Growing

Today Lexie turned 3 weeks old. Lexie took her first trip out of town this past Sunday to go to visit her Hoyt relatives. We had a great time and she loves the carseat and slept the entire trip both ways. These pictures were taken today. On Tuesday she had her 2 week Dr. appointment which was actually 2 weeks and 5 days, but it was the soonest we could get in with the holiday and everything. She weighed 8 lbs 8 oz and was 20 inches long. That means she has gained 1/2 a pound and 1 inch since she was born. The Dr. said that is really great; she is only in the 47% on weight and 28% on height. I'm fine with her being more petite and feminine!

This next picture shows a trait she inherited from both her mom and dad...sleeping a little crazy. Yes, both me and Bryan have had pictures of us taken in the past where we were sleeping in odd positions. This is the way Lexie loves to sleep...on her side with her head arched back as far as it will go. It's super cute!

I can't believe it's been 3 weeks since I gave birth to this sweet baby girl. I promised to post more about the delivery. They started me that Wednesday night around 7:00 using one form of medication, but it didn't do much so they started the pitocin around midnight. I had kind of started going into labor that day already because when I got checked at 11:00 that morning I was only dilated to 1 1/2 and before they started me on any medication I was at 2 1/2 and had started having real contractions before they gave me any medication. If they hadn't decided to start me because of the high blood pressure I probably would have been back to the hospital that night on my own. Once they started the pitocin the contractions really got going good. By 4:00 a.m. I was having very bad pains, got the shakes and all of that fun stuff. The nurse went to check me and my water broke and that put me in even worse pain. Anyway, at that point I was ready for the epidural. I had been in labor for about 9-10 hours at that point and I was ready for some pain relief! I seriously don't know how anyone does it natural, and I don't know why you would want to do it natural if you don't have to. Once I got the epidural it was pretty much immediate relief and I highly recommend an epidural to anyone going through childbirth! Anyway after that I was able to sleep which I did for several hours. At one point the pit got to be too much and I was having too long of contractions so they stopped it because the baby's heart rate started going down but they got things under control. The Dr. came and checked me about 6:30 a.m. and I had gotten to around a 6 or 7 so he left and I kept sleeping. At 9:00 the nurse came to check me and said I was complete and ready to start pushing. She went out to call the Dr. and he just happened to be in the hall so he came in and I pushed about 20 minutes and Lexie was born! Because I had been able to get so much rest and felt no pain, pushing was a breeze. The whole birthing process actually went very smooth and wasn't nearly as bad as I thought...thank goodness for modern medicine...otherwise I don't think I would have made it through! I'm grateful that everything did go so well and that we have our gorgeous little girl to show for all the hard work of pregnancy and delivery. Now onto even harder work...parenting!