Jackson Edward

Since it’s been almost 1 month since Jackson was born, I figured I would tell his birth story, even though it’s not too exciting!

September 1st came and went, I knew he wouldn’t be born on his due date (as much as I really wanted him to be).  At that time, I knew I would have to be induced.  The rest of that week I had mild to moderate contractions, but they weren’t consistent enough to make me think anything was happening.  Wednesday, September 7th, went SO slowly!  My dad, Livi and I went shopping for her birthday, then we came home and I cleaned while she napped.  Jason came home from work and I didn’t feel like making dinner so he got Grinders.  We finished cleaning and waited for AC & Sarah to arrive.  I knew by the time they got here it would be closer to baby time!

That night when it was time for Livi to go to bed we all put her to bed.  She did NOT want to go to sleep though.  She cried and screamed and we left her, but I couldn’t do it.  After a while I went back to her room and scratched her back and just sobbed.  I knew that 24 hours from then, or less, that life was going to be different and so I wanted to spend as much last minute time with her as I could.

I wanted to go to bed early, but that didn’t happen.  It was after midnight when I finally layed down, but I definitely didn’t go to sleep right away.  I think I woke up a million times looking at the clock, hoping for 4:30.  It finally came and I got up to get ready.  We got to the hospital at 6am sharp, Jason dropped me off and I headed up to L&D to get admitted.  Unlike last time, I sent my pre-registration card so that didn’t take 20 minutes, I was in and back to my room within 10 minutes.  The next 12 1/2 hours could start!

They didn’t start pitocin until 8am so labor didn’t take as long.  Pitocin started, then I got some pain meds, just to take the edge off…and it did!  I forget what it’s called, but it makes me feel higher than a kite and very sleepy.  I was able to rest a lot this time.  The broke my water around 12, I don’t think I will ever get used to that feeling…I got an epidural after that, but I can’t remember when.  With Livi I pushed the “extra dose” button a lot, but this time I didn’t have to.  I pushed it 3 times and after the third they checked me and I was 9.5cm (it definitely went a lot quicker).  The nurse called my doc (which I was happy to have there!) and she wanted to know if they wanted me to start pushing or wait the extra .5cm. She came to check me herself and said I could start pushing.  My cervix was “moveable” enough to push it over his head so they didn’t wait until 10cm.  I pushed for 5 contractions (I think), which ended up to be 10 minutes and Jackson was here!!

They laid him on my chest and he peed on me   I can’t explain the joy, but you moms out there know what I am talking about.  I wasn’t sure if I would be as ecstatic this time, since he was our 2nd, but the joy was the same as it was with Livi.

Shortly after, Jason brought Livi back and she got to meet her little brother!  They moved me to my recovery room about an hour later and the families came up to meet him.  I can say now that breastfeeding is a success.  I think that having everyone in the room after Livi was born was part of the reason why it didn’t work with her, plus, I gave up to easily.  This time it’s much easier, I’m probably a lot more relaxed about it too.  It’s nice to not have to buy formula!

That’s my birth story…not as exciting as it would have been had I gone into labor on my own, but I’m ok with that!

1 week…

1 more week…eek!  I’m not excited or anything   Although, it will probably be more than a week exactly, but we’ll see.  On Tuesday I was still JUST 1 cm and not even effaced yet.  But I know that doesn’t mean I couldn’t go into labor at any moment. 
I just hope if he does decide to come early, that he does it in the next 2 days or waits until the 29th.  Noah’s birthday is on the 28th and I really don’t want to share birthdays, especially with a family member.  He also needs to wait until after the 28th because we are planning on FINALLY getting his room put together on Sunday.  With Jason going back to school this week he has been too tired in the evenings to work on the room, and what needs done is mostly putting boxes into storage and I can’t exactly lift them.  Then tonight he starts another master’s class and tomorrow night is the first football game…so after that Jackson can come whenever he wants!

The last few nights Livi has been getting up and crying.  Not that I’m not exhausted already, but having her wake me up makes me more tired.  I’m not really sure why she’s been doing this.  Last night and the night before we had some storms and maybe that’s what woke her up?  She wakes up crying and calling out for us.  The first night Jason got up with her and she wanted him to rub her back, she eventually fell back to sleep.  Then about an hour later she did the same thing, so I got up and went to her…same thing the next night, only she woke up 3 times.  The 3rd time Jason said “just let her go, she’ll go back to sleep” and she did, faster than she did when we went in with her.  She did the same thing last night, but it was only once and she cried for a minute, laid back down and then fell right to sleep.  I sure hope this stops.  I also hope with Jackson being around that she doesn’t wake up every time he cries because I’m not so sure it will be as easy to get her to go back to sleep. 

I have to admit, I’ve been super hormonal lately…and I don’t like it.  I don’t remember being this bad with Livi, but I’d have to ask Jason, he would remember   I’ll be glad when these hormones have gone back to whatever is considered normal.  I just don’t like how I have ZERO patience for anything and anyone.  I find myself snapping at everyone, even the dogs, and it’s just not good.  I know I’m not always the most even-tempered person without extra pregnancy hormones, but I try not to fly off the handle about everything.  This is definitely something I will not miss about being pregnant!  I need to work on this for the last week+, because I have a feeling it could only get worse as I get more and more uncomfortable.  Pray for that

Back to work, which consists of sitting here at the computer doing absolutely nothing!

Full term!!

I am considered full term today!  I know this means that Jackson could possibly make his debut at any time, but I’m not sure I’m ready, lol.  Every day I change my mind, especially on the days when I’m sore and tired and the contractions get in the way of getting things done.  But I think I’ll be happier knowing that he is healthier by staying put for 3 more weeks (if he’s anything like his sister he will).  Plus, his room isn’t completely ready for him and neither is our room (where he’ll be spending his nights for the first month or so).  I also won’t face any un-paid days if he comes later.  I fully plan on coming back to work on October 31st and if he were to come earlier than I’ve planned for I won’t get paid for it all. 

My contractions have increasingly gotten more painful but they aren’t lasting for very long and are still sporadic.  My doc said that I’m at 1cm, which is what I was with Livi for the last 3 weeks, so I wonder if this will be the same or if I’ll progress more?  Time will tell.  She did inform me that she will be gone on my due date and isn’t coming back until September 7th.  I know I posted this on facebook the other day, but I was disappointed!  She didn’t deliver Livi because the day I was supposed to be induced she was there all day (15 babies delivered in 12 hours-that’s why they sent me home…I wonder what they would have done had I actually been in labor since they had no rooms in L&D or postpartum?).  So the next day when I came back she came in to tell me that she was going home because she’d been there for over 24 hours.  So what?!  Stay for me!  That’s what I wanted to say to her (plus, she could have gone home and rested for about 13 hours).  I got stuck with the doctor I liked the least and the only man in her practice (and the one I just knew my luck would bring me).  He was good, and when push came to shove (no pun intended ) I didn’t care who was there.  Thankfully my nurse was amazing.  I was just really hoping to have my doc because I’m fairly certain this will be the last pregnancy with her.  I like her and the nurses are good, but I don’t like driving up there for every appointment.  It usually takes about 20 minutes to get there, depending on time of day and traffic, and then I have to park what seems like a mile away, pay for parking, walk to the office and then after my appt, walk back to the garage…I’d rather go to a dr who has an office that is close to home or closer than this one.  I have a lot of time to think about it, this pregnancy isn’t even over yet!  Plus we’re planning on waiting a little longer between Jackson and #3 (if God allows us to have more).  I guess I’ll be just fine with whomever delivers, as long as I don’t have to be induced this time

already?!

I can’t believe it’s August already!  That means I am 1 month from my due date today!  I really am amazed at how fast it’s been.  Sure there have been days and weeks when it just seemed like I would never get to this point, but here I am!  I’m really excited…now just trying to work on getting things crossed off of my list!  Slowly making progress, but really hoping to get a good chunk done this week!

My sister-in-law, Sarah, is having a shower for me on Saturday.  It is at our house (because she lives in Dayton which is about an hour or so from Columbus, and because I didn’t want to have it at our church again, since we didn’t invite a ton of people), so that’s a big reason for wanting to get a lot of my list done this week.  BUT I’m ahead of the game, I’m trying not to wear myself out by marathon cleaning all in one evening, but by getting little bits done each night or day.  Luckily I’m back to my regular work schedule this week, so I have Tuesday and Wednesday off to get some things accomplished.  And even though Jason has football every evening this week, he had said we can work on things after he gets home and after Livi, aka “terror-girl” goes to bed

I call her “terror-girl” because lately, that’s how she has been.  Twice in the last week she has decided to take her poop out of her diaper and put it on everything in her room…the 1st time was worse than the 2nd time (thankfully, since I’m the one that caught her on the 2nd time!), but it still makes for a stressful time.  I’m not really sure why she does this, but I think we have a way to stop it.  We’ll see if it happens again, which I’m praying it doesn’t! 
She has also started saying “NO!” a lot more.  She used to just answer “no” to every question she was asked, but now…when we tell her to do something it’s “NOOOOO!”.  The way she says it is so cute, but we’re trying to get her to understand that she doesn’t say no when she’s told to something!  It’s so frustrating, but we’re coping. 

We finally had the relaxing weekend I’ve been waiting for!  But I won’t bore you with the boring-ness that was the weekend

This weekend was the first weekend in a while where we haven’t had a ton to do!  Yay!

Friday Jason had football.  I was bored to tears-literally- and really wanted to go somewhere with Livi, but we just watched tv and played for a while.  When Jason got home we went to Rooster’s.  Yum.

Saturday Jason had football again (this is ONLY the beginning…) and I of course, was still bored with staying home.  I thought about taking Livi to COSI, but I didn’t know how she would do, and if I could handle it by myself.  So, we put our swimming suits on and filled her pool.  It was nice to just stick my feet in and that actually kept me cool.  When Jason got home and Livi got up from her nap we went back out for a little while and I actually sat in the pool this time…oh the water felt SO good!
We went to Jason’s brother’s house in the evening, they had invited the family over for dinner.  Little did I know they had a purpose for inviting us…I thought it was just to get together, but they had some news to share.  Seth put on this apron that said “warning dad grilling…” (I can’t remember the rest) and told Jason to read it.  Neither of us caught on until Seth had to put his hands around the word “dad”.  I screamed and almost took Crystal to the ground with my hug!  I wanted to tell everyone I knew, but it wasn’t my news to share so I let them tell everyone (I did get to tell my other SIL Sarah though!)

Sunday we had a different speaker.  He’s one of our missionaries, but he grew up in our church.  I love listening to him speak, so it’s always nice to have them home. 
At lunch I got a text from my friend asking me if I wanted to go to the NKOTBSB concert with her, her cousin was supposed to go but was sick.  I wasn’t going to because I knew it would be late, Jason had a mid-term to take for class and I knew we didn’t have the extra $ for it.  However, she said it was free, Jason was able to work on his stuff while Livi played and I got over the lateness!  It was fun, I’ve never cared too much for NKOTB (I didn’t even really know any of their songs!) and BSB always came in 2nd to N’SYNC when I was into them, but I did enjoy it!  My favorite part was when New Kids played The Ohio State fight song and the entire crowd got up to sing and do the “O HI O” at the end!  It was almost as awesome to see it there as it is at a game!  Oh and Matthew Morrison (from Glee) opened for them, he was really good too!

Now I’m just trying to get through the day.  I have to work all week and all next week :\  I’m not looking forward to it at all, but I do keep reminding myself that my check will be nice   I really can’t wait for the next 5 weeks to be over though, then I’ll be the one on vacation!!

changing times :(

My baby is growing up too fast   Thursday we put her big girl bed together…I didn’t think we would get to this until next month, but Jason got home from football and decided to do it…at 9:30…he said “it will only take a few minutes to put it together” (which it did), but little did he know that the rest of it would take the majority of my valuable sleeping time  
After the bed, he had to take the crib apart, then we cleaned up the mass of toys, pacifiers (lol) and miscellaneous stuff that was hiding between the crib and the wall.  After that was done it was time to try to get Livi to lay down…oh.my.goodness.  I knew it would be challenging, but I wasn’t prepared for how challenging!  She loved the idea of her bed and being able to get up, but that was the challenging part.  She didn’t want to stay put!  So Jason read to her, then I read to her, while rocking (she gets mad if you don’t rock…lol, she even tries to push you so you’ll start rocking the chair) then she laid down for a bit, and we left to try to get some things cleaned up in our room (moving the dresser into the closet and the desk into our room was on Jason’s list of things to do that night also…but only because we were having new cable installed the next day and he wanted the computer to be in our room before they came-since it’s going to be in there anyway, why not move it now), and she came to her door (it might sound cruel, but we put a gate up in her door so she can’t get out, but we can still see her-closing the door and not knowing what she’s doing behind the closed door just didn’t appeal to me ) and cried for probably 15-20 minutes, wanting us to get her out. 
At this point it’s after midnight, I’m tired and still have to go to work the next morning.  So I go in the room with her and sit with her while she tries to calm down.  By now she’s tired herself out from crying so much that she actually lays down and starts to fall asleep.  By 12:30 she was out!  We still had work to do in our room before I could go to bed though :\  Finally after 1 I was able to go to bed. 
Livi slept until about 7:15, but I was more surprised that she slept all night without getting out of bed.  I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, she never woke up in the middle of the night while in her crib, but I guess I just figured being in a different bed would cause her to wake up, although it was the same mattress.  So far she’s done better each night with laying down.  She will play with her toys and books, but then eventually she will get into the bed and fall asleep.  I love it that she knows to go to the bed to sleep instead of laying down on the floor or sleeping in the rocker!

blah

I couldn’t think of a better title and I’m tired of “weekend update” or whatever.  Lol. 

What a week it was last week!  We had VBS from Sunday – Thursday with our closing program/ice cream social on Friday night.  It was such a good week!  I posted last week that we started out with 56 kids…by the end of the week I believe our total was middle 70′s!  We increased every night!  My class was different, the most we had was 7 and the least was 3, but it was still fun.  I think their favorite time was playing in our sandbox and playing outside for game time.  On Friday a lot of the parents came for the closing program/ice cream social, and most of them were not regular attenders of our church, so hopefully we’ll see some of them come back, if not all!

Saturday I ran errands…it was a glorious 2 1/2 hours alone!  These days, I’ll take it where I can get it   We went to the Madison County fair in the evening with my dad.  Livi loved it!  She liked looking at all the animals and she even rode a couple of rides–the merri-go-round and the cars.  I thought she would freak at the merri-go-round, but she didn’t!  And the cars, well she just loved those!  I think she really wanted to ride the strawberry thing, but she wasn’t big enough, Jason and my dad don’t ride things like that, and I really doubt I could have ridden it too!  Oh well, maybe when she’s older!

We went to church and once more attempted going out to eat…we were successful this time!  We went to a Chinese buffet, because we figured if Liv could eat right away she would be fine, and she was!  This definitely won’t be a habit, I don’t really like Chinese food all that much and other buffets are too expensive, but at least we know we can try it again!
I tried to be productive in the afternoon, cleaning up our room and putting clothes away, but I fell asleep, lol.  I had only intended to sleep for about 30 minutes, but it turned into 90.  Oh well   I did get some things accomplished but not as much as I had planned.  Slowly but surely making progress on my “to do before baby” list.  I plan to do some more tomorrow and Wednesday during naptime (Livi makes it WAY too hard to fold clothes or organize anything )

our weekend

With such a busy weekend last week, I was glad to have somewhat of a relaxed Friday evening (I had hoped for a full weekend of relaxation, but I forgot about some things I had planned already).

Friday night it was just Livi and I for most of the evening.  Jason was working on a paper due for a class he had in May and wanted to have it finished before he started class today.  That would have been fine, I love spending time with my girl, but I was SO tired, it was such a long short week.  She wasn’t terrible, but as tired as I was I think everything she did was magnified.  Jason finished up for the evening though and rescued me   Unfortunately Livi and I were still up at 11, but I think it took me about 2 minutes to fall asleep!

Saturday I got up and headed to the church to help decorate our room for VBS this week.  I waited for a while as my coordinator wasn’t there yet, but when she did get there it didn’t take us long to do what she had planned.  For 3 & 4 year olds, our room looks good!  I’m sure they don’t care!
In the afternoon I had a pregnancy class scheduled…one I should have taken when I was pregnant with Livi, but I skipped it.  I’m glad I took it this time, hopefully it will help me with Jackson in this area.  Out of all the mom’s in the class, there wasn’t a single baby girl to be.  We were all pregnant with boys!  The instructor said she had never had that happen in the 20+ years she’d been teaching!  I of course was the only non-new mom…but I was ok with that. 
In the evening we decided to head downtown to the new Bicentennial park.  They were showing “Despicable Me”, so we thought we would try that with Livi…she did ok for a while, but 10pm hit and she was just not having it, she didn’t want to sit still so we left.  We didn’t have to pay for anything, except parking, so we didn’t mind leaving.  Of course, the moment we got to the car she was fine…go figure!

Sunday morning I was in the toddler nursery and it was fuller than I’ve seen it in months!  There some visitors and so that accounted for most of the extra kids!  It was nice to have a big group though. 
Last night was the start of our VBS.  We had 56 kids!  I am working with ages 3-5.  We only had 5 kids, but I think we’re supposed to get a couple more tonight.  It was a good first night, we use Answers In Genesis’ cirriculum and this years theme is “Gold Rush”.  There is a drama at the end of every night and this years is going to be great, I can just tell from last night’s performance!  Our “actors” are so good!  I’m really looking forward to the rest of the week, even though I know I’ll be super tired!

Since there was a lot going on this weekend, I’m just going to update with bullet-points.  There’s too much to type and I’m too tired to put that much effort into it!  I would post some pictures, but my camera died, maybe tomorrow.

Friday-
-Went downtown to RWB
-Had a lot of fun, despite the heat-watched the parade and just sat around chatting with our friends.
-Livi got freaked out by the fireworks, but then fell asleep 1/2 way through!
-Waited for 2 hours to get home (1 hour standing around talking, 1 hour waiting in the parking lot…never had that happen before so I’m not sure what was going on!)

Saturday-
-Got up a lot earlier than I wanted to (since I didn’t go to bed until almost 2 the previous night)
-Went with Livi to the WABA (Westland Area Business Assoc.) parade to see Jason and the Westland football team. 
-We got wet, but she got lots of candy and I got some coupons!  She of course got really excited when Jason walked by us too, so it was worth standing in the rain!
-Went shopping–I had $10 and 20% off at Carter’s so I picked up some deals, and everything I got was on clearance!  Score!  Also went to Once Upon a Child and got Jackson a TON of stuff-got 10% off it too!  I love sales!
-Went back to the high school to see Jason (they had a festival after parade), Livi jumped around in the bounce house. 
-Got food ready for get together for that evening
-Went to Wells’ house for Grove City fireworks-always a good time!
-Livi didn’t freak out at the fireworks this time, instead she kept pointing to the sky saying “boom”
-Sat in more traffic on the way home…lol

Sunday-
-Went to church, took a nap, went back to church, Sunday was pretty boring…lol. 
-Someone in our neighborhood was shooting fireworks, so we stood in the front yard to watch them.

Monday-
-Jason power-washed our house, while I killed a million ants…I must have finally gotten through to them (since they’ve been coming in the house for almost a week) or the pesticide we’ve sprayed a few times has finally killed them all, because after my rampage killing yesterday I haven’t seen a single one, lol!
-We had planned to go to Easton, shopping for me and playing in the water for Livi, but she took such a long nap that by the time we got there everything was closed   So we just let her play in the water for a while, and our friends Chip & Tiffany brought their kids up so Livi and Clay could play. 
-We headed over to Gahanna for their fireworks, and it was pretty good.  Clay had been asking to see fireworks all weekend and so they promised him they would see some last night.  Livi on the other hand had seen fireworks each night since Friday!

Good long weekend, but I definitely wish I didn’t have to work today so I could have slept in a bit!

Well, the weekend wasn’t as low-key as I was hoping it would be…

Friday night we went to see Anna play baseball.  She’s so funny, she got to catch in the last inning, but really just sat there.  I got a kick out of it!  Since we were in Grove City, I wanted Graeter’s, so we headed over there and they had the whole street blocked off!  There was sidewalk chalk and other things for kids to do, so Livi had fun.  She tried to do the hula-hoop, but wasn’t quite getting it.  It was still cute to watch. 

Saturday morning we got up and went to the Hilltop Bean dinner.  It’s an annual thing on the West Side of Columbus, always the 4th Saturday of June.  Our church has done a kids area for a few years so I thought it would be fun to take Livi.  Little did I know I would be helping…
At first there were no kids around, because the inflatables we had rented were inflated.  The generator running them died.  After about an hour someone had gotten a replacement and the bounce house, slide and basketball hoops were back up and running.  It was almost instantly a mob scene of kids.  Which also meant that our face painting table had a huge line!  There was 1 guy from our church drawing, and I felt bad that he had no help, so I went over and helped him…and sat there for probably a good 90 minutes.  I had no idea I would be there that long!  It was fun though, it was something I didn’t think I could do, but most of the basic things we offered were just that, basic.  Rainbows, flowers, hearts, smiley faces, spiders (yuck!), lightning bolts.  They were pretty easy.  Then 1 girl started the butterfly and I wasn’t sure how to do that at first, but I figured it out quickly!  We had a few kids as for the full face ones, but we didn’t have enough supplies for that, nor did I have the talent, lol!  We did do a few cat faces, coloring the nose and drawing some whiskers.  All in all, it was fun, I’m glad I could help.  Next year I’ll sign up for it and be a little more prepared for the crowd!
Saturday night we had talked about going downtown to the Columbus Commons (a new park area), they were having a free family night.  But we were just too tired so we stayed home.  It was our anniversary, but we had decided we weren’t going to do anything because we didn’t have a sitter, which was fine with us.

Sunday…church was interesting.  At least the 1st 20 minutes were!  When we walked in (and we were late like usual) I heard a kid in the bathroom next to our soundroom crying, but I thought that they had been bad and they were getting a spank.  So I thought nothing of it.  About 10 minutes later we’re sitting in the auditorium listening to announcements and all of a sudden I hear this banging and screaming!  I thought for sure someone was getting beaten!  So I got up to check it out and it was coming from that same bathroom.  I knocked on the door and asked what was going on and through the hiccuping I heard “I don’t have any toilet paper!”.  So Jason got a knife and unlocked the door and I found a poor little boy just sitting on the toilet, shaking and crying.  I got his mom and she got him taken care of, but I know that poor kid was in shock or something!  The rest of the day was not as interesting.  I did take a nap, which led to not being able to fall asleep until after 2 this morning…what’s weird though is that I don’t feel as tired as I do when I get more sleep.  Guess my body is getting ready for all nighters!