On Thursday, just after midnight, I woke up to Kevin answering my phone that was plugged in at my nightstand. Melanie was calling to let us know that her and Jeff were on their way to the emergency room because she was bleeding a lot. She was 35 weeks pregnant, and my stomach immediately dropped. She was, of course, in tears, and we were super concerned. Jerry and Bev were both out of town (on separate trips), but luckily their neighbor came over to sit at the house while the girls were sleeping. Kevin told them that I could drive up, but they said that the neighbor was fine for now and that they would keep us updated. After hanging up, we said a prayer right away. Since I had been sleeping, I was a bit groggy, but I kept my phone on my pillow so that I would get any updates that they sent. Around 1 AM, we received word that the baby's heart rate was normal, so that was a HUGE relief. I was so worried that they were going to lose the baby.
I think I fell into a deep sleep after that because I didn't wake up until 4:45, at which point I saw a text that Melanie was scheduled for a c-section at 5 AM. I said a quick prayer, decided to jump in the shower, and began making preparations to get to their house by 7 AM so that their sweet neighbor could go home to get her own kids ready for school.
Since it was so early, I knew I wouldn't be able to make arrangements for Brooke to get to school, so I figured I would just let her skip for the day. I packed snacks and bags with clothes, etc, then tried to wake Brookie up. She was out cold, but as soon as I said, "Your baby cousin was born an hour ago", she perked right up and said, "Seriously??" She then jumped onto her bed and started doing "the shoe," haha.
I then woke Colby, and loaded everyone into the car. I tried to get the kids to go back to sleep, but they were much too excited for that. Brooke kept asking me questions about why baby Peacock was born so early, and I told her that I had no idea. I gave her a few plausible reasons, but the conversation then turned to how our babies died before they were even born. I love that she never forgets about our babies, but it was also a hard thing to listen to. She kept talking to Colby about how we have 4 kids in our family because of our two babies in heaven, and was clarifying that the first baby was a girl and the second a boy. Again, I love that she doesn't forget about those sweet babies in heaven, but I tried to distance myself a little from the conversation because I knew that it might be a little bit hard to know that if our treatments would have worked, we would also be having a baby at this time.
Traffic was a pretty good distraction, and since it was rush hour, it took nearly an hour to get there. But we still made it there shortly after 7, so I felt pretty good about that. Kinley and Aubrey were already awake, and were very eager to tell us that their baby sister was born. I talked to Jeff shortly after arriving, and he said he would let me know when it would be a good time to bring the girls to meet their new sister.
The girls were pretty anxious to go to the hospital (especially Kinley), but having cousins to play with was a pretty good distraction. They played for a few hours, so I kept myself busy cleaning Mel's bathroom and room (turns out her water actually broke, but since she had only had scheduled c-sections before, she didn't realize that was what really happened!), doing some laundry, and vacuuming the floors. The house looked great, but I was just trying to get ahead of the cleaning since I knew Mel would be in the hospital a few days and would be coming home with a newborn. Almost five weeks early!! Good thing she had the nursery prepared.
When we hadn't heard from Jeff for a few hours, I tried to distract the girls by playing hair salon. They always love when I fix their hair, so I figured this would be a fun way to pass the time...
Jeff called about noon to say that we could come visit, so we quickly piled into our car and drove over to Grapevine. Can you tell that they were a little excited about riding in the car together?
After I had a good cry, I was totally fine and was able to help all the kids hold the beautiful (unnamed) baby. I mean, how adorable...
This smile from Kinley is the most genuine I have ever captured in a picture.
After spending probably 3 hours outside, we headed back to the Peacocks house to veg! Colby snuggled right up to Kinley and made himself comfortable, haha. I was in no rush to get home, so I planned on staying with the girls until Jerry or Bev could take over.
At some point during the week, they settled on the name Emery, with a middle name of Dale (Jeff's middle name), and they were able to take her home on Thursday afternoon. On Saturday, we stopped by and spent a few hours at their house. This was Uncle Kevin's first time meeting and holding her...
Colby was nervous to hold her in the hospital, but he had been practicing at home with Brooke's baby Chloe. I sent Mel a picture of him practicing, so she said he could be the first one to hold her. You could tell that he felt pretty special about that, but when it came down to holding her, he didn't want to! By the end of the evening, he had changed his mind. The whole encounter was just about the sweetest thing.
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