Before and After

Some photos from a month before Norah was born...

And a month after she was born...

All photos taken by Missy Allen. She's the best and the coolest.

November in Review

Man alive I thought time went by fast before. Now that I'm watching a baby get bigger every.single.day it seems like the days are just blurring past. (It probably also helps that I'm on maternity leave, so the days tend to blend together...)

Some stuff we did in November.

- Went on a photo-taking adventure with Nathan and Clementine. I mostly wandered around with Norah and enjoyed the downtown air. Afterwards we got some pizza and Brian and I walked over to City Creek. It was one of my longer stints of baby-wearing and it was thoroughly enjoyable.

- I went on a few outings by myself with Norah. My very first one was to Target where things went fine until she started to wake up. I immediately panicked and got in the check-out line. We also went to the mall for a few hours. Norah got a bunch of compliments, I nursed her in the Nordstroms mother's room, and I didn't buy a single thing. All in all a successful trip.

- I looked like a total train wreck in front of the Fed-Ex guy on multiple occasions.

- We met a nice neighbor guy with an eye tattoed on the back of his head. He has now stopped by our apartment twice looking for a guy named Mark and seems endlessly confused to find he doesn't live here.

- Norah got her first round of shots. We all were pretty sad about it, but she did pretty well after the initial discomfort. We also found out she's chunked up to nearly 13 pounds!

- I turned 27! We got Indian food with our friends and had some root beer floats. Norah gave me the present of sleeping awesomely that night. Woot.

- My parent's came to visit! Norah loved getting so much attention all weekend, and Brian and I enjoyed getting a night out.

- For our night out we went to a Dan Mangan concert! We met Dan Mangan and embarrassed ourselves in front of Dan Mangan and then we went and got some donuts. (Also, he was just one of the openers so we left before the headliner. I felt old, but man we were tired and missed our baby)

- Brian's sister came to visit! I had never met her and he hadn't seen her in years, so it was a lovely reunion. (I'm now noticing that I'm using a whole lot of exclamation points in this post. Just read it in the voice of the Target lady.)

- I realized what it's like to be a teenage boy in that I want to eat everything. All the time. And also sometimes my voice cracks.

- Norah got a big kid tub after we realized her royal chubbiness was really straining the capacity of the one we brought home from the hospital

- We had a Dee's reunion with some friends we don't see as much anymore. (Which is kind of the story of our life right now. Friends! Come back!) I kind of feel bad when we hang out with people because we're either looking at our baby, talking to our baby, or talking about our baby. I'm sure this is endlessly fascinating to others. (It's not.) Also I found out it's nearly impossible to nurse in the round tables at Dee's.

- We had the first weekend since Norah was born that was completely plan-free. It was amazing and we mostly stayed home and admired our baby. (and ate a lot of ice cream and watched parks and rec...)

- We ate at Blue Plate twice in a week and it was absolutely a great idea both times.

- Brian got his very first tattoo. We both love it and I can now add tattoo parlor to the list of interesting places I've fed Norah. (A wedding ceremony and outside on Broadway street are also on the list)

- Norah and I spent a weekend in Malad. You cannot imagine how much love that girl received in such a short span of time. It's so great see how many people adore her and we both had a super great time.

The worst thing that happened this month was when I realized my fry sauce tasted strange because the ketchup I had used expired in October. October of 2013.

The best thing that happened this month was every single time Norah gave us one her giant gummy smiles.

Norah being super excited that it was my birthday.

This is also the month I started finding it acceptable to take selfies.

You cannot believe how much my dad adores her.

Waiting for Dan.

Happy December!!

Norah Jane's Birth Story

So I had a baby. Ah! She is amazing and perfect and oh my gosh I love her so much. I want to start doing monthly update posts because my memory is crap lately and I want to remember these things. But for now, here is her birth story.

At my 39 week appointment my doctor scheduled my induction for three days later. (I had gestational diabetes, which usually means you get induced by 40 weeks if you don't go into labor naturally) Brian and I had both assumed that they would make me wait till 40 weeks to be induced, so we were both really excited and terrified that it was going to happen so much sooner. We spent the weekend sleeping in, doing some last minute cleaning and organizing, and going on our last date night as non-parents. We arrived at our 5:30 induction appointment on Sunday night excited and nervous and anxious to meet our baby girl.

We checked in, joked with the nurses, and started to get settled into our room. I've never had to stay in the hospital for anything, so it was pretty weird to get dressed in the hospital gown and settle in to the Labor and Delivery room for what I assumed would be hours and hours and hours. (spoiler alert. I was wrong) I got my IV (ugh, I hate that part so much) and they set up everything to monitor Norah's heartbeat and my contractions (which I was apparently having? But I couldn't feel them yet).  At that point I was feeling really nervous. Everything was getting pretty real and I was feeling rather unsure about my ability to actually deliver a baby sometime soon. Luckily the nurses were really great and lightened the mood. I also had a doctor duck in and ask if I had gotten pregnant spontaneously which Brian and I both cracked up about.

A nurse came in to do a quick check on the baby's position. He chatted with us and felt around my stomach and left without much comment. I remember telling Brian that I was assuming she was still head down since he hadn't said anything. Foreshadowing! Soon after a couple nurses came in with an ultrasound machine to double check her position and said she was most definitely breech. 

Bummertown.

That obviously changed things induction-wise. We decided to try and have them manually turn her from the outside. If that worked, we would proceed with the induction and if it didn't we would decide where to go from there. We had gotten some really good tacos right before coming in (shout-out to Taqueria 27), so we had to wait three hours for my food to be more digested before they would start trying to move her. (There is a very slight risk of placental abruption or causing fetal distress from trying this, so I had to be ready for an emergency c-section. Which means...no food for a certain amount of time) We let our families know what was going on and then half-watched some tv until it was baby moving time.

The baby turning attempt was pretty miserable. It hurt the most of any part of my labor experience and didn't end up working. At the end of the second attempt to turn her when the pain was the very worst, I had a bit of a breakdown and started sobbing. It just hurt so much and I was disappointed that it obviously wasn't working. I also think the pain meds they had given me made me extra emotional (I was similarly weepy after getting my wisdom teeth out). The staff were all so supportive and gave us a few moments to be alone. (The anesthesiologist, who I had not 15 minutes earlier had a perfectly calm and rational discussion about the possibility of getting a c-section with, was understandably confused and concerned when he came to check in and I was having a melt-down.) Brian was able to calm me down and helped me wrap my mind around this change of plans. I was mostly sad that a c-section greatly reduced my chances of being able to hold and nurse my baby right away. But we decided to move forward since it was very unlikely at that point that Norah was going to turn herself around before my due date.

From there things moved pretty quickly. They told us it would probably take a couple hours to get everyone assembled for the c-section. Originally, they had talked about us coming back the next day, so I was really happy things could get going that night. I really couldn't stand the idea of leaving the hospital still pregnant. Instead of a couple hours, only 15 minutes had passed when they came to let us know we were ready to go! It's still crazy to me how fast we went from trying to move her manually to Brian walking me down to the surgery doors. I remember sitting on the bed, trying to curve my back correctly to get the spinal and thinking how strange it was that this sterile white room was where my baby was going to be born. It was entirely different than I had pictured it. I had honestly barely even considered the possibility that I would need a c-section. After the spinal (which I don't remember hurting at all!) I was laying on the bed and being prepped and waiting anxiously for Brian. As soon as he was cleared to enter and got seated by my head, I felt safe and ready for our baby girl to come. We sat and talked for what seemed like only a minute. I hadn't really felt the pulling or tugging I had been told about, so I assumed they were still waiting to get started. Imagine my surprise when the surgeon announced that we were about to have a baby! Brian watched her come out (butt first, like a real lady) and I swear I didn't breathe till I heard her cry. Which she did! Loudly! I followed suit (not as loudly).  

Brian announced to me that she had a lot of dark hair and that's when I felt like this was definitely my baby. Even though Brian and I had both been born with blonde hair, whenever I had pictured Norah, she had dark hair. Mother's intuition? Me just wanting a dark-haired baby? Who knows.

Norah was checked and cleared pretty quickly, so Brian got to bring her over to me. I was beyond relieved that she didn't have any complications and have to be whisked away. Seeing my sweet and amazing husband holding our daughter was one of the greatest things ever. It still is. I'll be honest and say I didn't feel an immediate bond with Norah like some people talk about. However, I was totally fascinated with this squishy new person. They soon placed her on my chest (I got the skin-to-skin experience that I had mourned the loss of earlier!) and I got to have my first cuddles with my Norah Jane. She was perfect.

Things definitely didn't go as we had planned, but I'm actually thrilled with how they turned out. The hospital staff was so amazing and reassuring, and they made the entire experience the best it could have been. If I had gone into labor naturally and she had been breech things could have been much scarier. As it was, I got to meet my baby much sooner than I expected. And I didn't have to feel a single contraction! And most importantly we got a healthy adorable baby girl who is ours forever. I really can't believe how lucky we are. And that's really all I can ask for in a birth experience.

Norah Jane Walker
September 21, 2014
11:51 PM
7 lbs 5 oz
19 inches