More Pictures of Baby Girl

I haven't decided what Baby Girl's name will be yet on here, so for now, she'll just be Baby Girl. 

She's just so sweet, I can't help taking so many pictures!
These next ones are when I was playing around with my camera. It does this black and white effect with one pop of color. I like that feature!

Minnie took the crown off her Rapunzel doll and put it on Baby Girl.  The girls thought it was cute. 

More birthdays!

It was a great time to have a baby, because the kids had Friday and Monday off of school! It was nice to be all at home and enjoy being a family.  Monday was Bucko's birthday and Tuesday was Goofy's, so we had the family crew over for cake and ice cream Monday afternoon. 

We did two cakes, of course.  Bucko had the cookies 'n cream cake and Goofy had pistachio nut cake.  (Now I know I said before that I don't like cake, but these two--along with Nana's triple chocolate bundt cake--are the exceptions!)

 Bucko's expressions always crack me up.  In the top left, he's smiling because he got money from Nana and Papa in his card.  Top right:  he's so excited because he got a Pokeball from his cousins.  He had asked for one for his birthday but PC had put his foot down and told him no Pokemon!  Bottom left:  He just opened his football from us and Uncle Dan told him that it has fire flames when you throw it.  The box has flames on it, so he apparently believed him for a few seconds, as you can tell by his excited/shocked face!  The last one, bottom right: he has been asking for an electric scooter since last summer.  We decided to get him one, but had to order it and it wasn't here, so we just put a picture in the card and explained. He didn't seem to mind having to wait.  He was so happy with all of it, he put his hands in the air and said, "Best birthday ever!" 

We let Goofy open his present from his cousins on Monday (a Cars bath set he was super excited about) but made him wait until Tuesday for the rest of his presents.  Minnie and Bucko like to help out, as you can see.  Goofy has been asking for a Spiderman webshooter since Christmastime. He was so excited to get it. I also found a Spiderman racing car, which he also loves.  His last present was roller blades.  He was very happy with all of them!  And I'm glad we have a month until the next birthday in the family! It will be here all too soon though!

Baby Girl Arrives!

I had contractions the whole weekend of my birthday.  By Tuesday, they had gotten really strong and 4 minutes apart, so I went in. I wasn't changing much though, so they had me walk the halls for an hour and checked me again. I changed just slightly, but not enough to keep me.  They figured I would need to come back that night in real labor, but my doc said if I still hadn't had her by morning, to come to his office and he would help me along.  So luckily, Wednesday morning, the 15th, I went in to see him and dilated to 4 cm and 80% effaced. He said that was good enough for him and sent me over to the hospital.  He came over at 10:30 and broke my water.  The contractions started coming stronger and I got an epidural at 12:15 pm.  The anesthesiologist was in the next room and had to go to a c-section so it was get it then or wait another hour or more. I figured I'd been in pain for long enough (days, in fact), so I went ahead and got it.  They started giving me a little pitocin a couple hours later.  I was feeling great.  Couldn't feel the contractions at all with the epidural until 3:30pm and then I felt like they were lower and a little pressure. The nurse checked me and baby girl was ready to make her debut! So she got the doc and I pushed her out at the next contraction.  Easiest delivery I have ever had!  She bruised my tailbone and I have been having pain with that since, but everything else had been great.  Recovery has been easy.  And she is precious! She weighed in at 8 pounds 1.5 ounces and 21 1/4 inches long.  She was born at 3:36 pm on February 13. 

I know I have a big, goofy smile on my face, but I just couldn't help it! I was so glad she was finally here!  They took her to get her first bath, and PC got a few pictures of that as well.

One of my good friends came to the hospital and took pictures when the kids arrived.  I am excited to see how those turned out.  The kids were all enthralled with her and love her so much.  She is such a great addition to our little family.  Love her!
Here are a few more pictures I took with my iPad while I was in the hospital.

Birthday!

One year older.  Wiser?  Debatable.  :) 
I had a wonderful birthday this year.  I was getting over a nasty cold, so really didn't feel the greatest, but I woke up to this message on my bathroom mirror.  What better way to wake up than this?



And then when he walked in from work, he had flowers for me as well!  What a great husband, huh?  PC insisted he take me out to dinner as well, so we decided on Chili's.  We knew everyone would be happy there.  And it was yummy food.  Afterwards, we came home and had Nana join us for "cake," which was really fruit pizza.  I'm not a big cake person, but I do like desserts!  (Papa and Johnny had gone to a bluegrass concert or some such.)  PC got me a new camera!  He kept asking me what I wanted and I couldn't think of anything, but when my camera started working for a few days and then stopped again at the baby shower, I knew I needed a new one.  I really wanted another small point and shoot one that I can keep in my purse or diaper bag.  He got a really nice Sony one that I love.  I will show you pictures in later posts where I was messing around with it to learn the features.  I lost my cell phone earlier in the day, and the girls found it, so they put it in a little case and had me "open" that for my present. I was glad to see it!  Bucko gave me a card and a penny.  Goofy felt bad and said, "I didn't get you anything!!" so PC had him hand me the present with the camera in it.  Everyone was happy.  It was a nice day. I sure have a wonderful family.

Baby Shower

On February 2, one of my good friends and my mother-in-law threw me a baby shower.  It was great.  They did a theme of "showering [me] with love" because I was ready to "pop."  The decorations were super cute.  See the clouds raining down hearts in the top left picture?  And they made a ton of different kinds of popcorn like cookies and cream, mint, caramel, and different types of jello popcorn.  They all tasted amazing!  Oh, and my mother-in-law made this yummy breakfast casserole.  The recipe is here if you are interested.  I had three sister-in-laws in attendance, along with one of their sisters and another one's mother, both of whom I feel are practically family anyway! It is great to have so many family members close by (though I wish some of mine lived close and sometimes being with PC's family just makes me miss mine more) and to be able to share in these happy events!  I had a lot of friends show up as well and we were blessed with so many things we needed!  One of my sister-in-laws did a Bingo game for when I opened presents, so that was a very nice touch as well.  I truly felt showered with love and enjoyed being with friends and family. 

Counting down the days

I feel like my belly can't grow much more at this point.  Everything pretty much hurts.  Of course, I finally caught the kids cold they had last week, so that hasn't helped at all.  I forgot just how hard it is to move around when the baby gets this big at the end.  Anyway, some have asked for pictures, so I took these on Monday.