All Smiles!

Cassie smiles a lot while she's falling asleep, and we've caught it on camera a few times! She's even started doing a little laugh in her sleep. She smiled at my mom last week while she was awake, but we're not sure it counts as a "real" smile, since she didn't seem to know what she was doing. Anyway, usually babies don't smile for real until about 6 weeks. We'll take the "fake" smiles until then. :)
She had just come out of a big smile on this one...And here's a yawn. :)One more- eyes open.Looks like we need to take pictures of Cassie with us- all of our photos in the last few weeks have been of just her.

Sweet, sweet baby

I'm sitting here with an adorable two-week-old baby asleep on my lap and thinking about how blessed I am. Really, I had so many worries and fears about having a new baby (everyone tells you their horror stories) and so many of them have disappeared. Some things I am thankful for:

• Cassie has brought so much love into our home! I love Trevor, he loves me, we love Cassie...yesiree. :) We definitely are a happy family.
• People are so NICE. So many people have been incredibly kind and thoughtful by offering to help, visiting, bringing meals, calling, etc. You know who you are- thank you!
• I feel grrrr-eat! (think Tony the Tiger) Honestly, I was afraid healing would be long and painful...but it's been quick and pretty painless!
• Cassie is really cute. Has anyone else ever feared having an ugly baby? Anyway, I'm really glad she's so stinkin' adorable- it makes all the hard things a little easier.
• Cassie is in a pattern of sleeping for two 4-hour blocks of time at night. I haven't done anything to deserve this blessing, but I sure am grateful for it.

Here are some pictures from the last two weeks:

Here she is in her bouncy seat. The sleeper is a little too big...thanks to Jessica for bringing over a few more newborn-sized clothes!




Hmm...she already has some crazy sleeping positions! It's a little too hot to swaddle her, so sometimes we find her sleeping with her arms in strange places...













And here's what happens when I leave Trevor alone with her:Thanks, Kristy, for visiting with your adorable Kimball! It was great to have some company today.

She's Here!!

Okay, first of all, this is Trevor, not Emily. Although I thought I'd never say this, I have to admit that blogging has its place in certain situations, like when babies are born. I hope you enjoy the pictures and the videos. You probably won't see much more of my work on here, but I thought I'd save Emily some time since she's rather busy feeding the baby and trying to get some rest. I'll have her update you with her feminine touch as soon as she has a little more time. Enjoy!

This is the last pregnant picture we have of Emily.We decided to get a few self-taken pics just before leaving for the hospital late Wednesday night.

Here's Em, anxiously waiting for the medicine to kick in and do its job. She was started on Pitocin (sp?) at about 12:30 am on June 5th. She was given the epidural (sp?...obviously I haven't read up on these big words) at about 5:30. She was thinking she'd wait and have them give it to her when she couldn't stand the pain anymore. I told her it sounded courageous, but kind of pointless. She listened and was very glad. Progress was pretty slow. The doctors were thinking she'd probably have to have a C-section, but after she hit about 4 cm, things accelerated. By 3:30, it was time to start pushing. Em pushed a total of 24 times (8 contractions over about 15 minutes) before the baby was all the way out. I couldn't hardly believe she had actually been in there or that she would fit through.

This picture was taken just moments after she popped out. Here are the stats:

Weight: 9 lbs 3 oz
Length: 21 in (on her way to the WNBA, I hope)
Name: Cassidy Taja Hawkes
Background on the name:
Cassidy: we just liked the sound of it. We had narrowed it down to either Cassidy or Jenna several months ago, but Em thought that seeing her would make the decision easier. When I saw her, the name I had in mind was "Raisinette" or maybe "Lumpkin." She's looking more like Cassidy now. We actually plan to call her "Cassie," but Em thought it would be nice to have a bigger name for more formal occasions, or if she ever becomes a cowgirl.
Taja: that's my little sister's name. Emily and I have all brothers except Taja, and we really liked the name (and my sister).

Here's Cassie getting cleaned up. She started to look normal after they wiped all the stuff off of her.
This is actually the second time they weighed her. The first time, it read 9 lbs 2.5 oz, so they rounded up to 9 lbs 3 oz. This is similar to the way I get A's in school (when I get A's in school).
The new dad!

This is my favorite. Em was soooo excited to see her new baby, as you can see.
Emily was crying because she was happy, not because she was in pain or anything. She keeps insisting that she really didn't feel much pain at all the whole time and is just grateful to have had such a positive experience. We have lots more pictures and a couple of videos, but I'll just put a few random ones on here that hopefully show you what she looks like.

This is the first time I really got to see her opening her eyes much. We can't tell what color they'll be yet.
We had several visitors come and see us from both of our families. Here is Emily describing the size of Cassie's head. (She's not that far off.)
Awww, a new little family. On Friday, Emily observed, "Hey, I just realized she's already sealed to us." That was neat to think about.
No, I wasn't faking it. Labor and delivery is rough on moms and dads.
And finally, here's Cassie in her car seat, getting calmed down for the ride home. We'll keep you posted with more pics soon.