+1 for Team Reeder

This is Todd. I've never blogged before, but certain events in life are worth documenting. I just received a new journal for Christmas (thank you Santa!) but wanted to share these thoughts with all of you. I received permission to post on this blog, with the condition that the post be reviewed by the Editor in Chief (aka Haley) before being published.

Let's start by identifying the elephant in the room. His name is Luke Todd Reeder and I'm not joking when I say he is an elephant! He was born December 18, 2012 at 6:06pm; measured 21.5 inches long; and weighed 9lb, 7oz! Here's how it all went down:

December 17, 2012
3:30pm - Haley was at the Dollar Tree looking for some birthday candles (for me since it was my birthday) when all of a sudden Haley felt like her bladder had just exploded all over her. She immediately thought "Oh my gosh, I think my water just broke!!," followed by "This is exactly how it happens in the movies, when you're out and about doing things!" Everyone has asked her if she left immediately and went home, but no, she continued shopping, found the candles, waited in line to pay, and then headed home! Haley called me on her way home from the store and told me the news. We both couldn't believe this was happening right now. We were supposed to be going on a date for my birthday.....what a date it would turn out to be!

6:00pm - I caught the 4:30 bus from school and arrived home around 5:00. After putting together our belongings for the hospital, eating some snacks, and getting Mitchell ready to go, we headed to the hospital about 6:00. We dropped Mitchell off at some friends' house (super helpful - THANK YOU!) and arrived at the hospital around 6:20pm. Haley's contractions started up soon after and we settled in for an eventful evening.

11:00pm - The "eventful" evening was over pretty quick, with very few events having actually occurred. Haley's contractions never did increase in strength and her dilation remained at about 3 cm, exactly where it was upon arrival earlier that evening.

December 18, 2012
8:30am - Haley labored lightly throughout the night, with very little progress. On the bright side, she was able to get a good amount of rest, as did I on my surprisingly comfortable hospital couch/bed. Haley's doctor came in and basically confirmed to us that not much had happened through the night. Since Haley had tested positive for Group B Strep and her water had broke, the doctor didn't want her laboring much past 24 hours from the time the water broke before using alternative means to get the baby (i.e. C-section).

As the day progressed--and Haley did not--we wrapped our minds around the idea that Haley may need a C-section. Haley prepared quite a bit for this labor in an effort to go all natural but when it came down to it we knew the most important thing was that she and Luke were both healthy when it was all done.

4:30pm - Haley's doctor and nurses scheduled a C-section for 5:00pm. She went into the operating room closer to 5:30 while I had to wait outside for a few minutes until they had her situated and ready for the surgery. At about 5:55pm, they invited me in where I was able to sit with Haley while they toiled away on the opposite side of a sheet they put up to prevent us from seeing the incisions and surgery. I asked the anesthesiologist if I could walk around and see them working on Haley but she quickly, and sharply, responded, "No! When they have the baby out the doctors will take it to the baby warmer where you can go see it. Until that time, do not try." Then, turning to Haley, she said something about not wanting me to pass out. Hello...do you realize who you're dealing with here? I witnessed my cat give birth when I was 9 years old and I had no problem remaining conscious for that; why would I have a problem now?

6:06pm - I tried to peek a few times but the doctors were always in the way of seeing anything cool. After a few more minutes of waiting, we heard a baby cry. The waiting was over- Luke had arrived! The doctors cleaned him a little and I was able to go see him and commence taking pictures. After a few minutes, I scooped him up and took him over to Haley who was being stitched up.

I have never witnessed anything filled with more love than a mother greeting her newborn child into the world. The tenderness and love I felt for Luke seemed to be eclipsed by the sweetness and love I felt by seeing Haley hold him. The same thing happened with Mitchell and to this day, I don't know if I am capable of loving my children as much as I have seen Haley love them. I am not trying to diminish the love I feel for Mitchell and Luke, because I love them tremendously. I am simply stating that Haley's capacity to love seems to be so much greater than mine. It is a testament to me that God created woman with more of a nurturing spirit than man.

I had forgotten the sweetness of a newborn over the last few years since Mitchell is almost three and a half. Of course, it helps the experience be sweet when your baby is not spending his first days of life in the NICU only to have a severe case of jaundice for another 10 days! That is what happened with Mitchell and I think the trauma took away some of the tenderness that we would have otherwise felt. Luke has been healthy from the beginning, with no trouble breathing, no jaundice, no anything! To have him in our hospital room from day 1 has been great. To see him sleeping so peacefully while realizing he is part of my family is itself a spiritual experience. I look forward to seeing all over again the endless list of firsts--first crawl, first walk, first word, etc.

Here are some pictures of the new family addition!

One of the first pictures...no more than 4 minutes old!

Not a great picture of Luke, but this is Mitchell's first time holding him. Mitchell really is as happy as he looks to have a brother. He is always asking to hold Luke, and always tries to give Luke his pacifier when he cries.

 

This is a video of Haley meeting Luke for the first time!  

Thanksgiving 2012

We were going to go to Utah for Thanksgiving, but I had some pre-term labor issues a couple weeks prior and we decided it was probably safest to stick around for the holiday.  But let's not let the pre-term labor story end there.  All should know that Barack Obama is responsible for putting me in the hospital two days after he was re-elected.  I am completely serious.  The night of the election I was so distressed and discouraged when I realized the way things were turning out.  Sure, in hindsight I'm not quite as bugged, but the night of? The stress was enough to start contractions.
I didn't take them seriously until Thursday morning when they started to grow in intensity.  I decided to head on over to the hospital, and yep, I was in labor.  Awesome. I was only 32.5 weeks along, so I wasn't too keen on having a baby quite yet.  Thankfully, after 3 doses of medication, the contractions slowed down enough that my doctor was comfortable sending me home.  This is the part that struck me as funny.  Sure I wanted to go home, I had no interest in spending the night at the hospital.  However, I was really surprised when the nurse told me a few times that the contractions were slowing down in intensity and speed.  To me, I had been contracting for almost 48 hours, by the time they sent me home, every movement my body was making made it feel like an intense contraction.  The nurse also informed me that the medication was pretty powerful and I was feeling those side effects as well.  All I know is I felt like crap when they sent me home, but happy was I to be leaving.
I had to rest for a few days, and there were a couple days there that I thought I'd be back in the hospital, but thankfully, I took it easy enough that the contractions stopped altogether after about a week. Now, at 37 weeks, I'm dealing with the occasional Braxton Hicks.
In the end, it was just us three for Thanksgiving.  It was really nice to know that I could prepare a humble Thanksgiving feast for us, and we could enjoy each other's company and not be miserable that we weren't with our extended family.  We are a family, we like each other a lot.
Mitchell didn't think Thanksgiving was quite as great as Halloween, and he's certainly forgotten about it in the excitement of preparing for Christmas, but the Thanksgiving season is definitely one of my favorite times of the year. It's the perfect way to start off the season of giving!

Mitchell's new trick- climbing up to find the candy. 

When is this kid going to learn to smile good for the camera? Gah!

Our Thanksgiving Feast prepared by yours truly! 34 weeks pregnant.

Remember October?

Gah! I'm turning into most of the people on my personal blog list...those who haven't updated their blogs in like a year.  October was pretty great.  I spent a good part of the month getting ready for a Halloween Party that we hosted for Mitchell's friends.  It was a ton of fun to plan, but it turned out better in my head! I need to remember that 3-4 year olds don't have the kind of attention span I give them credit for.  The handful of games that I planned only took up about 30 minutes of the party, but in my head, they were busy with the games much longer than that! Thankfully we had a Winnie the Pooh Halloween movie that saved the day and filled up the time until the food was ready. 
It was so much fun to have Mitchell's friends over and all decked out for Halloween. All the kids did great- except one. Mine.  Our little Superwhy! was throwing a fit almost the entire time.  I think he has issues when lots of kids are in his territory. Oh well.  Thankfully Todd was home for the party, so he took care of Mitch while I supervised the other kids.

Spider webs made with almond bark, pretzels and some raisins.

Mummy dogs- surprisingly delicious!

Jell-O Worms, alot of time, but totally worth it!

My dear friend, Kate, who helped plan and execute the party. Thanks Kate!!

My personal favorite, Jack-O-Lantern ball toss.

Ghost bowling

Pin the hands on Mr. Bones

Earlier in the month, we took the opportunity to head out to an awesome pumpkin patch just outside of town.  We had a great time on the hayride, getting lost in the corn maze, and of course, picking out pumpkins.

About 30 weeks pregnant. I'm way bigger now. Yikes!

Mitchell's classic "big smile and look at the freaking camera" face!

Carving pumpkins in this California climate isn't quite the same as growing up in Utah.  Here you can only carve them like 2-3 days in advance of Halloween because it's still like 80 million degrees here by October's end. Anyways, we enjoyed our carved pumpkins for about 48 hours before the millions of nasty bugs descended on them.

Mitch only loved the pumpkin "guts" just a little. He'd laugh so hard every time I said "guts"!!

Too great not to post.

Handsome guys!

Haley's pumpkin on the left, Mitchell's in the middle, and Todd's on the right.

And a couple more photos from the big day itself- Halloween.  Have I mentioned that Mitchell fell in love with Halloween this year?  He asked for about two weeks afterwards if we could go trick-or-treating again.  And, he's still quoting a couple of Halloween books we got from the library- Room on the Broom and Halloween Night.

As his parents, it's our responsibility to make sure our kid scores BIG on Halloween. And score big he did.

And in case you haven't seen enough...

We made a bird feeder for Joy School one day.  We were severely disappointed when we put it up early October and birds didn't eat from it til like November.  But then it was cool.

This is Todd trying to act like he's got photography skills.

Remember September?

I'm not sure why my blogging activity has drastically declined over the last few months.  I think it's just not at the top of the list these days. I am busier, but not by much. Life marches forward.  We're happy.  We're healthy.  Here's a small glimpse of September.

On Labor Day we took a drive up to gorgeous Lake Alpine. We picnicked at the Lake and then went on a short hike to a lovely pasture.  It was the perfect little hike between a three year old and his pregnant mother.

When I was still a cute pregnant lady.  Nowadays most people think I'm about to "pop"- when in reality I still have two months left.  How much bigger can I get?

Later in the month Mitchell went to a birthday party where I believe he polished off that entire bowl of M&Ms all by himself.

Mitch is crazy about dressing up these days, here are a just a few of his selections-