Our Sophie girl

I don't have any hospital pictures of our little girl on my computer...but I have lots of all that happened afterwards!  January 30th, 2007 was a day full of mixed emotions.  I went in to the hospital on Sunday night about midnight on January 28th.  I was going to be induced on Monday morning and we were expecting to have a baby that day.  Well, the day went by and even though the medicine was causing intense contractions, Sophie didn't make any progress.  I guess she was comfy in there!  We tried again the next morning.  Same thing happened...lots of contractions, but no progress.  But then my water broke.  That started a chain reaction that led to Sophie's heart rate dropping, me getting pain medication that made me basically fog out, and then being rushed to have an emergency c-section.  Sophie was born very blue, having some respiratory distress, along with pneumonia, low blood pressure, and a few other things.  She had to go directly to the NICU and stayed for a week.  My recovery was very slow and I ended up staying in the hospital for a week myself.  Praise the Lord, she recovered and we were so thankful we were at a hospital that could treat her so quickly.  We are so grateful for her life!

Sophie has been such a joy.  She was a happy baby who slept well, ate well, and pretty much went with the flow.  When she was about 5 months old we took her with us to San Antonio, TX for a conference.  She did great!  We flew from Atlanta and even had a connecting flight.  She didn't even cry!

One thing we did notice about Sophie as she grew was that she wasn't crawling or walking at the time when most children her age were.  We became concerned and eventually took her to get some physical therapy.  After a few months of that, Sophie began to crawl, pull up, and by 17 months she was walking normally!  It was a hard road for her with many tears, but seeing her take those steps was wonderful! 

 Sophie's second birthday...a storybook party.

 She loves to paint, too! : )

 ~Our pretty girl~

 We're in our second year of doing some homeschooling.  This was more of a good way to have structure in our day but also a chance for us to do some fun things and learn at the same time.  Her friend, Bethany, who lives right down the street, has been doing school with us.  It has been so fun for me to be their teacher and see them learn and grow.  They are both so smart and like little sponges they have absorbed so many things! 

 Here we are on a field trip to the strawberry patch.  This is my girl...smiley and happy (most of the time) : ). 

We're so thankful for our girl!  She is smart, funny, and creative.  Life would not be the same without her!

We love you, our Sophie girl!