Hi ho, hi ho...

...it's back to work I go. Last week Thursday I returned to the workforce. This past Monday was my first FULL day back. It wasn't nearly as hard as I was expecting it to be, but I sure did miss my baby!! Luckily, the day went by quickly and I could get back home to smother her in hugs and kisses. She repayed me by being in a good mood and being full of smiles. It's easy to go back to work when I know that her Daddy is taking good care of her while I'm gone.

Clara celebrated her first Christmas this year. It was a very busy weekend! Friday night we all went to church for Christmas Eve service. After that, as per tradition, we drove around and looked at Christmas lights. We met my parents at our house for dinner and finally got to bed around 10. Saturday morning started EARLY! Clara woke up at 5:30 and no one really wanted to go back to sleep. The 3 of us laid in bed together for quite a while. It was so nice. :) But, we decided we were just going to get up. Adam, Clara and I all opened presents together. Scooter even got some new things in his stocking: an awesome new collar and a new dinosaur chew toy. Around noon we packed up the car and headed for my extended family get-together in Neenah. Much fun was had by all...and Clara made out better than anybody. :) She got some really great toys that she's going to have a lot of fun with when she's a little older. After lunch and presents, it was once again time to hit the road...this time for Luxemburg for the Mueller family Christmas. We got there around 5:30 for a delicious turkey and gravey dinner with all the fixins. After dinner we opened presents. Once again, Clara made out really well with some cute outfits, some books, and some toys. Auntie Steff even got her some Dr. Seuss books that are written in Spanish! Daddy will have to read her those. :) We all stayed the night and on Sunday Clara got to stay with Grandma and Grandpa Mueller while Adam and I went to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra in Milwaukee. It was AWESOME as usual, but we've decided that if they're not going to have a show in Green Bay next year, we might not go. It's a lot of traveling...either that or we'll go, but not if it's going to be the day after Christmas.

So other than my returning to work, things are pretty quiet after the chaotic Christmas holiday. I'm looking into dental implant surgery and have been going to appointments for the past couple of weeks. I've got 2 appointments this week and one next week. I'm going to be really sick of the dentist by the time this is all said and done!

I think one of the things I most look forward to in the next month is the Eli Mattson concert in January in Greenville, WI. We haven't seen Eli since September! It would have been nice if his lady could have made the trip, too, but she's awfully pregnant right now, and travelling would SUCK! I'm excited for their baby's arrival, though...sometime in February. I SO wish we lived closer because our kids would be really close in age and it would be nice to have another mommy to hang out with.

I'm looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow. I took the day off to go to an appointment for my oral surgery. Even though I've only been back to work for 2 whole days, it'll be nice to spend some quality time with my little girl. :) In just a few days she'll be exactly 2 months old! I can't believe how quickly the time has gone. Before we know it, she'll be eating solid foods and walking! Slow down, little girl! You're growing too fast!

Wow-it's been too long!

I can't believe it's been almost a month since my last post! So much has been going on here lately.

First of all, Clara is now 6 weeks old. :) The time has certainly flown by. She's had some milestones. She stayed with both of her Grandmas for a few hours while her mommy & daddy had some time to themselves (which was MUCH needed!). She also saw her first snowfall and we brought home her first Christmas tree. She's growing really well, too! She now weighs 12lbs 3.5oz! On the downside, though, the last week or so hasn't gone too well. She was really fussy and having problems with choking when laying down and other symptoms of infant acid reflux. We finally got together with the doctor and he made the determination that it was, indeed, the case. So we now have her on Zantac twice a day. If she shows improvement before January 3rd (her next well-baby check up) then we've hit the mark. If not, that just means we have a colicky baby. But the doctor seems confident that this medication should help. I haven't taken a 6-week picture of her yet, but when I do I'll post it. I've put them all up on Facebook so far (except I didn't take one for 5 weeks).

Other things we've been up to: I have about a million phone calls that I need to make...mostly related to our health insurance. I'm also getting ready to go back to school in January. I'm only taking 2 classes this semester. I figured I had enough on my plate. I'm also going back to work starting Monday. I'm not sure what I'll all be able to do when I get back, but we'll see. We're having Christmas with my immediate family on Friday. I've got pretty much everything I need for that. I think there's one or 2 things left to wrap. Other than that, we're just waiting for the actual holiday to get here so we can celebrate with the rest of our families. AND on the day after Christmas we get to go see TSO!! That's my favorite thing to do every year at Christmas! :)

Well, it's time to go start getting the bedroom set up for bedtime. Even though Clara's sleeping right now, she's probably going to want a small snack again before bed. I'm also employing some new tricks that will hopefully help with her not wanting to be put down and her reflux. I'll try to post picures tomorrow.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I just wanted to write a quick post today. I have so much to be thankful for this year. Besides my loving family and the great friends that I have, I've also got a loving husband, a beautiful daughter, and some pretty great pets. We all (well, except for the pets) had a great time at my grandma's house today for Thanksgiving dinner. It's one of the few times when the entire family gets together so it was really nice that we made it. We even got to take a 4-generation picture together: Here is me, my Dad, my Grandma Ruby, and Clara.

I thought this would also be an appropriate time to do Clara's 3-week update. Here she is, wearing her my first Thanksgiving outfit.

It's really cute, but a little bit big! I had socks on her when we left the house this morning, but by the time we got to Grandma's house, they were both off. :) She's doing really well. I've stopped setting the alarm for her feedings. She pretty much gets me up at night when she's hungry. Adam and I have been taking turns and helping each other out during the night, too. When he wakes up for a feeding he'll change her diaper and then bring her to me so I can feed her and then when I'm done he'll get her all swaddled up and tucked back into bed. He's way better at swaddling than I am. It's something I just never got the hang of. She did really well last night. She usually sleeps anywhere between 2 and 4 hours in between feedings at night. She's also been a lot more awake during the days lately. She's learning to pick her head up and has been using her feet to push off of things. I'm just happy that she's doing so well and we've all pretty well adjusted to life as a fa

mily of 3. Our next big event will be Jessie's "Nutcracker" recital. I found a really cute dress for Clara to wear, because if you didn't know, one of the main characters in the Nutcracker is Clara. That's also the same weekend as Grandpa Mueller's birthday celebration. It should be a fun time! I'd love to write more, but it seems someone is deciding to be fussy, so I'll end this for now. I can't get over how fast the last 3 weeks have gone. I look forward to seeing how much more she changes in the next days and weeks. :)

A couple pics...

While Miss Clara is taking a nap, I thought I'd upload a few pictures. The ones above are her at 2 weeks 2 days old. It's hard getting a newborn to sit on a couch!! Maybe next time I'll lay her down. Also, the one on the right is Scooter checking out his sister...and Clara checking him out!

Last weekend my grandma along with a couple uncles, an aunt and some cousins came over to meet Clara. Here is a picture of my grandma (Clara's great-grandma) holding her new great-granddaughter.

Time sure flies!

Our little girl is now a little over 2 weeks old! It's unbelievable how fast the last 16 days have gone. It seems to me as if I've been doing this (feeding, changing diapers, taking care of her) for a lot longer than that. I guess that means I'm a natural??

She had a doctor's appointment (just a routine check-up) on Tuesday. She now weighs 9lbs 2 oz. That's a full pound heavier than her birth weight! The really amazing thing about that is she had lost weight after she was born. This is fairly common in newborns. She got down to around 7lbs 9oz, so for her to weigh 9 pounds already is pretty amazing! But I guess I shouldn't be surprised since she eats so well (and often)!!

There really hasn't been a lot going on around here. We've been trying to keep up on the housework as much as possible...sometimes it gets away from us. :) We've made a few trips out in public with her and it wasn't as much of a calamity as I thought it might be. Sunday we're going to my brother and sister-in-law's house for the Packer game. I'm looking forward to getting out of the house for a while. :) I'm usually good in small doses. As of right now, I'm thinking we're going to attempt to go to my grandmother's for Thanksgiving. What I do know is that if we do go, we'll be taking our own car so that we can leave if I've had too much people for one day. I tend to get overwhelmed around a lot of people.

Other than that, I'm going to try to take a picture of Clara every week or so, so we can see just how fast she's growing. I've got to figure out how to do that...maybe the old propped up on a pillow w/a note trick will work ok. :) Katie took Clara's newborn pictures last Friday and we'll be picking up the disc on Sunday when we go to Green Bay. I can't wait! I'll post some as soon as I get the chance.

One handed update. :)

So I wanted to post an update, but Miss Clara was hungry, too, so I'm doing this one handed.

We are now about 1 1/2 weeks post-delivery. Things are going pretty well. We aren't on any kind of schedule yet, but we seem to be getting there. She is now going 3 hours between feedings at night which is nice. During the day she eats more often and likes to spend time in her swing.

My recovery is going pretty well. I still have some pain from my stitches, but it's getting better. I'm also down around 30lbs so far! Only 25-ish lbs to get back to my pre-pregnancy weight. Yesterday I got out of the house for a while with my mom...Clara stayed home with dad. It was nice, and the weather was gorgeous!

Today we went to Green Bay to have Katie take Clara's newborn pictures. She got some, but Clara decided she was only going to cooperate for so long. I'm sure the ones she got were amazing, though.

Finally!

The title of this post is appropriate for many reasons! First of all, Clara is here!! She arrived on Tuesday, November 2nd at 1:33pm! Secondly, this is the first chance I've had since coming home Thursday to get on the computer for more than a couple of seconds. I wanted to get my birth story and a picture or two posted. And last, it's been a while since I posted anything!

I'll start with my last appointment which was on October 26th. I went in, hoping to have made some progress...which I finally had, but it was only a fingertip's worth of dilation and little effacement. At this point, I'd had enough. We talked about doing the Foley catheter induction and decided to go ahead and schedule it for Monday November 1st unless I went into labor on my own before then. I thought for sure it would happen over the weekend, but no such luck. So Monday rolled around and we went in for the catheter. What this involves is putting a Foley catheter into the cervix between the cervix and the bag of waters. The pressure from the inflated Foley is supposed to simulate the baby's head and stimulate labor. Well it hurt...BAD. I went home and contracted pretty much every 5 minutes until around 9:30. I took the sleeping pill they had prescribed around 9:30 and then went to bed, hoping I'd be going to the hospital before the 5:30 time they had scheduled us for. No such luck.

5:30am Tuesday we showed up at the hospital. We got settled into our room. I got my IV placed. My nurse checked my dilation, but it was hard to tell as the Foley was still in there. She tried to take it out, but opted to wait for my doctor to do it instead. A few minutes later my doctor came in and took it out. It was determined that I was 3cm dilated and about 50% effaced. At that point, they started pitocin and broke my water. Let me tell you, that's probably one of the weirdest feelings I've ever experienced!! At this point, time sort of became irrelevant. I know it wasn't too much after they started the pitocin that I was checked again. I was now 5cm and 75% effaced. My original birth plan involved going without pain meds. Well, let me tell you, laboring while on pitocin sucks. My contractions were about every 1.5 minutes apart and the more they increased the dose, the stronger they got. I ended up caving in and getting an epidural. I think it was probably around 8am. It took 2 sticks, but they finally got it in and it was FABULOUS!!

I labored on the pitocin for a while...I even took a nap after the epidural kicked in because I knew I was going to need all my energy to push her out once the time came. Around maybe 1o or 11 I started feeling pain again so I asked for a top-off of my epdiural. At around 11:30 I got checked again and was 8cm! My nurse said to let her know if I felt an overwhelming urge to push, otherwise they were just going to let me labor down. After that I was checked a few times (I know the last time they checked me I was 9.5cm). Soon after they checked me the last time, I started feeling like I had to poop. I remember telling Adam "I feel like I have to poop." I went with it for a little while, and then let the nurse know because I REALLY felt like pushing. So she checked and sure enough, I was complete and Clara was moving down in a hurry! She called my doctor (who was in a meeting...and happy to get out of it) and he rushed up. I started pushing a little after 1 and Clara was born at 1:33pm!! My epidural was wearing off by the time I started pushing, which really helped because I could feel exactly where I needed to push.

I thought the pushing was going to be worse pain-wise than the labor, but I was wrong! It felt really good. I was really in control. I pushed while Adam counted and in between contractions I let my body go completely limp and just tried to rest as much as I could. Before I knew it, Dr V was telling me to look at my baby! I could feel her sliding out the whole time so I knew when her head came out and then she was up on my chest...looking at me with those huge eyes! I do remember Dr V saying she had the cord around her neck once, but there weren't any ill effects from that. I held her for a good long time before they took her to clean her up. I couldn't believe she was actually here!

Recovery has been slower than I would like. I had a 1-day set back due to a spinal headache. I ended up needing to stay in the hospital for an extra day. I also ended up with stitches since Clara's chin cut me open on the way out. But aside from those things, recovery is going well. We're breastfeeding like champs. Clara is already latching on by herself. We had some concerns with jaundice, but her weight was up today from yesterday and I think we're heading in the right direction. Adam and I are both tired, but Clara's sleeping well at night (in between feedings) and all of our animals are doing great with her, too.

As much as I would like to write more, it's about time for Clara to get up and eat. Here's a few pictures...some with her new grandmas and some from today in her swing.