Anticipating Baby
Hi, Baby McDonald #3. This is your story.
I found out I was pregnant with you in a WalMart bathroom in San Antonio, TX, at the end of our coast trip with your daddy’s family. I was shocked, to say the least. I was finally able to tell your father about 45 minutes later. I held up the test and asked him if he thought that looked like a plus sign. He was shocked, too.
It’s not that we didn’t want you, and aren’t ecstatic to have you. But, you see, your sister Camilla had just turned 7 months old. I wasn’t expecting you, but am beyond thrilled to have you in our lives. Clearly you were destined for our family.
You gave me a scare at 13 weeks (just like your brother and sister did). Whereas I had a subchorionic hemorrhage with them, I actually had a tiny amniotic fluid leak with you. That scared the crap out of me. I was on edge for weeks, terrified of losing you. I actually spent a great deal of the pregnancy worried that you were going to come early. There’s no danger of that, as I started writing this the day I hit 41 weeks. Clearly you are stubborn.
The pregnancy itself was pretty uneventful, for which I am grateful. I’ve been in great health, and you have too. JR is amazing, and you’re going to love having him as a big brother. He’s so kind and sweet, smart and funny, and a million other fantastic things. Camilla is pretty awesome too. She’s a feisty, bright, willful, adventurous little girl who brings us all a smile.
I don’t know where to start to tell you how lucky you are to have the father that you do. Maybe that will be a different story altogether. I’ll leave it at this for now: I’m lucky to have married my best friend and bore his children. Really lucky. Wait. Not lucky — blessed.
Your due date was approaching, and I was starting to fret about my limited mobility. We had just bought our first house, and your daddy had to pack the old house and move all by himself. Then there was a fire on the road to the mine, and he had to take a week off which turned out to be okay because he was able to finish moving and cleaning. We thought for sure that you’d make an entrance right after that, but no. I’d had some Braxton Hicks contractions, but no signs of labor. On your due date, June 25th, I had my OB’s nurse do a (very quick) membrane sweep. I was barely 1.5 cm at that point. With some help, I lost my mucus plug the next day, and started having bloody show the day after.
Then things stalled.
There was a lot of walking involved. We all saw Toy Story 3 at some point. There was a day we all walked up to Denny’s (with daddy pulling JR & Camilla in the wagon) for breakfast and back to the house. There have been about a million trips to WalMart to walk around, probably resulting in the purchase of more crap than we ever thought we needed. I figured out you were facing the wrong way — you were sunny-side-up, occiput posterior — and knew that you were going to have to turn around if I had a hope of ever getting you out.
I started doing all the things from Spinning Babies. I have spent most of the last week on all fours, tushy up in the air, trying to encourage you to turn. I felt drained, like I would be pregnant forever. I was also starting to be in immense pain, so I scheduled a chiropractic appointment with Dr. Bill McAfee. On July 1 (at 40w6d), he gave me an amazing sacral adjustment and did the Webster technique. I had a contraction immediately upon standing up. I felt you wiggling. I had contractions all day and night, feeling you wiggle with them all. The adjustment/technique opened up my pelvis and loosened up my uterine ligaments. I felt fabulous and re-energized, and even got a good night’s sleep.
Today is July 2nd. Today I am 41 weeks. Today you turned around. Today is also your (middle) namesake’s birthday. Happy birthday, Uncle Darrell! 45 years ago, my mother gave birth to him. Today I hope to give birth to you. We’re all eager to meet you!
Awesome.
I can post from my new Android HTC Hero. John got it for me for Mother’s Day. I had a fantastic one, by the way. Hope you did too.
Spiced Pumpkin Pancakes
I am certain that this will be an autumn staple in our home! Make a double batch, and come up with great snack ideas for the rest!
2 cups all-purpose flour
2-1/2 teaspoons pumpkin spice mix
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons brown sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups milk
1 cup pumpkin puree
1 egg
2 tablespoons melted butter or vegetable oilPreheat a griddle to medium/medium-high heat (approximately 350*). Mix all dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside. In a larger bowl, combine milk, pumpkin, egg, and butter/oil until smooth. Add dry ingredients until just blended in. Drop by 1/4-cup onto lightly greased preheated griddle and cook on both sides until golden brown. Serve hot with maple syrup and a dollop of whipped cream.
JR had me add a handful of fresh raspberries to the top of his pancakes – super yum!
Ouch, Again
So at 2:45 am two Mondays ago, I came down with a sudden high fever and extreme abdominal pain. At 6 am, my husband said I needed to be seen. I called my local physician, told him my symptoms, and he said I’d be best off by going in to Fairbanks to the emergency room. He said that chances were that I had acute appendicitis. Fun times.
I was nearly doubled over in pain all the way there. Once in town, JR went to M’s place. I had to drink about a gallon of blue crap and then got a CT scan. By late afternoon it had been confirmed that I had appendicitis, and the doctor told me I was going to have it removed. More fun.
Surgery was uneventful, though it seemed there were a million more people in the operating room than I thought necessary. I thought I’d be able to go home the next day, but instead spent the next day feverish, somewhat delirious, sleeping, and vomiting. Wednesday I was well enough to be discharged, and it was so nice to be recovering in the comfort of my own home. John took excellent care of me, the kids, and the house all week. I spent Thursday and Friday barely upright, and hardly held anything down. John went back to work on Monday, and I was mostly better by Wednesday. By this past weekend, I was my old self again, with just occasional abdominal pain.
I have a nifty new scar forming, and am wonderfully minus one useless, troublesome organ. Stupid evolutionary blip.
Summer Pictures
He loves his dump trucks and rocks
Exploring the backyard with Buffle
Tires are fun
On the walkway built by Uncle Darrell
Exersaucer entertainment... love that smile.
Time zips by
and my daughter is already over 3 weeks old. She is beautiful and sweet and cuddly. She eats voraciously, stretches like her father, and is like my miniature mirror image. It’s pretty amazing to look at her and see so much of myself. She has my head, my eyes, my eyebrows, my nose, my lips… so many of my facial expressions appear on her tiny little face. She is so little, so fragile, so trusting, and perfect. And she is growing oh-so fast! We’ve had to adjust the straps on her carseat already, and I can tell that she’s filling out her onesies even more. It’s just going by so quickly, I want to take a moment and just freeze it forever, but our children will never be as little as they are today — something both to remember and to cherish.
A few faves
Filed under: beauty, crafting, entertainment, heart, home, products, random
Burt’s Bees Milk & Honey lotion
Super creamy, with no offensive ingredients, leaves my skin feeling super silky soft and hydrated, with a wonderful but not too heavy scent.
Denali Dreams handmade soap in Kodiak Brown (patchouli blend)
This soap is just luscious. I first found this at Denali National Park last July when my sister-in-law and her family came up for a visit. I love this stuff!
Silverhook dark roast
Roasted in Anchorage, Alaska, this is an organic coffee that I just adore. We brew it rich and strong and it kickstarts our days.
My modest collection started when my mother-in-law gave me a small pendant a couple years ago. I’ve enjoyed adding special pieces to it since then. We added two more prominent pieces on our last trip to Texas — our wedding bands.
Yep, I’m kickin’ it old style. I love my Docs. I want a pair of Doc Marten Mary Janes, as well as a pair of 20-eyelet boots.
This stuff is soft, squishy, and a pleasure to knit with. I’ve made a pair of socks for John that came out comfortably warm and even stood up to an accidental wash and dry cycle. There are other, truly decadent sock yarns that I love to use, but for a workhorse sock for John, I think this is the winner (for now).
Lip balms
I have no less than a dozen lip balms at any given time, and am compelled to always have one on me. It’s either in my jeans pocket or in my purse, but I have to have at least one. I go get another if I don’t have one. I hate having dry, chapped lips. I’ve made my own lip balm too, though I gave most of it away for Christmas. It was good stuff; I’ll have to make more.
Water bottles
I always have to have one of these with me too. I drink anywhere from half a gallon to a gallon of water a day, and my water bottles have become like grown-up lovies for me. If I don’t have one, I feel like I’m missing an appendage. My favorite one at the moment is my purple one from Ozark Trail. I had wanted to buy a Sigg the last trip to Texas, but forgot.
Sunflowers
Bright and beautiful, these flowers light up my world. Mama knew this, and would often get me sunflower-adorned things.
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
Sarcastic, witty, satirical, irreverant, and absolutely hilarious. This has to be my favorite book ever. I lost my copy, so I’ll have to get another one just so I can re-read it again soon. If you know me, and appreciate my sense of humor, then I am sure you’ll love this book too.
Baby Update, crafts, JR, and such.
Filed under: JR, crafting, entertainment, home, parenting, products, writing
I am 16 days away from my due date. I am as big as a house, and uncomfortable all the time. I am ready to get this child out of me. She is not yet ready to come out though. So be it. She knows when she’s supposed to be here. I do not. I will wait.
JR knows that something is changing with me. He constantly wants to be climbing on me, and I just can’t deal with it. I just want personal space. Poor little guy is in for a major shock when he suddenly finds himself sharing mommy and daddy. I hope he handles it well. I think he’s going through another growth spurt; he’s eating constantly. He’ll get to play with another little boy this Friday when we go to town; we’re going to have M watch him for a little while so that JR can get used to her and her son L. Hopefully he’ll have a good time and get comfortable with them.
We have almost everything we need for Milla’s arrival, except that I still need to sew together the ring sling and prep all of her diapers. My BFF Melanie is set to come up the last week of the month (also when John is having his sinus surgery). It’ll be great not only to hang out with her, but to have her help with the kids while John is out of commission. Besides, I don’t think I could handle having anyone else around the first month or two that Milla is here. If it were anyone else, I would feel like I would have to play hostess, whether that’s the case or not. I’m just not going to do that, so I’m glad that it’s just Melanie and John who’ll be around after baby comes.
As for my crafting, I’ve got socks for John on the needles using my pattern. I’m using this beautiful ShiBui Knits Sock yarn that I picked up last weekend at INUA Wool Shoppe. Isn’t that the cushiest looking yarn? I know I’ll be getting more.
I’ve decided that I want to make myself a snazzy, stripey sweater with my 1200+ yards of Patons that are back in my stash using this pattern. It’s not exactly what I want, so I will probably heavily modify it as I go. I have several other socks planned too, so you should just keep an eye out for me on Ravelry to see what I’m up to.
Let’s see… what else. Oh, I’m going to go insane if I have to watch The Wizard of Oz one more time this week. It’s JR’s new favorite movie. It was cute, the first dozen times. Now I want to rip all the stuffing out of the Scarecrow, then pull the Lion’s tail. We’ll see who has a heart now, Tin Man.
Catching up
Filed under: JR, crafting, entertainment, food, health, home, products, random, travel
because I haven’t written in a bit.
The day we were flying back from Texas, I went into false labor. We had just gotten to my sister-in-law’s house, and I realized that my “stomach ache” was turning into something quite different. I had a gut-wrenching, can’t-stand-still-can’t-move-well-can’t-breathe-well contraction. Out of nowhere. Then, like 3 minutes later, I had another one. And then another one. We decided to bag it and go to the hospital seeing as how I was just 32 weeks along and could barely breathe through them. We left a confused JR with my in-laws, and drove off into the unknown parts of Ft. Worth to find a hospital. After getting sort of lost downtown, and me having 9 or 10 super strong contractions in an hour’s time, we got to the hospital’s ER entrance. Everything stopped. Not another contraction.
I talked to the on-call OB who stands in for my OB when he’s out of town, explaining that we had a plane to catch and that it’d been over half an hour without any activity. I signed a form to get out of being seen at the hospital, and we headed back to my in-laws’ house. We loaded everything up, said our goodbyes, got to the airport, dropped off the rental, then were given the runaround by TSA agents who were clueless about where the Alaska Airlines ticket counter was located. After walking like 1/2 a mile through and around the airport just to be sent back, it turned out to be right next to where the damn agents were standing when we asked. We checked in, checked our bags, got some Taco Hell, and made it to the gate just in time to board the plane. Whew!
The flight was fairly uneventful, and we switched planes without a hitch in Seattle. It seemed like it took forever to get to Fairbanks, and we were so ready to be off the plane when we finally landed. Holy crap was it cold though! It was -43*F when we landed. That was heartbreaking, given that it was 88*F when we left Texas. My nose started bleeding as soon as we hit the baggage claim area, it was so dry.
John left to get the truck from the parking garage downtown, we stopped at Safeway for groceries, then drove 100 miles to get home. Oh, the relief to finally be home!
John had to leave insanely early the next morning for work. JR and I were still sick (and still are) so we took it easy the first day. I had (and still have) so much cleaning to do though as we trashed the house in our extreme hurry to get ready to leave in the first place.
Thursday I woke up super early and went on a mini-cleaning spree. I scrubbed the downstairs bathroom, cleaned the living room, did the dishes, the laundry, the diapers, swept and mopped the kitchen, and decluttered the countertops, all before noon. I managed to get dinner in the crockpot (which was super yummy: beef short ribs, slow cooked in barbecue sauce) and had it ready to be served when John walked in the door that night. So tender it was falling off the fork!
Friday I was up early again (gotta love pregnancy insomnia), and had showered, eaten, made and drank coffee, checked all my usual websites, and straightened up the kitchen before anyone else even woke up. We went to town that day for our usual shopping trip. I went to Joann’s and got some cool new knitting supplies (thank you Bec) as well as a baby elephant and hippo for JR that he adores (they’re Schleich, and I love them). We ate at Chili’s because I was craving buffalo wings like nobody’s business, which was so not worth the final ticket price we paid for dinner. Doubt we’ll go back (John had a ribeye, I had shrimp & chicken). I discovered later that night taht I must be allergic to shrimp. Nice.
Then we picked up a doggie coat & booties for our wussy indoor dog — and before you make any snide comments, those things are totally necessary for creatures in -40* and colder weather. We went in search of a new winter coat for JR too, though kept coming up short. FYI, Big Ray’s had a sign saying they were open until 8 (it was 7:15) and they turned us away. Frontier Outfitters is entirely too floofy, too. Sears was dead, and we speculate that they’ll be going under soon. Then it was off to WalMart for some random crap, then Freddie’s for groceries, then finally back home.
Saturday I was going to try to get together with M (who is this sweet woman that we’re trying to get to watch JR when I go into labor), but I started feeling even sicker and decided to nap with JR. John went back into town to pick up my meds and a handful of other things we’d forgotten (as he’s working this coming weekend and so won’t be home until next Thursday night).
Yesterday was a mellow day, thankfully. John cleaned up our files downstairs, JR played, and I worked on a fun new knitting project (the Noro Striped Scarf).
Today, John headed back to work. JR and I have just been hanging out for the most part. I’ve scheduled John’s sinus surgery/pre-op/cat-scan, and also renewed my belief that Chief Andrew Isaac Health Center majorly sucks. We got our home heating fuel delivery, and we’re now settled in with some simple snacks to watch the Fiesta Bowl (Hook ‘Em Horns!).
Up and up!
And then we go up!
We leave Thursday night. Someone want to come pack for me??? Or clean my house so it’s nice and spotless when we come home at the end of the month?
JR is feeling better. Of course, now that I’ve declared that he’s going to have stuff coming out of every orifice and will spew green stuff like Reagan on The Exorcist. Leave it to me to tempt fate like that.
I rearranged the living room & bedroom yesterday. It was simple (and I didn’t overdo it, so calm down) but made a huge impact on the feel of the rooms. The tv doesn’t feel like the centerpiece of the living room anymore, which makes me happy. JR’s toys are more prominent, and laid out so much more orderly, and as a result have seen more playtime than they usually do. He’s even putting them away as he’s done with them, for the most part, which is so much more than he was doing before. I’m hoping that displaying them more prominently, thereby showing them more respect, inspires him to treat them the same way. I also moved most of the plastic stuff so that his educational, natural, & wooden toys are seeing the most action. I think I’ll be slowly transforming our home into a Montessori-style prepared environment for him, as best I can before Milla comes.
I really should be doing more laundry & getting started on packing, but I’m sitting here trying to brainstorm what to make the ladies for our craft swap. I’m doing a holiday craft swap in Texas with the wives of my husband’s old friends, and I’ve just run out of time to get anything knit or crocheted for them, so I’m drawing a blank. Think think think. Maybe channeling Pooh Bear will help me out. Maybe not.
I had a ton of stuff that I was supposed to get done, craft-wise, before leaving AK, but I just have to suck it up and admit that it’s not getting done. I’m sorry. Kalli, Trinity, Karo, Jen — I’m sorry. I hope you forgive me.
I’m running out of time to get stuff done for MIlla too. I’m almost 30 weeks along(!!!) and seriously need to get cranking on stuff for her before she gets here. This pregnancy is going so quickly!
Ok, I need to do the dishes & make lunch.
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