Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Grandma Vickie

My mom is wonderful! Have I ever mentioned that on here before? She is a great mom period, but I am especially thankful that she came out to help us adjust after Alayna was born. She came to help after we had Madeleine and Ian too and each time her help has been invaluable! It was so nice to be able to go take a nap when I needed to and not have to worry about the cooking and cleaning. We have had lots of homemade waffles the past two weeks--Grandma's specialty! I guess I'll have to perfect my waffle making skills. And by "perfect" I mean acquire since I don't know that I have ever made waffles before (you know, real ones, not eggos).

Looks like Alayna is giving her a bit of a smile, don't you think? Thanks for everything, Mom! We miss you already!

Friday, July 16, 2010

Picture update

Do you remember Madeleine's Easter dress from earlier this year? (refresh your memory here, if you want) I loved her dress when I saw it at Marshalls and I'm sure I would have gotten it anyway, but I thought it was really darling that it came with a matching doll-size dress, pictured here on this teddy bear. But what do you think of it on Alayna?

How precious, right?! Of course it doesn't fit well enough that she could wear it for more than just a few pictures, but I couldn't resist checking to see if she could wear it and match her sister.


Then I decided I might as well put Ian in some coordinating dress clothes to capture these 3 sweet babies of mine. I love Ian's manly pose.

This is what Alayna wore for her pictures in the hospital. She was really loving that pacifier and actually ended up looking pretty mad in all her pictures from this little photo shoot since I had to take the pacifier away before each shot. Oh well, they're still cute. I have had to put her on restriction from her pacifier since she liked it so much. She seemed to be getting a little confused about what to do when it came time to nurse so we're taking a break from the paci. She doesn't seem to mind.

Labor and Delivery

If you have spoken to me at all in the last nine months, you probably knew that I was very excited to not be pregnant anymore. From the beginning. I don't do pregnancy very well. No, I don't get really sick, just really grouchy and fat and I have a rotten attitude for almost the entire time. Of course I had to stick it out till the end, but thankfully doctors these days will schedule elective inductions at 39 weeks. I was all over that! I did the same with Ian and it went really well so I couldn't see any reason not to do it again this time. My doctor scheduled me for Tuesday, the 13th and Spencer kept trying to convince me that I should wait till the 15th since my mom would be here and we wouldn't have any issues with finding someone to watch the kids. Well, I had to put my foot down and say that I didn't intend to be pregnant a minute longer than I had to be and I made arrangements for friends to watch Madeleine and Ian. (Big thanks to Shelley and Amy for helping out!!)


In California when I had Ian, I went to the hospital at night to start my induction. Here they had me call at 5:00am to make sure there was room for me, and then I went in to get started. Rather than wake the kids to go to our friend's house at that ungodly hour, I got up and drove myself to the hospital. Kind of unceremonious, huh? The nurses could tell I wasn't there to have my first baby since I showed up without an entourage. Spencer let the kids sleep till their normal waking time, dropped them off and made it to the hospital around 9. He hadn't missed much of anything. I had gotten the IV around 7:00 so had been on pitocin for a couple hours, but wasn't progressing superfast. When the contractions were starting to hurt a bit but before I was ready to be confined to the bed by the epidural, they gave me something in the IV for the pain. I can't remember what it was called. I think it started with an 'N.' Anybody know what I'm talking about? That was an interesting experience! My nurse told me I would feel it come on suddenly, like I had drank a margarita too fast. Well, I didn't know what that would feel like, but there was no mistaking it when it happened. It did help with the pain enough that I rested and watched a movie while I waited for my contractions to get worse.

I ended up getting the epidural around 1:00pm, very shortly before my doctor came to break my water. (sidenote: The anesthesiologist put it in my back while I sat on the edge of the bed, which was SO much easier than trying to curl into a ball like I did with my other two kids.) I was dilated to a 5 at this point. She told me she would come back around 5:00pm to see how I was doing, to which I thought, "uh, I hope I need you to come deliver this baby before that!" After she broke my water, my contractions started really doing their job and I progressed quickly. Around 3:30 the nurse checked me and found that I was fully dilated and it was time to call the doctor. I could feel some pressure with each contraction but not very strong so I wasn't sure I was really ready. She suggested we do a test push to see how it went and then if I was ready we would call the doctor to come over. I couldn't feel what happened when I pushed but evidently I was ready and Alayna was ready to be born. So we waited till the doctor came back. Once she got there, I pushed through two contractions and our little angel was born at 4:15pm. I must say, it was pretty heavenly to not feel any of it. With Madeleine, I couldn't feel anything thanks to the epidural, but I also had never had a baby before so I had no idea how to push one out of me and it took over an hour of pushing and a vacuum to get her out. With Ian, my doctor and I didn't want a repeat of how Madeleine's delivery went so she let my epidural wear off before I delivered him. He was born after only a few minutes of pushing too, but it was painful and totally exhausting. This time, I was blissfully numb and I only had to push a few times. It was perfect.

I have to confess that a good part of my joy in giving birth is the fact that I am no longer pregnant. The majority is how wonderful it is to welcome another baby to our family, but I can't deny how happy it makes me to not be pregnant.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Introducing...

Alayna Camille Rands. Born at 4:15pm on July 13, 2010. She weighed 7lbs. 14oz. and was 20.5 inches long.

Her sister and brother are so happy that she is no longer in my tummy.

Not quite as happy about that as I am though.
She is a beautiful, sweet baby and I really can't say enough how glad we all are that she is here! I'll recount my labor and delivery on another post later for anyone who is interested in that kind of thing.

Friday, July 9, 2010

Pictures, finally!!

I have no excuses to put it off any longer. I'm getting a bit more settled each day and now that we have our internet connection, it is high time to post pictures of our new home. Plus, I'm supposed to have this baby on Tuesday so I better do it now before it's old news, right? We are so happy to be in here! The pictures hardly do it justice. You'll just have to come visit us and see it for yourself. Until then, let's take a little photo tour:

Dining room

View from entryway
Kitchen view 1
Kitchen view 2 (master bedroom through the door in the corner)
Breakfast nook
Family room (half bath and laundry room are off to the left)


I'll sneak this one in here. I'm SO glad I won't be looking like this for too much longer!
Guest bedroom
Game room
I didn't get pictures of the kids' rooms and our room that are worth sharing. An empty bedroom is an empty bedroom, right? I'll post pics when those rooms come together with decorations, etc. The kids's rooms at least.
At this point I am patting myself on the back for not still being completely surrounded by boxes, but we have a long way to go. Hopefully it won't take too much longer to be all the way settled, but I'm not expecting to be done before our baby girl arrives. Moving is a huge project and I am thankful I have had the energy to do all that I have done. My big task now is to transform the guestroom from the dumping ground for boxes it currently is to something that my mom will be able to sleep in when she comes next week. As long as I don't go into labor tonight, I think Spencer and I can get that done.
Now that we are Texans, we are missing all of our friends and loved ones from the places we have lived and hope you are all doing well!