This face is one of adoration for her dada + her brother, looking right at the two of them!

You are such a joy to have in our family Annalise. Definitely the perfect completion of our long-awaited family. I just wish more than anything that your Sassy could be here to experience your sweet, yet feisty disposition. I’m pretty sure you are going to be so much like her!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MY LOVE!!

• “One” Crown: LittleBlueOlive
• Garland: PearlandJane
• Mat: Gathre
• Romper: Target
• One Script/A Cake Topper: yours truly with a Silhouette Cameo

Being able to shower Annalise with love is not something I take for granted. I cherish these memories all 4 of us are making, creating traditions one day at a time!

Our home was a flip completed by a home builder out of Edmond. It’s clear all the corners they cut to get this house done, but none were obviously when we bought the home! Within months after we purchased this home, the paint began chipping on the front porch. At first I wasn’t too worried but as time when along, you can see how bad it got! The below photos were a year after the home was renovated, just shy of 9 months after we purchased the home (another family owned the home for a few months before they relocated to Texas for a job).

Anthony + I spent countless hours power washing the paint off. I was so determined to get this completed before our daughter arrived. This photo is hilarious as Baxter spent many hours out there with us + would always get tangled up in cords. Dog has zero spatial awareness!

There was at least 2 layers of paint + carpet glue on these steps. The porch part didn’t take as long, but boy did I learn a thing or two about the stairs!

It ended up taking about a year for us to complete this project. Between newborn life + working full time, this wasn’t as much a priority to get completed as it should have been! The major motivation to get this job complete was Annalise’s birthday party.

First step was to power wash the whole thing again to get all the debris off. I filled in holes + cracks with a premade concrete mixture. Then I used Clean + Etch to prep the concrete. I think this is one of the steps that the contractor did not do!

You can see that we were not able to get up all the red paint off the steps. We were able to get the majority up + that was good enough for me! I didn’t get a photo of the primer on the concrete but I use Behr Concrete + Masonry Bonding Primer. Side note: if you are in OKC + would like to use some of this for a small area, hit your girl up. I’d love for someone to use this as we don’t have any other concrete to use it on!

After two coats of Behr Porch & Patio Floor Paint, here is the finished product. I went back + forth on painting it SW Naval like it was originally or going with a lighter gray or stenciling it. It’s a bit difficult as the exterior of our home is a blue/gray color. I do have a brighter, lighter blue to paint the front door, but that’s sorta at the bottom of the to-do list right this moment!

Porch color is SW Ellie Gray but using Behr. I’m so pleased with the way it turned out. Fingers crossed all this hard work will last until we sell this home!

Being pregnant during the COVID-19 pandemic was interesting to say the least. I was already incredibly emotional about the loss of my mom, then add in pregnancy hormones, then social isolation, it was a rollercoaster pregnancy.

I was closely monitored my entire pregnancy due to my age, my history of high blood pressure/preclampsia with Emery, then we found out at our 20 week anatomy scan that I had placenta previa. Placenta previa is when the placenta is blocking the cervix, which is not good. I ended up having so many ultrasounds, some at the clinic, some at the hospital with a specialist to determine if the placenta moved enough to try for a VBAC. With this pregnancy, I knew that I would have a repeat c-section, so the ultrasounds seemed a bit pointless to me.

I went in for a routine 37 week appointment on July 27th where my blood pressure was climbing. I knew it was going to be her birthday when I left the house that morning. After being admitted to OU Children’s, I had a lovely COVID-19 test. While we waited for those results + for the magical hours after eating (I mistakenly had a small something for breakfast that morning), I was wheeled back to the OR. The bad thing about having a baby in July at a teaching hospital is that you get new residents. The resident anesthesiologist had a hard time placing the spinal block, which didn’t work, so we ended up doing an epidural. This took a ridiculous amount of time, all while Anthony was waiting in our room for the green light to join us. It was a full hour(!) since I had been wheeled back to the OR!

When I heard her sweet cry, it was the one of the best moments of my life. In that instance, I knew her middle name was going to be Kathleen (I had gone back + forth on this the entire time I knew I was having a girl on naming her Kathleen or not!). We were wheeled back to our room + got to have that golden hour of time together. She nursed like a champ immediately! After she got the once over by the nurses, she was placed back on my chest. We were cuddling away. Unfortunately for me, it was shift change. The nurses thought she sounded off (I believe she was just smashed up in to my chest too much), so they whisked her off my chest to start evaluating her again. Within 30 minutes, my baby was being taken to the NICU. At this point, Anthony went down to get us dinner. When he walked in the room, he saw me bawling my eyes out with no baby around. I was once again robbed of precious moments with my newborn.

Several days later, she was finally released from the NICU. We spent all that time together, staring at her, wondering what we should name her. The anticipation from all of our family + friends for her name was palpable. The number of texts I got each day was pretty funny! We ended up having to stay in the hospital 5 days because my blood pressure was higher than they felt comfortable allowing me to leave. I missed my sweet Em-bug so much that every moment in that hospital was torture!

I am thankful that we welcomed a healthy, 9+lbs sweet chunk into our lives. She is the perfect puzzle piece to our family!

We adopted a boxer pup in January 2018 – Sir Richard Baxter Douglas Schmidt. Seriously one of the best decisions we have ever made. He brings our entire family joy, keeps us laughing all the time, + is fiercely protective of his people.

A few months later, we found out we were expecting our first child. Emery was born 4 weeks early in October 2018.

My mom was diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer when Emery was 6 months old. I wrote a bit about this journey on my personal blog. It’s been 18 months since I lost my mom, not a single day doesn’t go by that I don’t think of her! I continue to thank my lucky stars that we moved back when we did because I spent every moment I could with her during those 8 months.

Just days before my mom went unconscious, I got to share the exciting news that we were having another baby! My mom was ecstatic + swore that I was having a girl. As I laid on the table during our 20 week ultrasound, tears just streamed down my face as the tech told me we were having a girl. To know that my mom was right, that she was wrapping her spirit around my daughter was something that is hard to put in to words. Meet Annalise Kathleen, named after my mom, born July 2020.

To say that it’s been a busy, whirlwind 4 years is an understatement!!! I have hundreds of thousands photos of my children so I pick up my camera regularly, it’s just been hard to juggle all that is going on in my life to begin a photography business in Oklahoma City. I really hope one day in the next year to begin taking on clients once again. I’ve missed this space, connecting with my clients, getting to share moments in time for families.

Anthony, Emery, + I are excited to announce we are adding another kiddo into our world, coming August 2020!

Around 4pm, we drove out to the cemetery to visit my mom’s grave. I have been out there since her burial, but Anthony had not. Unfortunately it was so cold that we didn’t stay long, but it felt good to be near her earthly body. They recently laid sod down so grass will be growing in no time at all. My dad + Eric have picked out the perfect headstone, but I’m not sure when my dad will be able to order it.

We stopped by Clark Crew BBQ on our way back to the house for some traditional Easter BBQ.

Outfit is from Swanky Shank, mats are from Gathre. Two of my favorite small shops!

We were told that we would know about 45 minutes after she was rolled back to the OR – we’d either see Dr. Moxley or we’d get a call from the nurse in the OR to let us know surgery was happening.

For whatever reason, I asked Anthony to go down to the cafeteria with me right around that mark. I believe that was God’s way of leading me away, though I wish more than anything that I had been in the waiting room when Moxley came out to talk to the family. After going in laparoscopically, she realized that there was cancer under the liver, + she couldn’t operate. Dr. Moxley did remove most of her omentum which was completely full of tumor + had moved across her abdominal cavity (the omentum is a fatty apron-like part that drapes in front of the stomach + small intestines.)

When she was finally rolled into her room on the oncology floor at OU Medical Center, the first thing she asked me is what happened. I told her they removed the omentum + that’s it. She was still coming out of anesthesia, but she had the foresight to ask, “then what the f**k did she do?”. I started laughing at that point, because this is so my mom. She was in pain, obviously, from being cut opened, but that wasn’t going to stop her humor from coming through!

Not long after she got home from the hospital, she went downhill fairly quickly. She wasn’t able to drink much, so she ended up becoming dehydrated regularly. I think about every 8 days we were back at OU for her to get fluids. At some point within this time frame, her doctor finally got her on home health, where a nurse would come by the house to give her fluids. This helped her out tremendously.

Sometime around the beginning of September, I knew in my heart of hearts that the cancer was just too far gone, that she wouldn’t be recovering from this. I held off planning Emery’s first birthday, as I wanted my mom to be present for his party. I figured I could throw any date out there + our families would rally. Unfortunately we never got to have a party, but my mom did make it to his first birthday! That was my one wish, my goal for her to see him to a year. It seems so trivial now that she is gone.

The grieving process has been long, one that I know will continue for years to come. Many nights the dinner table is reminiscing about my mom, talking about my thoughts, sometimes re-living those final days. It’s therapeutic to have her at the dinner table with us.

I continue to pray that this little one growing inside me will have many of my mom’s attributes, that I will see my mom in her all the time. They will forever have a special bond, one that I hope will carry this sweet angel through life.