Mini Update Friday, September 29, 2006

Just enjoying a few short minutes to myself while Tom is upstairs with the boys and Kiarrah is sleeping... oh here they all are, let's just hope I can quickly post still. We're doing well and settled into routine. Colton is still enjoying preschool and Noah has gotten used to life without him around. I even ventured out on my own (with Noah and Kiarrah) this afternoon while Colton was at preschool and it went perfectly. Other than that, I have to say that 3 kids is a lot of work. Shocker, I know! I guess I've forgotten how to celebrate achieving 1 load of laundry and um maybe keeping the house some what tidy. I do not nap, but it is a fantasy of mine. I've been fighting a cold for a couple of weeks, so a little extra sleep might help but it's not happening. On that note, Kiarrah is sleeping very well at night. She just recently started sleeping THROUGH the night! If she does wake up at night it's only once, unlike Noah who at this stage was still nursing every 2 hours. So, no complaints there. Kiarrah is reminding me that my time is not my own. So here's a few pics to end us off.

Winners Monday, September 11, 2006

I haven't forgotten about the winners. I just haven't had the time to go back and check all of the comments, so here they are...

Grand Prize Winner ~ Mandy (You get to choose 4 baby bows or 2 toddler)
Winner of closest weight ~ Danna ( You get to choose a baby bow for your little girl)
Winner of closest time ~ Kori (you get to choose a baby bow too, they make great little gifts)

Congrats Everyone.

Well, today is our first day with Tom back to work. He was a huge help while he was home for the last 2 weeks, and I'll miss having him around to entertain the boys. Colton has his first day of preschool today and is soooo excited. He will be going 3x a week in the afternoons. I am looking forward to spending a little more one on one time with Noah, I'm sure he'll miss his buddy though. So, yes we are surviving our first day. It's 10:19am and Kiarrah is still sleeping, the rest of us are dressed and have eaten breakfast. I even washed my face, did my makeup and combed my hair!!! Now, I'm sipping my coffee and catching you all up on us. Let's hope the rest of the day goes as smoothly.

Fresh from the Baker oven 

Tom holding his little girl for the first time 

Resting with mommy 

Colton holding Kiarrah for the first time 

Noah checking out his little sister (note the bow) 

Noah loved my bed 

nice and safe 

safe with daddy 

the proud guys with their girl 

Chilling 

The Birth Story

This is long overdue, but better late than never. I'm a little surprised how much more work 3 is than 2. Right now the boys are playing nicely together, and Kiarrah is napping (big sigh). Kiarrah, Grammy and I spent the afternoon together at the hairdressers, so we are feeling very pretty, or at least I am:)

Kiarrah’s birth:

My water broke at 8am on Thursday, August 24th. I called Tom to come home and called triage at the hospital to find out what they wanted me to do. When Tom arrived home, we headed over to the hospital and they monitored baby for about an hour to make sure she was still happy. The nurse sent me home with instructions to come in if labor started or at 7:30am the next morning for induction.

We went to bed that night and I slept for an hour and a half before I woke up at 3am with back pain. I tossed and turned until I couldn’t take it anymore and then jumped in the shower at 4:30. As I was standing in the hot shower I realized that I was freezing cold and I couldn’t stop shivering; great now I have the flu too? I curled up on the couch with a blanket for a while so that I didn’t disturb Tom. Finally at 6:30 I could take the constant back pain anymore and started to think that the fever I had may be more than just a flu, so I woke up Tom and through tears told him I didn’t feel good and wanted to get to the hospital.

I cried all the way to the hospital and through registration. lol
There were 3 of us at the hospital scheduled for induction and I got priority 1 because it had been 24 hours since my water broke. So, I got settled into the labor and delivery room fairly quickly and hooked up to antibiotics and oxytocin (sp?). I was having major back labor, but they wanted to get things going quickly as the fever I had was actually an infection. By about 8:30 I got on the laughing gas (still crying and whimpering in pain; no laughing here). I was only on the oxytocin for about ½ hr. and by then I was in full intense labor. Things from here on are a bit of a blur. I know my doctor ran over from his office a few times as things were extremely intense and Kiarrah’s heart rate was around 190 the whole time with a few drops down to 100. There was talk of an emergency C-section, but later heard that they were worried I would deliver on the way down to the OR. The doctor was in around 10:45 and argued with a nurse on whether I was 7cm or 9cms. I had told him at an earlier appointment that he should be there at 7cms or he would miss the delivery. He got me to turn over and rock on all fours to help turn the baby. He then left and 10 minutes later baby’s head popped out. One of the nurses had turned around for a second to put her gloves on and when she turned around she saw the head. They told me to turn over and then all screamed “no” as I tried to roll over. They didn’t think I knew the head was out. lol How can a woman withering in pain not notice when the babies head is out and the pain level is cut in half! As soon as I rolled over they noticed that the cord was wrapped tight around the baby’s neck. It was so tight that the nurse was trying to push her back in so that she could loosen it enough to cut. As soon as it was cut our little girl was born and seconds later the doctor walked in. Missed it again. Things were pretty tense for about 15 minutes as they worked to get a response from Kiarrah. They let me hold her for a couple minutes before they took her to NICU. I was too sick to really enjoy my brief introduction to my little girl. I spent the next 3 hours in labor and delivery as they worked to control my bleeding and fever. I ended up back on oxytocin for about 6 hours to get my uterus to contract. Not fun!

I was moved to my hospital room at 2pm and got to visit Kiarrah in NICU and feed her a bottle 1/2hr later. Tom had been in several times to see her already, but wasn’t allowed to hold her since she was in the incubator. Doctors were worried about her glucose levels which quickly improved and her white blood cell count was much to high (A possible sign of infection). The doctors decided to do another blood test at 5:30pm and if her levels came down at all they would let us have her, if not then they would keep her in the nursery for 48 hours. So, we waited for her results and were very excited when they told Tom to come help bath her and bring her to mommyJ Her levels had come down ever so slightly, but enough that they felt she could stay with us. Every few hours the nurses were in to check her temp. During our time at the hospital before we were released on Sunday morning our poor little one got about 10 blood tests L. We were so excited to come home. This week we’ve laid pretty low. Kiarrah is still getting used to nursing since they confused her with bottles in the nursery, but getting better and better every day. Colton is absolutely in lover with her and Noah, well he’s been the baby for the last 3 years and is getting used to the changes.

So there you go. We are alive and doing well. Kiarrah will be having a lot of doctor’s appointment in the next couple months. She is being fitted for a hip brace on Tuesday and is being treated for thrush at the moment. (Thrush is a yeast infection common in babies as a result of illness or stress) So please pray that she heals up well. We are so blessed and thankful that her rough start at life isn’t any worse. With everything she’s been through she is a very happy baby. She only cries when she’s hungry and is sleeping pretty good.