Oh Christmas Tree

The importance of Grandmas

So I'm all alone today and in total Grandma withdrawal! For the week after Maylee was born my mom came and stayed with us and the day she left my mother-in-law arrived to spend the weekend with us. Yesterday was my first day alone and it was a little traumatizing.

I mean, what are all these dirty dishes? Whose going to wash them now? And whose going to cook for my kids who still want 3 meals a day? Whose going to hold the crying baby so I can take a shower? Whose going to entertain the 6 & 4 year old while I sit in a nursing coma on the couch? Whose going to pick up after me and bring me lunch on the couch?

Yes, I admit it! I was extremely spoiled this last week and a half and I'm a Grandma addict now. I just don't think it's healthy to go cold turkey. So I'm going to post more pics of the adorable baby in hopes of luring them back to my house. No Grandma can resist a cute baby, right?

Picture Mania

Because who can resist a naked baby?  
 
 
 

Introducing

Maylee Joann Drorbaugh
Dec 2, 2009 3:18 am
7lbs 20 inches

My contractions started yesterday afternoon but stayed about 10 minutes apart all last night but didn't seem particularly strong so finally at 11 we told the midwife to go to bed because we wanted to try and get some sleep. We got into bed around midnight and I fell asleep pretty quickly.

I woke up at 245 with contractions I couldn't sleep through, mostly in my back. Not super painful but very uncomfortable. I woke David up and told him to call everybody to come over as soon as possible, then I got into the bathtub. David ran around our room setting everything up for the birth. I had 2 contractions in the tub and then my water broke, then the very next contraction I started to feel kind of pushy. I told David to call the midwife and tell her to hurry. In one more contraction she moved down and crowned and then her head was out. I had my eyes squeezed tightly shut trying to concentrate on not pushing her out too fast but I remember David saying, "She's beautiful, a full head of dark hair."

With the next contraction I pushed her body out and pulled her up out of the water and put her on my chest. Then David covered us with a towel to keep us warm. We called the midwife back to let her know the baby had been born and she gave David some instructions in case the placenta came out before she got there. Me and the baby just snuggled in the bathtub and stared at each other until the midwife got there. She was so awake and super calm, just looking around at everything.

When the midwife got there she helped me get out of the tub and over to the bed.
The time of birth was 3:18 am and I woke up at 2:45 so the total time was 33 minutes between getting up and Maylee being born. Best of all I didn't tear at all like I did with both of my other kids! The midwife showed up about 25 minutes after Maylee was born. She did the newborn screen and everything was perfect. She weighed 7 lbs even and 20 inches long. She is the calmest baby I have ever seen and she squeaks and grunts while she sleeps which is adorable.

We woke Emma up right after she was born and she was excited and stayed up with us for almost three hours before crashing again. When we woke Eli up he came and looked at Maylee, smiled, and then asked, "Can I go back to sleep now?" He was much more excited when he woke up at 8 am. :-)

I can't believe it's all over and I'm so happy with my homebirth. It was intense but here I am 9 hours later in my PJ's typing at my computer while my kids watch Christmas movies and my husband snuggles our little girl. :-)

A Stress-Free Thansgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving here in Maricopa doing absolutely nothing. By a lucky coincidence David had the holiday off from both jobs and we decided that instead of running around all day visiting family and doing a lot of driving that we would just stay home this year. To further simplify things we celebrated the day with frozen pizza and bagged salad and ended the feast with root beer floats. We played games as a family and basically just vegged out and enjoyed each others company. It was wonderful.

I was also 38 weeks on Thursday. Here's a new pic. Hopefully the next picture I post will be of Maylee. :-)

I'm Official!

So today I am officially 36 weeks which means I am cleared to have my homebirth! Yea! I am starting to feel uncomfortable and really big now and when my midwife checked me yesterday I was 2 cm dilated, very effaced and the baby was at a -1 station. What does that mean?

Nothing really. You can be dilated for weeks before you go into labor. But heck it's better than not being dilated at all! My midwife predicted that I would go all the way to my due date which I thought was a little mean. :-) All of my labor companions have been putting in their "requests" for when I should have the baby. But I had a good talk with Maylee and told her to come whenever she wanted to because, heck, I'm always here.

Last Saturday my friend Mandy threw me a baby shower and it went so well. I had a great time and got so many cute things for my little girl. Here's a couple of pics:

Halloween

One of my favorite parts of Halloween is going to the pumpkin patch and picking out pumpkins. Here's the kids at the patch and me showing off my 34 week belly.

Here's the results after the great carving adventure. Guess which one David carved?
Here's the kids in costume. We were so late getting ready that I didn't get any individual pictures of my little witch or Luigi. Oh well.
Successful Trick or Treating