A LONG Day

Yesterday was my first full day alone with my boys. And it was a LONG one. Raph left at 6:00am and didn't get home until 6:30 last night, by which time I was about to lose it altogether. At 4:00, when he was getting ready to leave Boston, I talked to him and was so proud of myself because I had had a great day! I had taken the kids to Haverhill, MA to a kids' play center (it is still raining up here!!!!) with Nadine and her kids. That was a breeze and Makili had a terrific time. Then, I got both of them to nap at the same time (miracle!) and was able to make dinner. I felt like a champ. But boy that last 2.5 hours nearly killed me. Makili is very into being a big bother, I mean brother. Just kidding. Seriously though, he wants to sit on my lap every time I nurse and hold Remick's hand, or "kiss" him, which means to lay his head on Remick's face. If Remick is laying on the couch, Makili wants to "lay next to baby" which means wriggle and toss and turn and nearly whack the poor baby with feet or hands or lay on him altogether. Makili really has the best of intentions and I'm greatful he's not whacking Remick purposefully or anything like that, but it is exhausting.

2

Happy Birthday Makili.

I can't believe Makili is 2! Especially now that I am always holding his little clone. Have two years gone by already? One year ago he looked like this:





Some things about Makili. First of all, his cuteness is no longer fully captured in photographs, like it once was. You just can't see the expression on his face when he sees Dad come in the back door after work, or the way that he figures out new language configurations. I don't think I can actually capture his cuteness anyway, but lately I am especially disappointed in photographs of him in doing so. And I don't pull out the video camera enough to capture little moments like the one below which define our lives. Below he is showing us how a flamingo stands.


Makili is a BIG eater! He currently loves rice, pasta, ALL fruit (this is his mainstay), apple sauce, cereal, cinnamon sugar on toast, sauces of any kind, but he pretty much eats anything except lettuce. He's not a big greens fan. He makes a big mess as a general rule, though he is adamant about using a utensil to eat everything, which he is fairly adept at.

He sleeps from about 8:00 to 6:00 with some variation on both sides and then naps about 1.5 - 3 hours a day. Putting him down for a nap is torture and I'm not sure how that will go next week when I have two munchkins by myself, but we'll see. At nighttime, Makili is pretty good at going to bed, though we typically lay in the room with him until he falls asleep. Grammy has been in the same room with him now for a month, so I'll be curious to see how he does in the coming days.

Makili is a puzzle master. He LOVES puzzles. They are one of his favorite past-times, and I love it when he tries to pull me over saying "play puz." He has an amazing attention span and can readily complete puzzles that are well-above his age developmentally. Spatial organization seems to be a real strength of his.

Makili has well over three huundred words and speaks in sentences often. He most recently learned a lot of prepositions. "Lay next to baby." "Right here." and also adjectives, "this one" "that one" "huge" and "giant." After we dropped off Grammy at the airport last night, Makili kept saying "Grammy no ride airplane" over and over again the whole way home. He frquently strings together 5+ words in sentences. He knows his whole alphabet (capital letters), can count to 11, and knows most colors.

Makili is currently obsessed with tractors and can differentiate (and says all the words for) excavator, bull-dozer, loader, fork lift, mixer, roller, and back hoe. (There are probably more, as the kid seriously knows a lot more about tractors than I do.) He still likes balls, but his current favorite is golf, as Paka recently gave him a putter just his size. He walks around the backyard hitting his little plastic practice balls all over the place. I'm a little worries about the greenhouse. He has great gross motor skills (he's been jumping for like 6 or 7 months now, but has been getting pretty brave about it) and tries to climb on, jump off of all sorts of things that are inappropriate.

Here is Makili with his Ace bandage on, like Daddy. While Makili still has many many joyful moments, I think the addition of Remick into our lives has thrown him a bit. In the last two weeks, he has been shy around strangers, instead of his normal "HIIII!", shy about performing his tricks (he won't even do that adorable flamingo anymore), and tends to throw a fit when he doesn't get what he wants. He cries more easily when frustrated and we're trying to help him learn to express those feelings in ways that are a little more appropriate. Mostly we're trying to give him as much attention as we can. I got to take him to the ocean to throw rocks just the two of us both yesterday and today. It is hard to see him without his typical joyful self showing through at all moments.


We didn't get Makili any birthday presents for a number of reasons. First he gets "new" stuff from the thrift store all the time. Second, he doesn't really get that it is his birthday, though he will quickly tell you he is "two" when you ask him how old he is, while trying to hold up two fingers. Finally, we don't want him to be obsessed about "getting" with his birthday. So instead....





So instead, we tried to do some special fun things. Monday we went to Rumble Tumble with Nadine, Jack, Sam and Morgan. Makili loves those kids and it is fun to watch him interact with older kids. Jack and Sam were awesome about helping Makili through the climbing thing. (Thanks god, because those I climbed up into that thing when I was 9 months pregnant, I was really reluctant to do it again this week.) Nadine even went up there to help Makili go down the big slide - THANKS NADINE! Morgan and he are buddies and Morgan is super-cuter about asking him to do things with her.




Yesterday, we all went swimming at a local hotel that lets locals pay $5 to use the pool without actually staying at the hotel. Makili was extremely cautious as we went in and really wanted nothing to do with the pool, partly because it was extremely loud. Also, he was really uncomfortable with me taking his diaper off, since he is now very aware of when he has to pee. Since Raph is gimpy and my mom is my mom, I ended up having to put on a bathing suit to bring help him get into the water. Let me just say right now that it was totally worth it, but I am going to hold it against Raph for a while that I had to put a bathing suit on a week after having a baby. I slowly convinced Makili to put his feet in the water and before long he was a total menace, running to jump to me in the water. It was TERRIBLY cute. Raph did eventually get in the water when the baby needed me and Makili wasn't done jumping in, so he redeemed himself a little bit, though it would have been a lot better BEFORE I bared my post-pregnancy body to the world (in the Microtel Hotel).





Last night we took Grammy to the airport, which is going to be a tough thing for Makili since he loves Grammy and she has been sharing a room with her for a month now!

Today is Raph's first and only day of vacation, since he starts his summer job on Monday and has to go to training for his new real job on Friday. And the weather is supposed to be nice! Fort Foster here we come! Welcoming in Makili's 3rd year right!

Passing Days

We thought Remick might cooperate and sleep in Uncle Tim's bed while we ate Tim's delicious meal. He ended up sitting in my lap through the meal, which was delicious.Tim is a pretty great godfather, except that he keeps asking when the kids can eat meat? (He's just kidding, sort of.) Remick is the youngest baby he's ever held. We're glad he and Tamara are part of our kids' lives (and just as glad that he loves to cook for us!)


Makili LOVES the sprinkler these days.
And we all love the beach.

One week of Remick

It has already been a week! Hard to believe. A week ago I was nursing a tiny Remick, bedbound with IVs, foot things, catheters, the works, but Happy. Though we're still getting to know little Remick, I have to say that he is one mellow fellow. Here are some things about his week in our world, things I've noticed, things I'm fascinated by.

• I love how his dark hair looks like a hurricane (the doppler image), swirling around.
• I LOVE how he lays and looks around happy, happy, happy at the world around him for hours.
• He barks like a puppy when unhappy, though it also sounds like a girly scream
• He was born with little elfin ears, which are now almost normal. At first though, they were flat at the tops and laid flat against his head.
• He tolerates his brother's doting admirably.
• He LOVES music. On the few occassions when he is really fussy, I can turn on some Paul Simon on the computer and it knocks him out.
• He is attentive to noise in general, though seems to be able to tune out his brother's frequent screaming excitement.
• He LOVES warm baths at Daddy's hands.
• He is a mama's boy. He likes me. (In contrast to Makili who didn't seem to care for me in particular and screamed no matter who was holding him.)
  
• He already has a poop face like Makili, which I think is hilarious.
• He likes sleeping with Daddy (his mom likes this too and since Raph can't walk, at least he is doing something useful.)

I am smitten with this little boy. I can't believe how totally in love with him I am. He is so mellow and so sweet. I can't wait to see his personality unfold, to see the shape of our family come into focus.

Another Father's Day Tidbit

Raph came home from soccer hopping today. Not good. He can't put any weight on his foot and has been lying in bed all day. Makili tried to help and then resorted to using "Mr. Boo-boo" on his own boo-boo.Paka came to visit today too, and unfortunately didn't capture the top of his new hat which reads "PAKA." Paka seems to love being a grandpa. He can't stop buying Makili new toys, like his new scooter, which Paka even wrapped for him to increase the fun. He also bought him a power-wheels motorcycle which Makili will not go near! He doesn't like things that go on their own without muscle power. He also doesn't like those little cars that you pull back and then they go on their own. Not at all. Maybe in a few months Paka.

You're stuck with us, honey.

You're stuck with these bright eyes that look just like yours. These eyes that watch from the window as you can come and go. He hears the squeaky belts on your truck as you pull into the driveway an runs yelling, "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!" You're stuck with this wild one who stands like a flamingo, loves "excavaaaaaayyys" (excavators), wants to hold his brother all the time, eats more than you, and says "Owwww" (I love you) all the time.
And you're stuck with this munchkin, who we're just getting to know. So far he's been mellow though, and likes to sleep in the nook of your arm and when you give him a warm bath.

And you're stuck with me too, sweetheart. All my emotional outbursts, gassy eruptions, irrational rantings. But you've learned pretty well how to handle me. You know to to save me the last bite, even if I've eaten almost the whole thing, or I'll blame you for "eating it all." You know to pack snacks and bring water when we leave the house. You know I like to lay in bed after a shower even if I'm dripping wet. You know me and I'm so lucky for that. You're a great dad.

Remick's Birth Story

As you may know, I had hoped for a vaginal birth with Remick. I had really awesome prenatal care and for a long while felt pretty confident the VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) would happen. He was due on June 7th. For a solid two week period before his due date and up to my next appointment on June 11th, I was sure that every little cramp, every strange feeling down there was the beginning of something. But, when I went to the midwife's office on the 11th, my hopes began to dwindle when I learned that in fact I'd had no effacement of the cervix, no dialation, and the baby's head hadn't descended at all. In sum, my body was not showing signs of entering labor. The biggest risk of a VBAC is a ruptured uterus, which is a fairly catastrophic and serious event, but extremely rare. The chances of it happening however, are much higher if labor is induced. Therefore, they will not induce labor in a woman attempting to have a VBAC, so you either go into labor on your own, or you wait until your body is no longer nurturing the baby enough anymore to leave him in there safetly and then have a C-section.

My midwife's advice on the 11th was to try some homeopathic method of ripening the cervix, but to schedule a biophysical profile on Monday June 15th, which is an ultrasound that checks on the baby and the functioning of the placenta and amniontic fluid. This is basically a test of how safe it is to go on waiting for labor. I was also scheduled to have a "non-stress test" which basically charts the baby's heart rate over a 20 minute period, after having consumed some juice. I ended up doing the non-stress test on Sunday at the birth center because of scheduling stuff on my midwife's end. The baby looked great. So I fully expected that when I headed into the doctor's office on Monday for the biophysical profile, they'd tell me that everything looked fine, and we could wait until the end of the week before scheduling a C-section.

That wasn't exactly how things went down. The first thing that the technician measured was the amniotic fluid, which she immediately told me was "very low." They consider anything about a 5 okay, and I was at 2. The baby wasn't moving, which can be part of a normal sleep cycle, but the amniotic fluid level freaked her out a lot, and she gave up trying to get him to move, while she paged the doctor on call. This freaked me out a bit, since she mentioned "the doctor might want to schedule a C-section for today. "Today?" The doctor ordered another non-stress test, even though we had just had one the day before. Again, everything looked fine. The doctor popped in at that point to see the chart and I could tell she was relieved to see a healthy heartrate.

We met with her in her office (after waiting forever which turned out to be because she was reviewing my health records.) She told us that though the baby looked fine, the level of the amniotic fluid was a very serious concern, since it protects the umbilical cord. She said, "the baby could be fine today and change position, crush the cord and you could end up with a still-born baby tomorrow." C-section it is.

At that point it was 11:15. She scheduled the surgery for 2:00, which meant we had an hour and 15 minutes to get home and hug Makili and pick up a few things. (I started freaking out about Makili, which has turned out to be a pretty constant concern of mine in the last few weeks, but I'll get into that in another post.) It was a whirlwind time, we drove home as quickly as possible and I did get lots of hugs from Makili. We threw stuff in a bag and turned around, arriving 15 minutes late.

The nurse, Carletta, who greeted us was a super-cute older lady, who seemed to be clearly tickled to help me, since she was normally in charge and not allowed a whole lot of patient care. She told me that they had assembled a "special team" for me who would be of the mindset to help someone who had wanted a home birth. Practically every person who came in to see me or introduce themself apologized that things hadn't gone the way I had wanted. She also told me that they wanted to try an experiement on me - giving me the baby to me immediately instead of sending the baby to the warmer for the first five minutes. Of course I was fine with this. She took her time getting me ready, which was exacerbated by the fact that we had arrived late. Pretty soon, the phone started ringing and the anesthiologist and the OR wanted to know where I was. My midwife showed up with a beatuful rose from her garden. I stuck in my hair for lack of a better idea as to what to do with it, which made everyone laugh.

Soon we met with the anesthiologist, who was a bit of an ass, and promptly chided me for not having signed up for a C-section in the first place, since that was the safest option. (Go look up the uturine rupture rates for VBACs vs. the general public here.) BUT he did redeem himself a bit, when I asked where the music was in the OR and he promptly went and found an I-pod and a speaker system, and even chose a worthy first song, some upbeat Sinatra song which created a good atmosphere. I think every OR, especially ones where the patient isn't under general anesthetic ought to have music playing. It creates the kind of atmosphere where good things happen.

Anyway, soon after being given the spinal and laid out in the "cruxifiction pose" as I call it (your arms are stretched out to the side and hooked up to various things - pulse reader, blood pressure cuff etc.), Raph and Val, my midwife, were ushered in behind the curtain that they hang right in front of your face. And right about then and there it occured to me that I was having a baby. You really tend to lose sight of that at some point, even if you can imagine it at all. Even when it's your second time around. But right then I realized that within minutes I would have a baby lying next to me. And I was instantly excited.

The nurse anesthetist offered to take some photos of the baby being born, which are some of the coolest pictures ever, and was pretty cool since Raph was not interested in seeing that happen again. (He described it last time as seeing me cut open looked like vegetable soup.) They said he was crying before he was even out of me. Before I knew what had happened, Remick was bundled and lying inches from my face. Everyone was guessing how much he weighed and how big his head was, since they didn't take those measurements until hours later. It was so celebratory. I was so happy. We watched him stick out his tongue and smack his chops over and over again for the 20 minutes we were in there while I was stitched up. And before I knew it, I was back in our room with a baby nursing his little butt off. Again, it was an incredible celebratory mood. I was so happy.

A little while later, Makili, Grammy and then Annma all showed up to celebrate with us. Makili was wide-eyed and really not sure what to think. He was rather quiet for a full 10 minutes and was fascinated by watching Remick nurse, but was mostly not sure what I was doing laying there and with a room full of people watching him. He kept saying "baby eat" or "it's okay baby" when Remick would cry. In this way, Remick was welcomed into the world. Like they say in one of our favorite books (On the day you were born), we are so glad you've come.