Peri Jackson, Up All Night

Little Peri has been with us for four days now, and she's doing great. Yesterday she went to the doctor for her three-day check, and the doc was happy to report that she's right in the middle of the line for everything, and she's actually far below average for jaundice, which makes Grandpa happy to hear. Her sclerae are both beautiful white, and not blue or yellow like most. Her post partum weight loss and weight recovery are right on the gimbals.

And she's beautiful and inquisitive, as evidenced by the following video:

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We're working hard now to get the rest of our apartment in working order. Daddy's putting up shelves in Peri's room today and tomorrow so we can put up more of her things. Daddy likes making shelves.

Baby Peri, Rocking our Socks Off!

The last few days have been pretty tiring on us. The last few nights we'd been camping on the couch at night and falling asleep to cooking shows, because for a nice pregnant lady like Naomi, it's a lot more comfortable. Wednesday morning I woke up to her crying because she hadn't slept and was rather uncomfortable. I called up work and said to my boss "Baby", and got the day off. We had an appointment scheduled with our doctor and she suggested we induce. We ran home, got our stuff, and rolled over to the hospital to hunker down.

We've been here since then. They started Naomi with a balloon (a special catheter for induction). We waited around all day and contractions came and went. Later in the afternoon the balloon was pulled out and the Cervidil was started. All the while I was fielding phone calls and texts and was able to report exactly nothing.

Thursday morning came the Petocin, which usually does the trick. It wasn't until later in the evening that active labor happened. After a day and a half of pretend labor and pretty weak contractions (compared to what Naomi was having) the doctor recommended an epidural. That meant nap time for both of us. I woke up a couple times, once to see another epidural happen. Then we fell back to sleep.

Doctor woke me up by saying "time to push!" I snapped up and we went to work. After pushing for about and hour, a beautiful little baby came to the world! Peri Adeleine Althea Jackson was born at 4:32 on 22 July, 2011. She brought 8 lbs, 7 oz to the scale, 19.5 inches long. She's got blue eyes and curly blond hair. We're happy to report that she's doing well and in perfect condition.

Toes

Well, people have been asking, so I'd just like to say that I'm doing alright, the baby doesn't seem to plan on coming any time soon, and I'm off bed rest! Yay!

We also haven't heard from Purina  about that job in Iowa yet, so no good news, but no bad news either. I think Gary will give them a call sometime in the next week to get a definite answer. In any case, we're doing just fine where we are, though if anyone sees an engineering job suitable for Gary, let us know!

Mainly, we've been doing some packing at our house; getting ready for our move to the new place this weekend. We aren't planning to move all of it at once, since we have the whole month before we need to officially be out of there, but we want to have it done in the next couple weeks so we can have ample time for cleaning.

In something completely unrelated to anything, one night Gary was being silly and drew little faces on my toes as I sat on the couch. I of course returned the favor. There are X's on Gary's baby toes because Gary doesn't like them to be touched. He says it feels like they aren't on right, and they could fall off if you play with them too much. I'm sure he doesn't really believe that, but I leave them alone anyway.

Gary's faces on my toes

My faces on Gary's toes.

An Unexpected Turn

Last night was a pretty interesting night for us. We got to pre-register at the hospital before our Childbirth class, so everything is set up to go for when we have baby. We like Birthplace at Pullman Regional very much, they are so nice and they have a refrigerator full of snacks! This is very important.

So we're all nice and registered and this is where the fun happens! At around 6pm or so, just after we leave the hospital to go eat some dinner, I start to have cramping feelings in my back and tummy, accompanied by some sharp pains skittering around the edges. I didn't think too much of it at the time, because I feel these pains off and on every now and again, and they go away rather quickly once I change what I'm doing. This time they persisted all throughout dinner, and also through Childbirth class. By this time I'm not feeling so great, so at around 8:30pm we talk to our class nurse/teacher, and it is her expert opinion that we ought to take the long walk down the hall to the OB.

So we get there, we have all the instruments strapped to my tummy, baby seems to be doing fine, blood pressure is fine, but lo and behold, I'm having lots of contractions that don't seem to be Braxton Hicks.

The good news is: it doesn't seem to be pre-term labor at this point either. The contractions aren't getting more intense or closer together and they don't seem to be egging on the baby to get out of my tummy. For now, they've put me on modified bed-rest and I get to spend all my time at home doing nothing, which sounds great but in reality is quite boring.

In the end, the doctor gave me a drug that I can no longer remember the name of, and when I got home I slept like the dead and it was awesome. Unfortunately, it didn't stop the contractions from happening anymore,  as I can feel them going on right now. Hopefully they will subside on their own and baby will come out when she's supposed to, and not a day sooner.

I also wanted to say something great about Gary. He's so good to me. He was absolutely the best and held my hand and read me a story and was as concerned and attentive as he could be. He was calm and supportive during an ordeal that I'm sure was just as scary to him as it was to me. Peri is going to have the best Dad ever!