Am I blue?

Only in the best possible sense of the word. There isn't much that I really like about Texas or the outdoors. I'm a Northerner at heart and the summer heat here really kills me. But Spring? And Bluebonnets? This I LOVE...

More pictures on the KodakGallery site if you're interested.

Thanks Mrs. LeRose...

71 words

Speedtest

Please note, I had to go back and do this again because Mama T threw down the gauntlet with a little challenge.

Happy 3-month birthday Miss J...

It is just shocking to me how fast the past 3 months have gone by. But here she is, my baby girl, getting bigger every day. At least I've finally put her in a proper dress like a regular girl. And she's a big fan of faux fur. Nothing makes her happier than to lay on a soft sheet of furry fabric.

I neglected to mention that we had a nice visit from our friends Anne, Chris, and Olivia this week. Olivia has grown so much since the last time we saw her. She's soon to be a big sister herself, and although she looks up to the task, I think she really has no idea what's about to hit her. Good luck to all of them on the new adventure.

I've always thought the kids are especially sweet and/or funny when they're sleeping. I'm secretly lusting after a new camera with better low-light performance so I can shoot the kids in their rooms at night. But here are a few recent pics of Trevor that I had to share...He often toddles into my room at around 7 am and catches an extra half hour of sleep in the big bed. Who could turn this sweet guy away?
And this is him at about 8 pm on a day where he didn't have a nap. Pretty pitiful...

Substantial Improvement...

Last year, Trevor was deathly afraid of the Easter Bunny, which didn't work out well for the pictures at the mall. Actually, he seemed fine until showtime and freaked out at the last minute. Miraculously, he loved the big rabbit this year. He was all smiles and hugs. So here is my crew in their Easter finery...

Juliette was asleep before we left the house, so we don't have a picture of her in her pretty dress by herself. Later this weekend, hopefully, if I'm on my feet.

And one last thing to mention...

Juliette was cute today and is starting to grace me with her smiles.

Never trust the silence...

The boys got up from their naps today while I was trying to make some spaghetti sauce. I already had Juliette in the Baby Bjorn, so entertaining them wasn't high on my list. But miraculously, Hayden just sat down to read a book and Trevor was quiet.

After about 15 minutes, Trevor comes be-bopping into the kitchen with the St. Patrick's day card Grandma Carole sent him today. "Mommy, is it OK if I color on this?" he asks. "Sure baby," I say, noticing he's already been at it with the blue magic marker. Then I notice that the marker goes all the way to the edges of the card. "Where were you sitting when you colored this sweetie?" I ask. "In my room," Trevor replies. UH-OH, THIS CAN'T BE GOOD.

As I try to make my way down the hall to his room, he's physically trying to block me and push me backwards, saying "No Mommy, No". So I know it's really bad, yet am somehow unprepared for what I see, which is blue magic marker all over his bedsheet, desk, cloth runner on the desk, and the CARPET.

Was it washable marker you ask? Shut up already Vito. Of course, my child ignores the 200 washable and "Color Magic" markers in the house and chooses the permanent "Mr. Sketch" scented markers I bought for him.

I will say this, Folex carpet cleaner rocks. The marker actually came out of the carpet pretty well. Second thing I must say is that Trevor is pretty sweet despite making me want to kill him about 10 times a day. I went back to my spaghetti sauce and noticed he was silent again. Turns out, he had taken the Folex and a rag and tried to get the marker off of his sheets. Which actually worked pretty well too.

But seriously, don't think that because your 2-year old isn't tugging at your shirt that you've caught a break somehow. He's just creating some larger nightmare for you to discover later.

Perfect(ly Bad) Timing...

After Juliette, Trevor, and I picked Hayden up from preschool today, I said we could stop to pick up lunch. At this point, there were clouds in the sky, and it was very slightly misting. We get to the Chik-Fil-A parking lot and it's now actually raining. So I drive around a few times trying to wait for a spot to open up right by the door. No luck.

I ask the kids "Do you just want to go through the drive-thru and eat at home?". Screams of "NOOOO!" are heard from the back seat. "WE WANT TO PLAY!". Honestly, I want them to play too. Because it's raining, so we're definitely not going to the park, and I'd like them to burn some energy instead of coming home and bouncing off the walls.

While I'm driving in circles, the rain is getting worse. So I tell the kids, "If we go inside, we're going to have to go through the rain and we're going to get wet" They confirm that they're good with this plan. Juliette doesn't get a vote. So I get out to get out the stroller. Now it has started a torrential downpour, coupled with gale-force winds. I get out the stroller and am already soaked, despite the umbrella. I open the door on Juliette's side of the van and she is immediately soaked from the blowing rain. The wind blows the umbrella inside out. Now I notice hail also. Nice little ice beads pelting my precious baby girl.

This is when I give up. I get further soaked trying to put the stroller back in the car. The boys are silent when I tell them we're going through the drive thru. I think it's clear to them that getting out of the car isn't open for further discussion. The rain is blowing so hard that I get soaked again just ordering the food, even with the awning over the order box.

Five minutes later, when we're driving home...nothing but a mist. Yep. That's me and my perfect timing.

Hat Baby

Well, Juliette has made it to two months old without being a bow-head-baby. But she might just be a hat baby.

One of my favorite childrens' photographers had a post a few weeks ago with hat babies. Given the inspiration, I ordered Juliette a new hat from Etsy and we tried it out today. Pretty sweet, don't you think? Both the baby girl and the hat. Thankfully it was warm out today, because we didn't have any clothes to go with the hat so we wore our birthday suit.

VOTE!!!

Tuesday is election day in Texas, so if you read this blog and live in Texas, get off your bottom and get out there and vote. And do some crazy caucus nonsense afterwards too. Because if I can drag my 2-month old out to a caucus at 7 pm, so can you.

Look, I'm not telling you who to vote for, just telling you to vote. But if you're really at a loss and need advice from a blog, vote for someone from Illinois. Because people from Illinois are cool. I'm from Illinois you know. And I'm clearly super-duper cool. And if you live in Budapest but are still officially residents of Texas, I hope you got your act together and submitted your absentee ballots. Slackers.

Cowboy up!

Well, it's that time of year again...Rodeo days. Last year, I was the most unprepared for the "Trailrider's Breakfast" at Hayden's school. I sent him in jeans and a regular shirt and everyone else was head-to-toe in cowboy regalia. This year, I made a more substantial effort, although it was difficult without breaking the bank. Hayden has a man-sized head but it's hard to find men's cowboy hats for less than $50. And don't even talk to me about boots. But it is priceless at the end of the day to see my men-folk all duded up in their gear.
Note to other mothers, don't dress your 2-year old in chaps if you're in the midst of potty training. It's hard enough as it is for the little guy, but even his daddy couldn't figure out how to work all the ties on the chaps. But he was awfully cute, wasn't he?

Issues...

When you find yourself picking brownie crumbs off your newborn baby's head (hmm, must have dropped them on there when I was feeding her and eating brownies at the same time) and trying to get chocolate stains off her clothes, it might be a sign that you have a little addiction to sweets. Maybe I need an intervention, because I'm pretty much able to polish off a whole pan of brownies single-handedly. And don't even get me started on the diet soda issue. Hey, I'm trying to hold my act together with three kids. At least I'm not hitting the liquor cabinet. Oh, how we can rationalize.

In other news, I gave blood for the first time in forever this weekend. Platelets actually. It was a triple-point day plus I got 100 bonus points for making my appointment online. Plus, with the platelets you can give every 48 hours or something, so I'm already eligible to give again. And, they let you pick the movie you want to watch while you're donating. The downside is that you're hooked up to the machine for an hour and a half and something they pump back into me makes my face all numb for about 15 minutes. Oh, and I feel like my hand is going to fall off after squeezing that stupid ball for so long. But hey, this weekend is triple bonus time again and they did have that Michael Clayton movie on DVD, so maybe I'll hit it again on Friday.

Oh, and this is for Allison. Isn't her new little guy a cutie? Allison is part of the third baby club at Hayden's school:

The Oscars...

Many years ago, I used to listed to a local morning radio show and try to win their many give-aways. One year, they broadcast the Oscars at a movie theatre and my friend Steph and I won tickets to go. It was kind of fun, because you filled out a card with your Oscar picks and the person who picked the most correct winners, won a year long unlimited movie pass for two people. Steph and I really wanted to win, but ended up one right choice short (we guessed the Barbra Streisand song from The Mirror Has Two Faces rather than the Madonna song from Evita for Best Song).

It sounds cheesy, going to a movie theatre to watch the Oscars with a bunch of strangers, but it was actually fun. But what struck me today when watching the Oscars, was that unlike 1996, when I had seen most of the movies, I had only seen one of this year's nominated films (Juno). And while I still love movies, I'm not really sad to have not seen too many this past year. There are, after all, three good reasons I don't go to the movies anymore. And those reasons were looking awfully cute today...

More new pictures on the KodakGallery site.

Ready for her close-up...

Presenting, the almost fully-recovered from the trauma of the doctor's visit, two month and one day old Miss Juliette...

Initially I wasn't sure what color her eyes were going to be. Hayden has green eyes and Trevor's are very blue. I'm now putting my money on blue for Miss J as well. I think they can change up to one-year old, but hers are becoming more blue rather than less. But they're more of a violet-blue than Trevor. Very Liz Taylor.

7 Good Reasons...

I'm pretty religious about taking pictures of the kids to document their age milestones. Their first birthday pictures aren't taken a week before or a week after their birthday, they're on the exact date. But here are seven reasons I don't have 2-month old pictures of Juliette from today...
Little Miss J had a seriously traumatic visit to the doctor today which ended up with most of her skin covered in band-aids. Five shots and two vials of blood drawn made Juliette not a happy camper. The shots were all standard vaccinations, but the bloodwork is to check on her lingering jaundice. Hopefully nothing is going on with her liver to cause her to still be so yellow (I PhotoShop her skin color a little, so you can't see the full effect here), but we're waiting on results of the blood tests.

This next shot was a moment of exhaustion for her. But for the rest of the afternoon and evening, she screamed every time I tried to lay her down, even for a diaper change. I think she thought another needle was coming at any moment.

In the meantime, Trevor traded a smile for a piece of candy since Mommy had the backdrop out and was itching for a cute face to photograph.

Juliette's trauma made me stay home and miss my photo session with our new friend Will (one of Juliette's numerous future suitors). But she seems to be on the mend already so hopefully we'll get to take Will's pictures next week.

Resemblance?

The general opinion on the street is that Juliette looks like Trevor. What do you think? I see it some, but I remember thinking Trevor as a baby looked so much like Hayden and I think they're very dissimilar now. So you never know.

I feel like I've been so busy, but don't have much to report. I've worked 4 parent-helper days at Hayden's school in the past 2 weeks, plus a 6-hour shift at his school's garage sale this past Saturday. So that's been the bulk of it. And clearing out the closets here in preparation for the garage sale. Lots of excitement and you're all jealous, I know.

My mother came to visit last week (Valentine's day is "Grandparent's Day" at Hayden's school, nice way to import a free babysitter). It looks like they're closing the reservations center she works at in Chicago sometime within the next year so guess what? She might be moving to Houston!?! Hayden is obviously thrilled and planning many sleepovers at Grandma's house in Houston when she moves. I just hope my grandparents come up with a plan to manage without her in Chicago.

I'm starting a continuing education class at Rice Univ. this week. The subject would probably bore most of you (Photographic Lighting), but I'm so excited about it. Every time I've looked at the class before, it's been filled up. And taking it while I'm off on maternity leave works well, because it's hard to work a full day and then leave the kids for 3+ hours at night once a week.

I just hope I don't get too much equipment envy being around other photographers, especially now that I'm on unpaid leave. I've really been eyeing this beautiful new camera too (Nikon D3), if only it didn't come with a $5000 price tag and require me to buy a new lens too...We can all dream, can't we? Someday, if I'm really good, maybe Santa will bring me one.

Look what arrived!!!!

Thank you Mama T for my lovely new hat. I think it looks just wonderful on my little head.

Bowl Cut...

I'm the first to admit that I'm too hard on Sean. When I send him to get the boys' hair cut, I inevitably criticize the results, because I'm pretty impossible to please. But I win the award for getting Trevor a bad hair cut yesterday night. Which I guess means I have to keep my mouth shut for all the times Sean does it in the future. But I probably won't. I digress...

I took Trevor to TGF at 7:30 last night because his hair was in his eyes and clearly making him 1) uncomfortable and 2) half blind. But Trevor's hair is kind of his signature. I rarely take him somewhere without someone commenting on how beautiful his hair is. Not the style, actually, but his actual hair. So I keep it a little long on top so people can see more of it.

Now TGF closes at 8 pm so they're annoyed when you come in at 7:30 especially when they've already got people waiting. So I should have just left. But I'm stubborn, so I stayed. Eventually the guy calls him over to the truck to get his haircut. I noticed a slight accent, but the guy didn't say much, so I just went into my standard instructions (same cut as he has now, just a little trim, up to the eyebrows in front, clippers on the bottom, scissors on the top, basic bowl cut). From then on, I'm really just there as a distraction for Trevor, holding his hand and feeding him candy.

So we're a good 15 minutes into the cut when I realize this guy didn't understand a word I said, and is just marching to the beat of his own drummer. This is the point at which I basically started screaming, "Stop! Stop right now! What are you doing to his hair? STOP!!!!" and I'm ripping the cape off the boy and pulling him out of the truck mid haircut.

All the other customers are gone at this point, but the other woman who works there comes over and asks what's the problem. And I say "this is not at all what I asked him to do, he has destroyed my baby's hair". She asks "What did you ask for?" I said "A bowl cut" At which point she responds "He doesn't speak much English so he must not have understood you and thought you said 'boy cut'. Besides, I've been cutting hair for 20 years and I've never heard of a bowl cut." Now I'm equally pissed at her. Google "bowl cut hairstyle" and you get 22,300 hits. It's classified as a "Classic" hairstyle. There may debate on whether or not it's a good hairstyle (most sentiment says no, but I think it's ok for kids, just bad for adults), but it is well-recognized as a style. Except at TGF, apparently, where it's unheard of. Freaking idiots.

So I took Trevor this afternoon for a correction of his half-cut from last night. They had to cut it pretty short and it looks bad. Out of consideration for the boy and given the fact that things on the internet live forever, I'm not posting a picture. Suffice it to say, he looks like a chump.

Sean's cousin Debbie was over the other day and wasn't happy with her new hairdo. She said "I don't think the woman spoke English." To which I smugly responded "Oh Debbie, I won't even let someone paint my toenails if they don't speak English." So my smugness got its just reward. It just happened to be visited upon my innocent little Trevor. So sad.

Friendly Guy...

I was in the checkout at Target tonight and the guy behind me decides to strike up a conversation. "How old is your baby?" he says. I'm confused for a minute, looking around for Juliette who I believe I left at home with Sean. Then I realize he's noticed the diapers in my cart (size 5 - for Trevor) and I say "The diapers are for my 2 year old." "I'm buying the same size for my son," he says. Interesting, really, I'm fascinated...we must be the only two people in the whole world buying size 5 diapers. "Do you have other kids?" he continues. "Yes, a 5 year-old and a newborn," I say.

Now mind you, after every response, I go back to staring off into space, trying to end the meaningless conversation. Actually, even when I'm responding, I'm not looking at him, I'm staring off into space. Yet he continues, "Are you having any more or are you done with three?" Yeah Target guy, this is something you need to know? I'm thinking of coming back with some response to make him really uncomfortable like "I'm planning to breastfeed for six years so I won't be able to get pregnant again until I start menstruating regularly." Will this stop the conversation? I'm not sure.

It isn't as if I flatter myself into thinking this guy is hitting on me. He's clearly not. But dude, I'm a mother of three with 30 minutes to myself. I got to go to Target and didn't have to bring a single kid with me. This is like a freaking spa day for me. Can I PLEASE just have one moment of peace?

Sorry, just a little rant. In other news, we've had some bug going through the house. About a week and a half ago I had a fever for two days. Then Hayden had a fever for three days last week. Now Trevor has it. So I've been busy trying to bribe my children to take Tylenol for the last week. Hopefully it ends with Trevor.

Oh, and in case you love cheesy portrait studio photos as much as I do, have a gander at this site.

Lucky #7 Here we are, seven years after the day we said "I do". We've gotten in the habit of taking a picture together every year on our anniversary, usually a self-portrait with the camera on self-timer. I'm not so certain I'm liking the tradition these days, since I don't know how kind the years have been. I'll have to dig out the others some day (most are pre-digital camera) and scan them in.

I remember the 2nd anniversary with the scrunched up newborn Hayden in our arms. He was only 11 days old I think. And now there are 5 of us. That's a lot of change in seven years, but it's been a fun adventure and I look forward to many more years with this little family we've built together. I love you honey. Happy anniversary.

Too fast...
What happened to that scrunched up little newborn baby I was holding just a few weeks ago? Where did this big girl come from?

By the way, I stayed strong through my first big girlie challenge today. I was returning the scale I rented at the baby store today, and was convinced to try a miniature bow in Juliette's hair. I was truly tempted to buy it despite my many professions while pregnant that I would not have a bow-headed baby. In the end, I walked out bow-less. Maybe it was the $9 price tag for a 2 cm bow for a baby who really doesn't have much hair.

Evacuation

At the beginning of January, they started some major road construction on our street that's supposed to last till mid-2010. Which is a really long time to be annoyed every day sitting in traffic trying to get to your driveway. So I was even more annoyed today when Trevor and I were coming home from dropping Hayden at school and found the street shut down completely in both directions several blocks away from our house. I tried cutting through the neighborhood and coming back from the other side, but was still blocked off. So I parked the car about a block away and got Trevor out and starting walking.

I asked a cop who was diverting traffic when I would be able to drive my van back to my house, and he said after they fixed the massive gas leak the road construction crew caused when they hit a gas line. So I continue towards the house, suddenly noticing a strong smell of gas. I asked another cop a little further down whether it was OK to go to my house. He asked for my address and then radioed someone and then said "no, your house is right where the leak is". So I mentioned some mild concern that my newborn baby and husband were at home. He said no, they evacuated everybody. I said it seemed strange that Sean wouldn't call my cell phone to tell me they had been evacuated.

So the cop volunteers to go down to the house to see if anyone is home. He comes back and says that Sean's car is still there, but there's no answer at the door. I'm still concerned about not knowing their whereabouts, so he takes Trevor and I in the squad car down towards the house. He tells me to leave Trevor with him while I go check in the house, and that if there's a problem inside, come flag him down. I think the implication was that if my family is asphyxiated, he'll radio for help. So I go in the house and Juliette's carrier is still inside so I call for Sean. He responds "What?" from the back bedroom. I shout "Did you not answer the door for any of the police trying to evacuate you?" "I was in the shower" he shouts back. So I grab the baby, car seat, and diaper bag and tell him to come on. Sean, always cool in the emergency, needs to comb his hair first so I leave without him. He joins us in the police car a minute later. The cop was pretty surprised to see me walking out with the baby he was so sure wasn't there. So Juliette had her first ride in a squad car at only one month old. That's one for the baby book.

We tried to come home a few hours later but the street was still blocked off. We finally were able to get into the house about 6 hours after the initial evacuation. Did I mention it was pajama day at Hayden's school so were were toting around the boys in their jammies this whole time? Eventually I stopped and bought them some pants when it was clear were weren't getting back in the house for a while. Obviously, the house didn't blow up, and the dogs were still alive when we came home. We did have to leave the doors open for a while to air out the gas smell though.

All in all, an exhausting day.

Vegetable Shots???

Hayden had his 5-year checkup today. We thought he was going to have to get one shot, but he managed to make it through unscathed. He's up to 46.5 lbs and 45.5 inches, which makes him 90th percentile in weight and 95th percentile in height. They checked his hearing and vision and other than hearing phantom "beeps" on the hearing test, he passed with flying colors.

Developmentally, he's fine. Although the only things they asked were whether he could identify 5 colors, skip, speak in past tense, tell a story, and engage in dramatic play. Maybe the nurse didn't want to take my word for it, because even though I told her he had that all covered, she still quizzed him on the color of his shirt, etc. Come on now, if you want to test the kid, pull out some medical manual and ask the kid to read it to you. Or grab a map and ask him to identify all the states and their capitals. Or ask him to count to 100, or for fun, have him count by fives. But colors? Don't insult the boy.

The doctor asked him if he eats his vegetables. He said no, he doesn't like vegetables. So the doctor, in a total deadpan, says that's fine, that he can just come in for his vegetable shots every week. And tells me to set up the appointments with the nurse when I leave. I love our pediatrician. Don't you know the kid was begging for green beans at dinner tonight.

Took a few pictures of the baby girl today. Trevor was willing to give her a kiss in exchange for some candy.

FIVE!!!!!

I can't seem to grasp the reality, but apparently we are now the parents of a five-year old. This sounds cliche, but it really does just seem like yesterday that he was born. Sean and I were parent-helpers at Hayden's school yesterday, and the teacher started circle time by lighting a candle and saying "Five years ago today, a light came into the world..." It really chokes me up, I'm such a sentimental sap. So here is a glance at our little light on his big day:

I KNOW I shouldn't complain, but...

I wish Miss Juliette was awake a little more during the day. Seriously, most people would be soooo thankful to have a 1-month old that sleeps pretty consistently 7-hours in a row at night and mostly just sleeps and eats during the day, and rarely cries. And I am happy and thankful, really. But I wish she would wake up and play with me a little more so I could get to know her. And really, open those eyes during the daytime so I can take a picture or two, please. You turned one month old today and I mostly ended up with pictures of you sleeping and pictures of your pretty blonde hair. Oh well, it's obviously better than being up all night with a screaming colicky baby.

And hey, I saw a movie this weekend. How lucky am I to have Sean mind the store while I go to see a movie with a girlfriend and have a yummy lunch? I saw Juno. I highly recommend it for anyone who likes quirky movies (think Napoleon Dynamite, Royal Tennanbaums, Rushmore...).

A few new pictures...

On the KodakGallery site. Now that I'm done with the birth announcements, I can post pics without spoiling the surprise.

Shhh...don't jinx it...

If I tell people, it might jinx things, so I'm only telling my closest friends (the internet). Miss Juliette slept 7 hours in a row last night. Sleep, glorious sleep. We usually set the alarm so I can wake her every 4 hours, but when Sean tapped me in the wee hours and said "are you getting up to feed her?", I said "Is she crying?". He said "No" so I promptly went back to sleep and didn't hear a peep from her till 7 am.

Miss J also had her first international visitor last night. Our friend Mike made the trip from Aberdeen, Scotland to see the new addition and have dinner with us. So for those of you in Hungary, Canda, Chicago, Pennsylvania, etc., what's your excuse for not visiting? What's that? You don't work for an oil company that pays your $5k airfare for you to attend some bogus training class and visit friends? Oh well, we're here and the doors are open if you can make the trip. We don't even make guests change diapers.

Once an engineer...

Always an engineer. I chart everything. If there are numbers, a chart must be created. Sean charts our utility usage. I chart the baby's milk intake and weight. Really quite sad, but her weight seems to be on a good course and she has a second chin now. Dr. Injac always says 11 lbs. is the magic number for sleeping through the night. Which, based on my extrapolation of the chart, looks like it will be on about Feb 10th. So only 28 more days before I get a full night's sleep. Although my old boss used to laugh at my sad attempts to plan the unplannable in life. But a girl can dream, right? Well, not if you're not getting any sleep.

Little Milestones...

Well, I survived my first day alone with all 3 kids yesterday. Although around 8 am, I was thinking I should call Erika and beg her to come rescue me. But I managed to get Hayden to school almost on time and we all had our hair combed and wore clean clothes, so I was pretty pleased with myself.

Finally placed the order for Juliette's birth announcements. Unfortunately, my address list is hopelessly out of date so I'm going to be struggling. If you're a friend and read this blog and you've moved since Trevor was born (June 2005), you'd better send me a note with your current address or you might not get an announcement. I went with a completely different style than the boys' announcements, so it took me forever to design, but I'm looking forward to the finished product, which has already shipped and should arrive here on Tuesday. But I felt guilty not having a matching announcement to the boys' that I could frame with theirs so I made one in that style too. I think it turned out pretty cute.

I also think I've done pretty good so far with Juliette being the 3rd child. I think I have at least as many pictures of her as I did of the boys. Maybe because it's easier with the digital camera. I was still on film when Trevor was born.

The other milestone is that we had our first date night tonight since Juliette was born. We went to see a play. It was nice, although it felt a little strange to be away from her so long. Poor Michele and David were saddled with all three of our kids and their son too. They're troopers though and came through with flying colors. Poor Logan looked exhausted by the time we got home though. Not fair keeping a 2-year old up till almost 11 pm. I wonder if Michele longs for the days when babysitting only involved watching Hayden. It doesn't seem like it was that long ago...

Clean Bill of Health...

Took Juliette to the pediatrician yesterday, for only the 5th visit in her 2 short weeks of life (NOT counting the 3 visits from the pediatrician before we left the hospital and the 3 days in the NICU). He has pronounced her to be perfectly healthy and in no further need of constant attention. She's back up above her birth weight (7 lb 4.7 oz last night) and has actually gained about 2 oz. per day over the past week (1 oz. per day is normal).

He said her jaundice looked much improved and didn't even feel the need to do a blood draw to check her bilirubin level. Which is nice because her poor heel looks like a pin cushion.

He even said I don't have to wake her at night to feed her. So I actually got 4 hours of sleep IN A ROW last night. But I did end up waking her up finally at 5 am because it didn't seem like I should let her sleep any longer and I'm not sure she'd ever wake herself up to eat.

All in all, pretty exciting, although I don't know what to do with myself when I'm not shuttling my newborn back and forth to the doctor's office. He doesn't want to see her again for SIX WEEKS!

I had my 2 week check-up yesterday as well. It was pretty uneventful. My OB/GYN said he was glad we made it through the whole ordeal of this pregnancy. I think he was pretty fed up with all my complications and being paged at 2 am on the weekends. I never blogged it all, since I was on the bedrest, but I ended up with cardiac issues, allergic reactions to medication, and a lot of annoying midnight trips to the hospital with contractions <5 min apart. So we're both glad that I'm not pregnant anymore, but the end result was worth it and Juliette is the perfect little angel so far.

I'm working furiously on her birth announcement, but working furiously means sitting waiting for her to wake up and open her eyes so I can take a picture. I also was hoping for a picture of all 3 kids together but I'm starting to think that's just a hopeless dream. We'll see what happens. There may be a lot of candy and bribery involved.

No Words...

Status check...

Saw the pediatrician again today. Juliette's bilirubin is up slightly to 16.2 (from 15.5 on Monday), but the doctor says that isn't really statistically significant. On the bright side, she has gained some weight: 4 ounces since Monday (she's up to 6 lb 12 oz). Of course, this means the bottle feeding is working so we're staying the course on that end. But we're free from blood draws till next Monday, which will be a nice relief for the baby girl.

I rented a scale today so I could measure how much she's consuming at each feeding. It's accurate to a tenth of an ounce so you weigh the baby before and after a feeding and you can tell how much they've eaten. Juliette is really sloppy with the bottle a drools half of her milk out the corner of her mouth so I can't tell how much she's taken. And of course, I've had no way of tracking how much she takes if she's breastfeeding. So the scale should help. So far I've measured 3 feedings today and she took almost twice as much from the bottle as from the breast, which is quite disappointing. But the jaundice really zaps their energy so I'm hoping this isn't a long-term issue. You do what you have to do though, right?

Juliette had her first trip to the baby gym today and quite enjoyed it. She seems to have a 20-min period of alertness in the late afternoon. I'm trying to convince her that earlier in the day gives better light for picture taking, but she seems to like 5 pm and 3 am best.

Here she is enjoying herself in the gym:

Here is what happens when the big brothers wake up from their naps and say "I remember this toy!"

But big brothers aren't all bad, and can be especially sweet on occasion.

Home again...
As you can see, the family is resting at home again, although clearly some of us are getting more rest than others.

Juliette was discharged from the NICU on Saturday. After they discontinued her phototherapy, her bilirubin rebounded slightly from 9.5 to 11.3, but the neonatologists said it was still low enough to send her home. When we saw the pediatrician on Monday, she was up to 15.5, so we're going back for another check tomorrow (Wednesday). Hopefully, we've hit a plateau or gone down. A bilirubin of 20 or more is kind of the magic number that will send us back to the hospital. The pediatrician is optimistic that we'll avoid that, but indicated some babies stay at the ~15 level for several months, especially breastfed babies.

Juliette lost a few ounces since we left the hospital, so we're trying to feed her more agressively now. The pediatrician recommended that we bottle feed her, since she's very drowsy and it takes less effort for her to get milk from the bottle. Which means I spend about 20 minutes pumping milk, then 20 minutes giving her a bottle. And the process repeats itself about every 2 hours which doesn't leave much time for anything else, like sleep. So I'm hopeful that she's gained some weight at her check-up tomorrow and maybe we can stop the bottle feeding soon.

Sean goes back to work tomorrow. Poor him and poor us. The daytime should be fine, since Erika will come back tomorrow and will be in charge of the boys during the day. But if he has to go to work in the morning, that leaves me on my own for the night shift. He usually takes the diaper phase of the feeding process which buys me an extra 5 minutes of sleep at least. I will miss those precious minutes.

Oh well, been at the computer much too long. I'm so relieved we're starting to get some semblance of normalcy to our routine and I finally had some time to take a few pictures today. One is posted above and a few others are on the KodakGallery page.

Happy New Year!

Spoke too soon...

I'm posting from my Blackberry. This is a first for me, but there have been a lot of firsts this week.

The last few days haven't gone as expected. We took Juliette to her pediatrician for a check-up on Wednesday (the day after Christmas) and she was diagnosed as being dangerously jaundiced and requiring immediate treatment. So we have been at the NICU at Texas Childrens' Hospital since then. She's been receiving IV fluids and phototherapy and the treatment has been very effective so far. The doctors are very optimistic that she wasn't at sustained high levels long enough to cause permanent damage and neurologically she seems fine. They discontinued the phototherapy this morning and we'll see whether her bilirubin rebounds substantially. If not, she'll probably be discharged tomorrow.

The experience has been stressful, certainly, but we're thankful for so much. I've been able to stay at the Ronald McDonald house here which is on the same floor as the NICU. So I can get an hour or two of sleep between feedings at night.

We're lucky to live only a few miles down the road so Sean and the boys can come and go (although the boys aren't allowed in the NICU, it allows Sean and I to rotate out).

The Ronald McDonald house is so wonderful and the kids can watch tv and read books and play in there during the day which is so much better than being bored and stir crazy in a hospital lobby.

Seeing all these sick kids in the NICU makes us so thankful that our Juliette was born at 36 weeks, and not 27. Despite this recent episode, we know that ultimately we'll get to take home a healthy baby and there are so many families who can't say the same.

We're fortunate to have such a great medical staff here who responded so fast to her condition and seem to genuinely care about every baby they treat. And we're so lucky to have the insurance and financial means to get her the treatment she needs and not worry about how to pay for it (well maybe Sean worries, but really, it isn't a hardship to us).

Wishing you all many wonderful things in the new year. If I ever leave this hospital, I'll try to post some pictures from Christmas.

Not exactly as planned...

Well, things didn't go exactly as planned last week, but the outcome was good just the same.

We went to the hospital first thing Thursday for the amnio. First of all, never get your amnio done by a person who is doing the procedure for the first time in their ENTIRE life. I might as well have had Sean hold the needle. The instructor (i.e. real doctor) was actually yelling at the guy doing the procedure the entire time. Things like "butterfingers" and "what are you doing?" and "can't you feel that?" were angrily directed towards him as he helplessly tried to draw up a vial of amniotic fluid. But overall, I don't think you could have a worse amnio, and it still wasn't all that uncomfortable, more tragic comedy than anything else.

But an hour later, we got the results: the baby's lungs weren't mature enough to proceed with delivery. So the hospital threw me out, sending me to my doctor for a Rhogam shot (I'm Rh negative, Sean is positive, so any time there's a possibility the baby's blood has come in contact with mine, I have to get a shot). I get to the doctor's and he says "What the hell are you doing here?" and I say "The hospital sent me" and he says "They're supposed to hold you for 24-hour observation in case the amnio broke your water or something". So he proceeds to call and yell at the hospital and sends me back there. So I sent Sean home and sat there twiddling my thumbs for 24 hours while they monitored the baby's heart rate and my contractions. Nothing too exciting.

The next morning, my doctor comes to visit me and says that he's sending me home and we can schedule my delivery for next Friday (the 28th). So we chat for a bit and he's about to leave and I say "don't you want to check my cervix, just in case these contractions have actually become productive?" So he says "yeah, sure, let's do that since we're going into the weekend". And then about 60 seconds later he says "OK, go ahead and call Sean because it looks like we're going to have a baby today after all." So by some miracle after 2 months of continuous yet non-productive contractions, I had dilated since my office visit on Tuesday and was in real labor after all. So mature lungs or not, it was time to go. Things went pretty quickly after that.

Juliette Claire entered the world at 2:02 pm on Friday, Dec 21st. We got a little suprise during her delivery when the doctor discovered that her umbilical cord had a complete knot in it. I'll post a picture at some point. Needless to say, the doctor was relieved we delivered when we did, since that knot could have cut off her blood flow and killed her at any time. And we were thankful too, since we know someone who lost a full-term baby to a knotted umbilical cord and can't imagine the grief if something like that happened to our precious, long-awaited angel. Juliette needed oxygen for an hour or so, but didn't have to go to the NICU at all, thus disproving the "not mature" lung test results of the amnio from the previous day. She was fully baked and ready to roll.

We spent the usual sleepless nights in the hospital and despite some mild jaundice, came home today to spend Christmas Eve with our newly expanded family. Juliette has been awake for less than 5 minutes since we've been home. She refuses to open her eyes to see her new room, but maybe later. Updated pictures can be found on the McLaughlin family KodakGallery page (link on the right).

May all the blessings of Christmas be as abundant in your house as they have been in our home this year.

The end is near...
I am officially now more pregnant than I have ever been in my entire life. Having two pre-term babies wasn't fun, but being more pregnant than you ever expected to be is kind of annoying too. But I'm thankful to have made it this far and it looks like today will be my last pregnant day ever. So I had to preserve the moment with a photo. I'm going into the hospital in the morning for an amnio and if the baby's lungs look good, we should have her sometime later in the day. So think good thoughts for us and we'll keep you posted.

Down for the count...

Sorry belly fans, no pictures this week, or any time soon probably. I went to the doctor last Tuesday because I was having pretty frequent contractions. He checked me out and determined my cervix has already softened and effaced, which is a big no-no at 27 weeks. So he checked me into the hospital and I spent last week on a nice combination of magnesium (to stop the labor) and phenegran (for the nausea, but it puts me in a nice near-comatose state). I've been released from the hospital, with a pump that puts terbutaline into my leg 24/7 to try to keep my contractions under control. I get 2 hours per day hooked up to a contraction monitor which then transmits data to a nurse who calls and hassles me about how many contractions I'm having (if it's more than 4/hour, I get an extra dose from the pump and have to monitor for another hour). The rest of my days for the next 8 weeks will apparently consist of bedrest and occasional trips to the bathroom, maybe even a shower once in a while.

Decorating the baby's room? Not gonna happen apparently. Halloween pictures of the young Alex Rodriguez (Hayden) and Derek Jeter (Trevor)? Not gonna happen. Family Christmas card pictures? So sad, not this year. I'm trying to keep positive about this. The goal is to have a healthy baby GIRL who gets to come home from the hospital with me. So if that means 8 weeks of complete and utter boredom, sign me up. I'm with the program. How much I wish we had a laptop computer though. The doctor did tell me Monday that I get a few minutes per day of upright time sitting at the computer. I've just about exhausted that though, so goodbye for now.

Whatever...
I'm just annoyed today. Can't find anything, too dark to take pictures, backdrop stand is broken. 15 minutes late for a block party and Sean and the kids aren't even awake. Optimism about selling the old house in the first week is fading fast. Skin stretched to the point where it hurts. Boxes EVERYWHERE still. Trevor got first stitches this weekend (metal baby gate fell on back of head); questioning legitimacy of pediatrician who sews skin closed using child's own hair. Ready to throw out everything that isn't unpacked yet. Not interested in meeting new neighbors. Blech! One of those days.

Still experiencing technical difficulties...

The Comcast guy finally came, but apparently wasn't the right guy. He can only activate existing cable jacks, not install new jacks. Well, we told the person on the phone we needed new jacks. "That's a separate service call. After they install the jacks, I can come back and activate them." Arrrggghhh! Well, with a 1971-vintage house, you don't have cable jacks in every room. We did have one in the den behind where we put the entertainment center, so we were able to watch the disappointing Yankees loss to the non-PC-named team from Cleveland. I especially liked game 2 where they had some bizarre insects swarm the field and attack the players.

ButI digress. The lack of internet at the house, coupled with the massive amount of work to get the old house ready for listing, means that we went another week without the belly pics. But trust me, there's still a belly, and it's darned big. Once I unpack my stand and backdrop and have 20 minutes of free time during daylight hours, I'll take a pic for posting, I promise. The other issue with the pics is that since I include my head and face, it seems like I should shower and dry my hair first. That makes the whole thing a much bigger hassle when you're doing cleaning, moving and unpacking. I think that's why I did the decapitated pictures my first pregnancy. No primping required.

Oh well, off to parent-teacher conference at Hayden's school. Wonder what they'll say about him?

Disconnected...

That's what I've been. We made it to NYC and back successfully and closed on the new house and moved in. But the @#*&##'s at Comcast still don't have our cable or internet hooked up so I've been completely offline except for my Crackberry. I haven't done pregnancy pics for the last two Sundays but just take the last pic and adjust the width by 200% and you'll have a good idea of what I look like.

I'm almost glad to be back at work today because the overwhelming pile on my desk is nothing compared to the pile of boxes at the house. But, we're gradually settling in, even though Trevor keeps saying he wants to go "home". I tell him this is our home now, but I don't think he's accepting it just yet. I'm sure it doesn't help that they've been asked to just entertain themselves and stay out of the way for the past week-plus. And their diet has been almost 100% fast food and candy. And their sleep schedule is totally out of whack. But hey, they're kids, they can adjust, right?

Some things I love about the new house/neighborhood:

• Whole Foods Mkt only 3 blocks away
• "Fire Engine" park only 5 blocks away
• Great elementary school ~8 blocks away
• My work 2.4 miles away

Number of times in my life I am likely to walk or bike to any of these places: ZERO. But it's nice to have such short drives in my future :-)

Roommate update...

Bedtime was relatively uneventful last night and both boys went to sleep without much ruckus. Trevor woke up at 4 am and was crying because his nose was stuffed up. He went back to sleep pretty quickly after that. But when I peeked in at 7 am, I found Trevor snuggled up next to Hayden with his blankies covering both of them and Hayden's arm draped over his shoulder. Hayden said "He was feeling scared and wanted me to keep him company." That's what big brothers are for, right?

Apparently, I wasn't thinking ahead...

When I first did the layout on the pregnancy picture, the idea was to have them all exactly alike, so if you wanted to, you could do a slideshow of them and it would be like a time-lapse video of the explosion of my belly. But apparently, I didn't have enough foresight because I'm going to have to change the layout. If I don't make the pictures wider, my enormous belly is going to run off the page or else the elbows overlap from the front and side shots. Guess I didn't think I was going to get this big. And hopefully no issues and baby stays put for a long, long time. A few contractions were threatening last week, but they've eased off now.

What else? So much. Trevor has Fifth Disease, which sounds scary, but is really just a virus that most kids get at some point or another that has an associated rash. So no big deal, except it can be dangerous to pregnant women and causes something crazy like 5% miscarriages if you get it in your first 20 weeks. Fortunately, I'm past 20 weeks, and also apparently am immune from some earlier exposure in my lifetime. It only took 1 doctor's visit and 50 badgering phone calls to get this reassuring information. Gotta love that office staff.

We're packing furiously as the movers are supposed to come on the 26th, which is 2 days after we get back from NYC. I still need to hire a painter and a carpet company and a carpenter to work on our house to get it ready to sell. Oh, and a furniture staging company too. But we're 10% packed so it shouldn't be any issue figuring all that out in the next 4 days, right? Arrgghh! Stress!

My friends apparently weren't impressed with the tacky 70s retro flair of our new house and think I need to get HGTV on the case to rescue me. I'm open to all free renovations that are offered, but otherwise, 2 mortgages and no job (long unpaid maternity leave coming up) mean I'm putting on my polyester leisure suit and ABBA records and living the 70s dream.

Oh, and we put Trevor's bed in Hayden's room so we can re-convert our "nursery" to a closet so it will appeal to someone other than us. So today we had 2+ hours of everything but napping at nap time. Since they're going to be sharing a room permanently at the new house, I hope the novelty of sharing a room wears off quickly. But either way, they'll eventually be exhausted enough to sleep, right? Please just humor me here.

22 weeks...people are starting to feel up my belly

I guess I'm at the point where I'm so obviously pregnant that strangers feel like they're allowed to touch me. Maybe I should write to Miss Manners for some advice. Is "Get your damned hands off me?" a socially acceptable response? Or while somebody is in mid-grope and asks "Is this OK?" can I say "If it wasn't, now would be a little late to ask, wouldn't it?" I just don't respond at all.

I've been remiss in blogging lately. I never even caught up with Hayden's first day of school pictures. This whole house thing has been all-consuming and probably will be for at least another month. Right now we're scheduled to close on Sept 28th and somehow need to find movers, pack our stuff, get our house ready to sell, find a realtor, list the house, etc. etc. etc. between now and then.

We've cut the Northeast vacation short, which probably works out for the best since we didn't have anywhere to stay and don't need to blow any extra cash right now. I'm still trying to find accomodations for while we're in NYC for the Yankees games. I'm seriously considering staying in New Jersey at this point. Gotta love the Garden State, right? I can show the kiddos the cute little Cape Cod house I lived in on River Road in Piscataway. "Look kids, here's where Mommy's car got stuck in a snowbank and people she knew just drove past while she was digging herself out like a dog using nothing but an ice scraper." Oh, the fond memories.

Oh well, need to jet off to Lowe's to see if I can get some cute, cheap light fixtures to make this townhouse say "BUY ME NOW!!!"

Happy Labor Day...no, I'm not in labor

I'll keep this post short so as not to distract you from the shameless solicitation attempt below (please see post from Sept 1st). So here's a picture of my newfound enormousness.