Welcome Home Joshie!

Look at what Andy and the kids made for us!

Isn't that the sweetest! I love that man of mine!

He's here!!!!!!!

Thursday around 11:00 pm I was sitting downstairs with Cecilia and I was working on my new web site. I couldn't get comfy for nothing. My lower back was starting to hurt off and on. I then started getting these cramps that kind of felt like diarrhea cramps and had to get up to either pee or have a (tmi) loose bm. This went on until I finally gave up and crawled into bed at 12:45.

I kept having those cramps all night long. I just assumed they were due to a tummy bug that we had running through the house. The boys both had it recently and I just figured I'd picked it up.

So, all night long I kept having these cramps and it didn't matter what position I was in. They kept coming and hitting my back which really hurt. Finally at 4:15 I got up to pee and had one while walking and thought hmmm...could this be.... nah and headed back to bed. No sooner than I laid my head back down I got another one and it was so painful that I shot up out of bed. I guess I was moaning pretty loud because Andy then asked me if everything was okay. I told him what was going on and then told him to try and stay close to the area at work today because I wasn't sure what was going on.

He asked me to go downstairs and see if changing position made a difference and he got up to take a shower. I came down and started looking on the internet to diarrhea cramps and labor and viola, they coexist...

I called my OB at 5:30 and told him what was going on. He told me that it sounded like labor and to head to L&D. Andy got the kids up and I got dressed and finished packing my bags and we headed out the door at 6:00.

At 6:30 I was at L&D (oh and funny thing, Andy dropped me off at the front lobby and Cecilia came with me. Well I had a huge contraction right there and these two "Doctors" just walked right by me). They got me hooked up to the monitors and all and per my Doctor he wanted them to put me on an IV to rule out dehydration as a cause of the contractions.

An hour later and they intensified! They called him and he came over to personally check my cervix. I was about 1 cm dilated from a dimple 2 weeks ago, but I was 50% effaced! He said I was in labor! first time ever!

So this was at 9:10 and we were scheduled for the c-section at 9:30! talk about super quick!

I got back to the OR at around 9:45 and they got me numbed up and started the surgery at around 10:00. Joshua Anthony was born at 10:20 butt first mooning the world! He weighed 6lbs 8oz and was 19 3/4" long. He scored an 8 and 9 on his apgar tests respectively.

The Pedi saw him today and said he is absolutely perfect! He got his circ this morning too. 1 hour after he was born they brought him to me in recovery and he started nursing right on the spot. He's such an awesome nurser! No problems whatsoever.

I had my catheter removed this morning AND got to get up last night at 12 hours after surgery to walk a little bit and get cleaned up. I took my shower this morning at 24 hours past surgery and boy that shower never felt sooooooo good!

I'm just on pain meds right now and I'm a bit tender, but doing very good. In fact the nurses are fighting over me to be their patient because I'm not complaining.

So, this is day 2 in the hospital and I could possibly go home as early as tomorrow but my target date is this Sunday, Father's day.

I'm shooting for tomorrow but not getting my hopes up.

Here are some pictures of Joshua from today, 1 day old


Look at all his hair! And I had no heartburn with this pregnancy at all!

Cecilia couldn't wait to hold him.

Check out that grin on that bigger brother! He was so excited!


Oh and I have to share this. The kids are being so awesome! Cecilia is over the moon and keeps saying how gorgeous he is. Andrew keeps going around telling everyone here how he's the bigger brother and all he asked for yesterday was when he could hold him. James was so excited to see him but is a little bit afraid in a way. BUT he is so protective it's so cute! Everything he does or anyone does to him, James asks what's going on. I was pushing the bassinet in the hallway today and he told me that I was pushing Joshie too fast and that I needed to slow down.

36w6d appointment

Well, I asked my OBGyn today about my feet swelling and he just said this is just par for the course. :( Not my idea of a good answer. He also said getting into a pool and swimming (lightly, moving my legs and such) would possibly help displace some of the water I'm retaining.

Yeah, and about that... In the last 2 weeks I've gained 6lbs! He's pretty sure that it's due to water retention (no, really?). I'm just so miserable.

This morning I woke up and used the potty and Joshua was lounging over on my left side. Scared the poo out of me, he's never been that far over before. I asked my Doc if it was okay to sleep on my right side and he said yes. I don't know though, that really frightened me. I think as much as I'm so comfortable sleeping on my right side (more like sleeping on my tummy) I'm going to try my best to stay on the left side.

Anyway, my blood pressure was excellent (neglected to find out what it was) and my labs came back good (no protein in the urine or sugar), so it's business as usual. He wants me to check my blood pressure at home on Thursday to make sure it's not going up and if it is, or if I have wicked headaches OR Joshie's movements seem to become non existent; then I'm to call on Thursday and he'll see me on Friday for a possible c-section.

I found out today that Cecilia was born at 35w3d, Andrew was born at 37w3d and James at 37w4d. If I make it to this Sunday, that will be a record for me in terms of length of pregnancy. I go back again next Tuesday and that will be my last doctor visit until the c-section on July 1st.

So, the betting has begun. Or really it did a while back but it's getting down to the nitty gritty.

Cecilia and Andy say Joshie is coming this Sunday (Father's Day). I say this Thursday, but after my vist today I'm thinking of going back to my original date of July 1st. James says this next Monday (the 22nd) and Andrew says next Wednesday.

I guess we'll see who's right. ;)

My poor feet :(

Ugh, this pregnancy is killing me during this last month. My feet have swollen up so badly in the evenings that it's painful to walk. :(

I've got creases at the backs of my feet from when I bend them. My toes are so fat, my feet are so fat, you can even see the indentation my flip flops make into them. I just want to cry.

A new site!

Well, I've decided to get my diaper bag business back up and running but wanted to do something different than what I had before. I kept bouncing names off of my Hubby and told him that I wanted something unique and different; but not necessarily baby related.

I suggested the names Ranch Dressing, Spicy Jalapeno and my daughter suggested Pecan Pralines. Well Andy suggested The Spicy Pepper and it was the only one that wasn't taken; so I nabbed it.

I've been working with a friend of mine who does web design for a living and she suggested I talk a look at Joomla; which I've tried before but was a bit intimidated by it.

I gave in and tried it and tinkered with a few templates. The new site is in the works and is up and running, now I just need to get the shopping cart loaded and configured and I'll be good to go.

So, tell me what you think...

www.thespicypepper.com

WOO HOO for the potty fairy!

Okay, so some of you know that I've been struggling to get James my 4.5 year old potty trained. My Pedi was quite peeved at me when I took him in for his 4 year old check up in November and he was still in pull ups. :( He told me that I had 6 months to get him out of the pull ups and trained or he'd have to run a series of tests on him to make sure there was nothing developmentally wrong with him.

This pissed me off something fierce... Don't even get me started on how my husband felt. Needless to say, we changed Pedi's soon after that and I started working on getting him potty trained.

I went and bought the Peter Potty system from Walmart, you know that stand up urinal for potty training boys. James immediately took to it and within a matter of 2 months (he's hard headed, did I mention that) we finally had him going pee on the potty.

1 down, 1 to go!

Well, I've been trying since February to get him to poo on the potty and to no availe. I've even taken away playing th Wii, taken away playing on the computer and took away his Geotracks. I figured hit him where it hurts and he'd come around...

Nope! He doesn't care, he'd found other things to play with. Ugh! Stubborn little guy. Well, I finally figured out that when he had to do his business, he'd run up stairs into his room and shut the door so we've been trying to catch him to stop him in his tracks.

Well, what ended up happening is that he'd hold it in so much and for so long that he'd end up just going little bits in his underwear. We'd go through about 5 pairs of underwear a day. :(

I didn't think the day would come. I even told him that he can't start Kindergarten next school year because he wouldn't poo in the potty; it didn't even phase him. I thought great, I've got a new born baby coming very soon and I'm going to be changing poopy 4.5 year old pants and new born...AAAAAHHHHHH!

So guess what happened... Andrew is now home for summer vacation after finishing Kindergarten so I asked him a while back if he caught James taking off to do his business in his pants to lure him into the bathroom. Well, he got home yesterday from watching Night at the Museum 2 with his cousin and had to do his business.

James was interested and so he followed Andrew into the bathroom. Andrew is on the big potty and so he convinced James to sit on his potty (the training one). Andrew did his business AND SO DID JAMES! WOO HOO!

Andrew even went so far as to empty out the bowl from James' potty into the big potty, wiped his bottom and flushed it all down the commode. He informed me after the fact that James pooed.

I was so excited that I baked him (James) home made from scratch chocolate chip cookies! I told Andrew that if he got James to go again in the potty to call me before he flushed anything.

Low and behold this morning Andrew had to go potty and so did James. Same routine as yesterday, this time I got called in and OH MY GOODNESS!!!! James pooped out two huge pieces of poo! I have never been so excited in my life to talk about bodily functions, but I have to say I am SO EXCITED!

So, as a reward for the both of them we went to the store this afternoon and I bought them the game Mouse trap. Andrew played it at school during his last week and was really wanting it. Anything Andrew does/wants James does/wants too; so I got a 2 for 1 deal there. ;)

Now we just have to make sure we get James to hit the potty instead of his room and I should hopefully have him fully potty trained before Joshua gets here!

Yippee!

I'm going to miss Miss Simmons!

Today Andrew brought home a bunch of stuff from school as they are getting ready for the last week. In his take home folder there was a letter addressed to his parents. I opened it up and found this (click the picture to see a full size version):

I balled my eyes out! OMG, I couldn't get through the entire thing. Poor Andrew kept asking me why I was crying. :) I was so touched. I'm really going to miss his Kindergarten teacher. I wish she was moving up with the kids.

Ugh, more contractions!

Just like the energizer bunny... I keep going and going and going. Ugh!

They are not consistant, but they are increasing in strength. I wonder if I'll make it until the 1st?