Kaylee's Newborn Photos

We hadn't used a photographer since moving to Connecticut, so I started looking around for someone to take Kaylee's newborn pictures before she was born. I told Tyler about it and he informed me our neighbor across the street, Kishore, recently bought a very nice camera and had been getting into photography. So in Tyler's mind, it was a no brainer that we have him take our newborn photos ;) I wasn't so convinced but since he was doing it for free I had to agree. 

The shoot didn't turn out super well but these first two pictures made it all worth it. The top one was used as our baby announcement photo. The rest of the pictures below have never been seen my anyone else. Abbie refused to be in any photos because she was nervous around the photographer and even Jackson wouldn't look or smile because the large camera scared him... But looking back (a year later) I'm still glad I have these photos ;) 

Kaylee at home

The first few weeks with Kaylee were great. We had my mom in town for 10 days, then Tyler's dad came for a weekend (which also aligned with a work trip/BYU football game) and she was such a good baby :)

Kaylee meets her family

Jackson and Abbie were so excited for "baby sister" and had been talking about her for months. When Abbie was born, Jackson had just turned two and while he kind of understood that a new baby was coming, he was still pretty young to understand. This time around Jackson and Abbie both were a little older and completely understood what was happening. When they woke up on August 17 they saw Emily Morris in our house and luckily were familiar enough with her to not completely freak out haha. We were able to facetime with them from the hospital to get a quick glimpse of their baby sister.

Cutest Sisters meet!

Emily took them to church that morning and then Tyler went back to get them afterwards. He then went to pick up my mom from the airport. Once again, she had to switch her flight and got there later that day :) They came to the hospital and were really excited to see her and hold her. They came to the hospital again the next day when the nurses brought her a little birthday cake.

Abbie was so protective already and just kept reaching her hands out to hold her. Jackson was so sweet with her and right away they had a special bond.

I stayed with Kaylee alone both nights and she did so well, she hardly cried and had no issues or concerns her whole stay. I had been told there was no well-baby nursery, so she'd be in the room with me the whole time. This wasn't true however, so they took her at nights and I was able to sleep really well. They just brought her into eat and she did great at it!

One of Tyler's all time favorite pictures - those little fingers grabbing his.

The view from our hospital room, downtown Hartford, it was a beautiful and green time of year!

Ready to head home!

They were home with Grammy when Tyler and I brought Kaylee home from the hospital. Welcomed with balloons and they immediately brought the toys to her they'd been wanting her to see :) Abbie brought her a Cinderella toy and Jackson brought the activity mat.

They were so happy to have her home!

Buddies from the start

Sisters in their popsicle shirts!

 Kaylee got out to a great start at life, a quick and easy delivery, a great and healthy hospital stay and an excited family to welcome her home :)

Kaylee Lorraine Jennings

Kaylee's entrance into the world was quick and dramatic! We had just finished watching the movie "Divergent" downstairs in the family room. We headed upstairs and started getting ready for bed. I laid down, and per usual, started to feel some pains. But then it got real and I knew it was an actual contraction. The first contraction was at 10:50 pm. And  then they started coming every 5 minutes and lasting 30 seconds. At 11:05 Tyler texted Emily to see if she could head over, she was our designated middle of the night labor helper. 

It was once again, so crazy that all 3 of our babies have caused me to go into labor the exact same way! We started packing up things, my suitcase was pretty much already packed but we threw in toiletries and things for Tyler. We started timing and recording the contractions at 11:15 and I still have the note in my phone that recorded them. They came every 4-6 minutes and lasted  35-45 seconds. They were pretty intense but I was able to get around and move in the few minutes between them. Emily got to our house really fast, like probably at 11:25 or sooner and then we left for the hospital from there! We called my mom on the drive over and then tried to navigate the random roads into downtown Hartford. Luckily, as always, there is no traffic in the middle of the night so it was pretty easy to get there!

We got to hospital at 11:50 and sadly they don't do the "valet parking" after hours so Tyler had to drop me off and then go park. They let him park in the small lot right next to the hospital rather than the huge parking garage across the street so he didn't take too long, but I vividly remember sitting in the wheelchair waiting in the inner lobby between the two sliding doors as he found a spot. And I had a contraction while sitting there of course. We got escorted up an elevator since it was after hours all the doors were locked and then checked in around 12:05.

Contractions still coming every five minutes but not terribly painful. At this point I just assumed the labor would progress as it had with Jackson and Abbie, and she would be born around 6 am or so... And my first order of business was in trying to get an epidural ordered ASAP. I got to my room and they got me checked and on IVs and ultrasound with resident, said she 5-6 and 90 effaced. AKA just where I thought I'd be. The next 20 minutes or so waiting for the epidural was tough. I really felt like I needed to go to the bathroom the whole time. I knew I'd need to go now because I'd be unable to walk with the epidural. I did go the bathroom somehow, but it didn't really help with anything. I had back pain, pushing pain, and contraction pain all coming at once and I was wondering why am I doing this to myself again haha! Around 12:40 we finally got the anesthesiologist and it was getting really bad, much worse than I was feeling when I'd had by epidurals in the past. Finally he got it all set up and administered it. It was SOO hard to sit still through all the pain, like the hardest thing of the whole day was sitting still in order to get that drug. I ended up singing  A Child's Prayer out loud to help as they tried to have me sit still to get in. It really calmed me even though I was crying and crazy and they thought I was pretty weird ha. The epidural was in and even before the doctor left, the nurse checked progress, and I was already a 10! 

Baby girl was coming, I'm still not sure how the heck I changed from a 5/6 to a 10 in less than an hour but it sure explains what I was feeling! The nurse immediately called in for the doctor and the delivery team! No time for epidural to kick in unfortunately.I remember asking for my money back, as a joke, but they thought I was serious. The first doctor in the room was  a resident, then Dr Tracy Levine came in and they asked Rachel to stop pushing as they got robes on. After one push they got a handle on her head and noticed that her cord was loosely around her neck and told me to stop pushing so they could get her free of it. Through the pain, I started screaming loudly and the doctors told me to focus my energy on pushing and not screaming and focus on little half pushes. With those little pushes, and focus she came out at 1:04 am healthy and perfect! So about an hour after we checked in she was here! They put her on me directly as they wiped her off and then took her over to get weighed and measured. I was shaking a lot as I started receiving the epidural medicine, which was now obviously useless. Amazingly during the aftermath of that quick delivery there was very little tearing. We found out that we had a little 7 pound 9 ounce beauty girl and we knew pretty soon that her name was Kaylee Lorraine Jennings!

My body was so messed up after receiving the epidural but then having it taken out that it made me shiver and shake for about an hour after she was born. Who would have known the thing that helped so much normally, would cause the most pain of this whole labor. And it's kind of not official but I like to say that I had Kaylee naturally, no drugs that were effective at least ;) Tyler held her most of that hour because I wasn't able to be still yet, but when I was ready to hold her again I started to nurse her and she did well right away. Then they moved us over into the recovery area of the hospital and we tried to get a little sleep as they took her into the nursery for her first bath. What a crazy couple hours it was but we're so glad we had our little beauty girl arrive so safely!

Wrapping up life as a family of four

We got home from Massachusetts three weeks before baby girl was due and geared up for the final stretch before she came! With Jackson and Abbie both coming early, we knew baby girl would probably come early too. With some of my last doctor appointements it seemed like things were progressing. At my 38 week appointment my doctor was concerned because I was measuring smaller than I had been the week before, and I hadn't gained weight in two weeks. SO just to be safe, she called for an ultrasound to make sure she was developing ok and to find out how big she looked. After the u/s they discovered that she was doing just fine, and all the fluid levels were just on. It was just because she had dropped so low that I was measuring smaller.

But still, because Jackson was over 9 pounds I'm flagged in medical systems for being at risk for big babies. This leads to the fact that I'm more likely to have my doctors schedule an induction before my due date. With Abbie I was scheduled to be induced in the morning of April 12, too bad for her she wanted to come on her own and I went into labor the night before :) Anyways, I was due August 25 and so after this appointment I was scheduled for an induction, August 22 - but my doctor and I both were thinking that I wouldn't make it that far.

I felt a lot more pain in these last weeks of pregnancy than I had with Jackson and Abbie's pregnancies. Every night when I'd lay down for bed I'd get crampy and achey. I remember thinking - so this is what people mean when they say, I'm ready for this baby to come! But we were enjoying the beautiful summer weather of Connecticut in the meantime :)

Two little water buddies

The summer tradition, popsicles after nap/quiet time.

First Time with piggie tails 

They love when Daddy comes home!

My last grocery trip with just these two!

Our final date, before baby - dinner and dessert in downtown Avon

Bedtime books

Rock-Cats Baseball Game, earned tickets through summer reading program!

Friday night, August 15 we went to a fun get together with some of our friends from the ward down at the Mumfords house. They have a great firepit in the backyard where we roasted hot dogs and smores and the kids played all night. I wish I had pictures from that night- it was great fun :)

Saturday, August 16 we headed down to Lyman Orchards for our first time ever Peach Picking. We were there on the first weekend to kick off the peach picking season which means it was peach fest, but also means most of the fruit wasn't quite ready to pick yet. But we did get quite a few in our bucket but we had to search a little harder.

Me with my "three" kids

Jackson rode the same horse as last year's apple fest, Tomahawk!

We headed back to town that afternoon and I went and got a haircut. Then that night we headed to Fisher park for a ward picnic/ goodbye party for the Rondina Family. We stayed there for an hour or so before heading back home. Tyler and I put the kids to bed and then watched a redbox movie - Divergent. We planned on heading to church the next morning - Tyler had his 6:30 bishop meeting, since he was executive secretary, and was teaching gospel doctrine. I didn't have any assingments that Sunday but thought it would probably be my last one as Primary President before baby girl came... but then she had some other plans.

To be continued..