Big Day Out

Today was a big day for us. Jeff is back at work... Brodey needed to get to preschool, Lyla had a doctors appointment AND we needed to run to the store. I felt like a chicken with my head cut off.

We dropped Brodey off at school and made a very quick trip to Target (Lyla's first Target visit.. I should have taken a picture!). From Target we went straight to the Pediatrician... Brock was such a good helper. He said, "I carry Baby Why-wa for you."

Lyla never made a peep the whole time. She is 4 days old and already growing! 8 lbs 8 oz, 20.5 inches. Doctor said she is looking great.

From the Ped's office we made a very quick trip to the house to feed Lyla and then back in the car to pick up Brodey. And now they nap. As should I.

Meeting her brothers

Me: "Brock! You have a sister!"

Brock: "see my motorcycle?"

He didn't even look at her. Brodey came in.. smiled at me.. then said "Can I eat your breakfast?"

The men working outside were much more exciting to them.

Brodey warmed up to her pretty fast... he wanted to hold "him".

Brock was too busy checking out the hospital. He loved to push the buttons on the bed. I'm not sure he knew why we were there. At one point Jeff was holding Lyla and talking to her and I look over and Brock is standing face to face with a floor fan saying, "Hi fan!" in much the same voice Jeff was taking to Lyla in.

It wasn't until we got in the car to come home that he realized we had an extra. He looked over in her car seat and got really excited.. "BABY!" he kept yelling and pointing. He was excited she was coming with us.

Since we have been home the boys have loved all over her. Neither one of them seems to be jealous. The want to hold her all the time and kiss her head. They are both still calling her a "he" or "him".... we all are! I still can't get used to saying "she". And they don't understand why she's not sleeping in their room with them. Or why I won't put her down to run around with them. I told Brodey she can't stand up yet and he said, "well, lets just try it and see".

Lyla is the luckiest girl in the world to have two big brothers! Especially these two... they are going to take great care of her.

Labor

3 out of 3 are sleeping, so I'm going to try and get some updates in quick. (This is a lot of details and probably boring... it's more for me so I can remember)


I had been having contractions every afternoon for DAYS and they would always stop around the time I went to bed. They felt a little stronger on Thursday so I timed them for a little while. 6 minutes apart for most of the afternoon... still not very painful though. Our friends Clint, Kristin and Maddy came over that night.. as they normally do on Thursdays. :) They left at 8 or 9?? Around 10:15 I was still having semi-regular contractions (sometimes 4 minutes apart.. sometimes 15 minutes), so I called my sister to come over and spend the night just in case we had to leave in the middle of the night. When she got here I laid on the couch and her and Jeff timed my contractions while trying to convince me I was actually in labor and should go to the hospital. My doctor had told me to wait until they were 3-5 minutes apart for 3 hours... so the irregular, yet very painful, contractions were unconvincing to me. At around midnight we all went to bed.. contractions had slowed to 20 minutes apart. At 2am I got up again and paced around for a while.. still waiting for the contractions to be regular. At 3am Jeff declared we were going to the hospital whether I wanted to or not. We woke up my sister.. I told her we would probably be back (she didn't look like she believed me), and we left. Got to the hospital at 3:30am... triage at 3:45. I was 5 cm and 90% effaced! (I don't know what effaced means... but 90% sounded good.) I think the nurse was as surprised as we were. Then we waited a ridiculously long time for the anesthesiologist.. he came in around 4:45 and gave me the worst epidural... did I mention he looked like he was 15? It took him so long I had 3 terrible contractions while he was doing it and had to sit very still in an uncomfortable hunched over position. I think I probably left fingernail marks in Jeff's hands. He was finally done at 5am and the nurse checked me again... 9.5 cm. About 15 minutes after that the doctor came in... fully dilated. ** Back to it being a terrible epidural, he gave me such a heavy dose my legs were COMPLETELY dead and my blood pressure would drop every time I sat up or rolled off of my side. Not to mention I was throwing up during all of this. So the doctor had me start pushing... I pushed 6 times and then got very sick. My blood pressure dropped to 89/45 and I thought I was about to pass out. They put me on oxygen, rolled me on my side and gave me some kind of drug in my IV. Doctor said we needed to wait until my blood pressure stabilized to try again so we "rested". I felt terrible the entire time.. really the worst I have ever felt in labor. At around 7am, after 2 hours of being fully dilated, the nurses shift changed and we got a new nurse... very aggressive.. I liked her. She said I wasn't going to feel better until the baby came out so we were going to "get it over with". She turned off the epidural to help with the blood pressure situation and then we waited a bit for the doctor. When she got there we all decided it would be best to get the baby out as fast as possible, so they sat me up... blood pressure dropped, I started throwing up again... pushed 5 times.. and at 7:25am we had us a baby GIRL! I still can't believe it. The doctor held her up to face us and I just

remember being so surprised and thrilled! I kept saying I couldn't believe it and crying my eyes out. They put her up on my belly (another first for me... the boys were both meconium babies and had to be rushed off to be checked out by a respiratory team.) and I looked up at Jeff and he had tears rolling down his face... very un-Jeff like. We were both just so excited to finally have a girl!! Lyla is one lucky girl to have a daddy like Jeff.

And the nurse was right... I immediately felt better after she was born. Although I was so excited I probably wouldn't have noticed if I wasn't!

IT'S A GIRL!!!

Has anyone ever been so excited????

Lyla Rowan Culp joined our family on Friday September 5, 2008 at 7:25am.

She weighed 8 lbs 6 oz and is 19.25 inches long.

She has a head full of dark hair and is just PERFECT!!

Details and more pictures in the coming days....

8 lbs 4 oz when we left the hospital

Update...

I've had several requests this morning for an update... so here ya go. Went to the doc yesterday for the non-stress test (apparently the norm when you are past due)... I'm 2cm. Non-stress test again tomorrow and again on Monday if necessary. Good news is baby is looking good... probably toddler size by now... but looking good anyway!

Brodey had his second day of preschool today.. we braved the carpool line this time... he did great.. such a big boy walking into school with his bag over his shoulder. I asked him what he learned when we picked him up... "My head is round like a circle."

While Brodey was at school Brock and I went for a long walk, played on the playground, and then went to Dairy Queen and split a banana cream pie blizzard. At 10:30am. I think he likes having a pregnant momma. It has been fun spending some time with just him before the baby gets here.

First day of Preschool..

Today was the big day! Here he is still sleeping...


And Brock sleeping... it was a big day for him too.

Here is his foot... when he woke up and realized I was taking pictures of him he was not too thrilled and tried to block the camera with his foot.

Then I reminded him that he was going to school today and he perked up a bit.

Here we are... all dressed and ready to go (40 weeks, 4 day pregnant.. that's all I have to say about that)

Daddy stayed a little later than normal to see him off.

Here's Brodey waiting for school to start...

He had a great day! And I was a good mom and didn't cry until we got back to the car. He hugged and kissed me at the door and then marched right in.. no looking back. I can't believe what a big boy he is! When I picked him up he was all smiles. He said he made a new friend, but he doesn't know what his name is.

Brock and I went to Target while Brodey was at school... it's never been just me and Brock before. I don't think he knew what to do... for the first half hour he would only whisper to me and he wanted to hold my hand a lot. It was so funny how different his personality was with out Brodey around.

To celebrate we went to Chick-fil-a for lunch and Brodey told us all about his big day. (mostly about the playground and what he had for snack.)

40 weeks, 3 days

I have officially never been this pregnant. Brodey was 5 days early, Brock was 6 hours and 27 minutes late. 9 months of expecting an August baby and here it is September!! I have to say though, this is not as bad as I thought it would be. (Aside from the nausea... but really I can't remember what it's like to not be nauseous, so that's not too bad either.) The extra time made it possible for us to finish all our "projects", get the house cleaned up, stock up on groceries, PUT THE CAR SEAT IN THE CAR... I even organized all our files and banking! Now today we are actually able to rest and do fun things... it has been a long while. We went out for breakfast, played at a park, watched a little league baseball team practice, visited a friend.. after naps we plan on cooking out with some good friends we haven't had time to see in a while. I think maybe this baby has been waiting on US to get ready.

I don't know if Jeff would say the same. The further we get from our due date, the more nervous he gets. Yesterday I had two tiny contractions back to back and then got to witness him frantically pack a bag (that's right... bags hadn't even been packed). He packed several pairs of socks, when I asked why he says, (in all seriousness) "my feet get cold when I'm nervous." Last night he put his feet on me... they where ice cold. Poor guy... I don't remember him being this nervous with the other two.

Anyhow... my new guess is Friday, SEPTEMBER 5th, 1:15am. Still a boy... same size that I said before. (I want to wait until Friday now so I don't miss Brodey's first week of school!)