Thanks Mana and Pada!

Mana and Pada left this morning and Alex ended up in a sad and weird state after their departure. Usually his adjustments go well after family leaves but this time has already been a bit different. He's been more ornery and less willing to listen and apologize (e.g. taking a nursing pillow off of the bed and not putting back or apologizing after.) Though he was quite cute immediately after they left and snuggled up with me. We talked about how he felt sad and there was some sniffling but no tears.

So let's recap the visit.

Pada built (with some assistance from yours truly) a roof on Alex's playset in the back yard. It is awesome!



Pada also cut Alex's hair. Alex was extremely excited for his buzz cut!





Mana was awesome at making sure the rest of the house was functioning during these last two weeks. I don't know what we'd have done without her. Alex was a big fan of getting all the time in the world with Mana in the mornings. She took care of Kaitlyn when we needed a break. Thanks Mana!



Pada also built some great shelves for our garage! I don't have a pic of them yet but tune in next time for the horizontal glory!

heart melted

I love my Alex.
Tonight Jon and I walked in the door after a trip to the aftre hours clinic (I thought I had the flu, but it's mastisis which gives you flu like symptoms)and were greeted with a cheerful "hi mama! Hi daddy!"
This happens anytime I come home from somewhere and I absolutely love it. No wonder Jon likes coming home every day.

Kaitlyn's Cry

Our dear little Kaitlyn has got a set of lungs. Don't believe me? Watch:

Alex's thoughts on Kaitlyn

When Kaitlyn was crying we asked Alex what we could do to help her stop crying and Alex said to give her milk from mama's breasts. We don't tip-toe around the "taboo" words here. :)

He was talking on the phone to Great Grandpa M. who was asking about Kaitlyn. Alex told him that she cries a lot and she poops a lot.

He likes that Kaitlyn has a binky and is always eager to give it to her, though she doesn't like it much.

When Kaitlyn cries, he says that it makes him feel a little scared.

Overall he likes being a big brother and doesn't mind that I spend a lot of time holding Kaitlyn so far. We'll see if that changes once Grandma and Grandpa are gone.

The story of Kaitlyn Mikelle

Apparently I have an anxious audience. :)

And since I'm awake and the baby is sleeping, what better time than to blog? Except maybe I should be sleeping too... Good thing I have to eat, otherwise who KNOWS how much longer you'd have to wait.

I started trying to get Kaitlyn to come out last Monday. I walked, spent a lot of time on my birth ball and hands and knees and other various things. By Thursday she still hadn't arrived. And to make me feel really good about all that I had been doing, I was still dilated to a 3... no change from the previous week.
I really wouldn't have cared if she came early or not, I was just trying to be a nice wife and have a baby so that Jon could go up to Dallas to go to the Utah/TCU game. Because if I had not had her, there was no way I was going to let him be 3 hrs. away.

He tried to reason with me and tell me that the risk wasn't that great and that I could call him and all would be fine. He rationalized that since my labor with Alex was induced (water broken artificially and he was born 5 hrs. later {but ready to push 4 hrs. later... they made me rest out of concern for his heartrate}), we didn't really know how my body would labor on it's own and he should be able to get home in time to help me through labor.
My concern was that I wouldn't know I was in labor until I was in hard labor and the baby would be ready to be born within 2 hours.

No baby by Saturday, but I was definitely having more contractions and he didn't get to go to the game (good thing he didn't miss out on much of a game).

On Sunday, we decided to go on a little walk out by the lake. We started walking and then decided to walk the whole way around... Jon said it was like, 1.75 miles. Umm... nope. Try three miles.
So by the time we walked there and back and around the whole lake, we had walked 3.5 miles.

3.5 miles is probably a pretty good guarantee to put someone into labor.
I definitely started having more contractions that were a little more intense, but still really manageable. They were about 5 minutes apart and 30-45 seconds long for most of the evening. I was thinking that maybe they would lead to having a baby at some point, but there was no indication of them picking up in intensity, so they could have just as easily stopped.

We went to bed around 11 and I remember thinking, "okay... do I really want to go to sleep and risk my contractions stopping and not having a baby, or do I want to work with them and get them to pick up?"
I decided on sleeping.

Around 2:30 I noticed a more intense contraction. I watched to see when the next one would come, figuring that this was probably labor, but I may still have a while if my contractions were far apart. They were about 5-10 minutes apart, but were lasting a minute to a minute and a half and they hurt.
So at 3:30 I woke up Jon and we timed a few more contractions... they suddenly picked up to apart now. So we called the birthing center and luckily Joan was already there with a mom who was ready to push, so I didn't feel too bad that we needed to come right away. We told her we would be there in about 25 minutes.

We gathered our stuff together (which was really fun having to pause every 3 minutes for a hard contraction) and left the house at about 4:30.

The good thing about having a baby at night/early in the morning is that there isn't a whole lot of traffic to worry about.
The lights were kind to us and the toll road was such a blessing! Jon was flying down the freeway at least 80 miles an hour.

We got to the birthing center and in our prepped room at about 4:45. They immediately checked baby's heartrate and then my heartrate while I had two contractions almost on top of each other and they were going to check my cervix after the next contraction. The midwife asked if I wanted to get in the tub or shower and I said, "shower... no tub... "

But then the next contraction hit and I was saying that I was ready to push. There was a mad rush in getting my pants off and having me lay on my side (to help prevent tearing) and the midwife looked and said I was definitely ready to push and we all laughed when she said, "I guess we won't be doing the tub".

So it was all just a LITTLE bit crazy. :)

Five minutes after we got there I was pushing and Kaitlyn was born 15 minutes later at 5:05 am.
I think I proved my point to Jon that I would be having a fast labor. :)

She and I cuddled up and she nursed while I was stitched up. I ended up with a 2nd degree tear... (the midwife said that I have a short perineum which is why it was that degree).
Kaitlyn was weighed about an hour after birth and came in at 8 pounds even.

We did her bath at about 3 hours after birth and she enjoyed it until she had to come out of the water. We had a couple more hours of vitals and cuddling and Alex and my parents came to get us at 10:50.

Alex was happy to see me and was I think a little perplexed that I had a baby in my arms. It's one thing to talk about baby Kaitlyn coming out of mama and coming to our house and another to have it actually happen.
He was really excited about the present baby Kaitlyn brought him though! That was probably the highlight for him.
Okay, it WAS the highlight.

Here's the video of Alex meeting his new baby sister:

So at 11 am we packed up and brought our new baby home.
We climbed into bed and have been trying to catch up on sleep ever since. Sad to say, I think it may be awhile before we really feel fully rested again. :)


Jon's nerdiness has been coming out and he's getting an ftp site set up where we can send people a link to to see pictures, so that will be coming soon.


Here are some pictorial highlights!

Snitching

Yesterday Alex and I were making pancakes. They were wheat pancakes, so I was measuring some honey to put in them.
Alex stuck his finger in the stream of honey and when I said hey, he looked at me and said with a little giggle and sneaky smile, "I snitched the honey."

In other news, my parents arrived on Friday.
The baby did not.
She's still taking her sweet time. Yay.

Good day at Goodwill

Actually, Salvation Army, but I liked the title better with Goodwill. :)

I hit up half off Wednesday and it was good to me. I got a ton of clothes - most .50c for the babe and what I was really excited about was this (minus the people... I didn't take a picture of the one I actually bought):

Why was this so exciting? Well first, it was $1.50. Second, I used to have one like this when I was little:

I would have LOVED to have found one like the one I used to have, but better to have one than none! Now to find some fisher price little people and furniture to go in it that aren't insanely expensive.


The other fun thing was that I found a red newborn sized onsie, which had a train image stitched on it, that I modified so that baby Kaitlyn could have some spirit for the big game. I'm hoping she'll get to use it for the Utah/TCU game on Saturday, but who knows if that will happen.

It couldn't have turned out cuter! Yay for having a tiny baby in ute gear! AND it only took me a couple of hours.


Pregnancy wise, I'm still dilated to a 3. I had contractions going on yesterday pretty regularly, but none of them were really bad and they didn't increase in intensity. So no baby yet. We all went on a walk tonight and I may try some other things - just not castor oil! I am so not that desperate.
And really, the only reason I'm trying to get this baby here is so that Jon can go to the U game up in Dallas on Saturday. If I haven't had her, there really isn't any way I'm letting him be 3 hr.s away when who knows how fast my labor will be (especially since it was only 5 hrs. after they broke my water with alex and I wasn't feeling anything before that).
Oh the other good news is that the midwife said that the baby is not full on face forward... more with the legs off to the right and the back on the left. I get to keep doing the hands and knees routine.

Fall Ribbon Wreath

I whipped this up last night in a couple of hours.
I love how it turned out!
It's big and full and fluffy and fallish. The ribbons are slightly frayed on the ends because I didn't feel like sealing them. I love that they are frayed. It makes it looks like feathers or something. I wish I wouldn't have sealed the ones of my Halloween ribbon wreath.

I know that one day I'll still be pulling this thing out and my teenagers will go, "gosh mom, that thing is so ugly! Why are you still hanging it up after 15 years?!"
And I'll tell them about how I made that days/weeks before Kaitlyn was born, hoping that she would come soon. Precious.

Anyway here it is!
And if you want to make one, I still have TONS of ribbon!

39 weeks

With Alex at this point in the game, I was taking the final belly picture before we went to the hospital the next morning (to be induced).
So I had to take one tonight.
Here's the comparison:

Kaitlyn

Alex

It would be lovely to be a week early again, but I'm not counting on it.
I am having some good contractions and things are favorable to start at any time. It's just a matter of when.

I had an appointment with the midwife on Thursday and she said I was 70% effaced and 3.5 cm dilated. Knowing that can be variable, I say 3 cm.

The baby is at a 0 station which means she's low and descended into the pelvis. Oh- here's a picture:

My midwife also said that the baby is face up (posterior), so to try to get her to turn I've been spending a lot of time on my hands and knees. The exercise ball I got a few weeks ago has been quite helpful with that! I have to do hands and knees for 30 minutes 2 times a day. I'd really like to not have a lot of back labor, but I'm thankful there are nice showers and big tubs at the birthing center to help out with that!

And I'm still definitely nesting. I made my fall ribbon wreath tonight (pictures to come later). Luckily it was a fast project. I'm thinking I'm going to put together the mobile after the boy goes to bed and maybe start on getting the sheets cut out so they just have to be sewn tomorrow.

As far as Alex's anticipation, it's all about Grandpa and Grandma coming for him. He keeps asking when they will be here today and we keep having to tell him that they won't be here until baby Kaitlyn comes to our house. I think we'll probably continue hearing this every day.

We can't wait to get our new baby here!

church funnies

today in church Alex was looking around and saw a nearly bald baby girl with one of those little stick on bows on her head.
He got really excited and said, "That baby has an X on he head!" (he still hasn't really gotten the he's and she's and his and her's down yet).

We were also pointing out some of his friends that we could see and I told him to look behind us because his old nursery leader was sitting behind us.
He looked behind us and quickly turned back around with a big grin on his face and said in a silly/embarassed type voice, "it's sister escobar" and was all giggly. It was cute... especially when you hear him say Escobar... seriously one of my favorite things to hear him say.

I also got a good laugh over him calling various women/girls "guy", as in "what's that guy doing?". I told you, we're still working on those tricky gender specific names. :)

I'm going to have Jon take a belly picture here in a bit so I can do a whole pregnancy post. Exciting stuff.

More stuff for the baby's room

Once upon a time, we had a baby boy.

Being the ambitious person I am, we painted stripes in his room.

It took a LONG time.

The plan all along was that we'd do soft blue and green with brown and if we had a girl next, we could throw in a lot of pink accents.

Well then the blue and green paint colors were put on the wall and I realized that they were a tad brighter than I had wanted. Oops.

But they still worked for the baby boy's room and after awhile, they really weren't that bright.

The baby boy grew and grew until he moved into a new big boy bed.

Which already had bedding purchased for it.

Which was blue and red and cream and clearly would NOT work with the blue and green and brown. It didn't matter because the plan had always been to move him into the other room.

And then the joyous day arrived when we (finally) found out we were having a girl.

And the room planning was underway.

There were many concerns over how boy feeling the room was.

And then I started working my magic.

Step 1 was the crib bumper. Good thing I remembered the gorgeous fabric I bought over a year ago!

and then I found the perfect fabric for the sheets

Then when I was on one of my many trips to JoAnn's, I actually found girly fabric with the blue, green, and some pink in it! It's a nearly perfect match! The fabric is still on the crafty list, slated to become a valance and changing pad cover.

The valance will be paired with these flowy, sheer, dotted curtains. I still need to put them up and then you'll be able to see them a lot better.

We still need to hang the 3 Ikea flowers on the wall.

Yesterday and today, I've been working on a mobile (i'm not a mobile person, but this was an easy and cheap way to throw more pink in. It's really more decorative than anything and may not even go over the crib) and the letters to go on the BIG main wall.
The big main wall is the area that needs a LOT of pink and white to really make an impact on making the room feel girly. Good thing Kaitlyn has 7 letters in it. :)

So here are Alex and I working on painting. He insisted on painting with the paints I was using. I'm a nice mama and let him. And when he wanted to paint a letter, I let him paint pink on a letter from his name that I have yet to do anything with (yes... the baby's room is taking precedence).

Here are the letters all laid out on the adorable paper I found at Michael's (yay!) before they were painted.

This is the molding I'll be using to make frames around each one (to be painted white)

And here are the painted letters and circles for the mobile all mod-podged and laying out to dry overnight.

I can't tell you how excited I am to get these 2 things up and see what effect it has on the room. The sheets and the window I'm sure will have a major effect as well.

Once those things are done I can evaluate whether it will be necessary to add some pink ribbon to the border and if I need to do something as drastic as crown molding.

I'll keep you updated as more projects for are finished and put in the room!

Yay! A girly blanket!

One of the items on the list to take to the birthing center is 6 receiving blankets.
I don't really believe in buying those little flannel receiving blankets that you use for a couple of weeks when they are really small. I got some for Alex and rarely used them, so I refused to buy more just to have some girly ones.

I did happen to buy some adorable flannel online a few months ago that I had forgotten about until I saw it sitting on the shelf in my craft room when I was bored and deciding what baby project I wanted to work on (I have a lot!).

My awesome mom found me a sweet tutorial for making a self binding receiving blanket. It was a little confusing to figure out. Once I did it though, the technique isn't really that hard and I'm sure I could make another one MUCH faster.

Here is my end result:

I am in LOVE with it!
And I'm really happy that we'll have a girly blanket for her!

Oh and when I had it laid out to take pictures of it, Alex said, "I want he (he doesn't really get the he/she thing yet) to come out your belly and snuggle with that blankie."
It was very cute.

Nesting

shh... I haven't added pictures to my log of posts yet. I'm procrastinating.

I'm kicking into nesting gear. I have all of these nagging little thoughts of what needs to get done or get cleaned. Tonight I was sitting in the bathroom and took the time to wipe down the door frame while I was there because I was horrified by how dirty it was.
Last week I cleaned the bathrooms... including the molding and back behind the toilets. I can't remember the last time I had done either of those things in the bathroom.

I am currently getting some fabric washed to make some flannel blankets and put some sheets in the baby's crib. Not that she's going to be in the crib for quite some time or really even care what her sheets look like... it's way more for me than for her. :)


Alex seems to be in a bit of a nesting mode as well. A lot of his play involves talks of mamas and babies. Occasionally he'll throw a daddy in there.
The other day it was his ducks in the bathroom. He took 2 out and said they were the babies and they needed their mama to take care of them. He then had them go to their mama... the big duck rug in the bathroom. Since we were on our way to take a nap, we decided the ducks needed to take a nap with their mama too.

Today he insisted on bringing one of the ducks down to find the daddy duck.

Yesterday he was drawing... something about conductors (I think he got that from Dinosaur Train on PBS) and he was saying that there were mama ones and baby ones.

He also found a little squeaky frog and a larger stuffed frog recently and has been having a lot of fun with those being the mama and the baby.
Tonight he said, "an dis is da baby froggy an dis is da mama froggy and dis baby froggy needs to go in da mama froggy's belly. Put da baby froggy in dare peeeezz!"

lots of blogging soon to come!

I just spent a bunch of time getting pictures uploaded and have my posts all written. I will be adding pictures to them and posting them soon! Just be prepared for about 4 new posts in a day with a whole LOT of pictures! October has been a fun month for us!

Happy Halloween!

Here's Alex in his frog costume and me in my witch costume!

I just have to say, that Alex's costume took me maybe 2 hours to make and it turned out really cute! It was just a matter of finding a green hooded something. Yay to Kid to Kid for having exactly what I needed in exactly the right size!
Alex LOVED being a frog and was so excited about his costume. I'm glad that I took the effort to give him the costume he wanted.

He loved ribbiting and hopping around like a frog. Granted, his frog hops were more like Spiderman moves and left people a little confused as to what he was doing, but that's okay! Maybe we should have given him better hopping lessons. If only Grandpa C. were here...

I'm pretty fond of my costume as well. I remember well the years I was a witch when I was little... lol... which was pretty much every year. :)
I think mostly I just really liked my orange and black striped tights. And that I got to make use of the green eye shadow I have.
And the maternity dress I got from Tawna was perfect!
Alex loves my witch hat and tells me to fix it when it's bent over. His new favorite game is to have me sit on the stairs and he sits a couple stairs above me and throws a nerf ball at my hat. He thinks it's hilarious.

Funny facts about my costume... the tights are a child's large size. I can't say that they fit well, but they do mostly fit... just a tiny bit awkwardly.
The witches hat is also a child's size hat. They wanted $12 for an adult hat and $2 for the kids one. I have a really small head (I can wear a size 5T hat that I got for Alex), so the kids one worked out great.


Our ward also had a chili cook off and trunk or treat at the church earlier in the evening. I made some chocolate chipotle chili which was yummy. I still had some left over, which went in the freezer to eat after Kaitlyn arrives. It worked out perfectly! I ate way too much chili and took a lot of heartburn stuff afterward. :)
Alex thought the trunk or treat was awesome of course!

Trick or Treating wise, Jon went with Alex and they didn't make it to a ton of houses before Alex told Jon that he was really tired. Things would have been different if he had actually taken a nap.
The good thing was that he didn't get a ton of candy.
The bad thing was that he didn't get a ton of candy. (His mama is a bit of a candy addict :) )

Now that Halloween is over, the countdown to Kaitlyn begins! I just realized that Alex's birthday is 12 days before Halloween and we could very well have a birthday 12 days after Halloween too.