July 8, 2012

The most exciting day of Jer and my life thus far was July 8, 2012, just this past Sunday. It started out just like every other morning lately. I couldn't sleep so I snuggled up next to my husband and woke him up much earlier than he would've liked. I talked him into going on a walk with me at 7 in the morning. It was so nice outside and it felt good to get up and do something instead of sitting around the house doing nothing. We walked down to the high school at the end of the street and back. By the time we got back home I was having contractions more frequently than I had before. They became consistently every 5-7 minutes around 9 am. Our doctor had told us at our appointment on Friday not to wait till the contractions were 5 minutes apart and just to get to the hospital when they were 10 minutes because I was already dilated to a 5. My contractions weren't painful though, so I waited a while thinking that the pain would come. It didn't, but we decided to just head to the hospital anyways, just to be safe. We checked in at 11:30 am still dilated to a 5 with contractions every 2.5-3 minutes. We went on few walks around the labor and delivery floor until the doctor came at 1:30 to break my water. After losing a whole lot of water, I was dilated to a 7 and the pain of the contractions finally kicked in. We walked around a little more, but had to pause and breathe through each contraction this time. After 2 hours I was pretty sure this baby was ready to come out so we called the doctor in to check. Sure enough she was more than ready. The doctor told me to push on the next contraction and her little head poked out. I remember hearing the nurses, doctor and Jer commenting on how much dark hair she had. After the second push her heart rate dropped really low. The doctor told me she had to come out on the next push, so on the third push she was out. I remember being so relieved when she was out and the pain was instantly gone.  I heard her sweet little cry and couldn't believe my eyes when they handed her over to me and laid her on my chest. Such a perfect, beautiful baby girl. I will never forget the sweet feeling of having her on my chest, big-eyed and alert, soaking everything in. I think the most tender moment was when she wrapped her little fingers around the heart-shaped pendant on my necklace that Jeremy gave me on our wedding day.
After we had our few minutes of heaven in the labor and delivery room with our beautiful little girl we were separated for a little bit. I went down to our room on the second floor and ate my first meal of the day while Jer went with Adda to have her first bath and round of tests done.
Adda had lots of visitors right away with both of our families driving up from St. George to be there to meet her. She met grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins first. It was so fun to watch everyone come and see her and hold her and love her. There is just something about a newborn that brings a special spirit into the room. We are so grateful that our families were willing to come from near and far to be with us that afternoon and evening. We are also blessed with some great friends that came to meet her that night too. She is one lucky and loved little angel!
July 8, 2012 was definitely a good day.

Packing to go to the hospital

Getting checked in

One excited to-be daddy

I'm here!

So tiny! 5 pounds 15 oz 18 inches

Holding onto my necklace that her daddy gave me

First family picture

Hey! What're you lookin at?? Haha:)

4th of July Fun

We had a fantastic 4th of July! Fun random fact for everyone...this 4th of July was the 5 year anniversary of our first kiss:)
This year we went to Midway for their annual 4th of July sunrise program and breakfast with my grandparents. We went last year and really enjoyed it so we decided to go back again this year. It was so good to spend some time with Grandma Linda and Grandpa John!  We love Midway!

When we got home from Midway we decided to take a long (2.25 mile) walk to the gas station and back to buy Icees with our spare change. This is one of our favorite things to do when we have an afternoon with nothing to do and the weather is nice enough.

And to finish the day off 4th of July style we headed over to Jer's aunt and uncle's house for a BBQ, badmitten, and fireworks. I didn't participate in the badmitten game (I was a little sore from our walk earlier), so I was the photographer and cheerleader. I also bounced on the trampoline a little to see if Adda wanted to be a 4th of July baby. I couldn't really jump too much though for fear of losing control of my bladder haha.
The fireworks show was pretty impressive with the combination of the city's fireworks close by, the neighbor's impressive show next door, and our own fireworks set off by Anna's husband Ken.
It was a perfect 4th of July and I was so grateful to have Jeremy home. My plans before he decided to come home were to go to work, come home and go to bed early. Pathetic, I know. Sure glad he was here so it could be a real holiday!



36 Week Surprise...

For those of you who don't know, Jer has been working in North Dakota this summer installing security systems.  It has been hard to be seperated during this last trimester of the pregnancy, so we decded that 9 weeks was enough and that we were each going to drive halfway to meet in Casper, WY for the weekend. I wasn't supposed to have a doctor's appointment last Friday (at 36 weeks) because we were going to start the weekly appointments the following week, but we decided just to make sure that this baby was good to travel one last time inside me. We scheduled an appointment for Friday morning thinking I would be cleared with no problems and on the road to meet Jer later that day.  I got quite the surprise from my doctor though and my trip was canceled. Apparently I'm already dilated to a 4 at 36 weeks and Adda's head is down and dropped. SO not expecting this at all. Jer and I decided that it was better to be safe than sorry, so we just had him drive the whole way home and he'll be here till Adda decides she's ready to come out and meet us. It's crazy to think that instead of having 4 weeks to get everything ready for her I could have as little as 4 hours or 4 days. It's tough to say still when she'll come, it could be another couple weeks or it could be any day. I sure am glad though to have my husband back with me and to know that he will be here when Adda comes. So grateful to have him home!

Here we are at 36 weeks!

My growing belly

These are all on facebook and our other blog too, but I thought I'd post them here as well.  I know it isn't much and I'm still "so tiny", but there is definite progress from one month to the next. Today marks 32 weeks down and only 8 more to go if she comes on her due date.


16 weeks...the first signs of something growing in there...if you look closely




20 weeks....a tiny bit more to see than at 16 weeks




24 weeks... I admit this isn't the best picture, but 24 weeks is when I think I really started to have something to show



28 weeks...pregnant!



32 weeks...there is definitely a baby growing in there and pushing all my organs out of the way to make room



Adda's first photo shoot

So these aren't the best quality because it's just a picture of a picture, but these are the first pictures taken of our little one. Isn't she just so adorable?? Haha :-) I say that in part as a joke because our ultrasound tech kept saying things like "she's so cute" and "isn't she beautiful" and I just kept thinking ..."don't they all look the same at this point?" Don't get me wrong...I know that she's beautiful and just the fact that she exists is a beautiful thing to us, but I just found it funny to have the tech saying how cute she was as a 20 week old fetus. We are pretty confident though that she will be the cutest thing we've ever seen once we get to see her for real.
It was a pretty amazing experience to see her for the first time. Our tech was awesome and pointed out every body part and organ on the screen for us. Seeing her brain, kidneys, arms, legs, feet, and heart was so incredible. It truly is a miracle to me that she could form so perfectly from just two cells uniting and multiplying. I'm a biology major and I find embryology absolutely fascinating even in textbooks, but when it's your own child forming inside your body it is...I don't even have the words to explain how I feel about it...incredible x infinity!

Here she is smiling at her mom and dad for the first time

This is her little arm

I decided that since we will have a new member of the family join us in July we should also have a new blog. I think I want a new one more because I was so horrible at ever updating the old one and I'm slightly embarrassed about it, so I want to start over completely and hope for better results...but I'm sticking to the new member of the family = new blog excuse. If you want to see what little I actually posted on the other it is kenandjer.blogspot.com. That's where you'll find out about our family of 2: how Jer and my story began and a few of the adventures we've had since we got married. This blog is where you'll find everything about out family of 3. We are so excited to have Addalynne join our family in July and I promise to be much better at posting about her than I ever was when it was just about Jer and me. Little ones are so much more fun to see and hear about anyways right?