"God has shown favor"

Evan
God has shown Favor
also a Welsh derivative of "John" like the name "Shawn"

Alice
Sweet

Andy and I pretty much picked out the name Evan within a few hours of finding out she was a girl. That might seem strange since it is traditionally a boy's name, but my only association with the name was a childhood girlfriend, so to me it is a girl's name. It was pretty much only one of two names we even discussed and the other name was summarily dismissed by Andy upon my suggestion of it, so Evan it is. I finalized the decision to name her Evan when I found out what it meant, "God has shown favor." To me that is just perfect for how I feel about her. I don't know why I have been so highly favored to have such a sweet baby, but I have to express my overwhelming gratitude.

The name Alice comes from Evan's great-grandmother Howell. Grandma Howell died this last summer. I won't go into my experience completely, but I will say that at her funeral I felt very strongly that the time had come that we would finally have a baby. I found out two days later that I was pregnant. At Grandma Howell's funeral I felt so proud to be a Howell. What an amazing family and lineage that Evan now has!

Thank you Lord for showing us such sweet favor.

Introducing...Evan Alice

She's here, and what a good girl, two weeks early! She weighed in at 5lbs. and 13 oz., measuring 18 inches long. I really can't even begin to describe how overjoyed I am with such a precious daughter. Andy is over the moon. She came last wednesday and I would have posted sooner, but we are too busy just looking at her...and taking pictures of her. Here a couple of the over 200 hundred we have taken so far. Thank goodness for digital cameras!

Pregnancy meltdown

Wow, I have officially hit the emotional stage of pregnancy. I am a pretty emotinal person anyway, so I thought I would have gotten here alot sooner. I was actually beginning to think that I might skate through this whole experience without a great deal of emotinoal instability. Well, the past two weeks have proven that to have been a false hope. My oh my.

I had a baby shower the other night (thanks again Alyson and Wendy) and it was what I will remember as the official beginning of my meltdown. A few friends gave me some diapers they had leftover that their babies have now outgrown. It really hadn't hit me before that night that my baby is going to grow, really fast! Yikes. I don't think have thought much about that. That is probably a good thing because ever since I started thinking about it I have been an emotional wreck.


Then on Saturday I went to the hospital to pre-register. I know this is TMI, but on Tuesday I was dialated to 1cm and 80% effaced. Anyway, I was there just checking in and they told me, "Suprise, your doctor doesn't deliver at this hospital." What! I almost melted down right there, but I quickly became so angry that no one had bothered to tell me this, that being mad carried the day. That was atleast until today. After I talked to the nurse at my doctor's office I had a nice long sob fest. It really isn't a big deal other than feeling like I thought I knew how things were going to go down and now all of the sudden I have no idea and feel like I have no control over anything. That really stinks. I don't know exactly which doctor will be at the delivery because it is just whoever is on call that day. I asked the nurse about who I should discuss my birth plan with and she responded with "what do you mean by birth plan?" It turns out she knew exactly what I was talking about but apparently just wanted to take the opportunity to make me feel stupid. Fun stuff. S

I am feeling a little better now, but gees, no wonder pregnant get a little emotional. Hormones are going crazy, you feel like a whale, people act like your questions are stupid, and you are going to have a major change in life responsibilities in no less than 3 weeks (if I go over-due). Someone please tell me I am not going crazy. I know this is just another of life's adventures, but wow!