“Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.” Romans 12:12

Monday, September 10, 2012

Ava's Professional Pictures

While in the hospital, a company called Our365 came by to take pictures of Ava. It cost nothing for her to take the pictures and would be up to us if we wanted to order any.
 
Since I am an Integris employee, I received an employee discount of half off! So needless to say, we ordered pictures. What would have a $270 package only cost us $140. Pretty good deal and she did a really good job!
 
We were going to use a professional photographer about a week after she was born but decided against it for now since we were able to get good pictures at a really good price. I'm sure I will want to get more pictures taken when she is either three or six months. But for now, these turned out great!
 





 



 




 

 

Our New Life with Sweet Ava Rae

We are all still alive and well on the other side of blog world! :) I know some of you were starting to wonder if I would ever post again. I was talking to Wes last night about how I wasn't sure if the blog was going to make it through this transition phase of our lives but I think I've had a change of heart.
 
I am so glad I chose to start a blog and enjoy looking back on past posts. It allows me to reflect on just how far Wes and I have come since getting married and just how much God's provision has been so evident through it all.
 
So I will continue to blog, no worries! I will be honest and say that my posts may not be as frequent as they once used to be but hang in there with me! I will try to update as often as I can and hopefully capture these precious moments with sweet Ava Rae.
 
Let me go back quickly and recap the events leading up to Ava's big debut.

 
Tuesday, August 21st I spent most of the day at home relaxing on the couch. I don't think I moved from the couch except to get out to grab some lunch and rent the Hunger Games. Such a great movie!
 
That evening, I was sitting outside with Lexi, waiting on Wes to get home from work. I actually snapped a picture of my belly while sitting there and sent it to a friend. Little did I know that my belly would be gone by the next afternoon and I would be holding Ava in my arms.
 
We will label this picture my 37 weekly pregnancy update picture. :)
 
When I took this picture, I was feeling just fine. Not really any contractions (or any that I was feeling) or pain. I was scheduled to go into work that night at 11 PM so after eating dinner, I got ready for work.
 
As I was getting ready, I did start to feel my contractions more but didn't think much of it. I finished getting ready for work an hour early so I decided to rest on the couch. The longer I laid there, the more I started to hurt.
 
***Side Note: When Wes got home from work, he told me that he was told last minute that he was going to have to go to Tulsa the next day for work. I looked at him like he was crazy and simply said, "So you realize she will decide to be born the second you leave town, right?". He agreed it was probably a little risky going out of town but said he would be back in town by mid afternoon. What could I do at that point? Oh well...whatever happens, will happen.
 
So as I am laying on the couch, starting to hurt more, I look over at Wes and simply say, "I really am hurting...."
 
His response? "Are you just trying to get me to stay in town tomorrow?"
 
Really? He thinks I would do that? C'mon...you can't fake contraction pains!
 
I assured him that that was not the case and I that I really was hurting and maybe should call into work. So around 11 PM we headed back up to Baptist so I could get checked out. I was nervous about waiting it out at home too long because I had my doctor's appointment that afternoon and I was dilated to a four and being dilated just one more centimeter gets me admitted to the hospital. So there was no question that I was going to at least go get checked and see if these contractions were enough to make any change.
 
When I got to the hospital, I was dilated to a five but the doctor still wanted to watch me for an hour. I sure wasn't just going to sit in the bed for the whole hour so Wes and I walked the hallway hoping to get things moving. After an hour, I was still dilated to a five. I told the nurse to let my doctor know that I did not feel comfortable going home dilated to a five and especially with my husband trying to leave town on me in the morning.
 
She assured me she would let her know. So the doctor decides to keep me overnight for observation and then will be in to see me in the morning to decide to admit me or not. Ugh...really? Well I guess it's better than being sent home.
 
So we spent the night in the hospital, waiting. Well, Wes slept and I pretty much just layed there. I maybe got 2 total hours of off and on sleep. My contractions had spaced out some so I wasn't in too much pain. I felt like the clock was moving SO sloooow at this point. I couldn't wait for it to be morning so I could just know what the plan was.
 
The doctor came in around 7:30 am, checked me and said I was now dilated to almost a six. She then looked at the nurse and said, "Let's go ahead and break her water."
 
She then looked at me and said, "Are you ready to do this? There's no turning back."
 
Did she really just ask me that question? I stayed overnight in the hospital didn't I? Pretty sure I was determined not to leave that hospital without a baby in my arms.
 
So...quick series of events....
 
Water broke at 7:30 am
Epidural at 8:15 am = Happy and pain free!!

 
Dilated to an eight at 11:30 am
Progressed quickly; dilated to a nine at 12:00 pm
Completely dilated and ready to starting pushing at 1:45 pm

Last picture as a family of two!
 
Doctor shows up ready for delivery at 2:15 pm
Pushed for maybe 30-40 minutes (SO much more work than it looks!) And.....
 

2:59 pm Ava Rae DeWitte was born!!
 



She was immediately put skin to skin with me and that's when my world changed forever <3
<3 I was in love instantly, she was perfect <3
  

Not a dry eye in the house... :) Proud daddy and grandparents.


The new grandparents getting a closer look and of course, pictures!

First picture as a family of three. <3

Wide eyed and happy in mom's arms.

I spent two nights in the hospital and went home Friday afternoon. Our time in the hospital was good. Because Ava was just under 38 weeks gestation, she had to get her blood sugar checked which ended up being more of an ordeal than it intended to be. Eight heel sticks later, her blood sugar finally stabilized and all was good. She was actually one heel stick away from having to go the NICU (which would have included an IV and possible feeding tube to help get her blood sugar up).
 
One of our nights was a little rough. Ava was screaming (almost to the point of making herself hoarse) and Wes and I just looked at each other like, "What in the world have we gotten ourselves into? And what do we do now?"
 
I'm sure we aren't the only first time parents who have had that split second feeling of fear that crosses your mind. The night got better but it was definitely tough to see her so upset and not know what in the world was wrong and what to do to make her happy. And knowing we were going to be taking her home and responsible for knowing what to do in these situations; a little overwhelming.
 
Not to mention all the hormones (or lack there of) contributing to me being an emotional wreck. Oh and the fact that by this time (Day 2) I had only had maybe three hours of sleep total within the past two days.
 
I have never been so exhausted in my life. I honestly felt intoxicated I was so tired. Every time my eyes would close, I felt like the room was spinning. Strangest feeling in the world to be THAT tired and feel that way. And add an unhappy baby to the mix....fun stuff!

All dressed and ready to go home!

Snuggled in tight in her car seat.

Next stop... home!!

Okay, now to the more happy of times!
 
We have now been home almost three weeks and Ava is doing great! I'm pretty sure she is experiencing a growth spurt at the moment because she is constantly eating (like a little pig!) and fighting sleep like crazy. I can see it in her eyes that she is so, so tired but just can't manage to fall asleep.
 
By the time she decides to fall asleep, it is time for her to eat again and thus the cycle repeats itself. :)This makes for an eventful middle of the night let me tell ya!
 
Otherwise, she has been so good and so wonderful. She sleeps three hours at a time (most of the time). This girl never misses a meal so she is always ready to eat when she wakes up. I'm thinking she is going to be a little chuck like I was when I was a baby because she eats quite a bit for such a little girl. Last night (remember the growth spurt) she took five ounces of breast milk! Goodness! And of course was ready to eat again in three hours and took three more ounces. The girl has an appetite and must be growing, growing!
 
At her last pediatrician appointment, she weighed 7 lbs 1 oz which the doctor said is perfect weight gain for her age. She didn't grow much in length, just about 1/4 of an inch but after this little growth spurt, I'm sure we will see some changes in that area.
 
Lexi has done pretty well with Ava. She wasn't so sure of her at first and we did have a few moments where Lexi got a little upset/aggressive. My mom ended up taking her to Lawton with her for a few days which was nice. When she brought her back it was like we had a different dog. She was calm and now very sweet with Ava.
 
Our only struggle now is being sure to give Lexi attention. She is so used to have all of our attention that she gets upset when she sees all our attention going to Ava. But for the most part, Lexi has been sweet. Most times during the day, she wants to snuggle up right where Ava is.




 The nights are tough having to get up to feed her every three hours but we are trying to adjust. Wes is back to work so I try to get up with her during the week days so he can sleep and be rested for work. Which means I have to make myself lay down for plenty of naps during the day while I'm at home with her.
 
Wes has been so amazing with her and such a huge help to me. I am so incredibly blessed to have such a wonderful husband and daddy for Ava. He is always willing to change diapers, feed her, rock her, or just hold her so I can get stuff done around the house. He loves Ava to pieces and it is so sweet to see him interact with her. After she was born, he kept saying, "She's so beautiful, she's so perfect." Sweetest thing ever to see my husband fall in love with her so instantly. She will be a daddy's girl for sure.
 
I will leave you with a few pictures we gave taken over the past few weeks. I could never post all the ones we have taken, but here are some of my favorites.


 

 

 



 




 

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

She's here!!

Ava Rae DeWitte
Born Wednesday, August 22, 2012 @ 2:59 pm
7 lbs 4 oz
20 inches
 
Healthy and sweet as ever! <3
 











More pictures and details of her birth and first days at home coming soon!
  

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Quick Update!

I have definitely been out of the blogging mood lately but I do feel like I need to update everyone on the status of Miss Ava.
 
At my 35 week appointment I was surprised to find out that I was already dilated to a 1-2 and 30% effaced. I was completely shocked considering this is my first pregnancy.
 
I then discussed with my doctor about scheduling my induction date for September 6th. She kind of laughed to herself and said, "Sure, I don't mind scheduling it at all but I highly doubt you will still be pregnant. I would be very surprised if you still are."
 
Hmm...well okay then! Induction still scheduled for September 6th (at this point).
 
I had a late night visit to the hospital during one of my shifts at work two days later. I had been walking around quite a bit but really wasn't hurting a ton. A co worker talked me into putting me on the monitor just to see if I was contracting.
 
And...sure enough! What started out to be a contraction every 6 minutes gradually turned into every 3-4 minutes the longer I laid there. So the lead nurse decided it was best for me to go to the hospital I would be delivering at and get checked out.
 
Long story short, I went home to pick up Wes and up we went to the hospital. The nurse checked me and said I was now dilated to a 2. They observed Ava and the contractions (which were now consistently every 2 1/2-3 minutes by this point) and rechecked my cervix.
 
(Most people are probably wondering if I was hurting at all. I was...but not near the amount of pain that I know is to come when it is really time!)
 
No change. So they sent me home. Most likely early stages of labor.
 
No big deal. I kinda figured that but no true way of knowing without going in and getting checked out.
 
Since then, my doctor has taken me down to working 6 hour shifts at work which has helped a lot. I have still been contracting off and on but nothing bad enough to make me feel the need to go in again and get checked out.
 
I figured after one trip, I am not going to go in again until 1) my water breaks or 2) I am in so much pain I can't stand it anymore.
 
At my visit last week, I made the decision to move up my induction date to when I will be 39 weeks which is next Thursday, August 30th. I figured since I am already starting the early stages of labor, why keep it going just that much longer?
 
At my appointment today, I am now dilated to a 4 and 70 % effaced. Making progress from week to week, just slow progress. I was hoping to be dilated to a 5 so she would just send me on over and get things going.
 
Wishful thinking...Ava will come on her own time when she is good and ready. And as of right now, she is just fine with where she is. :)
 
Who knows, she might hold out all the way until the induction next week. We will see what happens!
 
36 weeks

I think this is 36 weeks too but took this before my baby shower at the church.
 

 Pregnancy Ticker

Friday, August 10, 2012

Pregnancy Update: Week 35 & 36

Yes, I am alive and well on the other side of blog world! :) Life sure has gotten busy getting ready for Ava to arrive. My mind is now consumed with a constant "to-do" list that never seems to end. I started a list about a week ago with seven to eight things on it and am now down to four so I guess I can consider that progress.

This awful Oklahoma heat is making running errands at 36 weeks pregnancy very difficult. What I once could get done in a single afternoon ends up taking two to three days to accomplish. Oh but I'm so close!!

You will be happy to know that one of my "to-do's" is to BLOG so here I am getting yet another item off my list. :) Although, I think I will end up having to do more than one post to recap the past month's events.


I have had two baby showers and will have another one this weekend. So of course I have pictures from those that I want to share. Wes and I are realizing just how blessed we are to have such wonderful family and friends to support us and love on us and our new baby. Ava is already one special little girl to many people!

So I will start up the updates with a pregnancy update. A lot has actually happened in that area since my last update from a very fast growing belly to now more complaints than I know what to do with. I am officially ready for pregnancy to be over. :)

Here are a few weekly pictures to catch everyone up on the ever growing baby bump:

 35 weeks: Taken just before my baby shower last week!

36 weeks: This shirt really showed off the belly for sure!

My body is starting to let me know that I am carrying around a full term infant in my body. My hips and back are hurting more and my knees! My goodness! Just squatting down to pick something up lights my knee joints on fire trying to get back up! My increased weight gain would explain that pain. I am now at a weight gain of close to 27 lbs and it is ALL baby.
My biggest and newest pregnancy symptom is my feet; swollen...swollen...swollen...all the time. It started to come and go and now they just stay pretty puffy. They have gotten really bad after being on my feet at work. I had to take a picture the other morning after working three nights in a row just to document how bad they really were.

Yikes!!! Do those feet even belong to MY body??
I try my best to elevate them sometime during my shift and drink lots of water but sometimes that unfortunately just doesn't happen. I am more than ready to be off work but I know the more I work maybe the faster she will be here! :)

Speaking of that....at my most recent doctor's appointment this week I got some good and shocking news. Looks like my body is already in preparation for baby Ava's arrival: my cervix is already soft, 1-2 cm dilated and 30% effaced. Pretty impressive for 36 weeks and first baby.

However, working in Labor and Delivery, I realize that some women can be dilated to a 1-2 for weeks before anything exciting happens. But some women also never dilate at all until they are induced at 40+ weeks.
I talked to my doctor about inducing me on her due date and her response was, "Of course! But I really don't think you are going to make it that long. I would be very surprised if you did."

Well okay then! You can only imagine what that news did to my already "to do" list, overdrive brain...super overdrive now!! I haven't been able to let my mind rest since. Like I said, it doesn't mean that anything will happen anytime soon but there's a good possibility it will be before September 6th.
Just for my peace of mind, I requested to have one more ultrasound to check her size. I'm not sure why I feel like I need to know this information but it's just a mental thing I guess, needing to know what size of a baby I will be delivering. :) I'm not at all concerned with her being too big. But I was curious because of so many people saying, "You are how far along??! You are so small!!"

I thought maybe I was going to prove that I was carrying an 8 lb baby just out of spite, but that isn't the case. We had the ultrasound yesterday and she is measuring perfectly at 36 weeks exactly which puts her at 6 lbs 1 oz.
I was 6 lbs 8 oz when I was born so it looks like she might be on track to take after her momma. Everything looked great though. The sonographer was even nice enough to flip over to the 3D for us to get one more look at her. She showed off quite a bit again by opening her mouth, yawning, sticking her tongue out. She's already a character. :)

The sonographer commented on her full lips just as the other lady did. haha I'm anxious to see if those lips are as pouty and full as they appear on the ultrasounds. Too cute!!

I finally ordered her baby book a few weeks ago. I knew I wanted to get one before the showers arrived so I could have a page for guests to sign. I ended up ordering it online and really love it!

The front...

A few of the inside pages. This one is so cute for the family tree.

My other project a few weeks ago was to make a sign for the door at the hospital with Ava's name and date of birth information on it. I see so many patient's family members that put up the cutest signs for their doors and knew I had to come up with something.

I got online and looked around for something I could easily replicate. I don't consider myself the most creative person in the world so I knew it had to be somewhat simple.

Here is the picture I found that I decided to go off of:

Believe it or not, I was even considering painting that little butterfly on the side of the letter too! Let me tell you what though, I got into Hobby Lobby and got completely overwhelmed and suddenly had NO idea what direction to take with this thing.

I was amongst all the millions of ribbon and had no vision in my head in order to pick something out. Of course I end up picking out two or three and would just decide later. After gathering all the rest of the supplies, I was ready to go home and figure out how I would make this work.

Turns out, I love what I was able to do with it and probably even more than that one above. I couldn't find an "A" as big as that one, so the buttons weren't going to fit. I didn't paint anything other than the colors of the letters and dots. I was pleasantly surprised with how easy it was to make though and how cute it ended up.

The plan is to have it hanging on the door at the hospital and then hang it on the outside of her door at home. One more "to do" to check off the list!!



Close up.

And one more....

Well, except for baby shower pictures and updates, that is all I have for now. Time to go complete more items on my "to do" list. :) First things first...thank you cards!
Hoping to post again soon but no promises. I will do my best!
 

 Pregnancy Ticker