1st Trip to Church

On Sunday we took Violet to church for the first time! I was scared that she would cry but she actually did great! She stayed awake most the time and I just had to rock her car seat in the chair next to me to keep her from getting fussy. I'm still amazed at how much she doesn't sleep! I have never heard of a newborn being awake all day. She has been taking like one nap a day. I have a feeling my house will be a disaster for a few months. When she is asleep I'm terrified of cleaning up and making any kind of noise that will wake her. Although she does usually sleep through my dogs barking so that's good. Yesterday I took her to Joann's Fabric store, it was our first trip out of the house without Justin. So scary. We pulled up and she was crying so I sat in the back and fed her a bottle for a good 30 minutes hoping to knock her out. No such luck. I almost went home cuz I was so scared she would be screaming in there. Finally I manned up and took her in. I ended up having to push the cart with one hand and feed her the bottle with the other for pretty much the whole time. I would pull it out and she would start to get fussy. By the time we were checking out she was zonked out finally. Mission accomplished! I was pretty proud of myself for not chickening out. I learned a lesson though, I will always make sure to carry a bottle with me wherever I go! Thank goodness for electric pumps.

church dress, flower as big as her head!

guess the pastor put her to sleep

mommy and me outing

thanks to my pump daddy can give mommy a break!

2 Weeks Tommorrow!

This week has been pretty crazy. Justin went back to work which makes things kinda difficult when ur a new mom and don't exactly know what you are doing. Monday, miss Violet stayed up all day crying and crying. I just could not get her to sleep. By the time Justin got home I was pulling my hair out. We ended up taking her for a drive and she slept for 6 hours! That's the longest she has slept yet, I had to wake her up to feed her at that point. Tuesday went well, I am learning tricks to put her to sleep and learning that I have zero time for anything but baby. Its wierd, I barely have time to go to the bathroom now, let alone do dishes or clean up. This is all going to take some getting used to. Yesterday I attempted to give her a bath (her second) by myself. I was totally dreading it because she absolutely hated the first. To show me how much she loved it she pooped in the tub. Pretty funny right. So I cleaned it up and attempted bath number 3. What do you know, she poops again! Ok, bath time is over for today. At the time it was frustrating but now I can laugh about it. Today we took her to her pediatrician for her 2 week checkup. She weighs 8 lbs 2 oz! Holy moly, that's 13 oz in 9 days! She is definitely not underfed. The Dr. said she looks healthy and is growing great! He warned me that she might start getting colicky here in a week so I'm crossing my fingers she doesn't experience this. He also warned me that I might crash soon and realize how exhausted I am. I told him I'm already there. Last night she was up all night and I about lost it. Poor hubby is dealing with my wrath today. Hopin' to get a nap in at some point.

in between poopy baths

bath time

before her doctors appt

love the bunny feet

1 Week Old!

Violet is now 1 week old! I can't believe it's already been a week! We are having so much fun with her. I have been totally loving dressing her up each day and matching her headbands to all her outfits. I pretty much take a picture everyday because she always just looks so darn cute. Oh the joys of having a little girl! I am now obsessed with anything pink, sparkly and bedazzled or glittered. It's funny how I dress her all up and then we rarely leave the house! Must be a new mom thing! Anyways, Violet had her first checkup and everything was great. She lost about 5 oz which is normal. Her weight and head size are average and her height is a little above average. She is a long baby! But everything looked good and she is as healthy as can be. I think she will be a little chunk in no time, the girl can eat. I swear she eats 15 times a day. I think its helping her sleep better though, she has been sleeping for 3 hour durations at night now. It seems to be getting pretty consistent too, feed at 9pm, sleep till 12:30, feed again, sleep till 4:30, feed again, sleep till 7:30. Finally I have been getting some sleep which makes me one happier mommy. The only place she will sleep is in one of her 2 swings or in my arms so I hope they make swings for 4 year olds cuz I can't see her sleeping anywhere else! Justin has been home all week helping out, I will be sad to see him go back to work on Monday. An extra set of hands makes all the difference right now! We sure are enjoying the learning the ropes of being parents!

sleeping with mama

mad for plaid!

loves her daddy

oh dear!

Penny checkin' out her new sis

yes she has a bow for every outfit

Violet's Birth Story

We were so excited to welcome little Violet into the world at 4:39 am on July 2nd. Weighing in at 7 lbs 10 oz. and 20.5 inches long we think she is just perfect. On July 1st I went to my doctor appt and found out that I was still only 1 cm dialated. I knew my doc wanted to talk about inducing due to the baby's size but was shocked when she suggested I go home, grab my stuff and come right back to the hospital! Holy cow, I couldn't believe it was finally happening. I can't tell you how terrified I was. Although I was very excited I was pretty dang scared too. My doc told me to be prepared for a c-section due to my size and her size. I really didn't want it to come to that, one more thing for me to worry about. We headed to Sutter Roseville around 12pm and the doc immediately broke my water. Crazy how much water there is. Its like a hose turned on full force! I walked the halls of the hospital for about an hour hoping to get the contractions going. It's pretty funny when you are walking around with water running down your leg and squishing in your shoe. The nurses inserted a monitor internally to better gauge how strong the contractions were and I gotta say this was the most the painful part of the whole process. I pretty much bawled my eyes out. My contractions were beginning to be terribly painful but not consistently strong enough so they gave me pitocin to speed it up. Wowzer, the contractions about killed me at this point! I ended up getting my epidural, which they had to do twice because they couldn't get the catheter in. I was pretty scared of the epidural but it ended up not hurting even one tiny bit. The epidural was amazing! I felt pretty great after that besides nausea and the most intense shakes. I was literally shaking like a drug addict having a withdrawal! After that I just laid in bed and they kept checking me every couple hours. I progressed from a 3 to a 7 pretty quick and next thing I knew I was at a 10. Once again I got pretty scared about actually pushing her out. I ended up pushing for a good 2 hours, my mom, Justin and sister Jessica there with me the whole time. Pushing sure is hard work especially when you can't stop throwing up. You feel like you can't possibly do it and they keep telling you your getting closer but it doesn't seem like it! Finally out she came and they placed her on my chest. I can't even explain the feeling I had, it was the most amazing, best moment of my life. All that hard work and pain was now so worth it and I would do it all over again for this sweet little girl. After she was born things got pretty bad for a few hours, I got super nauseous and couldn't stop throwing up and got this horrific headache where I couldn't open my eyes. It was terrible, all I wanted to do was hold my baby and take care of her and I couldn't. It took awhile for us to get to our recovery room because I couldn't stand up to get in the wheel chair without passing out. A few hours later I started feeling better and was able to cuddle my sweet angel. She is perfect in every way and we are so excited for our new little family!