Nola Madison is Here!

In short:
Nola Madison arrived at 5:54am on Monday Oct 26. She weighed 5lbs 12oz and was 19" long. She had a full head of dark brown hair and looks very similar to big sister Embry.

I will have to write this blog post later since it is already 10pm, but I know some people don't have facebook and might want to see pictures...so here they are!

We had some good pics taken in the hospital before we left and here is the link to those:
newborn photos Password is: 626001341572772
I normally would never order anything like this because it's a rip off, but I loved them, so I got a few.

36 Weeks

We went pumpkin picking last Sunday at Apple Annies and got a million great pictures, so I'm sharing our newest family picture. :)

36 Weeks
Taken 10/21/10

Good news came today! I'm 1 cm dilated! Woooo! Ok so I know this means absolutely nothing, but I'll take anything I can get at this point! I had my normal NST and then went to the OB who I told about all my pain issues. Basically Nola's head is up against my cervix (which is a good thing except for all the pressure in the nether-regions) and then her body is curled on the right side of my stomach with her butt smashed into my ribs. This means that my back is in a lot of pain and is the reason I feel like I'm being suffocated when I have a contraction. I told the dr that she probably wouldn't like it, but I've been self medicating with percocet that was left over from my root canal so I could actually sleep at night. She said it was fine and actually wrote me out another prescription for it since I was running low. She did my group beta strep test which means I'll get the restults in a few days. I asked her thoughts on tearing vs episiotomy and she said she hardly ever gives an episiotomy, so that was the right answer in my opinion. She did want to schedule another ultrasound for around 11/11, but we're both kind of hoping I don't actually make it that long.

We had our ultrasound on Tuesday morning. It went really well and I got an adorably cute 3D pic of Nola's face. I can't wait to meet her! During the U/S I had the tech look at my cervix and it was completely closed and she tried to jostle Nola in order to get her head to move off of it and she wouldn't budge. So apparently I've dilated 1cm in the last 2 days. She estimated her weight to be 6 lbs and the cysts in the placenta are pretty much all considered 'venus lakes' now which are apparently completely normal. The tech said Nola's head was on the small side but her belly was measuring like a week ahead of schedule. It also looks like she has pretty chubby cheeks from the 3D shot...so I guess we'll have to wait and see!

My baby shower is this Sunday. I'm so excited! I can't wait to hang out with everyone and just get to chat and eat and have fun and relax. Tony's mom and sis will be here tomorrow morning and leave on Monday morning, so hopefully that means more nap time for me...but I have a ton of stuff to do anyhow. Let's make a list:
1. sew halloween costumes (umm let's state also that I have no idea what I'm doing)
2. move bookshelf into Embry's room and paint it pink
3. move embry's name letters into her room and hang them
4. put up Nola's name letters in the nursery
5. finish unpacking 0-3 month clothes in nursery
6. put away all of Embry's laundry (in other words, like 50 outfits)
7. wash, peel labels from, and cut up the rest of these stupid milk jugs :)
8. prep the angel ornament fabric (cut into 2 size circles with pinking shears)
9. cut cereal boxes into 3.5"x3.5" squares
10. finish decorations for Embry's bday party
11. put together gift bags for party
12. get stuff for Embry's bday cake and figure out what in the world I'm doing
13. sew hello kitty bib, boppy cover, burp cloth, swaddle blanket, and carseat handle cover
14. take Embry's 2 year pics

35 Weeks

35 Weeks
Taken 10/14/10

Ok so let me just say, my back is killing me. There's got to be a nerve getting pinched or something. I've been taking tylenol, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to need something a little stronger than that. The bonus is I'm having lots of contractions, so I'm not much good for anything lately. To prove that point, I have about 6 loads of laundry waiting to be put away in my bedroom. It's kind of ridiculous. Oh and in additon to my cankles, my hands are now swelling too. Dr said it was fine and normal.

The NST's are all still normal, last fluid check was 12, and we have (probably our last) ultrasound on Tuesday morning before mops. That means Embry will be attending an ultrasound for her first time, wish us luck! I'm assuming she'll be fine since it's an eclosed area, but I've seen other moms bring their kids along for their NST's and everytime I imagine what a disaster it would be if I brought Embry to one of those. Hmmm, maybe Nola will be a super calm child...hahaha.

I had an OB appt on Thurs, everything was fine, but I thought she was going to start checking me and do the group beta strep test and she didn't. She said she'd start checking me next week (at 36 weeks) which I guess is the norm, so whatever. My body is definitely ready to be done with this pregnancy, but in my mind I know what comes next (ie, no sleep, total exhaustion, wanting to kill someone) and that kinda makes me want to never give birth. Oy.

I had my 27th birthday on Sunday. It was pretty uneventful. We went to see 'Life as we Know It' on Saturday night which was good, although I think she ended up with the wrong guy. Here's a pic of us before going to the movie.
Tony and friends from young marrieds spent pretty much the whole day on Saturday getting this swingset and setting it up. The getting it was the easy part, the setting it up is what took forever. I was very glad for all the volunteers though because it would have been almost an insurmountable task otherwise. We're still working on it actually. My mom came over the past 2 days to sand it and then stain it and Tony will be moving the rest of the rock to the front yard this weekend and then laying down the rubber mulch. We also had 2 people give us estimates for making a walkway from the grass to the swingset and enclosing the pool area in fencing. The iron fence is slightly cheaper, but not by much and the mesh fencing won't match the current fence, is slightly more expensive, but I think it's much sturdier and it has a lifetime warranty. I think eventually we'll have to replace the current fence anyway because it's all wobbly and then we can do the whole thing with mesh so it will match. I want the pool and swingset separated before Embry's birthday party on Nov 7th...so that's a tight timeline. I'll have to post a picture when the whole project is completed, but let me just say, Embry LOVES it! I'm sure we'll get way more than our money's worth out of it.
So I need to get Embry's 2 year pictures done and I think I want to try doing them myself. This proves to be a lot of work. I got a large piece of white blizzard fleece to hang from the back porch and use as a backdrop, but I'm worried about it getting dirty and also about how to make Embry not run all over the place. I think it's more than a 1 person project. I really want to get some maternity and family pics taken before Nola arrives, but that's going to be complicated and expensive. Maybe we'll just go somewhere like Target and hope for the best.

34 Weeks

34 Weeks

Taken 10/7/10

My contractions are becoming more frequent/intense. I'm guessing they're braxton hicks, but what the heck do I know? Basically my stomach/back get all tight and I feel like I'm being suffocated. It's not a pleasant feeling but I wouldn't really say it 'hurts' either. Anyhow, so I thought I was going nuts and just imagining stuff until the NST's this week finally started picking them up! On Monday it showed I was having moderate contractions every 5 minutes while I was there. You'd think someone would have been like, ooh why's that going on, but my nurse didn't even mention it while the other nurse said 'oh, looks like you're having contractions' to which I said, 'yes I feel that.' Then at my NST today, I only had one but it was a huge one, like to the top of the contraction box and lasted for about 1.5 minutes. Anyhow, if they're not concerned then I'm guessing it's nothing to lose sleep over. Especially when I'm gonna have a newborn in about a month.

Eeeeeeek! I'm gonna have a newborn in about a month!!! I don't know if I'm ready for this. That happens to be a popular question these days...'are you ready?' The answer: 'of course not!' Are you ever really ready for something like that?! You can't possibly be prepared because there's no possible way to know what it's going to be like, or what your baby will be like, or how your daughter will like/dislike/act as an older sibling. There are tons of variables and the most I'm hoping for out of it is to get some sleep...which in itself is a rather tall order. I'd like to sleep when the baby sleeps, but unless there's someone else here to take care of Embry, well then, I won't be sleeping unless they're both sleeping at the same time. Just thinking about this is stressing me out.

We got Embry a play house, which she loves, from a neighbor's garage sale last weekend. Good timing too because I'm sure we'll be spending lots of time in the backyard now that it's starting to cool off. I really don't like all the dramatics of leaving the park when we go to play at the park. I really love watching her have fun, but leaving is a whole other story. I can hear it now, Embry buckled into the carseat, screaming, 'sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide! *sniffle sniffle* sliiiiiiiiiiiiiide!' Yep, I don't like it. Sooo, we bought a swingset off of craigslist. It's pretty awesome if I do say so myself. Here's a link to it on the toys r us website. We got it used (18 months old) for $450, so really, how could I possibly pass up a deal like that? Now the issue is getting it disassembled, into a truck, across town, and set up in our yard. Oh and moving all the rocks that are now occupying the area where it will be placed. Then after that is all done, we'll have to figure out something to do with the pool fence so the swingset and grass area can both be accessed at the same time without entering into the pool area. Luckily some of the guys from our young marrieds group have volunteered to help Tony on Sat morning with all of that stuff so at least it will be set up and ready to play on. The fence thing we can figure out later. Oh and I found out that 2 tons of rubber mulch is incredibly expensive, just an fyi.