The Livezeys: Getting to Know Evie

We spent 4 days at Baptist Hospital since I had a c-section again. Unlike last time, we were ready to get home! (With Will, we wanted to stay there forever because everything was going so smoothly and we didn't want to return to the "real world".)

All of the grandparents were able to meet Evie the first day except for MAO. He had planned a trip to visit his parents in Florida and we never thought we'd have this baby early. Lauren came to visit that night and so did Hope and Garrett.

Gram and Gramps with Evie

Pops and Nonna with Evie

On Wednesday, Evie made her acting debut! The nurse manager came in that morning and asked if we would be interested in being in a promotional video. Baptist is in the process of changing their name to St. Thomas Midtown and they were making a video about "One Healing Community". I thought they were just going to video Evie, but they said I would have a line to say. I was all for it as long as I had time to take a shower first. Our acting career only lasted about 10 minutes, but we had fun! Check out the video at https://vimeo.com/75501244 and password is "mvp". It is about 6 minutes long, but we are right after about 1:30.

We finally got to see Will on Wednesday and it was a wonderful reunion. We hadn't seen him since I put him to bed Monday night. We didn't even get to say goodbye to him before we went to the hospital. I didn't want him to come until I was unhooked from IV's and stuff - he knows what those are all about and I didn't want to scare him. Gram and Gramps brought him to the hospital and JT was standing in the hallway as they came in. Will RAN and jumped into JT's arms. (Gram started crying because it was so sweet!) I met them out in the hallway and we walked around with Will for a minute while Gram and Gramps stayed with Evie.

Then we let him come in and meet his little sister. He did really well! He was distracted by all of the "big brother presents" that I was bribing him with, but he did look her over and even gave her a kiss. He earned himself a great big sticker!

Uncle Jon came to the hospital to meet Evie.

NeeNee came back to visit on Thursday during her lunch hour. Will ended up coming back up on Thursday for a few minutes with Hope and KiKi. He probably thought JT and I moved there without him and now he and Maggie were on their own at the house with a rotating crew of favorite people to babysit them! The Ellers came to visit Thursday evening and Maddy enjoyed holding "baby Evie".

Most of the hospital stay was uneventful. She passed her hearing screening. We got some good rest and just hung out with Evie. She stayed in the room with us all day and night except for an hour in the mornings when the pediatrician came by. There was no option to send her to the nursery at night like there was with Will, but she slept well so it wasn't a big deal since I felt like I knew what I was doing. I would have panicked if it had been like that with Will! She nursed well and cuddled a lot. JT and Evie even took a few naps together on his little couch bed.

She seems so little. We call her "Lil' Bit" or "Bit".

She has a little grip and likes to hang on to my shirt.

She grunts and squeaks.

She has the chubbiest cheeks I've ever seen. JT calls her "Cheeks".

We knew we would get to go home Friday and we were so ready! JT had our bags packed by 8:00 A.M. I'm sure the nurse was annoyed with us because we weren't being very patient. We were finally headed home at 11:00. We couldn't wait to get home and finally have our little family all together!

Since we've been home, Evie finally got to meet MAO.