Thursday, March 31, 2011
I finished the baby announcement for Rakelli and got them in the mail a few days ago. They were in the mail when she was two weeks old. I feel really good about that progress :) The announcement is really a tri-fold card, but I split up the images so it is easier to see. I love to have these for later when my babies are not babies. I forget how little they once were. Remember, you can click on an image to make it bigger.
Rakelli had her two week doctor appointment today. She is healthy and doing great.
She weighs 5 lbs 9 oz now, which is just barely over her birth weight (which is the goal for the two week appointment). Her length is 19.75 inches. For her weight, she is 1.08%tile and for her length, she is 23.79%tile. Basically, that means she looks long and skinny. She has been so much fun already. The boys all love and adore her. They are so excited when she has her "awake time," which is becoming a little more frequent. She eats about every three or four hours for five to ten minutes, but that's plenty for her and she is gaining weight well. Zander asks usually once a day to hold her. He will come up to me and put his hands in a bowl shape. While looking at them, he says, "Mom, can I hold it?" It's so cute to me :) Anyway, I never showed her pictures on the day we took her home from the hospital.
She is so tiny in her car seat.
Of course, she really looks like that still, but I know it won't last long.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Rakelli had her first professional photo shoot on Monday. She was just six days old and still so tiny. I am really excited with how they turned out and had a hard time choosing my favorites. Here are just some of my favorites because there are too many to put them all here!
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Rakelli Joy Bodell was born on March 15th, 2011. She is super tiny and tipped the scales to 5 pounds, 8 ounces. She is 18 inches long. Everything went great for the delivery and we already love having her as a part of our family. My sister-in-law, Jess, came to see us at the hospital while we were there and took some great pictures. I couldn't wait to get them from her, so I just stole them from her blog :) Enjoy!
In case you want the full story, here it goes . . . She is technically two weeks early, but I really think it's more like three weeks. My due date was always kind of confusing because she didn't consistently measure where she should during my doctor appointments. When I went in for my 20 week ultrasound, the ultrasound technician said that she was only developed to 18 weeks and she wanted to wait for 2 more weeks so the heart would be ready to look at. At that point, my doctor changed my due date ahead one week instead of two because my babies tend to come early. He was worried that I may go into real labor and they would try to stop it (if we moved the due date ahead two weeks) even though she would be ready to come. So, according to the due date we set, she was two weeks early, but according to how she measured the full pregnancy, she was three weeks early. Who really knows! Anyway, at a doctor appointment last Friday, I was already dilated to a 3 and 80% effaced. The doctor was pretty sure that she would be here within a week from then and said that if I wasn't already in labor at my next appointment (which was just Tuesday the next week), he would strip my membranes since I was already so favorable. On Monday night, I was having very consistent contractions, but they weren't increasing in intensity, so I wasn't sure what to do. No real labor came, but I had my doctor appointment the following day. I was still having contractions about 2-3 minutes apart when I went to my doctor appointment. I told him about that and he decided to strip my membranes as we had previously discussed. It wasn't as bad as I was expecting pain-wise, but still not delightful in any regard! After he was done, he said that Steve and I could just go drive around for a little while (but that we should stay close), or we could just go to the hospital and get going with the labor. After clarifying that they would not just put me into a room to monitor and then possibly send me home, we decided to just go get admitted to the hospital and have our little baby. We got there and checked in by about 3:00 pm. I was measuring almost a 4 when I went to my doctor appointment and by the time we were at the hospital in the room, I was closer to a 5 (just from stripping my membranes). Around 3:10, the doctor broke my water to help things move forward and they got my IV in around 3:30. Contractions were getting stronger and they said to get my epidural sooner rather than later because they had an emergency c-section on a 29 week old that was going to occupy the anesthesiologist. I got the epidural around 4:15, at which point I was dilated to a 6. The nurse wanted to see if my own contractions would get strong enough without using pitocin, so I waited until about 5:00. At that point, she talked to the doctor and he said to get me started on pitocin. I would be able to do it on my own, but it would just take longer :) So they hooked me up around 5:20. At 6:00, I was very ready to push so they called the doctor over. He took a little while to get there and the nurses were worried that he was taking too long. He came in around 6:10 and got ready. They reminded me when to push and we waited for my next contraction. I started pushing and the doctor told me to push less and then to stop since she was already out. I didn't even have to push one full time! She was healthy and had a good cry. With no stitches, tearing, or episiotomy, I was sitting pretty myself (as an expression, really I'm sure I was quite disgusting). She has a cute squeaky cry she makes sometimes and we have decided that she may just be a soprano when she grows up! The brothers absolutely adore her and will just stare at her with big grins on their faces. Conley even points at her and wants to get close. We are doing great and have already fallen in love with Rakelli.
Monday, March 14, 2011
It will be no surprise that Conley has still been sleeping in the crib. I'm not one to allow newborns in my room for the night, so it was very important to me that we get Conley out of the crib before our baby is born. Just on Friday, Steve and I started working on a trundle bed for Conley.
It slides under the bunk bed that we made for Brinton and Zander. Also on Friday, I started working on some bedding for the new bed. I was able to save some money and I got a better match with the colors already in the room. By Saturday night, the bedding and the bed were both made and ready. We put Conley in with the other boys that night and he has been sleeping there ever since. So far, it has been a pretty good transition. As long as Zander isn't in one of his naughty bed time moods, things go quite nicely. If not, well . . . we have to wait for him to stop being naughty and then all three of them will go to sleep. When Conley has a nap by himself, he will just lay there and go to sleep most of the time. I think I'll keep my fingers crossed that the three boys in one room will continue to work pretty well. If it doesn't, we'll deal with it at that point :)
A little while ago, I made a new car seat cover and canopy for our baby girl. The car seat I had was blue and I was happy to find some girly fabric that I liked. I ended up taking the old one apart and using it as my pattern (and I kept the same padding). I am really happy with how it turned out.
Brinton was quite excited about it too. He saw it and asked, "Mom, is that for sister?" I told him it was and he replied, "Oh, I love it so much and the flowers are so pretty. Sister is going to be so happy you made that for her!" How cute is that? He has been very excited for her to come and Zander has made comments about it as well. He will see some baby clothes and ask if they are sister's. We are excited and expecting her to come any time now.
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