The Firstborn

Three years ago today Ben and I were preparing to go to the hospital for an induction. When we got there, I remember we blasted Usher's "Yeah" in the car to get psyched up, ha.

I wrote this birth story back then, when Anna was born...

My doctor scheduled an induction for the evening that I would be one week overdue. I felt like my body was nowhere near going into labor on its own. I think I could have held that baby forever.

Ben and I went to the hospital at midnight and they started Cervidil. When the nurse started it she said I would feel light cramping but would be able to sleep through the night. She said in 12 hours they would start Petocin and I would probably have a baby in about 24 hours.

As she said all of this the Cervidil was already kicking in and I felt it big time--back pain. This felt a lot worse than she explained! I went on with that for a few hours, just rubbing my back and trying to rest (Ben was sort of sleeping), but I knew there was no way I was getting any sleep. I felt like a huge wimp because I thought they weren’t real contractions, but at about 3 a.m. I had the nurse start an IV and it had something in it (I don’t even know what, but that helped a little). Next thing I remember the nurses came in and said I was having constant contractions and the baby wasn’t handling it too well so they pulled out the Cervidil. They said hopefully my body would continue to labor on its own.

It did, and at 6 a.m. I couldn’t take much anymore and asked for the epidural…I was at 3 cm, and again feeling like a huge wimp. The hardest part was just getting through 3 or 4 contractions while they put the epidural in. But after that, it was great and I fell asleep for two hours. At 8 a.m. I woke up and told Ben we should call our parents. The nurse checked me and said I was at 10 cm, and ready to push. I was shocked! Ben called our parents and told them to hurry if they wanted to catch the birth. My Mom walked in right as I was about to have the baby.

Nothing can ever describe the surreal feeling of seeing that baby for the first time! She was so beautiful, and opened one eye to look at us. I couldn’t believe how perfect she was, someone said, “It looks like she had an easy entrance into this world.”

Anna Rose was born at 9:02 a.m. on June 30th, after about 8 hours of labor. She was 8 pounds, 2 ounces, and 20 inches long.

Our double blessing

It was a hot summer day, and Ben's brother and sister, John and Sabrina, came over to help us by painting the new nursery. After they left I hung up baby clothes and cleaned the house until past 11 p.m. I was exhausted, which happened easily by this point in my pregnancy.

I woke up suddenly at 3 a.m. Something didn't feel quite right. I got up and thought - is that my water breaking? I still have a month to go, right? After trying to go back to sleep for hours, I finally got up, took a shower, and got a bag ready. As soon as it was late enough to call someone, I called our next door neighbors, and asked their daughter to come over to stay with Anna so I could go to the hospital. I told them I didn't think it was anything, and I would probably be back in an hour or so.

Before I left I called Ben and woke him up, it was early in California. I told him I wasn't sure, but he probably wanted to look into flights back to Utah. Then, I called him back again about 15 minutes later.

Me: Ummm, okay, for sure my water just broke.

Ben: Really?

Me: Yes, I just got to the hospital and as soon as I got out of the car it broke.

Ben: Okay, I'm not finding any flights but I'll keep looking.

So I checked into the hospital with my wet clothes feeling really silly. They put me on the monitors and I was having contractions but couldn't feel them yet. At this point I'm thinking, okay, they can do the c-section later today (the twins were both head up so we knew it had to be a c-section). Nope, the nurse calls my doctor and informs me they will be doing the c-section in about an hour.

Ben calls and says he can't find any flights and will get in at 3:00 p.m., earliest. Right now it is before 8 a.m. I think I cried for about half an hour after that. Ben tells me he'll call Stephanie and Sabrina, so someone can be with me. They prep me for the surgery and just as I get wheeled in Stephanie comes in. It would have seriously been awful not to have anyone there. Sabrina was there too, but she had to wait outside.

Everything went well and I couldn't feel anything. I remember Stephanie saying, "There's Isabel!" I think I asked her if she looked like she was okay and Stephanie said she looked great. Then Adam...Stephanie said he looked great too. The nurses held both of them up to me for just a quick second and it was very surreal.

As I was recovering they came in to tell me Adam was having a little trouble breathing. I think I held it together because quite a bit of famiy was there by now, but it was pretty scary. I knew the babies could come early - but since I had such an uneventful pregnancy I really figured they would be full term with no problem. They brought Isabel in to see me and she looked so beautiful, and just like Anna as a baby.

Then a while later they wheeled me in to see Adam. He was all hooked up and honestly I felt like I never got to bond with him. I held his little hand for a minute and then they wheeled me out. I didn't see him again until the ambulance came to take him to another hospital the next day, and they brought him into my room for a second. I could go on forever about his NICU stay, but I won't. It was only 3 weeks and it seems so silly in hindsight, but at the time it felt like an eternity. Ben got to the hospital later the day they were born and met both babies, and then began the drive back and forth to Adam's new hospital when he moved.

So begins the life of our beautiful Isabel Katherine and Adam Benjamin. Isabel was 5 lbs, 6 oz, born at 8:53 a.m. (I think!). Adam was 6 lbs, 5oz, born at 8:55 a.m. So tomorrow morning I can give them special hugs and kisses at those exact times! I'll do another birthday post with pictures from the last year, but for now here are a few newborn pics.

We love them so much and I honestly feel like the luckiest Mom in the world!!

Favorites

I wish I could accurately portray the squeal Anna lets out when she is really excited about something. On Saturday I told her Aunt Sabrina was coming to pick her up and she squealed like it was the happiest day of her life (almost like she squeals when we talk about her birthday coming up). She had a great day and loved going swimming, as you can see.

But when Aunt Sabrina asked her who her favorite Aunt was, she said "Aunt Alex." She hasn't quite mastered the art of always saying the person you are with!

She did say Uncle Kevin was her favorite Uncle though!

Of course, Anna loves ALL of her Aunts and Uncles. Thanks for a fun day Sabrina, and thanks for sending the pictures!

Tired of studying

I am sick of studying for the bar. I hate the drive to Provo. I am tired of watching videos of law professors all days. I don't want to learn about California civil procedure (perhaps the most boring subject in the history of the world). Since I promised Allison house pictures, here are a bunch of pictures of the house when we first bought it (and after I took a sledge hammer to some walls). Enjoy.




This was the basement laundry room that we tore down and added a window. It looks much better.
















More basement laundry.












Stairway to the basement. The walls were in great shape.




















Master bathroom tub, toilet, bidet, and lots of ugly, dated, blue tile. You can't see it in the picture, but there is a cabinet to the left of the doorway entry with some random glass shelves and mirror.

















The master bath shower. We demolished and replaced with something a little bigger.



















Master bath vanity area. Ripped out everything, and put in new cabinets, countertops, and flooring.
















New carpet and paint in the Master Bedroom. I do miss the green, however.















Lovely staircase from the main floor to the top floor. Not pretty. We ripped down the walls and squared the the stairs off.













Another shot of the staircase. Lots of drywall and wallpaper (that ripped off the drywall paper when removed). We ripped this all down and replaced with Alder handrails and iron ballisters.













Some space in the room with beautiful mustard walls and lots of our junk. We just painted the space.















Dining room walls with really bad lights. We skim coated the walls, painted and replaced the light.










The opening between the living room and the kitchen/family room space (not sure what to call it). The opening between the two room was a small doorway. We ended up spanning the whole space with a Microlam that spanned 12 feet.












This is one view of the kithen. The mustard wall to the right is the backside of a large pantry that took up the entire space of the kitchen. We demolished and opened the space up.




Hopefully I will have the updated pictures to show you soon. However, I make no promises!

The Oh-So-Important Schedule

I am very focused on getting my kids on a good schedule, especially since Isabel and Adam were born. Kids who sleep are the key to my sanity. For the past few months we've had a great thing going. The babies sleep all night, and take two great naps at the same time every day.

Then, every day this week we had to leave the house during morning naptime for someone to look at the house. One day I put them down for a short time only to have to wake them up so we could leave. One day I just got in the car hoping they would nap there (ha, never). Anyway, just a few days off the schedule and it seems we are back to square one. We are home all day today, but so far the morning nap seems to be a goner.

I'm sure we'll get it back, but I live and die by that schedule. PLEASE let them remember how much they love napping!

P.S. I have been horrible about taking pictures lately. I'll try to take some this week. For now, here is Adam giving Anna a kiss. I think its cute even though you can't see their faces.

World's Greatest Dad

When Ben woke up yesterday, I told Anna she should sing him a song. She made one up, and it went something like this:

"I love my Daddy, my Daddy loves me.
I love my Daddy, I love my Daddy.
Daddy loves me.
I love my Daddy......most of the time."

We both laughed pretty hard at that one. Despite her silly Father's Day song, I'm pretty sure Anna loves Ben all of the time. She especially loves it when he rides tricycles with her, takes her to Home Depot, reads her stories for bedtime, plays Candyland with her, makes elephant noises, and all kinds of other fun stuff.

I remember when Ben and I first got married and we talked about having a large family. I told him that growing up I always figured I wanted two kids or so. Before I was married, in my mind I pictured it being all me, without much help with the kids. Once I married Ben I knew he was going to be a great Dad, and very involved, so I figured I could handle a bit more. He has been fun, caring, loving, and patient with our kids, and I can't wait to see him as they get older. Here's to Ben, the world's greatest Dad!

Ben will be with you shortly

Our house is finally on the market!! Ben wants to do a series of posts with before and after pictures, so I'll let him do that.

I am still exhausted from the cleaning spree of trying to get the house ready to show, and keeping it clean. Although I have to say, I LOVE IT after 6 months of a messy construction house.

Our van is in the shop, so if anyone wants to look at the house, I have to load the babies in the stroller and take a walk. Not a bad thing, except the street we live on is just one big hill, so not a great place to walk. Yesterday we sat at the corner until we saw the people arrive. Then luckily we saw a neighbor and went into their house for a while since it was so hot. We'll see what happens today...

15 Seconds of Fame

Originally I was going to title the post "5 seconds of fame" or something like that, but we were actually in this story more than I thought we would be.

I was interviewed by Channel 4 (ABC) news here in Utah. I work for PilmerPR, who is featured in the story. Some of their editing wasn't exactly consistent with what I actually said, but oh well.

We also had to set up a desk the night before the interview so it would look like I have a home office. Before this I was usually sitting on a recliner with my laptop. I didn't think that would look very good on TV!

Click here to see the kids and I on the news...

As a side note, I wrote the talking points that the news anchors say at the end of the piece. It was a fun work day and good practice, since I have coached people before on doing TV interviews, but never did one myself. I think I need some practice!

Baby steps

It was the end of the day so she's all tired out in this video and we only got a small sampling. But look who took her first steps today!




It makes us kind of sad that one of the babies is already walking. They are growing up too fast! We'll get some better video soon.

June Bugs

June is birthday month at our house! Mine is June 11, Isabel and Adam will be 1 on June 29th, and Anna Rose will be 3 on June 30th. Poor Ben, his birthday is in August. I seriously think our kids are going to be mad one day when we have another kid (yes, someday we will have another :) and then they all get old enough to notice this other kid doesn't have to share a birthday with anyone. We joke about continuing the June tradition.

So I figured I would update even though I still haven't found my camera charger. We are putting the house on the market in the next week, so I need to go and do some cleaning. Here is a quick update on everyone for the grandparents:

- Anna is enjoying playing in the dirt these days. She goes out back and moves dirt from here to there and puts it down her slide, things like that. This doesn't sound very interesting, but for those who know Anna, it is a whole new development that she will actually get dirty. Until now she liked to be clean. I'm not so excited about this new phase.

- Isabel has mastered the art of going up the stairs. It took her about one second. Now anytime you are downstairs she goes straight towards them and when you go after her she giggles and tries to climb as fast as her little legs will go. We need a gate.

- Adam is into kissing. He loves kissing everyone, and once you get him started he can't stop. He'll sit there and kiss Anna like 10 times. Or if you are lying on the floor, he can't help but come over and slobber you with kisses. He is such a lovey boy.

- Ben is driving to Provo every day to study for the bar (an hour away). Next week he will start taking the bus so he can at least study during that time, and because gas would end up costing us a small fortune.

- My days are full taking care of the kids and working. We have a fairly new nanny who is working out pretty well, she comes 20 hours per week. The kids are comfortable with her so I can get a lot done. And it is kind of nice to be missed when I come around and she leaves!

Wooo hooo, I just found the camera charger. But it's almost midnight so for now I'll just post this picture of the girls to say, goodnight!