Nights

Caleigh slept through the night last night for the second straight night (from 11 pm until 7 am when I went in and woke her up).  Yay!!!  In celebration of this great fete she has accomplished at 6.5 weeks of age we wanted to post some fun pictures.

In this one she is enjoying her new winter hat (thanks Gigi!) as well as her fist.  She likes to suck on her fist and when she is lucky sometimes just the thumb gets into her mouth.  We think part of the reason she can sleep through the night is because she has gotten so good at finding her hands!

I love this picture!

What a happy girl!  She is giving us such a wide range of expressions now... She is a little buddah and she apparently stores all her milk in her cheeks and her chin! Daddy and Cals hanging out...

One month old

Caleigh is pondering what she thinks about being one month old (actually 5 weeks in these pictures).

And after her one month checkup on Dec. 27th... She was super excited to learn that she was 8 lb and 15 oz (50th percentile), 21 inches (50th percentile).  She is perfectly average.  Her birth weight was 6 lb 14 oz and less than 25th percentile so she is slowly becoming a little chunkomunko we always knew she would be.

Christmas Day Stop #2

We headed up to the Dyers for Christmas dinner. (It made for a busy but fun family day!) Grandma Dyer holding Caleigh... Poppop and Gigi with Caleigh... Poppop and Grandpa Dyer and Adam hanging out before dinner. Overall Caleigh slept through most of Christmas - but she got some great gifts! We are so thankful that we got our Christmas gift early this year (Caleigh of course!).

Caleigh's First Christmas

Our first stop on Christmas day after we opened gifts at home was the Adams' house. Here is Poppop with Caleigh and Uncle David. Aunt Karen is opening some fun craft presents while the dogs enjoy their Christmas stuffed animal (that they rapidly ripped the stuffing out of). The Adams' dog is Yasmin on the left and that is our Bales on the right. Gigi and Caleigh... Adam and I with Caleigh. I became skilled at the one handed opening of presents, with Adam's help of course... Aunt Karen got a fun coat that looks like about 20 neighborhood cats had to be skinned to produce the lining. PETA would not be proud, but clearly she is proud of her coat.

Pre-Christmas Randomness

We started a tradition this year of getting together with some college friends/roommates for breakfast on Christmas Eve. Caleigh joined us for the festivities and is now in training to become a Carolina girl. Here is Kim, Jess, Caleigh, me, and Marcy. Christmas card outtake (hope you enjoyed the actual card!) Notice Caleigh is in her personalized stocking courtesy of Gigi - Thanks! A visit with Jess at Panera... and hanging out with Marcy in Caleigh's room...

Diaper duty

Adam took the diapers out of our diaper genie the other day. This is a 6 day diaper sausage.

Playtime

Caleigh's awake time/ play time does not seem very exciting but it looks like she is enjoying it. Our naked little bug is starting to grow a buddha belly - it's the biggest thing on her!

Out to dinner

Gigi came over for our first dinner out without Caleigh (actually we then took Caleigh to her house). My birthday was Tuesday so we went to Brixx for dinner. Here we are ready to go (sans Caleigh). We think going out alone without our 2 week old is a pretty big accomplishment. :) But we did kindof freak out on the way to the restaurant - it felt like we were forgetting something, or someone. But it was fun - happy 26th to me.

Great Grandparents!

Caleigh got to meet her great grandparents on Sunday - as you can tell from the pictures she was very excited. Caleigh went right to sleep in her great grandpa's arms - he shakes due to a WWII injury so I think she must have felt like she was in the car (which she loves). They were here all the way from Ohio (on their way to FL for the winter).

Bathtime!

We gave Caleigh another sponge bath today - she actually did much better with it than the first time around. As you can see she is a little happier now that she is wrapped back up. She did manage to pee through the towel and all over my shirt, just another initiation into parenthood. Me and Caleigh after her bath.

Look at the body in that hair! We didn't realize the true potential of her hair until after this bath. It looks like she put her fingers in an electrical outlet instead of her mouth! We absolutely love her hair though - it is super cute.

First week home pix

Here are some pictures of our first week home with Caleigh... Caleigh, if only you could figure out how to do this (sleep!) at night... Adam with our little snugbug... Enjoying some wide-eyed awake time, not much goes on when she is awake now.

Time to come home!

Well we came home from the hospital last night. Here are some pictures of our beautiful girl to commemorate the event. It is hard to believe you can accumulate so much stuff in a few days but that entire cart is ours. Our precious little snug bug looking very grown up in her car seat. Can't hardly see little Caleigh... A very proud father getting our girl situated in the car. It was a beautiful blue sunny day when we came home - Caleigh is smiling and asleep despite the light. It has been a little crazy since being home. But our little girl is worth it. (Although I am very very sleepy.)

The gory details

So we will break down the timeline of events for everyone who is curious. I was induced 4 days early just as a precaution because Caleigh had a loop of umbilical cord around her neck at our 19 week ultrasound. This caused us to see a maternal-fetal specialist, have several follow-up ultrasounds, and get a non-stress test (basically a heart rate/movement monitor) for Caleigh every week starting at 34 weeks. We now know that all of the concern about the umbilical cord was God's way of teaching us that there is no way that we can possibly have any control over Caleigh - that God alone is the One who keeps her safe, gives her life, brings her into this world, etc. So Sunday November 26th we packed our bags and put up our Christmas tree (sans decorations - no time) and headed into the hospital at 7:15 pm to be induced. When I got to the hospital I was not dilated at all nor was i effaced. I got Cervidil that night to help me to dilate and woke up at 4 am on Monday morning having contractions. I was 1 cm and the nurse moved us from the regular room to the labor and delivery room. They decided to hold off on Pitocin because my contractions were regular and frequent. I got some pain medicine around 6 am and this helped the pain a little - but mostly just made me really out of it. Around 7 am I was 3 cm but my contractions were slowing down so the doctor started Pitocin. My water broke on its own around 8 am. (I was initially convinced I was peeing in the bed, but glad to hear this was not the case). By around 9-10 am I started having back labor and dilated to 5 cm. I was in so much pain and was pretty much hysterical. I asked for the epidural around this time but the anesthesiologist was in with a C-section, so I had to wait. This was the worst time and it felt like forever. Finally they called another anesthesiologist in the hospital to come do my epidural and as he was preping me the L&D anesthesiologist came in. The epidural helped with the back labor and it took the edge off of the contractions in my abdomen. I went from 5 cm to 10 cm in a couple of hours but Caleigh was still high in the canal, at -3. They were concerned that I may have to have a C-section because she was so high. Thankfully, our nurse was awesome and had me push in some interesting position to help rotate Caleigh and bring her down. I started pushing around 1 pm (which actually was so much better than the contractions) and Caleigh was born at 1:28 pm. There were absolutely no problems with the cord during the labor and there was no cord around her when she was born - an answer to prayer! Her Apgars were 9 and 9 and she was totally healthy.

More pictures...

The proud grandparents came in to the delivery room shortly after Caleigh was born... Introducing Gigi and Gramps (names subject to change) - Lindsay's parents And Grandpa and Grandma Dyer - Adam's parents Approximately 24 hours old! So I am looking a little beat up in the pictures but Caleigh is looking so snugly and cute.

More pictures!

The beautiful new mom... Seriously, these are my parents? Is that poop on my foot?