GUESS WHAT! We have a new arrival in our home! The stork blessed us with a VERY healthy, full term baby! We prayed for months and months for a healthy, full term baby, who would eat, sleep, poop and pee without any challenges in doing so! God blessed us and answered that prayer with a yes!
Allison Nicole is such an easy baby! Lily... we never imagined she would transition into the role of Big Sissy with such grace and charm. We shoulda known though! She's always handled change and challenge with such style and grace! She dotes on Allie night and day! If she even fusses for a single second, Lily tells Mommy - Mommy she needs some booby milk! Lily named it that :-)
As if we weren't blessed enough, military personnel now get ten days of leave to spend with the new arrival, that doesn't get charged to their leave bank (Thanks Obama Administration)! Jon was able to spend every second with Tiffany in the hospital (just as he did with Lily), and had ten whole days to bond with Allie! The two are best buds and snuggle buddies! It's brought him closer to Lily too! Blessings all around!
Allie weighed in at a whopping SEVEN POUNDS, 7.9 ounces; 19.5 Inches long! She eats and eats and eats! She's a little over 4 weeks old now and already weighs 9 pounds, 12 ounces! Tiffany wanted to keep Allie in her belly until at LEAST 39 weeks. Sure "full term" is 37 weeks... but research has shown that an awful lot of brain development is still going on until the 39th week. Well, Allie made it! She was born at 39 weeks, 6 days! One day before she was due! Jon, Tiffany & Lily couldn't be more thrilled about that!
We've had to make some adjustments pretty early on with Jon being in the Marines. Thankfully when the squadron participated in "Bold Alligator" training less than a week after Allie was born, the squadron assigned Jon to the "stay behind" crew so that when his ten days of leave expired, he just worked at the shop during regular working hours and he didn't have to leave with the rest of the squadron! But when the next training "Emerald Warrior" came along, Jon had to leave early with the advon group and set up in Florida. The girls miss him terribly, but have transitioned into a routine and are counting the days until he comes home again!
We will be making the trip to Tennessee for a couple of weeks for Jon's predeployment leave for some much needed back home visiting! We'll be staying in the old farm house as Jon's sister Crystal graciously offered to let us stay there so we could have privacy and comfort when we are back home! Talk about accommodations! Can't beat having an entire house to ourselves, and it being the one we lived in when Lily was born! We can never thank Jon's parents enough for allowing us to stay there all that time, and having such a great place to stay when we visit! And we can even bring Tito! And we will! Jon's family misses Tito as much as they miss the rest of us, he is their grand-dog after all!
Well, that's about all for now! Lots of Love, The Parrish's!
