Grey Stirling

Grey Stirling- born 1/22/10 at 2:55 pm.

He is starting out right supporting his Tarheels from the crib. Thanks Granny for getting these for him- I LOVE them!

Yes if you look closely you can see the pink, girly flowers on his little gloves. We don't have any boy gloves and he gouged his eye out.

Hah- love this face! Not so sure about getting burped.

And this is the norm. Typically, he is sleeping.

No, he doesn't have much hair, and what little peach fuzz he does have is blonde and invisible! But he has the same hairline that Skylar had- and I LOVE it!

Since he has jaundice, he has to lie on a "photoblanket"- a phosphorescent light that goes against his skin and helps break down red blood cells. I am evidently O+ and he is A+, making his jaundice levels higher than norm. It also doesn't help that he lost almost a full pound after he was born. Here he is with the two "blankets", one under him and one on his belly. It kind of freaks me out and makes me think of weird chemicals being leaked into his body. Maybe one day we will have a little superman on our hands. Right now we have a handy night light so I can see him easily at night.

Granny and Grandma came to visit- and brink back Skylar who has been staying with my mom for the past few days. They couldn't hold him for long since he is supposed to be on the blankets for 22 hours a day. We don't make it up to that much just by taking him off to nurse!

Heh- "I will not open my eyes for you. Well, maybe just a little peak to see what is going on."

Welcome to the world PittBaby!

It's a BOY!!

Pittbaby has finally made his entrance into the world, two weeks before his due date and not a day too late for mom!

Wednesday afternoon, the girls I work for threw a wonderful baby shower for me and I believe that was the catalyst for sending me into labor! After this shower, there was nothing else I "needed" to do before baby. I was up most of the night Wednesday extremely nauseous, and then finally got up at 6 am seriously sick- vomiting, the works. I felt horrible all day and had the Dr. call in some phenegren for me to control the nausea and vomiting. Around 5 pm, I went to use the bathroom and low-and-behold, my water broke! Evidently, what I thought was a stomach virus was actually pre-labor!

I talked to the nurse on call and she told me to head on into the hospital as I was GBS+ and would need to start antibiotics right away since my water broke. So, we took our time and cleaned up, finished packing the bags with essentials and said goodbye to Skylar. And of course, took a family picture on the way to the hospital!.

We got to the hospital and signed in- only to find out that they were so busy there were no open rooms. We spent about 4 hours in the waiting area of the lobby/triage area. Needless to say- not the best place for a laboring woman to be! However, at this point I still had not started having regular contractions- just occasional ones. We moved up to a labor/delivery room and my mom, granny and cousin Nikki came up with us. I spent the next several hours (15 to be exact...) walking the halls of the hospital, getting hooked up to the baby monitor, bouncing on the ball, and walking some more. What I truly expected to be a short labor turned out to be a marathon!

Since my plan was to go all natural (i.e. no pain medicine) I did not want to take any medicine to help speed up the delivery either. So, instead of taking Pitocin, I decided to keep walking, take showers, bounce on the ball, anything to help progress my labor without taking medicine. However, by 12:30 pm, it was obvious that I was not progressing fast enough for the baby's/my health since I was nearing the 24-hour mark since my water had broken and the risk of infection was increasing. So, we decided to start Pitocin. The devil drug!

Within minutes, I was contracting strongly every few minutes apart. I went from 4-5 cm dilated at 12:30, to 8 cm dilated at 2:40. Basically, hell on earth. By 2:40, I was telling Ken and Nikki that I couldn't make it, I needed the meds; I really didn't know if I could handle it any longer. By 2:50, I was pushing and the nurses were running into the room to help me get on the bed in time to catch the baby that was already crowning. Pittbaby was born by 3:00 pm! It's a good thing it went by so fast, or else I don't think I would have made it without meds!

Pittbaby weighed in at 7.9 lbs, and 20 inches long! Although he is a healthy baby boy, he had an irregular heartbeat and extreme tremors at first that sent him back to the nursery before I really had a chance to hold him. They checked him out and found that his blood sugar was low (due to my taking Gliburide for diabetes) and they had to give him a bottle to help bring his sugars back up. He came back to our room once he was stable and nursed pretty well. He kept falling asleep, but latched on well! He has already had 4 stinky diapers, so he is doing well!

We'll post more pics over the next few days!!

Oh Pooookie! Where are you?

We took Skylar to the library to check out some books the other day and got this one from Sandra Boynton called, "Night, Night Pookie". Skylar loves this book and will "read" it to me at nighttime. She's pretty good at remembering the lines, especially the first one that says, "Oh, Pooooookie! Where are you?" She also especially loves the one where Pookie is hiding and his mom says she is going to count to 3... which we also do, but Daddy does much more often than myself. She thinks its hilarious and refuses to accept that it is Pookie's mom in the book and insists that it is dada.

So, now I am wondering where my pookie is!! I wish I could just count to 3 and out will come baby! Last week I went to the doctor and found out that I am already dilated to 2; 3 at the top of my cervix, and 75% effaced. My midwife says there is no way I will make it to my due date of Feb. 4th. Yippee!!

The only bad part about finding that out is that now I am super-ready to have this baby! I am thinking about it constantly now; wondering if this will be the day, etc. and I am probably stressing myself out for nothing. With Skylar I wasn't in a hurry to have her (I really enjoyed those last few weeks with her) and when my water broke, I almost wished I had more time!

Now, everything is ready, I'm ready, and just can't wait to meet PB! I'm really excited to see if it is a boy or a girl, what they look like, what kind of temperament they will have, will they nurse right away, etc. etc. etc. I can't wait to have all my questions answered!

Here is a pic of the baby wrap that my mom ordered for me from etsy. I love the pattern and am really excited to figure out how to wear it with the baby. One of the best parts is that she ordered a matching baby wrap for Skylar to use with her babies. It's the exact same as mine, just toddler size!

Here is a pic of the diaper bag that I made for PB. I didn't want to spend mega bucks on a diaper bag and couldn't find the one I used for Skylar- so I got some cute fabric and made one this past week. I was slightly unprepared for the fact that the pattern called for 71 steps! Needless to say, it took me a little longer than I thought it would when I planned this out! But, I really like how it turned out and now it is finished and all packed with PB's things for the hospital!

I think Skylar is finally understanding that there is a new baby coming soon. Now that we are setting up the furniture and baby stuff, she wants everything to be hers. We hear "that mines!" a lot! We have constantly had to tell her, "no sweetie, this is for baby". Yesterday my family threw a baby shower for me and surprisingly she didn't seem to care at all about the presents (huge surprise!) but then later on after we brought everything home and were looking through them again and putting them away, she would grab a few things and say, "this one for baby. And then grab another one and say, "that one mines." Too funny! She's also really big on compromising lately as well. For instance, if we stop and get burgers on the way home from church or something, she will ask for fries in the car. When we told her to wait until we got home, she said, "just one fry?" Ad when she wants to take her arms out of the straps in the carseat and we tell her to put them back in, she will say, "just one army?" all the while nodding at me with a really serious look.

Christmas 2009

Well, we are starting backwards, but here goes!

Here are Ken's brother Bill and his wife Kristen, whom Skylar loves! She spent the entire time they were here with them! I'm sure you can tell why...

While waiting for them to arrive so we could open presents, Skylar kept going in the living room and giving us this face saying, "More presents?" in the cutest little high-pitched voice that she uses quite frequently nowadays when she wants something we have told her she can't have. I'm not sure where she learned this new trick, but its actually one of the cutest things ever!

Sky LOVES to have her picture taken, and even more, she LOVES to see her picture afterwards! One of her presents this year was a kid-friendly camera that she has really enjoyed!

Posing in front of one of her presents- the usual cheese!

Being silly about wearing the Santa hat.

We spent Christmas Eve at my mom's house along with my brother and his family. Here Skylar is giving Granny kisses.

Trying on Cheyanne's new Cowgirl hat!

Playing with her new computer!

And of course, "Pisky" (Pipsqueak), the newest member of our family. (Zhu zhu pet- thanks mom for finding these!) Skylar loves Pisky and plays with him all day- he is the first thing she goes to when she wakes up in the morning and she routinely checks on him throughout the day. He has a wheel to run in and a car to drive, but the car doesn't work on carpet which we have in the bonus room, so she mainly puts him in the wheel to run his little heart out!

The stocking from Granny- complete with a sock monkey! Notice the hair-do! Gotta love her hair when she first wakes up!

Every year for Christmas, my extended family gets together on Christmas Eve to eat and exchange presents. It is always one of my favorite traditions! Here is Skylar and her Cheyanne.

Dustin made it this year with his little boy, Dakota. Notice the resemblance?!? Dakota had just woken up here and wasn't quite sure about all of these people, but he warmed up nicely. At the end of the night, he came over and gave me a kiss on the cheek and said bye. Totally a charmer!

Austin, Jaxon, Izzy, and Micael got Skylar this little doggy that has its own house to live in and she loves it!

Some of the older kids took turns helping Skylar open and figure out what her presents were!

Snow!

First snow of the year!

Skylar loved the snow this time (last year she was a little hesitant, especially if any of the snow got on her hands, face, legs, etc.)! Skylar was super excited to watch the snow come down and then get ready to go outside- although she didn't want to wear her gloves, scarf or hat...

Of course, she had to taste it.

Nana and Papa showed her how to have a snowball fight!

Skylar didn't get the hang of throwing snowballs, but she really enjoyed calling the dogs to her and rubbing a handful of snow on their backs. When the dogs were not available, daddy's legs were a good substitute.

The dogs were a little hesitant- they get cold easily, but they loved running around in the snow once we forced them outside!

Not quite the full cheese here = much better picture of her face!

More catch up... randomness

What have we been up to the past few weeks??

Lots of cheesin'

Lots of laughing when Daddy scares us... (notice how the hands come up to cover her chest!)

Lots of covering the mouth when being tickled.

Lots of dancin', with or without partners

Puppies have been growing steadily!

So cute!

Time to catch up... Thanksgiving

Since it is almost 2010, I figured it was time to put up a few pics from the past couple of months. I didn't really take any pics of Thanksgiving day, but here are a couple of Skylar with Gigi- her great Grandma on Ken's side. Ken's grandparents came into town for the holiday and Skylar got to spend some good time with them. She usually takes a little while to warm up to them since they live in TN and we don't see them that often, however she definitely remembered them this time- but made them work a little bit for the smiles and hugs.

Here she is with Gigi, examining the small "Christmas Trees" that Nana brought home- aka rosemary plants.

Here is Skylar and Gigi going through her flash cards- and the ever present Skylar "cheese" that she does whenever she sees a camera pointing in her direction... Most of our pics lately are of her cheesing with a mouthful of teeth and her eyes shut!