A video made by mommy from Andie's "Birth"day:
My pregnancy with Andie was pretty simple and peaceful. It started rough with a lot of nausea, sickness and running fast to get sick many times a day. It lasted exactly 17 weeks. By 18 weeks, this mama was feeling pretty good. The start of this pregnancy was just like our first, but otherwise it was quite different. From how I carried little miss Andie, to the smooth sailing pregnancy we had. Other than being congested everyday of my pregnancy with this little peanut - all was well and we were so glad. :)
We were pretty sure another little girl was on the way for us, but the day we found out - we were so thrilled!
Another sweet girl, a little sister for Quinn - everything we had imagined for our little family.
I had some intuition that this little girl in my belly was very reliable, determined, calm and strong.
We were so excited to meet you!
The week before Andie was born, my blood pressure started to rise a bit. It wasn't anything scary at all, but they liked to monitor me a lot because of my first pregnancy with Quinn. That meant about 5 visits to the hospital in one week just to keep a close watch on things. No pre-eclampsia, no other signs of any complications. All was well, but since we were approaching our due date anyway the doctors decided to move up our scheduled delivery date just to make sure my raised blood pressure didn't turn into anything else. Todd and I chose the 18th of June (kind of strange to pick a birthday :) - but Todd liked the idea of his three girls having birthdays on the 17th, 18th, and 19th (of different months though)).
So, Wednesday the 18th of June was set. Grandma and Grandpa made their way up from Florida to be here to stay with big sister Quinn. Of course the day before, big contractions kicked in and we made another trip to the hospital (my babies like to be in breech position so any sign of labor meant we needed to head into the hospital right away) - contractions were getting stronger and were consistently 4-5 minutes apart so we headed in. The 17th was not her day. :) After hours of regular contractions things slowed down and I wasn't showing progress so Doc decided to keep steady until tomorrow (the 18th -our scheduled day).
The morning of Wednesday, June 18th we were up early, got ourselves ready and headed to the hospital knowing in just a few short hours we would be holding our little baby girl. It was such a surreal feeling to have it all scheduled and know that today was her birthday. We got checked in about 7am, headed into our labor and delivery room and there got prepped for my 2nd c-section. It was calm and fun and so enjoyable. There were no nerves, just excitement. We had fun just talking to our nurses and staff that were helping us.
Time flew by and next thing we knew it was baby time! Everything about this experience was so different from Quinn's birth. I walked down to the surgical room now knowing in minutes we would meet our little Andie, hopped on the table, immediately got a spinal block (hallelujah for this - because with Quinn I had an epidural) and within seconds I was completely numb and ready to deliver baby. I didn't even know the procedure had begun and before I knew it there was a "here she comes!" I couldn't believe we were already there and she was almost here. I watched as Todd stood up to see and watched the big sweet smile come on his face. In the next minute I heard loud sweet baby cries and excited and different voices all exclaiming "She's here!", "She is so cute!", "Look how big she is!", "She is absolutely gorgeous!", "Oh those cheeks!", "Lots of hair!", "7lbs 8oz!", and then she was in my arms, her baby cries immediately calmed and this mama's tears took over. She was all of those things and so much more. She was ours and she was absolutely perfect. We couldn't believe how much she looked like her big sister. It was unbelievable. Andie's sweet little round face and chubby cheeks just melted us and we were over the moon with joy that she was healthy and so stunning.
Life is amazing and miraculous and these moments are beyond words.
The delivery went beautifully and so much better than I could ever have expected. In short, I realized that what I felt during my first c-section with Quinn was not normal (I felt a lot of everything during that surgery and was incredibly uncomfortable.) The birth of both of our daughters was incredibly beautiful, but little miss Andie's was just easy.
I was fully awake the entire time and was quickly rolled into recovery (where we would spend the next hour just being and enjoying and relaxing and taking it all in). We also got this little champ of a breastfeeder started. And we just stared at her. :)
After recovery we rolled into our post-pardum room where we would stay for several days. Here she met her big sister. The sweetest moment you can imagine. Moments of curiosity, pride, and love. Quinn immediately took to her (she wasn't so sure of mommy in a hospital bed, but little sis was all good :). Grandpa and Grandma D. and Auntie Amy also met little Andie on this day.
Our new little family of four.
So much love for our new addition - our beautiful little Andie Ainsley.
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