Update

We have not done well at updating regularly and for those who check on us regularly, we apologize.

Lincoln is now just over 4 months old and life has been so good with him in it! We feel so blessed to have such a sweet, happy & usually laughing baby. We also understand that it means he will either be crazy when he gets older, or #2 will be the polar opposite.. :) So we are enjoying every minute with little Link!

Here are a few pictures of Lincoln recently.

Bath Time!

Thanksgiving

Newsies

Best Buds, Abe & Lincoln

Nixon loving her brother

How can you resist?
All snuggled into mom's sling

Pictures

Here are some pictures of our little Link from the last couple of weeks. As of this morning he weighed in at a little over 9 pounds! He is growing so quick:( We are loving every minute of little Lincoln, even those at 4 in the morning. He is such a sweet baby that just wants to cuddle...so we do... all day :)

Some teaser photos from a shoot we had done when he was 5 days old. Our very talented friend Amanda took these. Her website Amandaelpersphotography.com has all her info if you are

looking for some great family photos.

Video Time

Big smiley!

We Need Your Help!!

As most of you may already know, Natalie's father, Lee Richards, was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. He is currently in his 3rd round of chemotherapy and is fighting this awful disease.

On September 22, Natalie & I will be walking in The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s (LLS) Light The Night Walk at East Noble High School in Kendallville to raise funds to help find a cure for blood cancers. LLS is the world’s largest voluntary health organization dedicated to funding blood cancer research, education and patient aid.

Please join us in the fight to cure leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease and myeloma, and improve the quality of life of patients and their families. You can help by making a contribution to our fundraising efforts for the Light The Night Walk. Help us reach our goal of raising $5,000 as a team in 2009 by making a contribution.

Here are some suggested donation amounts and the impact you can have:

$20 (Leukemia is the leading cause of cancer-related death among children under the age of 20)

$52 ($1 a week for an entire year)

$100 (100% chance for a cure in the future—with your help!)

$150 (Enough to provide one patient with financial assistance for a year)

$360 ($1 for each patient who will be diagnosed in the next 24 hours)

$500 (Enough to fund a Family Support Group for an entire year)

$1,000 (Enough to provide one patient with co-pay assistance for a year)Other (Every dollar helps us move one step closer to putting cancer out of business!)

Please sponsor us. By doing so, we will be helping save lives together. Your contribution is 100% tax deductible. In addition to your valuable sponsorship, I encourage you to join me at Light The Night by joining my team, Lee Bob’s Crew, and walking with me as we take steps towards cures. Click to DONATE or REGISTER and click the “Walk With Us” tab at the top of the page.

Thank you for supporting us in our effort to save lives!

Sincerely,

Matt & Natalie Troyer

Big Pappa with Lincoln

Family Fun Time

We have been having a lot of fun with little Lincoln. Watching every little thing he does and every noise he makes. It is pretty crazy how much we feel he has changed in his first few days of life.

Great Grandma Troyer, Vickie, Lindsey & Jenny all came down yesterday to visit Lincoln. Sorry Jenny we didn't get a picture of you with him since you were scared! :)

Aaron & Jenny Lee got him a pretty sweet outfit as well so we will see how long he can keep it clean tonight.

Grandpa Lee's sister Pat got Lee and Lincoln similar hawaiian shirts so we get some pictures of them together today.

The dogs are warming up to Lincoln and we are impressed with how they have handled it. Nevada is pretty concerned with him when he is crying or making noises and Nixon just kinda stays away and doesn't understand what he is or why he is moving around.

Nevada is trying to get back in the #1 spot with her mother. We don't think she will be able to steal that spot from little Lincoln though.

I'm sure we have a biased opinion, but it seems he gets even more cute every picture we take. This is currently in top place.

That's all for now. More to come.

Home Sweet Home

Today was a big day for all of us. We got to come home tonight about 6 PM which was just over 48 hrs from his birth. We are getting settled in and hoping to get him on a good schedule over the next few weeks. He seems to be a little calmer here at the house but it could be that he is not getting poked and prodded by nurses every couple hours. Our experience at Community North was excellent. We couldn't be happier with everything from the building, room, staff, doctors & food. They really did a nice job and made it a great experience for us. Here are a few pictures of our room.

Main Room

"The Man Corner"

This is our picture on our way to the hospital Monday night

Here are the last pictures of us at the hospital on our way out

Ready to go home!

We came home and enjoyed the cake that my work friends made for us. Grandma & Grandpa Richards are down for a little while with us and Matt & Janelle Spencer stopped by as well.

We know we won't get much sleep the next few nights, weeks, months but who cares when you can look at a face like this...

Watching him grow...

L, M & N

He is Here!!

Lincoln Lee Troyer was born at 5:26 PM yesterday.
He was 20-1/2" long & 7 lbs 4 oz.

Mommy and Lincoln are doing great. He is eating his fair share and we all got some sleep last night so we feel a lot better today. We will most likely be headed home tomorrow but they haven't really told us any of that yet.

It is insane all the emotion involved in having a child. Even though we both knew it was coming and thought we were prepared, we were immediately given a larger capacity to love that we never knew before. Everything about him is perfect and we can't keep our eyes off of him.

Thanks again for all of your prayers, thoughts & messages to us. We can't wait for everyone to meet him!

Matt, Natalie & Lincoln

It's a Beautiful Day... or night!

Well the time is finally here! We are at the Community North Hospital tonight here in Indy and Natalie is all hooked up to the baby monitor. We are expecting our little Lincoln to make his debut into the world sometime tomorrow hopefully. We are both still in disbelief that it is really happening. With all the doctor visits the last few weeks, it felt like the normal drive to the hospital to get checked out.

We have also tried to keep things exciting on our last day. We were loading the car up tonight and the dogs decided they needed to run which led to both of us chasing the dogs about a block away from our house! Our neighbors got a kick out of Natalie running through the grassy field down the road. Matt & Janelle, thanks again for housing our wild dogs for a few days for us! We know we owe you big time for taking on Nixon!

Well here is one of our first ultrasound pictures of Lincoln at 10 weeks.



It has been an incredible journey and extremely fascinating to see him grow and develop all of his parts. We are in awe of God's creation and are so excited to be able to hold him tomorrow!

We will keep you all posted and get pictures up as soon as possible. Thank you for all the love and support we have felt from so many close friends and family.

Matt & Nat

The countdown begins!

As most of you know, we are approaching on the birthdate of our first son! We are so excited to meet our little Lincoln and still trying to wrap our brains around the idea of raising a child as far as teaching, being an example for him, etc. We are blown away by the beauty of God's creation every time we see Lincoln on the ultrasound screen and I am sure the amazement will continue once he arrives in a few weeks.

July 28th here we come!

PS - Look how hot Natalie is right now!

For those who appreciate Switchfoot & Nickel Creek

Fiction Family - When She's Near from ATO Records on Vimeo.