finally!!

Okay, here are some pictures!
This one is weird... but it shows I was there, I guess:Rylie getting cleaned up:The family (minus one)!:This is when she was still kinda goopy... but cute.Her first bath. I had no idea she was allowed to actually be in water when she still had her umbilical stump thing... but they must know what they're doing, right? =P In any case, she seemed to love the warm water.All clean! And with her first hairdo, courtesy of a nice nurse:Okay that's plenty of pictures for now. Sorry we don't have any of Nathan in this one. The pictures are all from before he came to visit.

happy birthday baby girl!

So yesterday early morning I gave birth to our baby girl! She's 7 pounds, 7 ounces and 21 inches long. Pretty long. =) She has long feet and fingers, too. She's got some chocolate-brown hair and her skin seems to be a little paler than Nathan's and Jared's is. So she'll probably be all pasty, like me, haha...

Anyway, so Thursday afternoon I started having contractions pretty close together and they sort of hurt (but not enough to really bother me... just enough to be sort of distracting and I'd have to stop what I was doing for each one). I'd felt that way before so I didn't think much of it until a few hours later when it was still going. Anyway, Jared and I decided to go see Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull that evening and leave Nathan with Shannon. Guess it sort of turned out to be a "last date" in a way =) ... So we went to the movie (and left Nathan's car seat and brought my hospital bag just in case) and it was pretty good! Except that the contractions started getting worse and closer together. I wasn't honestly worried until the end of the movie, though. It was then I started realizing that the baby hadn't moved very much at all in the past 2 or 3 hours. Plus everything was hurting more. So as soon as the movie ended we went to the hospital.

At the hospital they checked me and I was 90% effaced and 4 cm dilated. Their policy was that if you aren't 39 weeks then they don't really admit you until they're sure you're really progressing so they told me they were going to have me wait an hour in the room and see if I dilated anymore. However, after less than an hour (I can't remember exactly how long) they didn't like how her heart rate kept dipping whenever I had a contraction so they decided to actually admit me and give me something to speed up the whole process so they could just get her out. So we did that, and then after another half an hour or so I asked for an epidural. That was nice, obviously... and it didn't slow anything down at all, fortunately. Some time later they came and checked me again and I was 9 centimeters. The baby was still showing the same signs of fetal distress, though. So they got the doctor and everyone into the room (and Jared remembered to ask for a mirror for me! thank goodness) and I started pushing. It didn't take very long. It was so crazy but also very cool to see the baby born. When her head came out the doctor said that the cord was wrapped around her neck a couple of times so he had to cut it straight away. He did that and then he brought the rest of her body out. I was worried that she wasn't making any sound but everyone else seemed very calm. I knew it was probably because everyone had dealt with this kind of thing before but I also felt that they knew it would probably be fine.

So the nurse and another doctor (I didn't even meet him so I have no idea who he was) or nurse started wiping her off and cleaning out her airways but she still wasn't breathing. So for a minute or so they used this bag thing to push air in and then she started coughing and had a little cry. Not long after that she started turning pink like she was supposed to be and they said everything was fine. Her red blood cell count was a little low at first because she'd had her cord cut so abruptly but they didn't have to give her a transfusion or anything.

After that they wrapped her in a blanket and put a funny hat that looked like a sock with the end tied on her head and gave her to me to hold. I was amazed that she already had her eyes open and everything, I hadn't realized newborns were like that. She was already so alert, although I don't think she saw anything very clearly and she still had some fluid around her eyes.
Anyway, we took several pictures but our computer is still not working (the USB ports are being dumb) so I think we'll just have to load a few onto Shannon's computer or something so you guys can see. In the meantime, her blog has some pictures from her phone that you can look at. Although I should mention one thing - she says that the baby has curly hair, but she doesn't, actually. One of the nurses did this weird spiky thing to her hair so parts of it look kind of curly right now. I forgot to tell Shannon that.

So, we haven't named her yet, and everyone keeps asking what we've named her... but that isn't going to make deciding any easier or faster. =) Sorry. Our goal is to name her by the end of tomorrow.

Anyway, we're very excited to have her here, and Nathan's behaved pretty well around her so far. We'll see how things go when we bring her home. She's starting to get the hang of breastfeeding already (somewhat) so that's good, too!

Well, I'm going to try and get a little sleep now. More later!

huzzah, huzzah.

I got this from Adrien and Eric's blog and I thought I'd do it for myself. When Jared is available, I'll ask him if he wants to do it, too. On other news, today we have reached 37 weeks! We are officially considered full term! I'm pretty sure the baby will stay in for a couple more weeks, though, at least. Anyway, so here's the book list.

The Big Read says that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they’ve printed.

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read
2) Italicize those you intend to read.

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame (this is both bold and italicized because I feel like my mom read this to us as kids, but maybe she didn't finish it. I wouldn't mind reading it again.)
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens (to be honest, though, parts of this I just scanned... it was just not very interesting to me.)
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams (it's not all evil bunnies!)
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald (I'm not sure whether I want to read this one or not)
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas (what I read may or may not have been the abridged version... I can't remember)
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell (I actually started this but never finished it)
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck (maybe)
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens (maybe)
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding (probably a waste of time, but a fun read... I read the sequel, also)
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens (again, maybe... I'm a little hesitant about Charles Dickens after having had Great Expectations virtually shoved down my throat.)
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel (I have mixed feelings about this one.)
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez (upon reading this, there was little to be admired about this book. the style and imagery were good, I thought, (and maybe the writing was great, but I'm not a very good judge of those things) but everything else: not.)
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

Anyway, just because something isn't italicized doesn't mean I'll never read it. It mostly means I haven't heard of the book. Although there are a few I intend not to read... like The Alchemist, for one. And The Stand. But that's just because from what I've seen/heard, I don't like Stephen King's plots. If someone wants to convince me otherwise, feel free to try. I'm always open to new things if I feel it's worth my while.

some who wander *are* lost.

Pregnancy is a funny thing... to people who aren't pregnant.
Lately, I've been dealing with this thing they call the third trimester. Never experienced this before! It's all so new and interesting, sort of. My body clearly belongs to someone else - especially my mind. I lose and forget things constantly (It's even worse than before. Imagine that if you possibly can). I try to tell things to people and then force them to endure several seconds of silence as I try to remember what I was about to say. Today, I thought we had lost our Graco stroller (You know, the one that you get with the infant car seat). I was so depressed that it was gone forever and that our new baby wouldn't get to have all the fun experiences in it that Nathan did that I ate approximately ten double chocolate chip cookies (Don't even get me started on how emotional I am. Just don't.) before Shannon informed me I'd put it in the trunk of her car last week.
How great was my joy.
How great was my chagrin.

Delicious.

Something is wrong (again...) with the laptop, so there are no new pictures yet (we just can't load pictures from the camera onto the computer because the hub ports are being ill for some reason). But I'm sure you can just imagine all the cute/weird/funny things Nathan is doing and be satisfied.

Anyway, because of that, I'm going to use old pictures (and some that aren't even mine) to illustrate.

Things have been good since I last updated. Nathan has had his terrible two's moments as well as his very sweet/cute/funny ones. As it has from the first time I heard it, his laugh alone somehow manages to cure all ills.I just love hearing him giggle. At the risk of sounding like a cheesy made-for-TV movie, it brings sunlight to my heart. Sorry, I just don't know how else to put it. =)We bought nectarines on Thursday when we went to Costco to pick up sausages and orange juice for the annual pancake breakfast the next day. There were so very, very scrumptious and mouthwatering. I died a little of happiness every time I took a bite. (My picture is so much better... haha jk)Thursday night Adrien and Eric came over and they, Shannon, Jared and I watched Vantage Point on our big screen thingy with the projector. It was pretty good. We liked it. The special features were way too drawn out and redundant, though. We didn't finish those, which is unusual for me. I live for the special features.

Friday morning, July 4th (yay!) was the ward's pancake breakfast. Jared was one of the ones in charge of that so he went over to the park a little early to help get things ready. Pretend that Jared is making turkey sausages from scratch or something...Nathan and I went over a little later and Shannon never came at all. Too early for her, I guess. =) The food was surprisingly yummy (I say surprisingly because when are cold eggs and sausages with limp, soggy pancakes good? But they were. Only they weren't cold [except the eggs, but whatever], limp or soggy. Everything was just as it should have been).Nathan got to play in the park for a little while after, but then I made us go home because I was getting worn out. Nathan wasn't particularly pleased with me, but when is he ever pleased with me when I tell him to do something?

We didn't really do much the rest of the day until that evening when we went over to Marlyse and Kenny's to watch fireworks. It was really nice of them to invite us over and we loved it! It was a great view.Nathan actually stayed awake for the whole thing, although he did try to fall asleep during the fireworks. He didn't succeed, but the second they were over, he pretty much zonked out.I was afraid the fireworks might make him cry or something, but he never did. He even laughed a little a couple times. Here's Nathan looking at the fireworks:After the fireworks were over, we put him in the play yard in Marlyse and Kenny's bedroom while we hung out (hanged out? haha... I have no idea) with everyone and played/watched people play on their Wii while waiting for the traffic to die down. We got home at around 1ish. Good times.

Anyway, then Saturday Shannon, Adrien and I went to Ikea......and I made the trip worth my while this time! Got stuff for the baby's room and curtains for our bedroom (only to decide to return them when I found something more to my liking on www.walmart.com ... in all fairness, I had looked there before, but I guess I somehow missed them the first time. Oh well). Anywho, I'm going to take pictures of those rooms when I get the curtains and when we finish the baby's room... but we'll see if I can get them on the computer.

Then Sunday was good. Church was nice and there was no trip to the hospital like on Father's Day. Adrien and Eric came over (again! I wonder if they're getting sick of us inviting them?) and played Scrabble with Shannon, Jared and me. Adrien won with flying colors (I think... my memory is terrible) so she can't say she's terrible at Scrabble anymore. Nathan was a pill last night, but then he warmed up a little. He went to bed late (a little after 9) because his schedule was kind of weird from when he stayed up to watch the fireworks with us.

Anyway! That's it! Thanks for reading, kids!