At Home with Sephira

Some of the precious moments of bonding with Sephira during her first days home...

Sephira's First Checkup

Sephira had her first checkup today with Dr. Hokari. She lost 8% of her birth weight (up to 10% is normal), and now weighs in at 7 pounds 14 ounces. She should start to put on about an ounce a day now, and be back up to her birth weight by next week.

Other than that, we're happy to report that Sephira is in great health!

After her appointment Sephira got to go for her first ride in her Bob stroller at Target for some nursing supplies for Mommy. Our first "outing" as a family! It was a great and beautiful day!

Resting Up and Going Home

We spent Monday night in the Mother and Baby unit at RiverBend. The suites there allowed us to have a fairly comfortable stay, and the nurses only checked in on us a few times during the night, so the sleep we were able to get was fairly restful. Sephira took to nursing right away and nursed frequently throughout the night.

In the morning Dr. Stenshoel checked in on us and again complimented Effie on such a stellar delivery. She gave the okay for us to be released that morning, however Dr. Hokari, Sephira's pediatrician, requested that we stay until 6pm to give Sephira 24 hours in the hospital after delivery to make sure all her checkups and monitoring was completed.


Our friends Tamara, Jennifer and Josh stopped by to see us and love on Sephira, along with Effie's parents Cliff (Grandpa) and Cris (Nana/GamaKiss).

Over the course of the day Sephira had her hearing and Jaundice tests - both of which she passed. She also had to endure getting pricked in the heel for her blood test.

Later in the day she had her picture taken for the hospital website baby album, and we filed papers for her birth certificate and social security papers.

By 6pm we were served our final hospital meal and were discharged to go home. Sephira loved the car seat instantly and "slept like a baby" the whole way home, where she was welcomed with suspicion by her cats Tommy and Yoko.

Sephira's Arrival into the World!

SEPHIRA LEE SIVERTS
Born Monday, September 8th, 2008 @ 6:37pm
8 lbs. 6 oz.
20-3/4" long

"Sephira" is of Greek origin and means "beautiful jewel". It is a derivative of Sapphire, which is the birthstone for September.

"Lee" is a family name on both sides. The middle name for Effie's mother and grandmother, a derivative of her great-grandfather's name "Leif", and of Dirk's father, Leif, and grandfather LeRoy.

Our last "pregnant" photo. Sunday afternoon, September 7th, 2008.








We started timing contractions around midnight Sunday night, and checked in to the hospital around 4:30am Monday morning when contractions were 5 minutes apart. At that time, Effie was only 1cm dilated so the doctor wasn't going to be in until later in the morning.

At 8:10am Dr. Stenshoel did an exam and announced we were 4cm's, at which time we were finally in "active labor", however Effie's water had not yet broken. Roughly two hours later the doctor returned to break the bag of waters to help the labor the progress. During this time various family and friends arrived to support and encourage both Effie and Dirk - which also gave Effie a great tag team rotation of people to help massage and put pressure on her back and hips.

Even with all the good work Effie was doing dilation still progressed very slowly, so by 4:30pm Dr. Stenshoel administered Pitocin to make stronger contractions... however they didn't feel weak to start with!

The combination of Pitocin and using positions to help her rotate finally got us to 10cm at about 5:45pm. Effie had to do "Hollywood breathing" to keep from pushing for about 15min and then the Doctor said "it's time to push"... at which time the contractions started to ease so the Pitocin was bumped up to get them rolling again. Sephira's head crowned and progressed millimeter by millimeter for at least 6-8 good sets of pushes.








Effie pushed with all her might and finally our beautiful daughter emerged into our world with a gasp and squall. She then pooped and peed all over mom, the nurses, and then the respiratory therapists.




Sephira had to have her stomach decompressed as she'd swallowed a large amount of amniotic fluid during the delivery, which impeded her ability to breath effectively.




















With her stomach emptied she turned a rosie pink and was taken back to Effie so she could do her first nursing. Sephira latched on with ease.

At this time we looked into her lovely little face and announced her name.

Doctor and Nurses were amazed at how poised Effie was during such a long and hard labor without any type of pain medication. Labor was ~19 hours long, 10 of which were "active" labor at the hospital.




Later the nurses washed and weighed Sephira, and combed her curly little locks of light brown hair.





















Click here to view the online announcement from RiverBend hospital!







Sephira and Effie with Dr. Tamara Stenshoel.

Waiting on Littlest

Littlest was due yesterday, September 5th, but she seems to be trying to make up her mind as to which day she wants as her birthday.

Now fully 9 months, we have had no contractions, dilation, or symptoms of a pending delivery. As of last Wednesday, Dr. Stenshoel says that Effie's body is ready whenever Littlest is. Her heart rate is strong, and she is still moving around nicely. She just seems to be quite content and happy in her little cocoon.

Come on little butterfly - it's time to spread your wings!