Headbands

Today we had Stake Conference. Miriam (my mother-in-law) had been asking for pictures of Emma in her dresses, with headbands on. Emma doesn't particularly like to have anything in her hair, or on her head, so I very rarely put them on her. I thought that I would at least put a headband on long enough to take a picture. For some reason this particular day she didn't take it off immediately.

Once Emma and I sat down on the pew at church it was a different story. I had her laying down on the pew while I fixed a bottle for her, and then all of a sudden she started screaming. I looked down and this was what I saw:

This is probably the funniest position she could possibly have gotten the headband in.

Chris was stuck working from home because of some major network issue that happened the night before, so I had to snap a picture really quick and send it to him. I am so glad that I captured this picture. After taking the picture I pulled the headband off and she was happy throughout Stake Conference.

Pictureless Post

I still need to figure out the setting that will make it so pictures taken on my phone will sync to my computer, so no pictures today, sorry.

Emma stopped sleeping through the night a few weeks ago, so we get to spend a good chunk of time between 3-4 together each morning. As much as I would LOVE to get a solid nights sleep, she is so cute and happy when you go in to get her out of her crib in the mornings. I just can't be upset with her for waking up when she flashes that smile at me!

Emma also stopped smiling when I pull my phone out. So she isn't quite as much fun for FaceTime because she won't smile at you, and she also won't really talk when the phone is out either. I can sometimes get her to ignore the phone during bathtime and she'll still smile and talk.

Yesterday she woke up from a nap and started screaming bloody murder. I ran into her room and found that she had rolled over onto her tummy, and she was NOT very happy about that. As soon as I helped her flip herself over she was fine. Apparently we need to work on tummy time a little better to see if she'll calm down. When I put her down in her crib, if she's tired at least, she automatically rolls onto her side. I knew it was only a matter of time before she'd flip over. Maybe next time she won't absolutely hate it.

We can't go to the grocery store without someone stopping to look in the cart at her. I realized it's best to avoid the grocery store when the retirement home busses are there... way too many people stop to look at the baby. It's cute, but it sure makes shopping take longer, and I am not a big fan of strangers touching her feet, which they all think is okay to do.

Emma loves to hold onto things and bring them up to her mouth. Yesterday a pacifier was next to her on the floor and she grabbed it and held on to it for about 10 minutes before she tried to get it in her mouth. After a few attempts she gave up and just decided to hold it. She fell asleep with it in her hand. I love when she falls asleep on a blanket on the floor or on her playmat. 

Yesterday she was super cranky. I put her in her swing, which is next to my piano. I sat and played some primary songs and sang along with them. She started smiling and cooing. I think the combination of the primary songs and the swing is a genius combination. If only the swing was small enough that I could take it to church and put her in it during primary. Last Sunday she screamed through half of primary, it was great. 

I've mentioned screaming a bit... Emma has realized that she can scream. So she does. Often. I should probably invest in a big case of Dr. Pepper to help the headaches go away as she screams at me. If only she would fall asleep when I know she's starting to get tired, then we may be able to avoid some of the screams. 

Emma

Because I don't really keep a journal separate from my blog I thought I should post these updates on Emma somewhere! She's almost 3 months now, but at her two month check up she was 11 lbs 10 oz (70th percentile) and I don't remember how tall, but she was 50% for height. She had to get a ton of shots, and boy oh boy did she scream like crazy. It was kind of funny though, as soon as the lady let go of Emma's leg she stopped screaming and started smiling. Emma hates having her feet/legs held down.

Emma is pretty much the happiest baby ever. Unless she's hungry or if you're holding her feet down-then she'll scream at you until she gets fed or you let go of her feet! She loves to talk. She absolutely loves her play mat still, and will lay on it and stare at her little duck toy for a few minutes. She recently realized that she can hold onto its feet, and occasionally even pulls his legs down (if you pull him down, he shakes). She smiles really big when he shakes back up, but tries to get his feet into her mouth. This is a picture of it, in case my horrible description hasn't helped you figure out what I'm talking about.

Lately when I put her in her carseat to go somewhere she gets really smiley, which is crazy because I think I would hate being strapped into a carseat. She often falls asleep in the car, although when I turned on a Backstreet Boys cd the other day she cried until I turned it off. Apparently I have an Nsync fan?

She LOVES her swing! When Chris's parents were in town for her blessing they got her a swing, and holy cow is it fantastic! It turns so it can swing side to side or front to back. It has some songs and some sounds that it makes, and it has an awesome monkey mobile.

While they were here we also got season passes to Sea World. In the last month (since we got the passes) we've gone at least 3 times, but I think we're at 4 now. We like to watch the Sea Lion show, watch the dolphins and go into the aquarium exhibit. I put her in her stroller without her carseat for the first time last time we went to sea world and she was in heaven. I pushed the stroller right up to a big fish tank and she looked around and was smiling. I don't know how good her vision is or how far away from herself she can see things for reals, but she seemed to really like looking around. We haven't seen a Shamu show yet, but hopefully we'll see one of those later this month when we go. We're also going to explore the water park there sometime before it closes for the season.

Emma's favorite time of day is probably bath time. She loves to kick her legs in the water and is just figuring out that she can splash with her hands as well! One of her least favorite parts of the day is getting into her pajamas after bath time. Not sure if she hates pjs or if she just hates that bathtime is over. When we take her into the bathroom for her bath she starts smiling. I put her towel down on the floor, put her on the towel and then get the tub ready. Once she hits the towel she starts grinning, and then will flash you even bigger smiles once you start taking off her onesie. I'm hoping she'll love playing in water/swimming as much as she likes bathtime, it's really too hot here during the summer to not spend a bunch of time doing water activities, I'm already excited for next summer!

Emma comes to Primary with me on Sundays now. I don't know how but she tends to sleep through at least parts of junior primary, and smiles when senior primary sings. I have a cd of the songs that will be in the primary program this year and I stuck it in my car. I like to turn it on when she's freaking out in the car.

She's almost outgrown her 0-3 month clothes which makes me kind of sad because she has some super cute clothes in those sizes. We do have a bunch of cute 3-6 month stuff too, but her 0-3 stuff has been just so fun! She's also pretty much grown out of size 1 diapers. I probably should've switched her to size 2 by now, but I'm working on finishing an open pack of size 1s, unless she has a blowout in the next few days.

She still has a ton of hair. I was thinking it would've started falling out by now, but it's still pretty crazy hair. One side of her head has thinned out a bit, and it's thinning a TINY bit in the back from her rubbing her head back and forth, but she's still got awesome hair. We like to play with it when it's wet after bathtime but no matter what we do with it there is just no good way to control it.

We recently changed the settings on our phones so for some reason right now the pictures I've taken on my phone aren't showing up on my laptop, so I don't have any super recent pictures to share right now... so these ones are at least a few weeks old, but you deserve photos if you've read all the stuff above.

Her Halloween pajamas! We love these pajamas and I will be so sad when she grows out of them :(

I love the way she has her hand, and the smile!

Don't you just want to squeeze those cheeks?!?!?

Love this face. She didn't find me very amusing!

Her staring at her duck!

What was I thinking?

I had every intention of blogging again soon after my last post. Life is kinda crazy though. I apologize in advance for typos, I'm writing this post on my phone and it's a little tricky.

The night before her 2 month appointment Emma decided to sleep 8.5 hours straight. Her pediatrician was  super impressed.  Shortly thereafter she started sleeping even longer. My sweet two month old would easily sleep 10 hours (8-6) and then one day it was 8-8. When Chris woke me up to say prayer before he left for work I  made him go in and make sure she was still breathing, she was at 11.5 hours, her record.  Life was fantastic! I was getting tons of sleep, she was taking great naps, and it seemed like I was able to do all sorts of stuff!

Chris and I talked for a while and I decided it was time for me to start my next byu class. Emma was sleeping til 7:30 or 8 consistently, would eat and stay awake for about an hour, then take a 2 hour nap. I felt like this was the perfect time. I could get plenty of sleep and then work during her nap.

Then  two nights ago Emma woke up at 3:30. She was cranky fr a good chunk of the day too because she wouldn't take a good nap. Finally from 2:30-5  she slept and was in a great mood for Chris when he got home from work at 6.  I didn't have the time or the brain capacity to touch my class.  I made sure before I put Emma to sleep that she was nice and full and was hopeful that tonight would be better.

She slept from 8:30-4:40 this time. I was a little disappointed, but then I had to remind myself that her doctor said that at her age they want her to be sleeping 4-6 hours. I had been spoiled by her sleeping 10-12 hours. I'd love it if she'd start spoiling me again so I could function a little better and be able to work on my class.

For  now though I'm wondering why I thought starting my next class was a good idea when Emma isn't even 3 months old...

new calling

I have a few posts that I'm working on right now, hopefully they'll be up this week.

In the meantime, know that I'm brushing up on

because I just got called as the Primary Pianist! I'm so excited, this is one of my dream callings!

I'm also busy practicing some other songs- I'm accompanying the ward choir as they perform this week, trying to figure out the song I need to help them rehearse on Sunday at practice, and struggling over a song for our non-exisistent Women's Choir to perform sometime in September. I've got to make good progress on that song this week though, because by the end of next week my next BYU class will arrive, and then I need to use nap time to do homework not practicing the piano.

Photo Dump

Emma's blessing was this past weekend, and today we dropped the last of our family off at the airport. That said, there is a lot to do to catch up on life... piles of dishes, baskets full of dirty laundry, bathrooms to clean, and some seriously searching to do (other people put things away in my kitchen and now I can't find things... they've got to be somewhere!) so instead of a post with lots of words you get a post of pictures until I have time to write a real post.

Sporting an outfit that her cousin only got to wear once... so far Emma's worn it TWICE! 

Being super cute!

When she sleeps her arms are almost always up like this!

She finally fits in pajamas! This was the first time she wore real pajamas besides the outfit she wore home from the hopsital. These pjs were from my good friend Jessica who went out of town for three weeks. We miss Jessica!

Rocking her "My First Fourth of July" onesie,  smiling at Daddy!

Smiling after a diaper change!

Emma's Blessing Day!

Emma was blessed yesterday, July 7th, by Chris. We were so excited to have my dad, and Chris's parents & little sister here for the occasion! In the circle was Chris, his dad, my dad, our bishop, and our friends Matt, Gary, Thomas, Ryan, and Josh.

Some of these pictures may be duplicates. And not all of them are great. But they are what I have on my computer right now. I have others that were taken by other people that I need to collect still.

Emma's friend Rylee was also blessed yesterday in our ward, and now I wish we had taken a picture of the two girls together!

This blanket is the blanket my grandma made for MY baby blessing, I was excited for my mom to send it down for us! And the dress was made just for Emma by my mom!

When all else fails...

...put her on the playmat.

This playmat was one of the first gifts that Emma received. It is from one of her great-grandmas. Last week I decided it was time to get it out, even if she may not be old enough to really enjoy it. I was wrong. She loves this thing. There is a little cat that hangs off of it that is a rattle. I don't know if she intentionally hits it around, but she sure does flail her little arms around and smiles when the cat rattles.

I've also discovered that it doesn't take long on the mat for her to fall asleep. I went to put her down for a nap this morning and she just wouldn't go for it in her crib. I was doing things out in the kitchen so I decided to bring her out to her mat. She played for a few minutes, and then this is what I found:

Totally knocked out. Not even the shredder running for 10 minutes could wake her up

I've got to make sure we send pictures to her great-grandma so she can see how awesome this toy has been.

going home... and going back... and going home again!

We got home from the hospital on Saturday around 1:00. Once home, we brought everything into the house, sort of unpacked some stuff, put Emma in her crib for a nap, and then Chris and I both took a nap as well. Chris headed to the airport to get my mom. They needed to run some small errands (I do t remember what, but I know there was some baby stuff we needed--more diapers maybe?) so I used this time to introduce Emma to Food Network. We watched a little bit of an Iron Chef America episode, with her falling asleep in my lap.

They got home, we ate dinner, and then I really don't remember what happened. I'm guessing we all just sat around, watching Emma. She provides some great entertainment. Kid sure did sleep well, there were absolutely times where we couldn't think of much to do, so we all ended up on electronic devices. It made me laugh. Chris taught Mom a ton about her iPad and helped her fix some stuff on her computer. I think I sat on my iPad or laptop on Pinterest looking at recipes.

On Sunday Chris went to Sacrament Meeting then came home to find Emma sleeping in her crib, and Mom & I asleep on the couches in the living room. Apparently we sleep in the exact same position, he took pictures to prove it to us. I don't have those pictures or I would show you :) We ate some yummy curry for dinner (thanks to one of my visiting teachers) and then I think we just relaxed and went to bed.

Monday was a busy day! Chris, Emma and I headed to the pediatrician so Emma could get her Hep B vaccine and so they could see if she was gaining weight. Emma was 6 lbs 13 oz when we left the hospital on Saturday, and at this appointment she was 7 lbs even (I think...). We talked about formulas since Emma and I were having some issues with latching and we wanted to make sure that she was getting enough food until we could have an appointment with a lactation consultant the next day. Mom and Chris then went grocery shopping- I think they went to Costco, HEB and Sam's Club, they were busy busy! They got all the ingredients for all the yummy things Mom was going to make us the week she was here!

FYI: this next paragraph is gross. If you don't want to hear about me throwing up (i'm not too graphic, I promise) then skip ahead to the paragraph after this one, but I can't promise it won't talk about barf...

Tuesday we headed to the lactation consult which wasn't the most helpful. Afterwards we came home for lunch and then my friend Jessica was coming over to do a newborn photo shoot. After Jess left I wasn't feeling great so I went to lay down. About an hour afterwards I threw up. I felt better, so that night I ate dinner. Threw that up too. I started eating just saltines and drinking water/ginger ale. Threw up some more. Wednesday I threw up everything I tried to eat (which wasn't a whole lot) so I called the nurse at Dr Satterfield's office to figure out what I should do. She talked to Dr S and they told me to call back if I threw up again. Then it was a little later in the day, their office was already closed but we called and Chris talked to Dr Cox who happened to be the on-call doc. He told me to just try saltines and gingerale and if I threw up again then I needed to call back and probably go to the hospital so I wouldn't get dehydrated (which I already was at this point). About 5 mintues later I headed to the toilet to barf up the few sips of gingerale that I had had since talking to Dr. Cox. Chris got Dr Cox back on the phone and Dr Cox said for us to get me to the hospital. He told us to just go to the general admissions desk and he would make sure that my orders were there before I got there.

Knowing we had to go to the hospital we did what any sane person would do-pack a hospital bag! It didn't have a whole lot in it... Chris's bag had his laptop and iPad, so he was entertained. Our home teacher Matt came to give me a blesing before we headed out. This was one of the saddest days of my life. Emma wasn't even a week old and here I was, having to leave her at home as I went to the hospital. I knew she was in good hands, Mom had been helping so much (basically doing everything to help me out as I was recovering), but it was still so hard to leave her behind. Many tears were shed, and then we left.

Once I got into my room they started me on fluids. All my nurses were nice (some were stupid [here's lookin at you, nures Kathy], but they were nice) and they asked about Emma. I threw up every single thing the hospital fed me. Some meds made me throw up. And I threw up just for the heck of it sometimes. I became really close friends with their nasty blue barf bags. I think it was Friday that they finally decided "hmm, this may not just be a virus" so Dr Satterfield sent me for an ultrasound of my gallbladder. That came back clean. Back to the drawing boards. My only symptom was throwing up. That evening Dr. de la Garza (the on call ob from Dr Satterfield's office) came up to see me and see if she could offer a new perspective. She said she wanted to try me on Protonix (a PPI used to treat reflux) and see if it was extreme acid reflux. She said it sounded stupid, but since my body had gone through some trauma (apparently giving birth counts as trauma?) and my hormones were out of wack (again... giving birth) and knowing that I had already had some intense heartburn my entire third trimester, she wanted to see if this was the problem. I got my first dose of Protonix, threw up one more time Friday night... and then haven't thrown up since.

Saturday morning I got my "clear liquids diet" breakfast -- jello, Italian ice, juice, and some chicken broth. Dr Satterfield happened to be on call Saturday, so sometime after breakfast she came up to check on me. I was feeling way better so she decided she wanted me to eat real food at lunch to see if I could keep it down. She also basically told Chris that he should go home, take a shower, spend some time with the baby, and then come back and visit me sometime. A hospital is not the place to be when you're healthy. It was decided (by everyone involved) that it was time for me to get better and leave the hospital. I had the best nurse EVER Saturday, and that nurse (Gina--pronounced Jenna) has a good working relationship with Dr S. Basically Gina was allowed to let me do whatever. After I kept my lunch down, and looked like I was feeling way better they decided they better take me off the IV fluids that I had been on since Wednesday night, to see how I was doing without the IV. As soon as they took that off I asked if I might be allowed to take a shower. I got a shower, and afterwards Gina had found me some scrubs that I could wear so I could feel a little more normal. It was amazing. I ate some snacks that she brought me, watched some HGTV, and pretty soon she was finding me some solids for an early dinner. I had to keep breakfast, lunch, and dinner down before they could discharge me. Around 4:30 Gina brought me some legit chicken noodle soup, a turkey sandwich, and some fruit. After a few bites and me being in heaven (real food! hallelujah!) she brought in my discharge papers to go over instructions with me. I called Chris to tell him to come get me, and as soon as he pulled up to the hospital I was ready to go!

I walked in the front door and immediately went to Emma's crib to get her. I just sat on the couch holding her for a while until I was ready for second dinner. It felt so good to be back at home with my baby girl.

Because you've read all of this, you deserve some pictures! I'll spare you the gross pictures of me at the hospital... you don't care what I look like anyway.

 I think this picture is hilarious. She was at under 3 weeks old in it, and I only know that because that is a newborn onesie and she stopped wearing those by 3 weeks.

 I think this is just kinda cute.

 I was trying some pajamas on her, but her feet were drowning in them. She looked pretty cute anyway! This was after one of her first baths that she actually enjoyed. Poor girl hated sponge baths and after her first legit bath she seems to really like bath time!

 And you see a little half smile.

This is one of the best smiles/happy Emma's that we've caught on camera! We've since started getting legit awesome smiles out of her, but not caught on camera yet!

Stay tuned for another update, hopefully one that isn't so gross and all about barf. Perhaps I'll do a post about the many poops of a newborn. Just kidding, I don't have pictures of that to go along with the post, so that isn't any fun.

Once upon a time... I had a baby

My last post is almost a month old... You probably (maybe you didn't notice I had started posting every Thursday???) were expecting me to post after my 40 week appointment on May 16th and say something about how I saw the nurse practioner (Dr S was in Mexico, after all) and wasn't going to be having the baby anytime soon...

Yeah, I was expecting to post that as well. I even had started the post and saved it as a draft so I didn't have to write it after the appointment. But the story of my due date is a little different than I was expecting! If you don't like labor/birth stories then you can just skip to the bottom where you get pictures... or you can just wait for my next post.

I woke up at 3:00 to go to the bathroom (not too abnormal) but was having some pains that just wouldn't go away. By 4:00 I realized that they were probably contractions and that I should start timing them, just to see if they were as regular as they seemed to be. Luckily the night before I had downloaded a contraction timer app, so I just grabbed my phone and headed to the living room so that I wouldn't disturb Chris. I started timing the contractions at 4:25 (yes, I just consulted the app to see) and they were lasting between 45 seconds and a minute and 10 seconds, and coming every 5-6 minutes. They weren't too painful, but I could definitely feel them.

Around 7:00 Chris woke up and was getting ready to work from home (he was planning on coming to my doctors appointment with me, just so he could hear from the doc how things were going). I told him that I had been having contractions for about 3 hours and how they were, he was just as surprised as I was, but quickly got on the computer and started working. This was around the time where things started getting a lot more intense. My contractions were getting to be a little unbearable, so I decided to hop in the tub, which made things feel much, much better! Then I went out to the living room and we watched a couple of episodes of The Office until it was time to get ready to go to the doctor.

By the time we arrived at the doctors office (11:00) my contractions were about 4 1/2 minutes apart and lasting just over a minute. The lady who checked me in told me that I looked uncomfortable, so I told her what was going on. She called the nurse immediately and they rushed me back into the exam room, I hardly even had a chance to walk to the waiting room before they called me back. Mary Francis (nurse practioner) came in pretty quick and checked me. I was expecting her to tell me that I was still "high and tight" like Dr S had said for so many weeks, but she gasped and said "You're about 4 cm, and 90% effaced. Do you want to go to the hospital?" She then looked at a schedule and told me that Dr Cox was the doc who was on call, so she went to chat with him for a minute and then came back and said "Dr Cox agrees, we can send you to the hospital".

Then Adele, Dr S's nurse came to the exam room with a wheel chair, and we were off! They wheeled me straight to the hospital. I was checked in and situated in my room by noon! My nurse was Melinda and she was awesome. She was quick to get my IV started so I could get the fluids they said I needed before I could get my epidural (yes, as I was wheeled to the hospital Adele asked if I wanted an epidural and I said yes. She made sure they all knew I wanted it, and soon :D). Pretty soon Dr Mullens came in to give me the epidural, and Millie came to assist Dr Mullens. Millie made me laugh, we were having a good time as they gave me the epi, and after they left and it started working, I was feeling pretty good!

At some point (I don't remember when) Dr Cox came to check me and I was 5 cm, and still 90% effaced. He broke my water, and then told me he'd be back later to check on me. I remember him telling Melinda to check me again at 4:00 and then to call him and let him know where I was at. Before it even got to be 4:00 Melinda got another patient, and that patient progressed faster than I did so Melinda had to stay with the other patient. Erin came in as my new nurse, and she was pretty fantastic too. When she checked me at 4 I was about a 9 1/2 and fully effaced. I felt like it was time to push, but I had to wait. Dr Cox wasn't available to come back yet, and when he did make it back to the hospital he had to go deliver Melinda's patient first.

Finally at 6:30 I got to start pushing, and around 6:50 Dr Cox came in the room. He noticed that my contractions were super regular but not quite as strong as he wanted them to be, so I got a small dose of pitocin to make them stronger. Pretty soon after that Dr Cox told Chris to get ready to catch the baby. He said that he would get her head out, but then it was up to Chris to catch her, that's how he likes to do things. At 7:07 Chris caught Emma and placed her on my chest! Dr Cox sang Happy Birthday to Emma right after she was born, and that was pretty awesome!

As bummed as I was that Dr Satterfield wasn't there to deliver Emma, I absolutely LOVED Dr. Cox. If for any reason Dr Satterfield isn't around/available down the road when we have another kid I would see Dr. Cox in a heartbeat.

I know that what you really want is pictures, so here you go.

Here is Emma soon after she was born:

And here is the first picture of the three of us that was taken... It's not so great, but it shows our whole family! I'll have a better family picture in the future... a friend came and did a newborn photo shoot a few days after Emma was born and we did some family pictures. I'll share those when I get them from her!

This one was taken the morning after she was born.

And this one! I love this picture. I think that Chris took this picture while I was back at the hospital a week after she was born. I'll tell that story in a different post.

And this photo was from yesterday or the day before... I don't remember which day she wore this onesie, but it was definitely in the past two days because that was when she started wearing her 0-3 month clothes!

I forgot to add... she was born 5/16/13 @ 7:07 pm. She weighed 7 lbs 3 oz, and was 19 1/2 inches long! At her two week appointment she was 8 lbs even. We love our baby girl! It's crazy to think back and realize that three weeks ago I was laying on my couch miserable having contractions, and now she's here! Time has flown.