Madelyn's story

As most of you probably know, we welcomed Madelyn Olivia Philpot into this world on September 8th, 2011 at 11:12 am! She was 7 lbs. 3 oz. and 19 inches long. It's been a bit of a whirlwind in the last three and a half weeks, so please forgive me for my delay in posting.

We were scheduled to be induced on the morning of September 8th, but Madelyn had her own agenda. The night before induction, I had taken a shower and was preparing for bed, as I knew we were in for a long day the next day. But suddenly contractions began! I wasn't sure what they were supposed to feel like, but I knew it hurt bad. So, as we were instructed, we started timing them out. We waited about 2 hours of timing the contractions before we decided it was time to head to the hospital. So much for getting any sleep! We headed to the hospital about 1:30 am, and sure enough, labor had begun! The next couple hours were very painful until I received the epidural. After that, it was a breeze. Labor lasted until about 10:45 am when they gave me the go ahead to push. Started pushing and just about 25 minutes later she was born! We were so thankful that our OBGYN was able to deliver Madelyn. She is an amazing doctor and couldn't have imagined it any other way!

The next 2 days in the hospital were filled with lots of visits from our wonderful families... and even more visits from all the nurses. Who ever said that being in a hospital was relaxing?! Finally, on September 10th, we went home!

And since then parenthood has been a miracle. We've both sat and stared at Maddie and said, 'Can you believe we did that?!' It's really quite surreal at times. In the first (nearly) month of her life, we've all experienced lots of incredible things, including:

- Establishing nicknames - Maddie, Maddie O, and Maddie Moo, and just Moo (I use this one almost exclusively)
- Several sleepless nights :)
- Two visits to the doctor
- Trips to both sets of grandparents houses
- Trips to Mommy's work and Daddy's work
- Losing the umbilical cord
- First bath
- First vaccination (and mommy and daddy's first good cry)
- Mommy and Daddy laughing uncontrollably at baby's gas
- Mommy and Daddy laughing uncontrollably at baby's silly and cute faces
- Lots of hiccups (this occurs daily, but doctor ensures us that it's normal)
- Plenty of diaper changes. Martin is really a pro at it!
- Walks around the neighborhood with Mommy, Daddy, and Jake
- Lunch out in a public restaurant
....and many more....

Overall, things are going really well for us all. Maddie is sleeping about 5 hours consecutively at a time at night. She spent the first couple weeks in her own room, but that proved very difficult for us all - so for the time being, she is in our room. She eats like a machine! We can almost literally see her grow before our eyes! She has already outgrown a few outfits. She is very long and lean, just like her daddy. She usually naps twice during the daytime, although yesterday she only had one nap during the day. Probably explains why she's still sleeping now :) Nearly everyone agrees that she looks like her daddy. I still would like to think she has my eyes though. And definitely my hair! But daddy's nose and mouth is a given. She is a cute little bugger and we love just staring at her. She does a pretty good job of staring right back too! She is nearly holding her head up on her own for brief stints. And she kicks like a maniac, loves to push her legs off and try to crawl.

Thank you to everyone for all of your well wishes, gifts, thoughts, and prayers. We are incredibly grateful and blessed.

Some pictures are coming next, so stay tuned!