3 weeks old!

Look who is 3 weeks old!

She's getting so big!

Hug, please!

This is my shocked face! ...already a drama queen!

Check those chubby cheeks!

Umm.... I could just eat her up!

Miss. Avery... you are adorable! You fit so seamlessly into our lives! It's hard to imagine life without you even though you've only been here 3 weeks! You're a sweet baby. You're a snuggler and sure do love to be held. If you're in the nap nanny, boppy or mamaroo and you're awake, you expect to be talked to or you get bored. Such a girl! I LOVE your red hair and sure do hope it sticks around. Between your poppi and mimi, we've got a good chance you'll keep it.

You're growing like a weed and have already outgrown some newborn sleepers and onesies. Cute clothes, here we come! I'm sure your major growth has everything to do with the fact that you'd nurse 23 out of the 24 hours in the day if I'd let you. In between when you think you're hungry, I try to soothe you with your paci. You had a meltdown in Target today and I had to nurse you in the car. Of course every single car around us "turned over" at least once while I was nursing you, meaning about 8 strangers saw my boobs today. That will teach me to put the nursing cover back in the car after I wash it! Opps!

I'm holding you, typing with one hand while you smile those drunken milk smiles. LOVE it...even if they aren't "real" smiles yet. You've started spitting up and my hair is your very favorite target!I had forgotten about the spit up baths your brother used to give me! I see a lot of pony tails and laundry in my future!

Love you, baby girl!

First few days home

I haven't done a post since you've been home! It has been nothing short of blissful! You wake up 1-2 times a night which some people say you'll grow out of in 2 weeks and start waking up more but I'm just not claiming that! I wake up rested and ready to conquer the day so if you can keep this up, we'll be golden! You've become a pretty good nurser. You will not be woken up to eat though so the every 2-3 hour thing doesn't always work out. Sometimes you go 1 hour and sometimes you'll go 5 between feedings. I let you dictate that. You're gaining weight so I'm not worried. 

We went for your 1st doctor's visit. Of course, you didn't cry.. you never do. You ONLY cry when you're hungry and I'm not getting "ready" fast enough for you. You came home from the hospital on Sunday May 8th weighing 6lbs 2oz and by the time we went to the doctor on Tuesday you weighed 6lbs 8oz. You go girl! You're a peanut. You are in the 10th percentile for head circumference, 50th for length and 15th for weight. I love that you're petite! Even more so, I love that you're healthy...and that you have BEAUTIFUL (albeit short) auburn hair!

Newborn clothes for the most part swallow you whole. You fit best in gymboree "up to 7lb" size clothes. I usually keep you in sleepers that have the arms that fold over your hands since you like to keep your hands by your face so much. Otherwise, you scratch yourself. 

Your favorite place to be (other than my arms) is in your mamaroo. That thing is genius. You sleep so soundly in it! I usually let you nap there. We tried the moby wrap for the 1st time today and you did great in that too. I need more practice putting it on, though! We also tried the Baby Bjorn but you need to get a bit bigger 1st, Your head was super floppy in it. 

You are a super easy baby (please don't make me regret saying that) and you have been nothing but a joy! Your brother is wildly infatuated with you and loves you so much! You're the 1st person he ask for in the morning and tells you night night before bed. You guys snuggle while watching his evening shows and it melts my heart. You seem to enjoy being held by him and laid next to him on the floor. He likes me to lay you next to him while I change his diaper and this morning he had me lay you in his bed with him for a few minutes before he got up. I hope you always love each other like that.

Enough words... here are a few pictures from your first few days home!

Coming home from the hospital

Nice and clean after your 1st bath

Big Brother LOVES giving you kisses!

Borther/Sister Snuggle Time

All bundled up in your mamaroo!

You are such a blessing! We are absolutely smitten by you!

Heading Home!

Happy Mother's Day! I got the BEST MOTHER'S DAY PRESENT EVER this year... a new life as a family of 4! Today I leave the hospital and start my new journey as a mom of 2 beautiful children. Daniel also gave me a hot pink Moby wrap which I'm really excited about since Avery is less than thrilled to be put down and I'm a busy body who needs my hands! I'm sitting in the hospital bed right now (waiting to have my staples removed....owie) but as I look to my left Daniel is sitting on the couch (aka his bed) watching something on his laptop with Avery on his chest while eating a yogurt parfait. Who says men can't multitask?!

I'm so excited to take Avery home to her big brother! He has been asking for her which just melts my heart! Yesterday he came to visit and when I went to take Avery out of his lap, he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her to him and declared, "no, my baby!" Here are a few pictures from yesterday.

Peace, cheese and baby

With her IV out, we can finally dress her up!

I'm smitten!

Lovin' her big brother!

Loving big a big brother!

Day 2 = perfection

Day 2 has been nothing short of WONDERFUL! Avery has slept pretty much ALL day (so I'm prepared to be up ALL night!) and has been such a sweet baby! We've had many visitors and she was so sweet and content to be handed around all day. We felt so blessed to have such great friends and family! We're definitely feeling the love! Here are a few quick pictures from day #2.

Miss. Holly and Avery. Holly brought me STARBUCKS!!! YAY!

Brandi and Avery. Brandi brought me the yummiest cookies!

Parker climbed right up in bed and asked for "baby."

Poppi and Avery

The hat Terra Wilson made Avery fit PERFECT!!! I'm loving attaching bows to it!

Beth and Jason stopped by on their way from DC to Atlanta. They brought beautiful flowers and a sweet toy.

Avery's Godparents Tabitha and Dean came by with a HUGE bag of hats and CAKE BALLS! (none of which I've offered to visitors)

How precious is this hat Tabitha made her!

I can't wait to use this hat in her photo shoot Monday!

LOVE the crocheted bow headband! :)

Well Miss A is back in our room from getting her antibiotics in the nursery. Gotta go love on my princess!

Avery's Birth Story

Update before bed....Avery is here! She's beautiful and a wonderful baby! She is 6lbs 13oz and 19 inches long. She's already nursing like a champ and wouldn't take her eyes off her big brother. We are so smitten!

We left off yesterday right after I had the epidural and I was a happy camper! About 30 minutes later, things changed! The side effects of the epidural kicked in and it quickly became evident that I should have not had the epidural. I vomited uncontrollably, shook like I was having a seizure and then my body went weak and numb. I couldn't even open my eyes. My blood pressure dropped so I spent the next 3 hours sniffing alcohol swabs. Unfortunately, at this time, I was begging for a c-section but the doctors thought I should stick it out. At 3am, I had manged to fall asleep and the doctors and nurses ran in, and wheeled me to the OR while telling me Avery's heart rate was no longer strong since my blood pressure was so low.

When we got to the OR, the plan was to give me a spinal then let Daniel come in. The doctors put a mask on my face and told me to count backwards from 10. I made it to 0 and was still wide awake. Unfortunately, my epidural wasn't spaced very well (I still felt most contractions mildly after I'd gotten it) so they couldn't use it to give me a spinal. The decision was made to put me all the way under. Avery was delivered and was perfect from the start. Because I had a fever, she was taken to the newborn nursery and given an IV that she'll have for 2 days for antibiotics.

This is where things took a turn for me. The doctors couldn't get me to stop bleeding. Daniel was notified and made the decision to do a hysterectomy if they couldn't get me to stop bleeding as I was quickly bleeding out. Thankfully, they stopped the bleeding just in time to land me in the ICU but not need a hysterectomy (which at this point, I wouldn't have cared that much because we are DONE with 2 kids after 2 traumatic births!) I woke up in the ICU with an IV in both hands, a central line in my neck and a drainage bulb coming out of my c-section wound. The right hand (maternity unit) and the left hand (ICU) did a poor job of communicating and both thought the other had given me pain meds. WRONG! At noon, they finally rectified this with some demerol in my arm as I was wheeled out of the ICU to see my baby girl!

The postpartum nurses felt so bad for me that they gave me a nice suite and have been WONDERFUL ever since! They've been on top of pain meds and complete dolls to Avery. I'm already up and walking a bit and can now get myself out of bed alone which is way sooner than I did with Parker so hopefully I'll recover faster!

Speaking of Parker, he came to visit today and it went 100x better than I thought it would! He LOVED his sister and wanted to hold her constantly. He called her "baby" and petted her head so softly. I was a proud mama!

Avery took to nursing like a champ! We are just through the moon with her! Daniel keeps saying "she's so easy!" "She doesn't cry!" All that will change soon but we're savoring these quiet, sweet moments! Daniel changed her diaper today and we caught it on tape. I'm SOOO glad we did. Parker watched intently as she pooped while daddy was wiping her. haha. His facial expression was worth a million bucks!

We got a few family photos of the kids in their matching outfits. So precious! My mom is going to have to bring Avery different clothes because I packed her all long sleeve cotton items but her IV in her forearm makes it so she can't wear anything but short sleeve outfits or onesies. She doesn't have bow ready hair but that's why I came prepared with headbands too which was precious! Daddy wasn't super thrilled that I put a bow bigger than her head on it but he'll get over it!

Sorry for the long and detailed post but since this is "Avery's baby book" once I have the blog printed, I wanted to make sure to document everything I could remember. PLUS.... PICTURES! We haven't taken many but here are a few!

Going to the hospital

Avery's 1st picture

Happy Big Brother reaching out to hold "his baby"

Our family of 4!!!

New Woman

OH MY GOSH.... I feel like a new woman. From 6-7:30 I didn't want to be touched or talked to which is so "un-Taylor." As I watched Daniel sit in the corner facing the wall eating a Pizza Hut pizza, I cried and breathed... no fun... so I gave up (sorry natural mamas). I'm a whooping 2 cm dilated at this point and the thought of doing this ALL NIGHT when I've been contracting since 6pm yesterday was simply unbearable. I felt defeated...until the epidural took effect. And now I feel like a sleepy rock star.

I figured I'd write a quick update as I'm planning to fall asleep to American Idol for a bit since the doctor thinks we're going to have a middle of the night, cinco de mayo baby. That's what I get for craving margaritas this whole pregnancy right? I see many donkey pinatas in our future birthday parties. haha (not really... until she's in college and it's her prerogative to beat a donkey with a stick... oh goodness.... my daughter's birthday will be quite the celebration!) Unfortunately, this messes up our 5/4/3/2/1 birthday order (May 4th and March 21st) BUT.... Miss Avery clearly had different plans. A stubborn Diva from birth. This confirms my belief that she's a fiery red head. I should start praying now, shouldn't I?!

Water Broke

At 11:00 Dr Taylor tried (again) to strip the membranes...unsuccessfully and rather unenjoyably. I got super bummed since the pitocin is causing frequently contractions but isn't moving the baby. He said we'd try a while longer and then he may send me home until next week. I was not a happy camper.

I sent Daniel to get himself lunch and eat it out of my sight at 11:45. I rolled to my side to rest and when the nurse knocked on the door, it startled me and broke my water! YIPPEE!!!!!!!!!! SOO... now we're here to stay! Hopefully the pitocin (which is maxed out already) starts to do it's job. I'm feeling the contractions but they aren't strong enough to need meds for. Honestly, I'm kinda bored. haha. Such a waiting game! I should have brought a book as daytime TV is proving less than entertaining! I don't think my TV is normally off Curious George, Barney or Thomas the Train until 8pm so I forgot that nothing but CRAP is on during the day!

So the good news is....water broke (odd sensation, right ladies?)
Bad news: Contractions aren't moving Avery like we'd hoped
Good news: We won't be leaving the hospital without her
Bad news: She may be born via c-section if things don't pick up
Good news: She'll be here within 24 hours either way! :)