Month: November 2010

After 33 hours of Labor…

Published on by melissaperea9 Comments
Born: 11/20/2010
Weighing: 9lbs 2 oz!! 
Length: 22 inches

Why we chose what we chose….

In case you haven’t realized people are really passionate about names. They either love a name or hate a name and they will go to great lengths to explain their likes or dislikes. Its for this very reason that Hector and I kept our mouths shut (for the most part) about our daughters name until she was born. We also wanted to meet her before making any concrete decisions in case we changed our minds. So because of this I wanted to name her something that came from us as parents and wasn’t influenced by our family and friends dislikes or likes. It’s really hard to keep a name when an Aunt, Grandmother or really close friend explains how much they HATE a name you have chosen as a possibility. However, most people will keep their mouths shut (at least to your face) if the child has already been born and the name announced. So please take note that if you don’t like this name I DON’T CARE and I DON’T want your negative opinion about it. Eliana is not your child and thus not your responsibility to name so deal with it. Also it’s not like I named her Egypt, Apple or Bon Qui Qui… I mean really it could be worse.

So this is how it all began…

We first fell in love with Eliana because of how it sounded and the fact that it is a Spanish name. I have no idea when or how we found it but we stumbled upon it and it was always the #1 name in the back of our heads. Other contenders were Liliana, Isla, Alexis and Eva, but none of them really captured us like Eliana did. After doing some research on what the name meant I was pretty much sold for several reasons.

First – In Hebrew Eliana means “God has answered me” or “God has answered my prayer”. I thought that was awesome. We definitely prayed that getting pregnant wouldn’t be hard and that we could have children abundantly, but you forget that God answers those prayers and its not just “luck”. Secondly – In Latin it is derived from the family name Aelianus meaning of the sun. This is a random association, but for those of you who don’t know, my sorority pledge name is Sunstone and my nickname has become Sunny. Thirdly – In Greek it is associated with meaning “daughter of the sun” and Lastly – in Arabic it means “the Bright”. Overall I loved every single meaning I could muster up on the internet. So I was happy I wasn’t naming her something that meant “a grassy knoll” or “black tar”.

Then we moved onto middle names. The middle name was the hardest to find, but the easiest to eventually decide on. I love unisex names and I also like names that aren’t necessarily on the top 100 list. So I had names like Riley, Quinn, Blake, Parker and Berlin on our “middle names” list. After throwing around Reese for a few days I found that I had really wanted a middle name with 1 syllable since her first and last have many.  This creates a name that is easy to say in comparison to one that is a “mouthful” and seems wordy. Her full name is 4 syllables, 1 syllable and 3 syllables. So it flows well. I know it may seem crazy to have so much thought put into a name, but seriously its not like she is a dog that I can name anything and it doesn’t really matter. Then lastly, I fell in love with the meaning of Reese as well. In English it means “Fiery/Ardent” and in Welsh it means “Enthusiastic”. I thought both would be fitting for her 🙂

So in the end we know that she probably won’t always be called “Eliana”, but we are more then open to all forms of nicknames including but not limited too – Elle, Ellie, Liana, Elia, or even calling her by her middle name Reese because I love it that much. I am sure my family will find several nicknames to call her that don’t even pertain to her real name. Example: My entire family (on my Dad’s side) calls me “Stubby”. I am not even sure if I have ever heard them call me Melissa. My Uncle even made up a song that incorporates my nickname into it. Personally, I love it 🙂 It shows they love me and makes me feel special. To me nicknames are meant to be a form of endearment and some of her “Auntie” and “Uncles” from the sorority and fraternity have already dubbed her “Cholula”. And truth be told if Uncle Cho wants to call her Cholula I am 100% in support of it.

So that is the story of how we came to name our first born daughter. I hope you enjoyed it 🙂

Belly Casting 101

Published on by melissaperea4 Comments

So because my daughter has decided to take her dear sweet time I actually had the awesome opportunity of casting my belly at 40 weeks and 1 day! They generally recommend you do the casting at least 2 weeks prior to your due date in case you deliver early, but obviously my child is in no apparent rush to get out.

My sister-in-law Val bought me this casting kit made by Pearhead. You can pick it up at Babies R Us for $19.99 or scrounge your local TJ Maxx, Ross or Marshalls and score it for the low price of $12.99 🙂 She always finds the good deals. I loved the kit and it made it super easy to do the belly cast so I would highly recommend going this route if its your first time. If you have done it before then just buy the plaster strips, vaseline and drop cloth separately. It will probably be super cheap.

Next, you need to find someone you don’t mind being partially naked with 🙂 So if your husband is up to the task ask him to help you. But if he isn’t then call up your sister, your mom or anyone whom you feel comfortable with. I had my sister Heather do it for me and she did a FANTASTIC job. I mean its really not that difficult, but if you ask someone who doesn’t have patience or is horrible with directions it could turn out to be a hideous mess.

Then you basically follow these simple steps:
1.) Disrobe to your waist. I would suggest wearing full butted underwear and nothing else so that your pants/socks/shoes don’t get plaster on them.
2.) Apply Vaseline EVERYWHERE you plan on putting the plaster. Be generous and make sure you don’t miss any spots. The plaster feels like pulling off duct tape on your hair if you don’t cover yourself with Vaseline. My sister got a little overzealous on plastering my sides and hips (where I didn’t put vaseline) and it was not fun pulling it off. Everywhere else it just slid right off so if you cover yourself well you will be fine.
3.) Cut the plaster strips into 3 different lengths. Short about 5 inches for your breasts, Medium about 7-9 inches for your upper belly and lower belly and long about 12+ inches for your mid belly where its largest.
4.) Whoever is applying the strips should wear plastic gloves because it gets messy. Then they dip the strips one at a time into a bowl of water and then apply to your body. Each area should have about 3 layers of strips to ensure a hard enough cast. You don’t have to apply in a perfect manner. In fact overlapping and going different directions will just ensure better coverage and a stronger cast.
5.) Once you are done casting the belly wait about 5-10 minutes to ensure that all areas of the plaster have dried. The cast itself should start to pull away from your body as it dries. Then you simply pull it away and let it sit somewhere for at least 24 hours to fully cure.

At this point you are technically done. But there are several options to finishing the cast and hanging it as art if you choose to go this route.
1. First after the cast has dried for a day hold it up to the light and see if there are any weak spots in your plaster where light shines through. If there is apply a few plaster strips on the inner side of the cast to strengthen these weak spots.
2. Trim the edges so that they are clean and look finished.
3. Sand the cast lightly and then apply joint compound if you want a super smooth appearance. Then sand again after the compound dries. If you don’t mind the rough appearance just skip to step 4.
4. The final step is applying a layer of art gesso so that it has that shiny finished appearance. You might apply 2+ coats as you do this step and feel free to lightly sand in between layers to ensure a smooth even coverage.
5. At this point you can leave the cast as is or paint it as you feel necessary. Many people put the name and date of birth of their baby and others do footprints and hand prints. It’s really up to you 🙂

Here are some pictures of my experience with casting so you can get a better idea of what it looks like. Enjoy!

I plan on sanding and finishing mine. And maybe painting it similar to this one that I found on the internet. I did the shoulder strap as recommended on the box, but I like the look without it so I am going to trim it down to match the other one.

I love the simplicity of the decorating on this one and how they included her name, date of birth and weight/length. Super cute!

300…

Published on by melissaperea3 Comments

So apparently one of the many side effects of pregnancy is crazy dreams. And I have to admit I have woken up several times with the most random people in my dreams. People I haven’t spoken to since Jr. High and other people whom I have never met and I always asked myself how they got in my head. Well a few nights ago was no exception. I think since I was near my due date and I had that fear factor of birthing and everything I began having dreams to boost my confidence. Well this is the craziness that I dreamed….

If you have never watched the movie 300 then you probably won’t get this, but I encourage you to watch this trailer of the movie (fyi the movie is rated R and is definitely racy, but its great if you can get past that). The trailer will give you an idea of the music that was playing inside my head during my dream and one of the exact scenes I dreamed of was in that trailer. It wasn’t an overly long dream, but basically there is one scene where King Leonidas’s wife is responding to a messenger that was sent on behalf of King Xerxes. The messenger wanted to know why Greek woman had influence/control over Greek men. (At this point in the movie King Leonidas was asking his wife what he should/shouldn’t do in response to the message sent from Xerxes). And Leonidas’s wife responded to the messenger with a simple “Only Spartan women give birth to Spartan men”. In essence saying that Greek men wouldn’t exist without Greek woman to birth them so they see each other as equals where in most other cultures women were held below men and were not used for counsel in any matter.

So basically in my head I was chanting “Spartan Woman give birth to Spartan Men” over and over again in my dream. And then following that I dreamed about the scene (its in the trailer) where King Leonidas looks at his wife (during the conversation with the messenger) and she gives him a nod. He then proceeds to kick the messenger in slow motion to this really awesome rock song and he goes flying in the air and falls into this tunnel to his death. This was King Leonidas telling King Xerxes you can go fly a kite because they won’t submit to slavery. (**killing a messenger was like an abomination since he was just delivering the ‘message’ so that was a big no no).

Anyhow, after that I woke up and I had the theme music in my head and I couldn’t stop replaying the words “Spartan Woman give birth to Spartan Men” over and over. I found it hilarious. I told Hector about my dream and his response… “Do you think your having a boy?” I about died. I said no our daughter is going to be a GIRL, however I apparently think role playing as a Greek Queen during Labor and chanting the words “Spartan Woman give birth to Spartan Men” will make labor easier for me. (maybe I will even dye my hair black and wear a Grecian robe and have a banner above my hospital bed that says “Prepare for Glory” – see picture above)

At the very least this will give me something amusing to think about when our daughter does decide to get this Labor going. And who knows maybe saying those words will help me. Although I am pretty sure I am a “White Woman giving birth to a Half White/Half Latin baby girl”, but for some reason that doesn’t have the same powerful ring to it.

Oh well 🙂

**p.s. the real quote is actually “Only spartan women give birth to real men”, but in my head I said Spartan Men so I went with what I actually dreamed. And just so I don’t get a bunch of comments from people correcting me… Yes, I am aware that isn’t the real quote, but just go with it k.

Stick a fork in it…

Published on by melissaperea4 Comments

Because we are done!

The day that felt like it would take years to come is finally here. November 15th, 2010 – your expected due date. To be honest it might as well be November 15th, 2009 because I don’t feel like I am about to become a Mom and even though I have been pregnant for the past 10 months I still can’t wrap my head around the reality that I truly am pregnant. I think its one of those things that doesn’t become a reality until you’ve been a parent for awhile. It’s rather weird. But anyhow we are pretty darn excited to meet you and since your taking up a large amount of my physical real estate it would be awesome if you came sooner rather then later, but I will be patient.

So for all of my non-facebook friends (ahem Kim Murray). I thought I would share my most recent belly shots and some of the maternity photos that my sister took of us. Enjoy!

My sister got together with us in Ocean Beach for a maternity photo-shoot. She has a great eye and since she is my sister I get the family discount of Free Photos 🙂 I loved the way they turned out. I hope you like them as well. 

 

 
p.s. here is a sneak peek at one of the outtakes for our Christmas Card Photo

Etsy Finds

Published on by melissaperea9 Comments

So every day I get an email from Etsy with their “daily finds” and sometimes its super hard to resist not buying EVERYTHING!!! However, I generally have good restraint and thus want to share with everyone the items that I would buy today if I thought I truly needed them or didn’t have to think about buying diapers and paying for baby stuff.

So even though I won’t “own” these items in real life let’s pretend we went shopping and then went home and poured all of our amazing purchases on my coffee table.

 I would love to have an herb garden one day. In fact I would love to have an everything garden, but condo/city living makes it rather rough. These copper herb tags would patina so beautifully over time and just add that little touch of whimsy. A gnome would help as well 🙂

 Sometimes I wish I knew how to write in amazing cursive, but unfortunately I always forget how to write Q and Z and my K’s always look like R’s. Having one of these on hand would encourage me to send out more handwritten letters. And I LOVE stationary. Especially stationary that looks like it came from the Jane Austen era.


 I actually will own this item. I have been searching for that perfect diaper bag that doesn’t look like a diaper bag, but is more functional then just buying a purse. Some purses can totally be pulled off as diaper bags, other purses don’t have enough pockets/compartments to make it useful enough. This is just perfect. Not only does it NOT look like a diaper bag (goal #1) I would totally use it everyday for my own stuff (goal # 2) and its made out of upholstery material so it will last forever (goal # 3).

I really want a Christmas tree this year, but I don’t think we will have the room nor the time to get one/decorate it with the baby coming any day. So my alternative is to buy a vinyl decal for our wall. This one is cool because its an advent calendar that counts down the days for you and you place an ornament over the # of the day to “decorate” your tree. Super cute!
 

Even though the Advent Calendar Tree has an interactive piece which is awesome, this tree really speaks to me. Its just soooo adorable and you can have it made in many different color options. So what do you think? 
And last but not least I wanted to share something that used to be sold on Etsy and now has their own online store because they got sooo huge. It’s called Bangerang Bake Shop and they are the originator’s of the cupcake in a jar. I bought one of these last year for Hector’s birthday and let me tell you… it’s worth every PENNY!!! SO AMAZING. I got the Red Velvet Revolution and WOW. So if you are looking to send a holiday pie or a fruit cake to a loved one STOP. Instead send them a cupcake in a jar. They will love it. I promise!

I hope you enjoyed shopping with me 🙂

Any day now…

Published on by melissaperea2 Comments

So basically they tell you that after 37 weeks of being pregnant you could go “any day” and it wouldn’t be considered bad. The baby is apparently fully developed and the only thing that happens in the last few weeks is they chunk up. So right now I am sitting on 38 weeks and 2 days. I really wanted to give another update before things go haywire, even though I am assuming it will be at least another week until any action occurs. So here is how things have been since week 29 (the last time I did this).

Today’s Date: November, 3rd 2010
Weeks Pregnant: 38 weeks and 2 days
Current Weight:  167 – eeeek!
Weight at the Start of Pregnancy: 126
Total pounds gained so far: 41 big ones baby
Height: 5’6”
Am I getting Braxton Hicks Contractions: All the time!! Especially at night. Sleeping sucks.
Do I have stretch marks: Some on my hips and one above my belly button where I got it pierced.
Do I eat weird foods: No, but I am always eating now. I had a foot long all by myself a few nights ago. I have NEVER eaten that much food before in one meal. I think it scares Hector 🙂
Do I exercise: I am still walking (did 4 miles the other day!!) at this point and I went swimming the other day, but the braxton hicks make doing too much physical activity super uncomfortable
Have I enjoyed being pregnant: YES! I didn’t get uncomfortable until about 2 nights ago. Sleeping is a lot harder now with the contractions and constantly having to pee. Luckily it took me until 38+ weeks to legitimately feel uncomfortable. Up until Monday I was happy as pie. I am still happy just bummed about the lack of sleep.
Am I reading Babywise: You bet I am. It’s a little overwhelming to swallow all the concepts, but it makes a lot of sense. And who wouldn’t want a baby that sleeps through the night at 7-9 weeks.
Am I using a doula: If one is available when I arrive I think I will gladly accept the extra help. Otherwise its just me and Hec  🙂
Did I do all recommended screenings: Yes. Any test that the hospital offered I took (as long as it wasn’t invasive or a health risk to myself or my baby). 
Did I get the flu shot: No
Did I get the H1N1 shot: No
Did I get the whooping cough vaccine: I will once she is born. Hector and I both will be given the shot immediately following her delivery.
Do we have a name: Yes, we have her full name picked out. We have decided to not announce it until she is born. Even though we love her name we do have a minor feeling that we might change it once we meet her, but hopefully not since we don’t really have a ton of back up names.
Measurements: We had some minor setbacks about being in the birthing center due to an ultrasound that showed her having an overly large Abdominal Cavity. We have since then had another u/s done and thankfully all of her measurements are average or on the small side. Which in reality means nothing because an u/s is never 100% accurate.
Anemia: Besides the measurements the only other thing that was a setback was me being Anemic. Apparently anything over an 11.5 means you are not anemic. My first blood tests showed me around 12.8 which is good. Around 20 weeks I dropped to 10.3 and if I got below 10 I wouldn’t be allowed in the birthing center. I was put on iron pills (which sucked!!) and my number went up to 11.1. I then switched to liquid iron around 28 weeks and at my last appoint it was up to 11.8 which was even better. And the liquid iron was much easier to handle. So right now I am still taking it daily, but all in all my hemoglobin is looking good 🙂
Other Vaccines: Hector and I haven’t given much thought to what we will or won’t do in regards to vaccines. I think we definitely will space them out more (they give waaaay to many at once). And we will probably say No to some of them, but I haven’t done a ton of research so its still up in the air. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated!!
Brain Cyst: We also wanted to let everyone know that her cyst has since disappeared. At her 19w u/s they saw a cyst on her brain, but it went away and everything was cleared at her 36w u/s as predicted by my midwife.

Lastly, here is the most recent comparison from my first picture (week 13) to my current picture (week 38).

I can’t wait to tell the entire world what your name is and to announce your weight, length and time of birth because it means you are finally here!!!