Kissy face

And since this is her baby book, I'm a bad mom for forgetting to post that Piper gives kisses now! The first one was last Thursday (December 10). I was sitting on the couch burping her and she leans into my face with an open mouth, smashes her lips on me for a second and makes a little "mmmm" sound. Absolutely adorable. Of course I melted into a puddle on the floor. When Reid got home, I told him about it and I don't think he believed me until she did it to him the next night. It's super cute too because she gives a kiss and then leans back with a gigantic smile on her face. She is simply the best!

And her first experience with snow was on December 5. I'm not sure she really enjoyed it all that much since she slept through most of the walk, but here we are when we got back from her walk through our winter wonderland ...


I'm also going to try to do more of these mini posts versus waiting to have a good chunk of time to actually write. Especially with the holidays, those are hard to come by, but I'm definitely going to miss lots of fun things if I only post every 18 days ... she's changing so quickly now, it's unbelievable.

Since she is still taking a little snooze, there's one other super cute thing I wanted to note. She curls her toes over all the time. I'm not sure if she's trying to keep her giant feet from looking big or what, but whether in socks or in bare feet, those little toes are crammed right over. And maybe it's because I'm her mom, but I think it's the cutest thing in the whole world.

Tummy to back roll complete, finally!

Most babies roll over from their tummy to their back first ... but not Piper. She's been rolling over from her back to her front for a long time now, but until this afternoon, seemed to be completely opposed to rolling over the "easy" way. In fact, she would put her arms out straight to her side if you tried to help her to prevent the roll. Reid has said many times this will help her if she wants to be a wrestler later ... great. Well this afternoon she finally rolled over on her own to complete the back to front to back roll series. Great job, Piper!

And here she is with her favorite pooch, Zoe. I think Zoe's her favorite because she has all of this fantastic fur to grab onto and yank. Luckily, Zoe doesn't seem to mind :-)

Adventures in eating

Picture this:

Piper's sitting face forward on my lap. Just in front of her is a bowl of Chocolate Trifecta ice cream with rainbow sprinkles that I am stirring around and around (I prefer soft serve, so I make it myself with some elbow grease). Piper is staring at the bowl. She's talking ... mmm's, and ga's. Even an ah-goo here and there. I take the spoon and put some ice cream on it and bring it up to my mouth. As I lift the spoon from the bowl, Piper opens her mouth in anticipation and talks even louder. She does this with every bite I take.

Oh yes, our little one is all of a sudden VERY into food. Everything we put into our mouths is interesting - and she wants some.

As far as what Piper puts into her mouth, I decided about a month ago that I wanted to make her baby food and ordered a Beaba Babycook. It arrived last week, and with last Thursday also being the king of all food holidays, we decided that the grownups shouldn't be the only people living out gastronomic fantasies and broke out the mini appliance to make Piper applesauce to mix in with her cereal. In short, she loved it. It's hilarious because when she's into what she's eating, she makes lots of noise. That's how I could tell that she liked the oatmeal and multi grain cereals way more than the rice cereal ... she tells us all about it. With the apple added to the cereal, her noises grew louder! Yesterday we added pureed pears for the first time, and so far, I can't tell which she likes better, but she definitely likes them both. And even though it may not look it from this picture, she's getting a lot better at eating. She knows to open her mouth when the spoon is coming in and way less is coming back out. She's an eating machine.

And with all that eating, she's doing a great job of maintaining the back fat rolls and butt cheek cellulite. Bananas are next and then we'll be onto veggies! Honestly I enjoy every minute of feeding her since it's so blatantly obvious how much fun she's having throughout the process :-) I'm also almost done a great book on raising an adventurous eater - Hungry Monkey - and am really looking forward to when she can eat what we eat, just mashed up. For those with little ones, and little ones on the way, I highly recommend it. Not only is it a quick/easy read (perfect while pumping!), but he ends each chapter with recipes. I've yet to try them, but am looking forward to it!

Breastfeeding part two

Last week, I paid a visit to my friend Erica, who was my first best friend and someone that I am lucky enough to be reconnecting with. Erica is due next month with a little girl so obviously we talked about babies, babies, babies. Oh, and baby gear. We also talked about breastfeeding and she suggested I do another blog entry about it because the whole situation has changed since I blogged about it in August ...

At four and a half months, breastfeeding is WAY easier than it used to be. I don't remember when the change actually occurred, but at some point, we both got better at it, which makes it a lot more enjoyable. For a long time now, Piper hasn't had any latching issues, and she's finally getting to be more efficient (it's usually about a half hour process now). It's also hilarious because she'll come off the breast sometimes, look up at me and give me a huge smile, and then dive back on. For so many reasons (the first being the fact that she couldn't smile), this couldn't have happened for a while, but with her personality coming out more and more, she's way more interactive and fun - including when she's eating! I think I've also become more used to the whole process, and a lot more comfortable with just feeding her wherever and whenever she needs to be fed. I will admit that we still time trips out around when she needs to eat, but I have no problem feeding her at play dates or when we go visit people. Depending on who we're around, sometimes I'll use the cover, sometimes we'll go in another room, or sometimes we just run with it. The last is usually when we're just around a bunch of ladies, but for those that are at the six week (guessing that's about how old Piper was when I wrote my last blog) mark and frustrated beyond belief, know that it got better for us, and hopefully it will for you too! We also love the mother's room at Babies R Us in Latham and have gone there just to feed Piper before. With a love seat, glider rocker and two changing tables, it's nice to have a private place to feed her when we're out and about.

I will say that our personal experiences are just that, personal. And breastfeeding is different for everybody - everyone I've talked that's had a baby has had different experiences and stories to share. It doesn't work for everybody and that should be fine with all of those women out there that judge whether or not someone nurses their baby or uses formula. Two of my friends that have had babies since we had Piper have had milk supply issues and either supplemented with or switched to formula. They did this to ensure that their baby was healthy and thriving - so for those mean women out there that have judged them for not nursing, shut up and mind your own business. It's shocking how a baby can open you up for public criticism from complete strangers, but somehow it does. But that's another post for another time ... right now I need to take advantage of this morning nap and fold the laundry!

Four month stats!

Well we now have a four month old, and as our pediatrician told us at Piper's checkup yesterday, Piper has finally "hatched" into her own little person! She's so smiley, moves her arms and legs like crazy when she sees us (or other people for that matter), reaches for everything, and in general, is our super happy baby. She is GREAT. We also got her latest stats yesterday:

• Length: 25.5 inches (88th percentile)
• Weight: 15 pounds, 8 ounces (80th percentile)
• Head circumference: 16.5 inches (85th percentile)

Basically, she's a very well-proportioned little lady :-) The pediatrician also told us how they're diagnosing double digits of swine flu patients every day so the most important thing we can do for Piper right now is to keep the germs away. So scary ... luckily Reid and I both got the H1N1 vaccine on Monday, but by no means does that mean she can't get sick. Hopefully the germs will stay far far away!!

Piper also got to meet her Uncle Travis and cousin Copland this past weekend when they flew in from Colorado to visit. Nana and Papa were here too and she loved soaking up the extra attention everyone gave her. I will say it's still hard to catch the smiles on camera. I think she gets confused when the silver thing comes out and flashes lights at her ... We're also back on the cereal kick. We had tried it during her recent growth spurt and it just didn't go well. I think her tongue thrust reflex was still too much in play and the poor little thing seemed to get super frustrated when she wasn't getting food in fast enough to her liking. Now she's a champ! We tried again on Sunday and the tongue thrust is gone and she seems to really like this new development in her diet. We did rice cereal Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and then oatmeal today ... and either she was a hungry lady or she really liked the flavor because she was all smiles and talked throughout her meal today. It was absolutely adorable. I'm hoping that these extra calories will help too with the sleeping because the days of her sleeping through the night have definitely been few and far between since her last growth spurt. I, admittedly, got a bit spoiled by a good night's sleep and I'm ready to have it back again!

Here are a few more pics from our big family weekend ...

Rolling rolling rolling ...

On Saturday, I went into Piper's nursery when she had woken up for the day and found her laying on her side ... this was certainly new for her, and let us know that maybe she was thinking about rolling over at some point. Well, that some point was today! She rolled over from her back to her front, and actually seemed happy that she'd done so. She even enjoyed tummy time for almost a full minute :-)

Saturday was also Halloween - and here's a picture of our little lion! We paraded her around to the neighbors and she tolerated the headdress for way longer than we thought she would. Such a cutie!

More firsts!

Piper is growing and changing so quickly that I need to be sure to be documenting her firsts! She's had three more (at least) in the last week and a half that I wanted to be sure to note. Last Sunday (October 18), she went on her first hike - Prospect Mountain in Lake George. The last time we did that hike was last November with Katie and Sara and I guess you could say Piper was there too (I was pregnant), but this time she was a lot more alert. And by a lot, I mean A LOT. When we walk around the neighborhood, she stays awake in the Baby Bjorn for a max of 10 minutes, but when we were hiking, she stayed awake pretty much the entire time (almost two hours!). Reid carried her, which was great because my balance seems to still be a bit questionable at times, and she seemed to love it. Here are a couple of pics from the hike ...

Then fast forward to Friday (October 23) ... Piper and I took a field trip to Toys R Us and bought her an exersaucer. She has great head control and is definitely into exploring everything so we thought an exersaucer would be a fun toy for her to learn and grow on. I will say that this thing is enormous and we've lost more of our living room to baby gear now, but she loves it! There's really only one area that she seems to be really into now - it's a globe that makes music and then a crocodile that says words too - and just like with other things that she's into, the drool starts FLOWING when she gets into her exersaucer. It's so fun to watch her learn ... really this is one of the best parts of being a parent. It's just amazing!

So then last night, we broke out the rice cereal for the first time ... she's not quite four months, which is what the official recommendations are, but again, she's rock solid with her head and lately, she's seemed extra hungry. She was sleeping through the night, for about a week and a half, and then last Friday night, she started waking up in the middle of the night again. And it wasn't just that, she was also chowing like an animal in the late afternoon/evening in addition to that extra night feeding. Never going two hours in between feedings ... she just seemed hungry, like she wasn't getting enough milk. So after three nights of her waking up earlier and earlier after her bottle feeding (Sunday was 1:15am - she hasn't done that in weeks), we decided to break out the rice cereal to try to get a few more calories in her. My mom had warned me that it was going to be a messy process, and it definitely was, but she loves baths anyway and it was bath night so we just threw her in the tub afterwards.

So after we fed Piper the cereal and gave her a bath, she had her nightly bottle. Now I don't know if it was the fuller tummy to start with, the nice warm bath water, or what, but she passed out part way through the bottle. And by pass out, I mean rock solid sleeping. So we picked her up, put her down in her crib and said goodnight. Well that was great for a half hour, and then she woke up and was CRANKY. So cranky and fussy that Reid and I were actually worried that she maybe had a stomachache or something. After 20 minutes or so of screaming, I noticed something interesting, though. The screaming only happened in her nursery ... hmmm ... was it possible that she was playing us and didn't want to go to bed? Our conclusion was absolutely because she was perfectly content anywhere else in the house. Nice try little peanut! So we put her back down and let her fuss for a bit and she passed out again. This time until 3:20. Now 3:20 is definitely not through the night, but it's better than the night before and we'll see what happens tonight :-)

And I don't know if the pictures are doing her justice, but she is huge! So long. She's growing out of her 6 month clothes that snap because they're getting to be too short. Such a big girl now! And also an awake girl. I hear her up from a short nap so I'm out ...

Unintentional spying

Reid was reading Where the Wild Things Are to Piper upstairs in the nursery and I could hear them through the monitor that was left on downstairs. It was absolutely adorable to hear him add commentary and different voices to the story. I don't think I tell him enough - as I'm usually handing her off to make dinner/fold laundry/take a little breather and not saying what I should be saying - but he is a great dad and I'm excited to see their relationship grow over the many years to come. I think sometimes we get so focused on Piper and making sure that she's happy/dry/fed that we forget to focus on each other enough too. Or I know I'm guilty of that at least, and I'm clearly feeling guilty about it, which is why I'm blogging!

Piper slept through the night again last night and this time we actually enjoyed it. I hope this is a new trend that's here to stay! As far as the napping goes, I've also given in a bit and just let her nap in her swing. I've stopped pushing the crib during the day. It works for now and we'll try the crib again in a little while :-)

I didn't get a chance to upload pics today. I made phone calls that needed to be made, ordered some music CDs for Piper and took a short nap while Piper slept. I ran out of time, but hopefully tomorrow!

A BIG milestone!

PIPER SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT.

It happened on Sunday night and it consisted of 9.5 hours of solid sleep - for her mind you.

Maybe she knew somehow that Sunday night was going to be a rough night for her parents. And by rough night, I mean the most sick I have ever been in my entire life. I was up for most of the night with what I thought was food poisoning, but what a trip to the doctor's in the morning confirmed was a stomach virus. THANK GOD she hasn't gotten it, and knock on wood we've cleared the danger zone at this point, but it was the worst night I've ever had. And Reid was up for a lot of that time taking care of me so the little peanut was an absolute angel sleeping through the night and giving us a night to deal with ourselves. I'm not going to lie, I would have loved to savor a full night's sleep as it has been over 3 months without one, but if she had to choose the night to sleep through the night, that was definitely the most helpful one to do it! She hasn't done it again yet, but she is still sleeping well, and I'm just happy she hasn't gotten sick.

I need to upload more photos so the next post will be more colorful to look at, but in honor of this being her digital baby book, I wanted to be sure to make some other quick notes. One, she laughed out loud! I think it was Friday (October 9), and it was when Reid was changing her. I was sitting on the couch, finishing up a hat for the next day's baby shower we were going to, and all of a sudden she let out a LOUD laugh. It was adorable! And then yesterday she definitely giggled loudly at her Nana, who was over helping to take care of her while I was trying to recoup (and Mimi was over the day before, thank God!). At the end of last week, she also put her pacifier in her mouth when Reid gave it to her. Now, it took several tries and a lot of patience on both of their parts, but she did it eventually and it was very cool to see. She's getting so big so fast! But this age is super fun. I feel like we see a little more of her personality come out every day and it simply is incredible. She's so alert, getting to be very interactive, and is just our sweet little peanut :-) She's also getting into her books a lot more and loves to just look around and take everything in. She was an angel at the baby shower on Saturday because when she was awake, she just wanted to look around at everyone and everything. You can almost see the wheels a turning up in her head ... she's going to be a sponge for years to come, and I can't get over how cool it is to watch her learn.

While she's still sleeping, I'm going to be a lump on the couch for a bit longer as I'm still not 100 percent. But getting there. And again, THANK YOU Piper for being so good to your parents just when they needed it!

Last day as a newborn

Tomorrow Piper turns 3 months, which means that she officially transitions from a newborn to an infant. In some ways, I feel like she made this transition a while ago ... she doesn't look or sound like a newborn anymore and it feels like she's been in our lives for a long time. In other ways, she's still so new and this transition makes me realize how quickly time is going by!

Whenever we meet someone new, there are a few standard questions we get asked: 1. how old? 2. name? 3. and my least favorite - is she sleeping through the night yet? The answer to that one is N-O. I wish, but no. She's been consistently going 5 or so hours in between her bottle at night and the middle of the night feeding, but that's not even close to sleeping through the night. Every night, I go to bed and wish and hope and pray that tonight will be the night ... hopefully soon! I don't want to jinx it, but I think we may be headed in the right direction. For the last two nights, she's gone 8 hours from that last feeding of the day. Two nights ago, it was uninterrupted and felt heavenly. Last night, she woke up at 1 am (it had been just over 4 hours) and wanted some attention. Reid changed her because she was soaking wet, and burped her, and put her back down. He's a lifesaver for doing this because if I go in during the middle of the night, even if she's not hungry, she smells me and is suddenly starving. Yeah, no thanks. So after he put her back down, she started crying. As much as it sucks to listen to her unhappy, we let her cry, and after 10-15 minutes, she sounded like she was getting sleepy. Reid went in, plugged in the pacifier, and she slept until 4:45. Woo hoo! Hopefully she'll start learning that it's not that fun to wake up in the middle of the night if she's not starving and we'll have a baby that sleeps through the night soon. I'll go to bed tonight and hope tonight will be the night!

The napping during the day is another sleep issue, and is why it's so hard to blog (among other activities). Unless we run errands or go somewhere in the car, she won't take a nap longer than 30 minutes or so during the day at home. She'll take a bunch of these cat naps, but the long nap is a beautiful thing, and something that I do believe babies are supposed to do :-) I've even heard they're supposed to take two naps! One in the morning and one in the afternoon, but I'm not greedy - I'll take one. I'm not sure if it's the lack of movement in her crib or pack and play or what, but napping at home could definitely be improved upon. Every once in a while, we'll get a 2-3 hour nap in the swing (again, it's moving), but that's rare too. Maybe it's her lack of routine ... sometimes we go for walks in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon. Sometimes we run errands, sometimes we'll go to play dates and sometimes we'll go visit people. I definitely want a flexible baby, and one that can travel and not be on a strict schedule and be good to go with whatever, but maybe that's biting us in the butt a bit too. This week, we had today at home, with errands this afternoon. Tomorrow and Wednesday we're going to Middlebury to see her Nana and Papa since Reid's traveling. Thursday we want to go to her cousin Sarah's soccer game in the afternoon. Friday and Saturday we have play dates - at different times. Hmmm ... I really like getting out and being social, but maybe we do a little too much? I'm going to keep it up for a bit and see what happens. I definitely don't want to be a hermit! I'm open to suggestions too ... anyone else have this 'no naps of any real length at home' issue?

We think she's advanced

At first, the bouncy seat was a piece of baby gear that Piper didn't seem to like very much, but I still loved it because it was a safe place to put her while I was in the shower, brushing my teeth, etc. But over the last couple of weeks, she's really started to enjoy hanging out in the seat and has been moving around and bouncing more and more. And then yesterday afternoon I put her in the seat so that I could put laundry away, and low and behold, she discovered that she could kick the things hanging down with her feet and make them move. So she kicked and kicked for about ten minutes, clearly enjoying every minute. She did the same thing this morning as I got ready this morning. I know I just said this recently, but it is absolutely amazing to see her learn right before our eyes! And while kicking the hanging fish might not seem like a big deal, it definitely is because she spent the first 11 weeks of her life ignoring them. And the picture doesn't do it justice, but when she kicks, she blows spit bubbles out of her mouth so she ends up covered in her own slobber. Super cute, though.

The other big change I've noticed, literally over the last few days, is that Piper is just starting to enjoy her stuffed animals. Today we played with her pig and one of her monkeys and she was smiling and trying to get the animals into her mouth, bit by bit. She also seemed to be hugging them - I don't think this was really intentional, but it was definitely cute :-)

As for growing, I think she might be headed into another spurt. Yesterday, all she seemed to do was eat. She ate SO often that by the time bedtime rolled around, I felt like a walking zombie. Outside of a couple of walks that we took, I spent the entire day feeding her, and then me so that I could feed her some more. And then today she's been a tired, sleepy baby. Maybe she's just making up for the lack of long nap yesterday, but I swear her legs somehow looked longer today. She used to be all torso with short little legs, but now her legs look like they've stretched out. So many changes in such a short amount of time!

Here's my little lady in her baby bjorn. She smiles so much more often than she used to, but I never seem to catch them on camera.

Latest stats

I know what I meant to include in the last post and forgot - Piper's latest stats! She had her two month check up last Thursday (Sept 10), where she weighed in at 11 pounds 8 ounces and measured 24 inches long. She's probably bigger now (her thighs look bigger to me today), and as for how she compares to other little ones, our little peanut is 93 percentile for height and 70 percentile for weight. While she's chunking up nicely, her length is quickly putting her into 6 month clothes (the ones with feet anyway), unless we want to do some Chinese torture on her and curl up her feet. She started wearing the 6 month sleepers yesterday, and while the sleeves are a little long, the legs and feet are just right. She's growing too quickly!

Also at her 2 month check up, she had her first round of vaccines. In full disclosure, I used to do PR for one of the world's largest vaccine manufacturers, so the thought of vaccinating Piper didn't freak me out at all. I felt like a well-informed consumer and honestly was happy to know that she was on her way to being immune to some pretty nasty viruses, but what I wasn't prepared for was the mother response to watching your little one get vaccinated. The crying definitely tore at my heart strings, as it did to her dad too who wouldn't put her in the car seat afterwards to go home until she was fully content (AKA sleeping soundly). I brought home the snuggliest little baby ... all she wanted to do was be up on my shoulder, nuzzling into my neck, but then the pain must have set in because she became super fussy about 45 minutes after we got home. A little Tylenol, a 30 minute nap, and we had our happy baby back. She did have two green bowel movements later that day - and when I say green, I mean the color you would find a lawn in Seattle to be in March. Pretty as grass, but concerning when it's poop. A quick call to the nurse on call that night put our mind at ease ... it was just the rotavirus (a nasty GI issue) vaccine and she would be fine soon. Sure enough, the next poop was back to normal.

Enough about poop - it's Friday! That means we have Reid home with us all weekend starting in not too long :-) Love it!!

Digital baby book

This past weekend, Piper and I went to Boston to visit some of her many amazing aunts while Reid was at a bachelor party and it was a great trip for so many reasons. While this might seem silly, I was a nervous wreck before we left for Boston. I was worried about traveling alone with her for the whole weekend to a place that was a pretty significant drive away. I was worried about how she would travel - whether she would start screaming on the highway, whether she would sleep at Heidi's house, whether she would eat enough since I was planning on just breastfeeding and not doing any bottles of pumped milk, whether I would be able to sleep at all ... and the list goes on and on. You name it, I was worried about it, but the fact is, the weekend was GREAT and all of my worries were unfounded. Phew! Because of this, it was a pretty awesome confidence builder. If Piper and I can travel all the way to Boston and back, then a day trip here and there is easy. And just heading to Saratoga for errands and to see a friend? Piece of cake. I'm finally feeling comfortable going places with her and it feels great! The fact that this has taken over two months has been a little bit frustrating - I'm not usually a wimp.

And of course it was amazing to see some of my friends and introduce them to Piper. Over the trip, Piper also met two of her future friends - Anna (5 months old) ...

And Mariko (6 months old) ...

It was amazing to see how different Anna and Mariko were compared to Piper. I felt like I had a glimpse into her future, both from a developmental perspective, as well as a growth perspective. Both Anna and Mariko were so expressive, and BIG. I don't want Piper to grow too quickly, but it was exciting to see the types of changes that she's going to go through throughout the fall. More fun is definitely on the way!

We stayed at Heidi's parents' house, and while we were there, Heidi broke out her and her sister's baby books. It was so interesting to hear what their parents wrote way back when ... and it got me thinking - we have a keepsake box and are storing lots of fun things to go through in the future, and we are taking lots of pictures, but we don't have an official baby book where we're keeping track of her progress. But, can this count? The thought of making time to write the blog and write a baby book seems a bit overwhelming. I already have a hard time keeping up with this, but going through the baby books made me realize how important it is to keep documenting. So a priority this blog will be! Not that it wasn't one already, obviously ...

On that note, Piper has been changing like crazy. Learning and growing and becoming more of a little person. A couple of weeks ago (this pic was taken one day shy of her two month bday), she was really into sucking her hand, and every once in a while, her thumb would find its way in.

I have to admit that Reid and I weren't that excited about this. You can take a pacifier away, but you can't take a thumb away. And while I had buckteeth without sucking my thumb, why encourage the dental destruction? But at the same time, if she can soothe herself, then that is HUGE. Regardless of what we thought, she's kind of cooled down on the hand/thumb sucking anyway. Not sure what changed for her, but she appears to have lost interest.

And then, over this past weekend, Piper discovered her reflection in the mirror of her gym and was absolutely mesmerized by it.

That was probably one of my favorite changes so far because I felt like I could see her learning and changing before my eyes. The mirror has been there all along, and I've tried to show it to her before, but she never looked at it with any interest. Then all of a sudden, while I was eating a bowl of cereal, she couldn't get enough of checking herself out. She smiled and cooed at herself and was captivated for a good ten minutes. Since then, she's done that at least once a day. It's absolutely adorable! Anna has the same gym at her house and Heidi was telling me how fun it's been to see Anna's interests change over time. The hanging parrot is now her favorite and she likes to roll onto her belly and play with the elephant's crinkly ear. For those expecting little ones, I highly recommend this! http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2266983

Piper is just so cute and we are so in love. I don't really know how to put it all into words, but I love our family more than I thought was possible and am so excited for all that is to come, which will be documented here :-)

Snarfing breastmilk and monster hands

Poor Piper! She was hammering a bottle of pumped milk earlier this afternoon, very enthusiastically after sleeping for two hours, coughed and snarfed breastmilk out her nose. I felt a little bit badly because I did laugh out loud when I realized she was fine and just being a little piggy.

Earlier this week, Piper and I went to our first play date through the Meetup group, Kid's Incorporated. Obviously she's too little to appreciate a play date at this point so the play date was really for me. I've been really excited to meet other moms and their kids in the area. Having worked from home for the past almost three years, it hasn't been easy finding friends in the greater Glens Falls area, and obviously we didn't have Piper to make friends, but I think the expanded social circle is a nice side benefit of having a child. There are so many young families in the area, and even after one play date, I felt a huge since of relief. It was so nice to just hang out with a few other ladies and chat - not to mention it was nice to get out of the house and not be running an errand. Social time is a must!

She continues to grow at break neck speed, but there's one part of her in particular that may be growing faster than the rest. HER HANDS. Check out the paws ...

Reid has been scheming about which professional sport she can pursue so that we can retire and live off of her winnings. Tennis and golf have been the leading contenders - and not just because that means we'll have to have a second home somewhere where it's warm all winter long (which I think sounds great). But after seeing her hands expand over the last several weeks, I'm starting to think she's either going to be a basketball player (since she'll be able to palm a ball a age 5), or a swimmer. Hopefully she'll just grow into her mitts so we can be back to tennis or golf and not be heading to the pool at 4 am on a cold winter morning ... plus, can you imagine how much she'll get made fun of if she doesn't grow into those things? YIKES. I hope she doesn't find this blog later and hate me for it!

8 weeks and baby gear

Happy birthday to Piper! She's 8 weeks old today, and as I told my husband last night, I feel like I have loved her forever. She is such a joy and we are beyond lucky. This is an old pic, but it's still one of my favorites. I love it when she makes this face - of course it's usually right after she just went to the bathroom, but whatever, it's still cute :-)

I wanted to do a post about my favorite baby gear, but I think I'm going to limit it to my two favorites for now because there are two that jump WAY out to the front of my favorites line. I will say, there is SO much baby gear out there that for first time moms it can be pretty overwhelming. I remember the first time I went into Babies R Us, I thought I was going to have a panic attack. Baby stuff EVERYWHERE and I didn't know what half of it did. Reid and I were both on the same page and wanted to be pretty streamlined in terms of the gear that we had. I'm still surprised by how much stuff is now in our house, but we have what are the necessities for us. Obviously every family is different, but what we have works for us. And I'll give huge props to Baby Bargains - a must have book if you're feeling overwhelmed and don't want to go overboard.

Probably my two favorite items are the Boppy Pillow for nursing and then the Baby Bjorn (the Active style). With how much time I spend nursing, I can't imagine trying to hold Piper up to my chest the entire time. I have a hard enough time getting comfortable while nursing - my back and I have definitely had to learn how to nurse so that I don't end up in pain! And then the Baby Bjorn is a life saver. Piper loves to be in it and it's extraordinarily comfortable. I wear it while she's gassy (it helps for her to be vertical), while I'm doing housework, on walks around the neighborhood, shopping ... the list goes on and on. And it's so easy to adjust so it can go between Reid and I with no issue. I've heard that the regular one can be a bit tough on the back after a while, but the active is fantastic. I recommend it to everyone!

Following up on my Fat Post, the sports bras that a friend recommended to me arrived today from Title Nine . Apparently they really prevent bouncing in big breasted women ... I hope so! I ordered the Frog Bra and the Last Resort bra. The Last Resort was definitely pricey ($60), while the Frog Bra was pretty reasonable ($33). I'm hoping the Frog Bra is great and that I don't need the Last Resort, but either way, I'm hoping that heavy duty sports bras will soon be on my list of favorite gear as well. I will say that I wore pre-pregnancy jeans this weekend and it was nice to get them on. The footnote here is that they were tight and I had to wear my Bella Band so that I didn't have to button them, but with fall on the way, I'm happy to not have to buy new jeans!

Smile!

Now isn't this just the cutest thing you've ever seen?!?! I love how the smile goes right up to her eyes :-) She's smiling at her daddy, who was talking to her and playing with her nose. So adorable!

Piper didn't sleep very well last night - she was up from 1-4, so I was too - so this is all I'm doing for a post today (I've been dragging all day today), but I just had to share this little piece of heaven!

Now where did that come from ...

Body image isn't something I've typically struggled with, probably because I've always been pretty skinny. Even in my "fat" days, I never broke 145. Well, now here I am fatter than ever and without the pregnancy excuse. It's not to say that I hate my body - I think hate is too strong of a word - but I do think it's accurate to say that I certainly am not in love with it right now.

Problem area #1: BOOBS BOOBS BOOBS. Ginormous, gargantuan boobs. Now obviously I do have a good excuse for the mams since I'm a nursing mom, but that doesn't mean I have to like them. They definitely make me look larger than I am, and they make the thought of running a very scary proposition. I don't know if they make a sports bra that could keep them where they'd need to be for me to be comfortable. And even though I don't know when I would run if I did own the world's most supportive bra for enormous boobs, I would still like to have the option :-) For me, running is one of the easiest ways to get back into shape and slim down. The weight drops off quickly and easily when I run, but I'll stop this pipe dream because it's not a reality currently ...

Problem area #2: Stomach. Yuck, it's fatty. Not sure what else I need to say here other than my abs are still stretched out. Gross.

Problem area #3: My thighs. Also fatter than usual. Thank God I bought two pairs of shorts on clearance at the Gap when I was pregnant last summer and they're one to two sizes bigger than I usually wear. I've been wearing them, alternating every other day basically, for the past few weeks. They're not maternity so I'm excited to say that (and my maternity shorts are all too big now so they look like crap anyway), but they are a size that I don't wish to be in for much longer!

One area I am loving: It's important to end on a high note! I love my arms and shoulders. This is one area that I didn't really gain any weight in during pregnancy and hefting around Piper and her multiple chins has helped to regain some tone. And thankfully I show more arm than thigh and stomach on a daily basis!

If we still lived in Austin, I'd definitely want to get in on the OutOfControlFatRoll fun. These ladies (three of them are my coworkers, past and present) rock!

And now, a cute pic of Piper, whose hair gets curly as soon as its wet ...

Smiles and breastfeeding

In the last 2.5 hours, I've done two loads of laundry, loaded and run the dishwasher, ordered diapers and bottles from www.diapers.com, finished vacuuming the pool, caught up with my friend Heidi AND written this blog. This is Piper's first long nap during the day that hasn't been in the car since she's been sleeping well at night and I'm taking advantage of it!

The most exciting update at this point is that Piper has started smiling! Now the little grin in the picture above isn't her big toothless grin that absolutely melts our hearts, but it is close and it's the closest we have to anything resembling a smile on camera so far. When she first smiled, my heart just about burst. And my emotional reaction hasn't changed since I've seen her smile since then. It's what I imagine heaven to be like. Pure joy.

Before Piper was born, I hoped that I was one of those people that would just love to breastfeed - and in fact, I was pretty sure I would be that way. Unfortunately, that just hasn't been the case. I'm still breastfeeding her and my goal is to do it for the first six months, but I definitely wish that I felt the ooey gooey sense of bonding and joy that many people speak of while nursing their baby. Instead, it was super frustrating at first because it took both of us a while to learn how to nurse well. In particular, she did not latch well for a while ... and the jaundice didn't get us off on the right foot, but the challenges did continue from there for I would guess a couple of weeks. So nursing took FOREVER. Now we're down to about 45 minutes for each nursing session, but without the ooey gooey feelings, it can still feel very time consuming. During the day, she nurses pretty much every two hours, so once I've fed her, we have 1.25 hours until she eats again. That combined with my apparent phobia of nursing in public makes it pretty hard to get out and about, which is SO important in my opinion. So I do try and get out, at least four or five times a week. We just make the trips quick. Thank God we don't live far from the grocery store or Target! I'm hoping that since she's getting older and better at nursing that I'll enjoy it more.

Oh, and there's a cry so I'm logging off - to go nurse!

Happy anniversary to us!

Three years ago today, my husband and I boarded the Northern Lights in Burlington, VT as singletons and disembarked later that night as husband and wife. It was an unbelievable day ... the weather was gorgeous. Even though it was August, it wasn't hot or humid. We were surrounded by our friends and family, and looking back, it was pretty much perfect. Now three years later, life is fantastic. I couldn't be more head over heels in love with Reid and Piper has only added to our joy. Happy anniversary, honey!

And now a quick update on the little one. She is doing GREAT. She seems to have finally figured out the difference between night and day and has been sleeping like a rock star for several days now. She wakes up once in the night to eat, and then typically goes down again for the remainder of the night, which has us recovering and feeling like humans again. I'm not going to lie, when she wasn't sleeping, it was really hard. There were three days and nights in a row that she hardly slept and I was a walking zombie. It's so difficult to be rational when you reach extreme exhaustion, and a good cry never seemed that far under the surface. It was very overwhelming to have this little human whom we couldn't seem to make happy for an extended period of time ... but now she, and we, seem to be figuring this out and life is much improved again. My mom told me that this (motherhood) will be the hardest job I'll ever have, and so far I agree. But at the same time, it is an unbelievably awesome job and I'm so happy to be doing it :-)

Piper is chunking up nicely and she seems huge now compared to when she first arrived. I love her chunky cheeks, multiple chins and fat thighs. It's almost time to put her newborn clothes away, which in a way makes me sad because she barely had time to wear many of them! The 3 month clothes are just as cute, don't get me wrong, but I can't believe I'm already putting stuff away in the basement, either for another little girl or for Piper's dolls if we have a boy next time. It's insane how quickly this is all passing. Everyone tells you that - and to enjoy every minute because time does pass so quickly - but the first month was such a blur between adjusting, sleepless nights, exhaustion, overwhelming happiness, etc, that there really isn't enough time to just sit and take it all in and enjoy it. It kind of reminds me of our wedding day in that respect, and is a good reminder of how important it is to just chill and put these things to memory while we can.

She's not just getting bigger either - there are so many other changes. Her eyesight has definitely improved and she now stares at us and objects intently. She also likes to track people and toys as they move around. It seems like she's starting to enjoy the animals hanging down from her gym and now we're just waiting for her to smile. She smiles every once in a while in her sleep, but I can't wait to see her light up in response to us, and not what I'm guessing is just gas.

I still owe many people phone calls and I definitely need to upload more photos and order birth announcements and all that jazz. Our house is still a mess and the nursery still doesn't have pictures on the walls. It's hard fitting it all in and it feels like there are always a million items on the to-do list, but I feel like we're getting a bit closer to a balancing act. Sleep definitely helps with that!

Piper just woke up! Time for her to eat. More to come, hopefully soon ...

Adjusting to reprioritization

As is evidenced by the time lag in between blog posts, I've had my hands full. For all of the parents that are reading this, the response will probably be "duh," but one of the lessons I've learned over the last almost four weeks is just how much life gets reprioritized with an infant at home - especially one that is still learning the difference between night and day (and therefore preventing sleep!). I feel like I've been totally out of touch with everyone, and it's not by choice - trust me, I would like to call you back - but by necessity. It's just that when I do have my hands free, I have to choose between 1. sleeping, 2. catching up on laundry, 3. making dinner, 4. putting said laundry away, 5. taking a shower, 6. making those phone calls, 7. blogging and keeping up on my digital life. And not that they always fall in that particular order, but the first five have been taking precedence over the final two and likely will until Piper is sleeping better and I'm not feeling like a walking zombie.

We do have LOTS of adorable pictures of Piper, but uploading those to my laptop would fall under the seventh category on my to-do list so this blog post is going to have to survive picture free. Sorry!

Piper is doing great though! She's fattening up and her chunky cheeks are super cute. She has a double chin and her newborn sized footed PJs are starting to get a little short (when she stretches out, she definitely reaches the limits of the onesie). We've seen a few almost smiles, but have yet to catch one on camera. She loves her gym and is starting to show interest in the toys that hang down at her. It's amazing how much she's changed in almost four weeks and her baby coos make my heart melt ... I just heard one of those coos so I'm going to sign off and hopefully get her nice and awake for the next hour or two so that she will (HOPEFULLY) have a better night's sleep tonight than last night!

Two+ weeks

Piper turned two weeks old yesterday! We celebrated the day feeling exhausted and out of it, after a night that passed by in its entirety without any sleep for the three of us. I think she had gas, as she seemed to just not be able to get comfortable and we could hear the bubbles gurgling inside of her, but burping her wasn't productive. Luckily, she (and therefore we) slept pretty well last night so Reid and I were able to recuperate a bit. It's a good thing they make babies so cute and lovable because it definitely makes this process tolerable, and somehow, even enjoyable. Here's a picture of the little cutie from last week ...

Piper also had her two week doctor's appointment yesterday and she impressed the pediatrician by rolling back and forth on the examination table. He should have seen her climb over her tummy time play mat at 6 days old, but I digress ... anyway, she's up to 7 pounds 7 ounces, which is great because apparently babies are supposed to be at or above their birth weight by two weeks. Her jaundice is gone and everything looks good! As usual, we had lots of questions for the pediatrician ... is the fact that she sneezes a lot normal? Yes, she's still getting rid of amniotic fluid from her nostrils. Since her cord fell off of her belly button last week, when can we give her a real bath? Last night was his answer, but since Reid and I were tired, we opted to just do a sponge bath. That has become familiar and we're pretty quick at it, but tomorrow we'll break out her new tub. Is the rash on her left hand normal? Actually, it looks like it's a birth mark, but one that will likely fade by 5 years of age. Since Reid is gluten intolerant, when do we test her? Not until she's eating wheat, or probably at about 12 months. And should I avoid peanuts while I'm breast feeding? The answer to this made me happy - since we don't have a family history, I shouldn't be too worried about having to avoid peanuts. I forget what else we asked, but it's amazing to feel so clueless about someone so tiny. Two weeks in, I feel totally confident that we can handle this whole process, but I feel like we have SO much to learn all the time.

Last week another important milestone passed for us - the anniversary of last summer's miscarriage came and went at the end of last week. I thought about it and remembered what it felt like last summer, but I didn't get overwhelmed with sadness and I finally felt completely healed. I'm sure I'll never forget, but it's a huge relief to feel like that chapter in our lives is closed, and more importantly, that I finally feel at peace with everything. When we did miscarry, a few of my friends got us a beautiful hydrangea bush. All of the flowers bloomed on it last week and it's gorgeous.

Since Piper is sleeping, I'm going to try to get a quick cat nap in as well. Everyone says sleep when the baby sleeps, but I do think that's easier said than done. If you do that, when do you shower? Unload the dishwasher? Check email? Blog? Hmm ... I'm clearly still figuring this whole balancing act out, and once I do, I hope to have the posts become a bit more energetic and frequent again!

Way overdo post ...

It's amazing how the time has flown over the past ten days and how my desire to communicate went on a hiatus. I have spent so little time on the phone or online since Piper was born ... I just haven't been able to take my eyes off of our new little angel and have been enjoying every minute with her. Plus we had a 48 hour speed bump with jaundice and had to go back to the hospital so Piper could get some photo therapy to lower her bilirubin levels so that was a stressful experience and I feel like we needed to adjust to being back home with her again. But now all is well with her and with us and I'm ready to share what was an unbelievable experience 10 days ago today. Here's the play by play ...

July 6, 2009

6:00 am - The alarm goes off and I hop in the shower before heading in for our scheduled induction. I was excited, nervous, happy, scared - so many emotions at once and needing to get last minute things together. Reid slept until I was out of the shower and then he got going as well.

7:15 - When we should have left for the hospital to be on time. I'm getting antsy.

7:20 - When we actually left. I hate being late, but we did the best we could. At least my angst of being late served as a good distraction for all of the other emotions we were feeling!

7:35 - Reid drops me off at the hospital entrance and I go upstairs to check in. They're immediately ready for me and I meet the two nurses (one finishing up her training and then her teacher - both are super chipper and nice and I feel immediately comfortable) that will help us through the labor and delivery process. They lead me down to our room and I get changed into a gown and Reid comes upstairs with our first load of stuff. Yes our hospital packing list was long and we packed more than we needed, but I wouldn't change that. It was nice to not have to wish that we'd brought something. My mom arrived too and I was super happy to have her and Reid there for the whole process.

8:30 - The midwife comes in and checks me. Still 4 cm dilated and 80 percent effaced. We decide that she'll break my water and see if that will get things going. Next thing I now, the water is broken. Wow, no going back now! After that, I get out of bed and start doing laps in the hospital wing. Contractions started and they were no big deal at all. I was all smiles and thinking that this whole deal wasn't that bad. I mean, the first 4 cm happened without me really ever being very uncomfortable. How bad can this be? I was worried it was going to get tough, but on and on we walked.

9:15 - The baby looked like she (ok, so we didn't know sex then, but now that Piper is Piper, there's no way I can call her an it!) was hanging out on the right side of my uterus so they decided to try to get her to spin around by having me kneel with my stomach on ice and a warm pack on my back. The theory here is that the baby heads away from the ice and toward the heat to get into a better position to come out. It's an interesting theory and spinningbabies.com covers it well. After 30 minutes of this, I got back up and started walking and the contractions really set in. From here, they got stronger and I was no longer smiling the whole time during my walks around the wing. When each one came, I would stand against the wall and take deep breaths with my eyes closed. I could tell Reid felt helpless, but I really needed to just deal with each contraction in my own way, which was independently and internally - typical of how I deal with all pain (emotional and physical)!

12:30ish pm - I'm guessing on time now since I pretty much stopped looking at the clock, but at some point, I had a cherry popsicle since that was all I was allowed to eat besides ice chips and I was starving. By this point, the contractions were getting really tough and we asked when it was too late to get an epidural because I didn't want to miss that window. I forget the answer ... at some point, my OB came in to check on us and he advised that we just order it. Things were clearly only getting worse so why not get a bit more comfortable.

Soon thereafter, the back labor set in and holy hell it was the worst pain I have ever experienced or could have imagined. When the contractions were in the front, they were tolerable. I mean, they sucked by that point, but they didn't make me feel like I was dying. The ones that were in my back though were unreal. They were HORRENDOUS and made me sick to my stomach. The anesthesiologist was called and it would be about a half hour before he could come up. I thought I knew who it was going to be - a Dartmouth alum whom I had met originally when I had the D&C for the miscarriage. I was hoping he would be the one to do the epidural since it would be comforting to see a friendly face. Alas, the good doctor arrives (and yes it's the one we were hoping for!), we discuss the procedure (in between contractions, which are so terrible I can't really concentrate) and then he gets to work. Now, it was well worth it, but to get the epidural, I had to lay on my left side, which caused tonic contractions. It was 4-5 minutes of constant back labor contractions and the pain was so terrible that I threw up my red popsicle and everything else in my stomach. Finally, the worst was over. The epidural started working almost immediately and I entered a state of painfree euphoria. The change was unbelievable, and since I was able to chat and mak jokes again, Reid started taking pictures. You can tell the pain is GONE because I was able to ham it up for the camera around while eating my ice chips :-)

1:45 pm - The midwife comes back in to check to see how dilated I am - 10 cm. Fully dilated. Time to push and become parents. I was a bit shocked to be honest. I'd only had the epidural for 20 or 30 minutes at that point and all of a sudden, the time was here!

From 2 - 3:20 pm - Pushing. Pushing. Pushing. Each push gave me terrible heartburn and I threw up again, but after I threw up, they had me reach down and I felt her head. At that point, I just wanted her to come out so that we could meet her! The epidural was perfect too. I could tell when a contraction was happening, but there was no associated pain, which enabled me to really push productively. Everyone was getting really excited in the room because we knew she would be out soon so back to work I went!

3:25 pm - One final push and Piper Elizabeth arrived!

I will admit that I had come to the conclusion that she was a boy so I was shocked to see a little girl. Shocked and immediately and completely in love. It sounds cheesy, but my heart was bursting with love and I could tell the same was true for my husband. I'm so glad we waited to be surprised by her and she was definitely worth the wait. I counted her fingers, five on each hand, but couldn't yet see her toes. Then Reid cut the cord and they whisked her off to the warmer to clean her off and weigh her. At 21 inches, 7 pounds and 4.5 ounces, she's a lanky little girl, but she's our little girl and she's perfect. And yes, she has all ten toes too.

So that's how little Piper came into this world. From start to finish, the whole process took about 7 hours - MUCH shorter than some horror stories I have heard so I certainly have no complaints. If I had it to do all over again, the one thing I would change would be that I would get the epidural a half hour earlier. It really made such a huge difference, and it likely sped up the dilatation process.

And ten days later, I'm pretty tired, but we're settling in nicely. Piper doesn't look so hot in her daddy's glasses, but she does look great in pink, which is a good thing because she now has a ton of it!

And now that we're feeling more settled, I'm looking forward to posting more and chronicling our journey as parents. It's sure to be a wild ride ...

We're home!

We got home a little bit ago with our new daughter, Piper Elizabeth Hutchins, born July 6 at 3:25 pm, weighing 7 pounds, 4.5 ounces and 21" long. Pictures and more details to come soon ... right now, we're enjoying our expanded family and are tired from lack of sleep, but also the overwhelming love and joy that we feel. She's amazing!

Expect the unexpected

If there's anything I've learned throughout the pregnancy process(es), it's that you have to expect the unexpected. And if you don't have lots of unexpected moments, then I think you are extremely fortunate! We had another one of those moments, and now a change of plans, today.

When I was driving home from the grocery store, I noticed that my vision was funky. It was as if my eyes were working independently and it definitely freaked me out. When I got home, I put some of the groceries away and immediately started chugging water. I hadn't had quite as much water as I usually do by that point in the day so I figured it couldn't hurt. I also threw an English muffin in the toaster since I hadn't eaten in a few hours. By the time I did these two things though, my vision was looking worse. I picked up a piece of paper and had a difficult time reading the words on it. I was also starting to feel just "off", so I called the doctor's office and waited for the midwife on duty to return my call.

Luckily for us, Julia called us back right away. I told her about my vision and she said I needed to come in (no surprise there!). On the drive in, my nausea set in. Maybe it was due to the vision issues, but all of a sudden, I was feeling terrible!

When we got to the hospital, they took my blood pressure and it was high (130/84), so that, combined with my symptoms, resulted in an interesting comment from the midwife ("Oh I bet I know what the doctor's going to say ..."). I didn't ask her to elaborate then, but I had a good idea she was referencing getting induced. My husband had the same thought.

Onto the monitors, blood drawn for labs, pee in a cup. The standard protocol really at this point. The midwife also said she wanted to check me again (to see if I was any more dilated/effaced) and would do that in a bit.

My husband took this picture - I look much happier in it than I was feeling! Sorry for the blurriness. As I've mentioned in my blog before, Palm Treo phones SUCK.

Anyway, back to the gory details. Julia checked me and I was still 4 cm dilated and 80 percent effaced - so no change from Thursday. At that point, I asked her what she was thinking would happen and her response was that she thought the doc would want to induce me, the question was whether that would happen today or tomorrow (lab results dependent). She said even if my labs were fine, the real question was, why would they want me to stay pregnant at this point? The baby is full term (and looking great on the monitor) so he or she is good to come out, and my blood pressure has been spiking a bit and now I have other symptoms. This is what we anticipated, but it was still weird to hear it.

My labs came back and they looked fine. My nausea by that point had subsided and my vision had cleared up, but I still had a headache. After talking with the doc on call, Julia returned and gave us the option of either spending the night in the hospital and being induced tomorrow morning, or coming home and returning to the hospital in the morning to be induced. For comfort reasons, we chose to come home, but we'll be back at the Snuggery tomorrow morning at 7:30 am to start the induction process. CRAZY.

We don't really know how the induction process is going to go. I know there are a couple of medication options, and Julia also said that the midwife on duty may just start by breaking my water and seeing what happens. It's absolutely bizarre to think that we're going to go in to be induced in the morning ... it's not how I thought this would all go down, but as long as the baby is healthy and I end up okay too, then I'm fine with it.

I'm conflicted right now as far as emotions. Part of me is excited to me this little one, part of me is nervous for the actual labor and delivery process, and part of me is just really calm. I'm hoping the third one will win out tonight when we go to bed so that we can actually get some sleep. The nurse that discharged us warned us that people that get induced don't always give birth on the first day. I'm hoping that's not the case with us!

I don't know when the next blog post will come, but I will try to keep my twitter feed (www.twitter.com/jenhutchins) updated, at least every once in a while. Wish us luck!!

Sleepy on the Fourth of July

Happy Fourth of July! While not officially on my to-do list, I have used some of my down time to knit a few baby hats. The strawberry is my go-to gift when the parents don't know what they're having - so one of these is for us, and then the other is for our little niece or nephew who is expected to arrive not too long after our little one. If you're reading this Trav, sorry to ruin the surprise! The sunflower hat is for a little girl (TBD who yet) and then I'm also working on a watermelon (my personal favorite), and finally will whip out a blueberry just in case a little boy arrives :-) This is all assuming our little one gives me the time to get the hats done!

Yesterday I had quite a bit of energy and Reid and I had a GREAT day. After hanging out at our house for a while, we went to the outlets to do a little shopping, went aimlessly driving around the east side of Lake George and then had a nice dinner on Glen Lake at the Docksider (food's not fantastic, but the setting is gorgeous). But today I am exhausted ... we hit the Glens Falls farmer's market this morning and then Lowe's for some random stuff and those two errands somehow took all of my energy. I tried to nap, pretty unsuccessfully, and am hopeful that some energy returns before we go to see the Pops concert at Crandall Park (by the Glens Falls Symphony Orchestra).

All has been quiet on the labor front. I had a painful contraction in the middle of the night last night - the most painful one I've had yet - but it was only one and then done. That's not going to get anything done unfortunately ... maybe my exhaustion is just my body telling me to chill before the big event. The calm before the storm ... we shall see!

Clearly a false alarm

Seeing as I'm sitting on our screened in porch, having slept in until 9:30 and just cooked a big breakfast with my husband, we were clearly just teased yesterday afternoon/evening by the little bugger.

By the time we went to bed last night, the contractions were gone, and while I've had a couple since I've woken up, they haven't been very painful and certainly haven't been consistent. So when will this little one arrive? Who knows! But seeing as my cervix is very "ripe" (technical medical term apparently - I couldn't have made that up if I tried), there should only be so many of these dry runs until the little one actually makes its grand entrance into the world.

In the meantime, the sun is actually shining so Reid and I have a date by the pool :-)

And then not so exciting ...

Hmmm ... think I may have spoken too soon, or jinxed myself, or something. The contractions, while still coming pretty regularly, don't hurt nearly as much as they did before. I'm no longer thinking this baby may come tonight. Damn!

This is getting exciting!

I'll start this post by saying, I may have a baby in not too long :-)

We had our weekly doctor's appointment today so we went in and my blood pressure was a bit high again. At this point in the pregnancy, this means an automatic trip to the hospital for a non stress test (getting hooked up to contraction and fetal heartbeat monitors), so my husband and I drove over to the hospital and got settled in. This time, the midwife also ordered an ultrasound to check my amniotic fluid levels - this actually excited me because we hadn't seen the baby in what feels like forever.

Oh, I should also add that at my appointment the midwife checked me and I'm 4cm dilated with 80 percent effacement (a measure of how thinned out my cervix is). WARNING: Straight pregnancy talk, such as dilatation and effacement will continue moving forward. I'm not going to sugarcoat anything.

Anyway, so while on the monitors at the hospital, we see that the baby looks great and that I was having contractions every two minutes. They were just little contractions, and honestly I couldn't feel them when they were happening. I guess this can happen after an internal exam - and in the words of our midwife, "labor is progressive," and not to worry, I'll feel the real labor contractions when they really get heated up.

My ultrasound was fine - the baby was moving around and my fluid levels were within the normal range. Then I had to wait to get some labs back to make sure there wasn't a chance of preeclampsia (just like last week). While we're waiting, my cramping began ... so apparently those little contractions are heating up at least a little bit. Labs came back fine so we were discharged, but before we left, I asked the midwife what the odds are of me being pregnant in a week. She gave me 50 percent odds - a coin flip. Well, a couple hours and consistently annoying (I say annoying because I'm crampy, but the pain is no big deal right now) contractions later, I'm starting to think we're getting VERY close to D-Day. Or it may be more appropriate to call it B-day for the little one! Our instructions are to not worry about calling in until I'm having contractions that I can't breath through. Basically, they want me to be very angry and uncomfortable when we go in for the real deal. We'll see what happens tonight ...

More to come, but right now, we're going to go finish packing the hospital bag.

Living in limbo

I feel like I'm in a weird spot in life right now ... I'm on maternity leave, but I don't have a baby to take care of. Technically, I guess you could call me a housewife, but the to-do list around the house is pretty much complete and I'm not supposed to be spending all day on my feet anyway. In truth, I feel LAZY, not to mention a little bit guilty. My husband gets up and leaves for work everyday and I get all set for my day of ... well, not a lot. I know I should be enjoying this time and feel lucky that I have the chance to rest and nap at will since I won't be able to do that again for who knows how long, but it's definitely something I'm struggling with.

I will say that it's nice to have time to cook dinner each night and it makes me feel good to send my husband off to work with leftovers for lunch. Having the time to read again also makes me wish I had renewed my Martha Stewart Living subscription, because now that I have time to be domestic (which I LOVE), it would be fun to have some new ideas to run with. I did subscribe to Cookie today so that will be a fun addition to my reading mix!

The baby seems very content to be hanging out in utero for the time being. I continue to have warm up contractions, but certainly nothing serious or consistent. One of my friends today asked me when I would want the baby to arrive if I had control and I honestly don't know ... we're of course excited to meet the baby, but I also know I'm not due for just over two weeks. I also like the idea of holding (although not delivering!) a bigger baby versus a tiny peanut so that's an argument for wanting it to hang out inside a while longer. And does it matter what I think? I know I've learned that it absolutely doesn't, so wishful thinking or not, this one is going to arrive when he or she decides its the right time :-)

Getting bigger by the day

At 37 weeks and 4 days, this baby is getting bigger and bigger! Here are today's photo shoot results ...

Standard profile shot:

Craddling the little one :-)

I think the belly looks a little more impressve without the tanktop ...

One more craddling shot:

Last one - frontal belly shot! You can tell from the shine that the poor thing is STRETCHED.