I forgot my camera!

Oh, I'm such a bad aunt! I forgot the camera when I went to visit Jill. I did remember the flowers, and balloons, and all my kids and my husband, but I forgot the camera. We took quite a few pictures with Jill's camera, but I won't have those pictures for probably several days.

Anyway, the baby is beautiful. And he's so good and seemingly content (at least for the first 16 hours of his life). We were there for about an hour and a half and little John was awake the entire time. He was just looking around and really interested in who was holding him and listening to their voice. He is SO handsome.

Jill went in at about 2 am Monday morning, and wasn't even completely convinced she was in labor. Her contractions were a big irregular, and not all that bad. She said every once in a while she would have a pretty bad one. Anyway, when they got to the hospital she was already dialated to 7, and she had the baby a bit before 4 am. She says it was a pretty easy delivery, even though he is her biggest baby yet.

It was pretty surprising to everyone because Jill's original due date was not till Wednesday, May 21st. This is her fourth child and she has never been early. I guess at around 20 weeks, after Jill's ultrasound, her doctor moved her due date to May 19th, but Jill was so convinced she would be late that just never told anyone the date had been changed. I was over at Jill's last Saturday and she had just had an appointment and her doctor who told her she would be late because nothing was begining to happen yet. So everyone was pretty surprised.

Holding John was a little hard on me. Not too bad, because I am so happy for my sister, but hard because he reminds me I don't have a baby to hold. We also were really looking forward to all the fun the three cousins would have together growing up, my Vincent, Jill's boy John, and Kat's boy Cruz. I was anxious to meet John and hold him because he has the freshest memory of my Vincent. Even though he can't talk and tell me all about Vincent and how much he loves me, I could sense it when John would stare contently into my eyes.

There was one point when I was holding him that he suddenly and very intently started to stare off into the air. If you've ever held a fresh newborn you know what I'm talking about. It's almost like they see something that we can't. It's such a focused stare that it always makes me turn and look to see if something is there, and there is always nothing. I have always thought that as new babies the veil that seperates this world from the next is still very thin and when a baby stares off into nothingness like that there really is a spirit they recognize there, we just can't see it. Anyway, John did this while I was holding him and immediately I felt like he must be seeing Vincent. I mean, surely Vincent was there, at least for a moment. I was nice to be reminded that Vincent is still real and still there, I think of him so much, sometimes I feel like he's just a figment of my imagination.

John was the first baby I know to be born since I lost Vincent. I know quite a few other pregnant women and it concerns me to have to see them all have their new babies. There is one in particular I'm worried about. There is a women I go to church with, and am good friends with, who is due at the same time I was. Her and I have similar body types and carry pregnancy pretty similar. She was due the week before me, and is usually a week early, where I am usually about 2 weeks early, so chances were pretty good we would have been having our babies within a few days of each other. She is a really great women, and has been really sensative to my feelings. But it's hard everytime I see her to not be reminded of how my body would look. I think it's going to be hard when she has her baby. I don't begrudge her her joy, or feel angry towards her for still being pregnant. She has definately had her own trials and struggles to go through when it comes to getting pregnant. I could never feel anything but happiness for her after everything she has been through to have children, but that doesn't mean I don't feel sad for myself at the same time. It's going to be challenging to have Vincent's due date come and hear about her having her baby. Luckily, she is having a girl, and her babies are usually quite a bit smaller than mine so thankfully her baby will not remind me quite so much of Vincent.

Well enough of that.

I still have 20 lbs to loose to get back to my prepregnancy weight. I was hoping to be back down before going to Texas June 10th, but that doesn't seem very likely. Maybe I can get at least 1/2 way there.... But I have to go excersise if I'm going to try.

Love you all!