After a few days of watching blood sugar levels and trying to get George ready for life at home, we were finally given the green light to go home Friday afternoon. We waited with crossed fingers to hear the good news. Since George had such round the clock medical care and had an IV in his scalp he never got his lovely sponge bath. We decided to give him one before we left the hospital ourselves. He isn't big on being naked (yet was a trooper when it came to blood draws and heel sticks!)and we aren't as skilled as the nurses, but it still happened! We snuggle him up in some warms clothes and headed home. Caroline was headed home as well and we could finally start our lives at home as a family of four!
Caroline brought her Aflac duck to keep George company :)
This is horrible Daddy!!!
Happiness is being clothed
Smiley :)
Bucked up and ready to go
He didn't need a carseat challenge like Caroline,
but his nurses were from the nursery so his
carseat safety check was performed in the same place as Caroline's
Tuesday morning I was set to go in for my induction at 9:30am. I couldn't sleep much that night, too excited and too congested. Ah, lovely pregnancy symptoms that would soon vanish! When it was finally time to get ready I started having a lot of discomfort, but no contractions. Caroline was still feeling under the weather so instead of dropping her off at school, we dropped her off at Nana's. Alan and I headed to Maine Medical Center and we couldn't drive fast enough. While I wasn't having contractions, my discomfort was growing steadily and quickly. We arrived at the hospital and as I had figured out, I was in labor. After a couple hours of paperwork and the basics, they decided to break my water and see if my labor and that would get the show on the road, but it didn't. I actually stalled so after three hours, they gave me Pitocin to start contractions up again. That was at 3pm and they kept cranking them up. They started with contractions every 4 minutes, then to 1.5-4 minutes, and finally every 1.5 minutes. We called my friend and birth photographer and told her it was probably time to head in. It was a good thing since when she arrived the contractions were pretty darn strong. I did 2 more laps around the delivery floor and then settled into the recliner. I ordered dinner but never touched it. It got too bad to think about eating and I could barely even listen to the anesthesiologist going over how the epidural would work. Once that was in I enjoyed about an hour of relaxation, but no food, and then I was told it probably wouldn't be until after midnight that we would meet our little boy. I didn't want to wait that long and made a comment I wanted his birthday to be 11/19. That was a little after 8pm. A little while later I felt a lot of pain. I went from nothing to everything out of the blue. The pain broke right through the epidural and I immediately hit that button. I wasn't going to not hit it like we did with Caroline! By the second hit the resident OB realized that we were ready to go. My OB came in the room minutes later and Alan left to grab some ice chips across the hall. He was gone maybe 60 seconds and they had already had me push once. Baby was coming fast and furious! I was very lucky to only push 5 times over about a 10 to 15 minute period and out came baby boy. George Willis Lovejoy had entered the world at 9:57pm. Every exclaimed how big he was but he seemed beautiful and small to me :) Granted, I only could see the top of his head. When they finally weighed him no one could believe that the guess of the OB, somewhere over 8 pounds, was absolutely wrong. He measured in at 10 pounds and 2 ounces, 22 inches long. Ignorance was definitely bliss because I was shocked and I don't think I could have pushed that easily knowing his size beforehand!!!
We'll be sharing the beautiful photos that Carly took as George entered the world and the following day when he met his sister for the first time as soon as we get them. For now, this is what we got. George had hypoglycemia due to his size and we couldn't get his levels to regulate so he was finally placed on an IV and NG tube. We still managed to leave after only 3 days even with stumbling with a few different medical problems and he took every one in stride. Upwards of 10 heel sticks a day and he was a champ! Through it all, he is a very easy and happy baby and already gives us the cutest smiles!
Alan doing some labor photography before Carly arrives lol
A blurry self pic
Relaxing on the warmer once we found out he had low blood sugar
This time around I was able to actually hold my baby, give him love & walk over to him once he was in the warmer. A totally different experience this time around :)
Snuggly in our hospital room
Getting love from Caroline
While the pictures are beautiful, Caroline was so cute meeting her
brother that we quickly had to grab our phones to get some video as
well!
George & I hanging out while Daddy is home
Some Kangaroo time with Daddy
Relaxing and getting some sun to help with his jaundice
Last week was supposed to be relatively quiet, but we had some extra appointments thrown in there, and some drama of random sickness. Baby brother even got in the mix with teasing us with an arrival. In the end though, we survived and it ended rather quietly. We didn't get much accomplished and we didn't get a chance to do a lot of fun things, but we spent it together which is the most important thing.
Over the weekend we spent more family time together, went out to eat for the last time as a family of three, and got ready for little brother's arrival. Which, is soon! As in tomorrow morning! We will drop Caroline off at school and head to MMC for my induction. We're all pretty excited for the massive change that is coming :)
Caroline's artwork has really gone up a notch!
This is a picture of Aunt Kathy :)
She has NEVER gotten into anything, always prim and proper and doing as told.
But... Daddy left her and my little independent girl decided she would
put lotion on herself so her skin wouldn't be dry :P
Little bunny sticking her bum out :P
She wasn't so sure about this outfit, but then once she saw herself
she just HAD to take a picture in it :P
Look at that long hair!
We still have a few things to do to the nursery, lighting and a few decor items that are on backorder,
but it's ready for the little man! Just under the wire as always :P
A couple of weeks ago we decided to have my friend Carly take some photos of us as we knew it would be our last time as a family of three and wanted to capture these moments. When I was told I could deliver any minute Carly was gracious enough to meet us with only two days notice! It was a gorgeous day minus some breezes, but Caroline was a bit grumpy and had a runny nose and I was just exhausted. Somehow, you'd never know. Carly did such a great job! I decided to share all of the pictures we got from her in web format. Stay tuned for some more beautiful photos from Carly very soon as our little guy should be here in less than a week!
Halloween has always been an end goal of mine during this pregnancy. No matter what happened, I wanted to make it to Halloween so that Caroline could have her fun holiday and we could share it as a holiday. While it was a busy week, we made it and we had lots of fun. It rained and didn't make for the best weather for trick or treating, but all three of us went out and trick or treated! The night before Alan and Caroline carved pumpkins while I separated pumpkins seeds from the pulp. Not as fun, but I love pumpkin seeds so it was worth it! I also learned this year that Caroline loves them as well!
After school and a decent nap, Daddy got home at a good time and we hit Dock Square for the first leg of our trick or treating. It was pretty rainy and we had to dodge a lot of umbrellas. Caroline wanted to stop there, but we found out she wasn't tired, but wanted to eat her candy! We had told her no candy until we were finished so we could check labels, etc. ! She had actually said, "No thank you" to a few of the store owners so she could rush to the car! The second leg was Summer St. We met up with Officer Russel and grabbed a blue glow stick and were on our way. Caroline only made it half way before declaring she was done, again just wanting to eat her candy. We decided that it was a good stopping point anyways. We still had to visit Nana & Grampy's house and Aunt Brenda & Uncle Robert's house. After those stops we went home and checked out the loot. She was allowed to eat her most desired treat before heading up to bed. That treat? A tiny purple box of Nerds. She declared those and the cake pop Aunt Brenda gave her the best out of her loot. Granted, she still has A LOT left since we are holding her to a very strict ration. She is only three ya know :)
Working hard on her favorite design, the bat!
Our Jack-o-lanterns glowing in the rain
Costume dress rehearsal!
Her cowboy hat and boots were perfect for the rain!
Caroline had school the morning of Halloween and they were allowed to wear their costumes. They put on a custom parade and gymnastics show for parents and grandparents. They also had a joint snack time as well. Caroline was super tired that morning so she wasn't as active as normal, but she still had a lot of fun. She didn't want me to leave during snack-time so I stayed for a bit and enjoyed the sharing of her and a little boy next to her offering their candies to me. Very good sharing, hehe. Grampy and Nana came along for the fun as well and got to see Caroline run around, jump on the trampoline, and swing on the bars! Her costume was coming apart with each activity, but a cowgirl can only do so much :)
