Love!

This pink strawberry outfit from Land's End is the first piece of clothing I bought when I found out Meredith was a girl. I don't think I can ever get rid of it I love it so much.

I think the girls look very similar to each other. Can you guess who's who? They are about the same age in both of these pictures.

Fluffy butt

Many of you might know this, but I've decided to cloth diaper this time. For lots of reasons. 1. It's an investment up front but it will be cheaper in the long run. 2. It's better for the environment and I'm kind of crunchy to begin with when it comes to that. 3. They are cute. Enough said.

We waited about 10 days to start on the cloth diapers and used up the disposables from the hospital. For those that might not know, newborn girls can bleed in their diapers from all the built up hormones from being in their mama's belly. We never had much of an issue with that with Meredith, but Anna was having bloody diapers so we wanted to wait until that ended.

It's been a week now doing cloth. I was just a tad nervous at first to put the first one on her but I quickly got used to it and I am loving it. It's a slight adjustment at first but it's really no big deal.

Cloth diapering has come a long way in the past four or five years. There are so many options out there depending on what your needs/wants are. And I do my own laundry. Diaper services are a thing of the past.

Here's a picture of little fluffy butt. We call this one Anna Moo. She has a red/white diaper that Meredith calls Santa Anna.

Anna Elizabeth Carlson

Anna Elizabeth Carlson made her debut into the world at 1:43 a.m. on Sunday, July 31, 2011. Technically I was 3 days overdue as I was due on July 28. Saturday was like any other day. We slept in, had a late breakfast and lunch and then went to the park later in the afternoon. Greg ran some errands. In the evening, we bathed Meredith and put her to bed. Like any other evening, I like to sit in bed after Meredith goes to sleep and play around on my iPod. Shortly after I sat down in bed, I thought I felt a contraction. But I couldn't really tell as it felt very similar as to when the baby would push out on my belly. Here's how things happened:

9:00 p.m. - thought I felt the very first contractions. But I wasn't sure so I timed them for about an hour. I felt one every 10-12 minutes or so. At 10:00 I told Greg that I thought I was having contractions. I figured I had all the time in the world since labor with Meredith lasted 24+ hours. Little did I know that labor would last a whopping 4 1/2 hours from start to finish.

10:15 p.m. - Decided to call my mom and have her come up. Again I wasn't sure but better be safe than sorry. Plus, it takes her about an hour to get here. At this point, contractions were every 6-8 minutes and getting stronger. I took a quick shower and got some of my stuff together in a suitcase.

11:15 p.m.-Mom had not arrived yet. Contractions were every 4-5 minutes so I called the OB office and they paged the doctor to call me back.

11:20 p.m.- Mom arrived. We talked real quick and I went upstairs to finish packing.

11:32 p.m.- doctor called. I told her I think I need to go in. Contractions were really strong and somewhat painful and about 4 minutes apart.

11:45 p.m.- Got stuff out to the car. As I was in the garage, my water broke. I told Greg he better hurry it up because either I peed myself or my water broke.

11:55 p.m.- Greg dropped me off at the ER and I went up to labor and delivery. Filled out some paperwork and got changed and settled into my room.

12:20 a.m.- Nurses checked me and started going over the epidural paperwork. I was 4 cm dilated at that point. Was told the anesthesiologist should be up in about 15-20 minutes. That seemed like forever.

12:45 a.m.- still waiting on the anesthesiologist. Apparently he was down in surgery. I was about 6-7 cm dilated at this point. We were thinking he wouldn't make it in time so the nurse gave me a shot of painkiller to help with the pain.

1:05 a.m.- Anesthesiologist finally made it! I was so happy. I got the epidural when I was about 8 cm dilated.

1:15 a.m. - Epidural was helping a little but it was a lot different than my epidural with Meredith. I felt nothing at all and couldn't even move my legs with my epidural with Meredith. This time, I could move my legs. I could still feel pain. Especially on one side. The nurse had me roll over to help with the one side.

1:25 a.m.- was still having really painful contractions. I really think the epidural was only working 50%.

1:30 a.m.- was 10 cm dilated. Still feeling lots of pain but what can you do? It was time to push. I pushed through about 3 or 4 contractions (10 minutes maybe) and out she came!

1:43 a.m. - Welcome to the world, Anna Elizabeth Carlson.

Fresh out of the oven here.

After looking seriously craptastic in all my pictures from Meredith's birth, I was bound and determined to look better for this one. But I look just as craptastic. I guess that's what happens when you go through labor in the middle of the night both times. This was moments after the cord was cut.

Here are a few more pictures that I like.

Weighing in at 7 lbs., 3 oz.

Right after her first bath.

This was the following morning when the proud big sister got to meet her little sister for the first time.

Grandma holding Anna for the first time.

Grandpa holding her for the first time.

And finally a picture with Daddy.

Heading home.

Home at last :-)

Almost there!

This might be my last post before little Messy Mess arrives. Here are a few final pictures of her days inside my tummy.

Pouty lips!

Hand in front of her face.

Cute, cute, cute!

4th of July

We spent the 4th of July at the ballpark! It was a beautiful day to be there. And lucky us, our last row seats in the upper deck just happened to be in the shaded part of the stadium with a nice breeze blowing in from the back. And even better, the Twins won. And I got to see Joe Mauer play! Meredith was most excited about getting cotton candy. She had been looking forward to that for at least a week! And then of course, she got her face painted with Hello Kitty. AND, she got to wear her red, white, and blue tie-dye shirt she made in preschool. We had a fabulous afternoon!

37 weeks pregnant here and you can't even tell from this picture...hehehehehe!

Cabin

Meredith made her first trip this year out to the cabin last weekend. Her Juana came up on Saturday to pick her up and keep her overnight and Greg and I joined them out there the next day. It's so fun to see how excited they get at this age about stuff like that. Her excitement over the days preceding the cabin were filled with as much anticipation as a 3-year-old can muster up.

Here she is getting ready to head out with Juana.

She gave Daddy a big goodbye hug.

Mommy got a big goodbye hug as well.

Mer had a blast out at the lake. I don't think I've ever seen her as tired as she was. When we got her home the next day, she slept until 10:30 a.m.

She played with sticks and leaves.

She played with my weird uncle Robin.

And she played with my weird uncle David.

It was the perfect weekend at the cabin. Doesn't this look beautiful?

It was perfect weather for swimming. Thanks for keeping your eye on her Mary Jo!

We made some s'mores after dinner over the fire.

And she hung out with Juana some more in the hammock.

FAthers Day

Mer made her daddy the cutest Fathers Day shirt. It has a goldfish that is made from a handprint and it says "my daddy is a great catch". We went up to the St. Paul Farmers Market with Auntie Jennifer to see her Grandpa Schwake and Uncle Chris. Then we went to a true man's restaurant, Famous Dave's for lunch.

I thought I'd add a few updates on where we are with baby girl #2. We are going to be cloth diapering this time around. I'm really excited about it. Below are the shells we are going to use. They are SO cute. I'm excited to have a baby with a fluffy butt.

As for me, I'm 35 weeks and change as I type this, but below is a picture from 34 weeks. I can't believe I only have a month or less to go!

The art of twirling

Twirling is a form of art to a 3-year-old girl. She LOVES wearing twirly dresses. And she has it perfected.

And some other random cute pictures of Meredith:

It's a banana bread kind of day

Since the weather this weekend has been not too stellar, Mer and I made banana bread today. And since we can't utilize our neighborhood pool because it's too cool, Greg and Mer are at the YMCA exercising and going to the pool there.

Here is my little helper. I love how excited she gets over things these days. Sometimes too excited...when things don't go her way. Yesterday she had a tantrum and she was sooooooo angry, she made herself throw up (in the car, on the car seat nonetheless).

The results. Yum...this was a new recipe I tried and I think it's my favorite recipe so far. I only used 6 tablespoons of butter instead of 8 and I substituted 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/2 cup of white sugar instead of 1 cup of white sugar. And I added a few chocolate chips.

Before going to the YMCA, Mer accessorized to her finest.
And an update on me. I'm 33.5 weeks right now. I go in for my 34 week appointment next week and I'm having a growth ultrasound since I measure small. I did with Meredith too. I'm looking forward to it since I know how my body carries babies at this point. The first time around with Meredith, part of me was worried something was wrong but not this time. But I am going to have them double check to make sure this is still a girl (even though I did see the money shot and it looked pretty conclusive that it was a girl from my last ultrasound). And I'm hoping to get a nice 3D picture again too.

It's funny because I hear a lot of pregnant women complain about the looks and comments strangers give them about their bellies being big. Well, I get the same comments and buggy eyes too, except for being too small. Whatevs...it doesn't bother me.

This is from last week at 32 weeks. I can't believe I only have about 6 more weeks to go before I meet this little girl :-)