Happy Birthday, Baby Boy!

At this exact time a year ago, my contractions were starting to get incredibly uncomfortable, I was dilated to about 3cm, and my wonderful husband had his laptop playing Jewel's Lullaby CD with his (uncomfortable) chair pulled up to my bedside while I was trying to catch some sleep while the pain meds were doing their job.

All day, I've found myself stopping and thinking "At this exact time last year....", and it's literally been breaking my heart. My sweet baby boy will be a whole year old tomorrow and I'm never going to get to do this again. No more baby stuff. No more fun baby stages. None of it. I can't say that I'll miss the sleepless nights, but I'd still take them to do it one more time (I always wanted 4).

My labor with Phoenix was the most emotional experience I've ever had with Dayton. While of course we had been through it twice before, for some reason (maybe because we knew this was the last time), we bonded more in those few hours than we had in so long. We had been so scared for the weeks before (due to the scare with his brain ventricles and being told he would need a shunt immediately after birth and would probably be mentally impaired) and when the time actually came, we were definitely in it together. I didn't feel alone for a single second during the process.

Anyway, here I am...freaking out that Phoenix is a year old, and yet, this is just the beginning! We've just gotten going. His little personality is starting to really shine. He's starting to develop in the most amazing ways. And I can't wait to see what he and Michael will do once he's a little older and they're really capable of running a muck! And I keep telling myself, "ANYTIME NOW! ANYTIME NOW HE'LL START SLEEPING THROUGH THE NIGHT!"....I'm probably not that lucky, but I keep telling myself that to ease the baby fever ;)

We'll be having his party on Sunday and I can't wait to see how he reacts. In the meantime, enjoy some pictures of our first year together! =)

Happy Birthday, baby boy! <3 b="b">

The drugs were working! 

About 6 minutes old!

All three boys <3 p="p">

On his way home...

AMAZING hospital pictures!

Sweet boy <3 p="p">

6 weeks with our midwife, Peggy

Mommy and Phoenix

10 months...and a mess!

Sweetness!

Time is not my friend...

In three TWO short days, my sweet baby boy will be a whole year old! I can't believe it. Tomorrow will mark a year ago that I woke up with a bitch of a back ache with an inkling that my water had broken. It would take all.day.long for Dayton to drag my ass to labor and delivery, only for me to feel like an idiot and find that I really was in labor. Ugh, this is so unnecessary.

A little while ago, I placed an order for my sweet baby girl's kindergarten pictures. KINDERGARTEN pictures! This time last year, we were planning for her pre-k pictures. Where has the time gone? Out my damn window, is where! She is growing so fast and so beautifully, sometimes I have to stop, catch my breath, and remember that this is my BABY. How did this happen?!

On Saturday, I packed up the kids and went to my sister's house. Because let's be honest...I've had a hankering to show off my babies (and my new car) for a while now. Dayton was working, so I went (and brought him back one BITCHIN' peanut butter cup blizzard cake from DQ). Michael couldn't stop telling people "Hey! Look! (with his head pointed up, pointing to his incision) My bump is going down!". He's so proud of that damn bump...it's so funny. And I have to give the kid props. He went through hell and back for that bump. Three ER trips. Blood draws. IV's. A combined 10+ days of IV antibiotics. A combined 10+ days of HORRIBLE at-home oral antibiotics. Surgery. Dressing changes (that were uber painful with that awful stick-or-die tape they gave us). The kid has put the effort in to get this bump to go down, and now, there's only a little knot right around the incision.

And speaking of the mister, he turned 27 on Saturday. Poor kid had to work 12 hours too (boo!). He was a little freaked out about the whole 27 thing (so I guess it didn't help that I had the girl at DQ write the most OBNOXIOUS "27! OMG!" on his birthday cake (because I'm the most amazing wife EV-ER). But, while he was busy worrying about turning 27, I realized, I'm only two years younger than he is. Fucking fail. And let's be honest....at 25 years old, I'm not exactly a spring chicken. I've still got 52 million things that I want to do when I grow up, and yeah....I already am. Talk about bursting my own bubble.

And now, for your viewing pleasure: pictures!

Still no teeth and yet the little booger can KILL a tortilla chip!

My beautiful (too big) Miss ZoeJane

A boy with no bump (but still a little bit of mouth paralysis) =)

Only my sweet hubby would buy me flowers the night before HIS birthday!

Annnnd, he's in pull-ups! (And pretty proud of his Car's ones) 

And, let's not forget the best present EVER from the best husband EVER!

My New Baby...

YES.HE.DID!

Testing out my new signature...looks like it works!

Surgery and some Loretab later...

Yesterday morning, they did some more labs and an ultrasound on Michael's "bump" (lymph node), and then decided to do surgery yesterday afternoon. This did not make for a happy boy, because he hadn't been able to eat anything since midnight on Monday. They decided to do the surgery to remove the lymph node because there still wasn't any fluid showing up on the ultrasound.

About 4:40, they brought in a dose of Versed to help him relax so he wouldn't be scared when they took him in the operating room. He got a case of the sillies. And suddenly, the iPad (which was turned off) was so much more interesting. He'd lean over ever-so-slowly to look at himself in the reflection, and kept bending until his forehead would hit it. Then he'd die laughing and do it all over again. ZoeJane didn't want to leave him down there, so she stayed in the room with Phoenix and my mom while Dayton and I walked him down. On the way down, he was goofing off and being so loud, we had to tell him to quiet down a few times. They led us into a pre-op room where the doctor and the anesthesiologist came in to talk to us. Micheal had been "slinging webs" the whole time we were down there, so after all of our questions were answered, we got some lovin' from the boy and the anesthesiologist says "Hey Michael, I have somebody that I want you to sling webs on"...he jumped right in her arms and she carried him to the OR (I loved that she carried him instead of him being wheeled in there on a cold bed). I managed to hold it together until he was out of sight, then I lost it. Luckily Dayton was with me and he held me for a second and then we walked to the waiting room.

Dayton went to tell my mom where we were, and while he was gone, I started talking to the only other mom in the waiting room. She was there alone. Her 10 year old son was having his brain shunt replaced...AGAIN. She was scared, but calm. And it made me feel a little silly about being so upset about Michael's minor surgery.

About 45 minutes later, the doctor came out with a smile on his face, "It went great!" was all I needed to hear. He said they went in prepared to remove the node, but there turned out to be fluid BEHIND the node (which is why it didn't show up in imaging), and they were able to drain about 3 cc's. They then placed a drain in the incision and it will stay in place for another 24 hours or so.

About 30 minutes after that, Michael was wheeled back to his room and he was very upset. And I really had to hold it together because it broke my heart to see him like that. He had been given pain meds in the OR, but the Versed apparently can make kids wake up extremely agitated. ZoeJane also got pretty upset seeing her baby brother like that, so Dayton and I took the other kids to the cafeteria while my mom got Michael settled and back to sleep. When we came back, he was out cold. Dayton took the kids back home and my mom and I stayed with Michael. About an hour later, he woke up in a lot of pain, so the nurse brought him an oral dose of Loretab. About 20 minutes later, he was back to sleeping peacefully. My mom left to go back to our house to help Dayton with the other kiddo's and it was just me and the little man the rest of the night.

About 10pm, the nurse decided we should wake him up for his dose of Motrin. He woke up slowly, but once he was awake, all he wanted was food (and who can blame him?). In a span of about an hour, he ate 2 packages of graham crackers, a popsicle, 2 handfuls of jelly beans, and some sweet potato fries ALONG with 2 cartons of apple juice and half a can of sprite. The best part? He didn't get sick! He stayed up for a couple of hours. His nurse changed his dressing (which he was really excited about because he got to see the blood...what a boy!) and he played with her for a few minutes. Everyone was really surprised to see how well he was doing. About 12:30am he asked me to come snuggle with him and he went right back to sleep. He slept a solid 9-10 hours without waking up, and then woke up in a great mood this morning.

If all continues to go well, we should be home by Friday!

What I couldn't put into words myself...

Hospital Ramblings.

Spending all this time in the hospital lately has given me lots of time to think. Lots of much needed time to re-evaluate things in my life. I've thought about things I want to change, goals I want to achieve, things that I'd like to do with and for my children. There are fences that I'd like to mend, memories that I'd like to let go of, hard feelings that I don't want anymore....and all of them have been on my mind lately, once the little man is safely asleep.

Of course, with health scares like this, you can't help but think about just how important your family (specifically, your children) is to you. It makes you stop to smell the roses and really enjoy every moment that you have with them. It makes you want to be a better person all the way around....if not for you, for them. That's really been hitting me lately.