Welcome Home

I know its been a while since I've had a chance to post something, so I thought I'd better get something up before I went to bed. We were finally able to leave the hospital this morning at 11:45. It seemed like it took an eternity because I was ready to go about 7AM. I took all the stuff out to the car and then...waited. For those of you who are interested, here is a rundown of how things went:

Erica was induced on Thursday at about 1PM. I thought she was pretty situated so I left her to get a couple more things from the car and call her Mom who was on her way from OH. When I came back, she was already starting to experience some major contractions. She was in a lot of pain for about an hour or so and then she had the epidural. Let me just say that drugs are GREAT. Her pain went away almost immediately. Jared and Charisse, Vivian, and her mom and I just sat around visiting with her and eating Subway when the Dr came in and checked her and informed us that she was ready to go (7:30). As you can see from the picture, this was the result at 8:38PM. My parents came up but were only able to see her just a little that night. They were able to see her a little before they left on Friday, though. Perry came up on Friday evening and was able to see her a bit today before he left around 4. Her mom will be around until Saturday of next week.

We are thankful to God for being so gracious to us in giving us a healthy girl and an uneventful delivery (I guess thats easy for me to say). He really has blessed us and we just want to thank Him for the good gifts He gives. Thanks also to those of you who prayed. I'll try to get some video up in the near future (but not of the birth don't worry!)

hangin' out with stella

8:38 7lb 2oz 20in

in the d

so far so good!

This is it!

Just wanted to let everyone know that it is 11AM and we are on our way to the hospital. Please check in here for updates-I will be leaving audio messages on the blog as often as possible. Please pray that God would bless us with a healthy delivery if He so wills.

More Nursery

For those of you who would like to get an idea of what the nursery looks like now that its finished,


click here

We are the Champions (my friends and I)

I went to Ford Field, home of the Detroit Lions, today at lunch with some guys from work. Ford was having a partner recognition day for their suppliers. I took these pics with my handy iPAQ rx3715. They are of course horrible. Enjoy! We found the only remaining Truth About Trucks display in North America that has a working DVD player.
An intimidating front line if I've ever seen one.

This picture is an unsuccessful attempt at capturing the majesty of the Ford field logo. Pittsley is standing in the foreground. For those of you with 20/20, this is what its like to have 20/80 vision and misplaced glasses.
A shot of the locker room...each player has his own personal chair!
Jason Elwartowski giving a press conference in the spot normally reserved for Steve Mariucci our coach.
This is what it is like to come out of the tunnel to the applause and cheers of adoring fans.
Joey Harrington (jared) on left and Charles Rogers (me) on the right. We are discussing a scintillating play bound to gain at least 3 yards.

Nursery...In Progress

As you all well know, no child is ready to be born until his/her parents have exhausted every possible reserve of energy prior to the birth by "fixing up" the nursery. As you may also know, "fixing up" may involve quite a bit more than the phrase implies including things like removing doors, refinishing floors, repainting walls, refinishing furniture, stenciling walls, etc. But when its all said and done, I guess the end product is worth it to the parents if not to the baby who will not be able to even see more than vague blurs of our toil for the first several months.

Here are two pictures of the nursery as we have it so far-again, my digital camera does not take high-res pictures so these are somewhat grainy. The one on top is a picture of the wall with the stenciling. Erica traced the outline yesterday with an overhead projector and I started painting it last night while she was attending someone else's baby shower. I thought it was odd that she had purchased both red and black stenciling paint but started the task with black since that was what we had agreed on, right? When she arrived home, I proudly showed her the wall and she replied that it was nice but the wrong color. Fortunately I had not gotten too far into it-anyway, she had it finished by the time I came home from work today. The changing table is on the left as is an old dresser that we refinished. We bought the crib from the Haney's (he is the youth pastor at ICBC).

This picture is the opposite side of the room. Erica got the idea to remove the closet door to save space (when it swings) and to put up a curtain instead. I installed the shelves at the lower part of the closet using some old pieces of closet maid stuff we found in the house when we bought it. So thats where things stand right now. Mom and Dad have been furiously working on roller shades which we will put up when they arrive. In the meantime, we will be installing the curtains either tonight or tomorrow.

So if you have any other suggestions of what could be done to the room, please don't post them because we are tired!

A game for you...

One picture was taken at 4 months; the other was taken tonight. We're putting this up as a fun game to see if anyone notices what the difference is. Let us know if you think you have the right answer!

Erica went to the doctor today and was informed that everything was exactly the same as last week. She is 1 cm dilated and 70% effaced (I actually know what those things mean, too). She could still have her any day now. The nursery is almost done-we just have to finish a few of the finishing touches. Jared Compton helped me hang some shelves in the closet this evening. Erica's bag is packed and ready and I have the car seat in the car. (Can you tell this is the first time for us?)

One more thing, there may be some confusion about how to comment so let me clear that up (i.e. I don't know if anyone has even looked at this thing yet). Below each post, you will see the word "comments" and a number next to it. If you click on "comments" it will take you to a screen where you can post something if you'd like. Ok, more tomorrow...

The Very First Post!

I know most of you have already seen this picture, but I just wanted to show you what each entry will look like. I will try to keep this updated with pictures and news of all things Stella (and maybe a little bit of other stuff too) so that everyone can keep as up to date as they'd like. You can post comments below each entry such as, "Wow, I think that is the cutest baby I've ever seen!" or suggestions, or whatever you want.