Beckys Blog

Well, after al these pictures I thought it was about time to post just a general update. We are all doing fine. I have lost 34 lbs so far and as of today can get 3 pairs of my pre-pregnancy pants on and buttoned. We are still batteling thrush, but it seems to be getting better not worse finally. Raquelle is still as tiny as ever. She seems so big to me compared to her first week, but her 0-3 month clothes still drown her. She is too tall for the newborn clothes, but still too small for 0 to 3 month. She is developing so fast. When I lay her on my bed, she can roll over. I think this is because it's a soft surface. She doesn't roll over on hard surfaces yet. I can't lay her on her side to sleep anymore, because she doesn't stay put. She has also started trying to hold her bottle when she eats out of one. Sunday night at church, I stuck the bottle in her mouth and she grabbed on with both hands. I let go and she held it the entire time until it was gone. She...

It's a beautiful sunny day today, so I thought we'd try one of her summer outfits, since I think she may out grow it by summer. The hat and socks are way too big, and the romper comes down to her ankles. It's suppose to be a shorts outfit. Someday, these will all fit! She does look good in blue though.

This is Raquelle's favorite place to sleep. Now mommy and daddy just have to find a new place. Apparently our bed is more comfy then her bassinet, crib, play pen, or bouncy seat.

Once again, waiting for mom and dad to finish getting ready, and once again her dress is still a little big. When will her clothes start to fit!?!

After 2 nights in a row of being up all night with a wide awake fussy baby, we are finally starting to make some progress with the scheduling. I got some good advice off of baby center on getting her days and nights straightened out and it seems to be helping. Since she slept all day yesterday I was expecting another bad night, So when Raquelle went to sleep at 6 pm, Thad and I both did too. She got up at 8 to eat and went right back to sleep. Same thing at 11, she woke up ate for 15 min and was right back asleep. Of course, her mommy and daddy were thrilled because by 11 pm, we had gotten more sleep then the previous 2 nights combined. Her 2 AM feeding was different, She woke up, ate, and actually stayed awake for about an hour and a half. I'll take that over the 8 hours of fussing from the night before any time. So, with the exception of an hour and a half, we actually got some good night time sleep last night. Even more encouraging is the fact that she has been awake t...

Sure, Now she decides to sleep! Raquelle is sleeping like a log and has been all day. I've tried waking her up and within a min she is back asleep. About every 3 or 4 hours she is taking 10 min to eat, and then back asleep. Of course, If I had fussed and cried from 7 pm til 3 am last night I would probably be exhausted too. Ok, so Thad and I are both exhausted and wondering who it was that told us that new babies sleep 80 to 90% of the time? Ours only sleeps during the day and then fusses all night. This is two night in a row where she has been up for 6 or more hours straight! Anyway, here is a cute picture of her sleeping. Of course, this is about 5 min after I woke her up to try to get her to have some daytime awake time.  

Raquelle had her 2 week check up today. Unfortunitely, she has thrush. That means of course that I have thrush too. So, now we get to deal with that whole mess. I tried to give her the first dose of medicine and she spit it all back out. I'm not sure if she spits it out if I should be giving her another dose or not. Anyway, aside from thrush, here are the stats. Birth Height - 19.5" Weight - 7 lbs 7 oz 3 days weight - 6 lbs 10 oz 1 week weight - 7 lbs 4 oz - 41 percentile 2 week Height - 20.5" - 56 percentile Weight - 7 lbs 11 oz - 28 percentile

The many facial expressions of a wide awake 2 week old baby. My favorite is the top right. She is still trying to learn how to smile, but it looks like she has it half down.  

Yesterday was Raquelle's first Sunday at church. Here she is all ready to go and just waiting for mommy and daddy to finish getting ready. Of course, she came home from church wearing a different outfit thanks to a nice blowout diaper, but she was still just as cute in that outfit too.

Raquelle played with toys for the first time today. I've put the toy bar on her bouncy seat a couple times before, but this morning she actually swatted at one of the toys for the first time. Here is the much requested "Eyes open" picture. These are hard to come by lately since she gets such bad tummy aches and is usually fussing if she is awake. I think we are finally starting to find some remidies that help. Combining baby gas drops from the drug store with .5 oz of formula does wonders for a little tummy ache and gas.

Raquelle has discovered her thumbs. However, she has not yet figured out what to do with the rest of her fingers. Both of her eyes are now red from being stabbed while she was sucking her thumb. We've kept up pretty well with cutting her nails, but that doesn't account for her trying to gouge out her own eye.

Raquelle went back to the dr today to make sure she had figured out how to eat and to check her weight. She has gained back 10 oz since Wednesday! Only a little bit to go and she'll be back up to her birth weight. She is now up to the 41st percentile! She still seems really tiny, but I could tell she had plumped up a little. She is also eating great and we no longer have to give her bottles. Her next check up is in a week.

 

I keep telling people what a good baby Raquelle is and here I go again. Last night, she only got me up once! I fed her last thing before bed, then I woke her up to eat at 3 AM since she was still sleeping, and then she got up at 6 this morning. I know that's not sleeping through the whole night, but it sure felt good to get a few hours of sleep in a row. I got more sleep last night then I did the last couple months I was pregnant. I get up to feed her less often then I use to have to get up to use the bathroom. I told everyone I couldn't wait for her to be born so I could get some sleep. They laughed, but I was serious!

Here are Raquelles 1 week old pictures. She is such a wonderful baby. She sleeps great, and is usually pretty happy when she is awake unless she is hungry. She can already recognize mine and Thad's voices from accross the room. I think it's because of all the bedtime stories Thad told to my belly when I was pregnant. Anyway, I still think she is the cutest baby in the world and that we are the luckiest parents to have such an adorable happy baby.  

 

 

 

Raquelle has decided that it is fun to only finish half her diaper and save the other half for as soon as she is naked. Last night, we took off the dirty diaper, and she pooped on the clean one before we got it all the way on. Then she peed and then pooped again. We gave her a few minutes to finish and then tried again. Thad pulled her little feet up to wipe her and when he did, poop shot accross the table and hit the wall!!! There was a nice line of the mess from her little rear end, accross the changing table, and ending in a glob on the wall. We were both laughing so hard. Now I wish I would have taken a picture of it.

Thad took Raquelle to the nursery to changer her diaper. My mom and I were sitting in the living room when all of a sudden, we hear "AAAHHH! NOOO! AHHHH! You to that in your diaper!!!" I'm sure you can guess what Thad was dealing with on the changing table.

Here is Raquelle's first baby picturer! Obviously, this picture is of her being born and was taken by one of the nurses. Thad caught her and cut the cord. I figured we would save it for a graduation picture or wedding slide show. That way everyone can see how cute she was right from the start.  

Raquelle had her first dr check up today. She is doing great except for her eating and her weight. She is down to 6 lbs 10 oz after only 3 days. Apparently, she has not been latching on properly every time she feeds so this stimulated my body to not produce enough milk for her. So, now I have to offer her a 2 oz bottle of formula after every feeding and pump to try to get my body to produce enough for her. Hopefully this will only take a short amount of time. I'm keeping track of how much she takes from the bottle and saving anything I can pump to eventually replace the formula. Hopefully it will not be long til she won't need bottles anymore. She has another check up on Monday to make sure she is starting to gain some weight back. I guess they were wrong about me carrying an 8 to 9 lb baby!

Raquelle Elizabeth was born Sunday March 5th at 5:49 AM after 41 hours of labor! I was sent home from the hospital 3 times Friday and Saturday because I was not making very fast Progress. Contractions started out 3 min apart Friday at noon and got really strong by about 11 am on Saturday. I could no longer stand the pain so they had to keep me this time. By 4 pm I was at 3.5 cm and Contractions were 2 to 3 min apart, and so strong I was shaking uncontrolably through them. So I begged for an epi (gave up on going natural after the first 28 hours). The epi was the most traumatic part of the whole thing. As they were putting it in, my blood pressure dropped dangerously low and they had to rip it out and give me two shots of epinephrin to raise it back up and then start over. The 2nd try, they put the needle in too deep and punctured the fluid behind the epidural cavity, which caused the fluid between my brain and spinal cord to start leaking. This causes horrible migrain headaches that th...

I'm borrowing internet as a distraction from pain right now. At 9:30 this morning they gave me Cytotec to get things started. Contractions started about noon and we went to the hospital at 1:30. Contractions were 2 to 3 min apart but not to painful so we were sent to go on a walk. At 3:30, I was at 2 cm, station 0 and things were progressing nicely so they stripped my membrane. then they sent us home to go on one last date and have a nice evening together with instructions to come back either tonight when the contractions are more painful or when my water breaks, or at 9:00 tomorrow morning if nothing happens over night. If she's not here by morning, I'll get another dose of cytotec and we'll have her tomorrow. Patty (our midwife) says she expects us to be waking her up sometime in the middle of hte night tonight.