The Birth of Jack Oliver

I know I've fallen behind horribly on the whole blog thing, and did zero blogs throughout this pregnancy, and I apologize! Sophia killed the charger to my laptop (again), and we just haven't bought a new one yet. And before that, Nate would bring my computer to work since it was our only laptop and he needed to have one for the job, and before we moved his desktop would never connect to the internet. BUT, now we're in a new place where it will connect, so I'm going to attempt to get back into it, because I've really missed it! Even the last post I made with the tutorial was done from my phone, and it was a bit of a pain to post from there!

Anyway, moving on, our family has grown! I'm pretty sure that I mentioned on this blog that we were trying to conceive, and after five months of trying we found out I was finally pregnant again! I really wanted to have a home birth, but in the end we just couldn't afford it (the ones here are all out of pocket), so I opted for the next best thing, and that was a natural birth at a birthing center. At 19 weeks, we learned that I was carrying a healthy baby boy, just as I had suspected. My pregnancy was completely uncomplicated, so always a good thing!

14 months

Wowsers, sorry for the long hiatus! For a good while we didn't have the internet, but now thank goodness it's back! SO, now to play catch up. A lot has happened since I've been away!

Seven months

Why is she already seven months old? This isn't fair, I want her to be my little baby forever. :( And what a handful she is! Into absolutely everything. Nothing is safe! She's learned that she can go to different rooms, so she is one traveling baby! Busy, busy girl. It's so fun watching her explore though. I love her sense of wonder.

6 months

Sophia is now six and a half months old...um, what? Seriously, where is this time going? And what a little ham she is. Too cute!

Tutorial Tuesday!

Okay, so I'm going to try my hand at doing a tutorial! Usually whenever I'm making anything, I just plain forget to take photos of the whole process. Seriously, it's so easy to forget. You just get so caught up in what you're doing, you just forget until it's all done...and, well, I'm definitely not undoing the sewing just for the sake of photos. Can you blame me?

Finished product

So anyway, today I'll be making a changing pad for little miss Jade. Cheyne didn't want a traditional diaper bag and opted for a backpack instead. Well, most of those don't exactly come with changing pads, and it's for sure a nice thing to have when out and about! Public changing tables are pretty grody, if I do say so myself! Besides, this will be softer and cuter than the one that would come with a bag anyway.

She's here!

Jade Ariana Miller finally arrived just before 3:00 PM yesterday afternoon! And holy baby! 9 lbs, 4.3 oz and 21.5" long. Umm, where did that big baby come from? If anyone knows, Cheyne is a pretty petite mama, like me, and she didn't get huge or anything during the pregnancy. She just had some major baby hiding abilities I suppose! Anyway, she pushed that baby out without an epidural, so proud of her! She's just precious though, and even though Sophia is only 6 lbs heavier, Jade still looks tiny. I'm so happy for her though! She's going to be a great mom.

What's in my diaper bag?

I finally did it! And I also finally FILMED a video! Well, I've filmed plenty of Sophia, but not really vlog-style ones. Even though I'd like to, but I'm not super sure of myself on camera yet. So, I played it safe and started out BEHIND the camera! Haha. So, if you don't feel like reading pretty much everything I say on the video, feel free to just watch the video at the end of the post! Enjoy!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day! Wow has time flown. Really, I mean where is it all going? I feel like I blink and a whole month goes by. Is that normal? Probably in mom-land.

Anyway, it was nice to finally be able to celebrate Mother's Day again. As an active mom. Hard to believe it's been three years since I've been able to, isn't it? I actually didn't really celebrate too much today; Nate had to work, so I guess we're celebrating tomorrow. I'm not sure how exactly we're celebrating, since he says he has a surprise, and I have a feeling that I know what the surprise is. Not 100%, but he's not the best at keeping secrets, and he's been egging me on to guess (I haven't, and I know it's eating away at him to tell me). If it's what I'm thinking, then I'm excited for sure! Whatever we do tomorrow though, it'll be nice to spend time together as a family and outside of the house (grocery shopping doesn't count).

4 months!

Where has the time gone??? I can't believe my sweet Sophia is officially 4 months old today! And can't believe how much I suck at blogging consistently (okay, yes I can). It's just when she's asleep, I have a ton of things to do (aka, cleaning), and by the time I'm finished, in the event I actually get to finish, she's already awake again. Maybe someday I'll get into a better routine. Maybe. :)

9 weeks

Well, time to play catch up, as usual! I'm not sure why it is so hard for me to keep up with this blog, but it is. I guess life just gets to me. And now I think the fact that I'm constantly nursing this little girl, which makes it not so easy to type, plays a factor. Anyway, where to start?

December favorites

So, this is the last day of December (and of 2012!), so I figured that I would do some Mommy and Baby favorites! I've planned on doing these for a long time (mostly in video form, but my system is too outdated, so I can't upload until I update), but just never have. But now I finally am! Considering I have a sleeping baby on me right now, I'm not going to get up and take pictures of every single thing that's my favorite. SO, instead I'll just include stock images (aka, I don't own any of the product images, and I would like to thank Google for leading me to them). In the future I plan to take photos of the objects myself, but we'll see how that goes. :) Anyway, let's go ahead and jump in. By the way, these are in no particular order.

Happy day after Christmas!

Six days old.

Can I just first start out by saying that time is absolutely flying by? Sophia will be two weeks day after tomorrow, and it feels like I just had her yesterday.

Well, anyway, she's doing great. Breast feeding is going pretty awesome I would say. I'm having to use a nipple shield with her for now, but with it she's doing great. With Blake, not even the shield would really get him to breast feed all that well. And let me tell you, she is all about that nursing thing. She eats so much! Which is great, because I want to make sure she's getting enough. It's so funny when she's done, because she will usually have a little bit of left over milk trailing out of her mouth. :) Got to love when babies are milk drunk! It feels so great knowing that I'm able to provide for her in such a way. Makes me realize even more what I missed out on with Blake (can't say I didn't try though), but it also makes me appreciate even more what I CAN do for her. This time around just feels like it's going so much more smoothly. I guess that's part of being a second time mom though, too.

Sophia has arrived!

Sophia is here! And what a story I have to tell about how she came. :)

So where to start. Well, my due date came and went on Wednesday (12/12/12 for those who forget). I had an appointment the next day, and my midwife agreed to perform a membrane sweep the next day after clinicals (so that way, if it worked, I would have the weekend off). So after clinicals I go in, and she checks me first. At this point I was about 80% effaced and 3-4 cm dilated, although she said she could stretch it to a 5. She also told me that Sophia was very low, which I knew already, and that she's ready and was probably just waiting on me. So, she did the sweep and there was a decent amount of blood after. She said she thinks that it would probably work, and the contractions usually start to pick up in 3-5 hours.

39 weeks

And still pregnant! I think I am definitely making progress though. Right before I turned 38 weeks I lost my mucus plug, but no bloody show. Not that it really means anything other than I'm dilating, which I kinda figured anyway. I'm still getting whole lots of Braxton Hicks contractions, many of which are uncomfortable, some even painful. Nothing regular though, and nothing that progresses. And she is very low in the birth canal. From my own checking, I would say somewhere between a 0 and +1 station. That, again, is just my guesstimation, but yeah, VERY low and engaged.

Room tour!

I feel like this is probabaly the most prompt I have EVER been for a blog post. :) I'm so proud of myself! But I really wanted to get this up BEFORE she is born, so might as well do it right away! And just as a warning, this will be a very picture heavy post. Missing from her room that I added tonight after a target run is her diaper pail (aka a step lid trash can that I put a drawstring laundry bag in), and her laundry hamper (just boring and white, but it's pretty much hidden from sight anyway). Other than that, everything is done!

37 weeks

So much has happened in only three weeks! For starters...I'm married! Me and Nate have officially tied the knot, and I love it. :) He's such a wonderful husband, now we just need our wonderful daughter to come into the picture finally! It was a little ceremony, with only me, him, our moms, Cheyne, and her man, Koti. One of Nate's coworkers actually married us. It was nice though. I'm not really one to be the center of attention, so I think I would be too nervous during a big ceremony. Nate still decided to surprise me though and arranged to have the song I've always wanted played at my wedding (Here Comes the Sun by The Beatles) played at the end, just after being officially married. :) Isn't he sweet? Yes, yes he is, and he's all mine for forever. My mom made my wedding dress, since I couldn't really find any reasonably priced dresses that fit and that I liked, and it worked out very nicely. Nate looks so handsome in his suit, and I thought it was sweet that he insisted on dressing up with me, despite the small size of the event. Our bands still haven't come in yet, since we're having the girl who made my engagement ring make both of our bands, and it takes up to 3 weeks to make. It'll be so worth it when they're finally here, but it feels like it's taking forever! For the ceremony, we literally tied the knot with embroidery thread. You know, whatever works! :D

34 weeks

Well, technically 34 anyway...I'll be 35 weeks tomorrow. I've been slacking with the posts, I know, and I'm sorry! I'll try to catch you up.

So, Sophia has dropped a lot! She's is still head down, and every once in a while I'll feel some intense pressure. She is still head down, just like she has been the whole pregnancy, and still active. However, I can tell she's getting cramped in there, since her once really strong kicks are turning more and more into intense stretches! She's still growing, so YAY! This was the point last time that all the issues started coming up, and so far, so good. She is on the small side of normal, which I'm okay with. My midwife's guess is that she will probably be around 6 lbs or so. Better than 4 1/2 lbs! Plus this way we can get a little more use out of her newborn things. Honestly, I'm glad mother nature doesn't have a 10 lb baby in store for me lol.

27 weeks

I can't believe that the day after tomorrow, I'll be in my third and FINAL trimester. Holy cow! Where has all this time gone? This pregnancy is just flying by, and I'm not gunna lie, I'm halfway scared that she will come before everything is all set up. But in all reality, there isn't a whole lot left to do, mostly just decoration that I've been working on during the weekends since I have officially been laid off (and it feels GREAT might I add).

25 weeks

And once again, I've let far too much time elapse before updating this blog. What else is new?

Lets see. What has happened? Well, we're all moved into our house now, with NO roommates. Oh, life is good. Pretty much everything is set up, we've got pretty much all pictures hung, and for the most part everything has a place. Exciting! So I've pretty much have just been working on Ms. Sophia's room. Did I mention I'm nesting like crazy? Oh, and school is officially back in. Yay. :( At least it's my last semester, but still. I just want to take this time and prepare for baby some more. Without having lots of studying to do in the mean time. Oh well, hopefully it will be worth it when I'm graduated.

20 weeks!

Sooo, this is embarrassing. I didn't realize that it had been SO long since I had done a blog post. 11 weeks? Really Sheila? My bad. And I can't even fully blame school! I mean, from I think 17 weeks on I've been on summer break, so that month and a half school consumed me, but dang. So much has been going on though! And I've been working a good amount to make up for the time I can't work as much from homework. Gotta love nursing school.

So let's see, where to start? I guess I'll start out by talking about baby. :) At 16 weeks we got to find out the gender and got a couple of good pictures, but I'll save all that for the end (suspense!). At my last appointment I weighed 109.2, so I've gained 4lbs total this pregnancy, after losing 7 lbs in the beginning due to morning sickness. BTW, I haven't had any of that since 15 weeks so WOO! But anyway, I'm still negative 4 lbs, but at least I have been gaining and not at an ungodly rate. Besides, baby is bigger this second half, so I'm about to start gaining MUCH faster. Yay?