Happy Birthday Baby!

Happy 1st Birthday Joseph Paul!

We had a wonderful day!

Details to come.

364 Days Later, A Birth Story

Never has a story been more worthy of being told.

You were due to be born on August 2nd, 2009.  It was a Sunday and I don't think your father and I ever anticipated a day with such wonder and enthusiam.  Pregnancy is a funny thing, it is simultaneously so very long and so very brief.  We could not wait to see what you would look like and what parenthood would truly feel like.  When you are expecting a baby you often hear how wonderful it will be. I anticipated it being really really good. Perfect, amazing, overwhelming. I had been waiting for this since I was a little girl. I was wrong. It's been more.  There are no words that describe all that being your Mommy and Daddy has been.

On August 1st, you and I had a shower to go to.  Mandy got married the October after you were born and her bridal shower was the day before you were due.  I wore a black dress with you tucked away snug in my belly. The reaction I got when people asked me when I was due I replied, Tomorrow, was priceless.  You stayed put like a good little boy even though I had little contractions all through the shower.

On the day you were due your Daddy was home with me.  We were more than ready for you, your room was all set up, the pack and play had been in the living room for months, and our hospital bag was packed. I think we were your typical first time parents. I had dreams of a wonderful, peaceful labor experience.  I planned on getting an epidural but our bag was packed with movies, and lotion, and little massagers for Daddy to help me through labor.  I packed way too many clothes for you and outfits for me that I had picked out especially for our time in the hospital.  The monkey that had sat superstitiously on top of the cable box since we brought him home months and months ago was poised and ready.  He had been waiting a very long time.

Daddy and I spent the whole day together, doing nothing special yet staying busy.  We talked of what would happen if you decided not to come.  Our next appointment was scheduled for Tuesday, and we were to speak of induction.  I wondered if this was the way it would go.  It was not. As we were laying in bed  in the dark ready to go to sleep, I told your Daddy I was not sure it was going to take much longer.  We kissed goodnight and rolled over to go to sleep.  Not more than five minutes later, at exactly 11:45 pm on the day you were due, my water broke.  We hopped out of bed, both sure and unsure of what to do.  The excitement of the moment was palpable, you were on your way.  Grandparents were alerted. We called the hospital but our doctor was not available and we were told we would be called back.  Too much time went by for your Daddy without a call, and he decided it was time to go.  He was nervous and took his job seriously, the way every Mommy dreams her husband would be. We drove to the hospital with an empty carseat just waiting for you to fill it, so excited, contracting all the way, five minutes apart. We got there, were checked in and hooked up. The doctor said I was at 0. At my last appointment my doctor said I was at 2. Pitocin it would be.

Maybe it was the pitocin, maybe it was just the way it was going to be regardless, but there would be no peaceful labor. No watching movies, no helpful backrubs, it was not happening.  True to form, as I was sick throughout my entire pregnancy, I was sick with each contraction.  The contractions were so very painful, within a matter of two hours I went from contractions which were barely detectable to contractions which were lasting a minute with a little less than two minutes in between.  It simply is not possible to stay lying back in bed in this situation and your monitors kept coming off.  I felt bad as the nurses kept coming in to readjust and reattach them, but there was nothing I could do.  Eventually, our nurse administered a combination of medications to ease the nausea and keep me laying down.  I could not believe how quickly they took effect and how spacey they made me feel.

From that point on, things were fuzzy for me. I know family made it to the hospital. I was too busy clinging to the rails of the hospital bed to bare visitors and so they waited patiently in the hospital waiting room.  I wanted an epidural but was not very sure of much else.  I remember being so so happy to see the anesthesiologist when he walked in the door. It's funny to me now that many moments of my labor are hazy but I remember him exactly.  I was really waiting for him. He was an old man, stout, with grey hair and glasses, slightly balding.  He was nice but not overly so and I was surprised at how the process of getting the epidural did not even hurt a bit. The relief brought by the epidural was enough for us to finally invite family back into the room.  Indeed the epidural eased everything but, although I was unaware, your heart rate kept dropping and when the shift changed and Dr. Raben came in, he decided that it was time to take you out.

Daddy dressed up in scrubs and I was prepped.  I was so impressed by how calm, effecient, and fast all the nurses and doctors were.  I was nervous. Your Daddy was nervous too, but he tried not to let me see it. A c-section was not my first choice, but they weren't giving me any options. I had dialated to 8.5 cm but had stalled and they could not determine why your heart rate would not stay stable. And so it was decided.  At 7:28 am on August 3rd, 2009, the world stopped and you were born.

Healthy, perfect, pink, crying, and magic, you were everything we ever wished you would be. You were raised into the light like a baby Simba.  We would never be the same.

Your Daddy watched you be born.  I watched your Daddy watch you be born. I knew the exact moment  you had arrived, it was written all over his face and I will never need a picture to remember that exact moment in time. After you were out, your Daddy was usure of what to do.  I think c-sections are hard on the Daddies. He had to chose to stay by his wife who was in the middle of surgery or go with his newly born son. I loved him for being conflicted.  He was already in love with you.  I gave him the urging he needed and he stayed by your side as you were cleaned up and measured.

You were 7 lbs 8 oz and 21 inches long. You can't exactly tell in pictures, but your hair was light.  Much lighter that I expected and I could not get over the fact that I had a blonde baby.  How?!  Your hair is still light today, though I think it will darken.  Your eyes were they typical dark baby blue.  They have grown lighter as you have grown older and I think they may stay blue.

  It did not take long for you to calm and start taking the world in.  It is so amazing to me, now that I have spent a year getting to know you, to look back and see how you were you right from the very start.  You were easy and cooperative (you were on a schedule before we even left the hospital, eating every 4 hours and sleeping at night), a good eater, and a snuggler.  You were calm and even-tempered, tolerated me dressing you up, and loved your binky.  You favored your parents but were open to everyone.  You were a peaceful, loving, joy, a little ray of light.  We were smitten. 

We were blessed.

You were here.

Party Planning..

Last year at this time we were planning for a baby and now here we are planning again .. parties. First Birthday Parties! Can you say YAY?  My kitchen table is no longer my own.  Neither is the top of my refrigerator for that matter.  If I'm being honest I guess I should admit I have taken over the kitchen counters in my mom's house as well.  We are now eating all of our meals in the living room.  While I wouldn't have the party planning any other way, I will be happy to get back to eating as a family at our kitchen table.  

Lots of these guy are around our house right now.

Our house party will be construction themed, inspired by Joey's love of trucks.

How do boys just know to love trucks anyway?

I'm trying not to be stressed.  I have nothing to be stressed about.  I have a bad tendency of getting that way though when I have a lot I want to do.  And now, everything I want to do Joey does too.  Almost-one-year-olds and printers are not compatible.  It makes noise and lights up, Joey is sure it was made for him.  Sweet Joe took Joey to the store alone (Walmart, no less.. gasp .. ha) to get most of the stuff we still need and so that I could have to time to work alone.  I need to remember not to take stress out on him.  I'm going to go give him a big kiss :o).

Little Man

Our little man

our baby boy

you bring us so much

pure, pure joy

6 Days..and Toddlerhood ...

Six days from now Joey will turn one. He will no longer be my "fill in the blank"-month-old, he will be my one-year old.  I think I will refer to him as 13 months, 14 months, etcetera because I can. 
Today Joey officially became a toddler. Does that mean he is no longer a baby? Agh. Are babies toddlers?  Are toddlers babies?  Are they mutually exclusive because I cannot digest the thought.  Why does motherhood make me so sentimental?  I don't think I can blame it on leftover pregnancy hormones anymore. Ha..

And because I want to remember, this is how it went.  After really taking his true first steps as a very wiggly seven and a half month old (two or three of them, from me to his playhouse in his bedroom) and a parent imposed hiatus from the ventures of walking, Joey took his first self-motivated, completely independent sequence of more than three steps today.  He has been able to walk for quite some time now.  Most people have not seen him do it because I really don't think he actually liked doing it until today.  Regardless, he has only been walking when really coaxed off an object like the couch or if we hold him up and then have him walk from person to person. 

Today, I was sitting on the couch watching him while he was playing independently.  I had ruffled the toys in his little wicker box so that the toys that had been on the bottom were now on the top and I was watching him explore.  He was holding his little ball that is half green and half pink and makes a chiming noise when he shakes it and standing unassisted next to his box shaking away.  I thought to myself how there was a marked difference in him today.  All of the sudden he was constantly just standing and holding on to things like toys or remotes (!) instead of the couch or the wall or something else to support him. 

He stood there shaking and shaking and I watched, amazed at how he was just standing there playing as if he does this all the time.  And then, like it was nothing, he walked slowly, perfectly, and cautiously, pausing to catch his balance, and kept going all the way from the box he was standing by to his little play table that was pushed against the wall.  It took him about eight steps.

I immediately called Joe and recounted the story to him.  I could hear the excitement in his voice and in that moment I remember feeling just how grateful I was that I was here to watch this moment in time.  So grateful. I hung up the phone with Joe and Joey did it again. And has been doing it all day. He's a toddler now, just like that.  This has been such a special day.

Nemesis

Joey's arch enemy.

The PURPLE PEOPLE EATER.

This thing eats people.  Joey is sure of it.

Obviously this is something we need to work on. :o)

We get courage from mommy's lap.

Enough courage to even touch the monster.

Even if only with one very little finger.

And with some prompting the bravery keeps flowing.

By the end of our little ritual we can even sometimes catch a little smile.

Sadly, the whole saga repeats every time the Purple People Eater appears.

But we're working on it.

In the meantime it's a little sad but really so cute.