They grow up so fast!

Eleanor has finally started to play with toys a little. We can put her in her play gym for about 20 minutes and actually walk away, which has been very nice. She's also been doing something we weren't quite expecting. If she is laying down, she tries to sit up! The only problem with this is when she does it after eating - she will often spit up all over the place! Since she's been showing interest in sitting up, I sat her propped with the Boppy pillow for support, and she stayed upright for about 30 seconds. Yikes! Isn't she still supposed to be a floppy baby? She'll be 12 weeks old in 2 days and is already on the verge of sitting up...time is just flying by! Here are some photos we took today!

No pictures please, I'm sleeping...


I play with toys, and put them on my face!


I like to sit up!

Holiday Craziness

Andy, Eleanor and I had a very busy Christmas this year! On the Sunday before Christmas, we went down to my Grandmother's for a Christmas celebration. We ate Chinese food and exchanged gifts. It was pretty relaxing and lots of fun. Eleanor was a bit fussy, as usual, but slept for the drive home. On Christmas Eve, we went to Mike and Patty's for a late Christmas Eve lunch. Eleanor was great over there - she sat on my lap for dinner and after dinner, she laid on the floor and smiled at everyone. She especially seemed to love looking at Caroline! Christmas morning, we got up early (Eleanor got us up at 5am), exchanged our own gifts, ate breakfast and then drove up to Maine. Christmas was a particularly tough day for Eleanor. She sat in the car seat for a long time and ended up in a strange place. We stayed the night in Maine and Eleanor slept in the bassinet for about 3 hours before waking up. She then would not go back to sleep, so I got up and sat with her on the recliner chair in the living room for the remainder of the night. Luckily, both she and I were able to get some sleep there. The next day, we drove up to Damariscotta to visit Andy's Grandparents. We also got to see Jean and Don Meakin. It was a lovely visit and we had lunch and got to introduce Eleanor to Grammy and Grampa Piper. We also took a trip to the Maine Cloth Diaper store, where we picked up some more diapers and covers, since Eleanor is quickly growing out of her current diapers. Eleanor did very well during the entire trip to Damariscotta, which we were very pleased with. We drove home later that night and have been recovering from the trip ever since.

For almost a month now, Eleanor has decided that she likes to eat a few times during the night. She's been waking up almost every two hours. For the past few nights, it's been almost every hour. Needless to say, we are exhausted and have no plans to stay up until midnight tonight to bring in the new year! Of course, if Eleanor wakes us up near midnight, we may still get to see the ball drop!


Here is a Christmas photo of Andy, Eleanor and I in front of our Christmas tree. Since we have nearly no furniture in our living room, we got a really bushy tree this year.

Here are the Christmas stockings I made for the family. It took me a lot longer than the estimated time on the pattern to make them, but having a new baby slowed things up a bit!


Here, we were trying to get a photo of Eleanor's mohawk after her bath, but you can't really see the mohawk very well. However, we thought it was a funny photo of just how angry she can get when she's hungry!






Here's Gramma Piper the morning after Christmas rocking Eleanor. Very sweet!







The Piper Clan up in Damariscotta the day after Christmas. Don Meakin is missing from the photo.




Grammy and Grampa Piper with Eleanor. It was great to introduce Eleanor to her Great Grandparents on the Piper side! It was also very nice to see Grammy and Grampa together during lunch.



We took this photo because we thought Eleanor looked like she belonged on the Soprano's. Hehehe.

Birth Story

This post is only for those who want to know the details of Eleanor's Birth. I wanted to write about it before I forgot.

I woke up on October 10 ( her due date) a little after 5am. I was surprised when I looked at the clock as it was the first night in a long while when I didn't get up 3 times to pee. When I went to the bathroom, I noticed I was starting to lose my mucus plug, so I put a pad on and went back to bed. A few minutes later, I had a strong contraction - it didn't feel much like the Braxton-Hicks ones I'd been getting for awhile. I looked at the clock and it was 5:18am. 7 minutes later, I had another one. After only a few more contractions, I let Andy know. I got up, drank water, walked around, rested on my hands and knees - all things which in the past have stopped the Braxton-Hicks contractions, so Andy and I knew this was the real deal. We called the midwife around 7am to let her know and she told me to try and get a nap and make sure I remember to eat and drink plenty of water. She also said she would call back later and we would most likely be heading to the birth center in the evening. I tried to lay down for awhile, but I was uncomfortable during contractions if I laid down, so I took a shower. The water hitting my lower back felt great. My midwife called back sometime between 10 and 11 and we told her that my contractions were now about 5-6 minutes apart and were still bearable. She said to let her know when they hit 4 minutes or when I was becoming too uncomfortable to stay home. At this point, I was pacing around the house, excited and scared about what was to come. It didn't take long before the contractions hit 4 minutes apart, and around 1pm we were headed to the birth center. This was when one of the worse parts of labor happened. The drive to the the birth center was miserable. I was contracting every 4 minutes and because I was in the car, I couldn't move around to get comfortable and Andy couldn't provide any counter pressure on my back (I felt most of my contractions in my lower back). We arrived at the birth center, where I continued to labor standing up until around 5pm. I had tried laying down to rest, sitting on the birth balls and resting on my hands and knees, but none of those positions were comfortable. Andy was rubbing my back with each contraction and every once in awhile he had to remind me to breathe. During this time, my contractions got closer together and more intense. The midwives didn't want me getting into the labor tub until I was further along in labor to make sure the warm water wouldn't slow the labor down. Getting into the tub was fantastic. I got in around 5pm and the crampy feeling in my stomach went away entirely. My back still hurt with each contraction, but recovering between contractions was much easier. My contractions were about 1 1/2 minutes long with 30-45 seconds rest between them, and I was dozing off between contractions. I'm not sure of the timing, but at some point my water broke - what a strange feeling that was. The midwife told me that one of two things could happen - labor could intensify or I could get a small break. Of course, my labor intensified. It didn't take much longer before I started feeling pushy. Once I hit the pushing stage, things were better. Instead of a 30 second rest and 1 1/2 minute contraction, I was getting 30-45 second contractions with a 4 or 5 minute rest. I rested through some of these contractions, just breathing, then when I couldn't resist the urge to push any longer, I started pushing. I did 3 short pushed with each contraction (no counting to ten). When I started pushing, I was squatting in the birth tub, but I ended up on the birth stool (still in the tub) for most of the pushing. I only pushed for 70 minutes, which I'm told is great for a first time mom and Eleanor arrived. She had the cord wrapped around her neck at birth and didn't want to take her first breath, but the midwives calmly encouraged her and before long, she let out a cry. Since she was still attached to the cord, she was still getting oxygen, so it wasn't a major concern. When it was time for me to get out of the water, Eleanor was lifted out and handed straight to Andy and I made my way to the bed to rest and eat. Andy came in a short time later to tell me our little girl weighed 10 pounds and my jaw hit the ground. I couldn't believe it! Her head circumference was in the 97th percentile and her weight was in the 90th percentile. I'm still not sure how she fit!

Andy was great during the whole labor and birth process. He was great at offering me water and Recharge (basically watered down juice with added salt to help prevent dehydration). He also remained very calming throughout the whole process. I was so glad we chose to have our baby at the Birth Cottage instead of in a hospital. It was such a great experience. Eleanor was born in candlelight with only Andy and 2 midwives in attendance.

2 months!

Eleanor turned 2 months old on Monday and had her 2 month well baby visit on Tuesday. She's still not overly fond of tummy time, but she's getting much more tolerant of it - especially if daddy is playing with her! She mostly sleeps great at night - she even went 8 hours one night - but naps are still a struggle. She is starting to enjoy playing under her play gym, but still prefers when someone else plays with her.

Here are some recent photos of Eleanor.

Photos!