Our Hospital Stay

I gave birth at Highland Hospital here in Rochester. Since I had a C-section, we stayed longer than for a vaginal birth. I was admitted Thurs night, had Avery Sat early morning and we were discharged Tues afternoon. So we spent several nights in the hospital.

Overall I was very pleased with things. All of the nurses and doctors we encountered were very nice and pretty helpful overall. The food was just ok-it's hospital food, what can ya say?! They had a breakfast buffet for us everyday which was pretty good. Lunch and dinner was brought to me everyday-that food was just ok.

Here's a pic of Avery getting wheeled to our room-#336


The maternity ward was pretty dead the entire time we were there. When we got to our room Sat morning, they apologized for giving us a small room. Apparently when you have a c-section they give you a bigger room for some reason, but she said they were full when we got admitted. Boy did that change! The rest of the time we were there it was like a ghost town. We would take walks down the hallway and room upon room were empty-it was strange! Very quiet, but peaceful which was nice. Overall I think we were very happy with things there-no major complaints about anything.

We had quite a few visitors as you can imagine!
Sunday we had visits from....
Grandpa B. (my Dad):

Grandma B. (my Mom):

Grandpa D. (aka "Pa"-Gabe's Dad):

Grandma D. (Gabe's Mom):

Aunt Molly (Gabe's sister):

Another family photo:

A pic of Avery in her cute little hat. I guess they have volunteers at the hospital that knit these hats for all of the newborns. They are so cute! We ended up with two of them-this pink one and one that's white with some purple in it.

A cute shot of Avery in my lap:

We had more visitors on Monday too!!
My friend Katie who was in town (in Buffalo) from Omaha. Her and her Dad made the drive out to visit us which was so nice of them to do!!

My friend Megan (Noah's Mom)who also drove in from Buffalo:

Our friends, Richie and Julie (Carly's parents):


Another cute pic of Avery after nursing:

A great shot of one of Avery's first smiles-too darn cute!

A pic of Avery after her second bath in the hospital-she hated every minute of it!!

We Are Parents!

It's official-Gabe and I are parents! I'm apologizing in advance that this post will be lengthly, but I wanted to give the story of the birth as best as I can! I'm also back posting these since it's taking me forever to get caught up!

From the previous post, you saw that my water had broken at work and I was being admitted Thursday evening to the hospital.
These are my last belly pics before leaving the house for the hospital:



We went in around 6:30 in the evening. Both of my parents made the trip out that night to be there with us. When I got there, they admitted me and started my cervadil around 9pm. That was the excitement for that night-we tried to get some sleep, which didn't really happen since we were interrupted a lot.

Friday morning they started me on pitocin at 7am. Shortly after, I was having contractions about every 2min. When you're on pitocin, they like to keep them spaced out every 3min or so. Since mine were so close, they didn't "up" the dosage much throughout the day like they were supposed to. So, my contractions really weren't getting strong enough to cause me to dilate. I was just having them very frequently. Around 2pm I got the epidural and at that point was only 1.5cm dilated. Once I got it, life was good for a short time. I couldn't feel anything and my contractions kept going. They did increase the pitocin at that point so I slowly started dilating more.
Here's Dad joking around with me listening to the baby:

Here's a shot of Mom and I:


Like I said, having the epidural made life good-unfortunately for me it was short lived. Once I hit 4.5cm dilated, I started having very bad pressure with each contraction. The epidural takes away the pain, but not the pressure so there was nothing they could do to make it go away. The only way I can describe it is that it felt like you had to make a bowel movement rightnow. Imagine that every 2min and lasting a minute or so. Not fun! About this time, the doctor checked me (it wasn't my doctor but another one at the practice that was on call). She told me my pelvic bone structure was a funny shape and that I may not be able to have a vaginal delivery.

Around 930 they had me start pushing. I was finally dilated enough! They had me push until around 10:15 with very little progress. They decided to give me a break to see if the baby would drop some more on its own. At that point, the labor got really bad. I started having the shakes really bad and I also started dry heaving with each contraction. So you can imagine the fun this was-and do I dare say that it went on for several hours?! They started me pushing again around 10:45pm. I pushed for roughly 2 hours (yep, that's almost 3 hours total!) again with not much happening. They could see the head but that was about it. The doctor looked at me and said "At this point, all we can do is say you did the best you could but I think we have to go to the OR." Believe it or not, I was relieved! After all the pressure, shaking and dry heaving, it was probably the worst 6 or so hours of my life. There were many times I thought to myself "there is no way in hell I'm having another kid." I felt bad for Gabe having to see me go through all of that-it definitely was not pretty and I'm sure he felt helpless. It was a very rough and long day.

So around 12:45am they started preparing us for the OR. I was still having contractions, dry heaving, etc all the way to the OR, death gripping the bed rails as I went. At that point, I didn't care about having surgery-I just wanted the pain to go away and I was beyond exhausted.

I got into the OR and they started getting me prepped. Gabe wasn't in there initially-they brought him in at the last minute. They put a drape up right in front of my face so I couldn't see anything. They gave me more medicine in my epidural line so I only felt pressure, no pain at all. The thing I remember most was that I was so tired. I wanted to sleep on the table and had to fight to keep my eyes open through most of the surgery. Gabe sat right at my head and we were talking most of the time wondering what was happening.

Then we heard it-the baby's cry! Sweet sound to my ears I can tell you that!
Here's a pic of the clock when baby was born:


They held the baby up so Gabe could see (I was too low down to see anything) and we kept hearing "hey little guy" and baby being referred to as "him". Gabe looked at me and said "I think it's a boy!" When they held the baby up, this is what he saw:

He couldn't tell if it was a boy or girl because the cord was in the way! So I'm lying there wondering what it is-I swear several minutes passed without them saying (I think they were playing games with us since they knew it was a surprise to us). Finally I said "So what is it?" and one doc said "do you want us to tell you?" and I said yes!! He said "It's a GIRL!!" We were shocked! I remember I was crying but no tears came out-I was so exhausted that nothing would come out!! And I still hadn't seen her yet!

After a few minutes, they let Gabe get up and take some photos of her while I was getting "put back together":


Inking her feet for footprints:

On the scale:



While taking pics, Gabe was relaying info to me "she has a lot of hair!", "she looks just like you!" and I just kept waiting to see her!

Finally they brought her over for Gabe to hold her and I got to see her! She was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen! I can't begin to explain the feeling of knowing my baby was finally here!
Here's proud Daddy with her:

And our first family photo:

Baby and I before leaving the OR:


Welcome to the world Avery Rose! Born Saturday June 27, 2009 at 1:29am. She weighed in at 8lbs 2oz and was 21" long!

Well, well, well....

The unexpected happened today! Without getting graphic on you....I was at work today and was questioning whether or not my water had broken around 11am or so. I waited a little bit longer and questioned it again. I called the doctors office and they told me to come in at 1. My strep test that they do came out positive, which means if my water breaks I have to get on IV antibiotics sooner rather than later. So that was my main concern. So I go to the doctors and waiting was torture-of course today of all days they make me wait 20min in the waiting room. Luckily once in the exam room I didn't wait long! I didn't see my doctor, but one of the others in the practice. He examined me and did a few tests and told me that my amniotic fluid was in fact leaking a slow leak. Of course I'm still not dilated at all but the water was definitely leaking. So they are admitting me in the hospital tonight! I have to call around 6pm to get my time to report and as of now they'll basically be inducing me since I'm not dilated at all. I was hoping that wouldn't have to happen, but there's nothing I can really do about it.

So I came home after my appointment and have been ready to climb the walls! I think sitting here is torture! I wish I could nap since who knows when I'll sleep again-but how are you supposed to sleep when you're having a baby in the next few hours or days?! So I've been pacing around thinking I have something to do...but I really don't. I'm pretty much packed and have been for a few weeks. I have a few little things to pack up, but nothing major. I'll probably shower and eat something but other than that, nothing. So I'm sitting here trying to kill time because I'm starting to get nervous, anxious, excited, etc. It's just insane to me to think that I'm going to be a MOM in a very short time and that I'm going to have a daughter/son soon! YIKES!!!

I Might Be Pregnant For Awhile....

So today I had my 39 week appointment...which technically I'm 39.5 weeks, but whatever. Anyways, ZERO progress-I'm still not dilated and only 50% effaced! The doctor said she expected me to be further along than this and that the baby hadn't dropped as much as she would have liked. So, she tried to "move things along" and opened me up to about 1cm, although she called it a "pseudo-1cm" since she did it and I didn't do it naturally. So, I'm crossing my fingers that her doing that gets things rolling.

If not? Well, my next appointment is next Tuesday where I'll be past my due date. They'll do a regular visit along with a non-stress test and an ultrasound to check fluid levels. If all looks good? They do nothing....if things don't look good, then they'll take action of some sort.

She told me they normally don't induce until you're 1-2 weeks past due. Since 1 week past due is July 3rd, they wouldn't induce me until after the holiday weekend, so not until the week of July 6th. Right now that sounds like forever away! I know it isn't, but when your due date is days away and that's almost 2 weeks away, it does seem like forever! Especially when you're 9 months pregnant!!

Oh, and if I happen to go into labor over 4th of July weekend, I'll end up with some random doctor...all of the docs at my practice are not on call that weekend for some reason which sucks. So I'm really really hoping I don't go that weekend!

So folks, cross your fingers that I go on my own and that it happens sooner rather than later! I'd rather not get induced at all so I'm hoping I go naturally and of course the longer it goes, the bigger I (and baby) get and the more uncomfortable things will be!

39 Weeks

Yes folks, one more week to go! I'm officially down to single digit days! Unfortunately at my last appointment, not much was going on. I'm not dilated at all but the cervix is thinning out which is at least something I guess. The past few days I haven't been feeling too great. I've been pretty nauseous and have been having bad stomach aches on and off. I mentioned it to my doctor, who said there is a stomach bug going around...or she said it could be an early sign of labor. I was actually a little nauseous last week too, but it's turned up a notch this week for sure. Luckily it's not constant, but when it comes, it's not good. I feel like I'm in my first trimester all over again! The only other bothersome thing is my swelling feet. I actually had one day this week (the day I posted my pics of my feet) where I couldn't get shoes on at all! I ended up wearing sandals to work because the shoes were not going on. It seems they get worse when it's warm and humid out. So some days are worse than others. Besides those things going on, I feel pretty darn good for only having a week until my due date. It's crazy to think that definitely in a few weeks there will be a baby in this house!

11 Months!

It's hard to believe that in one month we'll be celebrating our one year anniversary!

Yes....these are my feet!

What do you mean you don't recognize them?!

Project #3 Done!

"The Jungle"...remember it?! Before you go any further, go here to refresh your memory!

So that was last fall....spring came and here's what the jungle looked like:






You can see that stuff started to grow again, which we expected. So, we decided to get a few estimates to get this job taken care of. Lord knows it needed it and our neighbors I'm sure wanted it done :)

After having two estimates, we decided to go with Rockview Landscaping who is the brother of one of my coworkers. They came on Monday and started the demolition. I didn't really know how long it would take or what to expect when I got home from work that day. Here's what I came home to on Monday:



I was shocked that everything was pretty much gone and it looked pretty bare! The area next to the driveway used to be an area where we planted flowers (you can see a very small part of it in the original "jungle" pics). That was our one thing we did the past few years was to plant some annuals there and they were surrounded with a brick border. We decided we didn't really want that anymore-the grass was growing into the flowers all of the time and it made mowing around the flowers challenging. So we decided to get rid of it and just put grass in. I was surprised when the landscaper called Monday night and said they would probably be done on Tuesday with everything! I never thought they would have had it all done by then. Sure enough, I got home on Tuesday and they said they had a few hours left and they would be done.

So folks, here's the new landscaping!!










It'll take a few weeks to get the full effect because the grass all needs to grow and the bushes he put in need to get a little bit bigger. But, we love it so far and are really happy with how it turned out! It'll be so easy to maintain now and of course makes the house look much better!!

Oh Jerri!

I had to put this up because it's too funny. Jerri is the pickiest cat ever! My Mom's cats eat anything you put in front of them-meat, chips, pancakes, etc. They're like dogs! Jerri? Not so much. She snubs steak, passes on the chicken, will eat tuna only when in the mood. What does she eat besides her dry cat food (she snubs the canned stuff as well)?! Cheesecake, cheez-its and doritos!! A girl after my own heart-junk food all the way! So last week, Gabe was having some doritos and she jumped up on his lap and was nosing around. He held one out to her, and she went at it-licking all the cheese off! I snapped a few pics because I thought it was so darn cute!! Silly Jerri, doritos are for people!

Work Baby Shower

Today my coworkers threw me a baby shower during our lunch break. It was very nice! Everyone brought in a dish to pass-the food was so yummy. We had regular salad, fruit salad, chicken salad sandwiches on croissants, asian cole slaw, peanut butter brownies and a really good cake for dessert.

We got some nice gifts for baby as well. One of the doctors got us a halo sleep sack and some burp cloths. Another coworker got us a few really cute outfits. The rest of the gang chipped in for a gift-a boppy pillow and cover, a ton of onesies, burp cloths, a book, snack cups with lids, teethers, and a toy all put in a nice wicker basket. It was very thoughtful of them all and a nice break from the day today!

Thanks everyone for the wonderful lunch and baby goodies!

Project #2 Done!

Yes folks, the nursery is finally finished!! Baby held out long enough for his/her room to be ready. Well, she/he can arrive now because it's all done and ready! If you go here, you can see the last time I posted about the nursery...yes, way back in February! We've done a lot since then which you'll see in the photos.

The one last thing we were waiting on was our crib, which finally came over the weekend. I was waiting on that so we could arrange the furniture, hang shelves, and then decorate. It was cutting it close, but thankfully it all worked out for us. And I LOVE the way the room came out! Gabe did 99% of the work so he gets all of the credit for this awesome room! So are you ready to see it?!

Ceiling fan installed and in ceiling speaker installed, 3 recessed lights installed:


View of the room's entrance (I'll note that all of the trim is the original trim that was stripped of the white paint and restained):


Looking into the room:


Crib:


Area rug:


Tall dresser:


Tall dresser, new windows, new blinds:


Area near the closet-new glider and ottoman:


Long dresser/changing table:


Another angle of long dresser:


So what do you think? I think baby D. is going to LOVE it!!