Life Is Not Fair

So I've been really down the last few days. It has become so real that in just a few days I'll be leaving my baby behind and heading back to work. I am so sad, because I love being with him and being there to witness all of his firsts! It makes me cry to think that I'll miss too much and it's just not fair that mothers are made to make sacrifices like this. I mean we carry them for 9 months, always feel them move, protect them for 9 months, we give birth to them, and then we are expected to go back to work. It just stinks and it's not fair!

Then to top it off, work was going great. Love my boss, love the people I work with, and then 2 days before I went on Maternity Leave I was told I have to be in Chatsworth, GA. Talk about torturing a brand new mom. It's already hard enough that I have to go back to work, but to know that I'll spend almost 2 hours in the car every single day is the worst thing ever! Those are 2 hours that I could be spending with the most precious baby ever, but instead I'll be in a terrible place that has NOTHING there. Yes, I am very thankful that I have a job in these tough economic times, but I always get the crap end of the deal. This sucks!

Travis, sorry, had to be cheesy

So, I'm going to go ahead and apologize for being cheesy, but this has to be said. Travis has been incredible. He's the best and most loving dad and husband. He has taken such great care of me while I recovered. He would call my mom and made sure she was there with me, call to check on us, work from home some days, etc.

I know, without a doubt, that I wouldn't have recovered and been mentally prepared on a daily basis to be a mom if it wasn't for him. He helped from the time I got pregnant and still helping. He's made being a mom as easy as it possibly could be just by being there and loving us.

I never thought I could possibly love him more than I did until I had Jonathan and saw him with the baby. It was truly amazing. He's the best and most loving dad I have ever seen. He adores his son and that makes me the happiest woman on earth.

I love you Travis. Thanks for being such a wonderful husband and father.

Truly Blessed

God blessed us with incredible family and friends. My mom and Aunt were incredible during the birth. My Aunt talked me through it when I was crying too hard to focus and my mom didn't leave my side once after the baby was born. Those are things I will never forget. Travis was incredible too. He wouldn't leave my side until I made him go over to our son and check on him.

At the hospital, we had so many friends bring us meals. It was incredible. Then when we got home, we didn't cook for two weeks. Either someone brought us meals or my parents cooked for us. We wouldn't have made it without the help and support of everyone. Our friends, parents, and family made it easier for us to adjust and helped me recover without feeling rushed.

I want to also thank my incredible sister-in-law for all of her help and for loving Jonathan so much. She came over on her days off to help and hang out with us. Made me feel so special that she spent her days off with us. We love you Ashley!

We love everyone and feel so loved by our friends and family. We are so lucky!

The Birth

I feel terrible that I haven't updated our blog since our last baby shower, but we've been super busy. I'll update the blog now by telling about the birth of our beautiful baby boy.

On March 16, 2010, I spent the day at home with my mom, aunt, and Travis. My mom and I laughed a ton with my aunt while Travis tried to sleep. He didn't get much sleep the days prior from being nervous and anxious, I suppose. We met my dad at Provino's and all had a wonderful dinner together. Afterwards, Travis and I went back home and watched American Idol. We had to be at the hospital at 10:00 p.m., but I wasn't going to miss my American Idol, so we planned to be late. LOL! At around 9:15, I finally got nervous. I told Travis I was going to go in our bedroom by myself to get a grip on things. He didn't know what to think. LOL! After American Idol, we headed to the hospital. I didn't have time to get too nervous at that point since I was being induced and having all the IVs and such attached. They expected me to get some sleep. Yeah right! The anxiety was on high. Travis laid on the couch and I had to sleep on that awful bed. It's worse than sleeping on concrete.

The next day was crazy. I was doing great coping with the pain and got an epidural at about 5 cm. The guy comes in to put the epidural in. While he's injecting me he is singing. I was like, "Dude, stop singing and focus on what you are doing." I didn't say anything to him though. Two hours later the epidural had worn off. He sent in a young nurse to re-dose me. Well, guess what? It wore off AGAIN!!!! I told the nurse in a nervous tone, "I'm holding this baby in. He's coming out." She kept telling me that I should feel pressure, but not be in pain. I was like I feel it ALL. She checked me and sure enough I was 10 cm. I had to wait for my doctor and my dad to get in there. Crazy!!!!! When they get in there, I tell her I'm in pain and I feel it all. She tells me that I should feel pressure, but not pain. At this point, I start waving my legs in the air saying should I be able to do this, because I could get up and walk right now. Her face was priceless. Her and my dad said it was too late to re-dose me. I could have killed someone. Outside, we had Misa yelling, "Come on P, you can do it. Woohoo!" If I hadn't been in so much pain I would have laughed hysterically.

At this point, I had no choice but to have the baby. Travis and my dad were to my left. A nurse was to my right and my mom, Titi Laly, Debbie, and Ashley (thanks for taking all the pictures) were to my right as well. Travis was super sweet telling me I could do this, but my dad knew he had to push my buttons. He knew he had to make me so mad to push him out extra fast. He kept telling me that the pain was in my head and that this was no big deal, etc. I cried the whole time. I didn't cuss, I just cried. I know I know. Most people can't believe that I didn't say any bad words! Then my dad said something that really made me mad. I finally had to say something crazy. I said, "Dude, I'm going to cut yours off and sew it back on and then you tell me if it's in your head and not painful." The nurses lost it. Not my proudest moment. If it wasn't for my dad knowing to make me mad, I would have never had him as fast as I did. After I said that, my dad said 1 more set of pushes and you are done. Dr. Todd looked at him like why on earth would you tell her that, that won't happen. Well, I pushed so hard that sure enough I had him. I pushed less than 20 minutes. Jonathan Henry Schievelhud was born at 3:44 p.m on March 17, 2010.

He didn't cry at first so I was super nervous. He was the most beautiful baby I had ever seen. We had so many people outside waiting to meet him. We were so blessed to have great family there with us, great doctors and nurses in the room with us, and so loved by all.

I'm still not sure I'll ever do this again!

Shower Extravaganza

This past Saturday, we had our fourth shower. It was at Misa Ankar's beautiful house. Thanks Misa, for allowing all of us to come over and celebrate. That was very nice and generous of you. The hostesses were Amanda Grant, Jennifer Ramsey, Megan Knoblich, and Misa Ankar. Everything was beautiful! Jennifer had asked me for some favorite outfits that we've gotten and she used them to decorate the house. She hung up his name that she had made to match his room which was way too cute. The girls had flowers everywhere and a huge spread of food. It was unbelievable. Amanda made a homemade potato soup with toppings you could choose and put on top. It was delicious. She also made thumb print cookies that were not only beautiful but delicious. Jennifer made beautiful mini cupcakes. One was blueberry lemon and even had a blueberry and lemon zest decoration. The other was chocolate. Too good. Megan made my favorite fruit dip that I loved with the best fruit ever. Then there were all sorts of other goodies. Misa had us playing games and she was such a teacher. Cracked us all up. Everyone had an amazing time.

We were literally showered with love. I am truly blessed with such wonderful girl friends. We had an amazing time and it couldn't have been better. We got incredible gifts. Jonathan is one lucky baby, that's for sure!

Cindy Grant, Amanda's mother-in-law, brought my mom and Debbie a gift for being grandmothers. It was the sweetest thing ever and they both felt so special. A special thanks to her for making them feel special, because there is nothing more special than being a grandmother. I know my grandmother was one of the most important people in my life. I know Jonathan will think the same about my mom and Debbie as well.

Amanda, Jennifer, Megan, and Misa I love you guys so much. You guys are the best friends a girl could ever ask for. Everything was beautiful and I felt so special. Travis thought everything was amazing. You guys know he said he was going to "take pictures," but in all reality he just wanted to eat. LOL! We both appreciate all of the hard work, time, and effort that was put into making this such a special day for us.

We love you all!

Diaper Wreath that Amanda made. Too Cute!Meg serving the super cute Blue punch they made.

Some of the gifts. It was outrageous! Travis was worried at this point as to where we would put everything. LOL!


The sign Jennifer made

The Hostesses! Arianna is the cutest ;)

My Mom, LD, and I.

Mommies to be: Me and Yasmine

Work Family

I think the most important thing to have in a job is a family at work. What I mean by that is, you should love the people you work with, because you spend more time at work a week than you do at home, so working in a place you love is crucial to your job and how hard you work while you are there. You never want to let your family down, so if you think of your work as another family, I believe you will work harder and be more happy as well.

With that said, I can honestly say that I have an incredible family at work. I couldn't have asked for a more supportive, loving, and fun family to be with and work with every single day. It is a joy coming into work everyday and that's an awesome feeling to have.

My work family hosted an incredible baby shower on February 12, 2010. It was comical, because it hardly ever snows here. The shower was set to be from 3-5. With the amount of snow falling, they changed it to 1:30. Poor Teresa, the hostess, was so stressed out because she wanted everything to be perfect. She did the most amazing job. Everything was beautiful. She had her sister make an amazing and absolutely delicious cake. She made a punch that was blue and delicious.

Well, we ate, had an amazing time and then Kevin, my boss, sat us down to open gifts. Kevin, being an incredibly efficient person, set it up to be like an assembly line. Well, my logistics husband loved it! We even had a cart to take everything to the car. Let's just talk about how overwhelmed I was. I did cry at this shower (thanks to Deborah). Everyone was so loving. I was shocked and couldn't believe it.

My favorite store in Dalton is the Cherry Tree. According to Travis, I keep them in business. They are so nice and they do all sorts of personalized gifts. To me, personalized gifts mean more especially at my age because we don't really need anything anymore. Needless to say, so many people got us gifts from there, gift cards, and even the diaper bag that I had put on hold that same day at lunch was given to me. We couldn't have asked for a better shower. It was super fun, we laughed a lot, and everyone was so sweet and wonderful. We are so blessed. God definitely pushed me to make a move in jobs from US Xpress to Shaw and it was the best push that could have been given to me.

Thank you guys so much for making our shower so special. A special thanks to Teresa for doing everything for it and making everything so beautiful with extra special touches. We love you! Another Thanks to Melissa for writing everything down for us. Huge help. Thanks to Kevin, Dennis, Andrew, and Jacob for taking pictures, helping Teresa set everything up, organizing everyone to come enjoy with us, and for taking the gifts down to the car.

My Kalencom diaper bag

An Abundance of Love

On February 7, 2010, we had a shower hosted by Debbie Chadwick (my Mother-in-law), Ashley Ivey (the best sister-in-law), Melinda "Mimi" Ivey (Ashley's Mother-in-law), and Kathy Hubbuch (one of Debbie's best friends.) The shower was at Debbie and Phil's home. Everything was decorated so beautifully. When we walked in and saw all of their hard work, it was hard not to cry. You see how much people love us and care about us and it is just so overwhelming.

Ashley and her friend Katie, made a beautiful diaper cake. It was their first diaper cake to make and it came out perfect. They are truly professionals. The cake was from Piece a Cake Bakery and it was as delicious as it was cute. They also had some baby cookies made that were the favors for the shower. I swear there wasn't one detail missing. The food was outstanding. Everything was delicious.

We had friends and family there to be with us. Travis was with Phil upstairs up until we opened presents. As you all know, Travis can't miss that. LOL! For him, it was Christmas. He has been so excited about this baby coming and all of the great things we've gotten for him. At this shower, we were showered with love for Jonathan. We got so many great things and as we opened them, we made mental notes to learn how to use it all. LOL! It was incredible how many beautiful and wonderful things we got. Jonathan will not go without, that's for sure.

Again, we want to say thank you to the 4 ladies that made this shower beautiful, special, and a huge success. We love you guys!!!

Me and Ashley

Another thanks to Jennifer. Thank you for writing everything down and learning with us what everything is. We love you!