Published on Jan 21 by Safire
Everyone,
It all started about 4:30 in the morning on January 7th. I sat bolt upright in bed because of a pain or heart burn or something. Maybe a little of both. It was pretty common for me to be up half the night with some kind of pain but in the back of my mind I thought this was different. I laid back down and dozed until 5am, when I was up feeling very uncomfortable.
I hoped this was it. See, my parents were in town and I really wanted to have him while I had lots and lots of help. I had an induction scheduled on January 11th, and I hoped that I wouldn’t make it to that day.
I didn’t have very regular contractions. Mostly I felt horrible cramps. Like menstrual cramps. No matter what way I switched positions, I still felt them. I got up and walked around. I took some pain killers. I kind of puttered in the bathroom. I started noticing a pattern to the cramps and started timing them. They were around 2 min apart and lasting about a minute or so. I had about 20 minutes of that and Juice woke up.
By this time, I knew this was different. The pain killers did nothing to touch the cramps. I felt awful. My doctor at my last appointment told me not to wait to call. If I had contractions for more than half an hour, to call them.
I told Juice that I thought he should stay home. I decided to take a shower and see if the contractions and the pain went away. It didn’t. I got dressed and put all of my stuff into the hospital bag while Juice got ready. Still not very painful contractions, but these horrible cramps. I started noticing that the tops of my thighs were started to ache. I called my doctor. He said to come on into the hospital and get checked out. It never hurts to be looked at.
I was 38 weeks and 3 days. I had Butterfly at 38 weeks and 4 days. And the boys, I had at 36 weeks and 6 days.
I had breakfast and said goodbye to the kids. I was going to stay and make sure that Butterfly got off to school around 9am but I really just wasn’t feeling well. Juice said we should go sooner rather than later so we left.
We got to the hospital (time unknown, I really wasn’t thinking about the time) and headed up to Labor and Delivery. They were expecting us. I signed a bunch of forms. I got my ID bracelets and they asked us to wait in the empty waiting room.
About 5 minutes later, a triage nurse came and took us to triage. I got undressed and they hooked me up to the monitors. One showed that the baby’s heart beat was good. And the other showed my contractions. Or my lack there of. I was sure they were going to send me home. I still felt pretty horrible, lots of cramping but nothing really showing up on the monitors as a real contraction.
I answered a bunch of questions, including how dilated I was at my last appointment. Which was Wednesday the 2nd. I was 2 centimeters. They checked me again and this time I was 4 centimeters! They said they were going to keep me and moved me into room number 2.
There, I had all my monitors hooked up again, and answered a bunch more questions. Mostly about the baby and what my plan was. They asked me about 3 times if I wanted the epidural and I said I would think about it. I got a few more bracelets and an IV. (I HATED this IV. They put it in the side of my wrist and it ached every time I moved my hand. Which was a lot.) They left me to labor a bit. The nurse came back in and adjusted my monitors so I would get credit for the contractions that I was having. Since they weren’t showing up on the monitor and I was feeling them. The cramping was getting worse but nothing I couldn’t handle.
My doctor came in (same one I saw on Wednesday! Yay!) and we discussed my plan for labor. My contractions were still very, very mild. And not terribly regular. I wanted the doctor to break my water and see what happens from there. I didn’t want pitocin. I wasn’t sure about the epidural still. She said she was fine with that and got out her stuff. It was about 10:40am by then. She broke my water (which hurt, not the water part but the getting the hook in there part) and frowned. Both her and the nurse looked at me and the doctor said she knows she broke it. No water was coming out. (Honestly, I had been wondering if I’d been leaking fluid for a few days…no conformation on that though.) She had to break it again and pushed on my belly after. A small gush came out. Followed by regular little gushes as I had contractions.
It’s game time. When I had Butterfly, the doctor broke my water and I had her only a few contractions later. They did the same with the boys. I was expecting things to start moving. So was everyone else. So when nothing really happened, the doctor left and the nurse too. I tried to relax. Juice took a nap (a tiny short one, lucky) and I turned the music on my phone so I could think of something. About 10, maybe 15 minutes into it I started hurting. The contractions were finally starting to get regular and hurt! I just kept telling myself “down, out, down, out, down, out” with each contraction. Pretty soon my breathing and shifting woke Juice up.
I made him come over to my right side and hold the baby heartbeat monitor onto my side. I wanted to be sitting up. It was the only comfortable position. Sadly, they don’t want you sitting up because it’s hard to monitor the contractions and the baby. So Juice’s job was to hold the monitor on my belly and make sure that they can still monitor the baby while I sat up and tried to manage the pain.
I remember feeling like I couldn’t do this. I remember thinking that this was normal and that I was probably in transition. (Yay for reading and watching a ton of labor stuff before!) I started to shake. I KNEW I was in transition. The nurse came in and tried to talk me into an epidural but I knew it was close and I couldn’t wait for the epidural to kick in. I started to have contractions back to back to back and the nurse asked if I wanted to be checked.
The doctor walked in at that moment and said that she would check me. It took me about 4 contractions to be able to roll over onto my back to be checked. I was complete and ready to push. Then it took me about 4 MORE contractions to respond to that. I remember saying that I didn’t want to do this. A lot.
I had a small break in the contractions and they convinced me it was time to push. I asked if I could lay on my side. Really, I wanted to sit up but being on my back hurt way worse than being on my side. They said sure. It was awkward, laying on my back. They kept trying to push my legs out farther than I was comfortable. And I lost control. Lots of pain, lots of screaming (yes, screaming) and lots of crying. I think I only pushed on my side for a few contractions. They kept counting to 10 to help me and I totally ignored it. I pushed when I was ready, and for how long I could. The doctor told me if I rolled over on my back we would have the baby.
I remember having to steel myself to roll over. It hurt. A lot. And when I did, they kept trying to push my legs back. And I kept wanting to arch my back away from the pain. It HURT to be on my back. Finally, I decided, “Let’s get this over with!” and pushed as hard as I could.
Then, the contractions stopped. I had been having stair step contractions back to back, where I didn’t get a break in between to re-center myself. The pain just kept coming and coming and coming and building and building. I could feel his head crowning but it wasn’t painful. I suddenly could take a breath and realized what was happening. Then I felt the contractions come back and I pushed as hard as I could. His head was out. Then the next contraction the rest of him came out with a whoosh and a HUGE gush of water came out with him. It was 12:27pm.
They put the baby right onto my chest and I looked down at him. Boy did he look like Professor! I got to hold him for a few minutes and they took him to the warmer to get him wiped up and weighed. (8lbs, 3 oz which is what I weighed when I was born, and 20 inches long)
Juice took his picture.
The placenta came out in one big whoosh and I felt so much better. It really is amazing that once that is gone, you feel great. I guess it was a big placenta too because the doctor said so. She said she had to give me one stitch. She asked if I would rather have some local to numb the area, but it would be two sticks. One stitch, also sticks. I chose just to do the stitch and have it over with.
I started shaking really bad again at that point and they brought the baby back to me. They brought me a few more blankets and covered me up. They gave me a very cool bracelet that would play Braham’s Lullaby when the baby got close to me. They gave Juice his bracelets and I started shaking again. We did some skin to skin and they piled the blankets on. I think every house should have a blanket or towel warmer. A totally frivolous thing I would like to put on my Christmas list.
Juice and I looked him over, and he started sucking his thumb! So adorable.
I let Juice hold him for a few minutes and then they wrapped him up to be moved over into the other rooms. He got to push the bassinet and I got a wheel chair ride.
This was my longest delivery yet. Butterfly: 2 hours. The boys: 4 hours. And him, they count it from the time of my first contractions (I say about 5am) till he was born. So 7 and a half hours. But really, from the time they broke my water at 10:40 till his birth at 12:30 was only about 2 hours. This has been the only birth I’ve actually gone in to labor on my own. The other 2 were inductions. So I think it’s okay if it’s a little longer than the others! Plus, I had no pitocin, no interventions (other than breaking my water) and I seriously felt great after. Shaky, and a little light headed, but I like that I could get up to go to the bathroom if I wanted and I could walk only a few minutes after birth.
We decided on his name (email me if you want to know, I won’t mention it here) and Juice decided he disliked Buckaroo for his blog name. So we switched it to Cowboy and it fits him much better. Welcome to the work baby Cowboy!
Safire
PS- More about the hospital stay later. I have A LOT to say on that subject.
Categories: Baby #4, birth stories, birthdays, Cowboy Tags:
Published on Jan 18 by Safire
Everyone,
Today is my due date for the baby. Whew, I made it! And guess what? I had the baby almost 2 weeks ago. Yup. Blogging in real time people.
No honestly, 4 is harder than 3. I think because I had SO MUCH HELP when the boys were born that I was able to adjust slowly to having 3. This time, not as much help. My parents were here for a few days, and Juice has taken a few days off. It’s an adjustment for us all, and we’re all coping. Some better than most.
PLUS, our first floor is still in the messy throws of being of being re-floored. Which we’ve had our friends help with, and our family. But still, it’s all torn up and that is what Juice is taking time off to do. Oh sure, he helps some with the kids. He’s actually been very helpful. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not like he’s ignoring me and our three (!!) boys completely. But the floor does take up a lot of our time.
PLUS, we found mold in our downstairs wall.
Seriously, the fun never stops here!
Here are a few pictures of the babe, and then the birth story will follow in a few days.
You can see our new floor in this picture.
Safire
Categories: birthdays, Cowboy, house Tags:
Published on Jan 01 by Safire
Everyone,
Happy New Year! I am so excited for this new year because I have 2 resolutions.
1- Have a baby. That will (hopefully) be soon. Then I’m done with that for the year!
2- Survive. Seems easy enough, right? I have no grand ideas about learning a new skill or doing much else than having the kids and well, surviving.
So Let’s talk about last year!
January- My job with the horses was still very new. I started working there 6 days a week. My ankles swelled with the miles and miles I ended up walking every day. It snowed a few times. We went sledding. Juice decided to paint our house.
February- There were more horses. Which I loved. And Butterfly had a party at school that I was able to go to for about 20 minutes. She also lost another tooth!
March- Butterfly had her first sleep over with a friend. Then then friend moved away across the country. We miss them still. Juice continued to paint our house. He had a birthday (shout horray!) and we went to the dentist. Butterfly lost yet another tooth.
April- The boys turned 4. We went to Build a Bear. We also had a big animal party which was awesome! My parents came to visit and we went downtown. We also drove all over following the trail of the guy who killed Lincoln. That was pretty cool. We went to Baltimore. We went to the American Girl store and rode horses. (Well, me and the kids did. My parents don’t ride.) Easter, where Juice and I ended up with some kind of stomach ailment.
May- The kids did their first horse show and each got several ribbons! Butterfly turned 7! We had a horse themed party at the barn. It was HOT. I discovered I was pregnant. The boys went camping for the first time with Daddy. We went to Assateague for the day with our good friend Lavender. She was becoming increasingly sick.
June- Last day of school! We went blueberry picking for the first time and got close to 8 lbs of berries. I started a few weeks of summer camp at the barn. It was getting hotter. The kids were able to join me for a week of summer camp. Very fun!
July- We went to see the fireworks in Frederick this year, because our fireworks were cancelled due to a freak storm that wiped out almost everyone’s power. We went berry picking again and got close to 10 lbs of berries. They were gone in a week. We went swimming a few times. Butterfly did ELO (summer school) and the boys and I did a few activities with their preschool.
August- I went to New York with my good friend Lolli for a blogging conference. It was awesome! We came back and the next day, left for Utah. Pirate cut Butterfly’s hair. We spent 2 weeks in Utah having a great time with family. It wasn’t as hot there. My grandparents celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary. Our good friend Lavender died days after we returned. School started again for Butterfly who is now in 2nd grade!
September- We went to our annual Labor Day Parade. I was still pregnant and starting to slow down a bit. My Dad came out for business and spent the weekend with us. We went to the county fair. The kids had their second horse show and got a few new ribbons.
October- We had a hurricane. The kids were cute as a witch, and transformers this year for Halloween. I cut back on my hours at the barn even more.
November- We had Thanksgiving with our friends from the barn at their house this year. It was great! Our kids were the only ones there and we had a huge debate on having more than one kid. I got to be the expert. 
We set up our Christmas tree early. Juice went to New York to help clean up from the hurricane. Then he turned around and went to Chicago for his yearly business trip the day he came home. I got tired and stopped sleeping with the pregnancy.
December- The kids got very cute clothes for Christmas. We took the kids to see the city lights with the boys’ preschool. Christmas was a success! The 3 favorite toys being Pikman 2 on the Wii, plush Pikmen and a plush chomper ball thing from Mario Kart. We started ripping out the floor of our house to put down nicer stuff. Still pregnant. My job ended due to baby. Saying goodbye to everyone at the barn (even for a short while) was harder than I thought. Also harder than we thought: putting in new floor. Still pregnant.
Safire
Categories: year in review Tags:
Published on Dec 07 by Safire
Everyone,
For reasons unknown to me, I keep avoiding the blog. I keep opening a new post window, only to leave it there for days. In ways, I feel buried behind in all the information I need/want to put on here. In ways, I’ve just gotten out of the habit of posting. I’ve also got a ton of warnings and things that don’t work on here. I don’t have time/money/patience to fix all of them.
So. Instead of talking about all of that, let’s talk about the baby!
Poor 4th baby. I feel a little bad about how little I’ve talked about this kid. With the boys (still kind of annoying that I feel like I have to pick out a new nickname for Pirate and Professor, I don’t want to say twins) every single doctor’s appointment was documented. And I went a lot. With Butterfly, I have all of her doctor appointments documented too, and a lot of her firsts written down. This baby, I think I’ve talked 3, maybe 4 times? Poor kid.
I keep hoping that it won’t be important to him as an adult and that the mommy guilt I feel won’t last.
Let’s talk about him right now though! I see him bouncing in my belly as I type. He is the most active kid I’ve ever had. Pirate and Professor were calm. This little guys bounces and rolls and wiggles and flutters.
I’m measuring right on track. My doctor’s appointments are a 4 minutes of weight (scary), blood pressure (semi high), belly measure (right on track), concerns addressed (heart burn, minimal swelling), and sent on my way. Seriously, this is the most boring pregnancy I’ve had.
Which is good I guess. Boring is good. Boring is normal. Boring means I don’t have any scary complications and can expect a healthy baby in early January.
I did have an ultrasound a few weeks ago that said that he was measuring very big. Like, around 5lbs when he should be around 3lbs. And that his legs and his belly are measuring way over 95th percentile for other fetus’s in his gestational age. Now, they said the boys were going to be bigger than they were, so I’m taking this with a grain of salt. And scaling it back a pound or so.
He’s head down, and hopefully will stay that way. I have a big fear that he is NOT head down a lot of the time, but we will see when the time comes.
I think we have settled on a name, but we are waiting to see the kid to know that this is the name.
As for me, I’ve had a lot of heart burn. That is killer! It’s the worst when acid shoots through your nose in the middle of the night with no prior warning. Yuck! Between that and waking to pee every 2 hours, I’m getting very little sleep. Oh I sleep during the day just fine. In fact, I could sleep all day and be happy. It’s night that I really struggle with. I often lay and ponder troubles and then wake myself up even more. Sometimes I can’t get comfortable and end up crying in frustration. Sometimes my legs are so restless that I have to get up and pace the house in the dark, hoping that I don’t get eaten by aliens or step on those stupid crickets that show up.
Let’s just say that nights are awful, days are increasingly uncomfortable and I am ready to have a baby in my arms that I can actually put down. Or give to Juice to hold for awhile.
I’m so looking forward to meeting this little miracle of a baby. I want to see what he looks like. I want to know if me and Professor are going to be the only ones with blue eyes in this family. I’m anxious to see how having a singleton after twins is going to be. I want to do something along these lines when the kid is born: http://www.etsy.com/listing/105937178/horse-hat-and-diaper-cover
And I’ll let you in on a little secret…I think we’ve picked out his blog name. Buckaroo. Since he is the one that has spent the most time at the barn with me and probably could recognize a horse’s neigh over all the other animals, we thought this would be fitting.
Safire
Categories: Baby #4 Tags:
Published on Nov 11 by Safire
Everyone,
Right after our pool party, I went to BlogHer with Lolli. The day after, we flew to Utah to have fun with our family for a few weeks!
But not until Pirate cut Butterfly’s hair.
Oh yes he did. Bad brother! And on the morning we were supposed to fly out too! My old hair stylist in Utah (who still does my mom’s hair and is good friends with the family) offered to squeeze her in that evening to fix it.
Such a cute cut! I’m almost glad that Pirate forced us to get this hair cut. She looks adorable!
Safire
Categories: Butterfly Hair Cut Tags: Butterfly
Published on Nov 10 by Safire
Everyone,
Every year during the summer our bishop (the leader of our congregation) opens his summer camp to us for the day and we have a huge pool party. We go every year, shimmering heat or rain. Of course we always have fun swimming with our ward family. This year was no exception!
Pirate was obsessed with going under the water. Obsessed. It was all he did.
Professor was content to float around on his 5 pool noodles. He can push himself around the pool by kicking and watch everyone play.
I didn’t get any pictures of Butterfly or Juice in the pool because I was tied to the stairs saving Pirate’s life every third dive or so. My BFF Lolli took pity on me and hung out talking. She also took our annual picture on the pool alligator.
Whoops, not that one!
Juice played water ball with all the guys, and then street hockey. Every year, someone gets hurt in that street hockey game. He said the threat of danger makes it fun. Okay.
After all that playing, a good dinner of grilled stuffs and salads, we went home tired. I think all the kids fell asleep in the car and cried when we put pjs on them. Note for next year: bring pjs to change into!
Safire
Categories: Bar-T, church, family pictures, summer activies, swimming Tags: swimming
Published on Nov 09 by Safire
Everyone,
Next up in my photo stream is our annual trip to Assateague Island. This year we were able to take our friend Lavender with us. (She died about 3 months later.) We only spent one day instead of our normal 3-4 due to a mix up in lodging. But it didn’t mean we didn’t have an awesome day!
We didn’t spend any time anywhere else but the beach. But we did stop and see the ponies. Because what is a trip to Assateague without the ponies?
Getting to the beach is always an adventure. This year, the kids (with me and Lavender in tow) ran right to the water and jumped right in. Leaving Juice to do the heavy stuff.
We had a ball in the water. The boys thought it was a little cold. But still, this was the first year that they wanted to be in the water more than out of the water.
You can see our little beach tent with Lavender in it in the background.
Juice took Butterfly way out and tried to get her to body surf. Basically he picked her up by her life vest and tossed her into the waves. She was so water logged and happy!
We drug everyone out into the deep water and had someone take a picture of us bobbing in the waves outside of the breakers. Professor was NOT happy about the breakers. And then, not happy about being far out. He wanted to go!
Right after lunch I took a nap. Or I should say that I was SLAMMED with sleep. (Remember, I’m about 8 weeks pregnant here.) We have a little beach tent that I mostly made it into before I slept. But my legs were not all the way in the shade and they burned. Bad! Lavender kept me company while Juice played with the kids in the sand.
The day was very long (we left around 5am and didn’t get home until after midnight). But it was worth it! Can’t wait to go again next year!
Safire
Categories: Assateague, Baby #4, beach Tags: beach
Published on Nov 08 by Safire
Everyone,
At the beginning of May, my barn had a horse show. I entered all the kids into a few classes and we had a ball!
Before you can show, you have to get your horse ready. Which means clean. And braided if you have a helper.
Then you enjoy your show! Pirate rode Pepper, and Professor rode Rainey. See his girl helping him? She also rides Rainey and did Rainey’s hair. Amazing!
Everyone got ribbons!
Butterfly rode in the next class. She did really well.
She also got some ribbons!
She shared Cody her horse with another girl about her same age. They have become very good friends and enjoy riding at the barn together. Cody liked all of his ribbons.
Lunch was good. And then Juice took them home.
Since I was helping out a lot, I stayed till the end of the show and got to see all the older girls jump.
What a fun day!
(This is my fun, “Hey I’m pregnant but don’t know it yet!” picture. Although I had an inkling.)
Safire
Categories: horse shows, horses Tags: horses
Published on Nov 07 by Safire
Everyone,
Next up in my picture stream is random pictures of Butterfly during May. There was prince and princess day at school.
Butterfly had a birthday! We sang to her at home on her actual birthday. With an ice cream cake.
We also brought donuts to school to celebrate with her there. (If you want to hear about her party, this is the link.)
She lost a tooth just days after her birthday!
She sang with all of the 1st graders at a school assembly.
And a few days after May, was the last day of 1st grade! It rained all day. And what a fun year she had too! She was VERY excited to become a second grader.
May was a good month for Butterfly!
Safire
Categories: Butterfly, Butterfly activities, Butterfly birthdays, Butterfly in School, Butterfly milestones, Butterfly's missing teeth Tags: Butterfly
Published on Nov 06 by Safire
Everyone,
I know I’ve been bad about writing. But the next several (about 7) posts will be about what we did this summer. Because I don’t think I posted much. Maybe about once a month? Hey, I was working a ton AND I was totally sick with the baby that I wasn’t talking about with anyone. Looking at the few pictures I took this summer, we’re going to start about May and go from there. Okay? Okay.
Juice took the boys on their very first camping trip on May 12th. It was the Fathers and Sons camping trip that our ward does every year. And being newly turned 4 year olds, they were old enough to go! And spend the night! In a tent!
Seriously doesn’t get any better than that for a 4 year old boy.
Since me and Butterfly hung out at home, I am going from what Juice told me. I guess they got there and the boys ran with the other boys in the ward in a huge pack through the woods. Juice set up the tent, fed the boys the dinner I packed, and got teased by the other guys for wiping the boys nacho cheese dust off of them with baby wipes.
There was some roasting marshmallows, and more running through the woods.
When it got dark, the boys asked to go to bed. Juice got them ready, put them down, and this is what happened:
Can’t go camping with out our special toys. And it’s SO cool that the tent has just the right pocket for them!
They came home the next morning smelling of wood smoke and cranky. Ahh…camping.
Safire
Categories: 2 boys-double trouble, camping Tags:
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