busy week

So hey, I had my baby!

I went in on Tuesday the 20th (my due date) for a standard non-stress test. The test showed that baby's heartbeat dropped considerably every time she moved or I had a contraction. Under medical advice, we went to the hospital to be induced. They put me on pitocin, and the contractions came hard and close together. I was hooked up to all sorts of devices to monitor me and the baby, and I had to wear an oxygen mask as well. It was a less comfortable way to labor, but it was necessary. Towards the end, baby was having issues with me pushing as well, so it was urgent for me to get her out of there as soon as possible. This meant an episiotomy and a Herculean pushing effort in order to avoid a cesarean. And boom! Out she came, with the cord wrapped around her neck at least four times. The midwife told us it was a miracle that she came out alive. 5 lbs, 15 oz and with an IV for the first day and a half, but alive. And now she's doing great, eating like a champ and filling our garbage cans with excessively moist diapers. Hooray for Izzy!



Isadora Olivia, relaxing after a hard day.

pumpkin times

Matt and I carved pumpkins for our Monday-Night-Be-Awesome-Together activity.



Mine is the winking one, of course.

Also, I am 40 weeks pregnant today! The official due date is tomorrow, so baby should probably get started tonight if she wants to be on time. More on this later when there is actually more to say.

princess things

For Christmas this year I am making each and every one of my nieces a princessy tiara. It takes a lot of ribbon and glue. Here are the first five (for Kristin's wee ones):









No two will be alike, and I just hope that they are more or less the right size for little heads. Chances are good that I can get them all done before I go into labor, so maybe the baby will even get one. For later use, of course. :)

autumn

Fall is here! Matt and I went on a short hike to look at all of the pretty trees.





I tried to catch a leaf in motion, but I had limited success. They were just too fast and unpredictable for me. What I needed was a good ol' fashioned wind storm, but I had to settle for a gentle, soothing breeze. In fact, this photo is actually rigged. Matt dropped that leaf for me after I missed it the first time.

We tried, so hard.


The failure did not ruin the hike.

count down

So here I am at about 36 1/2 weeks:


That was taken about a week ago, so now I'm even closer! I'm officially "ripe," meaning that any day I could do that magic trick where I suddenly make a baby appear. (I use the word "suddenly" loosely, of course.)

My due date is the 20th of October. I am now accepting guesses as to when the chickadee will actually hatch. Leave your guess in the comments and if you're the closest I'll mail you a dollar. If nobody guesses then by default I win. I am already practicing my labor face.