Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Season Fall Greeting

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Fall Leaves

We've been raking leaves here at Huffman Drive. We've had lots of help, too. Thanks to Adam, Molly, Danny and Dad! They didn't seem so bad this year. I think we were mentally prepared for the work involved with owning a home. The weekend Claire came home, Dad, Danny and Adam worked like dogs raking leaves, cleaning gutters, etc. Only pictures are of the baby that weekend.

All my other pics are sort of far away, but you can see Molly and Adam raking them to the curb.

Adam would then mow every other batch that would fall to to ground.

Last Saturday, we saw the truck and crew coming to suck up the leaves and Adam and his Dad ran outside and quickly finished raking all the leaves to the curb.

Of course, we had to take some pics with the baby and the leaves too!

 

 We love the fall and are sad to see the season go.

3 weeks and 1 month

 Here are pics from the last two weeks. I was going to start doing monthly pics, but public outcry demanded weekly Wednesday pics of the sweet pea! I will try and keep up with it. 

Last pic in the newborn onsie.

My sweet girl!

3 cheers for being one month old!

 

 Nicknames for Claire include; Claire Bear, Claire-y, Clairabelle, Sweet Girl, Baby Claire, Pumpkin Butt, Chunky Monkey and many more that I can't think of right now!

Thoughts about C-sections

 Don't let this picture fool you, this was the only time I wasn't crying.

- First off, don't have one if you can help it.

However if this is the end result, totally worth it!





- After almost an entire day in a warm, dark, labor and delivery room with a few trusted people, being slapped on a cold metal table with a whole bunch of new faces in a freezing, bright room was a total sensory overload.

- I don't like being naked in front of strangers, especially people who are not strangers to Adam and he will work with them again.

- I told Adam that I felt like Jesus because they make you keep your arms out like you are on a cross.

- The surgeon (my family practice doctor assisted) was well rested and perky and talked a lot about dogs, specifically his white German Shepard. All I wanted to hear about was my baby, but he just went on and on to the other medical people about the value of owning a family pet.

- I was able to be awake and use my already in place epidural for anesthesia. Also, you can still FEEL stuff with an epidural. I could feel them pulling my stomach apart and moving stuff around. It didn't feel painful, but it didn't feel good. It also felt a lot higher up on my body than where my incision actually is.

- I thought they would lower the blue curtain for me to see when the pulled her out. I don't know why I thought that, but I was disappointed that I missed that moment. Some nonsense about preventing infections...

- I was glad Adam knew what was going on so he could peak over the curtain and let me know what was happening.

- I heard her first cry and didn't recognize it. I asked Adam, "what was that noise?"

- I was disappointed that Adam and I couldn't immediately do skin to skin with her and I had to wait to hold her.

- I remember seeing her for the first time, but it was so quick and there was so much going on that I have more vivid memories of holding her the first night and being alone with her in the mother-baby room (Adam was there, just asleep).

- I think the surgeon did a good job. The stitches dissolve on their own, and he super-glued over it so that it didn't need a special dressing or anything.

- The next 24 hours were painful. I didn't like how long it took for me to lose the tingly feeling and regain normal feeling in my legs or feel strong enough to get up. I also didn't like that a nurse had to come in so often to take care of me.

- I couldn't wait to get rid of that catheter, take off the pulsating compression stockings, and take out the I.V.

- You can ask Adam and my mom; I was super worried about having to have a c-section during the weeks leading up to my due date. I guess I had a woman's intuition.

- In the end, my baby was HEALTHY the entire time and I couldn't love her more!

2 weeks (yesterday)

Look at those eyes! She is 9 lbs of love. This week has gone well, although, harder now that there are no Grandmas. Her sleep patterns are different everyday but mostly she sleeps during the day. She likes snuggling, her pack 'n play, vibrating chair and eating. We love her!