1 Month

Owen hit the 1 month mile marker TWO weeks ago. I can't believe it. As you can imagine, I don't get much time to write a blog much less edit any photos I took of him (unless it is a quick instagram) so I apologize for this monthly update coming a bit late.
At his one month appointment Owen weighed a whopping 11 1/2 lbs and was 24" long. My baby is going to be a big boy! His weight is in the 80th percentile and height is in the 90th! Wow! It's hard to believe he is the same 7 lb little baby we brought home from the hospital. He is starting to smile at his mom and dad, is holding his head up like a champ and even pushing on his legs. The first month with Owen was obviously a learning one for everyone involved. Though I will say becoming a mom and watching Colin become a dad has been one of the greatest joys of my life. I am sure every stage will be my "favorite" but goodness I love waking up to this boy every day.

Owen Keith Campbell

I have never been very good at the whole blog thing. I always have great intentions of doing one and keeping it up to date but as you can see, I haven't written a post since 1 week after our wedding day and our 3 year anniversary was just last week.

Since that blog post LOTS has changed for these Campbell's, one major thing in particular. We are officially a party of 3 and I can't think of a better reason to try and keep up to date with our blog. I don't want to forget any details of the day we welcomed Owen into the world, so to kick it all off, here is Owen Keith's birth story.

Owen came into the world with quite a bang. From the two weeks of bed-rest to all the way to a week after his arrival, we have not been short of any drama around here. If you are up for the story, buckle up because it's a long one!

Towards the end of my pregnancy, my swelling started to get worst and my blood pressure started to rise. On May 5th, at my 33 week appointment, the doctor admitted me for the first time, this time only for a couple hours, to monitor my blood pressure, urine, and Owen's heart rate a little more closely. That is where it all began. My doctor let me go home that night but not without understanding that the possibility of bed-rest was getting close. I began doing 24 hour urine collections, daily blood pressure checks and closely monitoring my swelling. Preeclampsia was coming, we just didn't know when. Then on May 19th, after getting my most recent 24 hour urine specimen back, (which had gone to 500 when it only takes 300 to be diagnosed) I was officially diagnosed with preeclampsia and was sent straight to labor and delivery. This was admittance #2.

I remained at Boone Hospital on bedrest for a full week when my doctor gave me my get out of jail free card and I was sent home. With an induction date of June 1st and the strict instructions of remaining on bedrest. At the time, I hated being on bedrest. I was able to work remotely which helped tremendously, but I was horribly bored. Looking back on it now, I am actually thankful for it. It kept my baby boy safe for an additional week, I had wonderful friends and family who came to keep me company and I made some new life long friends.

Being able to go home for a week was exactly what I needed. I felt like I was able to get a few things wrapped up for Owen, repack our bags and enjoy some time together outside  of the hospital. Our last days as a family of 2.

June 1st- We were set to check in to labor and delivery (for the 3rd time) at 7:30PM to begin our induction. Making sure to get my last meal in before a looong 30 hours of no food, we stopped by Olive Garden. This momma wanted pasta! While there, I received the greatest surprise, my sister in law had flown in from TX to be there with me. Now, I love my mom and of course I needed my husband to be there for his love and support but I had been dreading my sister in law not being able to be there for Owen's arrival since the moment I found out I was pregnant. You can imagine the amount of tears that came once my mind registered that it was really her! We then headed to Boone Hospital.

After meeting up with our birth photographer to go over a few details, we headed up to labor and delivery to be checked in. We were shown to our room, met our nurse and so it began. I was a nervous wreck but in an effort to keep my blood pressure down, tried to remain calm. The first part of our induction required using a pill called cytotech that had to be inserted starting at 9PM and then again every 3 hours. I will not name any names but I will be so thankful if I never have to see my nurse from that night again. Imagine very short & stubby hands.

When the 3AM pill time came around, my nurse came in and informed me that due to the baby's heart rate dropping, she was not comfortable continuing and would be starting me on a bag of fluid instead. We would need to wait until my dr arrived and see what course of action would be the best. 5AM rolls around, my dr calls and gets caught up to speed on everything going on. Since I had been having contractions every minute all night it was thought that Owen wasn't getting time between each contraction to "recooperate" before the next one began. They began giving me a medication through my IV that would attempt to slow down my contractions but would also make my heart rate go through the roof. I was just going to have to attempt to remain calm and let the drugs work. At this point..epidural, please?

Once my dr arrived around 7AM, together with her, Colin and I decided that since Owen wasn't handling these very early stages of labor very well and we weren't in fact even in labor yet since petocin had not been started, that a c section would be the safest option for both of us. I was instructed that in order to be worked into the c section schedule, we would be going in around 8:30-9AM. At 7:14 AM my doctor came back into the room and said we would be going at 7:20 AM. Say what?! I quickly started signing papers and Colin began frantically making phone calls.. I walked myself to the OR while Colin got in his surgery scrubs. There were people swarming all around me in the OR. Nurses hooking me up to things all over, the anesthesiologist explaining to me what she was doing all the while I could do nothing but rub my belly one last time. Things had changed so quickly and I was about to meet my baby boy. I was given a spinal, laid on my back with my arms to the side and Colin was brought in. I held his hand probably tighter that needed as tears streamed down my face. Ready or not, here we go.


[a continuation of the craziness that ensued after Owen was born will be in the following post]

My favorite things about our wedding day..

It has now been 1 MONTH! since our wedding day. It seems so incredibly hard to believe! The more I look at pictures and the more I hear about our day, the more sad it makes me that it is already over. We waited so long for it to be here and then it was over. So, here is a list of my favorite things from our wedding weekend :)

1. After our rehearsal dinner, we had some errands to run. Drop back by the church, pick up Taryn, stop by the hall, go to Walmart and at some point, go home and get some sleep. Well, the hall took a little longer than expected so while my mom worked there I took the rest of the girls to Walmart to get what they needed. On the way back to the hall to pick up my mom, I GOT PULLED OVER!!! Are you kidding me? The very first time I get pulled over is the night before my wedding? Thankfully, it was only for a break light being out and the officer was extremely nice. I luckily did not get a ticket :)

2. Colin and I have a queen size bed. Nothing huge but decent. Just big enough for us and even sometimes it feels a little small. Well the night before the wedding, me, some of the girls, and my mom stayed at our house while Colin stayed with a friend. Sleeping in our bed was me, Emily (my MOH), and Taryn (bridesmaid). I have never been so thankful just to have me and Colin the next night. lol It was a tight squeeze and led to many laughs but I'm glad they were there with me.

3. Also that night, Taryn calmly asked me, "Danielle, what time is it?". I clicked the bottom on my phone and it read 1:03am. She then said, "You're getting married in 12 hours." I think that is when it finally clicked. It meant so much to me to hear those words from her and to have me wedding day start with the two of them.

4. After getting out hair done, we drove to the church. From where we were, it took about 15-20 minutes. As we are pulling off the highway on to the exit that the church is off of, Our first dance came on the radio. The whole way I was so nervous and I felt like a flipped through the stations a hundreds time and nothing. Then our song came on and it was like, ok. I'm ready for this. It was a sweet moment and I knew then (and of course many many months before) that marrying Colin was meant to happen for me and that day would start the beginning of the rest of my life.

5. Reading our letters to one another. We chose not to see one another before the wedding but we did want to exchange letters. We even chose to read them out loud before a petition. It was the sweetest moment of the day and one I will never forget.

6. My brother paying Colin $20 to "make it worth his while". As in smashing cake in my face. And that Colin did. lol

Well those are the ones I can think of at the moment. Hard to believe it has already been one month. But one of the greatest of my entire life. Until next time..

Love,
Danielle Campbell

A day in the life of The Campbell's...

Today was a pretty typical day for us. We both got up early and headed out on our days. He was off to play golf with a bunch of guys from work and then have a meeting with an insurance agency here in town. I was on my way to Columbia to spend the day with my niece and nephew. All in all we had a wonderful day.

Well, anyone who knows us or has watched/listened to our wedding video or was there when we read our letters to one another would know that my favorite thing about Colin is his ability to make me laugh and his favorite thing about me is my laugh. I'd say that worked out pretty well for us :) Well, tonight I was definitely laughing. A lot. To the point of tears and no breathing. The kinda where you feel like you just did 1000 sit ups.

It's pretty safe to say that there are 3 letters that describe me the best- OCD. I like things neat, tidy, organized. Everything has their place and if not, it drives me absolutely bonkers. So when I got home tonight, my hubby had dinner ready then we went to cleaning the house. I'd say we at least "pick up" every other night. Tonight was a little more in depth. Cleaning the sheets, vacuuming the floors, using the steam mop on the bathroom floor, cleaning the bathroom floor (I make him clean the toilet :), and cleaning the kitchen. So by the end of it all our backs were killing us, we were hot and all we wanted to do was to take showers and go to bed. One problem. No hot water. Per his allergen specialist, I was sheets and towels in hot water. That along with the dishwasher being ran and us washing the dishes at dinner that need to be hand washed there was not a drop of hot water left. I did not know this until I decided to just jump right in the shower. Needless to say, I jumped right back out. Rather quickly. Knowing it would be 2+ hours before we would have actual warm water we decided to suffer through it. OH. MY. GOD! It is a horrible awful thing to have to do. I did what I had to do, threw clothes on in an attempt to get decently warm, and yelled for Colin that it was his turn. You would have thought the water was murdering him and chopping him into pieces. I had no idea the screeches and yelling that could come out of his mouth until tonight when he had to take an ice cold shower. This is the point where the pee your pants your laughing so hard comes in. I could hear him all the way across the house! Oh lordy it was funny. So I guess the moral of this story is, I love my husband. He can take the worst situation and still make me laugh. Of course ice cold showers really isn't a horrible situation it still isn't one I care to be in that often. I'm so lucky to have found Colin and don't know how I was ever able to.

On a different note, here is the link to the sneak peek of our wedding video. I think its pretty awesome :) I can't wait to get the full version next week!

http://vimeo.com/45518602

Hugs,
Mrs. Campbell :)

Our Honeymoon

When planning our honeymoon we thought about quite a few places. I LOVE Disney so we considered a resort in Disney World but we decided to save that to go with my niece and nephew then one day when we have kids. Another option we thought about was going somewhere tropical but that seemed to be a little expensive and we weren't sure if we wanted to spend the money on it. So we decided to go stay in the mountains in Colorado. We have very close family friends that have a second home up in the mountains that they said they would be willing to let us use. It worked perfectly! We had such a wonderful time and luckily didn't run into any issues with the fires going on. Here is what we did...

Sunday, June 24th
           Our first day as a married couple! Since family was still in town, we decided to have a small BBQ so we could open our gifts. It was really nice to see our close family and friends again before everyone went home and we headed out for our honeymoon. That evening we drove to St. Louis and stayed the night at my dads house so he could drive us to the airport.

Monday, June 25th
          Colorado, HERE WE COME! We got up EARLY. 3:30 am early. We needed to get our things together to get ready to head to the airport and be there by 4:30 am. We chose the earlier flight because the next flight out wasn't until late in the afternoon and we were ready to get our trip started! We got our tickets and made it through security no trouble. Boarded the plane and we were off! We even arrived in Denver 20 minutes ahead of schedule. Got our bags, found the car our friends and left us and off we went. Well sorda. It was a stick shift and though Colin knew how to drive one, it was a bit of a rocky start. First, we couldn't figure out how to get it in reverse then as soon as we went to go, he killed it. And then killed it again. Then we went 20 ft and he killed it again. lol Once he got somewhat used to the car driving around the parking lot, we decided it was time to give the highways a go. Things were good but my anxiety levels kicked in and I finally just said, "Let's go rent a car!" So we parked the car back in the airport parking lot just like the had told us to do when we left, and headed back into the airport. Since it was still pretty early and we hadn't eaten yet we decided to grab some breakfast before going down to one of the counters to get a vehicle. We enjoyed some BK not knowing what was lying ahead of us. We get down to the counter and THERE WERE NO VEHICLES AVAILABLE TO RENT IN THE ENTIRE STATE OF COLORADO!!! I thought I was freaking out before, you should have seen me then! We contemplated going back to the stick shift or finally one company had ONE car but since they knew everyone was out, they wanted to charge us $1500 for a week. We really did not want to spend wedding money on a vehicle. Right when we were getting ready to pay it, my AMAZING sister in law, Nicole stepped in and found us one! Apparently, rental companies still have to keep vehicles available for companies they have contracts with and thankfully, their company was willing to let us use one. We ended up only paying $588 for the whole week. What a relief! After being stranded in the Denever airport for 4+ hours we were so glad to be out of there and in an automatic car!

First stop-  a brewery!

By this point it was way past lunch time so we decided to grab a bit to eat and after taking care of us to make sure we got out of the airport, Colin deserved a beer!
After lunch we headed towards to mountains. I should remind you that I do NOT like heights thank to my mom and in Colorado, side rails apparently don't exist so needless to say I was pretty nervous. But we made it to our condo safe and sound. We arrived to this...

Monday night we decided to just kinda relax. We drove around a little bit to get used to the area then stopped at a local grocery store for a few things for the week and stuff to make dinner that night.

Tuesday, June 26th
         WINTER PARK! For a wedding gift, Dallas & Kelsay (our very good friends) got us all day passes to the winter park resort. There were so many activities to do and a bunch of little shops to shop at. We did lots of things but our two favorite were the chair lift ride and the alpine slide. Once agian I had to conquer my fear of heights and I was glad I did. We got some awesome views! That evening we went for a drive just to check in all the scenery and actually ended up in a town called Grand Lake. It somewhat reminded me of the Lake of the Ozarks but on a smaller scale. Rather than an outlet mall, it was a bunch of little store front shops. It was a fun way to end the day. On our way home, we stopped at The Library, a brewery back by our house. It has delicious food and it was nice to just hang out for the remainder of the night.

Wednesday, June 27th
              Another early morning! We got up around 5am to hit the road by 5:30am to head towards Estes Park. It was beautiful to watch the sun come up and the views were spectacular!

The heights on this drive were plain awful. The pictures we took where we could see the snow on the mountains WAYYYY up high? Yeah well we got right next to that snow. Way up high in the mountains with absolutely nothing stopping us from just sliding off the edge and at 6am in the morning there is NO ONE around to know that you went off the side of the mountain. I started freaking out a bit as Colin is looking all around except in front of him! yikes. Too much for me and I will be happy if that is the only time I ever have to take that drive in my life. So we finally made it through Rocky Mountain National Park and into Estes Park where we would be doing our horseback riding. It was kinda expensive but totally worth it!

We took a 4 hour horseback ride where we went across rivers, streams, and saw some really awesome scenery that I don't think we would have ever been able to see without going on the ride. Our guides, James and Luke were very informative and very nice people. Colin rode Sawyer and I had Dandy. Both were very sweet horses and got plenty of treats once we got back to the barn :)

[smoke off in the distance from all the fires]

We were so exhausted by the end of our ride that we didn't even get to see much of anything else in Estes Park. We got back in the car and headed on our 2 hour drive back home. Once we got closer to the house, we were both starving so we swung through McDonalds grabbed a bite to eat and headed home to shower and definitely take a nap! Unfortunately, we planned on getting up from our nap to go to dinner and maybe go explore in Winter Park some more instead, we fell asleep at 6:30pm and did not wake up until 5:30am the next morning! So...

Thursday, June 28th
           Today was the day that we left our little home in Winter Park. We decided to go spend some time with my brother Michael before we headed home the next day. It actually worked out really well since he lives 20 minutes from the airport as opposed to the 2+ hours from the house in Winter Park.

Once we got into Denver we went to lunch and to the movies to see The Avengers. I left Colin pick :) After that we headed to my brother Michaels house before heading to dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings! Aside from chatting with my brother and his wife, Darrah, it was time for some much needed sleep before traveling the next day.

Friday, June 29th
      See ya later Colorado, Hello Missouri!
I'm glad we went on a honeymoon but boy was I glad to be home! We had a disaster of a house to come home to and we couldn't wait to sleep in our own bed!


Married life has truly been amazing. I couldn't ask for a better husband who makes me smile and laugh every day of my life. I can't wait to see what our future holds together <3

We're Married!

We are officially Mr. and Mrs. Campbell :)

Our wedding day could not have been more special and more perfect than it was. It was everything we had hope and dreamed of. 

Thanks to everyone who came. Post on our honeymoon coming up soon!

P.S. We have a new email address- thecampbell623@yahoo.com

16 days

I really am so bad about updating my blogs. It has once again been way to long since I last blogged. There hasn't been much of anything new going on in our lives besides the usual. I did GRADUATE from MIZZOU about a month ago. Truly, it was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. That morning I had my honors ceremony to receive my special medallion showing that I had manintained at least a 3.7 GPA  throughout my entire experience at the University of Missouri. I was surrounded by brilliant people and it was a wonderful feeling knowing that I was considered one of them. Then later on I had my actual graduation ceremony. The feeling I had hearing my name and walking across that stage is something that I will never forget. Last year it felt like school was taking FOREVER and that I would never be done but there I was become a MIZZOU Alum, my 4 years of college over. I absolutely love my school and if there is one thing I remember from that day it is this,

"Once a Tiger, ALWAYS A TIGER!"

So now that graduation is over, the wedding is FAST approaching. The year 2012 has gone by ridiculously fast. I can't hardly believe that once this weekend is over it is time for my Bachelorette Party followed by the weekend of our wedding! It felt like the day would never get here and here we are just days away. 16 days. crazy. I'm so excited to marry Colin. Things have been so crazy, busy,and stressful the past few weeks gathering up the last remaining details of the wedding that I learned rather quickly that at the end of the day, the thing that matters most is that I will be Mrs. Colin Campbell. It doesn't matter who didn't turn in their RSVP or the ones who did and then chose to tell someone THE DAY I send in the confirmed amount that they will no longer be coming. Or any of the other madness that has been going on. I get to walk down that aisle and see my groom for the first time that day and know that I love him and he loves me and were going to have a wonderful life together.

Based on my previous blog posts, the next time I will be on here will be after the wedding. I can't wait to see all of our family and friends there and I hope everyone has a good time. Wedding pictures to come :)

Hugs,

Nelle