BillyandAshlee.com

We are home from the hospital, and everyone is doing great. Nursing is going well, and we are still getting plenty of sleep (so far at least) We have posted new pictures in the Gallery – as you can see we are still trying to get the hang of things..

We had our little baby yesterday — SHE is gorgeous and absolutely perfect!

Name: Lauren Dawn
Weight: 7lbs 13oz.
Length: 18 3/4″
Date/Time: 9/27/05 @ 4:45pm

Ashlee & baby are doing GREAT, and we cant wait to get home.. (Thursday Eve)

More pics HERE in the Gallery!

Looks like the 10-9 vote for GIRL was exactly right!

We just got back from the dr. and there’s been no progress from last week (still 1.5cm and 80% effaced). So, we go into the hospital tonight at 9pm to start Cervidil and then will start Pitocin in the morning, there will DEFINITELY be a baby tomorrow! Wish us luck and expect a phone call and/or email tomorrow!

We made it through yet another weekend! At least there is an end in site as I will be induced tomorrow! We have a dr. appt today and will know whether we have to go into the hospital tonight for Cervidil or if we’ll just go in tomorrow morning and start Pitocin. Cross your fingers for more progress from last week so we can just go in the morning!

Friday night we went to dinner, Saturday we worked on the nursery and went to the Plaza Art Fair and then over to some friends house, then yesterday we got the last minute stuff done (laundry, grocery shopping, mowed the lawn, etc.). So, just still waiting. At least we know within 36 hours or so we’ll meet this baby finally!!

Still hanging in here! Baby is still moving and I’m still feeling good. I hope I go into labor before Tuesday, but no big deal if we don’t!

We FINALLY got the glider in yesterday (Babies R Us told us 10-12 weeks and it took almost 16!) so we were able to finish hanging everything on the walls! I love the way it turned out!! My mom made the quilt on the wall (as well as the matching bumpers!), the framed cards are homemade thank-you cards my friend Jen made using material from the quilt, the booties are knitted by my great aunt Me, and the painting was a gift to the baby from our friends Meggan and Dan! All we have left to add is the letters for the name (to the left of the closet, above the glider) once we know what the gender is! Here’s some pics, you can see all of them in the gallery under the Nursery link.

It looks like this baby must be pretty comfortable and has no intention of coming out! I still feel great…tons of energy, still working, still going for long walks at night, and still sleeping well! My last day of work is tomorrow and we’re trying to make a lot of plans for the weekend so that we aren’t sitting around just waiting. I think we’re going to go to the Plaza Art Fair, maybe a movie, the dog park, probably dinner/drinks (for Billy of course) with friends, etc. Hopefully the baby decides to come this weekend, but if not, we’ll have the baby on Tuesday!

Your Baby’s Development

The average birth weight for babies born at 40 weeks is about seven pounds, eight ounces and the average length is about 21 inches.

There are a number of surprising physical characteristics you may notice upon Baby’s arrival. You may not have realized the extent to which your hormones can affect your baby at this stage. Because of the presence of your hormones in your baby’s system, your baby’s genitals (scrotum in boys and labia in girls) may appear enlarged. Your baby boy or girl may secrete milk from the tiny nipples. This is another hormone-related occurrence that should disappear in a few days and is completely normal. Finally, hormones may cause some “infant acne” pimples on your baby’s face. These, too, will disappear within a month or so of birth.

• Although many moms think of a baby’s skin as “perfect,” it can be very sensitive. When your baby is born, it’s normal for her to have skin discoloration; blotchy, dry skin; or even rashes.

• Baby’s trip through the constricting birth canal will temporarily mold her tiny head into a cone shape; this will round out within a few days of life.

• Babies are capable of crying at birth, but they are born with an underdeveloped tear duct system. You may notice that tears don’t appear until one to three months of age.

• The umbilical cord between the placenta and fetus may be up to two feet long at birth. After the cord is cut, a remnant will remain attached to the baby’s abdomen. It will drop off within the first month

Your Development

By now you’re anticipating the delivery of your baby.

When you’re ready to deliver, you’ll experience the following three basic stages of labor:

• First stage: During the first stage of labor, your uterus contracts at regular intervals, thinning and stretching your cervix. This stage lasts the longest, because the cervix must widen from zero to 10 centimeters. The average duration of first stage labor in new mothers is about 12 hours (for moms who have experienced labor and delivery before, it may be half that long). However, first stage labor can range from much shorter to much longer than 12 hours and still be considered normal.

• Second stage: If you’re delivering vaginally, you’ll push your baby into the vaginal canal and out of your body.

• Third stage: The final stage of labor occurs when you deliver the placenta. After the baby has been delivered, the placenta separates from the uterine wall within about 10 minutes. Your doctor will massage your abdomen to help move the placenta along. Your doctor may need to reach inside and remove the placenta if it isn’t expelled on its own.

It’s important to realize that you may normally deliver two weeks earlier or later than your due date, but the odds are slim that you’ll give birth exactly on schedule (only five percent of babies are born on their due dates). About 10 percent of pregnancies result in a “post-term pregnancy” where the baby is still not born two weeks after the due date. This may be concerning because the amniotic fluid level usually drops after the 41st week, increasing the risk that the umbilical cord could become compressed, depriving Baby of oxygen. Post-term pregnancies also increase the risk that Baby will pass meconium into the amniotic fluid, where it could get into Baby’s lungs. If you have gone two weeks past your due date, your doctor may want to perform fetal testing to gauge if labor will begin spontaneously. Or, if necessary, your doctor may choose to induce labor by artificially puncturing the amniotic sac with a sterile tool. The painless procedure releases the amniotic fluid out of the vagina. Puncturing the sac boosts the level of a hormone that helps speed up contractions.

Doctors also can induce labor by administering synthetic hormones that help to strengthen contractions. If your pregnancy is high risk, or if there are any other potential complications, you may require a cesarean section delivery.

Just back from the dr. and we are NOT having a baby tomorrow (by induction anyway!). The baby is head down and measuring totally average size…Billy and I had a bet going on the weight and he said 7lbs 2oz and I said 7lb 12oz and I was right on!! I told Billy before the appt that I thought I was making some progress on my own. After the exam, my dr. said I am making great progress on my own and totally changed his opinion from last week and that it looks like nature is going to do what is intended and that if not, we’ll reevaluate on Monday and schedule the induction for Monday night and Tuesday morning, although he’s hopeful we wouldn’t even have to do the Cervadil Monday night!! So, exactly what I thought and exactly what I wanted!! Don’t get me wrong, I would have loved to have our baby tomorrow, but who’s to say it’s not going to happen on its own tomorrow? As far as the progress, for the past 2 weeks I was 1cm, 50% effaced and high. As of today, I’m 1.5cm, a good 80% effaced, and the head “is right there”!! Sweet!! Billy asked the dr. how much I paid him to say all this (he really wanted to be induced today, he’s totally anxious!).

So, after the appt, since everything I thought was true, Billy said he’s not messing with mother’s intuition anymore and that we must be having a boy (I’ve been thinking boy, he’s been thinking girl) and asked me when “I” thought we’d have the baby and I told him my guess was before Saturday, most likely Thursday or Friday. I guess we’ll see!

We have a list of email addresses that we’ll be sending baby announcement info and pics to, but if you want to make sure you’re included, click HERE and sign up with your email address! (clicking that link will open a blank email which is specially created to subscribe you to the list, all you have to do is hit send. There’s no need to enter anything, just leave it blank)

Alternatively you can sign-up using this webform.

We have our sonogram at 1:30 today followed by another exam/appt with my dr. I really am hoping for progress, but we’ll see. We’re leaning towards NOT inducing tonight/tomorrow but seeing if it will happen itself over the next week and then inducing next Monday/Tuesday if it doesn’t happen (dr. won’t let me go longer than that). It all just depends on what we hear at the appt today. We’ll make sure to post this evening to let everyone know either way! Wish us luck in making the decision and send easy labor vibes if we do decide to induce!!

Here’s hopefully the last belly picture!! I don’t really see much change from last week, probably just bigger!

We also attended a baby shower for some friends (Twynette and Steve’s) on Friday night (I was a co-hostess) and it was really fun!! They are expecting their first baby about 5 weeks after we are! Here’s a picture of all the hostesses and the mom-to-be! (from left to right, my friends Meggan, Jen, me, Twynette, and Twynette’s friend Christy)

Your Baby’s Development

Even as late as the 39th week, there is one part of your Baby’s body that hasn’t quite finished developing: the two soft spots on your baby’s head called the fontanels, where the skull bones haven’t yet joined together. These areas allow the flexible skull bones to bend, without damaging the brain, as Baby travels down the birth canal. Because of the strength of the contractions during labor, many newborn heads look elongated or cone-shaped right after birth. The bones will return to their round shape within a few days after birth. During Baby’s first year the skull will harden; by 18 months, the soft spots on Baby’s head will have completely disappeared.

Other last-minute developments continue:

• Baby’s skeleton continues to develop. Your baby now has 300 bones (about 100 more than an adult does, since some bones fuse together as the child grows).

Your Development

You’re almost at the end of your pregnancy. Your pregnancy weight probably won’t increase too much more from this point forward.

Your body is preparing itself for labor and you may begin experiencing Braxton Hicks contractions, which can be as strong as real contractions. Unlike real labor, however, these contractions are irregular and tend to stop and start. These contractions help to trigger the pre-birth process of effacement and early dilation. Although false contractions feel real, they aren’t strong enough to make the cervix start thinning out or dilating. They may wax and wane for days or a few weeks before the onset of true labor.

Another sign of labor — the rupture of your amniotic sac (water breaking) — could happen at any moment. When water breaks, the sensation you may feel can range from a startling gush of water to a steady trickle. Some women never notice their water breaking at all.

I had my dr. appt today and haven’t made any progress:( (still 1cm, 50% effaced and -3 station). My dr. said he didn’t like what he was seeing. Also, when he was feeling the head, he said he didn’t feel a nice, round head and thought maybe the baby had its hand up by its head, so we scheduled a sonogram for Monday to check for position and size.

So, he proposed the following. According to his experience, he doesn’t anticipate that I’m going to make much more progress on my own and is suggesting the sono/appt on Monday (9/19) and then I’ll go into the hospital Monday night to start Cervidil (bc I’m only 50% effaced) and then pitocin on Tuesday morning (which is 9/20 and I’m due on Thursday, 9/22). It’s totally up to Billy and I though. If we want to wait until the following Monday/Tuesday (9/26 and 9/27), he’s ok with that too. He said he’s not anticipating any progress between now and Monday or between now and 2 weeks from now. He said that he’s concerned about the baby’s size (which in my last sono at 31ish weeks, the baby was only measuring in the 24th percentile) so he said that I might be measuring/looking big because the baby hasn’t dropped much yet. He said that if the baby is measuring really large on Monday, we might go straight to a csection. He also said that I might not be dilating/effacing bc the baby might just not fit because I’m petite. I asked him about recent success with women being induced at where I’m at, and he said recently a lot of them have resulted in csections.

So, the plan is that we scheduled to be induced on Tuesday (9/20) but starting Cervidil in the hospital Monday night. However, we go in Monday for the sono and appt and we can make up our mind then if we want to go ahead with being induced that night, or if we want to wait and reschedule for the next week.

So, I guess we’ll know Monday if we’re going to have a baby on Tuesday (unless the baby decides to come before then!).

Nothing too exciting going on here. Baby seems to be lower, I’m feeling more pressure, and I’m still having on/off contractions (although not too many over the weekend). I did develop what they call “pitting edema” in my legs over the weekend (fluid retention in my legs that when I push on my leg, it stays indented for a period of time). It can be a sign of preeclampsia (pregnancy induced hypertension or toxemia), so I called my dr’s office this morning and sinc emy blood pressure has been fine, no headaches, no blurry vision, and no swelling in my hands or face, it’s probably fine and just due to being the homestretch of pregnancy. I have my next dr’s appt tomorrow, so they’re going to check it out then and I guess we’ll see how much progress we’ve made. I’m hoping we also set the induction (inducement?) date tomorrow also, I’ll be sure to post it here!

We finished getting everything ready over the weekend by running the last few errands, buying/sending wedding gifts for the 3 weddings we’ll have to miss because of the baby, buying 2 more baby gifts for friends, cleaning the house, putting up new blinds in the nursery, etc. Now we just need the baby!

Here’s the latest belly picture from today, 38w4d:

Your Baby’s Development

This is the week in which Baby begins to outgrow the watery home where she’s been developing these past nine months. Baby should weigh almost seven pounds this week, but at a length of about 21 inches, Baby hasn’t grown much taller. The average full-term newborn weighs between six and nine pounds and is 18 to 21 inches long.

Here are a few other developments this week:

• Although Baby’s growth is slowing, fat will continue to accumulate to help insulate Baby even more for her entry to the outside world.

• Meconium (Baby’s feces) will continue to build up in her intestines.

• By now, the circumference of baby’s head and abdomen are about the same.

Your Development

As baby puts more pressure on your bladder this week, your need to urinate increases.

Since you’re probably visiting your doctor on a weekly basis, you can ask your doctor for an estimate of the exact size of your baby. However, these estimates are only educated predictions — no one will know Baby’s precise size until birth. Ultrasound is fairly accurate at this point in estimating fetal weight by measuring diameter and circumference of Baby’s head and abdomen, and length of the leg bone.

Even an accurate fetal-weight estimate can’t predict how easily the baby will fit through your pelvis and the birth canal. Your doctor usually won’t be able to tell whether your baby will move easily down the birth canal until labor begins.

I had my first internal today (at 37w5d) with a CNM as my dr. is out of town this week. I’m 1cm dilated, 50% effaced and a -3 station (-4 is floating). So, she said I’m definitely making progress and that the head is down in there causing stuff to happen (she could feel the baby’s head!)! I measured 2cm’s smaller than last week (40cms last week, 38 this week) and she said that’s a good sign the baby is dropping! I also told her about my cramps/contractions and she said those are definitely contractions, woohoo!

Still hanging in there, although we’re ready whenever this baby is!! I’ve been having cramps for about 3 weeks and contractions on and off for about a week. Friday night I lost my mucus plug and had about an hour of contractions Friday night and about three hours of contractions on Saturday night. Not much since then, a few more this morning. I have a dr’s appt today and will find out how dilated/effaced I am and I’m hoping for good news after all the excitement this weekend! Here’s the latest belly picture from today (37w5d), it looks like I’m still dropping!