I know! I know! I’ve been home since Saturday & have been oh such a slacker, right? No post. No pics. No love. I’m so sorry, please do forgive! I promise that the whole birth story is soon to come, but recovery is a bit unkind.
I won’t make you wait for all the details, but I will tell you that after much pain & many hours, Selah finally made her entrance via a cesarean. I’m still coping with that emotionally & just desperately trying to hold to the truth of the matter that she is safely in my arms & she is beautifully perfect.
I’ll leave you with some of my favorite shots from the last few days since she joined us.
Just chilling after her shampoo….
Starlet is oozing with love for her new baby. Yes, “hers”.
I love love love love love love love this picture. We were all back in my room but I wasn’t stabilized yet (read “HORRID uncontrollable shakes”). So after Selah’s bath they wanted to put her in the warmer, but no… my amazing husband jumps in & says he’d do skin-to-skin (Kangaroo Care“) to stabilize her body temp, rather than the burger & fries heat lamps. This picture will forever have me falling in love with him over & over again.
Our first picture as the new family. Can I look anymore whooped??? Seriously, Mom, I thought I asked you to warn me about the desperate need of cover-up & gloss prior to photos!
With her dark hair covered up, she looks JUST like her big sis. Genetics amaze me.
Starlet cannot stop loving on her. Ever. At all. Must touch. Constantly.
Hey everyone! Flipflop Mamma here, with some exciting baby news!
Selah Noelle Eden was born April 30th at 10:27pm.
The Stats:
7 pounds 11 ounces
20 inches long
I’ll let Jess give you all the info later, you know, the birth story and all that good stuff:) For now, she’s at home resting, and lovin’ on a new baby girl.
Tomorrow morning is induction time. I have pushed as long as our medical system will allow me to go, and I’m grateful they are allowing me to attempt a much desired VBAC. For a VBAC, 41 weeks is my max, I’ve been told. I’ve tried all natural & suggested “remedies”. It’s bittersweet since I wanted this to be a totally non-medicated, natural birth, but if it just takes giving this body an oomph, I’ll take that over another cesarean any day. I’m trying to simply keep my eye on the prize of my baby girl in my arms at the end of it all, and the peace in my heart of simply resting in God’s mercy, His grace, His glory, & His plan…. albeit an unknown one.
I do have so much peace in my heart knowing that her birth day was not meant to be the 16th, which was the date I had originally scheduled a repeat C.
Please say a prayer & send me some lovely peaceful labor & birth vibes. I’ll have pics & an update as soon as I can!
Come on, baby!!!!!
Large and in charge.
She’s a brick… hhhooouuussseee!She’s mighteh, mighteh & she’s lettin it ALL hang out!
Over-baked.
Wide load.
Tenant non-compliant with eviction notice.
Come on, my peeps. Hit me with your best line or song title! I have all these great thoughts running through my head about all the different things that could be said about my current dimensions & state of mind. The final thoughts, though? I think I’m gonna be knocked up forEVAH!!! I am snarkily whimpering along at 40 weeks and 3 days, if you go of those lovely “due” date things that tease so cruely.
This little sweet girl doesn’t want to come out! I mean, I know I have provided a wonderfully safe peaceful haven in there & all. And what with her older sister’s screeching like a howler monkey, I can understand her desire to stay put. But Mama is DONE! I am ready to have babe in arms, no more in utero! And this “waddling, constant sweating, skin wants to tear & girly parts in pain peeing only one ounce every ten minutes” stuff needs to stop already!
But this is the final countdown. The midwife has given me an ultimatum of “performing” by 41 weeks (the 30th). Since I desperately want to have an all-natural, non-medicated VBAC, I’m bloody-ing my knees in prayers to go into labor prior to the 30th. Or they are threatening induction, or repeat C-section, depending on how my body is performing, or not.
On Tuesday I was 50% effaced, but with practically no dilation. Contractions were rokkin’ steady last Saturday night & most of Sunday, teasingly. Then buh-bye! Nothing worth timing or even needing to close my eyes to breathe though.
So that’s my update for you. Now I’ll leave you with a peek of my happiness…. Love my new sundress? I do. Sooo comfy!
Even better? The outfit is PERFECTLY finished with my new necklace from Flip Flop Mamma’s store.
Now that you see how great it is, I know you’re off & running to get one while you can, right? Go ahead…… I’ll wait………. Just come back to leave me oodles of beautiful labor vibes & don’t forget to enter my giveaway for a gift certificate to her store!
**Congrats to Katie of Boasting in My Weakness for her guess of 44.75 as my final waist measurement! I checked in to the hospital for my induction Wednesday morning (April 30th) & measured 44.75 exactly! (Birth story to come as soon as I can stop my head from spinning!) So you go, girl! I hope you enjoy shopping at Flip Flop Mamma’s etsy shop! And thanks to all you lovelies who sent sweet labors vibes & nice waistline guesses!
So you know how much I adore my girl, Flip, but have you seen her etsy store? Fabulous earthy goodness! You must go check her out! Her craftiness constantly amazes me. She makes chai, lip balm, body butters necklaces & cards, just to to mention some of her talents. For fun for me & to send love her way, I want to host a Flippin’ Earthy Girthy giveaway!
I hope to be birthing ANYday now (Ya hear that, body??) so I want to see who can guess the closest (withOUT going over) to what my actual final waist measurement will be. I’ll take the final measurement once I’m checked into the hospital.
Leave your guess in a comment here, and do be kind, mkay? Mama needs love! Contest will obviously be over when I post the winner.
I’ll give you some stats to go on:
Mama’s height is 5′4″
Mama’s current weight (at 39 weeks) is 169.7 pounds
Pre-pregnancy weight was 134 pounds (sniff sniff… you do the math for my weight gain… WHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
So let’s cliffnote this ditty of a giveaway, shall we?
~ Guess my final waist measurement withOUT going over
~Post your guess in a comment
~Winner will receive a $20 gift certificate to Flip Flop Mamma’s Etsy Store
~Winner to be announced at the top of this post, when I get home from the hospital.
And for a little more help, see the post below for some recent pics of me & my exponentially expanding waistline…
Until then, please do send Mama some contraction love & peaceful labor vibes, would ya?
As some of you know, I had scheduled an elective secondary C-section for April 16th (my due date is the 23rd). As that date hung over me taunting me to hurry up & labor (which is my ultimate prayer), I was becoming more & more uneasy that I was just simply not trusting God. I had planned the C-section with the fears that I will not go into labor on my own, like last time, and to also “lock in” a recommended doctor (that my midwife trusts) to do the surgery. Two thoughts on that “plan” of mine: I was letting fear control me & I was attempting to control my situation. I was getting so caught up in God not out-loud answering me about a path to go down, that I wasn’t paying any attention to the peace that He was offering if I’d simply trust Him & walk blindly.
I canceled the scheduled C-section and will trust & wait. If I do end up having to have another C-section at the end of it all, I will trust that that is truly God’s plan & not mine. God has meanwhile blessed me with an awesome Christian doula who has been working with me on HypnoBirthing and some much needed scriptures to meditate on. Not to mention the blessing of amazing family & friends who have been beyond compassionate & supportive through all my mind’s struggles. And I’m now at a great place emotionally! YEAH! And I’m getting there, physically, too.
I have been having some great contractions, but none worth timing. It may sound like not much, but this gives me great hope, since last time my water broke, then nada. The only contractions I ever felt were the wretched ones kindly provided by 13 hours of Pitocin. That is, hands down, the meanest drug EVER!!! I’m hoping to go the non-medicated route this time. But I won’t get you all caught up in all the lovely details of my birth preferences.
On a much lighter note, a few weeks back we headed out to our blooming botanical gardens for some maternity photos & I thought I’d share a few with you. Dreamily, my girl Kelly, THE rockstar of photography, would have come down to take these for me, but she had to go & get knocked up and be due around the same time as me. Pft. The nerve, girl! Love ya!
As much as I love these, I must admit that I think I look like I’m pig-snorting in that last one. Not so lovely, right? I can be so mean to myself, I know. And to polish off the photos, I must leave you with this one. Me, in a desperate attempt to induce labor, naturally. Obviously, it didn’t work. But I got my herbs & tomatoes planted!
Would ya check out the puffy eyes & swollen gonzo, with that herniated belly button on this chic? Geesh. The epitome of beauty & grace, wouldn’t you agree?
So that is the current low-down at the home of OMM. I promise I will try to keep the updates coming, but I can’t promise play-by-play posts since I have no clue if our hospital is with the times. Probably not, since its a military hospital, but one can hope, right?
“Mommy…. YOU are driving totally outta control! WHY did you slam on your brakes like that??”
“Starlet, darling, I had to because the yahoo in front of me did & I didn’t want to drive into the back of him. And its really not kind to judge people like that. Unless you’re perfect like God is, its not right for us to judge another person.”
“Then WHY do they judge on American Idol?”
Dammit…. I hate it when she stumps me like that! Is she really only four???
