Hudson's birth

Week 1:

I am so determined to stay up on my blogging this time around.  I feel that I have lost a lot of my memories of the boys in the last few years.  So I would love, love, to retain something of this next year of watching Hudson grow!  Here is my effort to keep on top of things!!

C-section and Delivery:  The c-section.  The event I had been dreading, praying, and sweating over.  It finally came.  An early delivery (7am) meant an early arrival time (5am), which was fine with me because I never sleep all that well the night before.  And I didn't.  With Noah and Luke I entered the hospital under the premise of trying to deliver the baby naturally (or quite unnaturally in my cases), but this time around surgery was all planned and booked.  We just had to arrive!  Everything went so smoothly, the IV was placed, (even in the small things a virtually painless IV was such a huge blessing), drugs were administered (no yucky drink!), I took about 20 trips to the bathroom (nervous) and we were ready to go!  But in the end as we were about to enter the OR an emergency c-section sent us into the recovery room to wait.

Pre delivery!

Our time came and I will be totally honest, I was pretty freaked out at this point.  But God so graciously provided comfort; my very kind OB held my arm while I was getting my spinal done.  No hubbies allowed anymore at this point!  And a very kind anesthesiologist who not only comforted and talked me through much of it; he also told me at one point, it's ok you can hold my hand, I guess I was grasping for something to hold onto!  You know what song kept running through my head at this point?  Rock of ages cleft for me, let me hide myself in Thee.  There is such a sweetness to this song.   And such a sweetness to call God my rock in the midst of a surgery.

There are so many little snippets I can recall, first was hearing Hudson cry and then nothing!  I can remember saying, is he okay?  Why isn't he crying?  He was fine and once he was out, he demonstrated just how okay his lungs were, for about two hours!!  Yikes.  The delivery was a bit rough.  Thanks to a combo of scar tissue and big baby.

Another thing I can recall is overhearing a nurse talking about 'his coloring looked very bad'.  Mommy ears for sure!  I am not sure how I heard this but before I had a moment to ask a question I then overheard, we should probably get him some juice.  What? Juice?... Someone must have seen my confusion and cleared it all up for me.  The poor male student who was observing his first c-section had passed out!  He was a great sport about it all and even came back to thank me for allowing him to observe the surgery.  Yes, you are very welcome for causing you to feel faint and woozy!  Anytime.

Soon I was out of surgery.  Ready to hold and cuddle our sweet little, still at this point, screaming baby boy!  Such a joy to be out!  Such a joy to be done!

Thanks for reading,
Heidi

(obviously a bit behind in my posting but still wanted to share this!)

July 4th

Peddling backwards a little these days!

We spent the holiday, which happened to fall mid week this year, at the Saylor's house.  They are wonderful hosts, we had a great time, and the highlight of the whole evening was the sparkler's followed by the sprinklers turning on.  My boy's went home happy with burnt fingers (Noah couldn't quite get the concept as to why he kept burning his fingers on the sparklers), wet bodies and tired, but happy, faces.

Thanks for reading!
Heidi

Noah Bob

A little post on Noah.

In the last month I have witnessed Noah mature.

It has been a very long, very emotional road, getting from there to here.  I have failed more often than succeeded at being patient and loving to him through his struggles.  I have spent many days pleading with him to sit, play, focus...and to no avail.  He was, and still is, our busy boy.

Yet for the past few weeks he has slowed down, he will sit for periods of more than five minutes, and just plays!  Wonderful play.

My heart rejoices each time I witness him: enjoying his toys, primarily his trains, putting objects in the caboose, making sounds and laughing.  This may sound elementary for a four year old.  But he is our four year old that never quite could do this seemingly effortless task.  And now I see it, I am thankful for it, and I see God's grace in the midst of it.

For I have struggled greatly in not having a child that reached developmental milestones at the 'right time', I have struggled in comparing him to other's, and I have struggled with being humbled in the midst of it all.  So we praise God for this and for Noah continuing to enjoy his time of playing.

Thanks for reading,
Heidi

One Month in....

I have a one month old (plus a few weeks).  Time is truly passing us by.  I have been trying to hold on tightly to each little phase that Hudson is going through but some of them pass too quickly.  It seemed that in one instant I could still squeeze a size Newborn diaper around him and then the next it was impossible.  I have already packed up all newborn clothing, but let's be honest when you are born at 8.14 and lost basically none of it, that isn't a big surprise.  And I am already thinking size three month is looking a little tight length wise.

Slow down little one!

In one month our little Hudson has hit some milestones.

He smiled at about one month.  A big, gorgeous grin, with his mouth wide open.  He is simply irresistible smiling at me like that.  Sweet thing.

He finally got his first shot at his one month visit.  Yes we are those parent's.  Not the non vaccinating kind but the kind that can't remember anything, and the kind that kept forgeting the important vaccine card that you are supposed to take to EVERY visit.  We forgot whether we had him vaccinated with his Hep B in the hospital, and forgot whether we had it done in the doctor's office at his first visit, and so on...proud parenting moment. We finally remembered to bring it and he finally got his shot!  Yay for him.  He screamed, I cried, same old shot routine...

He was picked up, sat upon, poked at, kissed, licked, all by his very loving two older brothers.  The picking up thing is pretty disastrous.  I made it worse by not reacting correctly the first time Luke did it, all I could do was say, oh thank you Lukey, thank you, thank you.  I was on the phone at the time and my dear friend kept saying, STOP thanking him and pick up the baby!!  Hello.  Unfortunately now, Luke picks him up (and yes he can undo the safety belts as well), walks to me over the TILE floor, hands him to me and says, Your welcome Mama.  Pray that sweet Hudson survives his brothers.

His belly button fell off.  And basically I did everything wrong during the process, are you starting to worry about how Hudson will survive our parenting?  I found out that putting a bandaid over the belly button is not what you should do.  Which, it turns out, makes belly button's worse if they aren't exposed to air, but I did, I covered it with a bandaid, then realized the whole thing was oozy and bloody and stinky.  And I will be honest I was a bit embarrassed that I had no idea how to care for an infant's belly button.  So I made Kelly take him into our pediatrician.  A shining moment for me making my hubby do the dirty work; thankfully they fixed it up with no comments about, isn't this your third?  But I think I learnt my lesson about sending my husband in because Kelly tells our dog, LOVING, doctor (I know this because she put it on her profile) how much he can't stand certain dogs.  And the dogs he can't stand are the one's she owns.  Classic Kelly.

I always enjoy putting the boys stats in my posts.  So here are Hudson's!
Weight 10.14 (75%)
Height 22.5 " (75%)

Thanks for reading!
Heidi