Violet Abigail Larson

So the big day has come and gone and we now have a beautiful baby girl! We are feeling so blessed and full of gratitude at the arrival of our little Violet. She was born on Monday, April 11 at 12:02 pm. For those of you on Facebook, you have already seen all of these pictures. But for the sake of our family history and for those of you who haven't seen them, here is a nice little picture overload for you!! And for those of you interested in the birth story and all the L&D details...here is my recap.

I had been planning an induction for 4/11/11 for about a month now. Mostly because that is what worked out for Nathan's schedule and for my mom to be there :). I was induced with Sawyer at 39.1 wks and everything went beautifully...9 hr labor and no complications. So I wasn't too worried about doing it that way again. I was 39.3 wks that day and I figured if she hadn't come on her own yet I was going to help her out! The paranoid L&D nurse in me doesn't like to keep them in much longer than that...I feel like there is a point where the baby is safer outside of me than inside. So that was my plan. Sunday night rolled around and I hadn't felt anything other than irregular mild contractions so far, so I knew at that point that the induction was going to happen. This time I requested to be the 5 am induction rather than 3 am like we did with Sawyer. This allowed me a few more hours of sleep which was greatly appreciated!! We showed up at 5 am and my friend Whitney started my induction. She placed a cervical ripening gel around 6 am and within 15 minutes or so I was feeling it!! The contractions were already coming every 3-5 min and were definitely uncomfortable. I remember it happening much the same way with Sawyer. Whitney went home at 6 and Deanna took over. At 7 I was determined to go walk the halls for an hour (which is standard protocol with the gels). Nathan went with me and I think by 7:35 I was dying to go back to my room because I could barely walk through the contractions anymore.

(headed to the hospital--430 am)

(trying to tough it out...starting to think about an epidural)

So I ended up going back to my room to try and work through the contractions a little longer. Anesthesia had 2 scheduled C-Sections that morning so I knew it was going to take some planning to get my epidural when I wanted it. My doctor showed up at 815 and they were still back in the 2nd Section...I told him he could go ahead and break my water even though I didn't have my epidural yet because I didn't want to miss out on my chance for that. Luckily he said he had some things to do at the hospital and he would come back in an hour to break water so that I would have time to get comfortable. I went ahead and put in my request for an epidural. They were finally able to come place the epidural around 930 (thank goodness for modern medicine! I don't know why I ever consider doing it without!). My doctor didn't make it back downstairs until 1030 to break my water, so by then I was happy as a clam with my epidural.

(loved having my mom there during labor and delivery...something about a mother's touch makes everything better)

(resting comfortably!)

So when Dr. Walter broke my water I was 4 cm (we started out at 1.5 cm when the gel was placed). I was happy that I had made some change on my own before getting the epidural and having my water broken. An hour later (1130) I was feeling TONS of pressure and told my nurse that she'd better check me. And I was right--10 cm! It was baby time! Dr. Walter made it back over to the hospital pretty quickly and I only had to push a couple times. My epidural was so wonderful...I could still move and lift my legs and feel some pressure...perfect scenario. At 12:02 Violet Abigail Larson entered the world. It was a special moment and it was so nice to share it with my husband and my mom. I couldn't have asked for a better experience! (And I'm super glad I decided to get my epidural before letting him break my water...I may not have had time otherwise! Yikes!)

Giving her a good rub down! Loving that she's totally got Sawyer's big mouth! And I don't know if you can really tell in any of these pictures, but she had a full head of dark hair! (truthfully it was more of a mullet...super dark and long in the back...much shorter/thinner and lighter on top. I, however, am all for cutting newborn hair and evening it out a bit so that's what we've done since we got home) But we were seriously shocked at the color after having Sawyer come out with bleach blond fuzz. Who would have thought?!?

Silly Daddy

7 lbs 3 oz!! So I don't know if I've mentioned before but around 35 wks we had an ultrasound because I was measuring a bit small. Turns out so was Violet. I ended up having to go in for weekly ultrasounds and NST's after that because she was 10th percentile estimated weight and that is technically considered IUGR (intra uterine growth restriction). Everything else was totally normal and healthy she was just measuring small. Overall my doctor was not worried about her but we had to take precautions just to be safe. So needless to say everyone was a bit shocked when she came out weighing over 7 lbs. I wasn't so surprised because I felt like I was small with Sawyer too and he still weighed 7.15. Anywho...she was a good sized little girl.

Dr. Walter, Deanna, and a Med Student :)...they did a fantastic job

My mom went home shortly after delivery and got Kristie, Sawyer and Mia. Of course my mom thought about flowers when she came back! It was so cute seeing Sawyer walk in holding a little bouquet! I kind of lost it at that point.

So all of those tender pictures above of Sawyer meeting Violet really only lasted about 2 minutes all in all. He was kind of like, "Oh hey, baby...wow look at this room!!!!" Then he spent the next 30 minutes pushing every button (including the call light) that he could find. I've never gone for quite such a ride in a hospital bed before!

Mom with her two granddaughters

My mom and Kristie stayed home with Sawyer for the remainder of our hospital stay. It was so nice just relaxing for a couple days with Nathan and baby Violet...my girls at Estrella took great care of me and overall my recovery has been so much better this time around!

Leaving the hospital with our new baby girl! Excited to go home and be with our little Sawyer again!

So that's it. Violet's birth story. And life continues here at home. It's so weird that we are a family of 4 now...still surreal actually. But we are excited and happy and grateful for the many blessings all around us.