Fishlake National Forest

After a few hikes and trying to fit in a lot of miles we took a lake day to rest. We found a beautiful spot along the creek with some shade, flowers, and no people to hang out in. We spent the day playing guitar, swinging in the hammock, napping, laying by the creek and taking slow walks. We also gave Roslyn her first bath in the basin with some heated up creek water. She was not a fan of this first one, might have been the bit of wind that started up as we put her in.

We quickly came to love the days we decided to park Walter and stay within about a 20' radius of that spot. Those were the days I nursed her to sleep swinging in a hammock and she'd dance to Joshua playing guitar at night. The times we let ourselves just be and not try to achieve anything were special. Stopping and slowing down are something Joshua and I are terrible at. 

Roslyn, Walter, and this trip exposed that in us and forced us to try things a different way. We learned and made mistakes at this but in doing that we became better at resting and better at loving the still moments almost more than the big showy ones. 

Walter doesn't really go above 65 miles an hour so we were always passed and hustled by but that meant we could soak in the scenery and just trot along while I read books not worrying about when we'd arrive. Roslyn is a mini person with her own schedule, she'd want to get out of her car seat mid ride so we'd stop and pop the back of the van open and play with her for awhile. We were learning to live life a new way and learning to be a new family.

Great Basin National Park

The first national park we made it to was Great Basin. It wasn't a park I knew much about but it's beautiful. The park was busy so we just drove around for awhile and landed at the Bristlecone Pine hike in the early evening. 

Since the trail was still pretty busy we decided to make dinner, and it was one I'm pretty proud of- bacon quesadillas. They were amazing and we had leftovers for lunch the next day. I loved cooking in the van. It took some learning and patience at first but getting to watch Joshua play with Roslyn while I slowly chopped vegetables and worked methodically over the gas stove was tranquil and always in the moment. This meal was a great example of that feeling. We slowly made food and then sat outside and ate while passing the baby back and forth.

After dinner the hot sun and crowds had dissipated so we hopped onto the 3 mile trail. It wove through some beautiful old forest and then opened up with some great views. The higher up you get the more bristlecone pines emerge. They are very very old knotty twisted trees with beautiful textures and colors. The path ends with a bunch of them all together and we lingered for quite awhile. 

Since we did an evening hike and all the campsites nearby were full we found ourselves a bit stuck after the hike. Luckily Joshua had one last free spot pinned on his map but we didn't know much about it. We ended up driving in the dark down a bumpy dirt road that looked like it had no pull offs. Then it just ended in a huge water filled rut. We felt a bit worried until we went to turn the van around and spotted a fabulous camping spot off the road. You could see the surrounding mountains and the stars were the best we'd ever seen. We put Roslyn to bed and sat out in the warm night air trying to capture them in a photo until we were tired.

Ruby Mountains

Being that Walter is without air conditioning we were a little nervous to drive into Nevada. It was quite warm there but Joshua took us up to a hike in the Ruby Mountains where it felt wonderful outside.

We started the hike on a trail following a creek surrounded by pretty greenery. Soon after though the trail gave way to giant snow patches and eventually became just a big snowfield. We strapped on our crampons and continued on the trail, snow in Nevada who knew! Then the trail kinda disappeared and we had to make our own way. We decided the best way was straight up, I only agreed to this plan because he was carrying Roslyn. Straight up was a shorter route and we got to look back where we'd come from with uninterrupted views.

At the top we hung out near a frozen Dollar Lake. Roslyn woke up, we showed her snow and played around a bit. Then I strapped her to me and we took a less steep route back down.

Alvord Desert

Joshua did a great job planning the road trip, free camping spots, route, etc. But he also threw in some roads along the way just because they were scenic or kept us off the highway. I can appreciate that, but it also made it take longer to get everywhere. I complained that I wanted to go to a destination not just drive scenic roads covered in the landscape I am already used to seeing. He must have thought "challenge accepted"  because not too long after my request he took us down a gravel road and drove Walter out onto an all white, dry lake bed.

It was stunning and expansive and very cool that you can just drive all over it. Sadly, it was also very hot so we didn't stay too long but we did run around in awe for awhile. Nothing to complain about in this beautiful spot. I started to trust him a bit more after this. No one can find a treasure of a hike or pit stop like him.

The trip begins

 

June 6th we set out on our trip in Walter. We felt it only right our first stop was the mountain town that inspired our daugher's name, Roslyn. We love to stop here to eat after hiking or climbing. She slept through lunch, we took her for coffee and a walk down the town street, ran into a VW van friend, and set off again. 

The first day and a half were more about getting distance from all the places we'd already been and to start figuring out how to live in the van. 

We learned one person cooks or cleans at a time. We determined this after we both spilled coffee while trying to help or do two things at once. That our fridge was not working anymore off propane and had to plan out fresh food only a day at a time. That Roslyn at this stage mostly just sleeps so we can do whatever we want and right now she'll adapt easily. But when she wakes up it's nice to make a stop and get out to intentionally spend time with her and pay specific attention to her.

 

That is what ended us up at Anthony Lake. She was up, wanted to play a bit so we walked around the lake. Gave her some sunshine, stretched our legs. She also spit up while we were taking her photo.  Then we were in Oregon for the night and officially living in our van.

We're parents

Still very weird to hear someone say we're a "mom" and a "dad". We don't really like calling each other that, still feels foreign. But daughter, we love that word. We love that she's ours and a part of our family.

She has been such a great baby so far. Sleeps in 3 hour stretches at night, we're getting the hang of this breastfeeding thing. We were a little concerned about a goopy eye and some other things so we went back to the pediatrician, she's fine, but they told us she's now above her birthweight at only a week old! She's trying to hold her head up on her own. Had a rough night recently where she seems to be fending off gas, hoping she's better this morning.

She love music, when a record ends she'll fuss until someone flips it over or puts on a new one. We've been listening to all kinds of things, she seems to like it all. She also likes to be lifted up and down like she's on a constant elevator, our arms are paying for that one. And lastly, she is already trying to lift her own head up for periods of time. She likes to be upright so she can look around and appears very observant.

Roslyn Oneleigh Elrod's Birth Story

Our daughter Roslyn Oneleigh Elrod was born on April 27th at 3:33am, weighing 7lbs 9oz, 19" long with a perfectly round head and big feet. I planned on writing her birth story down eventually but sitting in the hospital with our perfect girl asleep in my arms Joshua asked if I minded it he took a minute to write it all down. He captured it all better than I could and the tender gesture of him wanting to remember it all as much as I did was really moving. So here it is:

I had a crappy night on April 25th because I had begun to come down with a cold. I tried to sleep upstairs and moved downstairs around 0200 to try to sleep. Ashley came down the stairs at 0430 and said she thought that her water had broken. Leaking throughout the early hours of the morning confirmed  itand we went to the midwife’s office at 0800. 2 cm dialated, due to induce at 1700. because of infection risk. So we walked the various parks and streets of Ballard trying different ways to kick off labor with Liz. Walking with one foot on the curb and one on the street, deep lunges on park benches, smoothie bowls and back to the hospital with little success.

We made the decision to induce because we had 12 remaining hours before the baby’s chances of infection during delivery would climb significantly. Induction occurred about 1900 and yielded results almost immediately. Ashley had more regular contractions of increasing intensity. Liz and I helped work her through the contractions using doula techniques until finally after five or so hours something changed.

Ashley entered what they call the transitional phase of labor where the mother often feels like there is no hope. She was screaming, losing control of her contractions and losing her rhythm to the pain and frequency. Midwives thought she may be getting ready to push, so they checked her and found her only 5cm dilated. We were crestfallen. 5 hard hours of labor and only half way there. Ashley’s outlook diminished even further and she started talking about not being able to labor any more, not wanting to, wanting an epidural, wanting it to stop, just wanting to go to sleep. Her low, long breaths had been displaced by quick, higher pitched breaths, and often lost out to the chaos of screams and lost rhythm. I was devastated to see her this way and would have done anything to alleviate her pain. It was the full time effort of three people (Jessica, me and Liz friend/doula) to help her keep focused on her rhythm.

The midwife on staff was Sally, a 30-some year old veteran baby deliverer and Silvana a nurse who encouraraged her to head to the jacuzzi. It took some convincing to bring Mackenzie ever so slightly back from the brink for a dicey walk to the Jacuzzi. She asked Jessica to leave, and that left Liz and me to get her into the bath to help alleviate her pain. The nurse dialed back her dosage of pitosin which slowed her labor giving her a fighting chance to rest between contractions.

Labor progressed in the tub at a more manageable pace. Ashley’s contractions were intense, and at first she still felt the need to have her pain taken away. Her morale was still very low and she still had the feeling that she simply could not do it – could not continue to labor with contractions of this intensity for the same time period that she already had. Sally  and Silvana came and sat on the floor talking to Ashley for at least 20 minutes about the fact that she could in fact do this and already was – and all she needed to go was get a ritual built back up to help her ease the pain. Ashley she soon found rhythm. I sat behind her and massaged her aching lower back between contractions, and firmly held her arms or shoulders during the contractions to give her a feeling of grounding.  Liz helped pace out her rhythm, and eventually even during the most intense contractions Ashley was able to keep control and a certain level of relaxation.  This helped Ashley to center herself between contractions such that she was more able to relax and get ahead of the next contraction..

We had moved to the tub around midnight on the 27th. Around 0130, Ashley had begun to experience spontaneous pushing. Liz knew immediately what this meant and said she thought Ashley was ready to go back to the room. Ashley was not sure of this because the tub was what helped her to get ahead of her contractions and she feared losing her rhythm especially if the second 5 cm were to take as long as the first 5. Liz assured her that the trance-like rhythm technique Ashley had developed would easily carry over. She was right.

By 0200, we were in the bed and Ashley was on her side. She wanted to lay down at nobody else’s suggestion. At the end of her contractions she was involuntarily pushing at this point and Sally measured her fully dilated. What a change from only 2 hours prior. Ashley was obviously more assured of herself now and she could feel the progress that her pushing was making. Sally told her she was about to have a natural birth and Ashley knew she could do it at this point.

The pain was still significant. At first Ashley would scream through her pushing. Sally encouraged her to use the energy she was dumping into screaming to push even harder. Ashley grunted through her new pushes and ended each with a scream of release.  She really enjoyed this part of labor, feeling like she was able to finally do something and feeling the satisfaction from each push. Each contraction cause 4-5 spontaneous pushes. Her face got red and she clenched hard, so much so that the next day broken blood vessels were visible on her neck and face.

After maybe 45 minutes of spontaneous pushing, the baby’s head was visible. Sally thought that the pushing could be sped by squatting and pushing for 2-3 contractions, though the pain would be greater. She was right, and after a couple pushes the baby’s head was through her pelvic bone. Ashley laid back down and Sally told her that any push could give her a baby at this point and that she should take off her shirt so that skin-to-skin contact could begin immediately. A couple pushes later Ashley was in immense pain and her pushes were combinations of grunts and screams of agony but she knew she could do it and that it was only a matter of time. A few contractions later, the baby’s head was entirely out and the rest of the body followed only one or two contractions later.

Sally put the baby immediately on Ashley’s chest with the umbilical cord still in place. Ashley was absolutely overwhelmed. “My baby!” she exclaimed. “Oh my God!” Her expression was the mix of tears and joy and pain that one only wears when great agony and effort give way to an abundance of payoff one could have never imagined. “She is Roslyn.” “Yeah?” I asked. “I think so…” “I love you!” She kissed her on the forehead. I cut the cord and the placenta quickly followed and it was all over but the sewing and the recovery. Our daughter was born at 3:33 am and she laid on Ashley's chest for an hour and fed and snuggled. 

Because my water had broken so early on they usually mandate a 48 hour stay but the pediatrician said she was doing so well we could take her home Saturday night. Joshua walked home to grab her car seat and next thing we knew we were checking out. The nurses kept offering to walk us to our car not realizing fully what we meant when we said we live really really close by. We made it out the doors into a perfect Seattle rain with our new little family, walked the block to home, and there you have it. We snuggled on the couch all night struggling to breast feed, sleep, and admire our perfect Roslyn.