Free Range Family

Since its Anna's due date today, I thought it would be awesome to post Anna's birth story. Enjoy! :D The night of the sixth I woke up with contractions. They had been scattered and irregular all day so instead of waiting around for them to regulate, I took Alan and Aunt Ariel out for some fun. But these contractions felt different. They were stronger and were coming every three to five minutes. Knowing that I was not in full labor yet just possibly early labor, I convinced Lon to stay up with me and bake brownies. We baked two batches of brownies and ate about half of one batch lol. After that, my contractions were getting unbearable. I tried to go to sleep but couldn't so I knew it was time to call my midwife Karina. I called her and she told me to go ahead and come in. My mother (the person who was to watch Alan while I labored) was still in Townsend, a four hour drive away, so I texted her and told her to start heading down. Then we got Alan dressed and up, and hea...

She is finally here! Yay! We are so excited!!!!! :D Anna, Day one She was born two minutes before midnight on July 7th. I labored for 29 hours (nineteen hours less than I labored with Alan, thank goodness). She weighs 6 pounds and 13 ounces (a pound less than Alan) and is 20 inches long (a half inch shorter than her brother, they are almost birth twins). She is just so precious, I can barely stand it! Anna, Day two Alan met her for the first time yesterday and is as smitten as we are! He brought her a pink dragon he picked out for her and couldn't stop giving her kisses. He is a great helper too so far and is always willing to help bring me stuff for her! How lucky did I get with these kids??? :D I feel so endlessly blessed! I just had to post this one of her froggie legs! We just got home today and are finally reunited with Alan officially again (he has been staying with my parents for the past few days, so Lon could stay at the hospital and help me ...

I announced this month that I would not be posting as much this week, due to the closeness of my delivery date. Even though I didn't post too much, we still did quite a lot this month. Here is some of the stuff that we did: June meant the five year anniversary of my daughter Rosalie's birthdate. To celebrate, Alan and I made cupcakes for her and released five pink balloons to the heavens. It was a beautiful moment for us. :) We also celebrated Alan's friend Tatum's third birthday by going to her Hawaiian themed party. Then there was cousin Sophie's second birthday party at Pioneer Park. Alan and Kalvin had a blast playing in the wading pool there. We also made Lon's Father's Day a very special day for him as well. It was also the start of summer, so we spent lots of time outside doing fun new activities. Grandma Melanie took Alan and Uncle Kalvin with me to Geyser Park to play mini golf, bumper boats and go carts. I also introduced Alan to sidewalk ...

Today I had my first weekly midwife appointment. I again met with Katie, one of my new favorite midwives. I took my Group B Strep test and thankfully it wasn't all that bad. She weighed me and to our surprise, I gained a pound finally! :D Yes! My blood pressure was good, it was its usual low self lol. She then checked on Miss Anna and estimated her to weigh about five and a half pounds, similar to the ultrasound technician's prediction. Anna is still head down and had a healthy heart beat of 140 bpm. Then we talked about the hospital visit. She gave me a handout to fill out for my birth plan but I told her since this was my second, I had already written my own. Katie was very pleased with this and asked me to bring it next week. Here it is, for anyone who might need an idea what of a thorough birth plan looks like: Birth Plan Mother's Name: Jillian Andersen Baby's Name: Anna Ariel Andersen Due Date: July 17, 2012 Blood Type: O+ Allergies: No Known Allergies...