Things I am loving...

I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something you can be thankful for..no matter how simple it is.


I am loving the weather improving and I love the spring flowers that are blooming.   I have very pretty daffodils and sweet smelling freesias in my garden that I love to pick and dot through my house.

I am loving that I am using cloth nappies on my little bubba.  Not full time use yet but half the time over the last four days.  Not too sure why this gives me a buzz but it does.  We normally fill a shopping bag with nappies every two days and our wheelie bin (rubbish) is full every week.  I am hoping this won't be the case from now on.

Eva rocking the cloth

I am loving the flowering kowhai tree on the curbside of our house.  There was a tui playing in it yesterday which was lovely to see as there are not too many tui's in our area.

I am loving shopping bargains!!  I got two zip front sweatshirt jackets for the bargain price of $22!!!  Marked down from around $60 each and then both were half price!

I am loving the new Baby Whisperer Book.  I was having problems with Eva's sleeping during the day.  For a week she hardly slept during the day and was a nightmare at night.   After purchasing this book I feel like I have some new things I can do to help get Eva to sleep and help me to feel a bit more in control (not of her just the situation).

And I am loving my husband.  Not only is he a great Dad, he came home with some beautiful flowers for me this evening.

Given to me for being a great Mum

 Have a great week everyone!!

THINGS I AM LOVING...

I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something you can be thankful for..no matter how simple it is.

 Short entry this weekend,

I am loving little bubba sleepy cuddles...

I am loving bath time.  Our wee girl is a water baby and loves bath time.

Another thing I love is sleep, but unfortunately I am not getting much.  Oh sleep how I miss you so.

Words of wisdom...

Being a new Mum is hard.  There is so much to learn and so many new things to tackle.  Things no one tells you about.  Things books cannot prepare you for.

Everyone who is a mother has some form of advice to pass on to you as a new mother.  Some of this advice is old, some new to you and then you get some advice that you already knew but in your moment of tiredness had forgotten for a second.

I love hearing words of encouragement apposed to words of advice.  I am a different mother to everyone else and my experience is unique.  If I need help/advice I will ask for it.  And I might ask Dr Google or I might ask you.

I am part of a Facebook group for women who were due to give birth in July.  This group has been invaluable to me.  Both during my pregnancy and after the birth of Eva.
Advice, support and funny stories are shared on a daily basis and I feel like I have struck up a friendship with so many of the women, women I have not even met in 'real life'.  These women are my go to ladies for advice.  You get so many points of view but you don't get the pressure and you don't get the judgement.
There are a lot of first time mother on this page and one second time around Mum posted some words of encouragement and a lot of us Mums (both new and not so new) appreciated hearing it.

Here it is...

Just wanted to say that at this stage I think of our babes to still be in the 'fourth trimester' as in they are barely able to fathom why they are no longer in our nice warm tummies, why they now have to work for food rather than have it via a tube and why we, and the noise, keep disappearing when we put them down in bed. 

I guess I wanted to reassure first time mums that they do feed constantly...for days. They might just doze on you between feeds. They might not settle in the bassinet because it's strange, doesn't smell like you and is quiet with no beating heart etc. They will change their routine as soon as you think it's sorted because they'll have a growth spurt, or their sleep cycles will extend or they'll learn to roll over. 

If feeding to sleep works for you, do it! If putting them down asleep works, do it! If they sleep on you for four hours, then learn how to go to the loo using just one hand...hehe it's hard work! But just do what ever you have to do to stay sane, get your baby fed and you some sleep. Don't worry that you're teaching them bad habits or they'll never settle themselves. You won't and most babies aren't properly capable of self settling until much older. Or even if they self settle now at 6months it might go out the window and you'll have to try a new method. 

Every baby is different and what works for you is the best thing to try. The feeding at this stage is mind bogglingly taxing but soon these early months will be a distant memory. I don't have the answers so feel free to ignore me but us mums are doing an awesome job, you're not doing anything wrong and many babies are just crying, spilling, feeding little beings at this stage. :

This made me feel better for the fact the only way I can get Eva to sleep is for her to fall asleep on me and then I ease her into her own bed.  Something I wish could change, but she is only three weeks old (today) and it is something I am going to tackle in the coming weeks when she is not so little.  

Another Mum shared the link to this blog, 

http://nurshable.com/2012/07/19/the-wio-wait-it-out-method-of-sleep-training/

And this also gave me encouragement in what I am doing.  No advice given, it just made me feel like I am not a bad Mother and setting my child up to have bad habits later in life. 

So advice; I take it with a grain of salt.  I have become very good at nodding and smiling when advice is given when I don't really need it or agree with it (I think 40 weeks of pregnancy prepares you).  I know who to ask if I do need help with anything and I know who not to ask.  I know who is going to give practical advice and who is not.  I also know that as a Mum I have to trust myself and my own ideas and my own gut, if I trust that I will never be let down.    

Things I am loving...

I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something you can be thankful for..no matter how simple it is. 

There is so much I am thankful for at the moment and this post could be long so I am just going to pick out a few of the special things in my life at the moment.

Firstly the biggest thing I am loving is my wee girl, Eva Grace.  I have never known a love like this before.  She is the most special wee button and brings me so much joy.
Her 'smiles', her cuddles, falling asleep on me, her head of hair, her deep blue eyes, her super cute nose and ears, I just love everything about this girl!!!

Me and my girl.  Oh and our 5 foot teddy bear that my husbands Dad got for Eva from America!!

Two weeks old on Thursday

Secondly and also related to Eva, I am loving bath time.  Eva seems to be a real water baby and she just loves her bath time.  I love this time we have as a family (I am sure it will become a chore and will be something I will not enjoy at some point).  We have the Rockabye Baby CDs going and we bath, sing to and massage our wee girl and she relaxes and really loves it. 

In the bath, looks like she is concentrating...

My gorgeous little lady after her bath

I am LOVING our amazing friends and family.  I have only had to cook one or two times over the last few weeks since Eva was born and the presents that turn up on our doorstep are a sight to behold.  Eva is the most spoilt girl in the world and she is too young to even know.  We have had handmade knitted cardigans, hats, booties, blankets given to us as presents, the cutest girls clothes (which is great because the sex of our baby was a surprise and all the clothes we had were boring neutral colors) and as I said dinners!!!  What a treat for our wee bubba, and Mum and Dad. 

Some of the beautiful knitting we have received.  She does not look too impressed with the camera in her face (again!!)

I am also loving my husband.  He is such a great Dad and Eva (and I) love him to pieces.  He dotes on his little girl and wants to do the very best that he can by her.  High five to my husband.

Eva and her Daddy

Have a great week everyone!

The Mummy Club...

It is a very interesting time for my husband and I at the moment.  Our wee girl is such a big focus for us at the and we are learning something new every day.

As a couple we attended antennal classes and gained a lot from these.  I read some baby books and have read numerous articles in baby magazines but nothing can prepare you for your baby screaming in pain in the early hours of the morning!  Dr Google has been used a lot in the last week and a half as a way of trying to decipher what might be wrong with our upset wee girl as well as ways of easing discomfort.

There are so many things you don't know about when it comes to newborn babies.  You know that at this stage all they do is sleep, poo and feed. But you don't know about colic, reflux, side sleeping, swaddling, sleep cycles, babys fourth trimester and other things.  There is a lot to this baby wrangling business.

I thought I would share some things that I have learnt over the last week that have been beneficial to us and our sanity.

I had no idea about newborn baby sleep cycles and now that i have a bit more of an understanding of them I am able to help Eva sleep more during the day.

I have learnt that http://www.thesleepstore.co.nz/ is a wealth of information when it comes to helping get your child sleeping better.  They even have clips on you tube showing various things related to settling and sleep, http://www.youtube.com/thesleepstore.

I have learnt about The Happiest Kid On The Block.  This was recommended by my brother and his partner.  The Doctor who came up with this shows a range of techniques used to settle newborn babys. So far what we have used has been good.  I also came across the website yesterday and plan to have a good look through it at some stage, http://www.happiestbaby.com/.

I have learnt that you can go into motherhood with lots of ideas in your head of what you want to do and what you do not want to do.  I did not want to use a dummy with Eva, I did not want her sleeping with us, I did not want her to fall asleep on us, I did not want to use white noise etc.  Well...

A dummy has been in use a number of times, Eva is a sucky baby, she came out of me sucking her hand!!  A dummy at times does help to get her to sleep but at this stage it is not a necessity.  As someone said it is easier to take a dummy away then a thumb.   And being a thumb sucker until I was twelve, I agree!

Eva has slept with us for an hour or so a few times on nights when she has not been settling well.  This happened more in the first week of her being home.  She is better now at doing down in her own bed.

As for babys sleeping on us, they are so small.  They are comforted by being closer to us and hearing our heartbeat, smelling us.  And what is more special then your lovely wee one falling asleep on you??  I love it, don't encourage it but at this stage when she is little I think it is fine.

And then we come to white noise.  Before having Eva I did not understand it.  Now we have a cd and a downloaded track on an iPod in Evas room for day sleeps, and it is on repeat.  It calms her and helps her to settle to sleep.  Before I just thought it was a gimmick and thought that it would be yet another thing that you would have to attempt to wean your child from.

Another thing I have learnt is how great Infacol and Kids Calm are, and possibly Colimed when I give it a chance.
Our wee one has been suffering from Colic and infacol helps to bring up those pesky burps that don't want to surface and well kids calm is just a magic potion that can be used in many different circumstances.  I will be recommending it to other mothers and mothers to be any chance I get.

Two weeks on on the 9th of August.  And yes that is a big smile.  We get a lot of these.  She is so beautiful!!!!

I love being a member of the Mummy Club.  My wee girl is so special.  She makes me go all gooey and I just want to hug her and give her little kisses all day long.  She is now two weeks old and is growing so much and changing every day.

IT'S BEEN A WHILE...

It has been a while since I have posted on my blog.
Since my last post I have given birth, I love being a Mum, there is no other love quite like it.
I thought I would start back by sharing my birth story.  I am part of a Facebook group for pregnant women due in July and have enjoyed reading some of their very personal and individual birth stories.  I decided to take their lead and write my own.

My due date was the 17th of July.  My due date came and went and as each day went on I was feeling bigger and more uncomfortable. 

Part of me wanted just to have my baby and get it over and done with but to be honest the other half of me was really nervous and apprehensive and kinda liked that baby was still inside me for a wee bit longer.

I had a midwife appointment a week and one day after my due date.  At this appointment I was hooked up to a monitor to check baby's heart rate etc and my midwife filled out all the paperwork to book me in for an induction.  

At this appointment I decided to have a stretch and sweep to try and get things going.   On the day of my appointment I happened to have woken up that day with a really sore back (something I had not experienced at all through my pregnancy) and the stretch and sweep was painful because of this.  My midwife said that my cervix was still long and thick so not to get my hopes up, in terms of the stretch and sweep encouraging labour.  I felt kinda disappointed but calm in the fact that I had an induction booked and I knew in a week I would definitely have my baby. 

At the end of the appointment my midwife noticed that there was an abnormality with baby's heart rate and at one point it had gone down to 90 beats per minute and she was going to contact the hospital and get back to let me know if I needed to go into hospital to be monitored. 

Meanwhile, before hearing back from her I had made an appointment to see my chiropractor that afternoon so he could adjust my back.  He is a friend of mine and we were joking that he might adjust me and my waters would break or he would at least get things going and I would have my baby that night.   I felt really good after my appointment and had a bit of relief rom the discomfort I was feeling. 

After my appointment we headed to the hospital at 3pm, taking the hospital bags just in case they decided to induce me that night.  Before going to the hospital I had noticed that I was still bleeding from the stretch and sweep and that I had passed a few clots when going to the bathroom.  I thought this might just be part of the course as such.

We spent 3 and a half hours at the hospital with my wee baby moving around so much that they could not get a regular heartbeat.  It had gone from 90 beats per minute to the higher end of the scale.   The nurse was happy that the baby was moving and even though my baby's heart rate was on the high side everything did seem ok so I went home. 

I bled for the rest of the evening, I thought that this might be the start of something but did not want to get my hopes up only to have everything stop.  Later that night while reading in bed I felt my first contraction it was at 10.20pm and felt another 20 minutes later.  

At this time my back pain returned and the contractions were rather painful but I was still able to doze on and off for a few hours.

It got to around 1pm and I could not stay in bed any longer, my back was far too painful and I did not want to wake my husband.  I didn't think there was any point in him being up watching me wince in pain.  

For the next four hours I noted down each cramp/contraction and waddled to and from the microwave reheating my wheat pack to help with the pain.  

At 5pm my back pain had become excruciating and I could not deal with it on my own anymore.  I woke my husband who sprung into action.  

By this time the contractions were 5 minutes apart for around 3 or 4 contractions and then the next two or three would be around 10 minutes apart then the next set would be stronger. 

By 7.30am I was not dealing with things very well at all, I tried so many different positions to ease the pain in my back but nothing would make it subside.  I  did not think my contractions were far enough apart to ring my midwife but the pain I was in was too much to bear so my midwife was contacted. 

We were to meet the midwife at the hospital at 9am which meant we were going to have to drive through rush hour traffic to get me to the hospital.   

The drive was pretty awful, small bumps in the road were unbearable and each red light felt like an eternity.   I am unsure of what the cars around us thought let alone people who walked or cycled passed.  

We finally arrived at the hospital at 9am and my midwife arrived at 9.30am (traffic was heavy).  

On her arrival I was checked and I was 5cm dilated.  My midwife assumed that the position of the baby was the cause of my back pain and she said that it should ease as I went along because baby will probably move.  Initially my goal was to have a labour that was as natural as possible however with the excruciating back pain there was no way that this was going to be possible.  I had a shot of pethidine while in the shower and this helped a wee bit with pain.  By this time I had tried the gas but to tell you the truth it did nothing to help me at all.  

The bath was run and I spent some time in there attempting to ride out the pain, this did give me some relief until the pressure started building (what a strange feeling that is!!) 

During the bath I vomited three times (caught in cups by my doting husband) and I feel like everything after that was a bit of a blur.  I really do believe it is due to the pain I was in with my back.  I think that if I did not have this pain I would have handled the whole experience a lot better.  The only way I can explain the back pain is like being slashed along my lower back over and over.  I cannot believe I only swore once, or twice!!! 

Things I do remember, 

• We discussed an epidural and I decided I would have one because I did not know how I was going to handle the rest of the labour.  I thought I could still be going for hours and hours. All the anaesthetists were busy and my midwife said I was not far off pushing so I decided not to have one.   A decision I am super happy with.
• I remember always using my manners with everyone, I needed to centre myself and by still saying thank you and please I felt like I was still in some form of control (does that sound silly?)
• I was hooked up to an IV so I could get some fluids into me, apparently they had huge difficulty finding a vein and had difficulty keeping me still because after each contraction I would have stabby back pain. 
• My waters were broken with the amnihook at 11.17am 
• When pushing I had to close my eyes and focus so much because of my back, I was so worried I was going to burst a blood vessel!!!
• Also when focussing on pushing I could not have anyone touching me and I told the trainee midwife in no uncertain terms not to touch me, then followed that up with, I am sorry, I know you are lovely but I just cannot have that at the moment.  Who says that crap when they are giving birth??!!!!
• I also yelled at midwife because I thought she was pushing baby back in me when she was doing something fancy to stop me from tearing when I was pushing.
• I remember saying with great feeling, "I cannot do this anymore!!!!"  followed by a determined, "lets get this baby out of me"!!  

To cut my already very long story short my baby was born at 1.32pm, four and a half hours after arriving at hospital.  The placenta was birthed less than five minutes later. 

I had one stitch because I was grazed when baby came out because she had her arm up around her head, just to make things that wee bit harder for her Mum. 

We were excited to find out we had a healthy baby girl, I was a bit taken back because throughout my pregnancy I was adamant I was having a boy.  She weighed 7.7 pounds and was 51 cm in length.

Funnily enough, the pain in my back was not due to the position of the baby, I am just a really lucky person who experiences this when giving birth.  As soon as baby was born the pain stopped and I have not had an ounce of pain since.   It is hard to know if the pain I woke up with was the star of things or just a coincidence, hard to know if my chiro adjustments did it (doubt that very much), stretch and sweep or a combination of all things.

After giving birth for the next hour or so my midwife filled out paperwork, I showered and my husband fell in love with our gorgeous wee girl.  

Just before 4pm we walked (I did not want to be in a wheelchair) down to the entrance and I waited there while Andy got the car.  It was a very surreal feeling.  I had strangers coming up to me asking me about my baby and they were all very suprised I had had her only 2 and a half hours earlier.    They all commented on how well I looked (they were being kind, I looked like crap!) and obviously how cute our wee girl was.  

From the moment I saw Eva it was love.  She is a chilled out wee thing and melts my heart, even when she is crying at stupid o'clock in the morning.  I cannot wait for the new chapter of our life to begin and cannot wait to see the person that she will become in the future.

My wee girl about 20 minutes after being born.

Butter woud not melt in her mouth

Is this a smile?  Already?????

Pretending to sleep at one week old.