Brother and Sister

Some of you have mentioned this, and yes, Marissa totally looks like Shane did when he was a newborn!! Exhibit A (Shane on L, Marissa on R)

Exhibit B

Every day she is looking a little more like her own person, but generally they look a lot similar.  Of course Shane looked exactly like me as a newborn, and now he looks a lot like Josh, so who knows who she'll end up looking like!  As far as personalities go though, they are way different so far.  Shane was pretty much comatose for a month, and she is freakishly alert.  If you hold her on your chest she cocks her head right up and just wants to stare at you.  We are also realizing how easy we had it with Shane, she is a pretty good baby, but definitely feistier than Shane was and fights falling asleep because she doesn't want to miss anything.  We feel so lucky to have these two though and can't wait to see more of her little personality.   

All By Ourselves

This morning Shelley and Matthew headed back to Utah, so we had our first day by ourselves, and I'm happy to report that we survived!  Man we had a lot of fun with them and will miss them, we are so thankful for such supportive families that are always so willing to help us out.

I was worried about being alone by myself with both of them while Josh took them to the airport, and then making sure we didn't bug him when he got home, but it didn't take too long to find my groove, and the day actually went really smoothly.  I got into the rhythm of get Shane occupied, feed baby, play with Shane and baby, put baby down to sleep, get some things done, wash, rinse, repeat.  Here we are tracing letters while Marissa looks on

Hanging out and helping big brother with puzzles

Man I could stare at this pretty face all day! (And thanks for the adorable outfit Heather!)

And Shane made some HUGE progress today.  I had Marissa doing tummy time, and she started to get fussy.  Shane took me by surprise when he reached over, patted her back, and said "You're helping Marissa" (he talks in the 2nd person ha ha).  So I asked him to do it again, and he did!

Then when I picked her up he laid down on the blanket so I put her back down next to him,

And when she started crying again I said "Marissa's sad.  Can you kiss her better?" And he did!!!

A couple times!  I pushed my luck a little after and tried to put her on his lap, to which he responded "No thank you baby.", but I will take what I can get!! 

In other good news, these are my maternity clothes packed up to be put away because I tried on all my regular jeans yesterday and they fit!!  (now here's to hoping those shorts I pulled out will get some use here soon...)

I think it may have something to do with this hungry little girl.  Breastfeeding rocks.  (And makes for some interesting conversations with 2 year olds).  I took her to the doctor yesterday and she has gained a pound since she was born.  She is around the 95th percentile for weight and head size, and off the charts for height.  Not sure how come we make such big babies, but we sure do love em!

I Enjoy Having a Girl

I don't really consider myself much of a girly-girl, but I sure am enjoying having a little girl.  We are just laying low at home so it's mostly just onesies, but my friend Chelsea gave me a pack of the cutest little bows she made in different colors (she sells them on her etsy site here), and I have been having fun coordinating with her outfit every day.  Ha, this picture looks like she is enjoying being a girl too :)  (And thanks Aunt Rachel, for the cute onesie:) )

big yawn :)

I think Grandma Dettinger is enjoying having a girl around after 5 grandsons too:)

Daddy's Girl

Do you think her Daddy loves her?  Yeah, she's already got him wrapped around her little finger. 

(P.S. Josh finished his semester and is now hard at work at home full time studying for his Step 1 that he'll take on June 1.  This is a really important test that will be a big factor in determining how competitive he is for certain residencies, etc.  But don't get confused, residency doesn't come next, he will get some time off this summer [hooray!!] and then he'll start rotations at a hospital in the fall, then residency in 2 years.) 

Last Week

I was so so glad to have my mom here with us last week.  I had thought I had wanted the baby to come earlier, but it really ended up working out perfectly.  She was able to keep me company and from thinking about it too much, bond with Shane, and be there to watch him so we didn't have to worry about that at all.  We took her to our usual stomping grounds and she was so good to take him places for me so I could go for walks or take a nap or whatever.  Here we are at the children's museum

Mom and I got a kick out of people's reactions to the very pregnant lady, especially when they would ask when I was due and I could say "today". 

We went to McDonalds and my mom climbed right up in the playplace and got my little scaredy cat to do things I never could have gotten him to do

For my birthday on Thursday we went to Olive Garden

And the next day, "induction day", we went to the library so Shane could do some puzzles and I could get a book for the hospital. 

And that was when I called the hospital and found out all the beds were full and I would have to call back in a few hours.  So we all went to Sam's Club to cheer up.

Shaners had a blast with grandma while we were in the hospital, but was excited to see us too.  He is not so sure about the baby.  He isn't acting out at least but he kind of tries to pretend she's not there.  We are taking baby steps, he talks about her now but doesn't want to hold her or kiss her.  We were pretty sure this is how he would react because he is always timid about new things.  It does make me a little sad but Josh keeps reminding me that he's too much of a lover to be like that for long.

He was very pleased with her gift to him

first family picture

Grandma and Marissa

 And we were so happy that John and Pat drove out to be with us.

Shane definitely bonded with Pat this time too.

Josh spent the night with me at the hospital the first night, then on Saturday night he slept at home because he was driving my mom to the airport at 3:30 the next morning.  And since I was still in the hospital Shaners went with him.  Apparently he was chipper and perky for a lot of the ride instead of sleeping.  They went to
church after and then came to pick me and Marissa up to head home.  Shaners was super tired and crashed as soon as they left church, and stayed that way until we got home, so he kind of missed out on the whole leaving the hospital thing.

Marissa was excited though. Josh and I laughed at how she was wide awake and he was the one crashed out.

And I had to take a picture of our TWO kids in the car on the way home.  Weird!

We are home now and Josh's mom and Matthew got here on Monday so we are being well taken care of.  More posts to come soon.

Pictures and a Birth Story

(Warning: this is probably TMI for a lot of you, so if you're not into detailed birth stories, just skip on down to the pictures ;) )

So I had been dilated to a 3 for 3-4 weeks and had been having contractions every day, just nothing too uncomfortable or consistent.  April 5 came and went, and I was still feeling pretty much the same.  At 39 weeks I had talked to my doctor about scheduling an induction for Friday April 8 because my mom would be leaving early Sunday morning and I wanted to wait til Friday to give Marissa a chance to maybe come on her own, and also Josh had his final on Thursday.  The plan was to just break my water because when I went for my 40 week appt I was already a 4 and the baby was fairly low.  I was supposed to go in at noon on Friday to be induced, but to call at 11:00 and make sure there were beds.  Sure enough, the change in weather or something had sent a ton of women into labor and there weren't beds when I called.  I was pretty frustrated and just hoping that they would be able to get me in that day.  They finally told me I could come in at 4, and after some more waiting and getting settled the doctor was finally able to break my water around 6:00 pm. 

I was expecting heavy contractions to come right after that because that's what happened when my water broke with Shane, but they were still pretty slow coming and I was still pretty comfortable so we walked around the labor and delivery floor and around 8:00 pm I was at a 5 and the doctor gave me some pitocin to help move things along.  She upped the dose once and then it seemed to do the trick- my contractions started coming every 2 minutes and were getting more uncomfortable.  I had kind of decided before that I would wait and see about getting an epidural and that if things were moving fairly fast I would try to do it without one.  The contractions were definitely uncomfortable but didn't seem to last too long and I was feeling pretty good breathing through them and holding onto Josh's hand.  I started feeling like I wanted to push so they checked me and I was at a 9, so I knew I could do it without.  This was probably around 10:00 and with 2 or 3 more contractions I was fully dilated and ready to push.  I had heard horror stories about transition so it really didn't seem as bad as what I was expecting, but the pushing was a little harder than I had thought.  They finally did an episiotomy and after that I was able to push her out at 10:42.  I loved my epidural with Shane and was glad I got one, but I was really glad I didn't with Marissa.  It was cool to experience the huge relief and rush of adrenaline the second she came out, and I felt great afterwards.  It was nice to be able to get up and walk around right after and not feel woozy, and she was so alert too.  Anyway I think I will just play each labor by ear and see how I feel about getting the drugs or not.  And as an added bonus, it will certainly be nice to get one less bill!

Alright, it's safe to look now ;)  I am going to try and do a few posts in the next few days while my memory is still fresh and I want to document what I can because newborns change so fast and they look so different in every picture!  So here are some of Marissa's first couple days:

Marissa Rhae Dettinger

Born April 8th, 2011 at 10:42 pm.  8 lbs. 11 oz., 21.5" long.  Mommy and baby doing well, more details later.