perfect

My life is perfect (see last post!!). I couldn't be and more happy or lucky. Everything has exceeded expectations and gone awesome. I will try to highlight a few things (hopefully this will avoid some really long paragraphs that I have already told to many of you--if you want the long version you can give me a call!)...

1. Women now hate me. I pushed for 10 minutes. Literally. I started at 11pm and she was born at 11:10. My exact words when she came out we "That was it. That was easy." (note: the epidural should get some mad props for this). I did have a small tear...one stitch.

2. Joey is awesome. He LOVES his baby girl. You can just see it in him. He is very eager to hold her and soothe her. His schedule had been turned upside down in the past week from work and this early delivery turned it around even more.

3. My mom rocks. Most of you know this, but I had to put it out there anyway! This would be many paragraphs long...

4. My dad probably wins the award for the most emotional.

5. Brent and Kristine have been great! They were here the whole night on Thursday and stopped by a few time yesterday too. They have really been racking the miles up on their car! (fyi, if you didn't already know, they live 2 stop signs from the hospital too!)

6. When I delivered on Thursday, I basically did it during one shift, so I had the same nurse, Andrea. She was GREAT! I was very lucky to have her! The other nurses here have been really good too, but she was the best!

7. Juliette's pediatrician is an old neighbor from when I was like 4, Dr. Balfanz. His daughter and I were bff's back then. On Friday the on call doctor to come see Juliette was actually MY pediatrician who I had (Dr. Coyne)! It was fun to see him. I expected to see him again today, but in walked Dr. Balfanz!!! His daughter had called him and told him I delivered (she knew through the magic of facebook) so he called Dr. Coyne and said to stay home, that he was going to come in! Are you kidding me? On the 4th? Who does that? How lucky are we??? (This happened about 30 minutes ago so my mom and I are still in awe over it!)

8. Back to Brent. Through the magic of oversharing, he has learned a lot in the past 2 days. He has been a good trooper with listening to it all (sometimes 2 or 3 times when different visitors come). Juliette has still earned me some immunity!

9. I kinda like being in the hospital. I had always wanted to be because I thought it would be fun for people to come and visit. So far, so good. It has been really fun to see people and more are coming today. Who doesn't love being waited on 24/7?

10. Technology is pretty cool. Joey rolls his eyes when I am constantly checking my email, texts, or facebook, but I like it! It makes me happy to share our news and read all the comments that people leave...I realize how many people we have around us and it makes me smile.

Ok, so that kind of looks like some sort of Top Ten list, but it was really just my thoughts as they came to me. Baby is on her way back from some tests, so I am going to stare at her for a while...

Thanks for the love and support!

Juliette Grace

Here she is!!!

Juliette Grace

6bs. 11oz.

19 1/2 in.

born 7/2/09

11:10pm

For a few more pics, you can go to http://stulagu.bigfolioblog.com/ and look! I will also be posting a riduculous amount of pictures and time goes on...

baby likes...

When I first started to feel the baby kick/move it was really fun (still is!). Then Joey and I started associating her moving with whatveer we were eating/doing/etc. So it just became "baby likes..." and we would add in whatever she liked! Here are some things that baby likes...

Tacos (which made taco tuesday a staple in our house!)ice cream (who doesn't like this?)

eminem (seriously, i was in the car once and she was into it!)
pizza (this was probably a given...)

She likes lots of other things, but that's jsut what popped into my head while writing this...it's kind of been a fun little saying!

Also, last night I stopped by Brent and Kristine's to drop something off. I was able to get Juliette to move for them! Brent was unsure if he would want to do it, so I just grabbed his hand and put it on my belly when he didn't really have time to think about it. Kristine got a little more time and got to feel some good moving!! It was pretty cool!

july!

(stole this picture from Brent's facebook...)

Whoo hoo! Made it to July! I never thought I would realy go super early in June or anything, but I really like ruby for a birthstone (if yours was yellow topaz, you'd understand!). So now I can say I am having a baby THIS month! Joey actually called me at about 12:05 this morning to tell me...which I thought was pretty cute!

The next goal is to make it past the 11th b/c we have tickets to Green Day. Yeah, I know, I am already starting off as an awesome parent, huh? Other than that, July is pretty low key...I have a date night with Joey tomorrow and a walk and a lunch here and there, but my schedule is pretty light- which is good!

Totally switching gears...we got the cutest present last night!! Bonus points because it came UPS and who doesn't like to have a UPS package waiting for them at their front door? A friend of mine from college, Jamie (who now lives in AZ), sent this little lamb from the build-a-bear store. Then she sent little cards (like the size of business cards) with "1 week", "2 weeks", you get the pattern... so that I can take Juliette's picture next to the lamb and put the "week" card with it. It's a "Watch Me Grow" kit. SO thoughtful! And now I want to steal the idea for future moms-to-be!!

grace grace

Ok, so you all (should) know Juliette's middle name is Grace.

Most of you also know that Grace is my great grandma's name (she passed away just before thanksgiving last year, but I was able to tell her I was preggo before she died).

A few of you may even know that Grace was my great grandma's first AND middle name.

But I am pretty sure none of you know WHY her first and middle name are both Grace. I actually just found that out myself! I always thought her mom just got lazy by the fifth kid (sorry to my mom, but you don't even have a middle name so maybe there is something to my theory!)Apparently my Great Grandma's mom had two friends named Grace and didn't want one of them to feel left out, so she did Grace for the first and middle name. Problem solved...although who is the first name after??

Here are a few pics that i had on my computer of me with Grace, who was always wearing a hat:

I apparently stole this one

Even at bedtime...

and you can't really see it, but it's there!

i am gonna miss this...

Luckily for me, this pregnancy has gone great! It's really hard to find something to complain about...I didn't get sick, my doctors visits always go according to schedule, I have a nice belly, the weather hasnt been that bad, I didn't (so far) get as huge as I thought I had the potential to get, and I get to feel her move around all the time. I am going to miss it! Even if these last few weeks have some miserable moments, at least it's not that much longer! I must have inherited the I-love-being-pregnant thing from my mom!

Friday was our company picnic, so I wasn't by my computer to update with pics but here are some pics I had Joey take last night (I was already sans make-up b/c it was 10pm, so I thought I'd throw in pigtails to complete my look...):

In case you didn't know...

Me at just over 37 weeks...

Imitating my mom...

really, I don't know....but it was funny

Have a great week!

the baby kick fairy?

So miraculously the $20 reappeared. NOT from the actual culprit, but my dad gave my mom a $20 bill to put back into the fund! The funny part is that I hid the envelope in my desk and it took her FOREVER to find it :-) It's not the same, but I guess it still does have a story behind it!

In other news, Joey and I are going to get the carseats checked tonight and then to our class that is the "recap" of the online stuff we did. We're supposed to bring a pillow and a blanket so I am sure it will be a fun time. I just have this vision of a mixture of all the pregnancy classes I have seen on tv and I am not looking forward to it. I have no real desire to meet another pregnant couple and share our feelings. Ugh. I am happy we did most of it online b/c then we could talk about what we were the most interested in ourselves and not have to listen to others. I am such a brat. Oh well.

Tomorrow is 37 weeks so I'll try and get a picture up! Have a good one!

i am PISSED!

Ok, so my $20 bill from my first kick is MISSING. And I am pretty damn sure someone STOLE it! The ONLY time I EVER go in that envelope is when my mom gives me money (it basically transfers from her desk to mine). So today I was showing it to someone and then I saw it was missing....not the other money, but the $20 (I am assuming they didn't take it all so that maybe I wouldn't notice anything was missing). And the envelope was labeled "Baby Kick". You have got to be effing kidding me. I obviously do not care so much about $20, it's money, but it was the FIRST kick my mom got to feel and I am so pissed I want to cry. Maybe I should use the camera Brent and Kristine got me to spy on the cleaners.

FYI...I did leave a nasty note if they happen to open my top drawer again.

normal? really?

Who would have ever thought I would be considered normal? My appointment on Friday went well, as usual. I am about 30-40% effaced and dialated 1cm and a wiggle (that's how she described it)...which is normal. My belly measured at 36 cm, which is normal. Her head is down, which is normal (and good!). And the doc said she should be a normal size baby. All of my tests(blood pressure, hemoglobin, whatever they do with the urine sample) are good/normal. So at this rate I should just have the baby on the 17th, on time and normal :-)

Sunday Joey and I did a few more sessions of our online class which included the birth part...you know, the video. I told him he didn't have to watch that part if he didn't want to...he sat on the couch with the blanket pulled up to his eyes, peeking out just a little. The video was probably all of 15 seconds, but that's enough :-) I think it made it look a lot easier than it's really going to be since it was so short! We're working out a plan for how to deal with me in the hospital...I am not sure that the "you can do it, sweetheart" is really going to do it! He is worried about seeing me in pain and I said that's no big deal b/c it will be over before you know it and we'll forget all about that...then we can worry about the baby!

only four more donuts?!?!

Ok people, I am starting to put things into perspective here...once Juliette finally arrives, my weekly donut is probably not going to be coming! And what if I go early?? (Mom, I would still like a donut on the 17th!)

here is the post-it from my mom this morning...I already ate the donuts!

Ok, now some real perspective...four weeks left! Four weeks ago (which is how I measure how fast time went) Joey and I had a date night and he bought me the little piggy bank. That really wasn't that long ago...

This morning when I was laying in bed Juliette decided to do the worm (that's what I call it anyway) where she doesn't "kick" but she moves around...like she is doing the worm! The cool part was I got Joey to feel it...she went pretty crazy for like 20 seconds and he hadn't felt that much before so that was cool.

This afternoon I have my 36 wk appt. I am looking forward to it b/c they'll finally start checking "stuff" to see how it's going. Brent and Kristine leave tomorrow for their East Coast trip and I have been told not to go early, and I think I'll be ok. Plus, I am pretty set on a July baby!

That's all my news for now...if the doctor has anything special to report I'll let ya know...