Bowling

We were lucky enough to have Abe to ourselves last Friday night, so we decided to go bowling. Adeline LOVED bowling! Anytime it was someone's turn to bowl, she would say "it's my turn!" She was on such a high; laughing, running around, jumping up and down, etc. And then towards the end of the night she completely crashed and started having a meltdown. That's what happens when you get past bed time. We had such a fun time with her.






The other day I was frantically trying to clean our house top to bottom because we had people coming by to look at it. Every time I would clean something up, Adeline would get something out and start making another mess. I realized she was taking chairs, blankets, dolls, etc. over by the front door and I asked Abe if she was making a mess. He said, "Uh, looks like something you would have made when you were a kid!" I walked over and Adeline had her chairs in a circle with babies sitting on them and blankets draped all over. What a silly girl! She has quite the imagination.

Best. Surprise. Ever.

Last Friday night Abe actually had a night at home instead of being locked up in his office working on his thesis (story of my life lately). We were playing some wii together and one of Abe's friends called him at about 10pm begging for help because a pipe broke in his house and he needed help fixing it. So, off Abe went on his only night off to help a friend out. I was so tired I decided maybe I would go to bed a little early. Abe begged me to try and stay awake till he got home. There were a couple things that I thought were suspicious. #1: he took my car. I thought that was a little odd, but thought maybe since he never got to drive it he had the itch to? #2: my dad called me earlier that day and wanted to know what my plans were for the weekend. "Uh, nothing", I replied. Then he said, "Well, I'm sure you guys will figure out something fun to do!" Now that doesn't seem that suspicious, but if you know my dad, you would know he can barely keep a secret and I could sense something "funny" in his voice. I figured that if I really was going to get a surprise, maybe it was my dad coming to surprise me because he found an assignment out here or something. But that would be the extent.

Well, at about 11pm Abe calls me and tells me he is on his way home. He also tells me that my new car was hit while he was working on his friends house. Of course you can imagine I was not happy about that. However his story seemed a little bit off. I get off the phone with Abe and my sisters call me on speaker telling me they are missing me and they wish we were all together. Boy did I wish I was with them as well! As I am talking to them, Abe tells me to come look at the car. I walk out and to my surprise, Sierra, Amanda, Johanna & Emerson are all in my car! I think I must have looked in shock, because it felt like a dream and that it wasn't really happening.

We had the best time together. We did a lot of hanging out, crafting, talking, shopping, etc. One of the best parts was watching Johanna and Adeline play together. I think they had the time of their lives and Adeline is going to be having withdrawals for awhile. They are the cutest little buddies. They just disappeared all day long and were in their on little world. Made our lives easy! Ever since they left I have been going through withdrawals and wish we all lived closer to each other. Back to my boring life!! I am now finding out the meaning to an "AFIT widow". I had heard that all the time when we first moved out here when Abe started school at AFIT. Abe actually got all his work done at school and spent a lot of time at home with us. Ever since Norah was born, he comes home for dinner and then heads back to school to work on his thesis until about 10 or 10:30pm every night. Ah, this too will pass!

Here are some pictures of our weekend together

Little Norah

When Norah was just over a week old, I finally got around to taking some pictures of her. Funny how you get lazy with your own kids. It was probably because I was still recovering from birth, but I was so unmotivated!



If you want to see more pictures, you can go to my photography blog: nicolebarkerphotography.blogspot.com

She had her 2 week appointment last Friday and she has already grown so much! Here are her stats:

weight: 8.4 lbs
length: 19.7 inches long (even though at birth they said 20 inch)
head: 36.5 cm

She is a little chunk! Adeline fit in her newborn clothes forever and it seems like Norah is already growing out of some of them. She still looks just like Adeline did and has pretty much the same temperament: fussy. Unfortunately she doesn't like the binky very much and wants to be held ALL the time. She is such a cute baby and we love her so much. It does make it hard when she likes to scream and be held, while trying to entertain Adeline, but I have to remember that when babies reach 3-4 months (at least in my case) they are a lot happier!

We had some of my most favorite people come in for a surprise visit from across the country on Friday and they just left last night. I will have to get my pictures uploaded and tell you about it on my next post.

Thanks a lot for nothing...

So much for being a concerned mom!! Yesterday morning when I changed Norah's diaper and clothes, I noticed that her belly button was bleeding. It fell off extremely early and had a foul smell, so I had been worried about it anyway. I also noticed that on her tummy was a pretty good size circular area that was a lot darker. I worried that she may be bleeding underneath her skin since she was bleeding from her belly button. They had me come in on base for her to be seen. Not ideal since Norah was 8 days old and had already been to the hospital 3 days that week for her billirubin count. Her belly button they said was not a concern, but this bruising/discoloration... where did it come from? All of a sudden there were 5 doctors in my room helping take a bunch of her blood from all her tiny little veins, which was extremely painful to watch. Then they turned to me as I started to cry and insisted that my husband come in because it was important for him to be there. I started worrying even more at that point because they were so concerned.

All her labs came back.... normal. They then insisted that we go to the Children's Hospital so her vitals could be monitored for 24 hours and to make sure her discoloration/bruise didn't get any worse or that she didn't get any more of them. We got to the hospital and were admitted into the ER. Great. Last place I wanted to go with a newborn. We practically sat in a tiny little room for 5 hours while the doctor danced around the idea that she was being abused. They did an entire skeletal xray of her body AND a CAT scan. She was so upset from the xray that she puked everywhere once they gave her back to me. Of course her xray and CAT scan came back normal. The doctor finally agreed to let us be discharged instead of then being admitted for who knows how long.... for no reason since he didn't think that anything was wrong with her. So we got to go after 5 hours of being there just to make sure we weren't abusing her... plus the 3 hours of being on base. I felt like I was released from jail when we left the hospital. It is sad to think that babies are abused and I know it is their job to investigate; however it sucks to be accused of it. I was SO tired from being at the hospital for so long, already sleep deprived and it didn't help sitting on a hard chair for that long when I am still recovering from stitches. I told Abe that if a social worker came and talked to us to see if I wanted to hurt myself or the baby, I may just want to hurt her!! Then they would really be putting an investigation on us!

Today her "discoloration" has gone down and looks like it may go away. So what did I get out of my traumatic experience yesterday... or should I say Norah's? Nothing! Possibly and new little cold for my newborn. I am praying she doesn't really get sick. So out of both of our kids... Adeline is "failure to thrive" (you can click here if you don't remember that saga) and Norah is abused. What a great record we hold.

Norah's Birth Story

(this is REALLY long, so skip over if you don't want to read... more for my documentation)

I had a doctors appointment 2 days before my 41 week mark and my doctor decided to schedule me to come in the following Monday to be induced (break my water). He figured that if I didn't go into labor on my own before then, I would be close to 42 weeks, and at that point I wouldn't be able to deliver at Family Beginnings, which is a natural birthing center. He figured that if they broke my water on Monday, I would have a good chance of going into labor on my own and wouldn't need potocin. The following day I started getting a little stir crazy because I felt so horrible and was pretty sure I wasn't going to go into labor on my own before Monday.... so why wait until then? I figured I would have the same results on Thursday that I would on Monday. I called my doctor and he agreed for me to come in On Thursday (my 41 week mark) so he could break my water.

We arrived to Family Beginnings at 6:30am. 7:30am the doctor arrived and broke my water. He wasn't 100% that he actually broke the water because her head was so low that it was blocking any fluid from coming out. At about 11am he came back and attached a wire to the top of her head to ensure that my water was indeed broke. At that point they had me on a breast pump and walking to get regular contractions. At about 12pm I was having regular contractions and had started off 2-3 cms dilated. By 4pm my contractions were hurting pretty bad (still bearable though) and they checked me. I thought for sure I had progressed. To my disappointment, they told me I was still 2-3 cms dilated. The problem was that my cervix was VERY posterior (more than normal) and hadn't come forward at all on it's own. So before my cervix could dilate, it had to come all the way in the anterior position. If I had gone into labor on my own, my cervix would have most likely already been in the anterior position and my labor wouldn't have been too long.

Anyway, after they told me I was still only 2-3cms, I cried for a minute and then we started walking the halls again. At about 7:30 or 8pm, my contractions seemed unbearable and I really wanted to get into the tub. They normally don't want you to get into the tub until 5 cms, because it can slow down labor. They checked me and I was at 3cm. Once again, I really wanted to cry. The only good news was that my cervix was FINALLY in the anterior position. They told me to get into the tub anyway since I was in so much pain. Within the next hour of being in the tub, the nurse came in and told me she had to check me because of how I was sounding. She did and I was already at 5-6 cm. She called the doctor and had him come in right away. I labored in the bath for a total of about two hours or so and they had me get out because Norah's heart rate started going up. I moved into the room and ended up delivering Norah at 10:54pm. I really had wanted to do a water birth, but since her heart rate had risen, they didn't want me to get back in. Plus by the time I was ready to push, I frankly didn't care where or how she came out... I just wanted it to be over with. I am SO happy that I went natural, however it was REALLY hard! I kept telling Abe that I was going to die and that I couldn't do it anymore. And I really felt that way! It's amazing what the human body can go through and you really are ok! As soon as Norah came out I immediately felt SO much better! During my labor I kept thinking to myself "now WHY am I going natural?" I'm sure that everyone thinks that though when they are in the worst pain. My nurses were great and it was nice that I was able to eat throughout my entire labor, not be on an iv and be in complete control. My doctor was absolutely amazing as well. He wasn't even on call that night, but stayed on call for me and left his family on New Years Eve to deliver Norah. He even stuck around for a little bit after she was born and talked with us and wanted to look at little Norah.

Our room at family beginnings....


At 6:30am right before they broke my water

Immediately after I delivered Norah.... about 15 hours of labor... yuck!



This week has been going pretty well. My mom left on Tuesday and that was really emotional for me. I wish that we lived closer to family. With us having a new baby and moving to Boston in April, who knows when we will see everyone again... or when anyone else will get to meet Norah.

The hardest part about having two kids for me has been trying to give Adeline enough attention. I really don't want her to feel bad at all and get really jealous. She has been such a good little kid though and loves Norah so much. All day she asks to hold Norah and wants to lay be her. She is always hugging and kissing her and is pretty soft. Of course Adeline seems so old all of a sudden. She has full on conversations with us and is talking unbelievably well. Whenever she wants to do something she has to say after it... "that would be fun!" and she has to put in "probably" in just about every sentence. She cracks me up.

Adeline today before she went outside and played in the snow with daddy

The girls watching Dora together

Happy 30th!

Abe's 30th birthday was yesterday. I originally wanted to have a big birthday party for him. After all, it is the big 3-0! As I started realizing that I was going to be recovering from giving birth and have a brand new baby, I figured it wouldn't be the best idea. Plus Abe says he hates stuff like that anyway. So, we just spent the night at home. We had a ton of visitors, so it felt kind of like a party anyway! Adeline helped me make his cake and wrap his presents. She was so excited about Abe's "party" and ripped open all his presents for him and soon as he gave her the ok.

Happy Birthday Love!!

She's Here!

Welcome to the world little Norah Nicole Barker! She was born December 31st at 10:54pm and weighed in at 7lbs 4oz. She is absolutely perfect. It makes me laugh how much all the doctors worried about her weight. She looks just like Adeline did but is chunkier and has darker hair. We are already home and feeling great less than 24 hours later. I will post her birth story another time when I am not so tired!









Adeline was SO excited for Norah to come home. My mom asked us to call before we arrived home so that Adeline could stand at the window and watch us drive in. She didn't want to do anything else but wait for her arrival. Of course when we got home she ran upstairs and got her an outfit she wanted to change her in, wanted to feed her, hold her, change her diaper, etc. I think I may have *too* much of a helper on my hands :)