Grandma Laura Hammond

Here is a picture of Laura with her grandma, Laura Hammond, who she is named after.

When we were trying to choose a name, I couldn't get Peter to commit to any of the names that we were discussing. He just kept saying that he didn't just want to pick a name that was cute, but he wanted a name that had significance. One evening, we were discussing name ideas with his parents and Peter's mother mentioned "Laura." Ever since then, Peter was sure that was the name that we would choose. Luckily, I liked it as well.

We are happy to have our daughter named after such a wonderful woman and hope she follows in her Grandmother's footsteps.

Going Home From the Hospital

It was one of the weirdest experiences to leave the hospital. Not just because we couldn't believe that they would let us walk out with a baby that we had no idea how to take care of, but also because there was an extra little person in our family. When we came in on Friday, it was just Peter and me; on Sunday we left as a family of 3.

This is her all dressed up ready to go home. She doesn't look very happy here. Maybe she is scared that the hospital is sending her away with 2 inexperienced parents who don't know what they are doing.

She is all buckled up in her carseat that Daddy thinks Mommy spent way too much money on. I told him if he was that upset with having to buy a carseat, he could call my brother-in-law, Brent, who could teach him how to make a harness out of rope to strap her in with. It seems to work well with his children.

Laura Munk

Laura Munk, May 1, 6 lbs 7 oz

I went to the hospital on Thursday for a routine fetal NST monitoring appointment. During my visit, the nurse found that Laura had an irregular heart beat pattern, so she transfered me over to labor & delivery to be examined by a doctor. After 4 hours of monitoring and an IV stuck in my arm (I still don't know what the point of that was), they sent us home saying that everything seemed to be okay and telling us to come back the next morning for more monitoring. After being stressed out all night about the health of our baby, we called our doctor Friday morning and asked if we could be induced. She fit us in at 1:30pm. So yesterday morning we cleaned our house, packed our bags, rented a couple of movies, and left for the hospital to have our baby.

They started me on pitocin and after several hours of painless contractions, they broke my water to help speed along the process. This was followed by an epidural. That was the best thing that has ever happened to me. Don't ask me why some women choose to go natural. I was perfectly relaxed and calm and we spent the next several hours of labor hanging out with Peter's family in our room. I was so relaxed that Peter was even allowed to watch a basketball game, which I never would have imagined my husband would be doing while I was in labor!

By 10pm, the family was getting tired and the end still seemed several hours away. I was dialated to a 4 and 80 percent effaced. The nurse guessed the baby would be born sometime around 5am, so the family took off with plans to come back in the morning when things heated up. Meanwhile, Peter and I got ready to take a nap and rest up for labor. Around 10:15 the nurse came in to check and see how things were progressing and, much to her surprise, as well as ours, I was dialated to a 10. She called the doctor in and we were told it was time to start pushing. It seemed like up until this point, labor was way too easy, but I figured the pushing would make up for it. They told me that lots of first time mothers push for 1 to 2 hours. But, once again, things were way easier than expected. After 9 or 10 pushes, and no more than 10 minutes, the doctor said, "Push really hard on this next contraction and you are going to have a baby."

And that is exacty what happened. It's a good thing that it was over so quickly because Peter almost didn't make it. He was holding one of my legs and everytime I looked over at him his face was turned towards the back wall and he looked like he was going to faint. Not really the encouragement I was looking for from my labor partner.

So with in 10 hours of checking into the hospital we were blessed with a beautiful and healthy baby girl with brown fuzzy hair and the cutest nose I've ever seen. Since then she has continued to be the perfect baby and is nursing well and sleeping lots.

Thank you all for your prayers and

overDUE

The due date, April 27th, has come and gone. For the past several months, I have been counting down the days to April 27th. My planner at work has little X's crossing out each day and the 27th was a big and colorfuly marked goal that kept coming closer and closer with each X. Now, there is an X over the 27th as well. It was very anti-climatic.

I continue to cross out days, although I am not quite sure what I am counting down to, but I know that I can't have this big belly forever. At some point, something has got to happen. Although it sometimes feels like it, I know pregnancy can not be a permanant condition.

Meanwhile, Peter is happy that I am still able to go to work and earn more money and he is still able to study for his finals with out trying to balance school with being a new dad. Peter told me all along he wanted our daughter to wait until after his finals are done, May 6th, and it looks like that may just be what happens.

I haven't felt any contractions at all and think I should be more uncomfortable or in pain if anything was going to happen anytime soon. Yesterday, I decided to do my part to bring on labor and so every hour, on the hour, I hiked up from my basement office to the fifth floor of our building. By the end of the day, several of my coworkers had joined in with me. Unfortunantly, the only thing it did was make my calves ache. So this morning when I woke up, it wasn't with just a sore back but with aching legs. Well, I guess if it doesn't induce labor, it can't hurt to work on toning up my legs.

The doctor encouraged us to set the induction for this Friday, but I really want the baby to come on her own. So we put off the induction date till next Thursday, May 7th, the day after Peter's last final.

I hope this picture is not inappropriate, but I think it is so funny. Peter and I are both amazed at how big my belly has grown over the last several months. Peter wanted to make sure that we knew just how big it really is so he had me hold the chapstick to act as a scale.

The good news is that besides the fact that the suspense and the waiting is killing me, I don't feel as miserable as people told me I would feel at the end. I still have lots of energy and am still enjoying the big belly that is a constant reminder that there is a real baby inside of me. I love feeling her move around, and especially love the constant hiccups. I can't believe how often this baby has the hiccups! Best of all, I love the excitement of knowing that it could happen any day and the constant thinking and dreaming about what our baby will look like and what it will be like to be a mother.

Mom Jeans Baby Shower

My friend Angela and my sister Alainna threw a baby shower for me and the theme was Mom Jeans. (If you are not familiar with this term, I recommend you watch the Saturday Night Live clip http://www.hulu.com/watch/10333/saturday-night-live-mom-jeans ). I guess they think that now I am having a baby, my body will permanantly change so that I have to start wearing a new style of jeans!

Were these jeans really ever in style or did just a few fashion oblivious mothers wear them because they were more comfortable? There couldn't possible be a time in our recent history when it was fashionable to have the long bum look, right?



As you can see, both Lainna and Angela are sporting the long bum look here.

I think I will send this picture to Lainna's husband who seems to be out of town more than he is home. How will he be able to stay away with such an enticing picture of what he is misssing out on?

My co-workers came to the mom jeans party and gave us a pack-n-play which will be our daughter's permanant bed for the next several months. I had these great plans for painting an old crib, sewing her a quilt and fixing up a cute little room for our baby. But Peter doesn't want to give up his "office" and we don't want to collect a bunch of baby furniture that we will have to move across the country with us in August when we go to law school. So I hope our daughter doesn't have any expectations for a high standard of living. I still don't know how she is going to survive the summer months living in an apartment where the bedroom reaches 95 degrees and doesn't cool down at night.

We are down to 4 more weeks until our due date. I can't believe how close we are to the end and I keep trying to imagine what it will be like to have our baby outside of my belly. I have never been so excited for anything in my whole life!

My Baby's Quilt

I had so much fun making this rag quilt for my baby. It was the easiest and fastest quilt I have ever made. These are the simple instructions I wish I would have had so I wouldn't have had to figure it out along the way.

1) Buy twice as much printed flannel fabric as plain flannel fabric which will be used for the batting (The inside flannel will show so make sure you choose a color that matches)
2) Cut out 5''x5'' squares of fabric (Or whatever size you want the squares to be)
3) Place printed fabric right sides facing out with plain flannel square in the middle creating a 3 layer square
4) Sew an X through each 3 layer square
5) Lay out squares on the floor and arrange them into your desired quilt pattern
6) Sew squares into strips with the seams on one side of the strip
7) Sew strips together , once again keeping seams on one side of the quilt
8) With scissors, cut the seams making small cuts as close together as possible
9) Wash the quilt so that the seams fray


The only thing I wish I could have changed would be the thickness of the blanket. Next time I make a quilt like this, I think I might add an extra layer of plain flannel in the middle to make the quilt a little thicker. I can't wait to wrap my baby in this!