Happy Halloween!

From Rosie the Riveter, the Witch, the Fire Fighter, the Pea Pod, and the Soccer Player (behind the camera).

Family Pictures 2010

Marissa Redder, my old college roommate and Kara's sister-in-law, came to Vegas recently and agreed to take our family pictures. I was so excited - I love her pictures. She did an awesome job and I can't wait to get them all printed out! Thank you, Marissa!!

Letter C

{The kids loved helping make the crepes. I let them each crack an egg for their first time and it was a success. No shells in the batter!}

Monday: We read The Carrot Seed (BFIAR book) and The Whole Green World. We read both books twice. We tore up little pieces of orange construction paper and glued them to a big letter C. As usual, our art activity ends in Eva drawing all sorts of things. This time she wanted to draw the library storytime lady, Miss Shelly. She drew a picture of her with a head and legs. I said, "How about some legs? Does she need legs?" And Eva answered, "Um, no. She can just walk." Then she drew a squiggly line around and through all her pictures and letters saying, "Excuse me! Excuse me!" Like the line was interrupting the other things on the paper. What a crack-up. We did our Kumon cutting workbook and Leighton cut all the way through the paper for the first time. Then Eva did tangrams to make the letter C. We sang a song about the seed cycle (to the tune of Farmer in the Dell) and did the actions of planting and harvesting seeds.

Tuesday: We read Carrot Soup, and re-read our books from yesterday. Eva did her C pages in her workbook, along with a few extras working on size sorting. We went outside to play catch and draw with chalk. I traced the kids outlines on the patio and drew in the details of their faces and clothes. I found a Mr. Rogers video on how they make crayons, which was cool because Eva had asked me while coloring what crayons were made of. We made cookies after dinner (leftover dough from last week's M&M cookies. They were better after sitting in the fridge for a few days!) and I let the kids have 2 each. I had...a few more than 2.

Wednesday: We read Clumsy Crab and drew pictures based on C is for Crab. We clipped clothespins to a can (great motor skill activity for Leighton - his first time to get the clothespin open by himself) and a page in our Kumon Sticker and Paste. Although the stickers were supposed to go on a girl's apron, Leighton insisted she needed some stickers on her shoes, too. Then I let Leighton draw with markers while Eva did some alphabet workbook pages; he figured out how to draw balloons and literally sat without hardly lifting his head for over an hour straight. His paper is completely covered with little circles he drew and meticulously colored in and lines going straight up the page. A masterpiece - I'm saving that forever as his first intentional drawing. Ever since that day he has had this amazing focus while drawing and stays at it for LONG periods of time. We went in the backyard and did the crab walk later that evening. I intended to have a race, but I didn't take into account my out-of-shapeness or the kids' lack of competitive drive in things like that. So we crab-walked for about 2 minutes until I couldn't do it any more and the kids resorted to tackling me instead. Oh well. :) Also, we had cold cereal for dinner. (Not because of the letter C but because of the word LAZY.)

Thursday: We started the day by making delicious crepes for breakfast. I read them Crepes by Suzette and used the recipe in the back to make the crepes. Yum! My first time making them - definitely not my last. (How sad that someone who lived in France for 3 years has never made crepes, right?) After breakfast we read The Mixed-Up Chameleon. We drew chameleons (Andrew and I even got in on the art action and made it family drawing time - it was so fun!) and did some math workbook. Eva wanted to show Daddy her mad workbook skills, so we pulled out a bunch and let her do what she wanted for a while.

Friday: I had no books this day as my theme was caterpillars and my library book didn't come in time. Oh, and our copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar is torn in half after a few years of love and hundreds of readings. (Whoever thought board books were sturdy should come take a look at our bookshelves - R.I.P. Goodnight Moon.) So after circle time we went straight into crafts - making caterpillars out of pompoms and popsicle sticks. (I can't remember where on the internet I found this idea - sorry.) The kids LOVED the caterpillars - I even got out the googly eyes for them. And that was pretty much all we did that day for preschool.

Saturday: I finally got all the books I was waiting for - I need to request them earlier, I guess. So we just did reading today. The Monkey and the Crocodile, If I Ran the Circus (didn't make it all the way through that one), Coco the Carrot, and the Crunching, Munching Caterpillar.

Next week: Letter A

My new constant companion

{Photography brought to you by: Eva Webb. Big cheeks brought to you by: Genetics and too much ice cream.}

Here is a little riddle for you:

I am small and black and hang around your neck. My wires will hang down the middle of your chest and make weird bumps under your shirt. I beep if you leave the house without my other half. I am...

a heart monitor.

And I am the lucky wearer. Along with the Holy Ghost, this little baby is my constant companion. For 3 whole weeks. For better or for worse.

I try not to be annoyed by it. When I get irritated by the electrodes and the stickiness they leave on my skin, or want to scream when I turn over in the night and it wraps around my neck the wrong way, I try to tell myself that it's for a good cause. It will read my heart patterns and detect whether or not I have something wrong.

After an appointment with my cardiologist (if that sentence doesn't make me feel 85 years old, I don't know what will), I was relieved to hear that he would do lots of tests to get to the bottom of my weird problem, if there is a bottom. And if there is a problem.

Last week I went in for an echocardiogram (which, I learned, after sounding really foolish to the nurse, is different than an EKG) - an ultrasound on my heart. It was kind of strange going into a room with an ultrasound monitor and seeing something on the screen other than a fetus. In fact, that may be the last ultrasound I ever have, come to think of it. Normally when I have an ultrasound, I am thinking about the miracle of life in terms of my baby. This time, I was struck at the miracle of life in my OWN body. I watched my own heart beating (regularly, thank heavens) and the valves opening and shutting. It made me grateful to be alive.

So I guess if the worst thing I have to deal with is walking through the grocery store beeping like a senior citizen with a bad hearing aide, then life isn't so bad.

Letter M

Scripture: Ephesians 4:32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.

Monday

We started out reading our BFIAR book, Caps for Sale. The kids really enjoyed it, so we read it twice. We went outside in the backyard and walked around balancing plates on our head, pretending they were caps. We did Kumon Cut #4 - we worked on opening and closing scissors without taking our fingers out of the proper position. Eva was great, and Leighton is getting better every time we practice. He insists on holding them upside down, which makes it harder. Eva, after doing her "assignment" of cutting on the gray lines, cuts her scraps into miniscule squares, like confetti. We sang 5 Little Monkeys swinging in a tree. We did Kumon Uppercase Letters #7-8 and traced our alphabet tracing cards with dry erase makers. (Leighton now thinks everything he colors can be wiped off. A few days later, after coloring with a pen on paper, he yelled, "Wipe it, Mommy!" and couldn't understand why I couldn't wipe it off. :) ) Leighton drew straight lines all the way down his card for the first time, and Eva kept writing Ms and turning them into pants (flipping it upside down and drawing a line on the top). That morning we also took Andrew's parents to the Thunderbird museum on-base. The most educational thing that happened there (for the kids, anyway) was learning that Mom can ask them to stop jumping off benches and tell them to be quiet an infinite number of times. How's that for a math lesson?

Tuesday

We read Monkey and Me (Emily Gravett) and then Caps for Sale again - my other monkey library books were late coming in. We made a monkey mask - the kids colored it and then I put some string around their heads and cut eye holes. (Not in that order, though!) They thought they were pretty fancy wearing masks. They traced letter M on the cards again. (Well, Eva did. Leighton loves the letter H and insists on using that card.) Mammy and Pappy were with us that day, so we cut preschool a little short to spend time with them.

Wednesday

Marshmallow day! We read Marshmallow (Claire Turley Newberry) and The Marshmallow Incident (Judi Barrett), both of which were way too wordy and over the kids' heads. Marshmallow Kisses (Linda Crotta Brennan) was much better for them. We went outside and carried marshmallows on spoons in our mouths (like an egg race) and then came in to sort piles of big and little marshmallows. We glued mini-marshmallows on the letter M (Leighton picked them off and ate them, dried glue and all!) We did Kumon Sticker & Paste workbook - they are loving just putting stickers wherever they want - and then Eva did the M pages in one of her Costco workbooks. They ate WAY too many marshmallows that day, but it was all in the name of education. :) That afternoon we went to the aquarium at Mandalay Bay, which, coincidentally, also starts with letter M. Didn't plan it that way, but it worked out. Andrew refused my requests to buy a book on manatees from the gift shop. (Maybe I'm taking this letter of the week a little far...)

Thursday

This was another great preschool day - actually, this whole week was terrific. Several months ago I bought a treasury of Laura Numeroff books that came with a CD. Though we have read the book a hundred times, we had never used the CD. I saw it when I opened the book and decided to give it a try. The kids LOVED it. I had the CD read If You Give a Mouse a Cookie and If You Take a Mouse to School to them, and we danced to the songs that went with the books. It was adorable, and now I'm going to find more books on CD for them, just to change it up a bit. We also read Mouse Paint (Ellen Stoll Walsh) and One Monkey too Many (Jackie French Koller) (one day too late!), which were both awesome books that I want to buy and add to our library. After reading, we did the M is for Mouse craft, which involved me gluing down capital Ms and the kids coloring all over them. I was too lazy to dig out the pipe cleaners and googly eyes, so we'll chalk it up to more art practice. Eva just ended up writing "mouse" a dozen or more times, and all of our names. We did M&M color sorting, which I thought was our best math manipulative ever. Counting AND eating chocolate. Can it get any better? I submit that it cannot! I was even surprised at how little M&Ms were consumed in the process...by the kids, that is. That night, we used those M&Ms to make cookies. I let them stand on chairs next to me by the mixer (which normally drives me crazy, so this was a big step for me) and dump things in. Despite the constant pleas to lick the spatula (which Eva calls "the dough") and the mess, it was fun.

Friday

We used the CD from the Mouse Cookie book once again to listen to a reading of If You Give a Moose a Muffin. We danced to the songs and acted out making muffins. We also read Moosetache (Margie Palatini). We did some alphabet workbook, too.

This was probably the best week yet - I feel like it keeps getting better. Maybe we're getting into a groove, or maybe my planning got better over time, but this is awesome. I don't know what we did all day before we did preschool. It has saved my sanity! And it's not a bad gig for the kids, either.

Coming up next: Letter C!

Letter H

Can't believe it's been another week already! I keep meaning to blog in between my preschool posts but haven't done it yet. This week went by too fast, but we had fun.

Scripture: Mosiah 2:17

Monday

Reading: Our BFIAR book was If Jesus Came to My House. It went along with our memory scripture and has a great message. Unfortunately I think it went a little over the kids' heads. They were so confused about Jesus being a little boy in the pictures and I don't think they understood the end, where the little boy narrator explains that he had imagined Jesus that way and instead of really spending the day with Jesus, he could treat everyone he sees with kindness. Leighton kept pointing to the pictures and saying, "That's Jesus?" So it may have been a little too abstract. But still a great book. I hope as we keep reading it and talking about it they will understand it a little better.

Letters: Kumon Uppercase #5-6

Fine Motor Skills: they poked holes in a letter H on paper with thumbtacks. This was great activity for both of them.

Play/LMS: Hula hoop! Walmart charges $8 per hula hoop, which Andrew thought was highway robbery, but I think it was worth it. The kids loved it and have been playing with them every time they go outside. I tried to show them how it worked but couldn't successfully get it to stay up longer than about 1.3 seconds. But they have improved at the general idea over the week.

Tuesday

We didn't do preschool that day; instead, we went to the Children's Museum for some hands-on learning, if you will. We went with the Culvers and the Alleys, and Andrew even had the day off and got to go with us.

Wednesday

Another bad preschool day. We did circle time and then I read a few books before I rushed out to a dentist appt. We read The Napping House (Audrey Wood), A House is a House for Me (Mary Ann Hoberman) and The Little House (Virginia Lee Burton). The House is a House for Me one was great, even though I think I liked it better than the kids. The illustrations were engaging. This was our second attempt with The Little House, and for some reason my kids just don't like this book. They won't sit through it, which is extremely rare for them. Maybe it's because there's no interesting characters - I don't know. I think it's a good book, but we'll have to wait a while before checking that one out again.

Thursday

Reading: Are You a Horse? (Andy Rash) - this was a cute idea for a story, but I didn't like the writing. Would have been better if it was more predictable, so the kids could follow it better. The Wild Little Horse (Rita Gray) - I liked the pictures in this book but really wasn't crazy about the writing/story.

Art: H is for House, h is for horse - we didn't do the whole foam thing because I wanted Eva to be more involved in the process. I cut the letters out of paper on my Cricut, glued them on sheets of white cardstock, and Eva drew on all the parts with markers. Her favorite thing is writing words and she is always asking how to spell things; she loved writing the words "horse" and "house" on the page.

Math/FMS: workbook p. 15-19, then hammered golf tees into blocks of styrofoam. Another awesome activity, esp. for Leighton. He was occupied for the better part of an hour with NO throwing!! We did our cutting and sticker workbooks, and Eva kept asking to do "more preschool." I couldn't say no, so we just kept going and doing workbooks - our new Kumon Maze and Number Games ones are great and we did the first 2 pages in each. We went for almost 2 hours straight.

Music: Head Shoulders Knees and Toes, Peter Hammers, All the Pretty Little Horses, If You're Happy and You Know It

Friday

Reading: The Hiccuping Hippo (Keith Faulkner); Hidden Hippo (Joan Gannij); Hippo Goes Bananas (Marjorie Dennis Murray)

Math: Hippo Size Sort and Hippo Color Word Match - these were both awesome for Leighton. I was surprised how easily he matched the colors. The size was a bit more of a challenge (better for Eva) but he still tried and got a few in the right order. I think the hippo is adorable and I'm glad to have these laminated and around for multiple uses in the future.

Letters: We did workbooks and she breezed through them. I sometimes feel we do too much "workbook" stuff and I want her to have freedom, but she loves them so much I can't take them away. So I'll just have to deal with my feelings of being too "schoolish."

Next week: the letter M

1 month

My sweet baby Dean is a month old today.
I have that strange feeling where it seems like just yesterday that I lay on that operating table, and yet it seems like we've had Dean around forever.
I'm holding him right now, listening to the beautiful sound of his breathing while typing with one hand. His face is fuller and older-looking already. Time is already speeding past, and I'm not ready yet. But I can't slow it down. All I can do is kiss his squishy cheeks, smell his hair, and try to burn his littleness in my memory.
Here's to hoping the next month goes a little slower.

Letter L

I forgot to write last week what we do for circle time at the beginning of every preschool day. We don't sit in a circle, but I suppose I can still call it that. :) We start with a prayer, then say the Pledge of Allegiance, then the memory scripture of the week. Then I have a bunch of Wee Sing songs that we do - Good Morning, What Are You Wearing, My Name and Address, Right Hand Left Hand, ABC song, Ten Little Fingers, and Days of the Week. (After 2 full weeks we are still struggling a little with right hand left hand but they know everything else. Even our full address!)

Scripture: 1 Nephi 3:7 - this one was a little too long for them to memorize, so I mostly focused on the chorus from the primary children's song about it. This is the longest scripture I have planned so I wasn't expecting it to go as well as last week. Eva still did pretty well, considering.

Monday

Reading: Leaf Man (Lois Ehlert); Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf (Lois Ehlert); Leaves (David Ezra Stein); Fletcher and the Falling Leaves (Julia Rawlinson)

Art: made beautiful fall leaves from crayons and wax paper, tutorial here

Math/FMS: Kumon cut #2

Letters: Trace letter L card; walked around the house finding things that started with L (lid, ladle, lime, lego, lacing card)

Music: It's Autumntime (Primary Children's Songbook)

Tuesday

Reading: Llama Llama Mad at Mama and Llama Llama Red Pajama (Anna Dewdney)

Art: Eva drew a llama and a shopping cart and wrote Leighton's name; I drew a lime and wrote all the words we found around the house; Leighton drew circles and threw things around the room.

Math/FMS: Kumon Sticker Paste #3-4

Wednesday

Reading: Ladybug Girl (Jacky Davis); The Grouchy Ladybug (Eric Carle); Are You a Ladybug? (Judy Allen)

Letters: Kumon Uppercase #3-4

Math/FMS: Ladybug Numbers Practice; Ladybug pattern sort; Unifix cube patterns - Eva really seemed to get the hang of patterns today. I wasn't sure how to teach it and was feeling frustrated, but it seemed to click and she just took off with the cubes. Well worth the money for that math manipulative; I'm sure we'll use those in many ways for years to come.

Art: Ladybug cut and paste - Eva cut out the wings by herself and then glued all the pieces together. She wrote "ladybug" at the top of the page (I tell her the letters and she writes them herself) and was quite pleased with herself. We hung it on the clothesline art display in the play room.

Thursday

Reading: Library Lion (Michelle Knudsen); The Happy Lion and The Happy Lion Roars (Louise Fatio) (those two were a little too wordy/advanced for the kids - they didn't like them as well and I should have found more age-appropriate ones); If I Were a Lion (Sarah Weeks) although I don't know if we should count that one. Someone tore the last several pages out of the library book, so we didn't get to finish it.

Art: Glued down a yellow letter L (cut with my Cricut) and drew with markers to make something that looked like this. Just a little easier to execute with a preschooler. :) Eva also wrote the word "lion" at the top of her page.

Math/SMS: Kumon workbook (I got 3 more from Costco so we have those in case we run out of planned stuff. I really love those workbooks and so does Eva! If you have a Costco, run grab the 3-pack, it was a great deal.). We did lots of extra workbook because she was enjoying it so much.

Letters: Big Alphabet Workbook

Play/LMS: Lion hunt in the backyard! The previous owner of our home left this hideous plastic lion in the bushes - the equivalent of a tacky lawn gnome, but a big green lion. Andrew hid the lion in different spots and the kids ran around finding him. I knew that ugly thing would come in handy someday. I guess we'll keep him around for more lion hunts - as long as he stays hidden in the bushes.

Friday

Reading: we were kind of out of books by today. I'm still working out the kinks in my planning - like how I planned to spend a whole day on ABC Bunny. NOT happening. So we just reread a few of their favorites. Library Lion, though lengthy, was one they liked a lot.

Art: played playdough

Math: workbook p. 11-14

Next up: the letter H

Thankful

{My last pregnancy picture - 36 weeks. Can you believe I got bigger than that? I can't.}
Two posts in one night - how do you like that?
Tonight Eva said our family prayer. "Thankful that baby Dean came out of Mommy's tummy."
Amen, sister. Amen.

Creatures

This afternoon Leighton pulled the drawers out of one of my plastic organizer things. They were empty, so I didn't care. In one drawer, he found a live spider. He called Eva over and she said, "Don't kill it, Mom. I want to look at it." So they sat there close (but not too close) to the spider and watched it, squealing occasionally when it crawled around.

The day went on and I still didn't kill the spider. The drawer sat here next to the computer and I checked several times to make sure it was still there, but didn't bother it. (I don't know why. Maybe extreme laziness.)

Just now, I got the baby to sleep and came to eat Wheat Thins and look at baby pictures of all 3 kids. (Andrew is gone.) I saw that the spider had started weaving a web in the bin, and I said, "No way. No webs in my house." Even though we are the Webbs. Only room for one kind around here.

I didn't want to smoosh him, and I didn't want to open the front door to set him free. Besides, he might make it back in my house before Andrew gets around to spraying for bugs. Spidercide. The next idea that popped into my head was to dump the offending spider down the kitchen sink. I carried the bin there and saw that the sink was full of dishes. This spider's death sentence was getting complicated. I filled up the corner he was in with water and tipped it a little to keep him submerged. I stood there for a bit watching him swim, wondering if spiders have lungs and if I could drown him. I realized that I was watching a spider suffer to its death and felt really bizarre and kind of sick. I could have just smashed him, but instead I was torturing him. I walked to the bathroom so he could go the way of all the earth the same way we've sent 4 goldfish, and suddenly the song "All Creatures of Our God and King" popped in my head. Talk about weird guilt. It took two attempts to get him to get out of the bin, but finally he fell in the toilet and I flushed him.

As I walked back to the computer to write down this odd story, I made a decision: spiders are not included in that hymn. All feelings of guilt: gone.

Letter B

{Our first day of school picture, taken Aug. 23rd.}
Although Dean's unexpectedly early arrival threw off my preschool plans a bit, this past week I felt ready to get back into it. I had spent countless hours preparing and planning, and both older kids seemed ready for more structure after 2 weeks of none at all. Eventually I will get around to making a blog just for our preschool/homeschool stuff, but for now I'll just put it here. I can't even keep up with one blog right now, so starting another one is just asking for more pressure on myself.

I divided our "curriculum" into one focus letter per week. I did NOT go in alphabetical order. Also for each week I have a BFIAR book that we are semi-delving into, depending on my/the kids' interest. We have a meory scripture for each week, and I have to say I am shocked at how quickly Eva memorized it. By Thursday, she knew the whole thing perfectly, and her Dad is still struggling in a few spots. :) Our "subjects" are reading, arts/crafts, math/fine motor skills, letters, play/large motor skills, and music. Since this week we were still adjusting and I'm still trying to figure out how to have older kid time worked in around Dean's feedings, I'm hoping it will get even better. But for our first week of school, it was pretty good.

Scripture: Joshua 1:9

Reading:
The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown
Bunny Cakes by Rosemary Wells
Bugs! Bugs! Bugs! by Bob Barner (the kids liked this one)
Buzz Buzz Buzz by Byron Barton
Birds by Kevin Henkes (I LOVED this book - it was my favorite of the week. Kevin Henkes is one of our top 5 favorite authors around here.)
Grumpy Bird by Jeremy Tankard
Boo Hoo Bird by Jeremy Tankard (these were the kids' favorites, they are adorable books)
Boats by Byron Barton
Row Row Row Your Boat by Penny Dann

Crafts:
-Cotton ball bunny (glued cotton balls on a print-out bunny)
-Colored a big letter B blue and glued blue buttons on it (Our crafts were a little lacking this week due to my lack of motivation. We had planned to do this and this adorable B crafts for our alphabet book we'll be making, but we'll have to save those for a rainy day. If it ever rains here.)

Math/FMS:
-Kumon Cutting workbook - Eva's scissor skills were far more advanced than I thought. She did what I told her to (6 little straight lines on the dog's whiskers) and then cut out the full dog, curved ears and all. Leighton, on the other hand, ended up cutting lots of snips NOT on the lines and then just started tearing. :)
-Kumon Sticker and Paste workbook - they were so excited about stickers; I think this will be one of their favorite activities of the week.
-Math workbook - p. 7-10
-Butterfly clip cards - Confessions of a Homeschooler is an incredible resource for preschool printables. She even has a whole ABC curriculum for download for free! Amazing. I printed off and laminated the number cards and the kids clipped clothespins onto them. Leighton had a hard time with the clothespins, but Eva did really well. She knew her numbers better than she did 2 months ago, so I was glad to see her recognizing them all.
-Playing with beads - this is Leighton's favorite activity. He pours the beads from cup to cup and digs his hands in them...and eventually threw them all over the place when I was distracted. But Eva is good at helping him clean up, and I think it's worth the mess.

Letters:
-Big Alphabet workbook - we got this from Costco just for fun a long time ago, along with another one we have, but she did the Letter B pages in there. She really loves and does well with workbooks. We need to get Leighton one because he keeps asking to do his workbook when she does hers.
-Letter practice - I made some big alphabet "flashcards" where Eva can trace the dotted letters for practice. I saw some Kumon cards for $10 and decided I could make my own much cheaper. I printed them on cardstock, 2 letters to a page, and laminated them with my new Scotch laminator. If you want the file, just leave a comment with your email and I'll be happy to send it.
-Butterfly writing practice - this was really easy for Eva but I think it will be a good challenge for Leighton soon. If he can stop throwing markers long enough to focus on something.

Music: (I found 4 Wee Sing CDs on clearance at Borders a while back and have really enjoyed them. Good selection of basic songs.)
-Little Bunny Foo Foo - they fell in love with this song and we listened to it at least 30 times in a row. This was a song I had fond childhood memories with as well, so it was fun to see them hopping around and acting it out.
-The Bear Went Over the Mountain - again, we listened to this several times before they got tired of it. They got their teddy bears and pretended to climb mountains - the stairs and the toy chest.
-Baby Bumblebee
-Two Little Blackbirds

Things I planned to do but didn't (just for the record): Make paper birds; cut out and glue shapes to make a boat, beanbag toss, backwards obstacle course, and play sailboat with a laundry basket

Fun extras: made banana ice cream (actually Andrew made it) - YUM! Especially with Nutella and strawberries; found a bumblebee costume at a consignment sale and watched the kids buzz around.

Eva mastered writing both uppercase and lowercase B, and I think it's starting to sink in that words start with letters and it's not just a guessing game. Both kids love preschool and are already begging to read next week's books. Coming up: the letter L.

The Story of Baby Dean

Monday started out as a normal day. I was excited because it was our first official day of preschool. After spending hours planning out things for the kids, Monday was THE day. I woke up early to get ready, and we spent the morning in productive learning activities - reading, coloring, and writing. In the afternoon I put Leighton down for a nap and played playdough with Eva. At 3pm I decided I didn't want him to sleep too long - it always throws off his bedtime - so I went upstairs to get him up. I opened his door and found his eyes open. I went to lay by him and cuddle him to wake up slowly.

As soon as I laid down on the bed, I felt my heart start pounding in this really strange way. Not like I was out of breath from walking up the stairs, but a strange, irregular beat. It was beating so hard that it felt like the baby was kicking my shoulder or something - really odd. I laid there for a minute more but really felt like something was wrong. Eva came up, and I left the kids to go lay on the couch. Resting did nothing to slow my heart down, and I got the feeling that something wasn't right. Thinking it was my blood pressure, I decided to call the dr. and make sure it was normal. The nurse seemed really confused and was asking me if I had eaten anything or drank anything, etc. Lots of weird, unrelated questions. I tried to keep calm and explain that although I was resting, my heart was still pounding. She called the dr. and the dr. said to have me come into L&D at the hospital. I was a little scared but figured they would see that they baby was fine and send me home. I dropped the kids off around the corner with Stacey and didn't even say good-bye to them. Didn't even pack them a bag or anything, I was in such a frenzy to get to the hospital and get it figured out. I kept trying to call Andrew and couldn't get ahold of him. Finally on my way to the hospital, after calling my mom to inform her of the situation, Andrew called. He was just about to leave work, which is about an hour drive, so he said he would meet me at the hospital.

I got up to L&D at 4pm and was put in a triage room. The nurse assumed, as did I, that this was a routine thing and didn't even put me in a hospital gown. I was hooked up to the monitors and found, thankfully, that all was well with the baby. She put the little thing on my finger to get my pulse and that's when the circus began.

Over the next couple hours there were over a dozen people in and out, feeling my pulse with confused faces, staring at me, poking me, drawing blood, injecting me with terrible medicine that made me feel like I would die. I was a medical mystery. Andrew got there around 5pm. The cardiologist, the anesthesiologist, the OB, the nurse - everyone was puzzled by me. They debated back and forth whether it was atrial fibrillation or not and what to do to treat me. My heart was plugging along at 220 bpm , but I wasn't symptomatic - I felt fine other than that the pounding was giving me a headache. They determined that I would need to be put on a drip of heart medicine overnight, but the Air Force hospital ICU couldn't accomodate me. They decided to put me on an ambulance and transfer me to a local civilian hospital. (Even though Andrew requested that I be flown in a helicopter, they thought ground transportation would be more appropriate. :) ) At that point we didn't know what would happen with the baby, but they were sure that I would not be able to have a VBAC (as I had planned) since my heart would probably not be able to handle the stress of labor. A C-section it would be, but nobody knew when.

Andrew went home to get the kids settled - the bishop's wife graciously offered to stay with the kids overnight so Andrew could be with me - and I was taken to another hospital. On the ambulance ride (which wasn't nearly as cool as it looks on the movies) I started having pretty regular contractions. Which for me is a huge deal, as I've never had contractions without pitocin. I was worried that all the stress might cause me to really go into labor and then we'd really be in a bind. I was on heart medicine the whole way over there, but my heart was still racing at 180-190 bpm. The medicine was having no effect whatsoever.

They wheeled me into the ER where I met the most disgusting human being I've ever seen. He was an insane homeless man they had picked up in a gutter, and he was in a stretcher right across from me. He said the most crude, repulsive things to me as I sat there waiting for a bed. I will never be able to repeat his words, but I'm sure I'll never forget them either. That's when my love for Las Vegas was taken even a notch lower - I couldn't believe I was hearing this as I was in such a medical emergency.

There was a big confusion about where I should go and nobody knew quite what to do with me, but eventually I ended up in OB, hooked up to more monitors. No improvement on my heart, and now I was having regular contractions about 1-2 minutes apart. The nurse was freaking out, everyone was in and out asking me a million questions, and I started to freak out a little too. The cardiologist came in and said they were probably going to have to shock me with the paddles to kind of restart my heart, but he was worried about the effect that would have on the baby. The anesthesiologist came in (he was a total jerk) and said he wouldn't touch me until my heart was better under control. Andrew finally got to come in around 9:30pm. They had to cut my shirt off as they couldn't move around all the heart monitors. (That was fun. One less maternity shirt in my wardrobe.) From listening to the drs. talk, I eventually realized that they were planning a C-section for that night. (It really is appaling how little they told me as the patient. I just had to eavesdrop to figure out what was going on.) Andrew hadn't even brought the camera or any baby clothes or ANYTHING. We were completely unprepared for a baby that night, but it looked like he was coming anyway.

They gave me a medicine called Varapamil to slow my heart enough that they could do surgery. It seemed they were feeling more and more urgent to get the baby out so they could fix me, and I started to get really scared. The medicine seemed like it was working and they got my heart rate down in the 120s where the anesthesiologist felt comfortable enough to give me an epidural. The epidural was another one of the memorably painful experiences of the night - nothing like my other 2. It was awful, he was brushing up against all kinds of nerves and had me screaming like a baby. The cardiologist left, thinking I was under control, and said he would come back in the morning to do a scope of my heart and try to find out what was wrong.

They wheeled me into the OR, and again the chaos broke loose. My heartrate started climbing again, and it got back into the 180s. The drs. were all yelling at each other, everyone was running around, and I began to seriously feel that I might die. The epidural was couteracting with the heart medicine and having a terible affect on my body. It was all I could do to keep breathing and my chest felt so terribly heavy. They screamed to get Andrew out of there, and they put the paddles on me in case my heart stopped. (Which to me at that point it looked like it would. I have never been so certain that I might die.) The OB began surgery, and unfortunately I could feel everything. They couldn't give me more epidural because my blood pressure was so low, so they just put an oxygen mask on me and told me to focus on breathing and it would be over soon. I can't tell you how long those 15 minutes seemed. I felt everything. I thought a few times about just giving up and not trying to breathe anymore, because it was so incredibly hard. Finally I heard the baby cry. I heard someone say he was breech and he was 8 pounds. The pain was making everything hazy, and I just remember kicking my legs repeatedly. They kept telling me to hold still, but I couldn't. Andrew came back in at some point to hold my hand. The pain was so intense, I kept saying I couldn't do it anymore.

After a while, the nurse brought Dean over to me. She put his little cheek against mine, and for a few seconds everything disappeared but me and that little baby. I couldn't feel anything but the softness of his skin, and I just wanted to float away with him. Then they whisked him away and the pain came crashing back on me. Because of my heart, they couldn't give me much for the pain - a little morphine to "take the edge off." It must have been a big edge, because it didn't help at all. I don't remember how long it took for me to calm down. They took me to another room where they wrapped my stomach up and gave me clean sheets, and then took me to the cardio ICU for the night. My heart rate eventually slowed, and Andrew left when I was drifting off to sleep with the help of medication.

The next 3 days were living hell. I only got to see my baby twice for a total of maybe 2 hours. They kept me in the ICU and wouldn't allow the baby there because of the risk of infection. They wouldn't allow me to the nursery either, so I suffered all the physical pain with the added emotional pain of being separated from my baby. I can't even describe how difficult it was - any of you who have kids can imagine. Though my heart rate showed that I was fully recovered and fine, the dr. insisted that I stay on monitoring. I hated that dr. with my whole being, but there was nothing I could do. They determined that it may have been just the stress of pregnancy that caused it, but there could be an underlying condition. Oddly enough, they never did any testing to be sure. So I just sat there, useless and helpless, with Andrew occasionally going to spend time with Dean.

On Thursday morning I determined that I was going to walk to the nursery and nobody could stop me. I didn't care if it took me 3 hours and I bled to death on the way there - I was going to see my baby. Andrew stood in front of the door and wouldn't let me leave, and I just collapsed crying in his arms. I figured if they kept us separated any longer, the anxiety would send me into cardiac arrest, and then they would have to let me up there.

Finally finally, on Thursday afternoon, we got discharged to go home. They wheeled me the long walk to the nursery and I got to see him. It was terrible putting Dean in a carseat when my arms were just aching to hold him, but nobody really cares about mother-baby bonds, apparently. Except the mother and the baby, of course. I sat in the back seat with him and held his tiny hand the whole way home. I've hardly set him down since.

Now it's Sunday, and he's 6 days old. The knowledge that this is more than likely our last child has made me look at baby Dean in a whole new light. I have never felt a love so permeating, so complete, in my entire life. Of course, I loved my other babies, tremendously. But the appreciation I feel to have Dean after all we went through makes him seem extra miraculous. I feel almost a desperation to keep him tiny and new, and I simply cannot get enough of him. Even in the middle of the night. :) The last couple days have been like a dream. Of course I have had 2 or 3 meltdowns from the pain, but today I feel as good as new - or as new as you can feel with staples across your stomach - and full of gratitude. We came out of that experience stronger and better, and I am so so so happy to have him in my arms.