Ashley Marie Ford

I know you all have heard our wonderful news already but I figured I'd do a quick post while I have time here at the hospital and she's napping.

I got the pitocin drip started alittle after 8:00 Wednesday morning. It took until about 10:00 for me to start to hurt from the contractions. By this time I was dilated to a 6 and asked for the epidural. Wow, what an easy labor compared to my non-drop labor with Bennett!!! I could still feel my stomach tighten for contractions but no pain = wonderful! Around 1:00 I was starting to feel more pressure and I couldn't tell if this was that the epidural was wearing off or if I was really progressing. They checked me and I was at a full 10 cm (I went from 8-10 very quickly after they upped the drip amount). After 4 sets of pushing she was already here - maybe about 10 minutes of pushing (compared to an hour of pushing with Bennett). Part of this though was that they did get the suction tool out to get her out a little faster because she had the cord around her neck and her heartrate was going down alittle.

My recovery has been great so far. My bottom & back hurt alittle bit but it's very tolerable and I've only needed Tylenol a few times.

Ashley has been a great baby so far. She sleeps and eats without much crying (until we get home tomorrow I'm sure). I'm trying breastfeeding. She sucks but since my milk hasn't come in yet and she doesn't get anything, she gets very upset so we just give her from a bottle. I'm hoping that once I have milk for her it might work alittle.

She was 7 lbs. 12 oz. and 19 inches long. So either the ultrasound that I had last week measuring her in the 6 lb range was way off or I plumped her up from all the Christmas food!

http://grhsonline.org/ashley-marie-december-29-2010/

Baby Update

I had my weekly appointment today and got some good news! I am dilated to a 4+. She said I'm almost to a 5 but not quite. So, just in case this would take a few days still, and because of the bad weather predicted for the weekend, I am going to go in tomorrow morning and get induced. I have been having some contractions on and off this evening too though so I suppose there could be a chance that I'd be going in even before the morning but we'll see. So, hopefully by tomorrow (Wed) afternoon we'll have some good news to share!

Merry Christmas from the Ford's

Merry Christmas!

Here are a couple of pictures from our weekend so far. We started off last night by going to Mike's uncle Leo's in Edina. Bennett had lots of fun exploring their house. The highlight of that Christmas trip was the battery powered drill he got from Grandma Leann. He has been playing with it since!

This is the best picture I could get of him and Grandma Leann - he was mad at me for taking the drill away.

After we left there we went to my mom's where he also got way too many gifts with his favorite so far being his new tricycle. He can't quite reach the peddles decent but by summer I think he'll really have fun. (Added bonus, it has a bell for him to ring haha). Unfortunately by the time we got to mom's it was almost 10:00 so he was getting pretty crabby and didn't enjoy his time here as much as he should have.

Then this morning we went to church and then to mom's for Christmas dinner afterwards (after a pre-dinner nap for the three of us that is - we all needed it since it got to be midnight last night before bed!)

I still have failed to get any good pictures of just Bennett by our Christmas tree since he's been so crabby at the times when he has his nice clothes on but here are a few from the weekend so far (I say so far because we have another family gathering Sunday, getting together with Mike's dad who is here from Florida on Monday and then another one next weekend.)

Another Baby Update

Quick baby update... -40 weeks today! -still 3 cm. -my belly is measuring small so I had to go get an ultrasound done on Wednesday to make sure things were all looking ok and that the amniotic fluid levels were still where they should be. I found out today that everything came back normal. The only thing she said was that the baby is measuring in the 6 lb. range which is on the smaller side. This could mean that I'm either just going to have a small baby OR that I've got days/weeks left for the baby to plump up. My doctor also said that it is up to me if I would want to get induced or if I just want to wait until the baby decides to come on its own. We'll see how long it takes and decide then. My only hope is that the baby holds off until the Christmas weekend is over! My guess is that it will.

Santa Came Early

Santa stopped at our house this evening for Bennett! He got a battery-powered 4-wheeler. It took him a few minutes to get the hang of it but he seemed to enjoy it tonight.

We decided to let him have his main gift tonight. In case I end up in the hospital this weekend, we wanted to both be here to see him play with his gift (without a baby in the way or taking up the attention). And since he doesn't get what Santa is yet, we figured we could get away with it this year. Besides the fact that he'll be getting plenty of other presents over the weekend.

We also let him have this tonight because he seems to be having some rough days lately. I think he knows that something different is about to happen but doesn't get it or know how to express himself. He's been pretty clingy to me the last few weeks, not listening well at all, and acting out. So we just wanted to give him something to make his night and rest of the week (and mine) alittle better hopefully.

Baby Update

It has been awhile since I've done an update and given the "baby status". I am 39 weeks along which technically gives me less than a week to go since my due date is next Friday, Dec 24th. As of Tuesday at my last doctor's appointment, I am dilated to 3 cm's already. So, I am hoping that the baby decides to still show up this weekend. Otherwise I'm hoping it actually waits until after Christmas and I go over my due date so that I don't end up missing Christmas and being stuck in the hospital. Bennett was late so my doctor has told me that there is a good chance I'll still be late with this one even though I am dilating really well so far. She has also said that my belly is measuring alittle small which could either mean that I will have a smaller baby, that the baby has dropped so much already or that it still has a few weeks inside me to plump up. Guess we'll see...

Santa Claus

On Saturday we ventured out in the blizzard (a whole 4 blocks) to go see Santa Claus! Last year Bennett had no problem sitting on his lap but I was a little worried about how he'd react this year. When we first got there Bennett was all smiles seeing him. Then we got closer... Then we tried to sit him on his lap... We put him on Mrs. Claus's lap instead and the tears started. So she moved so that I could sit with him instead and then she took the picture for us. By the end though he was fine again and was playing with Santa's jingle bells and also laughed when Santa did his 'Ho ho ho' (but he still didn't want to sit by him). The treat bag helped a bit too :-)

Free and Not So Free Labor

It's been awhile since I've done a basement update because we kinda got stalled alittle from the mudding process. It needed 3 coats plus a day for sanding plus Thanksgiving being in there which meant it was a boring 2 weeks of not much exciting happening. But, that part is now done so all that is left is finishings - hooking up the electrical, installing things like the doors, toilet, etc. and then Mike's finishings of painting, staining, carpet etc. So last night I had my Free Labor over to help. My 'Free Labor' was Josh & Laura who were priming the bedroom for us while Mike was working at Domino's. And my 'Not So Free Labor' is David. He has been working on building us this built-in bookshelf which will be in the family room. He was over varnishing that last night. It really is looking great. I guess even my free labor wasn't so free because we did buy them pizza afterwards. Either way, I don't care cause work is getting done!!! I feel bad not being able to help but keeping Bennett out of the way is a job in itself. Mike also painted the bathroom the other night which is a light green color. I'll post pictures of that when everything is installed in there. Hopefully we are on the home stretch!