Pretty little Lucy

Can I just say I'm in love? This baby girl breaks my heart, she is so cute. She eats like a machine! At her 2 week check-up she was already 8 lbs. 4 oz! It's so fun to see her little cheeks getting chunky and her legs and arms not just having that wrinkly skin, but little tiny fat rolls. She is a pretty good little sleeper; at least one 3-4 hour break most nights. She sleeps too much during the day when I want to play with her, though. I want to see her pretty eyes.

Is it normal for your other children to lose their minds after a new child comes into the family? I swear this has not happened before but I am ready to strangle the other 3! Mad has totally regressed in being potty trained. Aidan is throwing fits and crying all the time. Sienna is angry and super emotional. I just don't know what to do with them. I keep trying to tell them I love them and give them hugs and praise when I see good behavior, but it's still really hard right now. Good thing I have a sweet little tiny to make this all worth it! At least they all love her and want to spend time with her!

Good news today! I was having a fast heart-rate for no reason randomly during the pregnancy, which would make me feel very ill. I was sent to a cardiologist who sent me for an EKG, Echo, and 2 days of a holter monitor. It was pretty scary for a little while, worrying something might be wrong with my heart. Luckily nothing abnormal showed besides the periods of sinus tachycaria (fast heart-rate) so the Dr. said he thought something else was causing strain on my heart; possibly the pregnancy and hopefully after delivery it would stop. He was right and today I had my last appt. with him. It is nice to know that my heart is healthy and I am not at a higher risk of any cardio problems because of this. It was nice to hear!

 Blessing day 2/13

 Snuggling with Papa

Lucy is here!

Lucy Aurelia Gregerson was born on February 2nd, 2011 at 1:17 am. She weighed 7 lbs, 7 oz and was 19 1/2 inches long. She was my biggest baby by far! It's crazy to think Madelyn was over a pound smaller and an inch and a half shorter. Lucy still seems so tiny! I hate that she is growing up so fast already! Knowing she is my last baby and knowing we will never be in this stage in life again is so sad. It's my favorite thing. I know I don't want another child and I definitely will not be going through another pregnancy, but I think I could take a million more newborns!

The delivery was pretty crazy. (This is gonna be long!) I had decided after I had Madelyn and had really bad shakes that I would like to do a natural delivery, without an epidural next time. With the first 3 labors, I would progress slowly to a 4 and then BAM! I would deliver the baby. I figured this one would be the same and I just needed to get through that hard part and then I wouldn't have the crappy epidural side effects; be shaky, no catheter, I could walk right after. It would be awesome!

After all the early scares, Lucy just didn't seem to want to come out. I had gone to the hospital almost a week before she was born, contracting every 3-4 minutes for hours, dilated to almost a 4 and was admitted. Since we were going natural, we got up and walked through the contractions for several hours. When I finally got back in bed to be monitored again, the contractions petered out and they sent me home since I had only effaced a little more in that time. After that, the contractions never wanted to get regular again. I was getting worried because she was getting bigger and I had had a 4th degree tear with little 6 lb 9oz Sienna. I was fine with the last 2 and them being right around that size, but I didn't know what would happen if I had a bigger baby.

I had an appt. on the 1st and was talking about my fears; about Spencer getting ready to go back on call and worry about him missing it, or even needing to shut the base down if the other nurse wasn't around so he could attend the birth. The Dr. said he would talk to the on-call Dr. for the day and see if she would maybe just help things get started. Since I was already contracting, just irregularly, she said no problem.

We got over there around noon and they monitored me, where I was already contracting between 5-8 minutes apart. They started pitocin around 1 and my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart right away. I was fine. For hours. They kept upping the pit and upping it and I wasn't even really uncomfortable. I couldn't understand because when I had had Pitocin before, it killed, right away. They just upped and upped, every 1/2 hour. At 6 the Dr. came in and broke my water. I figured that would get things going. Nope. I just sat on my birth ball, rolling around, trying to get fluid out, hoping it would speed something up. I'm not sure what time I finally started really feeling the contractions and having to focus on relaxing through them. It was late.

There is no way to truly prepare for the pain of that. I tried to, but, I just wasn't. I started feeling like maybe I couldn't do it. The nurse helped me with breathing and that seemed to help for a little bit. I was sharp with Spencer and felt horrible about it and was apologizing tons right after the contraction. He was amazing. He would have preferred for me to get the epidural, but was being so amazing and supportive. I love that man. Seriously, I LOVE him. He is my world.

Then I got to the point where I felt like I couldn't do it anymore. I could NOT get through one more contraction. All my relaxation skills were out the window. I asked for the epidural. They were good and did wait for a little while to make sure I was serious. They checked me to make sure I wasn't too far dilated and I was a 5-6 and 100% effaced. The anesthesiologist was on-call from home about 20 minutes away. Not too long after they called him, I felt like I needed to push. I was checked and just had a rim of cervix left. They told me to not push, but honestly,  I had NO control. My body was already doing it. They grabbed everything and had me go. I started screaming to "Get it out!" (and I only said that because I didn't know Baby's sex, not because my baby was an it!) and stopped pushing because it hurt so much. I forgot that I needed to hold my breath and push! 2 more pushes though and she was out. It was so fast and traumatic Lucy ended up with a bruised nose and broken blood vessels in her eyes. It breaks my heart. I was so out of it at that point and it took me a minute to realize Spencer had said she was a girl and realize my baby was out.

I still can't believe I did that. Now that it's been several days, it seems less traumatizing, and kind of funny, but not right after. I don't think I would ever do it again, though. It seemed to be more about getting through the delivery and the pain was my focus, where when I had an epidural, the pain was gone and the baby was the focus. I know my Mom said that she never experienced the pain the way I described it, so maybe for some of us it is different. For me though, it was a learning experience, but not one I would want to go through again.

Lucy is so beautiful and sweet. She is a very mellow baby and we all love her so much. It is such a blessing to have this new life in our home and I feel immensely blessed to be given the privilege of being a mother again to this beautiful little girl.

Christmas 2010

We were blessed with a wonderful Christmas this year! On Christmas Eve, we were invited to our friends home, the Jenkins, for dinner and a Christmas Eve reading of the birth of Christ. It was beautiful and spiritual and even though it wasn't with our family, it felt like it was, because these wonderful people here have become that to us. Afterwards, we came home and opened our Christmas Eve pajamas.

Christmas Day we opened Santa gifts and then family gifts and just lounged around and played. That evening we went to the Wysowski's home for dinner. We are so blessed to have so many friends here and people that we love. Some of the pictures aren't the best, but they are the ones that I have and it's so important to document these memories. I don't ever want to forget.

We are immensely grateful for the knowledge of our Savior and all that He has done for us. We love him and we love this wonderful time of year to celebrate his birth and life and remember all that He provided for us.

Thankfulness

This pregnancy had been a bit more complicated than the last 2 were. If not for the fact that Zofran kept me from puking up anything and everything I ate or drank from weeks 6-18, I could have lost a lot of weight, like I did with Sienna. Thank goodness for that medicine!

Starting at 17 weeks I have had bouts of sometimes very regular contractions, which if you know pregnancy, they say more than 4 Braxton Hicks in an hour is a reason to go to the hospital in case of pre-term labor and we were well above 5 an hour. I knew the drill, since I was also on bedrest when I was pregnant with Sienna. Lay down, drink tons of fluids, empty your bladder. I was very worried, and counting down until Baby was viable, then until Baby was 28 weeks, which is where I was when I had pre-term labor with Sienna. But the contractions kept coming, and getting stronger. They have gotten to the point where my uterus is so irritable that if I stand for about 5 minutes or longer at a time, I will get them every 2-4 minutes for a few hours.

The Dr's are not okay with this. While I am not dilating yet, things are changing and we don't want a bout of contractions to send me into true labor. Especially since I am only now at 33 weeks and they don't deliver babies in the hospital on Kauai until 35 weeks, which means I would have to be flown by Spencer's company to Oahu. If the baby did come early, it would be in the NICU there. So I have been on modified bedrest since last Wednesday. I swear each day gets a little harder for me. I am not one to sit still, to lay down, to feel like I cannot even clean up after my children. But it's just a few weeks until I can and is such a small thing to keep this baby baking a little longer. While the timing here ended up crazy, with Spencer working 15 days in a row (all 24 hours), I am super thankful for friends and neighbors that have chipped in and tried to make things easier, to take my kids for a little while, to pick up paper plates at Costco so I don't go insane with unwashed dishes collecting all over my home.

 I am extremely grateful that I am not working. It has been such a gift to be home with the kids, and they have expressed so many times how happy they are that I am here. While I have occasionally done a few haircuts or colors, I wasn't taxing my body the way I did in Utah and I can't imagine how much earlier this could have started if I had been working like that. I just feel so blessed, which might seem crazy, but I can see the Lord's hand in my life, inspiring me to wait until we were here to try for a baby, where my husband has been able to be home every other week, helping take on homemaking duties to take the load off of me throughout this entire pregnancy.

I love Christmas-time. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ, and I am immensely grateful for His many sacrifices for me. I am thankful for my knowledge and testimony of His life and love for me and how that knowledge has gotten me through my darkest of days. I am so grateful to be able to celebrate His life at this beautiful time of year, with my beautiful 3 children and new little one to come, with a husband better than I could have wished for. I didn't post for Thanksgiving, but my heart is overflowing right now and I just had to share at this, the most wonderful time of the year. Merry Christmas! We wish you all the same joy and happiness!

Gingerbread houses and Tree Decorating

We try to do some kind of Gingerbread decorating as a family every year. This year we did mini houses. The kids had a ball, as always. After that, we set up our Christmas tree. Aidan is so funny because he is obsessed with candy canes; he has been since he was tiny. We used to try to spread them out over the month, but here in Hawaii, with all the moisture, they get kind of soggy and yucky pretty quickly. I don't think Aidan minded us telling him to hurry up and eat all the candy canes! Madelyn was super excited to be able to put the star on the tree this year. I remember how excited I was as a little girl when it was my year to put the star up! I love Christmas-time and all of the fun traditions and memories that go along with them!

Corn Maze and Pumpkin Carving

We found out about a corn maze on the island, which we couldn't miss! It has always been a tradition for us in the past, so I am very grateful we didn't have to miss out while living in a tropical location. It was very warm and there were lots of bugs, but still, a corn maze! It took us about an hour to do, with Madelyn having a ball and leading the way most of the time.

We also carved pumpkins. One thing about living here is that they start to rot immediately, so even though we did it only 3 days early, I think next year we might just do it the day of Halloween. The kids really loved it and it's nice now that Sienna is older and able to do her own. I love the fall and all the fun activities and traditions we have!

Mad's, Aidan's, and Sienna's

Halloween and Party

We had a fun Halloween this year. I love Halloween! Since it fell on a Sunday and we no longer live in Utah where it is changed to Saturday, (so Trick-or-Treating was out) I told the kids we could have a party. I remember my Mom doing one when I was little and it was so fun, but I think she is more patient with a ton of other people's kids running around than I am. I had them limit it to 3 friends each. I think it turned out really well, but it was a ton of work. Thank goodness the next 6 years they can just go Trick-or-Treating! I don't have a lot of pictures of the party, a bunch got deleted somehow. Bummer! But there are a few. I loved the kids' costumes. It was so much fun to get them ready! We went with Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, although Mad was really the old-school Alice. Aidan even won a prize at the ward trunk-or-treat. He was pretty stoked about that!

Straightening Madelyn's Hair

Madelyn's curls are so adorable, but I wanted to see what she would look like with her hair straightened for once. It is crazy how much older she looked and how long it really is. It was a fun little change, but it doesn't last long here with all the humidity.

Sienna's 1st Hula performance

Sienna's 1st Hula performance was for the Coconut Festival in the city of Kapaa. I don't have the greatest of pictures, but Aidan did a great job while I was video taping it. She has been taking lessons since January and it was so nice to finally get to see her perform. They will be doing more performances in December and we can't wait to see!