Rosie's first month

The first month with Rosie flew by! She was a very sleepy newborn so our favorite thing to do was cuddle. There were days where I spent the whole time in bed cuddling and staring at this perfect little baby. We learned early on that she hated being cold, so whenever she cried it was usually because we were changing her diaper, undressing her, or giving her a bath. But once she was wrapped up in clothes, blanket or mama's chest she was fine again. 

She came out looking just like her daddy. This picture is a replica of one of Garrick's baby pictures. They're twins.

One thing that was pretty stressful for us newbie parents was her jaundice. Her bilirubin count was borderline in the hospital so we had to take her in to the dr 3 times her first week where they had to draw blood to test her until her levels dropped. It was miserable. She was a champ but I was a mess every time! She looks like Rocky in her sweat suit and we love it. 

Her Rosie the Riveter pose

Grandma Richardson was in town while Mom was here so she came to say hi to Rosie!

I love this picture of Kayla feeding Rosie. It is so sweet. 

I was so relieved to have my mom come to stay with us. She was a saint and got up all hours of the night to help us with Rosie. We were on dr's orders to wake her every two hours to eat so she could gain weight. So we were all adjusting to little sleep. Anyway, I LOVED having mom come, she spoiled Rosie with clothes, toys, a new bouncer, etc. And she cooked and cleaned. Basically it was amazing. 

Baby cuddles are simply the best thing in the world.

Garrick discovered that she loves to lounge with his hand as her neck pillow. It's so funny to watch her completely relax herself in his hand.

We were pretty conservative on baby clothes, relying mostly on hand-me-downs, but when we saw this bear suit at Old Navy we HAD to get it. I mean look at her, come on! This was also the first time we walked around with her outside. 

Overall we feel relieved to have kept her alive for this long! She's pretty great and we love our new roles as parents.

Birthday photoshoot.

My birthday was a week after Rosie's so I asked Kayla to take family pictures of us for my birthday present. She was happy to oblige. They turned out even more wonderful than I had imagined. It was also the first time I had put on makeup, showered, put on real clothes since Rosie was born. It felt good. And it made my birthday absolutely wonderful.

Newborn photos

Having a talented photographer as a sister comes in handy, especially when you have a cute newborn. Here are some pictures she took of Rosie during her first week at home. 

More hospital

One of the duties of being a Mother is taking pictures. I have to make sure this baby is well documented, its in the genes! That said, here's more hospital pictures. 

She was resting her head on her hands which was adorable! I also love how massive the binky looks compared to her tiny head. 

Here we are right about to check out, isn't she the cutest just chilling there?

My favorite view; post milk coma. And look at those rosy cheeks!

Meeting Grandma!

Rosie was breathing a little weird shortly after delivery so she spent an hour in the NICU as a precaution. But she was perfectly healthy. Garrick got some one on one time with her. 

I lied, THIS is my favorite view. This is my world right here!

The nurse told us she's worked in Labor and Delivery for many years and has never heard the name Rosie. We kinda love the name. It's funny, it wasn't even in the running for girl names that we had agreed on. We had decided to name her Faye but a couple nights before she came I had heard the name Rosie on a movie. So I googled Rosie to see what came up, the first thing that I saw was a Rosie the Riveter poster from WW2. I LOVED the idea of naming her after a strong female icon, she was going to be the leader of our family so she needed a strong name! Garrick loved it to, and when we saw her for the first time, Rosie just fit. Faye was the name we chose for her middle name, after Garrick's great great aunt who migrated to the USA with her young family. We wanted to choose a family name so she could learn more about them someday and fall in love with her heritage. 

All buckled ready to head home. I made sure Garrick took the long, SAFE route home to be extra careful. I also had the nurse make sure we had put the carseat in correctly. We love our tiny newborn!

Hosptial

Kayla came to the hospital once I told her I was dilated to a 4. She begged me to be in the room during the delivery but I wanted it to be just Garrick. She was a sport and patiently waited outside during the delivery and was with us right after. She was super sweet and offered to take pictures for us. Love all of these so much! Thanks Kayla!!

Rosie Faye Birth Story

January 12th, Garrick and I were at the doctors office for my weekly baby bump check up. At this point in my pregnancy I hadn't slept through the night in months, my ribs were constantly popping out of place, my back was in constant pain and I was starting to swell. So you could say I was so ready to have this baby out! I had been having contractions for weeks, one night the contractions were only minutes apart so I did heavy cardio for an hour to get labor going but to no avail. I ended up vomiting instead...I stopped trying to induce labor after that. But I wanted to be done with pregnancy so bad!!

Anyway, at that appointment I was dilated to a 2 and 90% effaced. I complained about my due date being this week and Dr. Gourley suggested we set a date to induce. I jumped on that idea so fast! He suggested Thursday January 14th, just a couple days later, I was elated! I couldn't believe he was going to induce just one day after my due date. He said that my body was ready and he was confident labor would go smoothly at that point. So Garrick and I went home and got everything prepared for Thursday!

Here I am the night before, 40 weeks along and SO ready to deliver! 

Thursday morning came, I had barely slept I was so nervous we would arrive late for our check in time which was 6am. I made Garrick get up at 5am with me so we could eat breakfast and have plenty of time to get to the hospital (which was only 5 minutes away). We got there and ended up having to wait 45 minutes before we could check in. The nurse told me I was in luck, they only had one more bed available in the labor and delivery room. I was going to be the only woman induced that day! Had it been full they would've made us come back another day.

Our last selfie as a family of 2 in the hospital elevator on our way to check in!

The nurse escorted us to our room, gave me my gown and told me to get ready. I gave Garrick the responsibility of taking pictures throughout the day so we could fully document it.

About to change into my hospital gown to deliver!

At 7:30 my nurse hooked me up to the IV (which I'm happy to say hurt less than the epidural) and at 7:45am Dr. Gourley came in and broke my water. In my head I thought this whole process was going to go a lot slower....but he broke my water, they gave me the smallest dose of pitocin and I immediately started having contractions. They came fast and hard! I had never experienced painful contractions yet so this was new to me. It was now 8:30am and I was hating life. I knew it would be a long day and I wanted to hold off on getting an epidural as long as possible. (I didn't want to seem weak!) 

I still had a smile on my face in between contractions!

Finally after an hour of disgustingly painful contractions,  I asked for the epidural at 9am. It was AMAZING!!! I am very very grateful for drugs because wow it works wonders! They checked me after I was given the epidural. When we checked in I was dilated at a 2, 90% effaced (the same as I'd been for the last 2 weeks) I figured since I was induced it would take all day for me to get to a 10. So I was surprised to hear that I had progressed to a 4. 

Drugged Jamie was much happier.

We happily continued watching Secondhand Lions to pass the time, everyone had told me to bring lots of activities since labor typically lasts between 12-18 hours. So we had brought tons of things to do and watch. By the time the movie had ended it was 11am and I was dilated to a 9!!! 

All of a sudden this was feeling very very real. I was getting pretty terrified, in my head I wasn't expecting to deliver until  the next day! We were going to be parents real soon! Garrick and I were freaking out about how fast this was all going. Okay, I was the one freaking out, Garrick was ecstatic. The nurse was completely shocked that I had progressed so quickly and told us it was time to get the doctor in here, we were almost ready to start pushing at 11:45am. 

At 12pm the nurse informed us that Dr. Gourley was in emergency surgery and we would have to wait a little longer to push. 12:30pm The nurse was getting ready to have me start pushing, she was prepared to deliver the baby. Luckily she didn't have to, Dr. Gourley came just in time. 

Pushing didn't last long either, at 12:53pm our perfect Rosie came into the world! She weighed 5 lbs 15 oz and was 18 inches long. We were instantly in love with our baby girl. 

I couldn't have asked for a more perfect labor and delivery. It was perfect, she is perfect. Now we're a happy family of three.