Meadow, now 12 weeks old, has developed an awesome personality. She is a lot of fun to have around these days, and even lets us sleep every once in a while!

Almost everyone we meet comments on how "interactive" and "alert" she is for such a young baby. She loves to watch what others are doing, and smile at them if they look over at her. She especially enjoys watching young children play; today at church Meadow squealed with happiness as a four-year-old did a little dance for her! I think she will enjoy having foster kids around when we decide we are ready for that.

But Meadow is not always bright and chipper; she is quite vocal about her preferences, and if she doesn't like something, she will let you know! For instance, because she is such a social bug, Meadow hates being in her car seat. Being alone in the back of the car is not her idea of fun. She also gets quite angry if you aren't in the same room she is in (even if you're just stepping into the bathroom for a second)! Yes, she is a big fan of attention and people!

Another strong preference she has: she does not like to lay down except when sleeping. She doesn't have reflux or anything; I think she just likes sit up so she can see everything. Also, when she is carried she only wants to be held facing outward - nothing else is acceptable!

I know, we have a pretty high-maintenance baby. But honestly, I don't think I would want it any other way. It's great having a child with a strong personality at a such a young age. She will grow up to be "her own person," and that is exciting to me.

I will end my little post with the obligatory "baby in the bath" video that it seems every parent is supposed to make at some point :-)

I promise I will write an update about Meadow soon, but something interesting happened today that I just have to write about.

Jason and I have started looking for another house. We would LOVE to live near Reid Park, a giant park in the center of Tucson with four playgrounds, an outdoor stage, baseball fields, two ponds, a rose garden, a golf course, a zoo, and pretty much the only large trees/grassy areas in town.

The only downside to this plan is that all of the surrounding communities were build in the 50s and 60s. One thing we have to do with these older properties is look through old paperwork in the property's file for addition permits, major repairs (or lack thereof), etc. Today I came across a phrase in a property contract which shocked my socks off. I copied it so I could share with you:



Yes, I know it was the 50s, but it is still baffling to me that they would actually write in the contract that no one except white people were allowed to occupy houses in this neighborhood! Also, why were "Asiatics" allowed to own the houses on Campbell Road, but nowhere else? Apparently they are only marginally acceptable?

I know racism is still around in our day and age, but I am soooo glad that I live in a time where, at the very least, our mortgage contracts are no longer racist. Because that is just crazy.

We survived four different plane rides with an infant! (Hopefully the other passengers survived, too!)

We first traveled to Colorado where we spent a week with Jason's family. We had lots of fun spending time with the relatives as well as some of Jason's childhood friends. Meadow loved the side-to-side baby swing so much that we bought one off Craigslist when we got home - a great investment!

Christmas Eve was the last day we had there, so that was when we opened presents. The best part was seeing Grandma and Grandpa open the present we bought them, which was just perfect for our poker-playing hunter Grandpa. Thanks, Ebay!



Jason's sister Candace is starting up a photography business, so she took a bunch of cutesy pictures of Meadow and the fam. Here is just a taste:






On Christmas day we flew to Iowa, since my brother Taylor was getting married the next day. It was a beautiful wedding, and we had a lot of fun despite the bitter cold and loads of snow. Here is Taylor with his bride, Anna. What a great couple they are.




We also finally got to meet our nephew, Reuben (Taylor and Anna's son) for the first time. He is adorable in every way!



I didn't take very many pictures while on holiday, but I am hoping to get some more from the relatives that did take some - especially of Meadow and our other nephew, Nathan (Candace and Jeremy's son). But here is one last picture that I have - a picture of Meadow Joyce Ard with her Grandma Joyce, who she is named after:

Meadow is a month old now! Time has gone by so fast. I don't know how I would have gotten through it without the help of my mom coming for two weeks and Jason's parents coming for the week right after.



I've got just a few weeks to survive on my own before we go off to Colorado and then Iowa for Christmas. So far things have been going pretty well. Meadow loves to be held all the time, which is a huge adjustment - I have learned to do so many things with one hand!

We are so grateful that so far our baby has been very healthy and is growing well.

The heavy stuff -

I am thankful for a wonderful husband who is also my best friend.
I am thankful for a beautiful, healthy daughter who already has a wonderful personality!
I am thankful that my mom and in-laws have been able to help out the last three weeks so that I wouldn't lose my sanity!
I am thankful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and God's love for us.
I am thankful for nature and all of God's beautiful creations.
I am thankful for music.
I am thankful for laughter.
I am thankful for so many supportive and loving friends and family members.

The B list -

I am thankful that my ankles are finally down to their normal size!
I am thankful for an Internet to surf while feeding the baby.
I am thankful for my favorite food - potatoes - and all of the wonderful fattening creations you can make with them.
I am thankful for the comfiest pillow in the world, which is also a "family heirloom" (Nana says that the pillow was probably made from feathers that her mother plucked and stuffed herself!)
I am thankful for tie dye and bell bottoms.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

I now completely understand why people's blogs focus almost exclusively on their children once they have them; my life has been almost exclusively devoted to Meadow since she was born, so she is all I can think to blog about!

I have good news about the fussiness - we haven't had a fussy night since my last blog post! I'm not quite sure what did it, but at least one of the following things helped. First, many people suggested that the baby might be sensitive to certain foods I eat that get passed on in my breastmilk. Ceasing the consumption of chocolate seems to be correlated with a decrease in fussiness. Second, Meadow's awake time has shifted to be during the day instead of at night - hallelujah! Finally, I have given in to holding her all the time, even when she sleeps. It helps that I can just put her in the baby wrap and leave my hands free. She wants to be held all the time, but I am told this is pretty normal behavior for newborns - they were used to feeling bodily warmth and hearing your heartbeat 24/7 in the womb, so anything different is scary. Anyway, at least one of those things (probably all three combined) has really helped the situation. It's still difficult to get used to the erratic sleeping schedule of a newborn (which is also my erratic sleeping schedule) but at least it is no longer punctuated by bouts of inconsolable crying!

Most of you will find this video incredibly boring, and that is okay. I thought I'd post it anyway, mostly for the benefit of relatives and baby-hungry friends. Watching it is completely optional! (SPOILER ALERT: It is a video of a two-week-old baby doing baby things, like looking around, crying, and spitting up. Riveting, I know. A few interesting points - you can see in the first clip that she definitely has a dimple on her right cheek, and the second clip shows off her very flat head, which I have been told by every nurse who sees her that it is indicative of her breech status in the womb.)

Five hours of wailing last night. Thank goodness my mom is here so we could take sanity shifts. Mylicon didn't work. The methods from "Happiest Baby on the Block" (swaddling, side lying, shushing, sucking...) didn't work. The swing, diaper changes, white noise, feeding, changing, singing didn't work. Crazy baby finally wore herself out at 3 AM! Any suggestions?

So far, being a parent has been pretty great! I think it helps a lot that my mom is here to help for the next few weeks - recovering from a c-section is both easier and harder than I thought. Easier than I thought, because I can still get around the house okay, and as long as I take my pain meds I don't hurt to much. Harder, because for the next two weeks I'm not allowed to lift anything heavier than the baby - that means no groceries, no laundry, no strollers, etc. I'm also not allowed to drive - so glad my mom is here to drive us to our doctors' appointments!

Meadow has been a pretty awesome baby so far. We did have several colicky nights, until two nights ago when we started using Mylicon (a baby medicine that helps with gas). Since then, we have had a lot less crying and a lot more sleeping. It hasn't been as hard as I thought to get the sleep I need, thanks in part to my mom being here to take care of the mundane stuff, and also thanks to Meadow occasionally sleeping for four-hour stretches so I can get a little REM sleep. And despite a few bumps in the road when I first started breastfeeding, things are going pretty well now, and at her doctor's appointment on Monday we found out that she had gained 7 ounces in the past 5 days!

We definitely think our baby is the cutest baby around! She also came with a great personality and a myriad of expressions. My favorite is when she is intently listening or thinking about something, she will raise her eyebrows and get a bunch of wrinkles on her forehead. She never does this long enough for me to successfully get a picture, though. I will keep trying!

Here is a picture of Meadow being fascinated by the computer screen (late at night when I am facebooking while nursing).



Most of you already know this, but if you want to see more pictures of Meadow, you can check them out in a Facebook album of mine:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2299279&id=17800275&l=96e9850e02

I know, I know, this is old news for you facebookers, but I really couldn't leave Meadow's birth off my blog! Here is a more detailed account of her birth for those who are interested.

We got to the Tucson Medical Center at 8 AM on Monday, November 2nd. They put us in a Labor and Delivery room while a nurse performed an ultrasound (to make sure the baby was still breech) and then monitored the baby's heart rate for about an hour. They were running late, or course, and I got into the surgery room at around 10:30. I felt like I was in a meat locker - it was freezing! They gave me the epidural and layed me out on the surgical table with a big blue sheet between my face and belly.

It took less than 10 minutes for them to get Meadow out. One of them commented on her "chubby butt" as they were pulling her out of the incision. She started crying almost immediately, and we were so happy to hear the loud cry of a healthy baby! They held her up for us to see, with her umbilical cord still dangling. What a beautiful girl! They cleaned her off, wrapped her up, and handed her over to Jason.



I didn't get to hold her then, since they were stitching me up, but Jason put her face close to mine to say hello. The midwife commented on how she moved her face as close to mine as possible, that she already knew me from my voice and smell.



Since the operating room is so cold they like to take the babies out ASAP to a warmer room, so Jason left with Meadow while I finished getting stitched up. Meadow went to the nursery for a few hours, where they assessed her to be healthy. She weighed 7 pounds, 5 ounces, and measured 18 inches long.

The first day after the surgery was not the most fun for me. Since the epidural was still wearing off, and I had an IV and a catheter, I was pretty much confined to bed. Probably the worst part was not being able to eat all day, either. Thankfully Jason kept me company, and I had access to the internet via a netbook generously loaned to me from friends. Probably most of the day was spent sleeping and practicing breastfeeding.

Since then, the pain from my surgery has been bearable (with medication), and I have been able to get up and move around slowly, eat, and take care of our darling baby girl. The nurses, doctors, midwives, and lactation consultants have all been wonderful! I do still look forward to going home tomorrow, though!

Meadow has been a real joy so far. Jason and I love her expressions, especially when she opens up her eyes for brief moments. She has a very passionate cry and generously expresses herself whenever anyone unwraps her or changes her diaper. She is extremely cuddly and does not like her bassinett one bit, preferring to be held all the time (which I don't mind one bit!). And of course we think she is a beautiful baby, and many have commented on her dark red hair.

So there you have it - Meadow's story so far!

As for the contests, I promise I did not rig them in any way, but it seems that both prizes go to sisters-in-law! Dawn got closest to Meadow's birth date/time - she guessed November 2 at 11:02 AM, and Meadow was born at 10:54 AM. Cali was within 1 ounce of Meadow's birth weight. Congratulations to you both :-)

So there have been a few disgruntled people about the "When Will Meadow Be Born" contest, saying that the contest is unfair since now her birthday has been narrowed down quite a bit. I disagree with these people, since (1) I did start the contest before I ever knew Meadow was breech and would have to have a c-section, (2) we are letting the midwives/obstetricians pick the exact day for us according to their schedule, (3) I could still go into labor before the decided day and have to have an emergency c-section, and (4) I have officially closed the contest to any further entries so no one has any more of any educated guess than any of you did a few weeks ago. There are still a lot of people who could win, and those who can no longer win (i.e. guessed past my due date) just did not think to take into account the slim chance that Meadow would be breech!

Still...after someone "wins" either the frog or squirrel carving, the other carving is still up for grabs. So, my thought is, why not hold a second contest for who gets the second carving? Whatever carving is not picked by the person who guessed closest to Meadow's birth day can be won by someone else in this contest! (And hopefully a few of you will be less gruntled.)

So, if you want to win the "other" carving, go ahead and make a guess for her weight on my blog, lauren.blogcadia.com. (Sorry, guesses on facebook will not be counted, just because I am too lazy and don't want to correlate all the comments!) Oh, and the weight needs to be in pounds and ounces! As much as I love the metric system, we will stick with English units today. :-)

What a day.

My External Cephalic Version was today. Early in the morning they did an ultrasound, and Meadow was indeed still breech. They also measured the size of the baby and the amount of amniotic fluid and determined I was a good candidate for a version. Then they monitored the baby's heart rate for about an hour to make sure she was also a good candidate. In the meantime, the midwife had had a conversation with the obstetrician on duty, and found out that this particular OB hadn't done very many successful versions and wasn't really comfortable with the whole process. So they asked me to wait until 3:00 for the next doctor to be on call - an OB who was "the best" at external versions. Well, of course I would wait! It was a long day of watching horrific daytime TV, eating hospital food, and lots of waiting, but it was worth it knowing that I would be getting "the best."

The version itself was practically a party - the awesome OB convinced the OB from that morning that she needed to get more experience with the craft and invited her to help. The midwife came, along with an intern midwife, and then there was an ultrasound tech to keep checking on Meadow's position. So, five people for one version (seven, if you count the baby and I).

ECV was the most painful thing I have ever experienced! I can't even begin to describe how painful it was to have fingers jabbing deep into your stomach trying to manipulate a baby through layers of fat, muscle, uterus, and amniotic fluid. No description I can think of can do it justice. They told me before we started that I could call it quits at any time, but I had determined at the beginning that it would be far worse living with "what ifs" for the rest of my life if I told them to stop because I was in pain. The pain was temporary, no matter how bad, and I wanted to walk out of there knowing that I had done my best to get that baby to turn. The labor books I read really helped with this - relaxing your body when it is under such duress is not an easy task! The midwife told me that I had one of the highest pain thresholds she had every seen. I take great comfort in knowing that I did my part to the best of my ability, and didn't wimp out.

The OBs were successful in turning Meadow half way three times. All three times one of them pushed her butt up and out of my pelvis, while the other tried to rotate her head around. Usually once the baby is half way turned they will get the message and go with the flow and let the OBs do their thing. Not Meadow! All three times, as soon as her head slipped out of their grasp, I felt a big "POP!" in my stomach as she pushed herself back into the position she liked best! She fought with them the whole time, hiding her head underneath the placenta, pushing back when they tried to push her head down - all the while keeping a cool steady heart beat. Gotta admire that tenacity. After three tries the OBs conceded defeat. It was good to know that I had "the best" working on me, and that if she couldn't turn Meadow, it just wasn't meant to be.

Now I sit here with a very tender tummy, a little scared at the stubborn child I am soon to hold in my arms! I can't say that I really hold out much hope that she will "turn on her own" in the next few weeks - if she didn't turn with the help of two obstetricians, I don't think she's planning on going anywhere! So tomorrow they will schedule a c-section for somewhere around 39-39.5 weeks, and if she doesn't turn by then, I will be having a scheduled birth. (I am being careful not to look at the contest entries from the previous post, and we have decided we will go with whatever day the midwife decides would be best, just to make it as fair as possible to everyone!)

It sounds strange, but at this point in time I am more grateful than ever that I chose to switch to a midwifery clinic for my prenatal care! Since they keep their c-section rate at a low 7.7%, I know for sure that my c-section is a needed one, and not the cause of the unnecessary medical interventions. I know I have done everything I could to have the healthiest birth possible - which in my case happens to be a c-section. Though unfortunately it comes with more risks to the baby and the mother than a vaginal birth, I get to be one of those lucky few where the risks are unavoidable. C'est la vie.

Yeah, it's a little bit of a disappointment. No, I don't take back any of the stuff I said about how awesome natural birth is (and I plan on doing a VBAC with the midwives next time around, for sure!!). Also no, I don't think it was Karma from my Halloween costume that caused this - though wouldn't it be funny if I were scheduled for my section on Halloween??

Tomorrow I will officially be one calendar month from my due date! Time sure is flying by in this last trimester!

As per request, here is a shot of my belly, taken just 10 minutes ago:

So....my due date is fast approaching! In less than four weeks I will be considered "full term," and in 6 1/2 weeks I will be due (November 7)! We are excited for Meadow to come into the world (and not just because of the plethora of aches and pains that come with the last few months of pregnancy)!

So, to spice things up a little, I thought I would do a little "baby pool" thing - with a prize for the winner!

The lucky winner will get to choose one of the following carvings, made by yours truly!

Squirrel:



Frog:



UPDATE (10/24/09): Now that we know that Meadow is breech and know with more certainty when she will be born, I am no longer accepting any entries!! Consider the contest CLOSED!

A few days ago I finished an interesting book called "Free Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedoms We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry." The premise of the book is that the dangers of letting children playing unsupervised have been blown way out of proportion in recent years, and that we should be letting our children be at least as "free-range" as we were as children.

What has caused us to be so overprotective of our children these days? Mostly the media - every child abduction story is publicized and harped on to an amazing degree, making us more and more paranoid about our children being abducted and killed.

One of the biggest reasons people give for being so clingy with their children is that the world has become so much more dangerous than it was when we were kids, or our parents were kids. Actually, the crime rate (especially violent crimes and abductions) has been dropping steadily since the 1970s! It just seems like the world is a scarier place because the media wants to get our attention with every violent and scary crime they can get their hands on.

So how likely is the abduction-and-murder scenario, really? Statistics show that 1 in 1.5 million children are abducted and killed. Of course you don't want that one child to be your child, but with such remote chances of this actually happening, our worries should really be transferred to other things that are more likely to happen.

A child is 40 times more likely to die in a car accident than be abducted and killed, yet we allow our children to ride in cars every day. Also, a child is 20 times more likely to be killed in a house fire, yet more and more of us are keeping our children cooped up indoors because unsupervised outdoor play is "just too dangerous."

And here are some even more amusing statistics that I figured out myself: 10 times more likely to be killed by a vicious dog, 15 times more likely to die in an earthquake, and 18 times more likely to die by being struck by lightning than to be abducted and killed as a child.

After the recent discovery of Jaycee Dugard's abduction for 18 years, the media is constantly reminding us just how unsafe the world is, that we should never leave our children unsupervised at any time, heaven forbid they get abducted! Yet, where are the news stories warning us about lightning strikes?

Or what about the recent murder of Annie Le? The media tells us not to let our children go anywhere alone - shouldn't they also be telling us to never - ever - let our children go to Yale, lest they be murdered? Of course not.

I'm not saying that you should just let your toddlers roam the streets in the middle of the night. However, I did enjoy this book for giving me a more correct perspective regarding the safety of our children. I hope to be able to give my children some of the "free-range" experiences we enjoyed in our youth.

I've been a whiner lately because my big pregnant belly has been making me constantly hot, sweaty, and tired, and now during the past few days my feet and ankles have swelled up to be absolutely HUGE. Sometimes it's hard to remember how awesome it is that I'm actually pregnant, and how grateful I should be for God allowing us to bring this healthy child into our lives.

It's made me think today about how our greatest trials in life often turn out to be the greatest blessings. I have a ton of examples of this in my life, and I thought I'd share the most awesome one on my blog today.

Before I met Jason, I had a boyfriend at BYU who I steady dated through my freshman year. For awhile we both lived in on-campus housing, and then he moved to be in an off-campus apartment complex called Campus Plaza to save some money on rent. I wanted to stay with the great friends I had developed in Heritage Halls, but love won out after a few months, and I ended up moving to Campus Plaza to live closer to my beloved boyfriend. At the time I believed the relationship was quite serious for the both of us and thought for sure that he would propose to me soon. So it was quite a great shock to me when, two weeks after the big move, he told me our relationship just "didn't feel like the right thing anymore" and he dumped me. Ouch!

During that two weeks I had already developed such a great bond with my new roommates and ward that I didn't want to leave Campus Plaza. (I think I also hoped that my ex would realize his mistake and get back together with me.) The next three months were extremely difficult and depressing for me living so close to the man I had thought I would marry. Finally my ex moved away and I was able to start moving on with my life (though I think it took six months more, and a summer in Delaware, before I finally was able to completely get over it). It was possibly the most difficult time of my life!

A year after I moved into Campus Plaza, Jason showed up. What an awesome guy! After 5 years of marriage I can't imagine my life with anyone else; my life since that time has just been filled with happiness! And to think that, had I not moved to Campus Plaza, I probably would have never met him. This is definitely a great blessing that came from a most difficult trial.

But that is not the only awesome thing that came from my move to Campus Plaza! Before meeting Jason, for a while Jordan and Chris and I were all attending BYU together, and so I thought it would be fun to arrange a date night where we all went out together. The deal was that I would set them up with girls, and they would find a guy for me (which they NEVER DID, those punks; I had to find my own date). I set them up with some very find gals, one of whom was destined to be my sister-in-law. Yes, apparently Dawn and Chris hit it off so well on that date that they ended up going on many more dates and eventually getting married. So, had I not moved to Campus Plaza, I doubt Dawn and Chris would have gotten together.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE! When I moved out of Campus Plaza and married Jason, I left behind a homemade hammock which I had tied to the railings outside of our apartment (I think it was tied too tightly to get the knots out). Fast forward two years. My brother Jordan gets home from his mission, and I convinced my mom and brother the Campus Plaza was *the* place he should move to after his mission, specifically the third floor. About the same time, my future sister-in-law, Cali, also moves to the third floor of Campus Plaza. What does this have to do with my hammock, you ask? Well, when Cali decided to move to Campus Plaza, she didn't know which apartment to move into. She decided on the apartment with the hammock (thinking that meant that her future roommates must be pretty fun people to have something so awesome in front of their apartment). As a result, Jordan and Cali end up in the same ward, they start dating, and the rest is history! So, had I not moved to Campus Plaza, Jordan would probably not have moved to that complex after his mission, and Cali may not have picked the apartment with the hammock!

To think, the my marriage and the marriages of two of my brothers were ALL the result of a move to Campus Plaza to be with a guy who would break up with me two weeks later, making my life miserable for the next year! Crazy story, huh? And what a wonderfully happy ending.