Monday, December 17, 2012

Katie Rae Pickett (Finally)

So it's been a really, really, really long time since I've posted to my blog. I just hate adding photos because I think it's so not user friendly but I'm going to try anyway.
July was a busy month for me. I worked up until July 13 and then took off work for Maternity Leave. My doc said I could schedule the c-section for July 26 and I said let's go for it (her due date was originally Aug 3). I had a c-section because I had a section with Elise. I thought I could VBAC but it turns out I have a large fibroid right next to the old incision and they didn't want to risk rupture. The great thing about it was that I was able to schedule it. So that morning we dropped off Elise at a friends house at 4:30 am and got to the hospital at 5:00 am. They took us right into the labor and delivery prep. I changed into my gown and they started with the blood work, IV and pressure checking. My blood pressure was high but that was because I was nervous about the whole thing. Then around 7 am Dr. Calder came in and asked if I was ready. I said let's go. So in we went to the surgery room and I got my spinal and laid on the table. Dr. Calder said everything was going great. When the baby finally came out she said "What an adorable face!" I was so happy to finally be done with pregnancy. I also got my tubes tied at the same time. I even asked her a few times if she was sure they got both sides. Jared was at my head the whole time but really wanted to be right in there for the birth.
Katie Rae was born at 7:51 am weighing 6 pounds, 15 ounces. She was 20.87 inches long. She had strawberry blonde hair, which kinda surprised me and she sounded like a cat meowing when she came out. They brought her to me after she was all cleaned up and laid her on my chest when they wheeled me into recovery. That's the part I don't remember because I was pretty groggy at that point. So then I was in recovery for a bit while they monitored both of our vitals. Katie was a peach during that time. She just laid there wide awake on my chest looking around and not crying a bit (kind of a curser of things to come which I didn't know at the time). The nurse gave her a bath right there and cleaned her up. Then it was time for me to be transferred to the postpartum unit. I thought that she wouldn't nurse like Elise so I didn't even try. I pumped a little and gave it to her. Then a little while later I was tired and figured that I could just try to nurse and see how it went. She was a complete natural from the start. I had no problems whatsoever. I was so excited to not have to pump. It was heaven. She was (and is) such a calm, mellow baby. She hardly ever cried except when she is hungry or tired or being bugged by Elise.
My hospital stay wasn't the most pleasant and I had to say a few extra days because my blood pressure was high and they didn't want me to have a stroke at home. So I was finally release and able to go home. I have to say that the pain was so minimal. I mean my incision was painful but not for very long and recovery was really fast. I was up really quick from surgery and was able to sleep in my bed from the beginning. I had great friends come to visit during my stay including the Burr's, Dutton's, Christina, Jen and even some of my work friends :) It was so nice of everyone to come see me.
Being home was a blur and after not sleeping for about 3 weeks I finally gave up on breastfeeding. I still pump every day, 5 times a day, I just never feed her on the boob anymore. It was so much work every few hours that I just didn't have energy to do it. Plus I knew I would be heading back to work eventually and needed to switch over. She is doing great with the milk. I have given her formula 2 times when I didn't have enough milk but she vomited that up everywhere. I'm glad we don't have to buy formula and that I have enough milk for her. Soon we will be starting on solids, but I'm trying to wait until at least January.
Katie is such a great baby. She is really calm and mellow and I love her little personality. She loves to just look and observe. Yesterday at dinner we were sitting at the table and she was reaching and grabbing at toys on her chair. Both Jared and I were amazed at her progress. She is already growing up and I don't want it to happen. I'm not ready for the crawling phase and the putting everything in the mouth phase because that means I'll have to be uber clean and tidy up all of Elise's toys. Anyway, I'll have more to post about the rest of the stuff I did this year and hopefully it won't be so long in between posts :) Here are some pics from the hospital.








Friday, April 20, 2012

Another quilt and my cute Easter girl!

I finished another quilt the day before yesterday and used only scraps :). This is only number 2 this year. I guess my goal of 12 is slowing diminishing. Well at least I had a goal. I'll have another one done soon too for Michelle. I have a bunch lined up I just hate the cutting part. Plus I really want to try and work on Free Motion Quilting because I've never done it before. Anyway, here are some pics of the quilt and of my cutest little creation ever. I made her Easter dress and she loved it. She wants me to make more but only if they are long like this so she can twirl. Silly girl!











Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Nothing new

I'm finally working on a new quilt for a girl at work. She's having a baby girl, so I gathered up some scraps and put it together. I'm going to baste and hopefully quilt it tonight. Pics to come. I was practicing last night on my free motion quilting and it was hard, but everything I've read said the first few times are difficult and never come out right. So I'll keep practicing and see if I can't figure it out. I also found that I love working with basting spray. It's so simple and easy to use and I don't ever have to pin again! Well maybe big projects.

In other news, there really isn't much new going on. I'm 24 weeks along and ready to be done with pregnancy. The leg cramps just started a few days ago and I'm already sick of them. Last time I took calcium and it seemed to help. So I just started that a few days ago too. I've decided that me and pregnancy are not friends. I don't like being sick and I really hate baby kicking me. It makes me nauseous. So there you have it.

Friday, January 27, 2012

Last quilt of 2011

This is the last quilt I made last year for my friend Christina. She had a little boy at the end of November. I'm in love with the polka dots on the back. The coolest fabric though is aliens and a little boy on the front fabric. It was fun to pick it all out and I was really lucky to find the back fabric which matched up perfectly.
photo(3)

photo(2)

photo(1)

I didn't take any pictures at the Quilt show, I think because I was so in awe of all the marvelous quilts I just totally forgot about it. The shopping was fun too. I found a pattern for my next quilt, some fat quarters for another quilt and a jelly roll for yet another. I think so far this year I have 5 quilts ready to go. Whew! It's gonna be a busy year!

Thursday, January 19, 2012

First Quilt of 2012

Here's the first of my goals for this year. It was a pretty easy quilt that I found on pinterest. It was for my friend Jen who is having a baby next month. I love, love, love the stripes. Those along with the polka dots are so cute! I wanted to post the one I made for Christina too but the pics are on my phone and I didn't download them yet. So here's this one instead. Karen, Lindsey and I are going to the quilt show in Ontario this weekend and I'm so excited to see all the awesome quilts and get some good ideas.
P1140858
P1140859
P1140860


Before and After

Here are pics of me and Lindsey before and after the 5K. Don't we look skinny!?!? It was a lot of fun, but I'm not ready to run anytime soon. That wiped me out for a while.
PC070798
PC070815

Friday, January 13, 2012

1 year post op

It's been exactly one year since I had my bariatric surgery. I can't believe how fast the year went. Seems like yesterday I was being wheeled into the operating room. Well here are the results: I'm down to 214 as of this morning. Since surgery that's 82 pounds and that makes a total of 104 pounds lost since I started this journey. I still can't believe how different I look and feel. I'm so happy I chose to do this. I was so unhappy with my weight in the past and now I finally feel that I have it mostly under control. I still have more to lose (like another 40 pounds would be fabulous), but I'm ok with it now. It'd be great to get under 200. So that's my next goal. It might be a while though before that happens because in about 7 months I'll be having a baby. Yep, you heard it here first. I'm due August 2. So I'm 11 weeks as of yesterday. I wasn't going to say much until 12 weeks, but it's almost here and it's slowly being leaked to the public. I'm not ready to blast it yet on facebook so only my faithful readers here will get the inside scoop. I'm exhausted, tired and even more tired than I was with Elise. I can't keep hardly anything down and the toilet is my new best friend. Luckily I have a great doctor who has been willing to help me with medications and they seem to be working a little bit. So anyway, there's the inside 411 for you all. Happy Friday :) Oh, and I'll have some pics to post soon of my newest quilt and one that I finished a few months ago that I haven't put up here. I'm excited to be done with quilt 1 of the 12 to do this year :) And I joined a virtual quilting bee and am very excited to be in one this year. It'll really help my skills. Ok, this is long enough now.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Welcome 2012

I'm not in the mood to work, so I was blog stalking again on some quilting sites. Found some really great ones I want to do. Maybe this year, but maybe not. I still have my goal of 12 in 2012. I need to start and finish one this weekend, since I have a baby shower next weekend and I'll hopefully be bringing it there. It amazes me how people find the time to do so much quilting. I guess I'll just have to make the time. That means late nights since that's pretty much the only time I have to myself. I could get up earlier, but who wants to do that? Not me!
Anyway, I don't have any resolutions this year. Got my weight under better control, so I don't need to focus on that. I should do some more exercising as after my first 5K I haven't even stepped foot into my running gear. Oh well. Guess that's a resolution. I'm just not feeling up to it. There's lots of things I need to change about myself internally but I'm not really sure there are resolutions for me to make to do that. Hmmm... guess I'll have to do some thinking about it. I should make a resolution to take more pictures and post them here. I know a few of you would like that. So I guess that's it. Nothing else I can think of. It's already feeling like a long year ahead. I hope that's not the case. Maybe I'm just tired and need more sleep. Oh, that's a good resolution, more sleep. Not sure it's gonna happen, but I'll try. What are your resolutions?