Catherine Allyn Hearn

On Monday, April 5th, 2010 we welcomed Catherine Allyn Hearn into our world. She was born at 4:26 a.m., weighed 7 lbs. and 11 oz., and was 19 3/4 inches long. I was in labor around 8 hours and Dr. Wideman and all of the nurses at Brookwood made my birthing experience so comfortable (well, maybe that's not the best word but you get the point!).

So I guess I will be renaming the blog soon because it will probably turn into the Catherine show. It will be a great way to keep grandparents and friends up to date with Catherine's development. She has already changed so much and time seems to be flying by. When you are nursing and constantly watching the clock it makes the day go by so fast. She was a little jaundiced but after two sets of lab work on Friday and Monday, her levels are returning to normal. We quickly realized doctor visits are not going to be much fun and Daddy was so miserable he could stand to go back yesterday.

She is definitely a Daddy's girl already. Sid has been WONDERFUL with her. He has probably changed more diapers than I have.....seriously!! We are dreading him leaving in a few days. As sad as we are he's 100 times more sad though. This too shall pass....and it won't be long until we are all under one roof again!

That's all for now....off to nap while she is napping. I'm exhausted but it's worth every minute of it. She's a really good baby. I'm just praying that lasts for a while!! We feel so blessed and are humbled everytime we look at her or hold her.

Showered......literally!!

Do you want to feel loved and realize how extremely blessed you are?? Have a baby. Sid and I have been completely taken back by how gracious and giving people have been to help us prepare for baby Catherine. Over the last 4 weeks we have had 7, yes SEVEN, showers!! From HHS folks, to our amazing family, to our friends, we are more than ready to welcome Catherine into our home.

As mom and I finished unpacking the last of the baby stuff, Sunday night, I started having some pain in my abdomen and back. She made made me stop right then and pack a bag. It was at that point that this all became extremely real to me. If all goes as planned, we are scheduled to induce on the evening of Easter Sunday. I finally feel READY to meet her and know that the fun and the real journey are just beginning. It's truly amazing how God does everything in His time and takes care of His children. Enjoy some pictures from my showers! In reverse order:

Decatur Shower

Muscle Shoals Shower

HHS Choir Shower

Homewood COC Shower

Birmingham "Friends" Shower

HHS Shower

HHS Guard Shower

The next big thing

Following Thanksgiving my life went into overdrive. For choral directors, Christmas is a super busy time of year which is usually followed by a nice break and downtime until after Spring Break. Well, this year has been different and for the past 3 months I have constantly been preparing for the "next big thing." In December it was Dinner Theater. In January it was AMEA. Then started February with UAB Honor Choir, All-State auditions, and District all in a matter of a few days. Oh yeah, let's not forget winterguard rehearsals 2 days a week and 2 weekend competitions in Tennessee.

This morning I arrived home from my most recent "big thing", our choir trip to Orlando/Disney. It was a fantastic trip. I got on the bus every night exhausted, feet swollen, back hurting but so happy because I teach a truly wonderful group of kids. They were so sweet and worried about me being preggo and treking around Disney for 3 days. I also had a great group of friends who are also my colleagues who went above and beyond to take care of me and make sure that everything went smoothly. Even though it poured rain and was FREEZING they were troopers and survived another memorable and successful trip.

So I'm sitting here today trying to recuperate from a long trip but excited because all of the other "big things" are over and I can FINALLY focus on the biggest thing......bringing Catherine into this world! I feel like I haven't truly been able to prepare for her because of so much going on at work but now my full attention is hers and making sure that we are prepared to bring her home. We have no crib, no changing table, no nursery decor and I feel so behind. But have no fear.....I'm in official baby mode. We are attending a birthing class next weekend and I think that's when it will really set in. We are also blessed to have great friends and family throwing us quite a few showers over the next few weeks so I'm looking forward to those as well.

Here's Catherine at 32 weeks....

Sigh......and smile.

I was at the ACDA Summer Celebration in July when I found out that my choir had been accepted to perform at the 2010 Alabama Music Educator's Association annual In-service Conference. I had mixed emotions that day because I knew what an honor it was to be invited to perform but it also scared the mess out of me knowing we would be performing for my colleagues and people who KNOW music.

Since then, I have spent a lot of time and energy into preparing my students to rise to the challenge of performing for this conference. There were days where I said to myself, "What was I thinking doing this?" or "There's no way we are going to be ready." My choir is young and the first few months of school I thought I had made a mistake in applying for this performance.

Well, on Friday, we performed. I have never felt such a since a rush of emotions all at one time like I did that day. I looked out in the audience and saw my family, my friends, my former students, parents of students, and colleagues and knew that I was about to share with them something so special, a part of my heart. This group of kids came together over the past few weeks to create some magical musical moments and I was so happy that we were able to recreate that on Friday. They sang with passion and a true understanding of what it was they were singing about. Those were our goals and they surpassed them.

I have put my heart and soul into building this program and Friday's performance is one that I will always remember. Through tear's, I told this to my students on Friday before we performed along with how proud I was of them and how blessed I was to be their teacher. From their reactions, it will be a performance that THEY will remember for years to come and that my friends, is why I teach.

Now it's on to get ready for district and Orlando!! No rest for the weary but there will definitely be a more relaxed feeling in the choir room at HHS this week!

If it wasn't for bad luck......

.....we'd have NO luck at all. We like to call it Hearn luck!

Sid's checking accounts were hacked by a certain "Arabic language news network." I'm afraid to say too much...don't want the FBI tracking my blogs! LOL. Needless to say, the timing could not have been worse. Thankfully, the bank says he'll get the money back and he caught it quickly so it could have been worse.

AND, school is cancelled tomorrow. Now normally I would be jumping with joy....however, I have only the BIGGEST performance in my 7 year career coming up in 2 weeks and we desperately needed all of the rehearsal time we could get. It better come a darn blizzard. It seems like there have been endless interruptions at school this entire year. Very frustrating but we'll hit the ground running on Friday.....assuming they don't cancel school Friday too......I'm not even going to think about that possibility.

I guess I'll try and enjoy my day "off"...... oh wait, the TIDE plays for a National Championship tomorrow...I'm suddenly feeling much better. ROLL TIDE!!!! :-)

Pregnancy Pics

So here are all of the ultrasound pics I have. Currently, I'm at 26 weeks and feeling GREAT!

26 weeks

21 weeks

16 weeks




12 weeks

Back to Blogging!

So apparently I'm a horrible blogger. Now that we are getting closer to the baby arriving I want to try to blog more often. Not that many people follow my blog so this is more a scrapbook of sorts of all of the exciting things that are going on in our life right now.

I had saved a few blogs regarding my pregnancy when we first found out, before we had told anyone. I'm going to publish those now and will update with new pictures as well. The old posts are on August 9th and September 11th. I enjoyed going back to read these and relive how I felt when I first found out I was pregnant!

We had a fantastic Christmas filled with lots of food, family, and friend time. I love getting time off during the holidays. Sid was able to come home for 2 weeks and we enjoyed spending lots of quality time catching up and reconnecting. We visited the Hearn's and Richardson's for a few days and enjoyed our time there as we always do.

For now it's back to work. January is going to be a SUPER busy month with AMEA, winterguard, and getting ready for baby. The countdown is on to meeting Catherine and to our family being reunited and living under one roof again. I can't wait!!!