Wednesday, December 24, 2008

First visit to the Pediatrician’s Office and first bath

Today was Carden Elizabeth’s first visit to the pediatrician’s office. She’s lost some weight since being in the hospital, but not enough to be concerned about. Her skin color looks great, so no signs of jaundice.

Last night we had our first bath at home, well sponge bath. It went a lot smoother than I expected. Carden fussed when we first got her completely naked, I think the initial shock of being cold is what startled her and then once we got the warm water on her skin she settled down. I’ve heard of so many babies that scream bloody murder when you wash their hair, but she actually seemed to enjoy it. I did tell her that people pay big bucks to have other people shampoo their hair so she is lucky that we are more than willing to do it for free! Of course we took lots of photos of the event and this has to be the cutest one so I just had to share!



We hope that you all have a very Merry Christmas and that Santa is good to everyone! He brought us the best gift anyone could ask for 5 days ago!

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Carden Elizabeth Dilocker

Carden Elizabeth Dilocker was born on Friday, December 19th, 2008 at 5:16 PM at Crestwood Hospital in Huntsville, Alabama. She was 9 lbs 11 oz and 20 inches long! Baby Carden, mom, and dad are all happy and healthy.







Thanks Dr. Aguayo and the nursing staff at Crestwood's Maternity Center for a smooth and supportive delivery free of any complications. The team made us feel so relaxed and at ease during the 12 hour labor and throughout our weekend stay in the hospital.

Monday, December 15, 2008

Foods to Induce Labor, Scheduled Induction Date, and Baby Names

Last week Dr. Aguayo told Jason and I to be prepared that Baby D could arrive at any moment because I was already dilated to 2 cm, effaced, and she could feel the baby’s head (which makes me want to gag!) So we’ve had our hopes up since then that "today could be the day" and that I would try to help encourage her to make an early arrival by eating foods that you hear about that are supposed to help induce labor:
Pineapple
Bran Muffins
Balsamic Vinegar Salad Dressing
Spicy Foods
Egg Plant
Well in the past few days, I’ve consumed all of these things (not all in one setting), suffered some serious heart burn as a result and Baby D has yet to arrive. Even the full moon on Friday and my father driving over every pot hole, railroad track, and bump in the road after church on Sunday didn’t help out!

As much as I have loved being pregnant, the time has come where I cannot wait any longer. The anticipation is driving us crazy! Plus Dr. Aguayo and I agree that we both don’t feel like spending Christmas at the hospital so I am scheduled to be induced on Friday, December 19th, that is unless she decides to show up early. The only bad part of being induced is that I don’t get to send Jason into freak out mode by calling him at work and telling him that my water broke or I’m having contractions! Just the thought of all the stories I won’t be able to share about that experience kind of makes me sad.

Most popular question these days are what are you going to name the baby. Jason and I agreed that we didn’t want to name her until we saw her. We do have a middle name picked out, Elizabeth, after my maternal grandmother--Baby D’s only living great grandmother. As far as first names go, we have narrowed down our list to Gretchen (after one of Jason’s aunts) or Carden (my maiden name). She’ll probably come out not looking like either name, so then we’ll be back to square one and have to pull out all the baby name books and start over from scratch—or worse, Baby D will be a boy and we haven’t even talked about boy names!

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Bags are packed, Philip Comes to Visit, and Maternity Photos

We are officially 3 weeks away from the due date of Baby D. That means in 21 days, we could be meeting our daughter—unless she decides to arrive early! Jason has been on my case the past few days to get my bags packed, so last night I packed my bag to take to the hospital! I am all set with socks and slippers, PJs, and some personal hygiene essentials—the rest will get packed once I go into labor. It just reinforces how little time we have left before she arrives.
The house is slowly progressing. A week ago I was less than thrilled with the progress; because there is nothing more frustrating than driving by your house on a beautiful sunny day and no one is there working. I understand that is it hard to get work done in bad weather, but on days when it is in the upper 60’s without a cloud in the sky. This week the construction team has managed to redeemed themselves—the brick masons worked on Thanksgiving morning (their choice, not mine so I took them a homemade pecan pie), the electrician and plumber worked on Friday (I’m sure just to avoid having to go shopping with wives, girlfriends, and/or significant others) and they even showed back up on Saturday and Sunday! I just wish the rest of the subs would follow in their footsteps! I’ve come to live with the fact that we will not be bringing Baby D home to a newly remodeled home, that she too will be living out of suit cases at her grandparent’s home for the first few weeks of her new life. I think that the grandparents to be are actually really looking forward to having the baby at their house. I know they will secretly miss us when we’re gone!
Philip came home over the Thanksgiving holiday. It was great to visit with him. At first he didn’t know what to think about me being pregnant, but towards the end of the visit he was ready for me to have the baby just so he could be apart of the action. He was able to feel her move on a couple of occasions. He’ll be back once she is born. Pearl, is suffering from Post-Phil Depression. If he gives the baby as much attention as he gave Pearl, this child will be totally over stimulated. We foresee a lot of time spent in time out for both Uncle Phil and Baby D when he comes to visit once she is a toddler.
Jason and I weren’t sure about having maternity photos taken, but finally decided that this is a time where we can get away with being cheesy so we hired a local photographer, Jillian Easley to do them for us. She will also take the newborn photos. She was a lot of fun to work with and know she’ll do a great job of photographing Baby D! Feel free to check out our proofs online by going to Jillian’s website Jilly Kay Photography and going to the "client" tab. On that page it will ask for your Username and Password.
Username: Dilocker
Password: trucker babe (be sure to include the space)
*Case sensitive.
The password is a result of a conversation held during the photo shoot—don’t ask.