Avery James Harrell - Oct 8, 2009

Avery was born Oct 8th at 1:44AM. He was 8lbs 15oz and 20.75 in long. He was a stubborn "little" baby and didn't quite want to come out. After having contractions since 3am about 10 mins apart (not bad ones at all), then going into full blown labor around 5:30PM (went from 4cm to 8cm between 5PM and 7PM), and pushing for an hour and half, the doctor said that it could still be awhile or he could use the vacuum/suction thing. I was all for that! 3 contractions later and Avery was here!

We had a great experience at the hospital. All the nurses were super helpful and kind. I would definitely recommend giving birth at Good Samaritan. Avery was born in the early hours of Thursday morning. We got to the "mom/baby room" around 4am after they weighed him, bathed him, tried getting breastfeeding started, etc. We stayed at the hospital until mid morning on Friday.

28 Weeks!!!!

Wow.. I'm an awful blogger.. so much has happened since my last post! I'll try to remember as much as possible without making this too terribly lengthy.

BOSTON - Back in May, Dylan and I went to out to Boston for a few days. We never ended up taking a honeymoon, so that's what we considered this trip. We had a ton of fun walking around the city, going to 2 Red Sox games, and seeing Pooja and Gentry. The baseball games at Fenway were pretty awesome. I love going to the games with that incredible atmosphere where everyone in the park is in tuned and excited about what's going on in the game (something that doesn't happen often at Rockies games :)) Sorry.... no pictures.. they are on Dylan's work computer right now.

21 WEEK ULTRASOUND - IT'S A BOY!!!!

The ultrasound was pretty crazy. We could see all of his fingers and toes. It was probably one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. When the ultrasound tech was trying to get a picture of his face, he kept covering his face up with his arms and hands - we could see all this on the ultrasound!

In light of having a baby boy, we are going to do a Cubs nursery. I just ordered the wallpaper border for the room tonight so I can start picking out the paint and getting the room decorated.

4th OF JULY - We took to dogs out to Dylan's mom's place in the Black Hills for the weekend. The dogs loved getting to run around and watch us play boche ball. We enjoyed taking the ATVs out in the national forest and spending some good quality time outside. We have some cool pics from our ATVing, but I can't find them on the computer right now, so they must also be on D's work computer.

2 YEAR WEDDING ANNIVERSARY!! - July 14th was our 2 year anniversary. We celebrated it by having a nice dinner at home and watching a movie together. I can't believe its already been 2 years! Here are some pictures from our anniversary - including pictures of my crazy belly!

MIKE and KRISTEN'S WEDDING - Last weekend we had a great time at Mike and Kristen's wedding. The ceremony and the reception were both beautful! Other than dancing with Dylan for one song, I didn't dance much because my back was sore (not sure if that is due to the extra 30lbs I'm carrying or from the belly pulling on my back).. It was still a great time and it looked like everyone was enjoying themselves.

NOW - I feel like my belly is getting bigger and bigger everyday. Each day Avery is a little more active. Right now, I'm watching my belly move from side to side because of his moving around. With how my belly is moving it looks like there is an alien inside trying to escape! I can actually touch my belly where he's at and its hard from the foot that's kicking me or the butt that's sticking out. Feeling and seeing him move like this almost starts to give this baby a personality.

So, that's a quick run by of life since my last blog..

Reunion with Roomies (minus Ceci :( )

A little pregnancy update - currently in week 15. This is the first week that I haven't felt sick or been sick! Progress!!! The baby bump means that a lot of my shirts don't look so good on me anymore.. need to start buying some clothes that fit. Seriously.. I will put up a picture soon. The only one I have is about a week old and doesn't do the bump justice.

Last weekend, Dylan went to Vegas for a bachelor party, so I went to DC to meet up the roomies. It was great to see everyone. I hadn't seen Megan nor Anna K since my wedding, so that was awesome to final see them! It was also great to Anna C and Lauren again. Unfortunately, Ceci is working in South Carolina and was unable to make our little reunion.

I flew into National on Friday evening. Anna C picked me up and we went back to her house. Her and I just spent the evening taking it easy, chatting, and catching up. In the morning we went to Giant to get food for our afternoon picnic. Lauren and Anna K then met up with us and the four of us drove to Fredericksburg to meet up with Megan. We picked up Meg at the meeting space - where we ooed and awwed at her ring!!! CONGRATS MEGO! It was exciting to hear all about her boy and the engagement!

We drove around and found a historic site/battlefield. We set up our picnic in the foundation of one of the old buildings. It was a great spot - grassy and shady. The shade was definitely needed since the temp was in the 90s. Everything was great about the picnic, catching up on what everyone is doing, the food, the place, the weather. It just makes me miss everyone. I wish we could all get together more often.

The only problem with having a picnic at a historic site, are the guided tour groups. A couple groups came by and stared at the foundation that we were sitting in for about ten minutes each.. a little bit awkward. We just kept our voices down and let the groups stare at us..

Driving back from Fredericksburg, we stopped in and saw my grandma. We hung out with her and socialized in her apartment for a little. It was great to get to see her.

All of us (except Meg, who had gone back to Richmond after the picnic) went back to Anna C's. We relaxed for a bit and then got ready to go out. One of Anna C's colleagues was a having a birthday get-together/wig party. I didn't have a wig, but it turned out that probably half the people or more didn't wear wigs. We went to the get together and just hung out and chatted some more.

Sunday morning I got up, went to the airport and came home. It was a great weekend and I was so happy to see everyone. I'm glad that we were all able to make the time to spend the day together!

The Heartbeat!

I'm now 13 weeks along.. I think I'm starting to feel better and I seem to have a little more energy (haven't found myself asleep by 8:30 too recently). I thought I was over feeling nauseous because I've felt pretty good the last few days. I've even gotten hungry instead of just feeling like if I don't eat I'm going to be sick. But then I was feeling a little sick today. So, I guess I'm not completely past this first trimester burden, but I feel like I'm definitely making progress!

I'm starting to get a baby bumb! Crazy, I know! Its really little, but its definitely a bump. Maybe I'll get a picture this weekend to share. For now you just have to believe me :).

We went to the doctor today. I'd gained 1lb since my last visit which was 4 weeks ago. From what I remember reading, that's actually what the weight gain is supposed to be in a month at this point - so not too bad. At the appointment, we just went through the results from the blood work that they did last time. All was good news :). Then we got to hear the little racing heartbeat!!! It took her a minute to find it with the doppler thing. She had warned us that sometimes it takes a sec when the baby is still this small. Even so, the 20 seconds or whatever it took to find the heartbeat was pretty nerve racking. I don't know how much of my nerves was the fear of there not being a heartbeat and how much I was just super excited to hear it. Anyway, she found it and she said it was beating at the right rate. Its crazy how fast that thing beats. It was 150 something a minute... I think.. unfortunately I can't remember exactly. Afterwards, Dylan and I were eating lunch and he was telling me how when he heard it, he couldn't help but to just smile :)

The Pregnancy Test

The one faint pink line;

Google required for proof;

Baby on the way!

I started feeling a little different about two weeks before my period was even due. I just felt like I had a bug of some kind - headache, nausea, etc.. After about a week of this, I started to think.. maybe.. could it be.. I don't normally feel like this... hmmm.. I began secretly looking up early signs of pregnancy and it seemed to fit. I mentioned this to Dylan and he thought it was all psychological - with the idea that I can make myself feel sick - he didn't think anybody would feel sick that soon. Since this was the first month that we began trying, I could understand his doubts, because I kind of thought he might be right. Then again, I knew that something wasn't right.. Then my boobs started growing.. Dylan noticed this and knew I couldn't just think them to grow.

Finally, after two L O N G weeks of waiting, I bought a pregnancy test. Their accuracy doesn't get up into the 90's% until a day or so before your period is due, prior to then its likely to give false negatives. So, I waited until my period was due the next day - I was convinced I was pregnant at this point and if I got a false negative, I didn't want to hear "I told you so". I stopped on the way home from work to buy the test - I got a two pack of course! Dylan had mentioned earlier in the day that if I wanted to buy a pregnancy test, I should go for it. I didn't tell him that I'd actually bought one, I just took the stick into the bathroom when I got home. I came back out with it after a minute or two... with a very confused look on my face. I shove the stick in his face, "is that one line or two?!?!?!". The one line is a control and turns pink from peeing on it if you are pregnant or not. The second line (and the important line) ONLY turns pink if you are pregnant. Well.. I could see where the line was, but it definitely wasn't bold like the control line. He just looked at me and told me to google it. So, I did. The result was - a line is a line, no matter how faint it is! There was definitely a line.. but really, is that as dark as its going to get?? We both had these huge smiles on our faces, but they were nervous smiles because we still couldn't believe it. For a split second I debated running to the store and buying a different brand to double check the result. Instead, we read all the pamphlet - because maybe it would be inspiring. It did tell us one more thing - if the result is negative, the result will disappear off the stick in 10 minutes, a positive result will last 48 hours. Two hours later, the result was still there.

The next day after work, Dylan suggest that I use the second pregnancy test. I know that you can't get a false positive on a pregnancy test because you either have the hormone or you don't. I just told him that I'd use it if he wanted me to. He seemed to think it would be good just to make sure. It ended up being the same story.. the second line was still fainter than the constant line.. but there were 2 lines!

That's the story of my pregnancy test... I can definitely understand those commercials that talk about so many people misreading the results. Prior to this, I thought those commerical were crazy - how tough can it be to read 1 or 2 lines, a plus or minus, etc.. Little did I know.

Bittersweet - Good bye WRX

Dylan and I made the big decision over the weekend to get rid of my car. Its bittersweet because I'm very sad to let go of my car - its been great to me.. and fun.. and fast... But this allows us to save up money to buy a car and hopefully not have a payment - which is good both with the state of the economy and with the baby on the way. I'm not sure what we'll end up getting at this point, but we aren't planning on buying anything soon. For the time being, I'm super cool driving Dylan's mom's 1997 Dodge Caravan. I look about as cool in it as I feel driving it. Its quite a change from the Subie, but I am definitely very thankful that we are able to use it and go some time without a car payment. We may even wait until after the baby comes and see how much space we need with the wheelchair, car seat, and stroller in the car.

The other big event of the weekend was Captain's bath. Somehow he knew as soon as I went into the bedroom what he was in for. He went straight for his bed and laid there. I would tell him to come and he'd just look at me like I'm crazy. Then he just rolled on his side and played dead. He's never this calm normally.. Its just his defense mechanism - dead weight is definitely harder to drag to the tub than a rambunctious dog. I finally tricked him into the tub using a treat - that dog is a sucker for anything he can eat. Most of the time he just acts as a mop and tries cleaning the kitchen floor in case there is the slightest residue of food on the floor.. probably why his breath always stinks so bad. Anyway, I finally get him in the tub and give him a bath. Of course he is filthy because that dog just attracts dirt. We had gone to the dog park and apparently there was only one good place to lay down - in the mud puddle. So now, he's all clean from his bath and I put him outside to dry (for those of you that don't live here, it was in the 70s on Sunday). By the time I get the bathroom back in order and go out to help dry him off some more, he's already walked all in the dirt so his feet and ankles were covered in dirt! So much for all the hard work and giving the dog a bath..

My First Blog

Recently, things have been going really well for Dylan and I. We found out several weeks ago that I'm pregnant! I'm now 9 weeks pregnant. We went to the doctor last Thursday saw the baby on the ultrasound. It didn't really look too much like a baby, but was still super exciting. We saw the a little flicker in the chest, which the nurse told us is the heartbeat! So, the baby's heart is already beating, but we don't get to hear it on the doppler until next month. The little guy/girl was 2.31 cm - its hard to believe something so tiny can be so life changing

This is a picture of the baby - Dylan took this of the ultrasound monitor with his phone. I should really scan print-out for better quality, but you get the point: (The dotted line over the baby was for measuring)

I've definitely felt the morning sickness. I feel like calling it morning sickness is very unjust since it lasts the entire day. Very few foods sound good to eat which is unfortunate since eating is the one thing that helps with the nausea. I am very thankful though that Dylan has been so patient with me. He's handled my crazy mood swings leading me to cry before work because I have nothing to take for lunch, my not wanting to do anything because I just feel sick and know I'll be miserable, and my utter exhaustion. I offered him the husband of the year award, but he turned it down because he thought it was too much pressure to live up to... so far, even without the award, he's doing a great job.

I've debated on whether or not I want to know the sex of the baby. I always thought that I would want to wait, but now, I want to know. That way I can decorate the baby's room before the baby gets here - and if its a girl I work on avoiding Dylan's desire for a Cubs nursery :). We'll find out if its a boy or girl around the first week in June when I go in for an ultrasound.

So.. that's my first ever blog!