Posterous theme by Cory Watilo

Ada hit nine months yesterday! That means she’s been out just about as long as she was in. 

It’s amazing to look back at all the changes that take place in such a short amount of time. Ada continues to amaze us with her new skills and endear us with her adorable, developing personality. 

Ada got to travel again in February. She and I flew to California for a week with the family. She got to meet Uncles Aaron and Steve (her birthday buddy), Aunt Kelsey, and Grandpa Frank, hang out with grandparents, and visit the magic kingdom. I think she enjoyed the warmer weather. 

Ada seems to produce a new skill every day! She still has no use for crawling, but she has found plenty of ways to move around. She’s starting to pull herself up on things if she finds something interesting enough to motivate her. She still hasn’t managed to get on her feet on her own, but she loves to stand when we put her on something. I’m wondering if she’s just planning to skip crawling. 

Where we’re seeing the most growth these days is with Ada’s social skills. She makes friends wherever she goes and smiles at everyone. I don’t think she understands yet that not everybody loves her as much as Luke and I do. She’ll see somebody whose look pleases her, start to quack at them, and then continue to stare until they’re out of sight, waiting for them to talk to her. In the last month, Ada has mastered clapping, waving, sharing, and talking. Well, saying mama.  She is truly a joy to sit and play with these days as she learns to interact with us. 

Since January 1 Ada has sprouted four new teeth, giving her six total. She has four on top now, wih two more on their way (I think). She handles teething really well, with new buds not really affecting her sleep at all. 

Sleep continues to be our greatest challenge with Ada. She is sleeping pretty well, but it requires constant schedule tweaking to keep her going. She even slept through the night once last week

Food is another really fun area right now. We’ve basically transitioned from purees to finger foods. Ada loves to feed herself, and if it comes off my plate, she wants it. I really never expected her to have such an obsession with food. We can no longer eat in front of her without sharing. We are not giving Ada meat yet, so we have to make sure there’s something else on our plates that we can give her. But we usually eat dinner after she’s gone to bed, so it doesn’t matter much. She loves just about every food she eats, with plain avocado being the exception. Her favorites include a black bean and avocado mash, blueberries, and yogurt. 

She did have quite a large breakfast this morning that included some new foods that, sadly, didn't agree with her. At all. And made a reappearance. Three times. Twice in the car. We feel like we're definitely in the parenting club now. 

After hearing a lot of comments about Ada’s size while we were in California, I got curious. We hadn’t been to the pediatrician since early December, but I wanted to know what she weighed. I took her to the office and weighed her on the baby scale. 14 lbs, 10 oz. This means that in two months, she had gained just 6.5 oz. It also puts her in the 2nd percentile for her age. We have a checkup next week and will find out then whether or not the dr. is concerned. My gut tells me that this isn’t a problem. I was an epically skinny baby as well, so it runs in the family. Besides, she’s happy and healthy, so I think she’s fine. I do enjoy still being able to put her in some of her 3 month clothing (although even that is coming to an end). 

Our favorite two purchases in the last two months have been Ada’s Skip Hop Playspot and her B Toys Zany Zoo. 

The Playspot is a set of interlocking foam tiles that create a soft place for baby to go boom when they fall and keeps all of her toys concentrated to one area. It is also free of all the unsavory chemicals that many other foam play mats contain (this also means it doesn’t have the smell many others do). 

The Zany Zoo is a wooden activity cube. Ada can stand up while holding some of the toys on top. She really loves this thing and it entertains her longer than any other $50 that we’ve spent. You’ve probably seen this featured in several pictures over the last few weeks. The B Toys line has lots of colorful, fun toys that encourage creativity. The colors are unlike all other toys, so the Zany Zoo is less of an eyesore than most of Ada’s other toys. We plan to give B Toys lots of money over the next few years. 

Well I think that’s it for nine months. I’ll leave you with a fan favorite- a picture my dear sister-in-law, Nicole, snapped while we were at Disneyland.

 

Diapers, baby food, and sleep training, oh my!

Where to start? It turns out I’m terrible at this blogging stuff now that I’m a momma. I’ll try not to go four months again.

Ada turns seven months old today! I can’t believe that she’s been hanging out with us this long. While she’s such an important part of our lives, and I couldn’t imagine life without her, it also seems like just yesterday that we were bringing her home.

When she’s not teething, Ada is a happy, healthy little girl. She’s certainly not without her challenges (what baby is?), but she brings such joy to us that it’s all worth it.

Since our last update, Ada has done a lot of growing up. One would hope so, right?

In October we flew to Phoenix to visit all our old friends and show off our little cutie. My best friend and her hubby drove out from California to see us. We had a great time visiting with everybody and showing Ada where Luke’s and my life together started. (Let’s face it, though, she didn’t care.) I don’t know if it was a coincidence, or if the travel really threw her off and set things in motion, but whatever good sleeping habits Ada had before Phoenix, she threw out the window.

We came back and nighttime became a nightmare. My sweet girl, who used to eat twice a night and had no problem going back in her crib, suddenly wanted her momma every couple of hours, all night. Oh, and she didn’t want to sleep anywhere but her swing. I tried some sleep training, but she was just not ready for it. I’ll spare you all the details, but I wasn’t able to start really sleep training her until we moved, just before Thanksgiving. With a lot of patience and tears (yes, we let her cry it out), I’m happy to say that Ada happily goes to bed without a fight, eats just once a night, and sleeps solidly, in her crib, from 7-7! If you’ve ever been there (meaning you’ve had a kid), you know how wonderful it feels to start getting something like a normal night’s sleep again.

Ada has also started eating solids in the last couple of months. I make all her food, and it’s been so much fun to watch her experience new flavors. So far, she’s had oatmeal, prunes, sweet potatoes, acorn squash, sweet peas, carrots, berries, and avocado. She’s a great little eater and has enjoyed nearly everything I’ve given her.

At her last appointment, a month ago, Ada weighed 14 lbs, 3 ½ oz. This made her ½ oz shy of doubling her birth weight, and put her in the 14th percentile for her age. So she’s a little bit of a thing. And this momma is not complaining! I get a lot more use out of her clothes. Today, in fact, she wore a size 3 month onesie.

Ada is getting more curious every day about the world around her. She’s recently developed a desire for mobility. We’re not seeing any crawling yet, but she can scoot around on her back like no other! A few weeks ago she decided it was time to start sitting unassisted. I love it, because it means I can set her down in a lot more places, but I know once she starts crawling, all that will stop. Ada loves to play peek-a-boo, have conversations, listen to music and dance with her daddy. Lately, she’s loved just about anything her daddy does.

We still love cloth diapering, and feel it was the best decision we could have made for our family. It really hasn’t been a lot of work and we’ve already made back our investment in savings. I’ve heard a lot of moms say that their husbands don’t like to use cloth, but Luke’s taken to it quite well. He claims to never have changed a diaper before Ada came along, but he’s a natural.

A friend of mine shares her favorite baby products on her blog, and since I have some new momma friends, I thought I might steal this one and share a few of my own favorites.

- Coconut oil- with cloth diapers, we can’t use traditional diaper creams because of the zinc. So we just slather little miss in coconut oil and so far it has cleared up any bit of irritation she’s had.

- Dr. Bronner’s Baby Mild Castille Soap- A little bit goes a long way, and doesn’t cause cradle cap! Enough said.

- Ibuprofen- I’m a fan of natural products for a lot of things, but when it comes to teething, I’ve decided not to mess around. When my little girl is in pain, we break out the good stuff.

- Baby Merlin’s Magic Sleep Suit- Yep, you read that correctly. Ada was fighting her swaddle big time when we started sleep training. This crazy suit is a swaddle transition. It gives her freedom of movement while preventing her from slapping herself in the face. We’ve used it for a month and I’m about ready to wean her from it, but it’s been wonderful!

Since anyone who reads my blog is either family or a friend on Facebook, I’m sure you’ve all seen plenty of pictures. But I’ll leave you with one from today. Until next time!

 

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Ada is three months old!

Ada is three months old today! While it seems like we’ve had her around forever, I can also remember holding her in my arms for the first time like it happened this morning. Ada had a very busy month, with lots of visitors and trips to new places. (By the way, can I just say that I love that she was born on the first of the month. It’s so easy to keep track of everything that way.)

Really, it was July when Luke’s womenfolk visited, but we’ll count it anyway. At the end of July, Luke’s mom, Elaine, sister-in-law, Heather, and two nieces, Haley and Hartley (15 yrs and 18 mo), flew out from the Midwest to meet Miss Ada. We sure enjoyed seeing everybody and I know they enjoyed spending time with the latest addition to the Lackrone clan.

On Saturday we loaded up both cars and drove to Annapolis for the afternoon. It was hot, but with we caught a break with the breeze from the water. It also helped that, just as everybody was reaching their low point, we found a shoe store where many of us made a purchase! On Sunday Heather and I knew that the babies probably didn’t need another day out and about. We stayed home and went for a nice walk at the park while Luke took his mom and niece to Georgetown, where they ate cupcakes and shopped for accessories at Urban Outfitters. I believe they also did some walking through DC, but I’m pretty sure the cupcakes were the highlight of the trip ;)

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A few days after the ladies left, Luke’s brother, Matt, was in Baltimore for a convention. He came over for dinner one night and got to hang out with a fussy Ada for a little while before I had to cart her off to bed.

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After Luke’s family left, we settled down for a few quiet weeks. One Friday we drove to a winery in Virginia to live out my dream of a wine and cheese picnic using a TravelZoo deal Luke had purchased months earlier. Ada did not enjoy sitting in traffic on the 495, but neither did we! She was very good at the winery, but I think she got a little sad that we didn’t let her share our glass of wine with her.

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Just when we thought we were done with visitors for a little while, my mom called up and asked if she could come out for another visit before going back to work (she teaches middle school- I know, she’s crazy). So we spent a few delightful days with my mom last week. One morning she and I went to Ft. McHenry and Ada got her National Parks Kids passport! My mom has visited DC and seen all the sights, but she had never made it out to the fort. She really enjoyed ticking one more sight off the list and picking up some educational materials before returning to school.

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On Saturday, after my mom left, Luke, Ada, and I drove to Frederick for the day. We love to walk up and down the main street, stopping for a pint at the local brewery, seeing what’s new at the battery-free toy store, and grabbing some ice cream or chocolate somewhere along the way.

Developmentally, Ada has changed a lot this month. At her 2-month appointment, she weighed 10 lbs, .5 oz and was 21.25 inches long. I think this put her in the 25th percentile for weight and something similar for length. So she’s not a big girl, and she’ll probably never become the cute, rolly polly Michelin man kind of kid, but she is filling out. Her legs no longer look hollow, so that’s good :)

In the last two weeks, Ada has learned to grasp small objects. This has opened up a whole new world of independent play on her activity mat, which in turn has enabled me to get in a 50-minute workout every morning! If I position Ada at the right angle, she can kick the support bars on the mat and rattle all of the toys herself. Between that and grabbing the rings hanging off of a few of the animals, she is having a blast every morning! She is still working on a two-handed grasp and gets somewhat frustrated at times as she tries to figure out how she can hold on to objects that aren’t narrow enough to hold in one hand. Over the last week she has become very interested in her Sophie, the giraffe. She enjoys holding on to it while we walk around the house and sucking on Sophie’s face. We’re quite proud of her newfound independence.

Ada has also learned a game this month! She isn’t really keen on tummy time, so I was searching for other ways to help her work on developing head control. She has pretty good control already, but the parenting experts make me feel guilty if I’m not doing tummy time with her. I learned that helping a baby do sit-ups is a great way to let them practice head control. Ada loves it! If she’s laying down, I’ll have her grab my thumbs, and then I’ll grasp her forearms and gently pull her up. Now, whenever she is holding Luke’s or my hand, she starts crunching to try and sit up. She also discovered her feet this week and spends much of her waking time in the carseat crunching forward to watch them.

Ada also seems to love music. I discovered one day in July that she loves to hear me sing “Let It Snow.” For some reason, this has a calming effect on her. She also seems to like show tunes, as I learned one day when I was singing a song from Avenue Q. If you’ve ever seen Avenue Q, you’ll know that I’ll have to stop singing those songs once she can understand language- or perhaps I’ll just clean them up for her.

It’s been really fun to watch Ada learn new things and become more aware of the world around her lately. There are a few things we feel are on the horizon for her. She doesn’t get peek-a-boo yet, but we try every couple of days just to make sure. She has been learning so many new things, but she hasn’t realized that she’s supposed to be proud of herself. We’re encouraging her with lots of positive chatter and clapping every time she accomplishes a new or challenging task.

Luke thinks I’m crazy, but I’m preparing for a somewhat early teether. Ada drools a lot, gnaws on Sophie’s face whenever she has the chance, and has started gnawing on my fingers, rather than sucking on them, when she can get them in her mouth. I think we’ll be buying her a freezable teething ring this week just to be prepared.

Ada has also developed some really great sleeping habits!! We worked really hard to establish a bedtime routine from the start, and it’s paying off. Around 7:45 every night, Ada informs us that she is tired, and would like to be put in bed. A process that used to take more than an hour has been cut down to 20-30 minutes lately. So even though we still start bedtime between 7:45-8:00 every night, she’s in bed by 8:15, rather than 9:15. She wakes up once or twice a night, eats, gets changed, and falls back to sleep quickly. These days my sleep deprivation comes from my own inability to fall asleep quickly!

Our first 6-7 weeks of parenthood were challenging, like they are for everyone. But Luke and I feel like we’ve really hit a stride. We realize that any of this can change as Ada enters the next phase of development, so we’re taking nothing for granted. For now, though, we’re just enjoying our easy baby!

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for taking an interest in our baby! We are so far away from our families that it’s important that we try to keep people up to date on what’s going on with our precious Miss Ada.

I'll leave you with a few more highlights from this month. Let the cuteness-fest begin!

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Lessons Learned Number Two

Just a couple this week.

  • The first time your child sleeps through the night, I promise you, you will not. Ada managed 8 hours twice this week. Each time, I spent the last hour or so just waiting for her to wake up. 
  • Your two-month old is not the only one who will cry when she gets her vaccines. I definitely teared up yesterday watching Ada get two shots. This is also the reason she slept 8 hours in one go last night. 
  • Having a coughing fit while nursing is less than desirable. Luke and I have been sick this week. Mine has taken up residence in my throat. I've been up more this week with couging fits than I have with my kiddo. Then last night while I was nursing Ada, I couldn't hold a cough back any more. She popped off and started crying. 
  • Another mother's tragedy really will make you snuggle your child a little closer. A woman I only know from a Babycenter forum lost her daughter to SIDS this week. It's caused me to snuggle with Ada a little longer at bedtime all week. 

Lessons Learned

I think I’m going to try to make this a regular- possibly weekly, but probably bi-weekly- feature, at least for a while. When I post lessons learned, I’ll share the things that Luke and I have experimented with that worked for us (or didn’t), and what Ada has taught us. To a seasoned parent, I’m sure this will be nothing new. So if you’re a seasoned parent, and you have already learned how to handle what we’re experiencing, pat yourself on the back and laugh in private ☺

Ada is 7 ½ weeks old, so today I’ll be playing catch-up on everything we’ve picked up over the last 52 days. 

The swing really is your best friend. This is probably the most important lesson we’ve learned so far. Ada is, like most young babies, quite fond of snuggling. If snuggling is a nice way of saying she likes to ride around on your shoulder for most of the day.  It’s hard to get her to nap, and it’s darned near impossible to get anything done (but you’d be amazed at what I can accomplish with a baby on my shoulder and one free arm these days). We started out without a swing because we just weren’t sure we wanted to commit to all the space it takes up in our living room. Over the last couple of weeks I’d been thinking about swings. I’d even asked a friend if Ada could come over and try her son’s swing to see if she liked it. But I didn’t push it too hard, because we’re tired of spending money. Then last week my mom got it into her head that a swing would come in handy and asked if she could buy one. We said yes and it’s changed my life in just a few days. Ada is now starting to take long, uninterrupted naps in the morning. She is also starting to take an afternoon nap- something we couldn’t count on before. Get a swing and put your kid in it until they like it. 

Don’t be a hero. Get a SwaddleMe. I spent the first 6 weeks swaddling Ada for bed using our lovely Aden & Anais muslin blankets. Short of pinning her down with my knee to get a tighter swaddle, I tried everything. And it was always just a matter of time before she got her hands out. Once again, she’s not unique. All babies like to get their hands out, but it seems that all babies also wake themselves up with arms and legs on the loose. A friend loaned us her son’s SwaddleMe that he’s grown out of (it’s great to have a friend with a kid just a few months older than Ada) and I started using it last week. It’s so much easier! In the middle of the night when I change her diaper after a feeding, I can do it without unswaddling her arms. It’s invaluable. While I’m at it, don’t be afraid to double swaddle a wiggly kid. After I put Ada in her SwaddleMe, I wrap the muslin blanket tightly around her to keep her feeling snug. 

Put your kid in their crib. I think a lot of people would disagree with me on this. But our next baby (a long time from now) will be sleeping in their crib from the night we bring them home. We put Ada in her crib at 3 weeks and haven’t looked back. Here’s my theory. You’re going to be up a ton at night anyway. Why not spend that time teaching them to sleep in their crib? I know a lot of people keep the baby in their room for the first few months, but that’s not for us. I feel like I killed two birds with one stone (can’t there be a less violent expression?). We got Ada on a decent sleep schedule while also training her to sleep in her crib. It required me to sleep on an air mattress in her room for a couple of weeks, but we got through it. 

Ada doesn’t like to sleep flat on her back. Nothing new there. I don’t think she has reflux, but she’s still more comfortable on an incline. I’m talking 2-3 inches. Go ahead and crucify me, but we skipped the $15 mattress wedge and put her crib on short risers on one side. Ada went from sleeping 2-3 hours at a time to 6 hours for her first stretch of the night. I’m talking her first night. It was another big game changer for us.

Blackout shades are a must!! Ada was really enjoying waking up with the sun, and I wasn’t digging the results. I either got up with her, or brought her into bed, where nobody got much more sleep. After discussing this with a friend, it dawned on me that blackout shades might just fool her for a while longer each day. I suggested it to Luke and the shades were up that night. We just bought the cheap paper shades for this house, and they work, but I’ll put up a more permanent solution in the new house. Ada still wakes up when she’s done sleeping, and sometimes that’s still 5:30, but most days it’s between 6:30-7:00 now. 

If you’re going to cloth diaper, cloth wipe as well. It would be inconvenient to use two disposal methods. This way, everything goes in one pail together and I just wash it all at once. I may change my tune on this when Ada starts eating solids, but for now, I love it. We keep a squirt bottle with a simple wipe solution right by the changing pad and dampen the wipes as needed. I do use disposable wipes when we’re out, but that’s only because I don’t want to carry a solution bottle around with me. By the way, Ada loves the flannel wipes. They’re not as cold as disposable wipes because they’re not dripping wet. 

Speaking of cloth diapers, let me just pitch them with a few caveats. It works really well for us because it’s fairly convenient. I wouldn’t preach cloth to anybody who works, or for whom laundry on a daily basis is inconvenient (like you live in an apartment without in-unit washer and dryer, or your bedroom is on the 3rd floor and the washer and dryer are in the basement). My washer and dryer are just outside my bedroom, and will be when we move in December as well. It’s really easy for me to start Ada’s stinkers after I put her to bed and hang them to dry before I go to bed.

Wear your baby! I wear Ada in a Moby wrap quite a bit when we’re out running errands and it’s usually a great way for her to get a nap if she’s been stubborn that day. The Moby gets warm, so I don’t wear her outside. I have a Mei Tai as well, which has better air flow, but I’m waiting until Ada is a little bigger before I use it. She doesn’t really like the froggy position her legs have to be in to use it at this size.

Plan meals your husband can finish cooking. Ada frequently enjoys getting cranky/hungry somewhere around the halfway point while I’m cooking dinner. It’s nice if I can pass dinner responsibilities off to Luke at any point. 

I think that’s enough for now. I hope this helps someone besides myself. But if nothing else, it’ll be a great reminder for Luke and I when we lose our heads and do this whole newborn thing again.

Ada Arrives

As many of you know, I had pretty much a dream pregnancy. Very little morning sickness (I never threw up), no complications, and I felt pretty good the entire time. I kept waiting to feel miserable and it never really happened. 

Two weeks before Ada was expected, we had our house torn up in order to replace both staircases. Don't ask what was wrong with them. I don't own the house, so I don't particularly care. Our house was in complete disarray for two weeks. To add to the chaos, our AC stopped working and temperatures were hovering around 100. I was unhappy, but it had nothing to do with pregnancy. 

As if the stair work hadn't made life crazy enough, Luke and I bought a house on Wednesday, the 30th. It's new construction, so we aren't moving just yet. But we had to pick out all of our options within 30 days, which meant I had to commit to a 3 hour meeting at the design center in the middle of all the "due any day now" excitement.

On Thursday, the 31st, everything wrapped up. Construction and painting were completed, the HVAC repair man fixed our air, and the cleaning crew was scheduled for the following morning. I could relax now. Luke and I went down to the sales office for the house to sign one more piece of paperwork. I had questioned the wisdom of going all the way down there when we could do it Sunday (the office is close to our church), but we went anyway.

As we walked around the neighborhood a little later that evening a neighbor asked if I thought I'd see anything happen that weekend and I laughed. Surely not. I didn't feel any different yet. I was due Sunday, but that didn't mean a thing. Maybe next week.

Luke and I had a nice evening relaxing in our less chaotic, cooler house and went to bed around 11. At 1:45 I woke up to what felt like menstrual cramps. I had had tons of Braxton Hicks, so I knew what those felt like, and this was a little more. I went to the bathroom (just a habit by this point) and tried to go back to sleep. A few minutes later, I felt another crampy contraction. So I checked the time and waited to see if it would happen again. 8 minutes later, it did. I woke Luke up, told him I was having real contractions and that I was going to go downstairs. I would wake him if they became the real thing. 

I went downstairs and started cleaning the kitchen. I had made dinner in the crockpot that night but had not cleaned it. I figured, if this was really labor, I was not going to come home to dirty dishes. I was timing my contractions with an app on my phone, and even though they had gone from 8 to 5 minutes in the last hour, I was not ready to claim labor. I continued cleaning the kitchen. When a contraction hit I would lay my head down on the cool granite counter top and sway through it. 

Once the kitchen was clean, I into the family room. I had my Kindle and planned to read for a while. I had practiced relaxation using the Enya station on Pandora, so I turned that on. My plan was to lay on my side, with all my pillows, relax, and see where this all went. It was quickly apparent that I wouldn't be reading, and that laying down was not very comfortable. I grabbed my balance ball and would lean on it and sway during contractions. Eventually I decided it was time to call the midwife. 

Around 4:00 I called the after hours number for my OB practice. One of seven midwives was always on-call at the hospital. My favorite, Mary Beth, was the one who responded. I told her my contractions were about 4 minutes apart and had been for the past hour. She told me to come in if I wanted pain meds, but to stay home as long as I could stand it if I didn't. I had spent my entire pregnancy preparing for an unmedicated labor, so I stayed home. 

I woke Luke and told him this was really it. I wanted to try getting in the shower to see if that would help. By this point, I was really having to work to relax through each contraction. We got the shower going and it felt amazing. Luke timed my contractions for me while I leaned against the shower wall moaning through each one. 

After a while I began to feel a little overheated, so Luke helped me get out. He dimmed the lights, turned on Enya, and helped me get on the bed. I laid there, on my side, breathing through each contraction for 45 minutes. It really helped me to have Luke tell me when I was halfway through a contraction so that I knew it would get better soon. On the bed, I was really able to relax. However, I knew that labor progresses faster when you're moving.

I decided to get up to see how I felt when moving. Yikes! The very next contraction was a lot worse! I immediately told Luke that we needed to head to the hospital. If I was this uncomfortable, waiting was only going to make the car ride worse. It took us about 30 minutes to get the car loaded (Luke) and head out. I called my sister and told her we were going to the hospital. We talked for about 3 minutes and I got a break from contractions during our conversation. As soon as I hung up the phone, the contractions started coming almost on top of each other. 

Being in the car was so uncomfortable that I had a hard time managing the pain quietly. Luke let me yell basically the entire way to the hospital- about 20 minutes. When we arrived, it was about 6:15. Luke dropped me off in front of the ER door and parked the car.

I walked in, barked my name at the woman at the admitting desk and hopped on a chair to breathe through the next contraction. Luke walked in shortly, they got me a wheelchair and we headed up to labor and delivery. Looking back now, it's hysterical, but the one thing Luke brought in with him was my exercise ball. I really thought it would come in handy. 

In L & D they put me in a triage room immediately. I was asked to change into a gown. It was one of the most difficult tasks I've ever completed. The triage nurse started hooking me up to the fetal monitor and asking me all the standard questions. I was having a hard time talking, so Luke provided most of the answers she needed.

I started to feel a lot of pressure- the feeling women describe when it's time to push. I told the nurse and asked her to check me. She continued to ask questions. Finally she checked me. Her response? "Oh girl, you don't have a cervix left." Duh...

Suddenly, things started happening much faster. She started calling around to find my midwife, who was finishing up another delivery. She decided to wheel me into the delivery room adjacent to the one my midwife was currently in, so that I would be close. At this point, the President could have been hanging out in the halls and I wouldn't have noticed. I was definitely panicking. 

Somewhere in the hall I felt something coming out of me. I really panicked at this point. Was Ada just going to leap out before we could get to the room?! The nurse checked when we got to the room and found that it was my intact bag of waters bulging out. Then I became a person of interest and a few more nurses made it in to check this out. 

Soon, my midwife, Mary Beth, arrived and promptly ruptured my bag. The room cleared out except for Mary Beth, Pam- the nicest nurse I've ever met, and Luke. There was nothing left to do now but bring Ada into the world. As my dear friend Vicki said, we'd drained her hot tub. It was time to pull her out.

I think I pushed for about 45 minutes. It was hard work. Mary Beth let me push without directing me. With each contraction I was able to get in three good pushes. Luke and I had taken 12 weeks of Bradley Method classes and they definitely helped me push on my own. Mary Beth called me a champ. Luke was an incredible help. I didn't have to tell him what I needed. In fact, by this point, he knew better than I did what I needed. 

Throughout my pregnancy I had envisioned myself trying several different positions for pushing, in order to find the most comfortable, effective position for me. However, when you show up at the hospital ready to pop the kid out, things happen pretty quickly and you stop caring. I never pictured myself on my back, gripping the handles, but there I was. I pushed as hard as I thought I could. With each push, Luke would push my head down into my chest, which puts additional pressure on the uterus and helps push the baby down and out. 

I was getting tired of pushing, and realized I would have to push harder if I wanted Ada to come out. I was determined to get her out quickly. So I mustered everything I had in me and pushed until she came out. It hurt, but it felt so much better to push than it would have to not push. 

Ada came out at 7:58 AM, with her left hand up by her face, yelling and healthy. They put her on my chest and I held my daughter for the first time. I can't remember much about what happened after that. I don't remember how long I held her before they took her over to the warmer. 

My poor midwife! She had been on-call for the past 24 hours, and here I am, giving birth a mere two minutes before she's supposed to go home. The next midwife came in and together they stitched me up. Because things had happened quickly and Ada had her hand by her face, despite the midwife's best efforts, I had torn a lot. It took 45 minutes to stitch everything back together. I have no idea how many stitches I got. I just know what by the end, I was ready to let them just leave the rest unstitched ;)  The only thing that got me through was Luke ordering a huge breakfast and feeding me while I held Ada. 

The dust settled, the midwives cleared out, and Ada and I were left to get to know each other. I nursed her for about 20 minutes before they took her to the nursery for all the mandatory stuff. Luke went with her, and the nurse got me cleaned up and ready to move to the post-partum room. 

Ada was absolutely perfect from the first moment. Her APGAR scores were 9/9- which means she was a tough cookie from minute one. 

We spent the next few hours calling family, taking pictures, and eating. A lot of women who have the goal of achieving an unmedicated birth resist going to the hospital because of the pressure they feel doctors will put on them to accept medication and interventions. But I loved my hospital experience. I loved spending the next couple of days in bed, recovering and enjoying my daughter. It was a really special time for us. Exhausting, but special. 

We've been home for 6 1/2 weeks now, and I'll save that for another post!

 

And we're already behind

Luke and I started this blog a few months ago, but we've been so busy with a newborn that we forgot about it! So here we are, 6 1/2 weeks after Ada's birth, and I'm just now getting around to my first post. 

Our intent was for this blog to be a chronicling of our adventures in parenthood, as well as something Ada can look at when she's older and see some of the (hopefully) fun things we've done with her. Sometimes you'll hear from me, sometimes you'll hear from Luke. We don't want to bombard the world with talk of our kid. We realize she's not the first cute baby to have ever come into the world. As her parents, we obviously think she's pretty amazing, but we realize not everybody is as gaga over her as we are. So we'll try to keep our baby sharing here on the blog. We don't expect everything we write to be interesting to all people. But you may find it enjoyable, so check back every now and then to see what's new with our kid. 

I also plan to use the blog as a way of recording our lessons learned. I can't tell you how many times in the last 6 weeks I have asked a mom friend about something newborn related and their response was, "I don't remember how we did it." I hope that this aspect of the blog will be helpful to other new mom friends, as well as a good reminder for myself when we are crazy enough to do this baby thing a second time. 

Stay tuned for photo bombs, stories about adventures we've had with Ada, and more. We'll also get caught up on the last 6 weeks, as Ada has already had quite a few visitors to talk about.