Are YOU Ready for the Digital Conversion?

You know you're good at procrastinating when after a year and a half of warnings, the digital conversion happens and you HAVEN'T gotten a digital converter box OR a newer tv. Or I guess I could just say that's what I meant to happen, because we're trying to cut down on the amount of television we watch. :) Right.

What else am I supposed to do at 2 am feedings or at 5 in the morning? I actually did break down and go buy a converter box, but after feeling disgusted because I didn't have the $40 discount from the government and I had to spend $50 for a box, I got lucky and happened upon a channel that was telling you what number to call to get your $40 coupon from the government. I called immediately when I saw this program, which happened to be on Wednesday. I was told my coupon would be mailed the 16th. The conversion happened on the 12th. Needless to say, we broke out all our movies to keep ourselves entertained until we can again restore television in our home. Sad, but we need tv! What would we do without The Office? :)

Now for your viewing pleasure, a moral question for you to ponder:
Yesterday, just as Reed and I were settling down to clean our bedroom while Aftyn was sleeping, someone rang our doorbell. I was the lucky one to answer. Upon opening the door, I was greeted by a teenage hispanic male. (The only reason the hispanic part even matters is so you can picture how he spoke. He had a bit of an accent.) This young man said to me
"Can I have a garbage bag?"
This seemed a puzzling question, since I wasn't sure why he was at our door, and/or why he should even need a garbage bag. I can't be sure my exact words, but I think I said something like
"What do you need a garbage bag for?"
He then proceeded to explain that he was mowing the lawn for MY neighbors, (that part seemed important to him), anyway, they had left and he had come to mow and they hadn't left any garbage bags for him. Which was why he was at MY door, because they were MY neighbors. :) In my head, this sounded like a personal problem, because I'm sure he was getting paid to mow, but I wasn't getting paid to give him garbage bags. So I generously offered him one medium sized garbage sack, which is the only size I have. Wasn't that generous of me?! I went and got the bag for this young man, and apologized at its size, to which he replied, "that's all right, that's okay" and then he took himself away from my front door. I guess I shouldn't have expected a thank you since one medium garbage sack isn't going to bag all his grass clippings. But still, it was more than he had to start with.

What would YOU have done? Would YOU have offered more than 1 garbage bag?

An update - Finally!

I could apologize for not updating for so long, but I feel like I've worn out my welcome with "I'm sorry" So, here's what I've been doing INSTEAD of blogging - I've been working on getting enough sleep, keeping my house relatively clean, learning all I can about Aftyn, and trying to get our dumb computer to keep working. Today, I got lucky enough that I had time AND the computer wanted to work, so YOU can get an update. :) I'm happy to finally get back into some blogging. I have missed having my creative juices flow.


A List of everything I have learned about Aftyn so far:

She doesn't like having her diaper changed, and always cries when you do it. :(

She also doesn't like baths, but I think its because the water might be too cold.
Just yesterday, we managed to have a bath where she only cried 2 short times! The
water was much warmer.

When going to sleep, she likes to be wrapped in soft blankets, and loves when the
blanket covers her face.

She is amazingly alert at least 2 times a day, for about 30 mins.

She is REALLY good at holding up her head when she is laying on your chest.

She generally only cries when she's hungry. She fusses a bit when she's tired,
but it's usually not a lot.

TMI - She is very tooty, as in she toots a lot. Sometimes when she poops and I'm
holding her, I'm afraid she's going to blow through the diaper onto my clothes,
because she does it with such force. Sorry, but its rather funny.

She doesn't like being naked, probably because she feels cold.

In other news, Reed and I are surviving new parenthood. Reed very happily watches over Aftyn whenever he has the opportunity, and he also voluntarily changes diapers even when he knows they're poopy. For the last 2 weeks, whenever Reed and Aftyn are in the room together, I most often hear Reed gushing about how cute Aftyn is. It is probably the most adorable thing ever. :)

I have been striving to get enough sleep - even if it means sleeping until 11 am. But I have learned that getting 8 hrs of sleep, when you add up 2 hrs and 3 hrs and 3 hrs is totally not the same as getting 8 SOLID hours of sleep. I have also been learning to be okay with that. I've also learned everything takes longer with a baby. For example, here's a typical day :
Clean my house - okay, only after I've fed the baby, (40 mins) gotten her to sleep (30 min.), put all the dirty diapers from her nighttime changings into the diaper receptacle, gathered her dirty laundry, started her wash in the washer, gotten myself through my own ablutions, wait a sec - its already time to feed her again?! Next time she sleeps, I get a little closer to finish cleaning one room. It's not easy taking care of 2 people, but it is very rewarding and I'm glad to make the sacrifice. Every time I lay Aftyn on my chest and she looks up at me with her beautiful eyes, and does her little head bob as she works at strengthening her neck, I have to laugh at how cute she is and I think how much more fulfilling my life is because of her.

5 days old, and I've been initiated

So, yesterday Aftyn went to the doctor for the first time. Good news: She's in the 80th percentile for height, 75th for weight and 55th for her head. She has already managed to gain back her birth weight and then some. Now she weighs 8 lbs 4 oz. I was so happy to hear that!
Bad news: She got her first shot. I had a feeling of dread, only because you never know how a baby will react to shots, and she and I are still getting the hang of each other in a lot of ways. After sleeping solidly for about 5 hrs and then being awake for 2 hrs straight, I thought, gee, this isn't too bad. Last night though when she wouldn't stop fussing AND wouldn't sleep until after her feeding at 3 am, I was scolding myself for being so confident that she would get through it so easily. Luckily this morning, she seems anxious to make up for her lost sleep and is currently still sleeping quite soundly. Hopefully, she's over the worst.

In other baby news, I received a full fledged pooping yesterday. I've learned you really have to have the next diaper RIGHT THERE, otherwise you're risking the perfectly clean clothes that you just put on. (And then I had to stay in them until we went home because it happened while we were over at my in-laws. )

I feel as if I have just dipped my little toe in the sisterhood of being a mother. I'm sure there are much worse things that could and will happen. I'll just wait patiently until I've been "baptized by fire." Or covered in vomit, urine or any other liquid that might find its way out of Aftyn and on to me.
By the by, any good ideas of getting our baby to burp? I have tried the hand under the chin with the tilted forward position, the non tilted forward position, the normal "on your shoulder", the wrestling position - over your shoulder so your shoulder is pushing right into their tummy (I got one burp out of her that way), laying face down on my lap, and probably every other position there is. I've patted soft, hard and medium. I've patted low and high. This sounds like it could be a song. :) Anyway, if you've got a secret burping position or something that I haven't mentioned, please help a tired burper out and share. I will try anything. We are currently using Dimethicone drops and they seem to help a little, but the thing that would REALLY help is if we could get the dang bubbles out with burping.



As promised, here you go. There are more, but most of you will be seeing those pictures in her upcoming photo spread for her baby announcement. Have a fabulous day!

How I wore myself out today . . . . .

Since I don't want to overwhelm you with her cuteness, I'll put up the rest tomorrow. :) Tomorrow I am truly doing nothing, cuz I can't keep wearing myself out like this. Poor Reed is so sweet and takes such good care of Aftyn and me when I get too worn out.

A few days late, but better late than never!

And I'm not talking about Aftyn! For those not in the know yet, we had our little girl Saturday morning at 3 am. She was 8 lbs 2 oz and 21 inches long. Here is the picture they took in the hospital shortly after she was born. She's a little swollen.




For those wanting the whole "birth story", here you go.

I woke up Friday morning, starting at 1 am, with a crampy kind of feeling every hour only lasting a short period of time. I think it was just braxton hicks, but thankfully, over the course of the day, increased to every 20-30 minutes between cramp-like feelings.
Anyhoo, about 8 pm, with Reed over at his parents, house and due to be home any minute, my contractions picked up and were coming faster and getting a little more painful. I called Reed to let him know, and he made it home in record time at about 8:30 pm.
He came home and was literally running around the house, trying to get everything into the car and packed and everything. I kept telling him that he didn't have to hurry, cuz I didn't think I was really in labor or anything. So at the hospital, as we're getting out of the car, I said to Reed, what if it's all in my mind, what if I'm not really having contractions and they send me home? Luckily, that wasn't the case.
They admitted me b/c I was a 3.5 cm, and quickly dilated to a 5.5. And quickly dilated to a 7.5, and then just as quickly was almost completely dilated. Wow, I thought, that was easy without any pain meds. Little did I know what was coming.

At this point, I thought, all right, I just push her out and we're done with all this painful stuff. :) I was so naive.
My bag of water hadn't broken, so the dr. told me I had 2 choices. I assumed they were that she could break my water or we could wait for my water to break on its own. I stopped her before she could tell me what SHE thought my choices were, and told her I wanted my water broken, thinking I was ready to push and be done. So, she broke my water, and then informed me that my bag of water had been holding my cervix open, and now I was back down to 7 cm. I had never heard of this happening before. The Dr also said she hoped that now that my water was broken, she hoped my contractions wouldn't get too painful. What do you mean, MORE painful?!?

I will skip that part, and only include one word: Ouch. Really. Ending with the fact that I finally asked the nurse if there wasn't ANYTHING I could take to help with the pain, and so I got some Steidol, which only helps relax you, it doesn't numb the contractions, so I felt the contractions but was so relaxed in between and through the contractions that it was bearable. And about 30 minutes after I got that, I was ready to push. Thankfully, my body was ready, Oh and I forgot to mention Aftyn was posterior around the time I found out I was back to a 7. Posterior meaning she was literally facing the wrong way, and boy was that a fun one to fix. It was probably a lot of my OUCH problem.
So, out she came after about 30 minutes of pushing, and she was cute, and didn't want to cry. It was 3 am and poor Reed couldn't keep his eyes open. He zonked out pretty fast, while I waited for Aftyn to get done with her first bath and checking her vitals and all that stuff.
Everything went well, we were both in excellent health, so we left the hospital on Sunday about 2 pm. And have enjoyed being at home, sleeping in our own beds, eating our own food, and learning about our little Aftyn girl.

Babies are amazing creatures. I can't believe how much love I have for this little girl. I bravely tried to clip one of her fingernails today, and thought I had possibly cut her little fingertip.I promptly burst into tears at the thought that I had possibly hurt her. I don't know what to blame that on - hormones or too much love for my sweet, helpless dughter. Either way, there's a reason women are mothers because they are nurturers and have an inordinate amount of love to give. I'm grateful for that.

It's about time . . .

that I get on here and update our blog with something new! Ha ha ha I'm so mean, I made you think we were having a baby, huh?
Well, I only wish I had that to write. But I don't.

In the meantime, let me share some of the funnies of our lives. Evidently, men in the general public aren't used to seeing women whose babies are nearly due. I have had more stares in the last 1-2 weeks from them than I can ever remember getting when I was not pregnant and probably looked more cute!

I have heard of women whose ankles were so swollen you could push in on them and the pressure from the pushing would actually leave a dent. Never thought I would experience that, but my ankles have been especially swollen this week, so I tried it. And, really, it's gross but interesting in the way that you can actually leave dents in skin swollen with water. I'm looking forward to the 15 lbs in water weight I will be losing when I have this baby.

Reed's knees are still scabby and gross, but thankfully not as painful as they were. He is so busy with all the things he's involved with, and having a baby, and helping me around the house. This week, he finally told me that he thought he had put too much on his plate. I started laughing. Poor guy, ever the optimist, that had to be hard for him to admit. But, as he usually does, he told me that it just meant he would have to organize his time better. His persistence is definitely one of the qualities I love about him.

Well, that's our mini update. Tomorrow is my last day at work. I was going to work until the day I had this baby, but when I go to work, I don't feel productive because I feel so slow and sluggish. I feel good that, essentially, I will have worked up to my due date.
Hope everyone has a fabulous and fun Memorial Day Weekend!

Visiting Teaching Companion Saves Waddling Pregnant Woman at Walmart !

That would have been the headline if it had made it to the papers.

Yesterday, I ran to Walmart to buy a couple of things. Literally, 4 insignificant things I felt were important enough to drive about 4 miles down the road for. As I drove there, I turned a corner and overturned my purse, knocking a lot of things out of my purse, most importantly my keys. (Our ignition key is stuck in the ignition, and our door key is a separate key. It's a long story, and I don't know why our ignition key sticks, but it does.) Anyway.

I get out at Walmart, after sticking what I THOUGHT was everything into my purse, including Reed's phone which he had just recently left in our car. Obviously, minus my keys. I do my shopping at Walmart, and walk out to my car, finally noticing that I have no keys in my purse. I begin to panic, because it's hot and Reed needs the car ASAP, and if you remember, we're still sharing one car.

I start to think, who can I call? Long story short, I'm talking to one of my sisters on the phone, trying to figure out what to do, when my visiting teaching companion calls, needing the primary book I still hadn't returned to her. She lives close to my house, so I ask her if she would mind going to my house, asking Reed for HIS set of keys, and then coming to Walmart where I could return her primary book which happened to be locked in the car with my keys. And she did all that for me! Can you believe that?! I have to say, I would do absolutely anything for this very kind sweet woman now. I feel eternally indebted to her.

I was seriously in a panic, b/c of course I'm thinking that I could go into labor any moment, and I had no way of calling Reed b/c I had his phone. I could call an ambulance, but then we'd have to swing by the house and pick up my husband. Wouldn't that make for an interesting story? :) Anyway,it all ended well, and the whole problem was fixed about 30 minutes after I had originally found out I locked my keys in the car. What a blessing!