Powerful: Derek + Laura

January 3, 2013: Afternoon: Checked in to the hospital and made the mistake of not eating anything. I was starving but due to the fact that I almost threw-up multiple times the night before I didn't want to put anything in my system. Let me tell you...it was a long 24 hours without food and without sleep. I was so tired and that just seemed to make everything worse. They take me to my hospital room and hook me up to monitor my contractions. As soon as that happened I was no longer in active labor. My contractions were every 6-9 minutes. They gave me an hour to see if active labor would start up again. Nope. They presented me with my options: go home or get induced. At this point I didn't want to do either. I was in so much pain. I had back labor like nobodies business. They gave me an hour to walk around to try and start labor on my own. So grateful I had a midwife who supported my choices to want to go as natural as possible. After that hour they checked me aga...

Since our little girl is almost 4 weeks old I decided it was time to write her birth story. I want to put down the details before I start to forget them. This is the first time I have had a chance to look at all the pictures from birth and I am reminded of all the emotions I experienced. I have feared child birth my whole entire life and it is so surreal to know that I actually did it, barely, but I did. Now before you continue I should warn you: There will be lots of photos and it will be lengthy in text in the two following blog posts.  Just needed to put that disclaimer out there in case you didn't want to read on. Since I some day hope to turn this blog in to a book I want to record as much as I can. December 30-31, 2012: I had started to feel light contractions during the day...maybe about every 1.5-2 hours. There weren't too bad but I was excited as I knew it was a sign of labor. I still had my doubts that we would progress at a quick rate since this was my first bir...

Sorry I haven't updated in a while. I am starting to adjust more to motherhood and all the joy and challenges that come with it. My next post will contain her birth story and her hospital newborn photos. So excited to share them with all of you. She has already changed so much in just 3.5 weeks. We sure do love our sweet girl. I love snuggling with her. It is one of the many moments that brings me so much joy.

Life has been busy since our baby girl was born but I wanted to take a moment and announce our most exciting news. Brooklyn Elise Power was born January 3, 2013 at 10:45 pm weighing 7 lbs 11 oz and 20.5 inches long. She is so beautiful and we feel so blessed. She is our little girl and we couldn't be happier. Tomorrow she'll be a week old. I can't believe it. Thank you Brooklyn for already allowing me to experience so much love and joy. Thank you for letting us be your parents. We sure are doing our best. We love you sweet girl. Thanks to all of you for your love and support throughout pregnancy. We love our little miracle.

Finally Scott, Kim, and the kids arrived and we were able to spend some time with them. We are so excited to have them here and we love seeing them whenever we can. Last Friday night we all went to Temple Square as a family - we were just missing Stephen. That's pretty impressive for a family that keeps growing. Scott, Kim and Bennett had to leave early so we enjoyed spending time with cute little Addie. It was freezing but the lights were beautiful. My family was so sweet and patient as I walked slowly behind them. Derek was nice enough to keep my pace. So grateful for the opportunity to go and cherish time with my family. This will probably be our last Christmas as a entire family for who knows how long.  Isn't she adorable? Bennett Boy! Look at him. So cute. Love her. Playing in the kitchen in the family history center. Addie was making us all soup. Derek took this on our new camera. I love it.   

Taken on Christmas Eve. Belly is HUGE! 38 weeks, 4 days How Far Along: 39 Weeks today. (I know I missed 37 and 38 weeks so this is a three in one.) Due date is one week from today! Crazy. Size of the Baby: Somewhere around 7 pounds and 20 inches long Weight gain/loss: This keeps fluctuating every week. Just depends on the time of day. Basically I have gained anywhere from 23-25 pounds through pregnancy. I just hope that I can keep it around there until she comes. Since Christmas is over this should help a little, right? Sleep:  I just laugh at some of the positions I end up in. Anything to get some sleep. My sleep has been accompanied by some crazy dreams this past week, mostly of going in to labor. (This was a couple of weeks ago.) As of now, sleep is really non-existent. Every part of my body aches from the mid-back down. Best Moment of the Week: Getting to see our baby girl on an ultrasound last week. We haven't had an ultrasound in almost 20 weeks...

Ok first thing. Can we talk about how it has been snowing all day long? It hasn't stopped since last night. I went outside for one brief moment today and nearly froze to death. So grateful I am working from home on a day like today. My car is covered in snow and my only two shoe options at this point are flip flops or slippers. No jacket that fits either. So grateful to be inside and warm. Now that I have addressed the snow factor I wanted to share some adorable photos. So ever since I have become pregnant I have constantly wondered about what our baby girl will look like. It's something I think and sometimes dream about in these final weeks of pregnancy. I am so excited to see her cute little fingers grab hold of mine and to see if she has hair/no hair, her cute nose, her eyes, and everything about her. I am getting excited just thinking about it now. As you know I am in the final stretch of pregnancy, only 15.5 days until our due date. I can't stop thinking about her...