Gub Gub's Birth

I was laying here in bed thinking that I should really update the old blog, but it takes so long doing it on the phone and really Gub Gub is 3 months old now and her birth is a bit old news, but I have not recorded it anywhere and that is so unfair to her. So here it goes.

About 2 weeks before July 27th, Gub Gub's due date, I took Baby of Dreams out of nursery and left church early having constant contractions, pretty sure we would be having a baby early. I got some last minute things put together and then the contractions stopped. It had been a good thing I had let the Husband continue sleeping. On July 28th we found out at the Dr's that I was still only dilated to a one and that both of the male Dr's that I felt comfortable delivering the baby would be out of town for the next week. We had the option of inducing that day, but decided against it. I was pretty heartbroken about not having either of my Dr's there and having to have one of the female Dr's, deliver Gub Gub, that I felt uncomfortable with. But I really wanted Gub Gub to come on her own. The next day I woke up around 1am having contractions. The husband was awake after having slept the rest of the previous day, so we were able to chat and he was excited, but not anticipating that we would be having a baby too soon. I tried to go back to sleep, but contractions were between 4 and 20 minutes apart. I finally got up again and got everything really ready to go and watched movies and was very bored. I went grocery shopping with Baby of Dreams, hoping all the activity would speed things up. I went for a walk while the Husband an Baby of Dreams were napping. The contractions were anywhere from 3 to 20 minutes apart the whole day and I was exhausted from having been up since one. Plus I had only eaten 2 pieces of toast the whole day, because I was under the assumption that I needed to stop eating when labor was beginning. (I found out later that was not good advice, when I was hooked up to the IV and dehydrated.). Finally around 7pm I was so exhausted and in pain, and the contractions really were getting stronger, that we loaded up Baby of Dreams, took her over to our dear friends house where she was going to stay and then headed over to the hospital. We did not bring all my stuff in, just in case they sent us home again. They got me all signed in and checked me an I was only dilated to a 3. I thought for sure all those contractions had accomplished a bit more. The nurse said that technically they could send me back home, but since I was already 2 days overdue she would try and help me stay. She wanted us to walk around for a bit and try to get me a bit further along. She told me that even if I did not progress much, she would say that I had so I would not be sent home. I was so thankful to her. By the time we got done with our walk it was around 10pm and I was dilated to a 4. I had wanted to try this delivery without drugs, but while I was getting checked when I was still at a 3, I was in so much pain, and so exhausted, that I said to bring on the epidural as soon as possible. They gave me whatever it is that makes you tired and loopy while I waited for the epidural. I guess I made a nuisance of myself asking for the epidural after that. It seemed to take forever. I found out later that the nurse was still trying to convince everyone that I needed to stay. I finally got the epidural and had multiple big contractions during the administration of it. Plus my water finally broke right in the middle of getting the epidural. Talk about uncomfortable and icky. The nurses were all so wonderful though. The nurse checked me after the epidural was done and I had been cleaned up and I was dilated to a 10! She basically told me I could relax for a bit because the Dr. Was busy with 2 or 3 other deliveries at that moment. It was nice knowing I was ready to go, but not in pain and just able to rest and prepare. I had found out that the Dr. on call was an affiliate of my clinic and so I had never met her before. I know that might sound terrible to some people, but was feeling grateful that I would not have to have either of the ladies from my clinic, that I so disliked. My nurse had me do about 3 sets of practice pushes, which were much easier than with Baby of Dreams, owing to the fact that my epidural was not too strong and I could still feel a bit of pressure. Then the Dr. came in and I think I pushed once or twice with her and Gub Gub was there! The Dr. might have been in there all of 10 minutes. Gub Gub was born at 2:53 am on July 30. (Which happens to be the Husband's, oldest brother's birthday.). She was 6lbs. 8 1/2 ounces and 20 inches long. Her hair was a medium brown and there was barely any there. She had grey eyes and did not make a peep. Grandma the Husband was there and said that the moment they took her over to get her cleaned off she started rooting around looking for food. Someone mentioned that the cord had been wrapped around her neck twice, but it did not pose any problems and the delivery was so fast. I only tore to a 1 as opposed to a 3 last time. I could tell I was handling recovery better in just taking a bath and shower afterwards. Our friends were able to bring Baby of Dreams over later that day and we got a picture of the two girls, but she wasn't too interested in little sister. We all went home the next afternoon with instructions to come back on Saturday, the next day, to check Gub Gub's jaundice level as it had been a tad high. We did and they called us later saying she would need to be on a billiblanket for a bit because of the jaundice. She was on the billiblanket later that day until early Tuesday morning and has been healthy ever since.

Our little Gub Gub is now three months old and such a wonderful addition to our family. She loves to smile talk and is in the process of discovering her hands. She can pretty much hold her head up and likes to stand on her legs. She rarely spits up, which is such a blessing because Baby of Dreams had to be on medication for spitting up. Half the time I forget to burp her because she rarely has any issues. She has a small red patch in between her eyes and a large red patch on the back of her head. When she was 2 months old we took her to have an x-ray of her back because her bottom crack, as it begins up her back, is slightly crooked. Everything turned out okay and it looks like things are straightening out. Baby of Dreams, for the most part, loves her sister and likes to give her kisses, hugs, talk to her and hold her. She has even tried picking her up a few times when mom's back is turned. She has had a bit of a difficult time adjusting to share mom and dad's time and attention. But she doses not seem to blame Gub Gub for it. Every once in a while when she is extremely frustrated with mom, she will hit Gub Gub, but that has only happened about 5 times in three months. Mostly I have to watch and make sure she doesn't love her sister too much. I have caught Baby of Dreams doing many sweet things for Gub Gub like giving her toys, pushing her swing,talking and singing to her, tickling her and giving her hugs and kisses.

I am getting to hang of two kids and am only having to work ten hours a week which as of yet I haven't actually done. I got about 2 months off because there were no clients for me to work with. I have been working about 5 hours a week for the past month and somehow we keep barely making it each month. I really need to be getting ten hours a week to make ends meet, but we are so thankful things have been working out so far.

I think I have fulfilled my goal of writing about Gub Gub's birth and now just have to figure out how to get pictures on here. I mights just have to wait until I can get on a real computer with the Internet. And next I need to write about Baby of Dreams' 2nd Birthday that took place when Gub Gub was 11 days old. Then I suppose I should at least touch upon Halloween. One thing at a time though.

Climbing

The title to this post has at least two meanings to our family this week. (And yes, I know I still need to write about Gub Gub arriving.But I have to wait until I have a bit more time.) I am sitting here in bed waiting for Baby of Dreams to fall asleep. Normally I would put her in her crib and just go to bed knowing she would fall asleep eventually. Well, as of three days ago she can officially climb out her crib at will. As some of you know, the poor girl shares a room with us, and Gub Gub, because there is no other room for her to be in. She does sleep in a separated area and I can not see her from our bed, so if she gets out she could easily reach the stairs or other areas that she should not be getting into, before I can catch her. She knows she shouldn't be doing it so she is extremely quiet. I can not hear her get out. I am terrified she will get out in the middle of the night and fall down the stairs. I have talked to her about my concerns for the past three nights and luckily she has stayed put. I assume this would be a good time to transition her into a big girl bed, but we just can't until we get a new house. I wish that was incentive enough to get this house put together enough to sell it. I do know this is the end of naps as we used to know them.

The other meaning of climbing this week is with The Husband's job. With the economy the way it is, there just have not been many openings in management at The husband's work. So our well constructed plan has not real come to fruition yet. He has been working so hard to do a good job at work, but he has also been checking on other vocational possibilities. (I tried to go back to work part time last week, but there were not enough clients for me to have any yet. They will work on getting me a couple of clients and I will be working people's hours when they can't until then.) Nothing seems to be even as good as what he has. Some higher positions at his work just opened up, that he is eligible for and he got a much anticipated interview on Friday. He came home from work this morning and was able to tell me that he got one of the new positions! He is going from being a regular worker to supervising multiple supervisors and many workers. He is just one step below salaried management. He will be getting all the experience of being in management with not as much pay. Great for being able to move up in the not too distant future, but not so much for me staying home full time. This seems to be our best option right now though and I really am extremely proud of him. He will be in a very responsible position for having no managing experience in that company. Plus he should be working much more reasonable hours, just a bit more random. We are very excited and know Heavenly Father is watching out for us.

Well, Baby of Dreams is finally asleep so I think it is safe for me to fall asleep now. Luckily Gub Gub went to sleep at 9:00. She has been going to sleep at around 8:30pm for a few weeks now and for the past 3 days has been sleeping until around 4:00am before she wants to eat. Then she will wait 2-3 hours to eat again and then we will all get up around 8:00am. A pretty decent schedule for a 6 week old. She also started smiling quite a bit yesterday and is just so darn cute.

Too Long of a Break

I feel sad that this is my first post in over two months and such big things have happened. First the birth of our second beautiful little girl and second the 2nd birthday of Baby of Dreams. I am feeling sad because I am already starting to forget small details of Gub Gub' birth. Plus I am typing this on my newly aquired phone and it takes quite a bit more time than using the computer, but at least I can do it. (We still do not have the internet in our home and plan on keeping it that way for quite a while.) Well, this isn't going to give much info, but now that I know I can do this on my phone, I will do my best to go back and update. Stay tuned.

Update

Quite a few things have been going on lately that I would like to be able to look back and remember so, since this is a record of our family, I am going to write about them. Feel free to tune out or not even bother reading, you won't hurt my feelings.

So, since the Husband has graduated, he has gone back to work full time, which I am very grateful for, because I have been able to cut my work hours to about 16 a week and spend the rest of the time with Baby of Dreams and preparing for Gub Gub to be born. We have been able to work on the house, getting it ready to sell. We have painted a lot of the kitchen, we still have a lot of trim work left in there. We have completely painted the two front rooms and they look so much nicer than before. We have the upstairs left to paint, the second bedroom and little touch-ups here and there. Then we will work on all the little odds and ends that have needed to be done for a while, but always neglected. Getting the house ready to sell is going better than I expected, mostly because the Husband is completely involved with helping to get it done. This is such a huge blessing. I had kind of prepared myself to take on most of the responsibility of getting the house painted inside and letting him do the rest, but he has stepped up to the plate and I have been the one helping him get it done. We have actually had quite bit of fun working together on this whole project and both enjoyed the experience so far. I do believe that we will have had our fill of painting for a while, before this is all said and done though.

Gub Gub has had her picture taken at least 6 times in her short pre-birth life and the doctors are finally okay with her size. She is still on the small side, but has been growing steadily so there are no more worries at this time. I am 35 weeks along as of the 23rd of June and will be starting my weekly doctor visits next week. With five weeks left I am getting a bit excited, a bit nervous, but mostly overwhelmed with what we need to get done before Gub Gub arrives. Our new goal is to get the house on the market before she is born. We think we have finally finalized a name for the poor nameless child. I am sorry, but we will not be sharing it on here, so hopefully you know me on Facebook too so you will be able to find out there eventually. Gub Gub has been really active for the past few months and has been causing me quite a few uncomfortable hours and a few short nights with her poking and jabbing and twisting. Other than that I think things are going well, she is definitely head down and just keeps moving on down.

Baby of Dreams just got her stats taken and is 22 lbs and 38" tall. She is a little less than the 5th percentile for weight and a little less than the 10th percentile for height. She is extremely active and always has something to do and somewhere to go. She will be turning two about two weeks after Gub Gub is born and is showing all the signs of a two year old. She is talking more and more, much to my relief, as I have been a bit worried about her lack of speech. She is saying new words almost on a daily basis and we are really working with her to say the words that she already knows, especially when she needs something and tries to whine or grunt to get it. She has been showing her wonderful sweet side a lot lately when she gives kisses and hugs to the Husband and myself. She even gave kisses to grandma and grandpa when we visited them on Father's day. Her hair is a bit curly and so very cute, but my favorite hair do is her two high pig tails. I really need to get some more recent pictures on here. Baby of Dreams is very strong-willed and has her own ideas about how things need to be done in our home. We try to compromise a lot. We are waiting to see if she is going to be left or right handed. She will often eat and color with her left hand and seems a bit more coordinated with it, but she still uses her right hand as well. We are okay with either way and just want her to be able to be comfortable with her choice. We are very curious to see how she will react to her new baby sister. She has recently become more involved with her baby doll and wraps her up in small blankets and feeds her a bottle so tenderly. It is so fun to watch her. Baby of Dreams has been sleeping through the night wonderfully for many months now and sleeping for 11-12 hours on a regular basis. I sure hope she can continue this habit once her sister arrives. She still takes a 2-3 hour nap sometime in the afternoon and is pretty happy and content most of the time she is awake. We love having her in our lives and are so happy she is part of our family.

Another bit of news is that we got rid of our Internet about two weeks ago. It was a lifestyle change that we feel is good for us right now. (Plus extra money each month to put toward more important bills.) I will still be getting on the Internet periodically and doing my best to keep this updated with the pertinent news, but if I don't respond to you for a while, that is why.

The Husband is now completely eligible for management at his job and is actively looking for a position that he can get into as soon as possible. He has put in his availability as immediately and for anywhere in the United States. Right now our goal is to just get him in the program as soon as possible. We are really willing to go anywhere and know that Heavenly Father will take care of the important things, like where we will be living for the next year or so. We would like to stay in the Northwest area and the Husband is kind of hoping for Alaska, but we really have no idea what to expect. It will be very exciting figuring it all out, especially with a new baby coming and a home to sell.

Our last bit of news is that I will be having my 30th birthday tomorrow. We mostly celebrated it on Wednesday with cousins and a very fun round of mini golf and an unforgettable dining experience. I might go into more details later. It was a much needed relaxing and extremely satisfying time and one of my better birthdays. Although all of my birthdays with the Husband have been pretty great. He is so good at finding things that I really want to do and making me feel special.

Well I think this is long enough for the updates. I will definitely keep things posted on the job front and the baby front, just probably not in the timeliest manner.

Graduation

I was reminded today that I haven't written about the Husband graduating yet. Since it is a milestone I really need to get to it. So on May 11th the Husband graduated with his Associates Degree from the local technical college. I am so proud of him. His parents were extremely happy because this is their first child, not including daughter-in-laws, that has gone to college, let alone graduated. It was so great that the Husbands grandparents could be there also, along with a few close friends. I bawled through most of the beginning just realizing that this hurdle was finally past and we can hopefully move on and up from here, plus I am pregnant and bawl at most everything these days. Baby of Dreams did wonderful all throughout the graduation. Our family took up a whole row, so she just hopped from one family member to the next, sitting nicely with each one and coming back to me when she needed a snack. I was able to get the Husband walking across the stage, on film, from where I was sitting. I was going to download a couple of pictures, but I have misplaced our video camera. Or rather, it is not where I left it, so I need to question the Husband about it when he wakes up.

So on to bigger and better things. The Husband is officially back to work full time and I am cutting my hours down to about 17 a week. I have really been looking forward to this for the entire 4 months the Husband has been in school. The Husband is now eligible to get into the management program at work, we just have to figure out how to go about it and where to apply. He found out today that the program doesn't really start in this area for another 5 to 6 months, so we will most definitely be looking for something out of this area. We just need to get things going quicker than that. The plan is for me not to have to go back to work after Gub Gub is born and that can't happen unless the Husband is in management. Good luck to us! I know that Heavenly Father will look after us. We have such righteous goals with all of this. I just hope it isn't supposed to be one of those frustrating growth experiences that we will look back on and realize was the best thing for us. I so hope it will be a miraculous 'you did good and get to be blessed right now' experience. All we can do is keep praying and trying to do our part. It really is great to be so much closer to our goal of the Husband having a good job and me being able to stay home with our children.

Our next goal that goes along with everything is selling the family house by the temple. If anyone is intesrested in a two bedroom, one bath, charming home in a great location, let us know. We are going to be working really hard to get it ready to put on the market soon.

I Am Officially a Momma!

Well, it is definitely official. I am a Momma! Baby of Dreams has been calling both the Husband and I ,Daddy, for her entire life. Although I just realized this a few weeks ago. I previously thought that she just didn't call me anything. This last weekend we spent with the Husband's parents and Baby of Dreams actually started calling me Momma and has been doing it all week now. It seems to finally have stuck. It is such a simple yet miraculous thing for your baby to call you by your parental name. I love it and can't get enough of it.

On the not so cheery side, Baby of Dreams had her first " we had to rush to the Dr." accident on Monday. She was at my office with me and we had just finished my weekly meeting, (which my boss is so good about letting my take Baby of Dreams to). She had eaten lunch, played around and was sitting nicely on a chair, when all of a sudden she was on the floor screaming. I picked her up and saw that she had a 1/2" long gash in her forehead that was open about an 1/8th of an inch. After I held her, she stopped screaming and I had mostly stopped crying, I called the Husband, told him the issue and asked his opinion on going to an urgent care center. He suggested that I go, so I headed over there. I had a wonderful co-worker with me at the time to remind me to stay calm and fetched me a wet paper towel for Baby of Dreams' bleeding head. I luckily got a hold of Baby's pediatrician on the way and they said I could bring her right over instead of taking her to the emergency room or urgent care. They strapped her to a papoose board, which I believe she hated worse than the accident, and super-glued her gash back together again. Luckily she did not need stitches, but the Dr. said she will have a scar, because the cut is going up and down instead of side to side. The Husband was also there with us, having left class and met us over there. I was so thankful that he just did this on his own without even asking me if I wanted him there. It was much more manageable for me having him there with us. Baby of Dreams got the 3rd Dum Dum in her life and was pretty content after everything. She has been just as reckless since then and fallen many times this week, just no more blood thank goodness. She is extremely fearless and a bit careless in her actions. I have a feeling this is just the first of many emergency Dr. visits to come. I am hoping and praying that Gub Gub will not follow in these footsteps of her big sister.

On a better note, the Husband graduates with his Associates Degree in about 2 weeks and we are both so very excited for that day. He will probably end up with 3 A's and 1 B, which is pretty amazing for someone who thought he would fail at least 2 of those classes. He has done an amazing job with school this semester and I am so proud of him. I have been able to earn most of the money we have needed by working about 28 hours a week. I haven't really enjoyed it, and I hate being away from Baby of Dreams and the Husband that much, but I have survived and this will hopefully make it possible for the Husband to move on and me to be a full-time stay at home mom, after Gub Gub is born. At the very least, I only have 2 more weeks of 28 hours a week then I can move it down to around 17 hours a week. It may not seem like much of a relief, but I can assure you it is. We just keep praying that things will work out and the Husband will be able to move forward in his career.

Gub Gub is Definately a .....

Okay, it is now official and for sure (as sure as you can be about this sort of thing) that Gub Gub is a girl child. I had my Dr. visit last week with a different Dr. in my clinic and she decided that I did not need another ultrasound and unscheduled it for me. I was pretty upset so I left a message for my regular Dr. to see if he still wanted me to do it. He got back into the states yesterday and his nurse called and rescheduled me for the ultrasound today. I made sure to tell the nurse of my frustration that the lady Dr. had second guessed my male Dr. It makes me sad because there are four Dr.s in the office and I now only feel comfortable seeing two of them. What happens if one of the icky Dr.s are on call when I go into labor? I guess I will cross that bridge when we get a bit closer to July. Well the ultrasound lady said that Gub Gub is small, but is growing well. She also remarked on Gub Gub's small head. Personally I think that is a great quality in an infant, so much nicer for the mama. We really are excited, not only do we already have the stuff for a girl, but we are hoping she and Baby of Dreams will be able to grow up as close friends. We still are struggling to come up with a name though. Baby of Dreams' name just kind of came naturally and poor Gub Gubs' is not. I guess we will figure it out eventually.

Gub Gub is......

Well ,we went to the doctor yesterday to have our ultrasound, to figure out the sex of the baby. We were at 19 weeks so the ultrasound lady was not positive, but said that Gub Gub looked like a girl. She said that all the other things she checked were perfect, except Gub Gub is about 5 days smaller than she should be. Baby of Dreams was, and is, on the small side, so it could be that the Husband and I just make small babies. The doctor wants me to have another ultrasound when I come back in at week 23, so that he can start tracking Gub Gub's growth. If she continues growing at the proper curve, just under it, then we just have small babies and everything is okay. If she is not growing at the proper curve, then the doctor will figure out what to do from there. I am assuming they will double check the sex too. I am getting used to the idea that Gub Gub is a girl. As some of you know I had a gut feeling that Gub Gub was a boy. It took me most of the day yesterday to change my thinking. It will be easier having another girl, I think. We already have all the stuff. Our biggest problem now is we already have our first boy name completely picked out, so a boy would have been great, we thought we had a girls first name decided on, but are second guessing it and now looking at all of our options again. We aren't decided on a middle name either. Baby of Dreams was easy to name, but we just don't know about Gub Gub. I guess we still have about 5 months and I am thinking we will need it.

Nursery

It has been over a month since my last post and I really have no excuses. We have had tolerably interesting stuff going on and I have had time to write short posts here and there, I just haven't. Oh well, life continues to go on.

Our biggest news lately in that Baby of Dreams went to nursery today and is officially okay with it. We went two weeks ago and I stayed in there the whole time with her. She was a bit nervous and made it clear that it was a good thing I was there. She was sick last week so we did not make it to church at all. I went with her today and it was clear she did not need me, but I could not tear myself away until about 45 minutes until it was all over with. When I got back to pick her up, she had just barely started to get sad. (Nursery is from 12-2 which is right in the middle of nap time, so I feel a bit of sadness is totally understandable.) I figured she would be okay with nursery and I am pleased that she likes it. She even waved and told a new friend "bye bye" when she left. I can't believe my baby is 18 months old and in nursery!

Tomorrow I will be 17 weeks along. We find out what Gub Gub is in two weeks. At the moment this pregnancy is going by somewhat fast. The morning sickness is getting better, I think. I have had two different types of colds and a flu thing in the past four weeks, so that has been overshadowing a lot of stuff. And with work and helping the Husband with school, things have been busy around here.

Gub Gub's Due Date

It turns out I was right. Gub Gub's due date really and truly is the 27th of July. We had our first Doctor's appointment on Monday. We got ultrasounds and the tech said that baby had a very strong heartbeat. The ultrasounds are a bit more developed than Baby of Dreams were, so it was fun seeing what almost looks like a baby. I'll have to scan them into the computer so I can post them, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I am 11 weeks along now and still feeling pretty sick. I had truly forgotten about this part of pregnancy.

The Husband starts school again on Monday. For those of you that haven't had to listen to our lofty life plans yet, here they are. The Husband has been working for a large retail store for the past year and a half. He has been taking a break after two years of school. He realized that he would very much like to go into management in this store, but the easiest way to do that is to finish his associates degree, which he is 4 classes short of doing. So starting on Monday he will only be working on the weekends and will be going to school full time during the week. I meanwhile will be working around 28 hours a week to make up for his loss of a decent paycheck. We worked it out so I will go immediately to work when he gets home from school so one of us will always be able to stay with Baby of Dreams. That is extremely important to us. We probably won't get to see each other too much, but it only lasts until the very beginning of May. He will then graduate and we will go back to him working full time and me working about 15 hours. That will hopefully last only about 1-2 months and then he will hopefully be able to make it into the manager's program. Then I might work a bit before Gub Gub is born, but I won't really have to anymore, it will just help out. The plan is that I will not have to go back to work at all after Gub Gub is born. I look greatly forward to this blessed day. Well, that is the plan. I am planning on it not going as smoothly as I outlined it, but this is the hoped for version. It is good to finally have a plan again though.