my mom

My mom was able to come help for the week. It was great, it always is. With every baby we pick a show to watch all day and night. With Mac it was LOST, we watched the first 2 seasons. I'm not mentioning the one we picked this time- but it was good. I lay around while my mom is our slave. Life is good when mom is here! She's so great it makes it hard to say goodbye!

Every pregnancy, birth, and baby are different. And with every one I learn something new. Here's just 4 new things...

1. Labor, giving birth, nursing, all the pain that accompanies these3 things does not compare to saying goodbye to my mom.

2. Waiting to see your baby before you name them is a million times harder than naming them before and leaving the hospital without a name is the dumbest thing you can do!

3. Crying is ok as long as you know you are irrational and crazy.

4. saying goodbye to some of your best friends 5 days after having a baby is a bad idea! Hear that Kev?!-this deserves a post of it's own!Needless to say this week has been hard in different ways. Annie is such a great baby. She sleeps, eats and poops like a champ, nothing to complain there. The boys are adjusting beautifully. Mac can not get enough of his little sister and G is in his own little world, content as can be. So it might be confusing why this week has been so hard. Hormones, is all I can guess. I can't wait until I get back to my normal non crying self!

and because I know my mom misses Annie just as much as we miss her. Here's Annie stretching- my moms favorite thing she does...
if only I could get a picture of her puckered lips.

Perfection

I can not get enough of this baby girl. Everything from her cry, her not so small feet, her extremely long fingers and tiny ears... perfection. I am in love with this baby!!! This week, while it's been hard, it's been pretty incredible.


These guys think she's pretty great too...




Side note... I just read this article and loved it "Why I can't stop reading Mormon housewife blogs"

Annie's first bath!

Getting ready to get her first sponge bath, happy and content...

She hates to be naked...
Did not love the experience...

She's here!!!

Name: Annie Lynne Millar
Birth date:1-11-11
weight: 8 lbs 6 oz
length: 21.5 inches

If you want the gory details read on....

Monday my mom flew in. We ate a great dinner as a family and then Drew and I said our goodbyes and we left to the hospital to be induced. We got to our room, changed, settled in, watched some football game. It's funny, for some reason while I'm in labor Drew picks what we watch. With Mac it was football, and with Gray it was the French open. It's ok inbetween timeouts I got to watch "Dan in real life." Since I was still dilated to a 3, I was put on a low pitocin drip overnight. When I woke up I was dilated to a 5.

7:00am: doctor broke my water, upped the pitocin a little. I was determined to do my part in getting me to progress. I walked around and bounced on the yoga ball.
9:00am: my mom showed up
10:00am: dilated to a 7. Got a little anxious to have this baby out and told the nurse to up the pitocin
10:30 am: hard, really hard contractions. regretted my decision to up pitocin-moved to the bed
11:00am: pain but manageable. Turned off the tv and I stopped talking all together.
11:20 am: continual pain. Nurse prepped the room for delivery
11:37 am: told the nurse I needed to push
11:40 am: started pushing without doctor. finally felt some releif to the pain.
11:40-11:46 am: my body took over and I pushed until I broke a blood vessel in my eye, while the amazing doctor turned posterior baby
11:47 am: one last push and I finally got to hold my baby girl

totally exausted but feeling pure joy

It was so great having my mom in the delivery room. With the boys' births Drew and I decided we wanted it to be just us, but for some reason, for Annie's we both wanted my mom there. Because I was planning on doing the delivery naturally we were all a little nervous-especially my mom. We all knew if I couldn't hold it together, there was no way my mom was going to be able to. But I promised the minute I was mean or started yelling-crying, I would get an epidural. Turned out the delivery could not have gone smoother and I kept my end of the deal. I'm so glad Drew and I could share this experience with her! Something none of us will ever forget.

Every time the boys came to visit it got a little crazy. Mac was a nervous wreck, asking every so often if the doctor was going to give me or the baby a shot and Gray made himself at home...

First family photo. Baby Annie only 8 hrs old

Getting ready to go home...

We love this little girl so much! As you can see, she looks so much like Mac but there are some differences. She has lots of blonde hair, a much smaller size head -2 inches to be exact:). Blue eyes and little tiny ears. She's such a good baby. Loves to nurse and rarely cries- we are hoping this good behavior continues:)

Update...

Still no baby and really, I'm ok with that! Physically I'm ready, the house is clean, the bags are packed, closets organized, bedroom painted and my body has had it. I'm bigger than I have ever been, swollen and just plain uncomfortable but the thought of going into labor is scary. I kind of forgot about the pain thing until recently- but there's no turning back. My goal to have her as far away from Christmas is working so far.

Besides the labor and Christmas thing I'm so excited to hold her for the first time. See who's traits she has, finally name her and let the boys meet her. Gray thinks she'll be born tomorrow while mac thinks I have another week. The doctor on the other hand thinks I'll go any day. I'm dilated to a 3 and 75% effaced but I learned the hard way with Mac that you can be that way for a long time and not go into labor on your own. So if that happens again, we've set an induction date just in case.

Update on the boys... I think they sense change. Mac is a little or a lot more emotional these days. Gray is naughty as all get out. He bullies everyone. But he has a way of getting himself out of trouble. He's a charming thing. This Sunday G was put into a new nursery. When Drew went to pick him up after church the teacher gave us an update on his behavior. "Gray tackled and punched Dawson in the mouth and gave him a bloody lip. He also punched pretty much everyone else in the class too that tried to take his toys but he always said "Sorry" and he was fine as long as I kept him by my side." Oh it was a proud parent moment! How could we have 2 boys that are sooooo different.

Hopefully the next post will be filled with pictures of our sweet little girl! Until then enjoy this picture of my large stomach!