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Indigo Naomi Hughes - Birth Story

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I always enjoy reading birth stories, so it's a privilege when I get to share my own. Giving birth is intense, and it can really shape you as a woman. Unity's birth is a memory I treasure even though it had its hard parts. I learned so much. And I also came away with a plan to learn more before the next baby. I felt like I had prepared quite a bit for Unity, but nothing is a better teacher than experience. 2 things I came away from Unity's birth with, and that I brought into my birth with Indigo, were 1. I wanted to push less (I pushed for several hours with Unity), and 2. I wanted to feel more aware of what positions were working for me and with my body in labor. So, the week leading up to Indigo's birth wasn't exactly what I pictured it would be. I imagined my mom and I would go for a walk every day, take Unity to the park or the beach, go out for coffee, etc. Lots of "going". Instead, we had a heat wave, and I got covid. Thankfully, the covid was mild a

3 Month Milestone - for both of us!

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 Let me get right to it with no sugar coating: These three months with Unity have been HARD. In so many ways. I guess I had hoped motherhood would come naturally, and I wouldn't say it feels unnatural but it has been nothing of what I expected. I was prepared for low-sleep nights, some fussing, and keeping an eye out for anything medical to deal with. I felt well trained for all of these as a nurse, my years of working in childcare (not to mention all the babysitting), and as one gifted in thriving without sleep haha. They used to call me Mary Poppins. 😆 If you laughed when you read the word "some" before fussing, then you get me. Or I get you, now. Miraculously our girl sleeps really well at night, so my skill of not needing much sleep means little. But the DAYS are another story. So.much.fussing. We are actually starting to see some real improvements, so don't think this is just a rant post haha. I just know that pictures can look great, but we all know there is so

Unity Ember Hughes - home birth story

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 Before I forget how it all happened, I'd better write it down. It's amazing how only one week later my memory of all of the sensations of labor have already dulled. There are moments I will never forget, and other moments I'd never remember if we hadn't snapped a few photos. Preface - I realize, I have not updated my blog since I last wrote about our journey through infertility. That was written in September of 2020. We were working through how to wait patiently on the Lord and discern what to do in the waiting. We decided we needed to first work on moving into a bigger space where we would have room for a baby. Our little studio apartment had been a huge blessing, but it was time. We figured we would start fertility treatment at the end of the summer when we were settled into a new house and done with all of our summer travels. In February we started the process to get pre-approved for a house, in March we got our pre-approval letter - and a positive pregnancy test. W

Till My Soul is Satisfied

 [Insert obligatory introductory apology for not blogging in 4 years] Whew, with that said - I've been thinking about this song a lot in the last year - I Will Wait for You (Psalm 130) by Shane & Shane. I pretty much listen to it on loop for a few weeks every few months (so, nonstop 😉). But before I explain why, let me intrigue you with this: My husband and I are struggling with infertility. So there's that. If you're not comfortable with this topic, this is your cue to exit stage left. I won't be offended. It's a difficult topic. We've been trying for 2 years as of next month. And at the very beginning of this journey we prayed, before we stopped using any contraception, that God would be sovereign in planning our family. We truly believe that God can open and close any womb. I had known many couples who said they were going to "let the Lord plan their family" as the reason they stopped using birth control, and usually they just proceeded to then

Status: Delayed

Here in this post are the statuses I put on Facebook that represent some of the things I feel God has been teaching me lately. There were things I also learned which I did not get around to posting on social media. Those will no doubt come up over time, but for now, I found these enjoyable to ponder afresh. Thanks for reading them. :) December 6, 2015: A thought on food (sorta): "...and give us this day our daily bread..." The Word of God is like daily bread to the Christ-follower. Sometimes, though, I am ashamed that I can go so long neglecting to eat it. But it's like, I've been given the tools to really dive in all proper-like. I have the three different forks and spoons and I know which one to grab to start experiencing the fullness of the feast. So why don't I? I think it's because I feel like all I have time for is a quick hotpocket which contains only a little bit of real meat and then a whole lotta processed goodies. The hotpocket's not bad, of

Presence, Power, Glory

Long overdue, I know, and I'm sorry. I can't express the up's and down's, busy-ness and avoidance that has postponed this post. It's hard sometimes to sit still long enough to be very honest. I intended a while back to specifically share about what God's been teaching me lately, and now, almost a year later I'm finally getting to it. I was feeling quite guilty about waiting this long to finally update the ol' blog, and then I realized that I did in a way actually give the update in the form of various posts on Facebook (which I have put in a post on the blog in case you should want to browse those. Click here ). But since those have already been published, I thought I'd still aim to boil down the main idea I've been working on swallowing over time. So, this is what I'd boil it down to. I spent a lot of time this year coming back to the heart of understanding what it means to have really died with Christ, to have been raised with Christ, an

Riding the Tsunami

At one point, I thought I was going to write monthly posts on this blog. Ha. ha. At one point I also thought letting 2 thin pieces of hair always hang in my eyes looked cool. Turns out, it doesn't look cool. And it turns out it's really hard to do nursing school and keep a consistent blog. But finally, the moment has come! A pocket of time for a single update. So to briefly  bring things up to speed... I had to think of where I left off and it's funny kinda funny now to remember life at the time of my last blog post. I remember I was one month into nursing school and I just wanted so badly to finally feel a little nurse-y. The whole 2 years of prerequisites were beneficial, even educational (shocking?), but they weren't super nurse-y. Meanwhile just uttering the words "nursing school" was inspiring people to show me all their weird bumps, rashes, cuts and deformities and ask,  "Does this look like cancer?" "Should I be concerned about this?&