Quikie

Just a quick post since Daniel's awake but being quiet at the moment, subject to change at a moment's notice.

He had his 2 week checkup today, and is doing great! He weighs a whopping 7lbs 1oz, which means he gained 7 oz from about a week ago. Nearly an oz a day! Wow! I don't know if that will continue for long, but it's fantastic while it lasts. Everything looked good, hurray!

Of course, I'm gaining weight too right now, since I cannot stop eating. First it was because I felt like I was always starving, thanks to the sudden increase of space for my tummy. Now it's like my hands are shoving carbs into my mouth of their own accord. I can't even see what I've put on, because the lithium battery in my scale that has lasted 4 years just died! I'm still supposed to be on the diabetic diet.... oops.

And Squeaker is fussing now, so I'll have to go. He cried when the speech therapist held him today, and stopped the second I took him back. Too funny!

Mr. Bright Eyes

Okay, he's not all chunky, but he's got his eyes open! He was awake and just quietly looking around after his lunch, so I snapped a couple pictures.

We took the boys to Walmart yesterday to find their Halloween costumes. The selection for boys was just pitiful... so was the toddler section. Plus, the one we picked out for William is too short and tight in the chest so we have to go back to town and exchange it today. What happened to all the fun costumes? There's a huge shop in Boise, but I'm not driving all the way there, that's insane. But we went home with 2 pirates and a vampire. Daniel will wear a little devil's costume we bought for Nathan, that William wore too. It'll be too big, but will help keep him warm.

I think Mark likes Halloween more than Christmas! He gets so excited every year about how he wants to do the front door area and going to haunted houses. It didn't get done really this year, with having a baby and everything. But I think he plans on carving the pumpkin with the boys on Saturday, and he and the boys put up a big web by the door this week. I have none of my Halloween or even Fall decorations up at all. Mark brought the box in for me, but I haven't had the time or even the energy to clear all the clutter so I can set it all up! Not even the leaves Steph made for me last year have a home yet. *sniff* Sad. I'll make up for it at Christmas, I guess.

Am I really crazy?

Oren threw up yesterday morning, so Mark kept the older boys home while I went to church with Daniel. I would love to say I enjoyed Sacrament meeting, but I was feeding him for most of it. :-) It's a good thing I went, because I only had a piano substitute set up for last week, and we have a primary program coming up. We scheduled it for November 8th, since I knew I wasn't going to go over my due date and we figured that would give me sufficient time to heal to sit on the piano bench again.

I should have brought my foam pad I used during pregnancy.... That bench is hard! We did a full run through, and then just sang songs for the last 30 minutes, which means 2 full hours sitting down on a hard piece of wood, not even 2 weeks after having a baby. Ouch! I was hurting the whole rest of the day.

What amused me was the number of people who couldn't believe I was at church already! I'm feeling great, other than the sore tushy from the bench, and it's not like I was there with all the kids by myself and chasing them all over the building. There is a cold going around, I know, but he was kept covered and behind the piano the whole time. I let people peek, but nobody touched or got too close. Is it really crazy to want to go to church with a newborn? I'm needed there, and there's got to be a first Sunday at church for him so may as well get it over with, right? I did go home and rest for most of the afternoon, except for the apple crisp that I made from scratch. (I need to get used to using sugar again, because my baking has gone downhill a bit from disuse.... it was a tad more tangy than I would have liked....)

Crazy? Stir crazy maybe, because I'm going from a completely full schedule - to sitting on the couch for several hours a day.

Maybe just one more nap?

Wow, as glad as I am that Daniel nurses well, I am one tired mommy!

He tends to feed in clusters, which means a lot of mini-feedings in a 2 hour period where I am pretty much stuck on the couch. Then a 3-4 hour nap, and it starts all over again. Not fun from midnight to 2 am....

And, I apperantly have a foremilk to hindmilk imbalance, as well as a mega-strong letdown. So the kiddo gets things going and then just sits there as it squirts into his mouth all by itself. And he gets a whole lot of foremilk and fills up before he gets to the nice fatty stuff, which makes him very gassy and gives him green slimy diapers. Not what you want to make him all cute and chunky!

So I have to pump before each feeding to ease the letdown and take out some of the thinner foremilk so that he doesn't get full before the good fatty stuff. Glad I have a pump! And glad we have a good lactation consultant available on base, whose number I have taped on my fridge right now! After starting the pumping thing, he's eating much better and the diapers aren't so offensive. But all this work makes me tired! He's so cute that I really don't mind it, and Mark is home to keep an eye on the boys. And he lets me sleep if I need, when I need. What a guy!

And at the lactation consultant's office, we found out that although he had lost weight like normal babies do, he was back up to a whopping 6lbs 10 oz! Just 5 more oz to go before we hit birthweight again, and hopefully that fatty milk is doing it's job. :-)

Best weight loss plan ever!

Apperantly, all I need to do to lose weight is to get pregnant and get diabetes. This morning, I am officially 20 pounds lighter than when I got pregnant! Holy cow! It really doesn't look like I gave birth last week, at all. The tummy is still quite squishy, but on the whole, I'm feeling pretty good now.

I finally broke down and gave him a pacifier last night. He wasn't quite sure what to think, but finally quit gagging on it and went to sleep. Until I laid him down. So he ended up sleeping cuddled up next to me, where he's been every night since he was born. Even in the hospital he wanted to sleep right next to me. Funny kid! I'm not sure I want to use the pacifier a lot, but we'll see. Some kids just want to suck more than others...

But he stayed awake this morning for a good 20 minutes, just looking around, all quiet and cute, before nursing to sleep. And he's actually sleeping in his bassinet right now! That's a first for him. It's been either curled in the boppy pillow, or in my arms for naps so far. So this has been an exciting day. I got to eat breakfast before 10, and even took a shower and shaved my legs - discovering I can bend over again has been wonderful. Rediscovered some cute jeans I forgot I had, and am lamenting my shortage of shirts that fit my slightly bigger baby feeders....

Just keeps getting cuter!

A whole 4 days old today! Can you see the blonde hair just above his ears? He's going to have his daddy's hair for sure.

We're all settling in pretty well. We've found that if he wants to nurse, he pretty much gets what he wants, so I have been scarfing down meals in between sessions. Chicken Alfredo in 90 seconds? Sure! Because that gives me another 60 to use the restroom before he gets too angry. :-) He nurses great, and I really don't mind being a human pacifier, because Mark is fantastic about getting household stuff done while I'm glued to the couch 8 hours a day. That's what it feels like at the moment anyway, and I'm sure as his schedule evens itself out I'll get to stretch my legs a bit more.

The boys think everything he does is funny. His hiccoughs, his cross-eyed look, his gassy smiles all make them laugh. Even William, who was very hesitant about this new kid on the block, is climbing up beside me and asking if the baby wants to eat some popcorn too.

I ventured out to the store today. Crazy me, have a baby on Tuesday and go shopping on Saturday! But Mark isn't on the WIC check, so I have to go. And where my milk machine goes, there the baby must be also. So he and I headed out together to stock the fridge. I had it pretty well filled before, to last us this week, but it needed filled again for next week and the store is closed on Monday so it meant I had to go today. We made it all the way to the frozen veggies before he decided that he had to eat and he meant now. Luckily I am quite adept at nursing and walking and pushing a cart all at the same time, even though it made it interesting trying to put the groceries on the belt at the checkout. Fun stuff! And his hat is somewhere in the frozen foods aisle.... ooops! At least it was a free one from the hospital, not one I actually paid for. :-)

He's here!

Daniel James Willford arrived safe and sound at 6:53pm, Tuesday, October 13th. He weighed a hefty 6lbs 15oz, and is 19 1/2 inches long.

I am typing this one-handed as I am currently a human pacifier. :-) After 2 somewhat restful days in the hospital, we came home this evening. I am so glad to be home! He's a great little nurser, has the cutest high-pitched little cry, and will very definitely be a little tow-head. Iwould take a better picture to post, but he doesn't enjoy being put down... Long fingers, pianist maybe? And long toes. And worth every cookie I've turned down in the last 6 months!

I was able to hold him immediately, they scored him on my tummy. He nursed right away with no problems. It took us a while to realize that he wasn't going to the NICU, and was having no problems breathing. We're so grateful that he's here and that everything went so well this time.

Tomorrow ~

Tomorrow I will wake my boys early. To help them go to bed tomorrow night for the sitters.

Tomorrow I will finish the rest of the laundry so Mark can dress the kids for the week.

Tomorrow I will be getting their bags packed for their sleepovers.

Tomorrow I will enjoy playing with my boys before our family changes.

Tomorrow Mark and I will say goodbye to my sweethearts and I won't see them until maybe Wednesday if he can bring them to see me and baby.

Tomorrow will be the last time I get to do anything without wondering when my new son will want to eat or need held or a clean diaper.

Tomorrow is my last day to enjoy feeling this newest baby moving around inside of me.

Because Tuesday morning at 6am we'll be checking into Labor and Delivery for our induction, we'll welcome our new son, and our lives will change yet again!

Now I feel bad...

William was being silly yesterday and opening his mouth really wide while we were waiting to pick up Nathan. I looked at him, and for some reason, his molars caught my eye. It looked like he'd been eating chocolate or something, but not in the middle of his molar where food normally gets caught. It was in a little hole in the front of his molar, where there is normally not a hole!

What?

Double checked, brushed his teeth, and checked again. Um, the brown stuff didn't go away. So I showed Mark this morning and told him I'd call the dentist next week. He sweetly reminded me that he is capable of taking the children to doctor's appointments, so go ahead and call, see what they have open. Somehow they had an appointment for an hour later, so I took him in.

You know how much fun we had trying to take his picture? Yeah. I literally had to pry his mouth open for the poor dentist. All the guy got was a quick look, couldn't even really scan the other teeth. But it turns out what I suspected. He has a cavitity on both sides of his mouth, the first set of molars. Don't know how he got them, but the dentist said that we were lucky, it looks like I spotted them pretty early because they don't seem to be bothering William yet.

And now we have a referral for a pediactric dentist in Boise who will do a more comprehensive exam and do the fillings. Most likely William will have to be sedated, since I know he will absolutely not cooperate for this one either. He just doesn't like new people and I can't hold his mouth open while they do the fillings..... Poor baby!

I totally feel like a bad mom right now though, because my barely 3-year old has at least 2 cavities! It could be just really soft enamel, Amanda's daughter had several caps and stuff done at 3 1/2 because her enamel was genetically so soft that her teeth were rotting in her mouth. Or it could legitimately be all the junk food Daddy gives him while I'm gone. Who knows?

So we'll try calling on Monday and see if the office is open. If not, then we'll call on Wednesday. Either way, he won't be going in until the next week, because this coming week is going to be CRAZY!

Silly Willy turns 3!

William's birthday was on Sunday. We kept it really low key, since I had just driven 1 1/2 hours back from Mom's house and cooked dinner, and Mark had to drive just over 4 hours to get home that evening. We were all exhausted!


Daddy thought it would be fun to wrap everything. I don't have any wrapping paper other than Christmas stuff, so we used my huge roll of butcher paper, which is harder to rip open. That explains the look on William's face as he tries to open his first present!



He got all excited about this one. It's a Little People farm, with animals and doors that open and stuff. It's pretty much been in the living room since Sunday night, he loves it! Especially since Daddy put batteries in and it makes the noises it is supposed to. Most of the toys he has to play with are his older brothers, this one is just for him!



And with the crazy weekend, we chose to get a tiny bakery cake. All the boys had them this year. Sad thing is that the 1/8 sheet cake only cost $2 less than the 1/4 sheet cake, which is twice the size! Explain that one? He tried a couple times to blow his candles out, but couldn't quite manage it, so Mommy had to help a little. I hadn't gotten around to buying ice cream, so we sort of skipped that. Plus, it was sooooo bedtime, and the cake was more than enough sugar.

I can't believe how big he has gotten! It still feels like not so long ago we were sitting with him in the NICU, so tiny, with his little attitude. He'd reach up and grab the fabric"glasses" protecting his eyes from the bili-lights, and throw them over the side of the incubator. Used to drive the nurses crazy! When he wanted to suck, he'd get so mad that he couldn't keep the pacifier in, so the nurses ended up sticking the end of his nasal aspirator into the Soothie pacifier, and propping it against the side of his bed. First time I walked in and saw that, I cracked up! But he was happy. :-)

When he started walking I think he went straight to running after his brothers. Our long hallways was lots of fun for him, as was the laundry room with it's big bowl of water right next to the kitty food. And baby gate was necessary for quite a while!

Now he's talking all the time, climbs everything, and has no fear. Except of the lawn mower. That thing is evil..... apperantly. He loves hanging out with his brothers, and when I say it's time to go get them from school he runs and finds me shoes and hops back and forth while I put them on, then pulls me out of my chair and out the door. So I can't say anything until it's time to walk out the door, he doesn't want to wait! I can't cuddle him and dress him any more. He'll grab the clothes and insists on doing it himself! Kind of nice, but sad that he's getting so independent.

We can't wait to see what this next year will bring!

Great Appointment!

Today was officially my last OB appointment! It went great. I am still just a 3, which is fine since I hope he stays in there a bit longer. Sugars were good, his fluid levels are fantastic, and the ultrasound estimated his weight to be around 6 1/2 lbs today. If it's not off any, which they can be, he's measuring average. All that hard work with the diabetes has been work it to not have a 9 pound baby! He should be between 7 and 8 pounds by next week. Perfect!

I have been scheduled to be at Labor and Delivery Tuesday morning at 6 am sharp. An hour away in Boise, which means that the boys will all be farmed out the night before for sleepovers. Otherwise we'd be dropping them off sometime between 4:30 and 5 am. Ouch! I don't mind the early time, we'll get the show on the road quicker, and hopefully Mark can be home to get the boys by dinner time and get them all settled into bed. Even though I'd rather not be induced, the baby sitter situation is far easier than "Oh no! We gotta go! Quick, grab the kids and call the sitter!" And hope that everybody I need is home.... and that it's not 3 am.

I just can't believe it's so close. There is still so much to do on my "before baby" list, rooms to clean and stuff to get organized. I know afterwards it will be a long time before I have energy to tackle any of it. But I am battling this awful cough that is making it hard to do anything strenuous. I can talk, but it makes me cough. Whispering makes me cough. Breathing makes me cough. We're praying it goes away a fair amount before next Tuesday. The boys think it's funny that Mommy can't yell right now though!

Feeling better

I still have almost no voice, it kind of comes and goes depending on how much I have to use it. But I do feel lots better today! Still coughing, but my throat doesn't hurt like it did yesterday, thank heavens. And best of all.......... I was able to taste my lunch!

I felt bad going in to my NST this morning sick, but being that I get this same cough thing every fall-ish, and it does the same thing every time, I knew it wasn't anything really serious. Plus, no fever this morning, so I figured I was fine. Baby passed with flying colors again, but I got scolded for not drinking enough, for the ketones I usually have, and for the protien that was new in my sample this morning. Today is officially the longest I have ever been pregnant, since Oren was 38 weeks to the day, and I am now 38 and 1 day today! So I was glad to mark another appointment off my calendar. Each day we go through gives us that much higher a chance to take this baby home with us and not need the NICU. And each test or scan is so reassuring that he's doing well in there.

Tomorrow is another OB checkup, lovely internal exam - I'm so excited..... - and a final ultrasound to check how big he is now. And officially my last appointment, other than Friday's NST, because if he's not here by next Tuesday, we'll be inducing Wednesday morning!

All is quiet....

All sorts of things have been quiet lately! The baby stayed quiet this weekend, allowing Mark to go to the funeral and stay until Sunday evening. He and I both appreciated this, since I know he had been worried about leaving me.

Conference was quiet. Mostly because I drove over to Mom's for the weekend, so Mark wouldn't be so worried and so I could rest. Because I am sick. Oh, joy of joys! Mom was so sweet to let us come and invade their home even though I'm not feeling well, so the boys had plenty to keep them occupied and I could sleep through most of the afternoon sessions without worrying about what they were up to. Janelle, angel that she is, even changed William's diaper so I wouldn't have to! Of course, I couldn't really smell that he was stinky at all.....

And today has been the most quiet. I've nearly completely lost my voice right now. I whisper when I have to and getting any sort of sound out requires a yelling-at-the-top-of-my-lungs effort, which makes me cough and my throat hurt. So Mommy hasn't said much today at all. Mark has had to intercept calls so I don't have to talk, and hopefully nobody calls me this evening while he's at work! He's also let me take a couple naps this morning, since I was up tossing and turning and coughing all night. I sure love him, especially when I'm sick, he takes such good care of me!

This evening should be fairly quiet as well. I've rescheduled piano lessons, since I can't talk, and have a fever that I don't want to pass on to Amanda's kids. The boys will likely end up watching far too much tv, mostly William's new movies from his birthday which we celebrated yesterday. Who knows what dinner will be..... we may dig into our freezer meals early, or just have leftovers from last night.

Tomorrow Oren begins a higher dose of his medicine. We've held off for quite a while, since his meds can decrease his appetite, slow his growth height-wise, and make it difficult for him to go to sleep at night. But he needed the extra control at school, his dose wasn't effective anymore. My 7-year old weighs all of 42 pounds with jeans on, and now stands at 48 1/2 inches. My baby is over 4 feet tall now! Just over 1 more foot, and he'll be as tall as me!

I'll post pictures and whatnot about William's birthday later, when I'm feeling a little more up to editing them. My living room is a disaster area thanks to being sick, so I will probably have to clean them up a bit. But he's 3 now! Such a big boy!

Sweet lunch date

Amazing Amanda offered to watch the boys today while I did my NST in Boise.... because all the kids were out of school. That way Mark could go with me if he wanted and see what they're like, maybe do lunch. I asked him if he wanted to go and he suprisingly said yes! So off we went to Boise for the morning, our last date before baby gets here.

We had a stubborn son this morning who didn't want to show up any good patches of fluid for about 15 minutes! Then he fell asleep and would only move if I poked him during his test.... little stinker. They got all excited when I had a pretty decent contraction in the middle of it and his heartrate did great, just tells us how well he's still doing in there. Mark enjoyed the quick ultrasound, and thought his son was funny not wanting to move. This was the first NST he's been to with me, including all of William's.

Then we ran over to the music store to see if they had any Christmas music. We're starting when I come back to teaching in November, and I don't know how many times I'll be getting to Boise before then. They didn't have much selection yet, but I think I have the levels I still need.

Baja Fresh for lunch! We like them, they are fast food but it's all made fresh when you order. No freezers or anything, and I have a suspicion they may make their tortillas, because they tasted amazing. I had the best fajitas, and even treated myself to normal-carb tortillas for once, a date-day treat. I usually can't because they make my sugars too high afterwards, but they were so worth it. (And my sugars were fine this time. Yay!) It was nice to get to stand in line and hold hands, not trying to corral boys running 3 different directions or figuring out what everyone wants.

I thought it was so sweet of him to want to come down with me. And we found I get just as tired going to Boise, no matter who drives. So I had to take a nap before piano lessons this afternoon. 2 more NST's and 1 more doctor appointment, until the 13th and we get this little guy here! If I make it that long...

I think it was reassuring to Mark to see him doing well in there, because he'll be going to his parent's this weekend. His grandmother passed away Wednesday and the funeral is tomorrow. I can't go, so I'll be here with the boys while he drives the 4 hours there in the morning. He'll stay the night unless I need him to come back, and then he'll drive back Sunday afternoon to make it home for William's cake and presents. Luckily it's only 4 hours, 5 to Boise and the hospital. So if it came down to it, I'd call him to come home, the doula to come to base and pick me up, and the sitters to come get kids. He wasn't there for Oren, so it's not like I haven't done it without him, and I wouldn't be alone at all. I think baby is going to sit tight for now though, I've probably been a 3 for a while, who knows. He was supposed to work this weekend, but they are being super nice and letting him go being as it's only a few hours away. So I'm glad we got time alone today, it's the last chance we'll have for quite a while!