"Weeping may tarry for the night,

but JOY comes with the morning.” Psalm 30:5b

and she did…she really did.

Rylie Joy came in the morning after a hard night of induced labor. Our God was not mincing words when he said your greatest joy shall bring your greatest pain in Genesis. I will spend a lifetime trying to understand why something so wonderful is at the same time so incredibly difficult. If it brings me one step close to understanding His love for me, then He has won.

Hello, buenos dias, and good morning to all of you. My boys have been taking care of the blog site in fine fashion, I see (though we could discuss picture selection. To their credit, I didn’t give them much to work with- there are no “naturally beautiful post-delivery glowing mom” shots in our folder). I have been literally lying low due to a reaction to my c-section anesthesia…a lovely spinal migrane that prevents me from sitting upright or moving my neck. It is slowly getting better, but I feel like I have lost so much time. Fortunately, my parents were here until early Sunday morning and were a tremendous help and blessing for the 2 (dad)/ 1 (mom) week they stayed. In a mother/daughter world-record, we argued only once and it was during labor, so I don’t think that legally counts. Curt and Dad became fast friends taking care of the 2- and quickly 3- women in their lives who needed attention and love and support and, most importantly, food.

Having them here for so long makes me think that children should be born to 4 people. This allows 2 people to be on “break” fixing cars, grocery shopping, hunting, making dinner, sleeping, etc. while the other 2 are dressing, feeding, walking, and otherwise dealing with Baby. No one is ever alone. Why has no one brought this up before?

To all of you who called, visited (some, the wrong hospital- thank you), didn’t call out of politeness, found out through the grapevine because we couldn’t call people fast enough and then just gave up, and sent food- thank you. We are figuring out life. NOTHING is like the books…and it is taking me a bit to realize everything is ok. She doesn’t eat like the books describe. My delivery wasn’t anything like what they said in the books. She doesn’t poop like in the books. My recovery wasn’t mentioned, and the nurse coming in at 3am was also not mentioned. I say this only to bring some sort of relief to Janna and Jess and Sunday and Natalie…if it doesn’t go exactly how the nurses and books describe, you’re not doing anything wrong. I cried all the way home from the hospital because my nurse was so incredibly reluctant to let me go. Ry wasn’t eating “normally” and I didn’t have sufficient answers for everything…and half way home I thought perhaps we’d made the biggest mistake ever by leaving the safety of monitors and 24-hour medical help and mesh undies. But the thing is- you just know when you’re ok. And I think we’re ok. We’ew not textbook, but we’re ok. And I know where to go if that changes.

So, we’re home. I tried to bring the catheter and Nurse Carolyn home with me, but they made me leave them at the door. Man, it was nice to have 2 days of no going to the bathroom every 5 minutes. They explained I could have one at home if I empty it as well…and, well, I’m just not willing.

Meg– you won the Birthday Bet by a long shot, so come by anytime (no driving for me for awhile) and claim a Beanie. The rest of you are also welcome- the Shoebox is open. I can’t promise anything exciting, but we do have tons of venison jerky to snack on (thanks, Pap) and we can just sit around and stare at Rylie all day.

She’s ready for her BFF Rylie Jayne Carr to be born…bring it on, Jess.