The Saladino Family

No clue if anyone ever comes here looking for updates anymore, but since I have some time, I thought it would be good to get going again. I stopped posting, because our hard drive died and I lost some photos. Just couldn't seem to get going again, because trying to go back and catch up was just too intimidating.

At this point, I thought it would make sense to introduce the newest member of our family...Adri! It seems totally crazy to think I wasn't even pregnant with her when I abandoned our blog. Adri was not a planned baby, but she definitely was not an unwanted baby and of course, none of us can imagine our lives without her now. She is such a sweet, happy little baby.

Adri came into this world in the early morning of February 26, a date that just happens to be her paternal great-grandmother's birthday as well. When Michael woke up the morning of the 25th, I told him I had been up all night every 1/2 to one hour due to contractions. I called the birth center and they said it definitely sounded like early labor, but that I didn't need to come in until my contractions were about 5 minutes apart and lasting for a minute for at least an hour. We were nervous and excited at the same time and were certain we would have a baby by the time that Sidney was due to get home from preschool.

Here he is that day:

During the day, my contractions slowed. My mom came out to take us out to lunch at Mrs B's the tea shop nearby. We then hit some of the thrifties around town. Her plan was to keep me up and walking! My contractions came back and were getting more painful, but still pretty far apart.

We had a dinner of plain fettuccine. Of course, by this time Sidney was home from daycare. We debated what to do. Since I was still having contractions and it was cold and snowy out, we decided to send Sidney to Courtney and Morgan's house for the night in case the baby did decide to arrive. We didn't want anyone worried about driving on potentially icy roads. My mom stayed with us and we continued timing contractions. Every time we would think we were going to hit the 5 minutes apart for an hour mark, they would slow to 7 minutes or 10. When this would happen, they were more painful. My mom debated going home, but decided against it.

When we finally went to bed, it seemed we no sooner got settled than I told Michael I thought it was time to go. He woke up my mom and they helped me get to the car. We had to stop for contractions along the way.

Whe we got to the hospital, we had to wait in the Emergency Room. I felt so conspicuous being the 41 week pregnant lady holding pillows. Fairly quickly, they sent someone with a wheelchair to come get me. I refused to ride in the wheelchair and we had a pretty slow walk to the L&D area.

We got settled into our room (I was 8 cm dilated) and at some point, I kind of felt like pushing. Not anything like the desire to push with Sidney, but we decided to try as I was dilated enough, although the baby was still too high. I tried pushing, but after a bit, it was decided that Adri was not in the right position. They wanted me to lay on my side and breath through the contractions.

It was very painful and hard to do. It seemed like as soon as they got the bed put back together, I really felt the urge to push. It took all I had to breath through those contractions. Finally, it was time for round 2. I have no idea how long it lasted. According to Michael, it was only a handful of pushes and then out came our beautiful 10lb 2oz baby girl, Adri Elizabeth.

Here she is in her first cloth diaper:

The nurses had thought it would be too big on her, until she was born and we all realized quickly, it was almost too small!

My first impression of my baby girl when they laid her upon my chest was that she looked like an Asian sumo wrestler. Looking back at these photos now, I can clearly see my little Adri for the gorgeous girl she is, but maybe it was the after-effects of a natural delivery and seriously, look at these rolls.

Our first picture together.

Her and Daddy.

So sweet.

According to the nurse, a half hour after our delivery, Dr. Leyba was still out in the hallway exclaiming about how she never would have guessed she was delivering a 10lb baby.

I wish we had gotten some photos of my mom with Adri on this night, but for some reason we did not. I'm so glad she got to be there when her granddaughter arrived into this world. Adri was born in the exact same room as her big brother, Sidney.

Anyway, that's the short version of our birth story. I hope you enjoyed it. I'll try to update more regularly and get us caught up.