Happy 1st Birthday Baby Molly!

Dear Baby Molly,

I am not believing it's true! An entire year has already gone by since we first met. I will never ever forget the first time I laid my eyes on you, as you were being born. It was a very long 14+ hr wait for me  after my 1st glimpse of you, before I got to see you again. You had to be in NICU and the Doctors wouldnt let me come see you until the next day, because I had a fever and I had to be on oxygen due to difficulties breathing after you were born.
Those moments without having you near me, were so hard and so scary. As I was dealing with my own complications, I had the fear of what you were also dealing with and I struggled not being able to be by your side. I sent Daddy down to NICU to take pictures of you for me, and I called several times to check on you.

Daddy was so sweet, since he got to go see you before I did, he made sure to not touch you or to not let anyone else touch you because he wanted me to have that special moment first.

I also will never forget walking into NICU the next morning, and seeing you officially for the 1st time.

1st Moment seeing you since birth

You were laying there so swollen and so puffy and you had stuff on your face& I couldn't really see what you looked liked all that well. The first time I touched you, felt like heaven to me. I couldn't believe that this was it. This was the moment I had waited so long for! My First Born.You were the baby that finally made me a mommy. You were the baby that I felt move inside of me all that time, you were the baby that I looked forward to seeing on ultra sounds every week, and most of all, you were the baby that doctors said I may never get to know...and there you were. Right infront of me. So Tiny, yet So Beautiful. And though, I knew in that moment that I had a long wait to go, before I could bring you home...I was so very excited that you were finally here. All my pregnancy struggles were over, and now I had a new set of worries that began. But in my heart of hearts, I knew that God had kept you safe inside of me for 32 weeks, and because of that I was going to soon be bringing you home.

Every single day I came to visit you, without fail. And I looked forward to coming around that corner to see you laying in your little isolette. Every day you grew stronger, It always made me smile, to see how snuggled & peaceful you seemed when I would walk in.

And every day you had another nurse fall in love with you. But no love, was ever stronger than the love I had for you.

When the day came that the doctors called and told me you would be coming home, I can never explain the joy I had in my heart. I had waited so long for the moment that I could hold you without end...no nurses telling me my visitation hours were over...you were finally mine to keep and  that was indescribable to me.

The Day You Came Home

These moments I am sharing with you, still seem like yesterday to me, yet it has been an entire year.
I have loved every moment of being your mommy, and can not believe this time has gone by so fast. Sometimes, when I have time to just sit and think...I often wander back to the times that I had to wake you up every 3 hrs to feed you. I miss that. I miss you being so tiny that I could hold you and your sister both in just one arm.

And though I miss those times of you being so small, I know that I have made the most of those times. I took full advantage of my time with you, and rarely even went anywhere at all without you.

 And the time I have with you now I am also making the most of. You have become such a gorgeous little girl, with big beautiful blue eyes, and you have such a lovey personality! You are my social butterfly, and you smile at everyone! You give me so much to look forward to in this life. I love you with every beat of my heart!

You are taking your time on the crawling thing, but you have started to army crawl using your arms to get around. I LOVE seeing you do this. This is a fairly new thing for you. You used to just scoot or roll but now you do the army crawl and I love it. You have figured out how to follow me around the house doing this. And it melts my heart to see you come lagging behind me.

You are definitley calling for Mommy when you are upset. You always say "mu mu mu mu" and when you are playing it is "da-da-da-di" :)

We have introduced you to table foods and are trying to feed you more table food and less baby foods. I still plan on keeping you on formula until you have reached your "adjusted age" of 12 months. Which will put you to be at 14 months.

We tried the sippy cup with you once and you were not so sure, and daddy has been wanting me to try again and I will...but I know that it will take you a lot of getting used too.

You are weighing 15lbs 11oz and are in size 9 month clothes. Mommy has many nick names for you and Daddy does too. In the past year you have been our "Mollard Pollard", "Molly Anna" " Milkshake Molly" "Noodle Doodle", "Skinny Minnie"  and my favorite....the one I call you every day....is
"Mommy's Special Baby"

Molly Ann Rabon, you are my miracle baby, and I will never ever be able to tell you in enough words how very special you are to me, but I promise to show you every single day of my life, that YOU are the center of my world.

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

Mommy& Daddy are so proud of the little one you have become!

Love, Mommy