Visitors!

Norah has had some recent visitors in Wheeling before we left for Cleveland.

Two of my close friends from Pittsburgh came to visit the day after my birthday which was very much needed. Joshua and I had an all-nighter with Norah the night before and she had not been feeding very well, so she had pretty much been crying all day and could not be consoled by the time they arrived. It was helpful to be able to hand her off so that we could have a break. As soon as our friend Allie held her she was quite. That's when I let my guard down and cried because, well, it is just a little stressful at times when you can't figure out how to help your new baby. It's great to have friends and family help out when you are so tired and can't think of one more creative way to settle your new one.


We enjoyed lunch and conversation with Allie and Erin and we got to meet Lucy, Erin's second little girl who was born one month before Norah. It was so nice to be with my friends. I wish I had been a little more putt together and not so emotional, but that's what they were there for, was to meet Norah and support Josh and I, which is exactly what they did!

This next picture is of one of our students "Chevy." We met Chevy on our New Orleans trip last year. (Chevy is her nickname.) Chevy and I became almost instant friends once we really got to see how goofy each of us was. She is a ton of fun and I'm so glad she got to come and meet Norah because unfortunately Chevy is leave WJU and will be joining the Air Force this coming April. We will miss Chevy very much!


We are now in Cleveland, so I will try to post some more pictures from here soon! We are enjoying the down time. Norah has her crib set up here too, so I will get some pictures up of that as well.

Week One!

Norah is one week old today! She had her first pediatric appointment today and everything looks great! We have been pretty tired lately and not been able to blog or e-mail out pictures alot, but I thought I would take a few minutes to share some of my favorite photos from the week at home.

This first picture is of Norah in the hospital sleeping under the blue light because she had jaundice. We loved these little black foam glasses she had to wear and thought she looked like a little superhero! We figure this is how they make superheros, they give them these glasses and bake them for awhile after they are born!

This is Norah on her trip home from the hospital. Her clothes are a little big, but so cute! She is just too sweet!

This is one of my favorites! She likes to have her hands next to her face alot. She had her hands up around her face in her sonograms too!

This is two of Norah's cousins that came to meet her. Ellie is on the left and Cora on the right.

These are my grandparents McCowin with their three great grandchildren! They love being great grandparents!

When we got home from the hospital some guys from our dorm made this welcome home sign! We loved it!

These are the women from my family that came to visit. (L-R) My mom and she is holding Ellie, my Aunt Linda, my grandma, Cora being held by my sister-in-law Heather and me. And Norah of course!

This is one of our first family pictures!

This is one of my favorite moments in the day, which happens several times each day. When she is ready to feed I put her up on my shoulder to get situated for feeding and she starts to make out with my neck, then cheek and then nose! It tickles so much and is the best feeling. She is so sweet!!!


This is just a cute one!

Joshua's brothers all came to visit too and Marisa our sister-in-law! We loved having them! (L-R) Jim, Tim, Jeremy, Joshua and Norah (front and center)

Uncle Jim drove from Virginia so he stayed with us for two nights. He and Joshua played lots of XBOX and Norah played too! I loved this picture of her little bum!

So there they are, I hope you enjoyed the pictures. More to come for sure.

Norah is Born!

Hey, this is Joshua posting for Rach. No time to write a full post, but you can go here to see pictures of Norah and the delivery if you want to.

Trying to Induce Labor

Well, we've tried almost everything we can think of to induce labor, and nothing has worked. So, we decided we would try to guilt Norah into coming out. We figured if we baked her a birthday cake, she would HAVE to be born. So, we baked her a delicious chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and wrote "Happy Birthday Norah!" in home-made vanilla frosting. The cake was very delicious, and... ultimately ineffective (so far at least). So, even with an honest to goodness birthday cake, Norah's still not born. Ugh. Tuesday it is.

Here's the cake!

Norah didn't seem to be motivated by the guilt, but we ate the cake anyway. (We went to our friend Katie's house and ate while we decorated her Christmas tree.) Now... all we need is for Norah to actually be born.

P.S. Our apologies to Uncle Tim for Norah not being born on his birthday. Maybe next time.

Christmas in Wheeling

This is our real Christmas tree that we put up the day after Thanksgiving! I love having a real tree in our apartment!!! We knew we needed to do it soon one because Norah would be here soon and we would not have the time or energy after her arrival and two because we leave for our Christmas break on December 15th or 16th, so we need to get as much Christmas in in Wheeling as we can!

We rearranged (Josh did, not me) the apartment to make room for the tree and to make room for Grandma Elek's rocking chair in the bedroom. That's why Grandma B's (Josh's grandma) davenport is in the living room now, but it is only out in the living room under one condition and this is a condition that Grandma B set up many years ago, "No eating on the davenport!"

I also took a picture of Norah's corner in our bedroom so that those of you who may not be able to make it to Wheeling to see her can see her "crib."

We hope to visit with lots of people over the holidays while we are at our families houses. Feel free to stop by and visit us and meet Norah!

By the way, I will be induced on December 4th if I don't go naturally before then. I am getting a little anxious now that we are a week away from life drastically changing.

Happy Thanksgiving!

My family came to Wheeling to share Thanksgiving dinner with us since we are unable to travel 6 days from our due date!!

It was really nice to have everyone hear. It was my grandparents, my parents, my brother, sister-in-law, two nieces and cousins.

Josh made his first turkey and homemade stuffing!! It was really good! I decorated the table as you can see below...

Here we all are at the table in the lounge across the hall from our apartment! Who would have thought we could pull off Thanksgiving dinner for 12 in a college resident hall!

These are my grandparents with my two nieces Ellie on the right and Cora on the left. Ellie is 6 months old and needed glasses, so Cora wanted a pair too. I happened to own 2 pair of fake glasses so i wrapped a pair up for her when she came! She loved them!

I hope everyone had as great of a day as we did! Now the wait really begins as I do not really have anything major to do, so Norah can come any day now!!

Spaghetti Sauce

So here I am 8 days from my due date! I'm feeling pretty good for the most part, but I am having a little bit of lower back pain, and this is really the second day that I have had any, so I'm not complaining.

Josh came home from work tonight and started figuring out what to make for dinner. Now in case you are not aware, I am the number 1 pickiest eater in the United States of America and if there is one thing that I am the most picky about it would have to be spaghetti sauce.

He offered to make some homemade sauce because he knows that's really the only acceptable option for me. Since my back has been hurting we decided to eat in the living room where I could keep my feet propped up and sit in a more comfortable seat. He prepared the plates and drinks and carried the plates out to me first. He handed me my plate and then handed me his and I put his on the end table next to me. He turned to get the drinks and a grated cheese. I quickly assessed our plates and realized that my plate had more spaghetti on it and I knew I probably would not be able to eat it all. I quick scanned to the kitchen to see if he could see me and quickly switched our plates. The reason I didn't want him to see me switch the plates was because I have a million and 1 quirks that he is learning to live with, so I try to spare him the moments to observe that there may be more that he is unaware of!

So we eat our dinner and he turns to me and says,

J: What did you think of the sauce?

R: I liked it but I thought it was a little spicy.

J: (mouth drops) It was a sweeter sauce though and my secret ingredient was grape jelly.

R: Really! Grape Jelly! Well that's weird, because honestly the sauce has a kick to it.

J: I did not put any spices in it! Not even black pepper! Wait....(quickly darting his eyes back and forth between my plate and his)

R: (I quickly realize that I did something wrong and need to confess) Ummmm, I switched our plates!

J: Why did you do that!!! I put alot of red pepper flakes on my sauce! I was wondering why mine was not that spicy!

R: Well, it looks like Norah's coming tonight!!!

We both started laughing so hard because I'm so weird. I told him how I thought he might think it's weird if he saw me switching plates.

Below is a picture of me and how I need to eat my meals with a towel over my stomach. I can't not spill things down the front of me and spaghetti sauce is a hopeless cause when it comes to spilling!

He explained his ingredients, they were as follows: sauce, paste, garlic, salt, a tiny bit of onion and grape jelly. It all went into the blender as any type of chunk produces the gag reflex for me! :)

This is just one example of how hard he has to work to make our meals good for both of us. I usually know that there is a difference, but since I was not in the kitchen the entire time he made dinner I didn't even think that our plates would be different! The funniest part was that the whole time I was eating it I kept thinking to myself, "Why does he have to push it with these spices to get me to try new things."

Ahhhh, marriage....you never know what's going to happen!