Congratulations Pastor Jill!

Congratulations to Pastor Jill Russel and husband Andrew, proud Parents of Cassidy Carolyn Russell. Following is a copy of letter Pastor Jill sent out to all and pictures of the baby. Good Luck proud parents! Our prayers are with you.

Dear Friends, Church Families, Colleauges, and Family,

Some of you know that we decided to deliver Cassidy 5 weeks early due to some complications from my side that made it safer for her  to come into the world early.  She arrived on Thursday night (after 2 days of trying to induce labor) via c-section.   She is a little girl (only 4 pounds 11 oz at birth) but doing remarkably well.  Her name is Cassidy Carolyn Russell. 

She amazed all of us with great apgar scores and no real problems at all.  She is so small that feeding her immediately and not waiting from my milk to come was critical. It took a while for her to be interested in eating but now she is a eating like a champ and we hope to phase out the formula later this week.   We are just thrilled to have her home...we finally got out of the hospital yesterday.   Andrew is home for the next two weeks and then my mom and dad will be here for a week so we have lots of support.    Andrew was absolutely amazing, by the way...he was with Cassidy from the moment of her birth and stayed with her during all the initial observations and tests they do with premature babies....then taking care of me which was a bigger job given the complications and surgery.    He's a great father already...Cassidy and I are very lucky to have him.


I tried to send this to as many folks as I had easy email access for...please feel free to forward to other friends (especially from the churches I've served since I only hit a smattering of folks from each place).

I'm attaching a couple of pictures of Cassidy here. 

Thanks again to all of you for your notes, emails, flowers, calls, prayers, and thoughts.   We felt the support this last week.

Peace,

Jill