Karalee Elizabeth Clark is Here!!!

Our little girl is here after a much anticipated wait! Her Daddy and I are so in love, everyone is right and it's the most indescribable feeling to hold your child for the first time. I look at her and just think how can mere mortal's have created such a beautiful little life? It truley is God's miracle and I'm so grateful to have her here. Watching Dana hold her and learn the "Dad" things has been so fun, we're both in for so much learning but we're so excited! His entire face just lights up as he's holding her and it doesn't matter if she's crying or she's sneezing or she's just looking at him he's so patient with her and playful and tender all at once. She's already a Daddy's girl and looks very much like him to boot! She's got his eyes and nose which is hard to see in the pictures. :-)

Max and Buggy aren't too sure what to do with this new little person who's suddenly arrived in "their" house! Max loves to sniff her and he's given her a few Max kisses so I know he likes her he's just not sure what to do with her! LOL Buggy is still freaked out everytime Karalee makes a noise! Max's ears go down and he whines right along with Karalee when she's crying it's so funny. Poor guy hates to hear anyone sad! :-)

She's very alert and loves to look at her Daddy and I when we're holding her. She's passed all her tests thus far with flying colors! They did detect a heart murmor but it's only off and on they catch it so they did an EKG on her and she on occasion has an irregular heartbeat, a cardiologist checked the reading and feels this is nothing to be concerned about as several newborns are born with this and it generally resolves itself within 2 weeks. They are going to check her today and then again in 10 days just to make sure but all her vitals are great, she's got great color and all the doctors feel this irregular heartbeat will be gone soon and is completely normal. She breastfeeds like a champ, has quite a latch on her! I'm still adjusting to it and how tender you get but I love feeding her!

Well I promised the labor/birth story so here goes! I started having contractions at about 5PM on April 29th. At first they were just like bad menstrual cramps and I couldn't get comfortable, by about 11PM they were really starting to get painful but they still weren't at a consistent tempo, it'd be 3 minutes, then 7 minutes, then 10 minutes, then 2 minutes etc so when I called the midwife she recommended taking some warm baths to help relax my muscles and especially my lower back which was really starting to ache. She said first babies always take awhile and I was probably still in the very early stage of labor as I could still talk through my contractions even though they hurt. So discouraged but with information I dutifully did as directed and soaked, and rubbed my back when I'd lay in bed. I had sent Dana to bed so that one of us could get a little rest and since he was the driver I wanted him to be semi cognizant! Lol So he'd check on me periodically and I told him what the midwife had said so I sent him back to bed and continued to labor in the spare room and the guest bathroom in the tub. Well at about 2:20AM the pain was so intense I cried out and then GUSH my water burst all over the comforter, I "dashed" aka hobbled my way into the guest bathroom just to make sure it wasn't something else and nope it wasn't! I was finally ready to go to the hospital and know for certain they couldn't turn me away for being in false labor. Well I went to the spare room and got slammed with another contraction so hard I couldn't move for a good 30 seconds or better. Dana rushed in and said we're going to the hospital to which I answered "Yeah we are my water just broke" so we go get dressed and I hobble downstairs and sit at the kitchen table while more and more water comes gushing out, I was a mess I can fully admit! In between contractions which by now were probably about 2 minutes or less apart Dana got me to the car and sat down. The entire time I'm screaming and feeling A LOT of pressure on my back end. Well, I hadn't actually thought I was going to go into labor so I hadn't put more gas in the car figuring I'd do it on the way to work........um yeah don't do that poor Dana's got a screaming wife who's breathing as best I can but those contractions are really starting to hurt and he has to stop to put gas in the car. Oops on my part. Least I had the hospital bags in the car! At any rate we dash for the highway after getting gas and call the midwife to let her know we're on the way etc. We get to the hospital at around 3AM and pull in behind an ambulance so I got a wheelchair escort up to the labor area where they checked me and got me in a hospital gown. I was already at station 2 when I got there and fully dilated so no epidural for me, to my dismay at first I might add! Lol Dana got there in time for that look of dismay but gamely jumped right in to holding my hand and being there for me. They tell me to start pushing at my next contraction so I did and I have never in my life felt such a burning and stretching sensation inside! Few more pushes and I hear they can see her hair! Whew I think if they can see her hair then her head must be right there and I'm done soon! Well...not quite! Took several more pushes before I got her head to crown and then pop it was out and it was time for the shoulders, pop they were out and my daughter was on my stomach beautiful as could be! I know I cried a little from pure joy at seeing her and knowing she was finally here! Dana got to cut her umblical cord which I wish we'd thought to take a picture of but alas we were a tad preoccupied! They took her to the warmer to check her and Dana went with her while I delivered the placenta a few minutes later, felt like a big water balloon coming out was very weird. Then the stitching below began, wouldn't have been so bad but my legs were shaking like crazy from all the work we'd just done. Thankfully I didn't tear very bad so I'm told I'll heal just fine. :-) That's it. That's our birth story, 1/2 an hour after arriving at the hospital our daughter was here! It was recommended that since second children typically come faster we leave a smidge more wiggle room in our labor plans lol. I will say that it was all worth it and if I had it to do all over I'd do it the same. Laboring at home was much more comfortable then being in the hospital and getting there with very little pushing time was really pretty nice. Scary for certain and not what was in the "plans" but having gone natural I now know I can do it and I'd do it again. Just not for a couple years! Lol

Karalee has had a very busy life for as short a time as she's been here! She's met most of the neighbors and is of course a HUGE hit. She charms everyone the second they see her! :-) She's also been to Village Inn where we had lunch after seeing the peditrician-who gives her a clean bill of health just wants to monitor her heart irregularity which Dana and I got to listen to today-and she's been to Babies R Us where we picked up the monitor so we'll sleep better, and some various items from our registry. Now she's home and sacked out in her crib while I listen to her on the monitor. Dana is doing some grocery shopping and should be home shortly.

We'll keep you updated on her progress and ours as we go! Enjoy the pictures!

Karalee getting weighed


Karalee just after being born


Mommy and Karalee on going home day


Karalee in her hospital crib


Daddy and Karalee after she was born and weighed


Daddy, Mommy (who was very tired) and Karalee


Trisha our midwife-she was fantastic!


Daddy and Karalee

7 Days 7 Nights

Well we are officially one week away from our due date! Yikes! Had our 39 week doctor's appointment today and here is where we stand: 70% thinned out, 1.5 cm dilated, cervix in mid position and most exciting of all is Karalee's head has moved down farther so we're now at -2 station! Yea! Her heartbeat is 125-130 which is still very strong and while lower then last week normal. She was moving a ton during the exam and our mid wife was cracking up at how it sounded on the monitor. :-) Dana also got to feel Karalee's head (from the outside) which was very exciting for him! I also told my work that barring going into labor early, next week would be my last week of work.

Here's the pics for 39 weeks, I'm off to enjoy the night before it gets too cold!

Thank you!

We had a bbq yesterday that my neighbors and I planned as a distraction so Dana wouldn't know the real reason was a Daddy Diaper Roundup! Lol He gave the first couple people who handed him diapers funny looks but it clicked at about the third one! It was so great! We got a ton of diapers so that'll be a huge help and it was such a neat way to include him in the baby's arrival since lets face it, it's not like daddies get showers! Thanks guys for planning that for him!

Daddy Dana and his stash of diapers!


Since we're on the thank you trip here's a picture of the Thank You cards I had done that you'll be seeing shortly, I have to go buy stamps and with last week being tax week I avoided the post office like crazy! Lol Only thing I request is please no copying the work as it is copy righted by the designer who can be reached at: Creative Expressions Jessica Schwebel, owner & designer 770-296-1884 for your own specially designed card. :-)



Dana and I are off to get dressed and take Mr. Max for a walk since it's such a beautiful day out!

2 weeks

Just got back from the doctor's appointment and I am 1 cm dilated, 50% thinned out and my cervix is in mid position. Karalee's moving tons and she has definitaley dropped as I can feel more pressure when I'm laying down or if I'm walking a lot. Her heartbeat is at 134 which is very strong and has remained consistent, she seems to stick at about 134-136 which works for me! Long as she's healthy! We have another appointment next Thursday which Dana's going to and I'm curious to see where we'll be at then. I haven't had any contractions that I'm aware of, some braxton hicks on occasion and some cramping which I assume is from that "area" stretching for dilation as it's not constant and it's not overly painful.

It's so hard to believe in 2 short weeks she's due! Seems like we only just started this journey yet we're almost done! Well with the pregnancy part, of course the parenting part you're never really done with! Hee hee Dana and I are both so excited to meet our little girl! We can't wait to see her face and count fingers and toes, cuddle her all up! Can't wait to cry from happiness and exhaustion!

Karalee also scared and excited her dad a few days ago, she was sticking her foot out on my right side so he puts his hand there just as she moves it so it went all the way from his fingertips, across his palm to his wrist! He'd never had her do that before so it startled him but he was so excited at the same time! She did it a few more times later that day just for him, already a daddies girl. :-)

I thought I was the one who was supposed to get vivid dreams and such? Seems that Dana's getting those! Lol Poor guy had one that kept him up for a couple hours, think he just wanted to make sure I wasn't going to make it true! Lol I'll just say it involved the bed and water breaking, nothing provocative so for all you gutter minded folks hit dry land! Lol

Alright time to get household chores going, Dana did the dishes last night so it's laundry and take Max for a walk so we both get exercise time!

Here's the 38 weeks belly shots!






This is a little remedies kit full of great things every first time parent needs that a friend got me and also a swaddle me! I'm so excited! Karalee has got such great things from everyone!


This is her closet with the organizer, now it'll be tweaked of course as I get more hangers etc but it worked out so awesome to have that and the storage tote! Cleared so much space in there!

Baby Shower

Well today was the big day! I of course forgot my camera but a couple people took photo's they're going to give me copies of so when I get those I'll post them. I did take pictures of all the gifts we received after I got home so you could all see those! We're so blessed to have such generous friends! Karalee is going to be one styling little girl! I apologize I didn't keep the gifts seperate so while I think I got pics of all of them they are intermingled. :-) We also got a couple gift cards that I didn't take photo's of but I'll take photo's of what they get used on! Also didn't take pics of the diapers we got from people. :-) There are also onesie's that everyone at the party decorated with fabric markers so once I get those I'll post pictures, it's so great to have a reminder of this day and to have something so unique for Karalee! Can't wait to get some pics of her in them! I also got to hold my friends almost 2 month old daughter! She's so tiny! Of course as soon as mom handed her off I got spit up on! lol All of us just cracked up! Guess I better get used to it! Lol See Gregg you aren't the only one that gets hurled on by babies! Hee hee She's such a good baby though, hardly fussed at all during the party and she loved getting attention from everyone. :-)

Diaper Cake two of my friends made-the booties on top are hand made!


The begining of taking apart the cake


More dismantling.....


Dismantling cont....


What you get after taking all the "extra's" off, lots and lots of diapers! Yea!!!


Clothes


Blankets


Outfit, pacifiers, lotion, butt cream


Safer Bather-this is supposed to be really supportive and very easy to clean!


Outfit, rattles, bibs, blanket, pacifier attachments (keeps them from falling on the floor), socks


Outfits, blanket, rattles, health care kit


Outfit, closet organizer-love this already! Soon as I get all her clothes put away I'll take a picture, folding bin-it's holding the diapers from the diaper cake! Teether, breast milk containers, 2 in 1 drying rack & organizer


Travel baby lotion etc, mermaid towel set


Bibs, hangers, bassinet sheets, disposable diaper bags


Outfits, piddle pad-it's for the car seat to help protect it from blow outs-socks, plastic tub-this came in so handy! I have all her blankets and sheets sitting in it! So glad to have that!


Nike outfit-from Uncle Gregg and Uncle Jim


Alright I think this post is long enough! Thank you so much to everyone that's given Karalee a gift, it's so appreciated and we thank you from the bottom of our hearts! Your kindness and generosity is overwhelming!

The boom

I got news recently that a good friend of mine is almost 5 months pregnant and then this morning I got the wonderful news another friend is about a month pregnant! Surprised her that's for sure! I won't mention names here since the news has not been shared world wide yet. :-) I'm so excited for them both! They're both great mom's and I can't wait to see pictures of their new little ones!

My parents just celebrated their 29th (almost positive I have that right) anniversary yesterday! How exciting! It's amazing how fast time goes!

My boss had told me some time ago you'll start to notice in your group of friends that you all get married around the same time, start having babies, and then divorces will be the third thing you'll see. It's weird because he's right! This past year I've had two friends get divorced, several of us are pregnant or just had babies, and we all got married within a few years of each other. It's interesting and while it has it's sad moments it's got a lot of happy times too. Least we're all still keeping in touch so far even if it is scattered communication! Lol

Well this Friday the 13th has brought gloomy skies and snow to parts of CO. We have the gloomy skies but knock on wood no snow at our house for a change! It's cold but I'll take that with no snow! Lol I'm hoping it stays away!

I've been training the office manager who's going to cover for me while I'm on maternity leave and that's going well. I knew it would, she's a sharp cookie and my job is more about learning what screens you need to be in and what data goes in which slot. Once you have that down it's not too bad at all. :-) We covered a lot of ground this past week since her main boss was out of town and she had more time to spend training so the next couple weeks should be pretty easy on her work wise in both positions. :-) It feels weird to train someone to do my job, I'm used to having it to myself and I don't think it's really sunk in fully yet that I won't be there for 6 weeks.......I keep waiting for the realization that yes you are going to be having a baby and yes you are going to be on maternity leave to hit. I have a hunch it won't really sink in until I hit that first contraction! Lol

Dana has been diligently researching video camera's for awhile now and narrowed down the one he thought would work best for us! It's so tiny! Fits in the palm of your hand! I haven't played with it too much yet but it's a pretty cool camera. Best of all we made Best Buy drop the price since 1. We stood around for a good 20+ minutes waiting on the sales guy to acknowledge us since he was helping someone else, the manager actually came over and threw a fit for us and got someone to help us out with out us prodding him at all which I thought was pretty cool. 2. The camera we chose is cheaper at another store so we made Best Buy honor their motto of matching prices 3. We had gift cards we hadn't used yet so we got the camera for quite a bit less then the asking price! We were pretty excited and pleased about that! Here's a pic of our new toy: Oh and for those that are curious no the birth will not be taped, I don't really think anyone wants to see that! I don't and I'm the one giving birth! Lol Rest assured there will be video of Karalee after she's here though and we'll begin the learning of uploading video's to the blog.

This camera is so cool, doesn't need tapes or dvd's just uploads directly to the computer and has about 1 1/2 hours of battery life for taping! Great choice honey!


We also got some early baby shower gifts so Dana and I opened those, couldn't leave the poor guy out of opening gifts entirely! Here's the pics of what she got recently. Thank you to everyone that sent something, look for your official thank you cards in the mail in the next few days! :-)

This is a Mommy Bear, it plays the womb sound to help soothe the baby to sleep, Dana had a great time playing with this! It's a really cool bear, shuts off after 10 minutes so you don't kill the batteries to fast. I'm excited to see if it works! If not heck we'll just put it in our room! LOL


This is an outfit and hangers Karalee got from Grandma Karen


This is another record book to tell us what Karalee was doing at a certain age, from Grandma Karen


These are sheets and the blanket is so soft! Dana wants to steal that too! Lol Look out Karalee, Daddy's after your toys already! Lol


This is a swing from our neighbor who used it with her daughters! We're excited to try it out! The swing runs on batteries instead of a crank like a lot of older ones so that's very nice! The pad is actually for the diaper changing table I just haven't taken it out of the basket. You can pop the basket out and swap it for the chair pictured below which is very cool!


This is for letting her sit and swing, the cushions are just in the wash which is why it looks so bare.


And of course no post is complete with out belly shots! In a few weeks you won't see these anymore! Not until it gets back to flat! Lol

37 weeks 1 day








What else do we have going on this weekend....well we have our usual Friday night dinner plans with our friend Jim and since it's his b-day we're going to celebrate that! We also have a surprise party to go to on Saturday which should be a lot of fun! Then Sunday is my baby shower and I'm looking forward to that! I talked to one of the ladies and she's getting a strawberry and champagne cake from the same place we got our wedding cake, they make the best cakes! Then, and this tells you how much my friends are glad to not be the one's pregnant we're (well they will at any rate lol) having jello shots! It should be a blast and I can't wait to see them all!

I think I've caught you all up on our lives as much as we've done recently! Hope you're all having a safe and fun Friday the 13th!

Ah calm has been restored

So last night I got the bright, and I say that with the utmost sarcasm, idea that by adding a google bar it would supposedly bring in revenue for us. Well........let me just say that little idea made my night rather growlsome. Poor Max wouldn't even come near me! Lol Lets just say it made the blog a pain to operate so I figure I'll just delete them.......well then that messed up the placement of things on my blog. So what was the fix? Well they say update the template and voila. Great. Except it lost every single link I had for friends websites and last night I could not get them to re-appear! GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!! However, being the studious worker I am, wink wink, I got it to work this morning and I'm pretty sure I have everyone's links back on my blog. :-) If you see someone missing please let me know!

Wives Tale

So I had a little Mexican lady tell me that once my belly button pops out-thankfully it hasn't yet-that I need to count 21 days from that point and that's when I'll go into labor. I had to laugh and she looked at me quite seriously and said I have 11 kids so I know what I'm talking about. She just laughed after that, I of course had to share that with my friends that have had kids and they laughed saying they popped long before labor ever came about. Hee hee

I think my favorite old wives tale I heard from a friend was "If you look at smething ugly your child will be ugly." We both got a huge laugh out of that!

Happy Easter!

Karalee is doing great, heart beat was 136 at the last doctor's appointment and she's still head down. She is still sitting high in my ribs though so we're not likely to be close to popping into labor soon! Which is okay by me, I still have to train my replacement! :-)

So I'm ready for the hate e-mail as I anger the masses with this next statement. Who the heck cares that Sanjay from American Idol is a total loser, that his sister has "racy" pics on the internet supposedly and that he wasn't liked in NY? I don't even watch the show and I already know more about this guy then I ever wanted to know! Vote him off and be done with it! I think it's time Simon just started bribing America to vote this guy off so I can stop hearing about him. Not to mention the one and only time I saw him perform the man can not sing! Eeeeek. Alright that was my morning tirade. :-)

Oh and apparently one of the buffalo got out and were running around some neighborhood, not ours, and apparently officials were unable to catch him so they had to shoot him. Nice we haven't even seen on yet and already they can't keep them contained! Sheesh.

We have a busy weekend coming up! A baby shower on Friday at lunch, then I go pick up and pay the tax guy-I still dislike the IRS-then Saturday is a b-day party, and Sunday is my shower with friends! Can't wait to see everyone!

Let's see...what else have we done recently..chosen a daycare provider is about the most exciting thing recently. We chose what we think is a great place and the lady seems to really love her job so we're excited about that. Not excited about shuffling funds to pay daycare but I don't know anyone that leaps for joy at that thought! Lol I washed all of Karalee's clothes and blankets last weekend, couldn't believe how much room those tiny little things took up!

Here are belly shots-36 weeks





Almost forgot that Karalee has her first Easter gifts! Thank you Great Grandma Mason! Or GG as she's now being called. :-)


I got in a baking mood last night so I made brownies which turned out really yummy, rice krispy treats which will be lucky to survive until tomorrow as I love snacking on those! Then I made chocolate chip cookies from one of my cook books....snoooooorreeee! They turned out so bland it's terrible! The rice krispy's have more flavor for goodness sake! Needless to say that recipe is in need of serious modification! :-) 2 out of 3 isn't bad though I guess.

Everyone have a Happy Easter!