has the biggest imagination ever! She is completely happy to play alone with her thoughts. She loves to dress up and make me have a mountain of laundry daily. If there is anything that has to do with baby dolls, princesses, Barbie, or anything girly in general she is all over it! She's almost always a very happy child (in my eyes), and has a lot of spunk. Although she's shy in public once you get to know her she'll talk up a storm. She has the cutest voice ever!!! One lady once told us, "I thought my son had a cute voice, but I could listen to her all day. Katie, keep talking." Even strangers tell me how cute her voice is. She says the funniest things and has the best expressions to go along with them. She doesn't like animals in general but cats are the most terrifying to her. I think it's because the neighbor's cat taunts her. She is a complete mama's girl. I am wrapped around her tiny finger and she knows it. Although she's 4 she still climbs into bed with mommy and daddy on a regular basis. Oh how I love my little Katie Bug!

Katie's favorite...

thing(s) to do: Dancing, singing, and twirling

food: poppy seed chicken, string cheese, and bread

friend: mommy... and Gracie (Knight)

color: pink, purple, blue, and red... ("Wait. My favorite, favorite, favorite color?") Pink

movie: Princess and the Frog

primary song: Scripture Power

other song: Ever Ever After by Carrie Underwood

Here are some of my favorite pictures of Katie all in random order as are my memories.

Blessing day

3rd birthday

She fell asleep with her head in my lap while I was folding laundry. I thought she would wake up once I stood up, but stayed in this position.


So cute with her lil' bum in the air.

Halloween 2009, age 2

This afternoon I could NOT get Katie to calm down. I tried everything I could think of and then passed her to Brigetta and she exhausted all her ideas. Brandon walked in the door and sniffed at Katie's head and she crashed! Brigetta and I were both stunned that all she needed was her Uncle Brandon to hold her.

At the park with the Eisley family.

2nd birthday!

Valentines Daddy-Daughter date 2011

Wyne family reunion 2010. She played constantly in that path of dirt... it was so fine it almost seemed like powder.

4th birthday! She was so excited to get her new outfit! She saw the skirt at Costco and fell in love with it! And she specifically asked for pink leggings.

Easter 2011, this is a typical outfit for Katie. She is constantly changing her clothes and putting on crazy combinations. Usually there are a minimum of 3 layers of clothing. In this picture the dress up skirt was her wedding veil.

Now for the long part... you can skip over this since I'm just putting it down for posterity... and it's not sensitive to the weak stomach crowd. I don't think I've ever written down her birth story so here it goes.

After having 2 c-sections my doctor was willing to let me try a v-back. This is almost never done and I had to go into labor completely on my own. I was overdue, but not in a hurry to have girl number three. We had just moved into an apartment about a week earlier and I was barely settling in. I went on a motorcycle ride with Brandon and got a ton of dirty looks. What? I was wearing a helmet.

My due date came and went... two days later (June 28, 2007) I was cleaning the apartment and doing our normal routine. I felt a little trickle and thought, "Did I just wet my pants?" I went to the bathroom, changed, and didn't think much of it. A little while later it happened again. I went to the bathroom for a second time and thought, "I am an adult and I just wet my pants. What is wrong with me." I went about my business. It happened again! This time I thought maybe it wasn't my bladder. I called my sister-in-law, Mindy, and asked her what it was like when her water broke at home. She replied, "It was a huge mess---Why?! Are you in labor?!" After talking for awhile I told her I didn't want to go all the way to the hospital for them to send me home. I really didn't know if I was in labor or not so I called and left a message with my nurse. Then I called Andy to give him a heads-up on what was going on. He told me to call Emily who used to be a labor and delivery nurse. So I called my sister-in-law, Emily, and asked her if it had to be a big mess when your water breaks. She said, "No. It can be just a trickle, but you'll feel a little trickle ever time you have a contraction. Are you having contractions?" (Yes) "How far apart are they?" (About every 5 minutes) "Get yourself to the hospital!" I wasn't in any kind of pain whatsoever and I only had a few trickles, so I still wasn't sure if I was in labor. Emily and I talked for a few more minutes and decided that it really wasn't a big deal if I waited since my labor with Sammy was about 15 hours. (Ashley was a scheduled c-section.) I got off the phone with Emily and called Mindy back to let her know what was going on. I said, "My gut feeling is that I'm not in labor." I leaned forward and gasped, "Never mind! My water really just broke!" It was a mess that time! Mindy said she was on her way to pick me up. I changed, cleaned up the mess, packed my bag (I know, it seems that should have been done already), and then finished up my kitchen. Mindy walked in and said, "What are you doing?!" I kind of laughed because I knew it would be a long time waiting and I still was not in any pain.

We texted Andy 911 for his cue to meet us at the hospital. We loaded up the girls and we were off! Sure enough, just like Emily said, every time I had a contraction another trickle followed. I was so embarrassed! Beside the fact that I forgot a towel and I continued to make a mess in Mindy's car the only clean outfit I had that actually fit my whale of a body was khaki pants and bright blue underwear. Yep! It definitely was visible to everyone by the time we reached the hospital. Mindy laughed and said, "I don't think they're going to send you home."

Andy and I walked to the maternity floor and the lady at the desk said, "Are you sure your water broke?" If there wasn't a desk between us I would have kicked her in the shin. Of course my water broke!!! Everyone I walked by could see that my water broke! They admitted me, started my IV and we were on our way. My doctor came in to see how I was doing and said, "Things are going well but if anything goes wrong I'll go right in and get her out." Andy and I tried to pass the time by talking about baby names. We wanted the middle name to be Emma, but were undecided on a first name. He had his heart set on Riley, and i kind of liked Maddison. Later Andy said, "What do you think of Katlyn? And call her Katie for short." We had a small list and decided to look at her first and see what she looked like.

About 6:30 pm they started my epidural. Things were progressing but very slowly. The nurses would come in and check my cervix occasionally and then about 11:00 things started to turn for the worst. The nurse showed me my bag of urine and it looked like blood. My blood pressure was low, the baby's heart rate was dropping, my epidural wore off, and I was on oxygen. The nurses kept a close eye on me and stayed in touch with my doctor who was delivering other babies. They upped my epidural and decided to monitor me for a little while longer. My epidural wore off again and I was in pain. I was crying mostly because I really didn't want another c-section. I asked Andy to give me a blessing to help calm my nerves. The nurses came back in and found that my cervix was starting to close. At that point with everything else that was going on my doctor pulled the plug on a v-back. He said that it was too dangerous to wait any longer.

They had me move from the bed to the gurney then to the operating table. I was crying at that point because I was having hard contractions on top of each other and then it took a few more minutes for the epidural to start working again. My doctor stayed right beside me and held my hand till Andy was allowed in the operating room. I was freaked out and crying hysterically. The meds were working and they started to cut. My doctor said, "Alanya, is there something that happened that I should know about?" I was confused as to why he would ask that but I replied, "Well, my daughter fell on my stomach after my last c-section." He said, "Did she jump off a building?" I was more confused and it seemed it took forever for them to get the baby out. Once she was out the nurses worked quickly on her and found she was healthy and had all her fingers and toes. At some point my epidural wore off for a third time... but this one was during surgery! I was in the most pain I've ever been in! They were going to knock me out but didn't want to put a breathing tube in. So they quickly upped my meds and tried to hurry. The nurses took the baby out and said, "Okay, daddy will meet you in recovery." I was scared because they never make him leave before me, and I didn't want to be "alone". As soon as Andy left I heard my doctor say, "She's bleeding out! We've got to hurry!" It was almost like those TV shows ER or Grey's Anatomy when there is a true emergency. I'm sure the tears were like a river at that point. 2 and a half hours passed and they finally finished the surgery.

I was wheeled out to recovery where Andy was waiting with the baby. The nurse monitored me and never left my bedside. When the doctor came in he said, "That went better than we expected. That was one of the worst c-sections I've ever done... and I've done a lot. Your uterus was adhered to your stomach muscles and your bladder. I couldn't tell where one organ ended and the next one began." It all made sense at that point and he continued to tell us that I hemorrhaged and they were pretty scared at that point they were going to lose me. I am so grateful I had an amazing doctor who stayed calm and did his job even in difficult circumstances. (Later Andy told me that my uterus looked mangled.)

Andy and I looked at our beautiful little baby girl we were just blessed with. We looked at each other and said in sync, "She is not a Maddison." That narrowed it to Riley or Katlyn. We called my mom and Mindy who both requested us to call no matter the hour and let them know she was born at 3:17 am, weighing in at 7 lbs. 13 oz.! My mom laughed out loud because she asked me earlier what I thought she would weigh and I said, "She has to be 7-13 because Sammy was 7-11 and Ashley was 7-12. It would just make it easier to remember." I totally called it!!!

By about 7 am we were able to go to our room. Dr. Hodges came in to see how I was doing. I told him that after my last baby my recovery was so painful they ended up putting me on morphine. I asked if I could just request that now. He said, "Oh, honey, we are putting you on something much, much stronger than morphine. You are going to be in a lot of pain." Whether it was the meds, the lack of sleep, or tons of crying, I was wiped out and I crashed hard!

Mindy called for the details and I remember crying... again... on the phone. My emotions were so out of whack and I couldn't stop. She ended up coming later that day with Sammy and Ashley. She took a few pictures and got the word out to the rest of the family the details and that we decided on Katlyn Emma, but didn't know the spelling at the time. Other phone calls came in and I was still so tired I mostly had Andy talk. I even fell asleep while on the phone with my sister-in-law. We told my mom and Brigetta that they could come to the hospital but I wasn't ready to see anyone else.

The recovery was extremely painful and I mostly wanted to either sleep or sit in the shower, but getting back and forth was quite the challenge even with it being my 3rd c-section. I had nearly 30 staples and my insission was from hip to hip. And of course I couldn't just recover normal. I was running a fever and I was on an IV longer than the other 2. So they watched me closely and kept me meds coming. My fever finally went down and we were able to take our baby home July 2nd, but didn't actually walk in the door till after midnight on the 3rd.

It took about 12 weeks for me to completely recover and it was very painful... but I would do it all over again for my little Katie Bug! I love her so much and I couldn't imagine my life without her. She is such a joy to me and I absolutely love being with her. I love you with all my heart Katlyn!!!