The story, the experience...the 411

It was 4:30am, October 18th, one week to the day before my due date. It was still dark out, cold, raining, and my water broke on a routine trip to the bathroom. I must say, I'm a big fan of the water breaking. It happened with Harper too, and it definitely takes the question out of going into labor. Knowing that a week prior, at my last appointment, I was already 4 cm dilated, I grabbed my phone as fast as I could and called the doctor on call. To my extreme jubilation...it was Dr. Zimmerman! He is my absolute favorite doctor in the practice, and the one who delivered Harper!! Another reason I love him is he doesn't jerk you around. He answers the phone "Hey Sarah, it's Zim, great day to have a baby isn't it?" He then tells me "Well, come on in, we'll be expecting you." None of that...wait at home in severe pain, and possibly miss the opportunity to get an epidural crap.

My next phone call was to my parents, and then to Emilee. I figured I would alert them ASAP so while we were getting ready to leave my mom could be on her way and Emilee could be getting her stuff ready. 30 mins from Wake Forest is a long time when you're in labor. By the time I showered (I absolutely HAD to shower) grabbed a banana and some cereal (knowing I wouldn't be eating for a while) and kissed Harper good-bye, my mom was there and ready for duty.

We got to the hospital, they assessed I was actually in labor, and put me in a labor room. Emilee arrived about the time we got to the room and she was also ready for duty. After seeing our birth video of Harper, I couldn't imagine not having one for our little Stratton too. It's one of the most amazing memories I will ever have.

Labor was almost a carbon copy of that with Harper. Contractions started within minutes of my water breaking and were fast and intense. I finally got my epidural around 7:30. Along with it came relief and drops in blood pressure whenever I changed position. I managed to keep my banana down, but definitely had some lightheadedness. They did have to give me a few extra doses along the way as my right side was a little less numb than the left. When the time came to start pushing, everything was numb that was should have been, and it was completely painless. As Stratton emerged (pretty much on his own) Adam had the exciting and wildly anticipated job of announcing the sex. Those words went something like this "IT'S A BOY, OH YES, IT'S A BOY!!!" It was quite a moment. One definitely worth waiting for.

Recovery has been a breeze, and for the most part everything has come back to us. I'm not going to lie, the first few weeks are not fun, and it is definitely a different story with a 2 1/2 year old running around. However, they are just that, a few weeks, and we are almost out of the dark and into the light as that goes.

I can't wait to share with you the slideshow Emilee puts together. I know it will take our breath away like the day itself.

Jumping right to the pictures

I promise to fill everyone in on a detailed (well, not too detailed) birth story for our beautiful little Stratton, but for now, I'm just going to post some of his newborn photos. Actually, since I never posted them, I'm going to post some from our maternity, newborn, and family sessions. Wow, how lucky are we to have a photographer as a best friend :)

Boo!! This blog post really does exist

Halloween this was definitely an event in the making. Actually, October was in general. First of all...Adam took the DAT (Dental Admissions Test). This was a huge event in the Brown house and basically consumed our/Adam's life for the 3 months leading up to it. Well, luckily HE DID GREAT!! So we won't have to go through all of that again (that is of course until dental school). Next on the line up was...The North Carolina State Fair!! This may not sound like a big deal to you, but I am a fair lover and never ever miss it. This, of course, leading up to the main event of THE BABY!! We spent most of the month praying he would wait and wouldn't come until after all of the happenings...which he did.

Now, on to Halloween. Though we were hoping the baby would hold off for a while, I was very optimistic he would be here for a little trick or treating with the family. I had planned the kids costumes and was very excited.

As luck would have it, he missed all the dates we wanted, and made it in time to hit exactly 4 houses on a rainy miserable Halloween night :(

Earlier in the month we found the time to make a repeat visit and grab some pumpkins at Hillridge Farms. We were so excited that we randomly ran into our friend Whitley and her little boy Tully (one of Harpers favorite little buddies). It made the day that much better, especially for the kids. The train and hay ride were just as fun as always, and feeding the animals never gets old. The 2 new attractions for Harper were the hay jump and the big slide. She had the best time!!

This was a very big slide for such a little girl to take on all by herself!

Out of the hundreds of pumpkins to choose from, Harper chose this little guy and wouldn't let go. No matter how much mom and dad tried to convince her to get a bigger one, or a smoother one, she would have none of it. It wasn't even carvable. This was, in fact, the Charlie Brown Christmas tree of the pumpkin patch :)

And now for the costume reveal!! Harper was a beautiful Eskimo (princess) as she would say, and Stratton was her sweet little papoose. My precious little babies.

And the winner is...

MY MOM!!!

I promise you there was no nepotism involved. She was as "in the dark" as the rest of you. This was completely a computer generated contest, and all the scoring calculations were out of my hands. I guess she's just that good.

It figures it would be the one person I constantly get free babysitting from and totally doesn't share my design style. Oh well, Mom, I'm sure we can work something out. Maybe you can come over and watch the kids WHILE I paint you something.

Congratulations to a well deserved winner :)

The baby is HERE!!

Well, all the guessing is over, and all the questions are finally answered, the newest Brown is here and it's a...................BOY!!!!! He was born at 12:31 pm, weighs 8lbs 4oz and is 21.5 inches long. A week early and still a big boy. Name is still in the works as we had only narrowed our list and didn't come to a final decision before the ol' water broke.

We could not be more excited...especially Adam. A boy, holy cow!! I have no idea how to be the mom to a boy. I guess I'll figure it out soon enough, I'll have to.

Details and pictures to come, but for now here's a side by side comparison of Harper and her new brother so you can see the family resemblance. My 2 babies on their first days of life :)

This may be your last chance...

or I could go another 3 weeks.

That's one thing about labor I HATE, not being able to predict or have any sort of guarantee. Funny that based on that character flaw I possess, we didn't find out the sex either. What are we doing to ourselves??!!

Anyway, anyway, back to the point of this post. I just went to the doctor today for my weekly check. I am 38 weeks (14 days to go) and almost 4cm dilated, 50% effaced, and still at -2 station (meaning the baby hasn't dropped at all yet). My thought process is...another week, maybe. I am sending you all this friendly reminder so that you will get your Baby Pool guesses in before it's too late. As soon as this baby sees the light of day, the pool is closed for business. Remember, if for some strange reason you don't want to babysit as your prize, or you live out of town, I have decided to do a Painted Peacock piece for the winner. Now who would pass that up??

Good Luck :)

Click here for the link.

Too...many...posts. Running...out of...time!!

Well hello there captain obvious, I've been neglecting the blog. I really have no excuse either. Pregnancy would be a great one, except how do you use the same excuse for being too lazy to do the dishes, laundry, or grocery shopping, aaannnd sitting on the sofa, playing on the computer. Seems like maybe I should be able to muster up the energy to do one of those things. Well...I'm madly catching up on posts this week, so guess which one I chose?

After going through our phones for pictures and downloading our camera from the past 4 months, I have found a ton of pictures. Most of them weren't vital enough to get their own posts. However, several of them were definitely blog worthy. So I've decided to just do a mass catch up post and give a very small commentary for each picture or group of pictures. We did have a few events that were given an entire post so make sure to read down through all the new ones :)

Back in July, Harper made the switch into her big girl room (more on room design later). We decided to keep the nursery as is and move her into our old guest room. Surprisingly, she took right to it and has never turned back. She, for whatever reason, never gets out of her bed. She will talk, sing, or read to herself, but has been good as gold since the big move. Love her!!! Here is our little girl and dada on "night 1".

Life these days is all about the mouse. If Mickey isn't there, it isn't worth doing!

Oh, and Minnie too!

We are potty training. Well we have BEEN potty training. Harper was a fast learner right from the start, as long as it was warm out and we could go bottomless. She then seemed to have a little setback when we moved to just underwear. Still was still doing really well, with only the occasional accident. The problem came when poop was involved. This was evidently a concept she didn't agree with. It's a work in progress. I will say, in the last week or so, we've had a few issues. This, I'm sure, is due to my lack of ability to "play" too much, and Adam always studying. Once Adam's test is over, and the baby is here (allowing me to get back down on the floor) we will find our new normal and she will get back into her groove.

When you gotta go, you gotta go.

Everything looks better in heels...even potty training.

We haven't had a ton of rainy days lately, but those that have found there way to us have definitely been utilized to their fullest around here.

"I want to look like dada."

"Baby or not...I'm sitting on your lap!"

We made our own pizzas. It's no brick oven but it'll do.

We held a baby for the first time!!

Speaking of first times, dad brought us to Krispy Kreme to enjoy the incomparable taste only the hot light can bring. This was a moment I didn't get to experience until college, she is already waaaay ahead of me!

This was a mistake. Though a brilliant idea at the time, not all stores have the "shopper in training" carts. That does not make for a pleasant time.

When all is said and done, we had a great summer, and the most important thing was...we stayed safe :)

Well, when you have 14 different devices that take pictures you're bound to miss a few!

I had forgotten to download all the pictures from Adam's and my phone. Therefore, I'm "forced" to post a supplemental collection of pictures from Colorado. Enjoy :)

First day there, enjoying pizza at one of the family's favorite watering holes.

Harper's traditional picture with Buff. My how she's grown!

Adam's dad was one of the highlighted donors to the event.

How could you have a bad day on this course?

Our champion traveler on our way home.