Our Little Peanut!!

Welcome to the world little Elliot Parker!!  He officially joined our family last Monday night, March 10th at 11:34 pm.  He is perfect in every way, and he has already captured our hearts for sure.  To tell the whole story, I'll have to rewind to the previous Thursday morning, March 6th.  I had an appointment and we expected to get some news about when we could schedule an induction in the event I didn't go into labor on my own.  I had kind of had my fill of being pregnant and going to the doctor every week.  The baby was still fine, but I had not dilated or changed any from the previous week.  She offered to put me in the hospital that night and start an induction.  Believe me, the offer was tempting, but I knew deep down inside that he probably wasn't ready and neither was my body.  I wanted to do everything possible to avoid a long, hard labor like I had with Harry and I just didn't want to do something stupid that might put me at risk of having a c-section.  So I declined, and set an appointment for early Monday morning to see how things were going.  I think Travis was about ready to kill me...he was so excited to meet his new son!  I tried to get on with life and I even worked that Friday, Saturday, and Sunday!  Monday morning brought great news.  I had dilated to 2-3 cm, my favorite doctor was on call that evening, and he told me to head to the hospital at 1pm that afternoon to get things going!  I wasn't expecting to get things going that early, so I had to scramble to make arrangements for Harry, get Travis home from work, and get the rest of my stuff packed up for the hospital.

We got to the hospital, they started my IV and broke my water all by about 1:15pm.  We then sat around and were actually pretty bored for a while!  We watched the 40 Year Old Virgin (probably not the most appropriate choice of film to watch in a catholic hospital!) and then my contractions started to pick up and I started to feel pretty miserable.  I should also mention the fact that I was super sick with a cold.  My head was full of congestion and I had the nastiest cough imaginable!  I held out on the epidural until 7pm and I believe I was about 4cm then.  Then Mom, George, Harry, and Chris stopped by to visit.  I was getting pretty frustrated at this point.  I was feeling like crap from the cold, and they would only let me sit up minimally since I had the epidural.  When it came time for everyone to leave around 10, I had only progressed to 5-6 cm.  When they were taking Harry home, I had to fight back the tears.  I was sad because he was a little freaked out by all of the monitors and I couldn't really hold him since I was hooked up to the IV, on monitors, and laying almost flat.  I was also frustrated since I just knew I was in for a long night and I wanted the baby to be here so badly.  After everyone left, we put in The Break Up to run some distraction.  During that hour, I became increasingly uncomfortable and by 11, I was having the strange sensation that I needed to push.  But surely not, right??  I coudn't have progressed 4-5 cm in an hour...but I did!!  And 3 glorious pushes later he was here!!  It sure beat the 27 hour, 3 1/2 hr pushing fiasco with Harry! 

Babysitting

Elliot weighed 8 pounds even and was 20 1/2 inches long.  This was yet another blessing since they had some concerns about his size and was estimated to be 6 1/2 lbs 2 weeks prior on our ultrasound.  We chose his name Elliot just because we liked it and his middle name Parker is my mom's maiden name.  He has so far been an absolute breeze.  He still sleeps a ton during the day and when he is awake, he is not fussy and just seems to be taking it all in.  Believe me, with crazy parents, a crazy older brother, and 4 crazy pets, there is a lot to take in!!  Nights are going okay...he wakes up every couple of hours but that is to be expected.  I am slowly recovering from whatever I had which has made things a bit harder, but all in all I really can't complain.  The house is not destroyed, everyone is fed, and even little Harry has adjusted well to the changes.  He is interested in the baby, but not too much, and he has for the most part been his funny, silly self.  We are extremely humbled and grateful that God has provided us with these 2 amazing, wonderful, sweet boys.  The best keeps getting better around here!!

Regression at its finest!!

I guess it could be classified as a small miracle that Harry is closing in on 23 months and has avoided getting an ear infection.  However, that all ended today with a doctor's visit and an "Ewwwww" from the doctor as she checked out his sweet little left ear. 

It started Saturday.  We went out to the mall for the sole purpose of walking around to try to get some labor started.  We met up with Chris for lunch and Harry suddenly seemed sooooo sleepy.  He kept leaning on me or laying his head on the table and had little interest in eating.  I picked him up to hold him and he was on fire!  I got him home and took his temp (not an easy feat on a squirmy toddler and it read 101.5, but I suspect it may have been higher because I couldn't get him to stay still long enough for the thermometer to read properly.  I started giving him Motrin, Tylenol, and ice water and he seemed to be better after his nap.  I kept giving him the medicine on Sunday, and he acted okay so I thought he probably just had a bug and would be fine.

Then Monday rolls around and he gets the boot from daycare that afternoon and for today for spiking another temp of over 100.  Mom was gracious enough to come over and watch him today even though she is recovering from a sinus infection herself.  His nose was producing some nasty stuff and he was developing a little bit of a cough.  I decided to try to get him into the doctor even though I thought it was probably viral just in case because I wasn't so sure how to handle a newborn and a sickie at the same time.  It was a good thing considering they found out that he was indeed sick and now we can get some of the good old pink stuff in him before the baby gets here.  I'm not a big fan of treating all ear infections, but she said it was yellow and pus filled so that definitely sounds like a winner to me.  With his new diagnosis, he bought himself another day out of daycare tomorrow and gets to spend it with his grandmas instead.  If you happen to be into that sort of thing, please pray for a speedy recovery for out little fella so he can be a strong and healthy big brother really soon!