Baby Walker's third week

We had another wonderful week! Baby Walker continues to be the best baby. He just eats and sleeps and doesn't fuss, what more could we ask for? He is a precious angel with the most content spirit. The twins are absolutely crazy about him now and all jealousy is out the door. They show the perfect amount of interest... you know, enough to love him but not too much to smother him. He is on a 3 hour feeding schedule, sometimes 2.5 depending on our day. He goes 4-5 hour stretches at night. He is our joy and has added so much to our family! I am still recovering, feeling much better but still low on energy. We haven't ventured out of the house much because I am pretty whooped still. We are loving adjusting to life as a family of 5 and feel so very blessed. Here was his third sweet week. 

 Hadley wearing my postpartum belly binder :)

Walker's Birth Story: Part One

Walker's birthday was a pretty unexpected one. It was May 1st and I was exactly 39 weeks. We schedule all of my OB appointments on Fridays since that is the day of the week that my weeks changed and it is Luke's off day and the twins have preschool on Friday's so each Friday morning we would enjoy a mini date and OB appointment. We dropped the kids off at preschool and headed to the chiropractor. We both go to the chiropractor twice a month for wellness appointments but with my pregnancy nearing the end, I had been going each week for relief of sciatica and back pain, which I hardly had any at the end of my pregnancy and I credit it all to my awesome chiropractor.
As you also my have read in previous blog posts, my greatest desire was to have Walker vaginally, after my C-section with the twins (VBAC.) Going to the chiropractor was also helping get my pelvis into alignment in hopes to give my body the best chance for VBAC as well.
We had gotten adjusted and had a little bit of time before our appointment so we stopped at chick-fil-a and I got a chicken biscuit because I was starving. We then headed over to the sprint store to get my new iPhone. I had been eligible for a new phone for quite some time and my old phone had no memory left, so taking a picture was nearly impossible to do, and I wanted to get a phone with more memory to take lots of pictures before Walker's arrival. After we got my new phone, we headed over to the hospital where my doctor's office is. We checked in and did the routine weight, blood pressure and urine sample. I was excited to get my cervix checked again because the week before I was at 1cm and 50% effaced. I was hoping for more progress in hopes of having this baby vaginally. He checked me first thing and told me that I was still at 1cm, I was more effaced than I was last week and baby had still not dropped. He then took out a tape measurer and measured my belly. He seemed concerned. He then told me that my uterus had grown three times more than it should have since last week. He gave me an ultrasound and discovered that my polyhydramnios (high amniotic fluid levels) had worsened and my uterus was much larger than it should be and was starting to get dangerously large and I was at risk for rupture. He said we probably needed to get this show on the road. I said "Like, this weekend?" and he then said "Like, today." It was 11am and I said "when?" He asked me when I ate last, which I told him the chick-fil-a biscuit about an hour before, so he told me to come back at 2pm and plan on a C-section at 4pm. I began to cry and asked him if induction was possible rather than a C-section. He explained to me that if I had progressed more, he would have considered it but to only be at 1cm, and if he had to break my water, my over-distended uterus would go from SO big to so small than my placenta was at risk from tearing off my uterine wall, which would cause me to bleed out completely in 20 mins. He said it would be much safer to do the C-section and with baby's giant head, he just felt it was all too risky. I tearfully agreed. I still think if I was with a midwife at a birth center I would have had a better chance of VBAC but I do love and trust my OB so I went with it. He told me it was a good day for a birthday, as it was his birthday as well. It also happened to be two of my very best friends birthday's, so it was happening, we were going to have a May Day baby!
My tears of disappointment begin to mix with tears of excitement as I realized we had 2 hours to go home and pack and figure out what to do with the twins so we could come back and meet baby Walker. My doctor told me not to eat or drink anything at all, and he would see me in a couple of hours. WHAT?! We were going to have this baby and today!!! He also told me how sorry he was he couldn't give me my VBAC but to trust him that this was our safest option. I just pushed the fact the I was having another C-section to the back of my head and I told Luke to call our amazing friend (who we call Gi-Gi for God-Grandmother) who was on standby to watch the twins. She was available to come and amazingly dropped everything to come watch the twins. We went to pick the twins up from preschool where I tearfully told the teacher what was going on. We went upstairs to Luke's office and told the people who were there working that friday and I began to go from tears to joy. We called our parents and our sister in law and texted our closest friends to let them know what was going on. I told my mom and dad to go ahead and try to get a flight for as soon as possible because the twins would need care as I knew we would be in the hospital for three nights. We felt so blessed to know our kids were in such great care with Gi-Gi until my parents could arrive the next day.  I packed the rest of my bag, shaved my legs and touched up my hair and makeup and it was time! Gi-Gi prayed over us and we were off! With much anticipation we were off to go meet our precious baby Walker...

Waiting for the doctor before I knew it was going to be baby day! 

Getting ready to leave my sweet babies.

Go time :)

Last Day of Preschool 2015

We were so blessed to have the twins in the most amazing Christian Pre-school we could ever have prayed for. This is not your average preschool, they do unbelievably fun and creative activities all while learning about Jesus. I could go on and on about the school itself and then my sweet Jack Henry and Hadley were placed in the Kangaroo class with the best teacher we could ever pray for, Ms. Beverly and her assistant Ms. Julia for the second half of the year, Ms. Jenn the first half. They learned SO many things about Jesus, about shapes, colors, seasons, they learned songs and they learned how to be a friend. You can read more about their first day here. As this last day approached I knew I would be so so sad. I cried on the first day as it began and I cried the last day, today. It FLEW BY WAY TOO FAST, I also couldn't believe I found out I was pregnant when the school year started, and now I grew and birthed sweet Walker at the end. I truly am so thankful for such amazing teachers who poured into and loved on my babies and I am thankful for the memories made and friendships cultivated for the twins. What a great school year being Kangaroos. It is one we will never forget. Their teacher cried saying goodbye and they sent us home with the most precious memory books and other keepsakes that ripped this momma's heart out. It was an emotional day but one we are thankful for. Here is to a fun and memory filled summer!  

Week two with baby Walker

Week two was another amazing week. Luke went into work Tuesday and Thursday while the twins were at preschool and this was our first week without family staying with us, simply as a family of 5 so we planned on this being our "transitional week." It was like finding a new normal, slowly, still with the help of my husband. I tried to do more myself this week since I knew this was my last week with Luke's help. I begin to feel more confident in my recovery and balancing all three children. Thursday came though, and this was Walker's first doctor's appointment. The plan was for all of us to ride to church where we would drop off the twins, and then I would hang out with Walker in Luke's office for about an hour until it was time for his appointment. However, I was feeling AWFUL that morning. I had run a really high fever all night and when I woke up it was almost 104. I felt awful. I had run a fever two nights before but had been without a fever for over 24 hours and then BOOM it was back. I was waking up totally soaking wet, but my body does that anyway post pardum, getting rid of all the extra fluid. But this time I knew it was a fever because my whole body ached. I knew I needed to call the doc because I was just 13 days post op and didn't want there to be an infection. I checked my incision, and it looked fine. My breasts were a little tender but I thought it wasn't abnormal for a new breast feeding mom, but after talking to my friend, she convinced me that I had mastitis. I was supposed to see my doctor the next day to have a normal 2 week incision check, so he wanted to wait and see me then and started me on an antibiotic just in case. I had faint redness on one side, and sure enough the next day, he confirmed that I had it. My milk supply is really good since my body is used to making milk for two and sweet Walker is often so full after one side, he wont touch the other, so milk was staying stagnant and getting backed up and thus the mastitis. I called my lactation consultant who gave me the go ahead to start pumping. After the medication and the pumping I begin to feel much better and now am pretty much totally healed. It was pretty HORRIBLE though, and I felt like I got hit by a truck, so I am very thankful to be on the other side of that! 
Walker's doctors appointment went perfectly. We had been unhappy with our pediatrician here, and never liked the twins's pediatrician in Cincinnati either, but the one I wanted to get in with here was only taking infants and their siblings, so I have been waiting to have another baby so we could switch everyone over, and we feel SO BLESSED to have this new doc. He is more holistic and just precious and we can't say enough good about him so far. Walker got weighed and he is now...

9lb 9oz (80th percentile)
Still at his birth length 21.5 inches (50th)
Head circumference (95th) hey its on the charts! 
Praising God for a perfectly healthy and happy baby.

My hormones are becoming more in control (yay!) and this little guy is just the SWEETEST! He still doesn't hardly cry. At night when we lay him down after a feed, he either quietly goes to sleep or he will fuss for 5 minutes or less. His cry starts out a whimper to a mad cry and then just stops, there is a break and he may start the same cycle over again or he may not. All I know is I always set an alarm for 10 minutes if he does fuss and he never makes it to the 10 minutes for me to intervene. He hit his first big night sleep stretch of 5 hours and he is just precious. 

We are SO in love and week 2 was a great week prepping me for my first solo week (which started today.) The twin's last day of preschool is tomorrow... TEARS, and life is just so sweet. Here are some week two pictures....

 Mother's Day 2015

 We got our newborn pictures taken, those are coming soon :)

Dr. New, my awesome OBGYN.

It was another great week.