Nathaniel Bear on Vacation

Last month we went to visit my family in Alaska. Since they live so far away the last time we saw some of them was when they came down for Nathaniel's funeral. None of them had seen Nathaniel bear so we decided to bring him along. I didn't want him to get lost so he came along in our carry-on suitcase with Felicity's diapers and our extra clothes.

While we were there a lot of people got to see him. We left him out in the living room at my parent's house the whole time that we were there. A couple people came over and my mom would show him off and make them hold him so they could feel how heavy he is. Often I would see my niece with him when she was over, holding him or hugging him. We also brought him to church with us on Sunday and to a picnic that afternoon so we got to share him with many people that I have known most of my life.

We took a family picture one day while we were there. Nathaniel bear was in it too. He was also in the grandkids picture and the extended family picture. I'm sure those pictures will be up in everyone's homes for a long time. It's not often that we are all together.

I'm glad that we brought him along on our trip even though we didn't do much with him while we were gone. It gave us a chance to talk about Nathaniel with people we wouldn't have otherwise like the TSA agent at the Anchorage airport. We don't have much chance to do that anymore. 

Nathaniel Day 14 - New Decorations and a Baby Sister

You can read about the idea behind Nathaniel Day and the activities of previous months here (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13).

In the morning Grandma and Grandpa dropped off Abby at the hospital to meet baby sister. She had a great time holding her. While she was there the professional photographer stopped by and we decided to take some pictures. We got her to take some with Abby, Felicity, and Nathaniel bear. 

It wasn't quite the picture that I had imagined since Felicity wasn't wearing her little sister shirt anymore. She had gotten it all dirty earlier in the day. I will just have to try again later to get all three in their sibling shirts.

Abby had been calling baby sister Rudolph since some time in December. When she met her she continued, but by the time Abby left she stopped calling her Rudolph and started to use her actual name.

Abby stayed and had lunch with us at the hospital and then Grandma and Grandpa took her back to their house.

I had planned to take Abby to the store to pick out some new, springy decorations for Nathaniel's grave, but since I was in the hospital Grandma took her. Abby picked out a sunflower for baby brother. I had found the pinwheel before Easter in the dollar section at Target.

It wasn't the day that I had imagined, but I never thought that I would be having a baby that day. From now on Nathaniel Day will also be celebrating her too.

Big Brother Nathaniel

Dear Nathaniel,

You are now a big brother. Baby sister is here now. She decided to come on Nathaniel day so you're going to have to be a big brother and share. Sometimes the 6th will have to be about both of you now.

We named your baby sister Felicity Hope (not Rudolph like Abby wanted). She is a great baby. She eats and sleeps well. And she's really really cute. We love her, but she doesn't replace you or make it all better that you aren't here with us too. I want all my kids here with me. All three of them.

After you were born I spent many many nights awake in the middle of the night. I should have been up nursing a newborn, but instead I was up thinking. I couldn't turn my mind off to go to sleep. I was so tired, but couldn't sleep. So I wrote. I wrote Abby's book. I wrote this blog. Eventually it got better I was able to sleep at night again. All night.

After Felicity was born I was not able to sleep at night. I should have been sleeping since she was, but instead I was awake thinking of you. That's what is happening right now. She's sound asleep. I should be because I have so much sleep to catch up on, but I can't. I try everything I can think of, but my mind won't turn off. 

A lot of what I'm thinking about is you. I wish you were here, but you're not. We are going to make sure that your little sister knows about you just as much as Abby does, though she won't have ever met you I hope that you will be such a normal part of her life that she tells people all about you when they ask her about her family.

 We brought Nathaniel bear to the hospital with us when I went into labor. I had bought him a little brother shirt. I wanted a big brother one, but I couldn't find one little enough to fit him. Abby has a big sister shirt and there was a little sister one for baby sister when she came. 

I wanted to be able to take a picture at the hospital of all of my kids meeting their new baby sister. With Nathaniel bear as your stand in I was able to get the next best thing. You are still represented. Just as you will be in all of the important days and celebrations of our lives.

We talked about you a lot at the hospital. We told our nurses about you. We showed everyone Nathaniel bear and explained why he is special to us.

 Before we left to go home we got to talking to our nurse about you and found out that two of the nurses that were there last year when you were born were there. One was your baby nurse. The one who had given you your first bath and gotten you ready for us to see you. 

It was so good to see them. They remembered you and were so excited to see us again and meet your baby sister. We talked to them for so long that it was about two hours after we had been discharged that we got ready to leave to go home. 

It reminded me of leaving the hospital last year. Just like last time, we could stay as long as we wanted. No one was making us leave at any particular time. Last year we eventually had to leave and we had to leave you there. This time we were bringing baby sister home with us.

I love you. I'll miss you forever no matter how many more kids I have.

Mommy

Birth day photos of all of my kids.

277 Days

Nathaniel was born at 39 weeks and 4 days (277 days gestation). Today it has been 39 weeks and 4 days since Nathaniel died. That is the same amount of time I was pregnant with him. As of tomorrow it will always be longer that he has been gone than he was with us.

Today, after he has been gone for 277 days, we got our Nathaniel bear. I don't think this is a coincidence. I think it was supposed to take an extra week to get to us so that he would get here on this day exactly 39 weeks and 4 days after he went to heaven.

9 Months

Today has actually not been bad. I really wasn't sad at all. It seems every month it gets easier and easier to make it through the sixth. I guess that's a good thing.

Abby and I had a fun day. We didn't do anything terribly big or exciting. I'll post on the Nathaniel Day activities in another post in a few days.

We still don't have our Nathaniel bear. I was sure we would have it by now since it was supposedly shipped last week. Yesterday I got another shipment notification that it was going to be shipped today, but I checked on it and it seems that it still hasn't shipped. The waiting is driving me crazy. I need to stop thinking about it and checking on it all the time. We will eventually get it. It really doesn't matter when.

100th Post

I haven't posted for a while so here are a few random things:

This is my 100th post. I didn't think I had that much to say when I started this blog. 

I got past 1 million likes the other day. Crazy! I think it took 10 days from when I posted about it.

We carved pumpkins the other day. Abby insisted that we needed to buy one for Nathaniel and carve it. We did, I didn't take a picture of it, we put it out on the porch and some creature ate his face off. Stuff like that always seems to happen. It's so annoying. It seems to always be Nathaniel's stuff that breaks or is lost, not Abby's.

We're still waiting on our Nathaniel bear from Molly Bears. We were told that it would be in production by October 31st, but that's in 2 days and I haven't heard anything. I know it will be here soon and it will be way sooner than I had originally thought, but the waiting is hard.

I have an idea of what we will do for next month's Nathaniel Day. It won't be as much as most months. Dave is working. It's a Thursday. Abby has story time at the library on Thursdays so we will go to that. It's in the late morning so we will probably have lunch somewhere and then do our Nathaniel Day activity. We might have some friends join us this month. It's fun when other people can participate too. 

Nathaniel Bear Coming Soon

I heard about Molly Bears soon after we lost Nathaniel. I think I first looked at the website in February when I was spending hours each day finding all the baby loss and memorial websites that are out there that I had never heard about.

Molly Bears is a non-profit organization started by a loss family a few years ago. They make weighted teddy bears for families that are the exact weight of their baby that died. They make them for babies at all gestational ages and then up to 2 years old. They only accept orders one day a month and it is a limited amount, usually about 125.

When I placed my order for our Nathaniel bear there was a long waiting list. I think I was told at the time that it would about a year and a half before we would get our bear. I thought it would be fun to have the bear for Nathaniel's birthday, but was thinking that realistically that might be his 2nd birthday.

Today I got an email from Molly Bears that they have gotten up to our number on the waiting list and our Nathaniel bear is going to be made this month. I nearly cried when I read the email. I was not expecting that at all. Not this soon. It's only been about 5 months.

I'm so excited to get our bear! Abby will probably try and steal him when he gets here. I told her today that he will be coming in the mail soon. I think we are going to be anxiously checking for packages for the next couple of weeks until he gets here.