~ Karys' 1st Dr Appt ~

Karys had her very first doctor appointment this morning! Dr. Lentsch was impressed with how well she is eating and putting on weight. She now weighs 7 lb 5 oz!! She is a very healthy little girl :) She also switched her formula from Enfamil to Similac because she said that in her experience, babies on Enfamil have constipation issues. Luckily Karys has not had any of that just yet and is now about to have her first bottle of Similac. They also gave us plenty to take home!

We also talked with her about Karys' broken collar bone. She said that it is really more painful for the parents because the baby really does not feel it and it should heal really quick. On Thursday we can start leaving her arm unbound during the day sometimes to let her move it around. She said even now with bathing her and everything, she is fine and we aren't going to hurt her. That reassured us and put our minds at ease a little more though!

We'll go back next Friday for her second week checkup. Other than that, everything is going pretty well. So far she is sleeping pretty good and has been a dream child! The doctor also said that since she is putting on weight and eating good, we can wait until she wakes us up at night to feed her. That works very well for us because she will sleep for about 5 hours at a time right now! Mommy & Daddy are very happy about that! :) And during the days she is eating about 2.5 - 3 oz every 3 hours. Then we play with her and keep her awake for awhile and then she naps until her next feeding. My sister is also staying with us for part of this week and she has really been so helpful too! Tim and I are able to nap while she watches her - which we couldn't be more thankful for! We've had quite a busy few days! :)

It's crazy how in love with her we are! I cannot get enough of this child and I cannot stop kissing her! She is just perfect in every way imaginable. We've had lots of visitors this week too - Karys is definitely loved by a lot of people! Great Nana even brought by an ExerSaucer yesterday for her! We've had lots of people send us flowers and fruit baskets too. Everyone has just been so helpful and great and we really appreciate everything.

Brinks also loves her already! He sleeps by her bassinet and looks in on her while she is sleeping. He runs over to her when she cries and when she is eating just to smell her and lay by her. It's really cute! He's been very gentle with her :) He doesn't seem to be jealous of her at all so that is also good.

Thanks to everyone for the sweet comments on the guestbook. We are just so happy with this perfect little girl that God blessed us with. Life could not possibly get any better than this...

Love,
Steph & Tim

Here's what happened the day of delivery....it's kind of a long read because it was a very long day and Tim documented everything for us! :)

At 4:30am we received a call from the hospital asking us to wait to come in until 7am rather than 5:30am. We arrived at the hospital at 7am and were immediately admitted into a Labor & Delivery room. At 7:50am they did an exam and I was dilated to 3.5cm, 80% effaced and at a -2 station. Dr. Patronella broke my water after the exam. At 8:05am I reminded Tim to set his Fantasy Nascar lineup, which he thought was pretty funny! :) At 8:12am they started me on pitocin at 6 milliunits, at 8:30am they increased it to 12 milliunits, then to 18 milliunits and at 9:05am to 24 milliunits. At 9:35am I was dilated to 4cm. At 9:40am they increased the pitocin again to 30 milliunits. Around this time my contractions were getting pretty strong and more painful so they administered an epidural at 10:30am. At 11:15am I was dilated to 5cm, 90% effaced and at -1 station. They also increased the pitocin to 36 milliunits. My epidural started to wear off and I began to feel pain again because it was not done properly by the first lady who did it. So another doctor had to come in and take out the first one and give me a whole other epidural! This time it did not hurt at all because he knew what he was doing!

By 1:30pm I was dilated to 6cm and 100% effaced! Right after that exam the nurse noticed the baby's heart rate had dropped significantly and did another exam immediately. Within 2 minutes I had dilated from 6cm to 8cm!! The pitocin was turned off and I was given an oxygen mask for me and the baby. They started me on a low dose of pitocin again around 2:10pm and increased it in 15 minute increments. At 2:50pm I started to feel pain again and it turned out that my epidural catheter was blocked and the pump had stopped! So they gave me another injection of pain meds through my epidural and restarted the pump and I started to feel better again. I was also dilated to 9.5 cm. By 4pm I was dilated to 10cm and started pushing at 4:05pm. By 4:25pm I was pushing regularly with each contraction. After 1.5 hours of pushing, Karys was born at 6:13pm and I was able to hold her after they cleaned her up. She was then taken to the nursery where she got 9 out of 10 points on the apgar scale! She's so great!!

We finally got to a post partum room and got to to see our daughter again by 9pm and we gave her her first bottle at 9:35pm. When the nurse first brought her to us, she explained that Karys had a broken clavicle (collar bone). They explained that this is fairly common with first babies when they are coming down the birth canal. They said she isn't in any pain and that it will heal on it's own in a matter of weeks. We just have to keep her bound up, which is easy right now since she is swaddled anyway. And we have an appointment with our pediatrician on Monday and she will give us further instructions on how to take care of it.

Overall, the entire process was a lot harder than I ever anticipated it being. Pushing was by far the hardest part but a lot of my pain meds had worn off too I think which made it a lot harder on me (I have a high tolerance to pain medications!). But once they put Karys in my arms, everything was worth it. I felt so much love in that instant and was just amazed at how beautiful and perfect she was. She was worth every second of it and I wouldn't trade her for anything in the world!!

It's now less than 2 days until we meet our baby girl and we are so thrilled and so excited! This week has been a little more stressful for me as I am becoming overwhelmed with so many different emotions: excitement, anticipation and nervousness to name a few! Sometimes I feel so scared and other times I feel like I'm so ready! I think the idea of there being a definite "date" now has added a little extra stress though. I'm not sleeping as well at night because I'm kept up by thinking about everything. Luckily though, I have a friend who delivered a beautiful baby girl a couple months ago at the same hospital and she has been able to calm me down by explaining the entire process and her own experiences. I feel much better today after talking with her more!!  :)

I had a couple painful days this weekend and during the nights. It's increasingly harder to walk because of all the weight, but today I've felt really great with only a few contractions and no real pain. Today is the most energy I've had in a long time - which is great considering the lack of sleep I'm getting! Tonight will be our last full night of sleep before waking up really early on Thursday to be at the hospital by 5:30am! Though I'm sure the thought of that alone will be enough to keep me up tonight too :)

We're definitely ready and excited to meet our baby girl! That very thought is constantly on my mind! Time seems to be creeping by now. We keep wondering who she'll look like and what it will feel like to finally hold her in our arms and it's all just a really wonderful feeling. We're just so blessed to be able to experience all of this!

Thank you to everyone who has been checking up on us and praying for us. We're almost there and we are so thrilled! We will update this site as soon as we can after bringing our baby girl home this week! And I'm sure the grandmothers and aunts will be posting and sending out pictures faster than we can imagine so be sure to keep checking back!

Love,
Steph & Tim

I had my regular doctor appointment today and while there were no physical changes with me (still 3cm), we did get a date set for the arrival of our baby girl! The doctor gave us a choice of Monday, Tuesday or Thursday to induce. We went ahead and picked Thursday because Monday and Tuesday would have to be done at another hospital and possibly in a semi-private room. Since we are already now familiar with our hospital, we went ahead and chose Thursday, March 1st for our baby girls birthday!! I don't think it has quite sunk in yet that one week from today we'll be able to hold our little girl for the first time!! So next Thursday, we need to be at the hospital at 5:30am and they will begin inducing me at 7:00am.

As for right now, I am still pretty uncomfortable. I've also started to retain some water this week. I've noticed it in my hands and face mostly. I can't really put my engagement ring on comfortably anymore without fear of it not being able to come off so I can only wear my wedding band. We're just very happy to finally have an end date to look foward too. She could always decide to come earlier, which would be great, but if not, we know for sure when we'll see her!

Thanks to everyone for your thoughts and prayers! We're really anxious to finally be able to meet our little girl! Now the countdown really begins! :)

Love,
Tim & Steph

Today I'm 38 weeks pregnant! Not too much has changed since my last update - I'm still having cramps and contractions daily. Some days are worse than others though. I also feel that Karys has dropped even lower if that is possible! Sometimes it's pretty difficult to walk and I have to hunch over because it feels as if she is just so low. My pelvic bone has been bothering me this past week too a lot. My body is definitely getting ready! I'm curious to see if all of this means I've dilated further. I realize this will all be worth it in the end for a healthy baby girl and I just have to keep reminding myself that she'll be here by the end of next week and there's not that much longer left. We'll know more after our doctor appointment on Thursday afternoon if Karys hasn't made her debut by then though!! Very exciting! :)

I don't know what I'd do without Tim to help me - he is constantly having me sit down or running me a bath or bringing things to me so that I don't have to move around too much when I'm in pain. I couldn't ask for a more wonderful husband to share this with. I'd be lost without him!! We've been spending a lot of time together lately before Karys makes her arrival since our time will be a bit more restricted for awhile. We've been trying to have as many "date nights" as we can! :)

We also officially became "Uncle Tim & Aunt Steph" over the weekend!! Zoe Madison Moyer was born on Feb 17th to Justin & Jamie.  We weren't able to be there to welcome her into the world since I'm not allowed to travel, but we hope to get to see her sometime soon. The pictures we've seen are just beautiful! We're very happy for them and can't wait to become parents ourselves!!

We hope everyone had a great weekend. We'll keep everyone posted as things progress!!

Love,
Steph & Tim

Today I'm 37 weeks 3 days pregnant. I feel much better about everything after talking to my doctor this morning at my appointment. After checking me, she said that I am dilated between 2 - 3cm and that I am effaced about 60-70%.  I spoke with her about everything that went on at the hospital and she thought it was a little odd that my contractions had just stopped the way they did but said that with the first pregnancy things like that can happen because they are more unpredictable.  We really trust and value my doctor's opinion and since she would have made the same call the on-call doctor had made, it put my mind at ease as well.

Because of everything that happened and all the cramping and contractions I have daily, I also asked how far along she would let me go before we began talking about being induced (since that was what they were going to do the day before at the hospital). She said that if I have not had Karys by my appointment next Thursday, then we would set a date for induction. She said she won't let me go longer than 2 weeks from today! So that means somewhere between now and March 1st, Tim and I will officially be "Mommy & Daddy"!! That was a relief to hear after all the turmoil the past couple of days.

I'm still really tired today and have tried napping on and off. I am cramping a little too from all the exams I've had in the past couple of days. I'm very ready to not be pregnant anymore and to have this child in my arms rather than in my belly. If nothing else, Karys will have an interesting birth story for when she is older!

I also posted another belly picture today. My belly has grown so much in the past week and a half!! I hadn't thought much about it until I saw how much bigger I was in the picture! I can only imagine how big I'll be if she goes another 2 weeks!! My goodness!! :)

Please keep us in your prayers and pray that she comes soon!! We're very ready to be parents to this beautiful baby girl!

Love,
Steph & Tim

Around 3am yesterday morning, I was experiencing contractions every 4 minutes for about 2 hours. My doctor said I could go to the hospital but they sounded more like mild contractions. So we decided to wait awhile longer before heading to the hospital. Throughout the day, we walked around a lot and the contractions got more intense and the nurse said to head to the hospital. So off we went!

Once there, my contractions became much more frequent and much more painful than anything I'd experienced before. I could barely breathe through them and would have a hard time concentrating on what people were saying to me. They were about every 2.5 - 3 minutes and lasting for about 45 to 60 seconds in length. Upon checking me, they informed me that I was now dilated to 3cm. It looked as if things were progressing at this point. They moved me from the inspection room to a Labor & Delivery Room. I was hooked up to monitors to watch the baby's heartbeat as well as my own contractions and also an IV (which hurt so bad because it took them 3 times to get it!!). They planned on inducing me at 5am if my water had not broken on it's own during the night.

After a long night of painful contractions and them having to give me pain meds, the contractions just for some reason decided to stop completely early this morning. So the doctor on call (not my docor) decided to send me home rather than induce. Tim and I are so tired from being awake all day yesterday and last night. It's been a long ordeal and we are both just ready at this point. The doctor said she believes it will happen in the next 3 or 4 days now so I guess we'll see if she is right.....we're both just ready now. And exhausted.

I go back to see my doctor tomorrow and will talk to her more about everything that went on. As of right now, I am dilated to 3cm, 70% effaced and the baby has dropped even further from last week. I am very uncomfortable and just ready for something to happen. I don't know how many more "false alarms" I can take.

We will let everyone know as soon as anything happens. We're still hanging in there....please keep us in your prayers!

Love,
Tim & Steph

The past few days I have been in a major “nesting” mode! In addition to reorganizing our entire pantry, this weekend I have also organized my whole closet (yes, including all the shoes!) and in the process we discovered that there is a floor in there after all! Ha! After finishing that on Saturday, I moved on to reorganizing and cleaning out the hall closet on Sunday afternoon. I seem to have a burst of energy lately and want everything clean and organized!! Except now I’m out of things to organize so today I’m taking it easy and working on the baby book and other little things like that.  I had some more contractions Saturday evening and all through that night but nothing more yesterday. I almost started timing them around 3 am because they kept waking me up and seemed to be more and more intense and frequent. Today I’ve had some minor contractions and some cramping but nothing too serious. At this point it’s more of a waiting game! I’m just so anxious and excited to meet Karys!! 

The good news is that I'm 37 weeks along today so I'm considered term now, which makes me feel a lot safer about her delivery. Tim and my mom were both convinced she was coming this weekend but I guess she isn't ready just yet. It's becoming a little harder to wait and be patient lately though since I've been home for almost 6 weeks now and I'm so close to my due date. But I’m trying! :)