She's Here...3 Weeks Early!

Can't believe our little girl made it here 3 weeks early! I had a feeling she would come early but it all started to get real at my 35 week appointment on May 6th. What I thought was going to be just a quick check for the strep B test, turned into surprise news that I was already starting to dilate and efface. With the other 3 kids I wasn't dilated to a 1cm until I was closer to 38 weeks, so hearing this, Nate and I were both shocked. Two weeks later, May 20th, was my 37 week appointment and I was definitely starting to feel miserable. Just a few days before this appointment I told Nate I didn't know how much longer I could last being pregnant. Being the rock for me through this all, Nate just kept trying to help me remember I still had 3 weeks to go and I needed to be strong. So I tried to tell myself that I needed to prepare for a long 3 weeks but deep down I knew she was coming. After my 37 week appointment and hearing that I was dilated to a 3cm and 60% effaced I knew it wouldn't be long, especially when Dr. England said my "membrane was bulging". I came home that day and washed baby clothes and started packing our bag. I spent that whole day with major back pain and achy all over not thinking I was that close to going into labor because I wasn't having any contractions to go with the pain. I figured I would need to tough it out another week or so, but that next morning at 3:20am I woke up to a real hard contraction and I instantly knew it was time. I laid in bed timing the next 4 contractions and they all were 4 minutes apart. It was then that I texted our moms giving them the update and then I hopped in the shower to start getting ready to head over to the hospital. We left to the hospital at 5:30am while Alison stayed at our house with the other kids until Nana could make it over and relieve her. When we got to the hospital the nurses checked me I had already changed to a 5cm and 90% effaced. That was more than plenty of change from my last appointment just the day before so I was quickly admitted into labor and delivery. The nurse snagged my epidural as well since it was a busy morning already around the hospital. By 7:00am I was officially checked in, my epidural was pumping and had the best on call nurse (Kristy Allen's mom). With my mom making the drive from Colorado and still a few hours out we were anxious for updates on my progression so at 8:00am the nurse checked me again. That time I was at a 6 1/2cm. At 9:00am Dr England came in to let me know I needed to hold off for a couple hours if I wanted him to delivery our little girl. He was about to go into a hysterectomy in the next 30 minutes and that surgery would take about a hour to an hour and half. So with that news we weren't anxious for progression anymore, because now we were waiting for the Dr. and Grandma. The nurses then checked me at 10:00am and I had moved to a 7 1/2cm. That same time Nana and the kids made it over to visit us at the hospital. It was lots of fun to have the kids apart of all the excitement even though they got bored waiting. Maelyn wasn't sure what to think of seeing me in the hospital bed, but had no problem sharing ice chips and cuddling with me. At 11:35am Dr. England came rushing back up to my room making sure I wasn't delivering without him while his partner took over the surgery he was working on. While he was in my room he checked me again and I was still a 7 1/2cm, so he broke my water to get things moving now that he was almost finished with his surgery. Within the next hour I was fully dilated and effaced and ready to go! My body was beyond cooperative because Grandma Kay and Dr. England made it in plenty of time for delivery.

Delivery is always my favorite part and makes the 9 months of pregnancy totally worth it. Just before Dr. England came in to deliver her, I told my nurse my epidural wasn't working very well. I could still feel every contraction and was slightly uncomfortable. She asked if I wanted an extra dose of something in my epidural to help with delivery since I  knew it was almost time. Well I got the extra dose just in case, but right after the anesthesiologist put the medicine in, Dr. England came walking in and started gloving up so I didn't get the 15 minutes for it to kick in. I remember feeling a really strong contraction and told Dr. England it felt like a good one, so he asked me if I wanted to push. To me, I just do the what the Dr says, so I asked him if he wanted me to push. Sure enough he was having me push on the hard contraction before he was even fully gloved up. 2 pushes later on that same contraction she was here at 12:45pm!! Luckily I was numb just enough that I didn't feel much, but I got to feel the whole thing of what a natural birth would be like without the pain. I was surprised I didn't feel much with her head coming out, but what was the coolest part was her arms and legs. There aren't even words to describe that feeling other than a baby on a water slide. Right after that she was placed on my tummy and after a long 37 weeks I  finally got to meet all 7lbs 14oz of our little girl. She was covered in tons of that baby fat all over her. I don't think any of the other kids had that much covering them, but she definitely had it everywhere!

As soon as I was covered up and decent, the kids, Grandma Kay and Nana came back in from the hallway and got to meet our little girl as well. Andersen by far was the most interested. He was right by her side the whole time! Jackson being the gentle giant he is, had a hard time hearing her crying so he sat on the bench plugging his ears so he didn't have to worry about if she was ok or not. Nate made sure to let Maelyn see, but I am not sure she understood what was really happening other than being really curious of what the excitement was all about.

We spent the next hour holding our new little girl! Everyone got a few minutes to hold her. Nate was really cute to help each one of the kids meet their sister by getting some individual time with her. 

We all couldn't get enough of her! She went from arm to arm as we all soaked in her freshness. Definitely a sweet moment our family got to have as we moved from a family of 5 to a family of 6!

The next two days were spent relaxing and visiting at the hospital. We loved our visits from all our family and friends. Nothing better than a couple days to do nothing but love on our new baby. Those are my favorite days! Love watching the first bath, the first outfit, the little yawns and noises and all the cuddles without too many distractions.

Friday, May 23rd, it was time to checkout of the hospital and finally decide on a name. This is always our hardest part about adding a new one to our family but I refused to leave this time until we had a name. I had a list of names that I had liked throughout the pregnancy which were Mara, Macie, Sicily or Eden. Nate didn't have any suggestions to add to that, but he definitely didn't like Eden. Mara and Macie became our two we were deciding from that morning. As we discussed back and forth through those two names we both agreed on Mara but then it came down to figuring out a middle name. I wasn't set on anything but I feel like a middle name needs some sort of meaning so that was where we got stumped. We went through all sorts of options and Nate suggested Jo. At first I quickly refused on that one because it sounded so masculine to me, and the last thing I wanted was my girls not to have a feminine name. I could tell Nate was getting frustrated with me because he started packing up the room and took a load down to the car. While he was gone to the car I looked up the meaning of Jo. The first meaning that popped up in my search was "beloved one; darling; sweetheart". Once I read that I was sold. Shortly after Nate came back in, I told him I liked Jo and it was a done deal. This picture below was right after we officially named her Mara Jo Rothe. Less than 10 minutes later she was all buckled in and we were checked out of the hospital and on our way home.

Mara was welcomed home by many arms ready to hold her and lots of love to go around. Lots of kisses and snuggles! Those first few days home Mara got to meet Grandpa Dave, spend time soaking up some Vitamin D for some mild jaundice and even an antibiotic for her eyes to clear out a yucky bug. I loved spending time just looking at her little features and trying to comprehend such a miracle. It impossible to understand how something so small can be created into something so perfect and sweet! She has the longest fingers and toes and the best head of hair. Exactly a week after Mara was born, all visitors were gone and Nate was back to work and I was on my own as a mother of 4! Definitely overwhelming when you are going on no sleep and trying to heal from delivery, but I feel so lucky to have such amazing friends as my neighbors that are always willing to lend a helping hand. Its only been a few days with her a part of our family, but its already hard to remember life without her. We are beyond grateful for her safe arrival to our home! We love you already so much sweet little Mara!

4th of July with the Sampsons

The Sampson's are always known for a fun party over the 4th of July so we finally planned a trip to visit them! The last time we had been to Minnesota I was pregnant with Andersen so we were definitely overdue on a visit. I was a little anxious traveling with Maelyn being so small but besides the typical behavior from kids, we had successful flights as a family of 5 and luckily sat next to a really nice couple that enjoyed babies, so Maelyn wasn't a bother to them at all!

Besides spending our days just enjoying one another's company and letting the kids play together, we made a quick trip across the street to see the traveling circus that happened to be in town at the same time. Definitely no circus that we are used to watching, but it was fun to see this small town circus come into town, set up for a couple days and then disappear. We let the kids play on all the bouncing toys and Andersen insisted on riding an elephant!! What a cool experience. The show was very entertaining and would have been even better if the tent had some circulation. We all left the show drenched in sweat.

The 4th of July party consisted lots of food, and even more fireworks than food! Mike LOVES his fireworks and plans all year for this day. The kids spent the day in their swim suits playing in the pool and hose. Later we did a BBQ with their neighbors. We even got to see some old friends from Utah that Nate works with and got transferred to Minnesota. We had a such a fun week with the Sampsons and its always nice to get away and relax with family. If only the mosquitoes stayed away a few more days the trip would have been perfect! Hopefully its not another 4 years until we get back to visit! 

Pool Time!

These kiddos LOVE the pool or anything to do with water for that matter, so Alison, her sister Wendy and I took a trip to the Riverton pool one afternoon to soak up some vitamin D. It's amazing how fast 3 hours can go just playing in water. This visit to the pool the boys were brave enough to go off the diving board. Andersen only made it to the smaller board but Landon and Jackson jumped off the high dive like pros. Maelyn even enjoyed splashing and playing in the shallow end with Mom. Definitely will have to be doing more of this next summer!

BeYOUtiful! Girls Camp

Where do I even start with what a fun girls camp this was? Lucky for us we were able to reserve Heber Valley Girls Camp again just as our ward. Of course we all met bright and early to get our camp on. This year was hard because Hollie had just been released as our counselor and YW just isn't the same without her, but she was nice enough to make sure I got a little birthday surprise before we left for camp that morning. It wouldn't be a year of girls camp or youth conference without celebrating my birthday with my young women girls. Our camp theme this year was "Be Your Own Kind of Beautiful". Teaching these girls beauty is more than just your appearance. We taught them about physical beauty, but also about spiritual beauty and emotional beauty

One of the days at camp was our service project. This camp ground is beyond beautiful and its because of all the many hands that put in their time daily to help keep it clean and nice. Our service project was chopping wood (or more like sliding wood on to a powered axe!) and then piling it in each campsite so everyone had plenty of wood for fires.  The girls were so helpfully and an hour or so later we had chopped and stocked many pounds of wood! The girls favorite was this HUGE log that took so many hands and different chops to finally break it down.

Some of the other things we did besides all spiritual learning was have FUN! One of my favorite highlights was beating Lauryn at ladder toss. We created a tournament with all the girls interested competing round after round. The luck landed on me and I ended up kicking all the girls butts! So much for being the nice leader, right? Other things we did was go canoeing on the little lake. We had a mystery dinner that Pam, our camp cook put on. She gave all the girls random utensils and cups to use and then served them up dinner to eat with what they had. They girls were so confused at first but quickly caught on and dug into their food with no problem. We also took a small hike/walk around the lake and then a lot of hang out time goofing around at our campsite.

Our last night at camp is always the most anticipated night of camp because the Bishopric and wives join us for dinner and testimony meeting. Its always filled with tons of laughter and good tears. For our program before testimony meeting I asked a couple speakers to join us that I thought represented each "beauty" topic we had already talked about throughout the week. What a good job Janelle, Jessica and Stephanie did! Overall, this was my favorite girls camp as their YW President. All the girls got along and actually let down some tough barriers that have been up for years. We also had great leaders and priesthood leaders joining us all week, with delicious food and very 5 star camping facilities. The whole time at camp I speculated and had a feeling it would be my last camp in this calling so I tried to soak it all in as much as possible. Little did I know that felt release would come a week later! Totally bittersweet, but two weeks after that I was called to Stake YW's and the first thing I thought was..."I get to go to camp!!" Nothing better than a few days in nature with some great women.