the best kinda exhaustion

every time family visits i’m wiped out for the next couple of days due to attempting to make the most of our time together.  being 10-12 hours from my fam is still not my idea of fun nor is it always easy.  it’s gotten easier in the 9 years i’ve lived in other states, but i’ll never enjoy not getting to be in arkansas with all the rest of the fam.

i was newly preggo with jilly the last time my older sister came to visit, and i was super excited for this visit to take place since it’d been so long.  it’s been attempted a couple of times in recent years, but it was never able to work out.

it was so, so fun to have mom, ginny, camryn, and henry here even if the time went by way too quickly.  there are a ton of pictures, but here are a few of my favorites:

{i love my grammy!}

{this girl is growing up way too fast!!}

{good to have grammy back!}

{wild man henry on wheels}

{nope, bud, still no mail}

{so glad my kids have a grammy who is this much fun!}

{her bounce u obsession}

{his bounce u obession}

{blue sand hands!}

{camryn the thinker}

{finally, some water at the spray park!}

{i promise, i won’t spray you, come closer}

{yup, we played as we were – clothed- since we didn’t know it’d been turned on}

{make a wish}

{so thankful for such amazing family!}

the big day

Honestly, this post is mostly for me.  Most of you probably won’t stick with reading it from start to finish, but I want it written so I remember how the day of Laurel’s birth went.  With Jilly I blogged several times through out the day to say how things were going, but I did all of my updating on facebook this time around.

We got to the hospital right on time for our 7:15 am check in.  To say that they had expanded the L&D floor since we had Jilly would be an understatement.  It was way bigger.

8:22am on fb:  “at lakeside, hooked up to pitocin, hating my iv, excited about the day ahead!!!”

After going through the routine questions, all of which I had already answered over the phone, things got rolling.  My least favorite part of the day is always getting the iv put in.  That day was no exception.  Not only did it hurt, I bled all over my hand.  As much as I was unhappy with the iv, it was necessary for the pitocin, and I was definitely ready to get that rolling.

11:50am on fb:  “enjoying epidural bliss”

I didn’t last as long as in the past with getting the epidural.  I had every intention of getting one, but I usually try to wait as long as I can.  My tolerance has apparently decreased though.  I have no clue how epidurals work, but I know that this was by far my strongest epidural of the 3.  I would almost say it was too strong.  I kept feeling like my feet were falling off  the sides of the bed, but I couldn’t lift them to move them where I wanted.

2:38pm on fb:  “gunther is apparently in no rush, it’s slow going here, but hopefully things will pick up soon”

At this point, I was getting tired and feeling a bit frustrated.  I had started the day at about 2 and had only made it to not quite 4 at this point.  I was ready for some speedier progress.  One of my nurses moved me into the throne position to see if that would speed things up.  I spent just over an hour like that before she returned and asked if I was ready to lie back down.  I was more than ready.

This is where things got a little crazy for me.  I had gotten to 7, but Gunther’s heart rate was not reading well.  I was rolled to one side with no luck, and then to the other side with still no luck for a better read.  (Remember I’m not only 9 months preggo, but I also have zero feeling in my lower half.)  Being told to roll from side to side was stressing me out.  My other nurse called the nurse working with me to see what was going on.  The nurse in the room decided to attach a heart monitor to Gunther’s head.  Then she was putting oxygen on me.  All of the time, I’m starting to worry about why all this fuss was necessary since nothing like this  had ever been necessary with Nate or Jilly.  My other nurse came in the room, and made the comment “you did the internal monitor?  how’d you know how to do that?”  The reply was, “We practiced on oranges in class.”  Okay, worrying me is now in tears freaking out, not only is no one explaining what was going on, but apparently I have a newbie nurse doing all of this.  The more experienced nurse then started to explain that Gunther’s heart rate had started to drop and they needed to get it back up.  Also my blood pressure, which is always really low, had dropped.  They were going to give me meds to raise my blood pressure, and it would hopefully bring her heart rate up.  Luckily it worked, and things calmed down.  All of that took place in about a 10-15 minute time frame at the beginning of which I was at 7.  By the end of that time I was at a full 10.

5:20pm on fb:  “god has blessed us greatly with laurel jane knorr!  7lb 3.5oz, 20.5″, 4:30pm”

Less than 3 pushes during one contraction, and I was holding Laurel Jane.  She got an 8 and 9 on her apgars.  Although Brad put 4:30 on fb for me, it was actually 4:26pm.  It took a good 3 hours after that before my epidural had worn off enough for the nurses to trust moving me to a wheelchair so we could be in a postpartum room.

The past week and a half have been spent falling in love with our littlest.  We’ve survived the biggers having major colds and keeping them from littlest.  We also survived the jaundice roller coaster.  I’m still navigating the hormonal roller coaster, but I’m truly appreciating it being the weekend and having Brad here.  I’ll get back in the swing of sharing more pictures, but we’re currently still adjusting to our new normal.

She’s here!!!

Laurel Jane

10.13.10

7lb 3.5oz

20.5 inches

4:26pm

a dimple in each cheek!

(more about yesterday later and if i ever find the camera cord we packed, i’ll post pictures)

playing

we’ve been playing.

playing at parks and playing the waiting game.  we are less than 48 hours away from our scheduled hospital arrival.  as long as she stays put, which although i’m uncomfortable, i’d prefer she’d do at this point, we head to the hospital to check in at 7:15 am on wednesday morning.  we’re all super excited and about as ready as i think we’ll ever be.  we have a little more cleaning of the house to take care of, and i need to find one of those “what to bring” lists to make sure i’ve not forgotten anything, but i think we’re ready to meet and welcome our sweet baby girl.

3 weeks!!!

3 weeks from today is our big day!!!

i think i could currently live off kit-kats and perfectly ripened pears. (the only one we currently have left is not ripe yet.)

i have spent most of the past week and a half lying down to alleviate pain in my right back/side.  (today i have been mostly pain-free!!!)

our countdown chain is getting shorter and shorter!!

i’m still debating using our old fashion swaddle blankets vs. purchasing some swaddlers.

it’s probably about time i track down our carseat.

i have every intention of preregistering with our hospital later today.

i’m still desiring to find that perfect coming home outfit.  had considered ordering this with the correct initial and name, but never did.

need to come up with an idea of what gunther is going to give nate as a present.  (i think i’m going to have her give jilly a dora doll.)

i’m still very open to the idea of her deciding to come earlier than 3 weeks from today!

(apparently registering for the hospital has become a little more technical than the paper form i filled out and mailed in for naters!!!)

the waiting game

just over 3 weeks left until gunther arrives, and although bags are not packed, newborn diapers are not bought, bumper pads and are not sewn back together, i could not be more ready.

is 31 (nearly 32) too young to feel too old to be pregnant.  i definitely feel this way.  maybe if it were my first pregnancy it might be different, but i just feel like my body and mind are exhausted with pregnancy.  i’m ready to feel like i can move around and play with my kids without being in pain or just too tired.

one exciting and fun thing i have accomplished is getting all of our 0-3 month clothing washed and put in gunther’s room.  i need to go through and pull out a couple of things to take to the hospital for her though.

and as much as i am a planner and love it that way, i’m kinda hoping she decides to come before our inducing date.  i want to experience that “is this it?” panic/excitement.  although i have no idea how that would play out with making arrangement for nate and jilly, we know a ton of people who would be willing to help us out i’m sure.

we’re at the point of weekly check-ups with my doctor.  as of last friday (35 weeks 2 days) i was one cm, but sweet gunther had not dropped yet.  where as 1 cm doesn’t seem like a lot when you’re ready to be done, i know i have pass 1 to get to the finish line.  if she does decide to hold out until the 13th, let’s hope the next 3 weeks fly by!!!!

it’s all in the numbers

numbers

2:  days until jilly’s birthday

5: days until preschool starts

48:  days until baby sister is here

nate’s been a bit number obsessed lately.  it started with knowing jilly’s birthday was getting close.  we’ve been counting squares on the calendar every morning for the past few weeks.  luckily now he remembers without having to count.

although he’s excited for school, i think i’m a bit more into that countdown.  those 2 mornings a week will be a nice change of pace around here, and he loves learning.  it’s a win-win.

and the countdown we are all most excited about is the countdown to baby sister.  i still get routinely asked by nate if she is “getting closer to zero”.  he loves the countdown chain we made yesterday.  it gives him a visual of how much further we have to go.  today’s number is 48.  for several reasons we will most likely induce october 13 (i’ll post about it at some point soon) and therefore we are slightly ahead of the what the ticker on the sidebar of the blog would say.  less than 50 days!!!  woohoo!!!

time behind bars

a new friend has joined the rank of much loved aminals around our house.

meet piggy.

he has joined the family along the same lines as hobbes and sammy.

it’s strange getting ready for gunther.  with nate, everything was new and needed.  with jilly we had add girl stuff to our collection of baby goods.  this time around it feels so strange to have so much of what we need.  there’s nothing really to prep.  there are certain things that could use replacing after 2 kids worth of use, but it’s not the end of the world if gunther uses a couple of worn out things.  that made finding piggy feel like a big deal since we hadn’t purchased anything else for her yet.

as soon as jilly moves to her big girl bed in just over a month, he’ll begin his stint behind bars in the crib!

so excited to officially be third trimester tomorrow!!!!

me?, sleepy?, no way!

what’s that?

oh yeah, i was gonna attempt to be a better blogger in july.

well, apparently blogging while pregnant with kiddo #3 is just not meant to be.  or at least not the mon-fri blogging i’d like it to be. i like routines.  that’s why the mon-fri thing appeals to me so much.  unfortunately, my body likes naps at quiet time much more than blogging for the time being.

we’ve also been a wee bit busy around here. in the past two weeks we’ve painted the stairway, hallway, and nate’s room; brad and a friend, adam, drywalled a wall in our basement which was started while we were on vacation; we planted 2 sticks trees in the backyard, and brad officiated the first of three wedding he’s got scheduled this month.  mix all that in with regular routines and tasks, and we’ve been pretty non-stop.  i’d like to think we’ll slow down a little soon, but with jilly’s big girl bedding on it’s way i’m sure we’ll be picking colors and painting her new room soon.  there’s also talk of building the closet that goes with the wall that was built in the basement.

it’s all good stuff, but it’s leaving me exhausted!

in the wild word of kids, they are quite busy too.

naters is getting more and more confident on his bike.  we’ve seen major improvements in the past week.  he asks a lot of questions about if his baby sister is “getting closer to zero”.  i also dodged the “how is she going to get out” question last week by changing the subject when a simple “the doctors at the hospital will help” didn’t suffice.  he’s full of questions; seriously,  the boy can ask 100 in an hour easily.  we often have to have “mommy needs a break from answering questions” time.

jilly’s literally changing day by day right now (a month and a half and she’ll be 2!!).  we’re seriously losing any bit of baby that was left in her.  she is a big time talker and uses 5-6 word sentences quite often.  she’s also likes to add the long e sound to half of the words she says:  dora and boots-y (she’s obsessed with them), shoes-y, lunch-y, dress-y, the list goes on and on.  she’s still hanging onto her pacifier and still goes back and forth with her interest in using the potty.  she’s still tough and daring.  her first combat tactic with her brother is to grab his glasses off his face.  we’ve not yet figured out how to put an end to this.  we also haven’t figured out how to stop the angry, high-pitch scream she is becoming well known for everywhere we go.  in the end though, she continually melts my and brad’s heart.  the dimples, the blue eyes that can smile, and her sweet little girl voice are beyond adorable.

i’d offer you pictures, of all of our house progress and the kids, but that’s another area i’ve not gotten around to lately.  you know i’m tired when the camera doesn’t get pulled out!!!

i’ll aim to put some pictures up at some point this week.

littlest update

our littlest is doing well.

the two bigger kids keep me busy enough that our littlest doesn’t seem to get much blog attention.  i’m sure that will change though come october.

i went for a routine check up today, and everything looks great.  her heartrate was 162 bpm and my measurements were pretty much right on.  i had a little weight jump, but i expected that since i’m a terrible eater when brad is out of town.  overall though, i’ve only gained 10 pounds so far which is wonderful in my book.  although i don’t obsess about how much i put on during pregnancy, i do keep aware of it because i gained 50 pounds with nate and have no desire to repeat that again.

i was able to confirm with my doctor that it was most likely braxton hicks contractions i was feeling  this past saturday and sunday.  i haven’t dealt with these with either previous pregnancies so it was nice to be reassured by the doctor that it was all normal.  luckily i’ve not felt any discomfort in that way since going to bed sunday night.  although i wouldn’t mind her coming anytime after i hit 37 weeks, she can stay put until then!

next visit, glucose test!  yippee!!