A few things that will stand out in my mind about being pregnant with Agatha are the following: what a surprise she was!, we were quite confident the whole time that she was a girl, the April excitement of wondering when she would arrive, what her name would be, and thinking it could be close to Mike's birthday, the rainy late spring weather, spending quality conversation time with Travis the week before she was born, everyone telling me how big I was! :)
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| Aunt Mary with the 3 kids |
The most memorable event leading up to her birth will always be what an incredible blessing it was for my generous Aunt Mary and Uncle Mark to take all three kids up to their farm for a whole week! Mike and I were able to rest and relax, get things done around the house, clean the house (and it actually stayed clean!!), enjoy each other's company, read, Mike worked on our bathroom. It was heavenly. Really! We had forgotten what it was like....to have peace and quiet, and to be able to do whatever we wanted! Mike took a lot of that week off which was nice. I know this time enabled me to mentally be ready for the baby to come and to have extra energy for her arrival and taking care of all four in the weeks to come. People couldn't believe I would have such generous relatives to be willing to help us in this way. The kids loved it just as much as we did. They didn't need to talk to us at all or even miss us!
Anyway, I had a lot of contractions leading up to Agatha's birth. Because of this, I thought the labor would go fast when I did go into the hospital. And that is what happened.
Friday, May 3rd I started having more consistent contractions around 6pm. I thought these were the real deal and I wanted to go into labor, so I walked around our house for the next 5 hours keeping track of the contractions. Since it was rainy outside, I walked around our living room about 832652746392 times. Around 11pm, I decided to try to take a nap knowing that I would need energy soon. I woke up around 3am to a hard contraction and told Mike we would need to go pretty soon. At 4:00am we left for the hospital and Agatha was born at 5:33am! I did another water birth and everything went smoothly. The last 10 minutes were brutal, especially since she was such a big baby at 8lbs 11oz. My biggest baby!
The stay in the hospital was great. We had so many wonderful family and friends visit, it was almost too busy - we are so fortunate to have such great friends. Actually, while I was in the hospital I felt really good.
Mike got the kids on Sunday. I came home Monday....and once I was home, I wasn't feeling as great as I did in the hospital - there was a bit more commotion here at home! :) The first week back I barely moved from the couch while taking lots of Ibuprofen and trying to direct kids from the couch while I nursed. It took me 2 solid weeks before I was feeling more myself. But now I am feeling good and just trying to get a grasp on our new 'normal'. People have been so unbelievably generous and helpful when it comes to meals and helping with the kids.
I have been loving this book "The Master of Hestviken" by Sigrid Unset. It will end up being one of my all time favorite. It is a serious tome, but I am eating up every page.
Here is the quilt I made for Agatha - with our gut feeling of her gender, I took the risk of making a girl quilt for her. I embroidered the few animal squares which was a fun project.
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