Many, Many Glorious Pictures

Ok - so I've promised some pictures for quite a long time and I've FINALLY been able to get them onto my computer so that I can get them to you! This first picture was taken way back in October when Aunt Rhian came to visit. This was the first time both she and Mortimer got to meet Sadie. Here's the adorable shot:






















Next is a shot of Sadie and her friend Parker. This was also taken in October. We drove over to Indianapolis for Butler's homecoming. I can't wait to take a similar shot of both girls next year to see how much they've grown and changed! I know it will be astonishing!
















Next is a Thanksgiving shot. It's not the greatest, but you can kind of see Sadie's cute little Thanksgiving outfit.


















Now we have a shot that I just can't resist. Sadie has recently begun to actually enjoy being on her tummy for longer periods of time. She's almost rolled over a number of times and if she's on any kind of an incline she will actually roll over. She's a genius, I know! :)




















The next two shots are also some favorites. There is one of me and Sadie and you can kind of see our Christmas tree in the background. I was dressed up and ready to go to the Orange Johnson House. This is a historical house in Worthington. The Worthington Historical Society gives tours of the house every Sunday. The house was built by Mr. Buttles sometime in the very early 1800s and has been in Worthington ever since. Obviously, Orange Johnson and his family lived in the house for a long time, which is why it is now named after him. Anyways, for the last 28 years there have been special Saturdays in December for children in 3rd and 4th grades (the years you study Worthington history in school) where children can pay a small fee and come to the Orange Johnson house and celebrate a 19th century style Christmas. They get to enjoy a meal that they help prepare. The meal is all cooked over the open fireplace. (My mom's the one who does ALL of the cooking over the fireplace - very HOT work!) They make a craft, sing some carols, play 19th century games, listen to stories, and get a visit from Saint Nicholas. This has all led up to the explanation of the other picture. This is Sadie and Saint Nicholas. If you look closely enough you might recognize Saint Nick (hint: at least thus far, Sadie has avoided inheriting his nose!).








































Next, here's a shot of Sadie opening her first Christmas gift. It is a tradition in our family that we always open one present on Christmas Eve. It's always the same thing - a new pair of pajamas. This is Sadie opening her new pair of pajamas!

















Then, there's a shot of my Dad's favorite gift that he purchased for Sadie. It's a Po-knee (pony). It actually makes horsey noises and both Grandpa and Sadie seem to love it. I will do my best to actually get the video posted. It's very funny!




















Finally, here's a family shot at the Columbus Zoo. Earlier this week we had an unseasonably warm day - 66 - so we took advantage and took Sadie to the zoo to see the Wildlights. She was captivated, but, as you can see, all that looking around was tiring work!

















Holy cow - I almost forgot one! Here is Sadie with Santa!




















Well, hope everyone had fantastic Christmas celebrations and are anxiously awaiting your New Year's celebrations. I'm definitely looking forward to 2009 and all of the wonderful things that are in store for us. Hopefully there will be as many wonderful blessings in our lives in 2009 as there have been in 2008. We began this last year by learning that we were pregnant with Sadie and this year we begin by celebrating with her! Adam, Sadie, and I all wish you much joy and happiness in the year ahead!

Catching Up - 4th Photo

Ok, I've had the luxury of catching up on some blog reading this morning and have seen a recent trend. Apparently, there is this "fourth photo" challenge going around. Below are the directions.

The object of the picture tag is to:

1) Choose the 4th folder where you store your pictures on your computer
2) Select the 4th picture in the folder
3) Explain the picture
4) Tag 4 people to do the same

Here is the picture:




This is obviously a picture of me. It was taken in the Bahamas. It was taken the night that Adam and I arrived in Port Lucaya way back in December of 2005. We decided to go somewhere exciting to ring in the new year because (as some of you may remember), I had a particularly bad Fall at school that year. I had the principal from Hell and was an emotional wreck from everything that she had put me through. However, this picture does bring back happy memories. It was Adam's and my first big trip, only Adam's second time flying anywhere, and definitely Adam's first time digging on a beach. This particular photo shows me chowing down on some lobster. We had high hopes for tasty lobster, but that little fella was disappointing!

On a totally different note, another quick update - my mom, Sadie, and I travelled to West Chester, Ohio yesterday to make a pilgrimage to IKEA. I bought a ton of picture frames for all of our new pictures and enjoyed the chance to just wander that fantastic store. Sadie was a GREAT little girl and enjoyed traveling around the store in her Baby Bjorn. She is now outward facing, most of the time, so she thoroughly enjoyed getting to see everything and have everyone coo over her when they saw her adorable little face. My mother got more of a chuckle out of the whole thing because she thought Sadie looked like some little alien trying to escape from my chest. We'll have to get a picture posted and let you decide!

Also, Aunt Rhian and Mortimer are now home safe and sound. This is very good since we're now having a bit of scary weather. Hopefully things will cooperate tomorrow, when Pam comes down for a visit, and on Tuesday when cousins Megan and Amanda fly in. I'm nearly jumping out of my skin with excitement at seeing all of these people. Woohoo!

Well, I'm going to try to catch a shower before my angel wakes up! Take care!

Happy Holidays!

Well, I have good news to report this morning, so I thought I better report it. Sadie has a place to go during the days beginning in January. She will be going to stay with a lady here in West Jeff. Her name is Amy and she is currently only watching two other children - an 8 month old boy named Blake and a 2 year old girl named Lily. Amy, Blake, and Lily all seemed very easy going and I felt very comfortable in Amy's house. Plus, Blake is a super cute little boy and if Sadie's going to have to have a boyfriend, I guess I'd be ok with it being him. :) Having this decision made has made me feel AMAZINGLY better and I'm quite glad to have Sadie be so close to me during the day. She's literally less than 5 minutes from my school. Amy is also not charging us an arm and a leg and will not be charging us if Sadie is not actually in her care for the day, which is a pretty unusual policy. So, I'm feeling pretty darn lucky at this point.

I'm also feeling really excited because my sister is flying in today. She doesn't get in until 10:30 tonight, so I won't actually get to see her until tomorrow, but just the thought that she'll be actually reachable in less than 24 hours is filling me with holiday giddiness. And, we're having our holiday potluck at school today and my mom is bringing Sadie out to school. So, I get to see my baby in only a few more hours!

Finally, our pictures are in from Penney's. I'm posting a few of my favorites, but you can follow the link below to see all the rest.

On another note, if you know Tiger and Megan, I talked to Tiger yesterday and they have learned the gender of their baby. Megan is due May 14. You'll have to talk to Tiger or Megan to find out, but they do know now. :)






Here's the link for the pictures:

Go to http://www.smilesbywire.com and enter the following:

Customer Name: KRYSTEN SMITH
Access Code: LTPP0741120209JCP

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Very Quick Update

Ok - this is my second time typing this.

Sadie was weighed on December 3, 1 day before her 3 month birthday. She weighed in at 15 lbs even.

I really don't enjoy being back at work. This year's crew is not particularly pleasant and that doesn't help motivate me to want to be here. Plus, it's super hard to work all day and come home to Sadie in the late afternoon. Like her mom, she's a morning person, and typically by the time I get home she's not in the greatest of moods. That just adds to the guilt.

We've also had a horrible time trying to find someone to watch her that I both like and can afford. I think we have this finally resolved, but I'll have to keep you all posted on that.

She's been staying with her Dad, Grandma, and Grandpa. I've been pumping like crazy and she's been happily eating from her bottles. She even likes to hold the bottle herself!

We spent Thanksgiving at Uncle Tim and Aunt Sarah's house. Sadie got to play with her cousins, Codey and Noah. They were GREAT with her, thanks to lots of practice playing with their little sister. We also got to see Grandma and Grandpa Brinkely, which is always a treat. We even got to see Grandma and Grandpa again this last weekend because they came down for a visit.

I'm very excited for Christmas. Aunt Rhian gets here on Thursday and then my cousins Megan and Amanda arrive on Tuesday. Pam is also coming into town, so Sadie will have many new friends to meet.

Well, I do actually need to get some work done this morning, so I have to run. We got pictures taken last week and I'll post that information as soon as I have it. Merry Christmas everyone!

2 Months and Facing the Inevitable

Well, it's been a while since I've had a post. I still haven't downloaded the latest round of pictures from my camera, so I have no new pictures to post. Since last I've written, Sadie dressed up as an adorably cute pea pod for Trick or Treat. We took her around my parents' neighborhood and told everyone we had a treat and did not need a treat in return. All of the neighbors were delighted to meet Sadie. And, she was absolutely the cutest baby ever! :)

Sadie is also two months old now! To celebrate her two month birthday, we went to Red Lobster. Sadie then enjoyed her shrimp flavored breast milk! :) Also, her two-month check-up was yesterday. She now weighs in at 13 pounds, 6 ounces and is 24 inches long. The nurse also measured her head as 14 inches in diameter, but that was smaller than at birth, so clearly she measured incorrectly. The doctor said that that particular nurse always seems to have trouble with measuring babies heads. Anyways, Sadie is the 95% for length and 90% for weight. She is such a cute girl! Her hair is starting to come back in. It's definitely going to be dark!

Now the inevitable - I have to go back to work on November 24th. I'm freaking out a little bit. I've left Sadie for about 5 hours, when Adam and I went on a date. But, that's about the longest I've been away from her and I'm not looking forward to being away from her for a longer period of time. I have a feeling I'm going to be a nervous wreck. I'm already feeling terribly guilt-ridden and have moments where I want to burst into tears. In other ways, I am looking forward to returning to a job that I do really like. Hopefully the good and bad moments will balance out and we will both be able to survive this rather difficult transition. I think I would feel a lot better if I knew a bit more about what to expect.

Well, it's time for Sadie to eat. She's currently dancing with Daddy. Daddy is holding her in the baby Bjorn. It's adorable! Take care all!

More New Pictures

We had a great weekend in Indianapolis! Sadie got to meet her friend Parker for the first time. Though I'm not really sure that either girl realized the others' existence, us parents sure had fun talking for them and making it seem like they were interacting. I will have pictures to post to show both girls, but I can't seem to locate my camera cord right now.

I did receive the link for our latest JC Penney's pictures. We had some taken when Aunt Rhian was here. Plus, we were hoping to get some better pictures in Sadie's halloween dress. But, not surprisingly, it was still ridiculously hot in the studio, so things didn't turn out so greatly as far as smiling in her dress. But, they were a little better than the first time. I'll post some of my favorite shots below and also the link for how to access everything. I'll have more to say later when Sadie is actually sleeping She's currently playing under her mobile in her crib! :)

We've got a pictures of Sadie in her dress, our family and mom's whole family. Enjoy!

Go to http://www.smilesbywire.com and enter the following:

Customer Name: Krysten Smith
Access Code: LTPP0741118363JCP

Quick Update and Paying it Forward

Quick Update:

I had my six week follow-up appointment with my ObGyn yesterday. I am well-healed and things are "back to normal". This is excellent news on many levels and I am very thankful.

Since my Ob is at the hospital, I took Sadie down to the women's center after my appointment. The women's center has a baby scale where you can drop by any time and weigh your baby. At six weeks and five days, my beautiful daughter now weighs 12 lbs 8 oz. That's right - she's not even 2 months old and she's already wearing 3-6 month clothes! (Truth be told, because she's not SUPER long, her 3 month clothes are fitting her just fine at this point, but I know it won't be long.)

Sadie has begun making the cutest little noises. Right now she's laying under her Baby Einstein play gym and making the happiest of noises. She grabs at her rattle toys and and LOVES to watch her flashing star. While she is doing this, she makes the most delightful coos and happy noises. It makes my heart melt. Every time she makes a happy noise I think it makes me love her even more (not that the sad noises make me feel the opposite, I just LOVE the happy noises!)

Aunt Rhian came in for the weekend. She got here on Thursday and left Monday night. She brought Mortimer with her. You may remember from previous posts that Mortimer is her miniature dachsund. He wasn't quite sure what to make of Sadie at first, but ended up wanting to be her protector. He did this with a lot of barking and much licking of Sadie's hands and arms. This was a bit nerve wracking to me, but in the end everything was just fine. As soon as I get a chance, I will upload my new pictures and get them posted. Aunt Rhian was delighted to meet Sadie and really seemed to enjoy her new "Aunt" role.

I got FANTASTIC news at dinner tonight. I'm still so excited I want to leap for joy. I am one of those people who has always been really close with her family. Any of you who know me well, know this is true. I only have 3 cousins, 2 of whom I grew up with living just a few blocks away. We went on vacations together every summer and we saw each other all of the time. However, since we've all grown up, I am the only one of the 4 girls (my sister and I and my two cousins) who have remained in town. Megan is the oldest of us (3 months older than me). She lives in Seattle. Amanda, her sister, now lives in New York. Rhian lives in Phoenix. Even though we don't see each other much, we do still e-mail and actually talk on the phone on occasion. Anyways, the last time I saw Megan was when I got married. Obviously that was more than 2 years ago. I saw Amanda last Christmas. But, my excellent news is that Megan and Amanda are both coming home for Christmas. I am so excited. My heart is bursting with excitement. They'll get to meet Sadie and better yet, I'll get to spend time with both of them. It's been at least 5 years - maybe more - since everyone's been home at Christmas, so this will REALLY be special. :)

Ok, now to the second part of this post.

Paying it Forward

Today I was driving back from the mall with my mom. My back right tire literally exploded off of my car. This happened as I was driving down the exit ramp from the freeway. I turned the corner with my blown off tire and a VERY nice man, who saw my "Baby on Board" sticker, pulled over and changed my tire for me. I have never had someone actually do this for me. I do have AAA and could have easily called them and waited for them to come and help, but this man just felt the need to help and had my tire changed out for the spare within 5 minutes. It was awesome. So, now I feel that I need to pay this amazing favor forward. If you know of anyone in need of an extra kind deed, please point me in their direction. Hopefully I'll stumble upon an opportunity before anyone else needs to point anything out, but keep your eyes peeled for opportunities for me.

Well, that's the update for now! I can't wait to see my Indy friends this weekend! Woohoo!!!!!

More Pictures

I finally got the link for the pictures we had taken at JC Penney's. As previously stated, they are ADORABLE! The pictures in her white dress are a little better because she wasn't fussy. She got fussy in her Halloween dress. I could hardly blame her since it was ridiculously hot in there, but it made for some very sad-face pictures. We're having them taken again tomorrow since Aunt Rhian is home and can be in the pictures with us. Hopefully Aunt Rhian's mere presence will bring out many happy Halloween smiles! :)

I promise that at some point, I will post the picture of me in a white dress at Sadie's age. The similarities are eerily scary. Clearly she will grow up to be one very attractive girl! :)

Anyways, here's what you need to do to view the pictures:

go to http://www.smilesbywire.com and enter the following:

Customer Name: Krysten Smith
Access Code: LTPP0741118134JCP

Enjoy!

An Update in Pictures (and a few words)

Ok, I have finally uploaded the pictures from my camera and have some adorable new shots to post.

First, here is our little sleeper:
















Here are Sadie and Great Grandma Winter. Remember, Sadie is Great Grandma's 28th great grandchild!
















Here are Sadie and Uncle Tim. She has the curious look - this guy looks kinda like my Dad, but I'm just not sure. :)
















Here are Sadie and Grandpa Brinkley. She was very amused with Grandpa.
















Here's the delicious cake that Aunt Sarah made for us. I wish we still had some!
















Here's a family shot when we visited the pumpkin patch last weekend:
















Now for the words:
Last Wednesday we had to visit the doctor. This is becauase Sadie's tear ducts have been blocked since she was born and her eyes are very gunky. Things seemed to be getting worse, not better, so we decided to go to the doctor. We now have an appointment for this Wednesday with a pediatric opthamologist at Children's Hospital here in Columbus. Hopefully they'll have some good suggestions and they won't have to do any procedures on Sadie, but we'll just have to wait and see.

While at the doctor, "the chunk" got weighed and measured. She weighed in at 11 pounds, 6 ounces. That is 2 lbs and 5 oz up from her birth weight. This girl can eat! She is also now measuring 22.5 inches, which is 2 inches up from birth. Additionally, her head now measures about 16.5 inches around which is 1.5 inches up from birth. She has a BIG brain too! My mom pulled out my baby book so that we could compare Sadie and myself. I was 9 lbs 12 oz at birth. At six weeks, I was 11 lbs. Sadie was 11 lbs 6 oz at five weeks. So, she may have been slightly smaller than her mom at birth, but she has more than caught up!

Last Monday we actually had our first Sadie photo session at JC Penney's. She did great for the first round of pics and then kind of lost it. It was ridiculously hot in the studio and, like her mom, she does not deal well with excessive heat. I don't have the link to post the pictures yet, but I will post the like as soon as I get it. I can't wait to post the picture of me at Sadie's age and then her picture. It's kind of scary how similar we look. I will say, though, that she has far chubbier cheeks! :)

One more "Hallelujah Moment" to mention - Sadie had been VERY resistent to a pacifier. Plus, the lactation consultant kept discouraging it because it can change the way she latches on the nurse and make nursing more painful for me. But, this basically means that I get to serve as her pacifier. (This is also perhaps why she has gained so much weight!) We had a break through this weekend though. I got my hair cut and my mom watched her while I was at the appointment. During the appointment, she got Sadie to take and keep the pacifier. Since then, she has spent many moments happily sucking away. This is great for while we are in the car as well as just calming her down so she can go to or go back to sleep. It's fantastic. God bless the pacifier! :)

Ok, because I can't resist, here are 3 more pictures. The first is a shot of her adorable feet.
















Here is a shot of Mommy's other baby. This is our little kitty, Beau. This is a relatively small basket that he has absolutely fallen in love with. He's so cute that I couldn't resist posting it.
















Finally, here's a great shot of Daddy and Sadie. We had a picnic lunch at Antrim Lake on Friday. Antrim Lake has very special meaning for Adam and I because it's where we met the first time. Adam can take an hour break for lunch, so he drove over to the park and met us for lunch. It was awesome!
















Ok, I feel like I've sufficiently flooded you all with pictures. Hope you're all off to a great week. Aunt Rhian is coming to visit on Thursday morning, so I'm sure we'll have more pictures and stories to post very soon! Take care!

Wordless Tuesday

Ok - I do realize that it's Tuesday and not Wednesday, but I had a spare minute to insert a picture and I couldn't help but do it. I had to send this picture from my phone. Unfortunately, I can't send more than one picture at a time and it takes quite a while to do it, so I'm only posting one picture. As soon as I can get caught up on some sleep and have more than 5 minutes at a time, I promise that I'll post more pictures.

In the meantime, what do you think this sweetheart is thinking?

Thursday Thirteen: Thirteen Reasons Why I am Having a Hard Time Posting

Since it's been well more than a week since last I've posted, I figured I should update everyone as to what's been happening in Smith world. We've been busy. Here's my list of 13 things that have kept me so busy that I've been unable to post:

1. I spend most of my days at home by myself from 8:30 am until 5:30 pm. I spend much of my night wide awake with the baby. So, I sleep during the day. When I am not asleep I am either comforting the baby, feeding the baby, showering, or checking on everyone else's blogs.

2. Even when my husband is home to watch the baby or my parents come over, I usually just want a few minutes to relax instead of work on the blog.

3. I really wanted to have new pictures to post and kept telling myself that as soon as I downloaded them, I would do a new post. I still haven't downloaded them, but I decided to do the post anyways. Hopefully Adam will help me out with some new pictures soon.

4. On the days when I have had more sleep at night, I've been trying to get out of the house. Last week we visited the lactation consultant on Wednesday and my school on Thursday. Yesterday we met Daddy for lunch and then went to Babies R Us, out to Grandpa's school, and then out to Grandma's school to pick her up.

5. Last Thursday, my mom "fell" in the parking lot while walking to her car. By "fall", I really mean almost passed out. She had been having physical therapy on her shoulder and then all of a sudden got very dizzy. She thought she had an ear infection or was coming down with some kind of flu. So, on Friday, after going to school, she called the doctor. Unable to get an appointment, she went to Urgent Care. The Urgent Care doctor sent her to the ER. Her own mother died of a Massive Cerebral Hemmorage, so she had some concerns that my mom had perhaps had a stroke and that was what caused her to "fall." My dad had to go pick my mom up from the Urgent Care and take her to the ER. They got there around 6:30 pm on Friday night, weren't seen until after 10:00 pm, and then my mom was in the hospital from Friday night until Tuesday morning. They did all kinds of tests: cat-scan, EKG, MRI, scope down her throat to look at her heart, and a tilt-table test. The diagnosis finally came with the tilt-table test. She has this syndrome where her body doesn't efficiently pump the blood back up from her feet and when the blood pools there, she passes out. As soon as she feels symptoms coming on, she's supposed to lay down immediately. There's not a great treatment for this syndrome. Here's the worst part: she's not allowed to drive for a month! So, I've been rather worried about this whole situation and focusing my energies there instead of blogging.

6. Baby's first road trip. Last Saturday morning we loaded up the car and headed to Great Grandma's house. Sadie was Adam's Grandma's 28th great grandchild! Pretty amazing! We have a great picture of Great Grandma holding Sadie and I promise that I will post it at some point.

7. From Great Grandma's house we headed to Grandma and Grandpa Brinkley's house. There we visited with Grandma and Grandpa Brinkley and Grandpa Brinkley's daughter-in-law and grand child. We didn't stay there too long, though because Mommy was hungry for some dinner.

8. We went to Uncle Tim's and Aunt Sarah's house. We got to see Uncle Tim, Aunt Sarah, and cousins Codey and Noah. We had pizza and calzone for dinner, watched the cousins play video games, and spent the night. We were awake until about 1 am and then slept until almost 10 am. Aunt Sarah made us a delicious and HUGE welcome cake. We have a picture of it too and will someday post it. We ate lunch around 2 pm and headed home around 4 pm.

9. We had to meet my dad at the Urgent Care to pick up my mom's car.

10. We went to my parent's house to drop off the car and also to catch up with my dad. We ended up staying and ordering pasta from Pizza Hut. It was actually pretty good! We didn't head home until almost 8 pm.

11. I spent Monday text messaging between my parents and Adam. We were still without a diagnosis for my mom at that point, so with each new test we all communicated about what we thought would be next.

12. We went to the hospital on Monday night to visit Grandma. Daddy was very tired from all of the driving and from staying up half the night with Mommy and baby.

13. It's taken several attempts to get this list completed. I had to feed the baby, attempt to go back to sleep with the baby (mission failed), and go to the bathroom while Daddy changed Sadie's diaper. Adam is working from home today, which I why I even felt like I could attempt blogging this morning. Currently Sadie is in her swing and quite content. I wish she would fall back asleep because I'd sure like to. On the other side of things, it might be nice if she'd stay awake now and sleep tonight. If nothing else, I'm learning what's on TV in the middle of the night. Thank goodness for Law and Order!

I do really, really love being a mom, but I am also quite sleepy and would very much appreciate a few uninterrupted hours of sleep. Maybe tonight if I'm very lucky! I promise to post some more pictures as soon as I have a few more spare moments to upload them, sort them, and make appropriate choices about what to post. Hope all is well with everyone else!

Back to This Century

Well, it's been a crazy week! We were without power from Sunday night at 5:00 pm until Thursday afternoon around noon! But, we can now see at all hours of the day and night and have a newly stocked refrigerator full of food! Here are some of the highlights of the past week:

Monday night - Wednesday night: Stay at a hotel with Grandma and Grandpa Stotts, get spoiled by constant attention and Grandma's willingness to rock or walk with her at all hours of the day and night

Thursday dinner: Eats out with the family at Olive Garden. Marvelously well-behaved the entire meal!

Thursday night: Misses Grandma and cries for 2 hours straight during the middle of the night, Mom finally consoles her and we can all go back to bed

Friday - Saturday nights: Grandma and Grandpa Stotts have a sleepover since they STILL didn't have power! Sadie goes back to full-on spoil mode!

Friday night: Took a trip out to the tailgate at Mommy's school. Enjoyed being fussed over by Mommy's co-workers.

Sunday: Take a trip to Easton to enjoy some sunshine and shopping. Cries when we initially arrive, but then calms down and sleeps peacefully while being wheeled around.

Monday: Currently sleeping in her swing! Yeah! Mommy and Daddy both got to take showers while she was swinging. Daddy is working from home today!

And now for the best part, here are some new pictures of Sadie. Even though they might just be accidents, she has started to smile. She's also enjoying the luxury of sleeping in between Mommy and Daddy, at least when she's not sleeping somewhere else! :)

Adventures in the World of No Electricity

Seeing the title of this post, you may be wondering - if she has no electricity, how is she posting? Well, I'm at a hotel. Let's start from the beginning, though.

On Sunday morning we woke up to a hot day that was rather windy. Throughout the day it kept getting more and more windy. Then, around 3:00 pm, Adam and I decided that we would try and venture out and go to Babies 'R' Us and pick up some food for dinner. Unfortunately, this was the point in the day where the wind was really picking up. We made it about 5 blocks from our house and then were attacked by an orange barrel that was flying through the air. We decided that we would keep going, but we were getting a little scared. Branches were starting to fly around and lights were dangling perilously from the stoplight wires. We headed to the grocery store to buy some gift cards (we get gas points when we shop at the grocery) and the grocery had no electricity. My parents' electricity was already out, so we really weren't sure what to do. Adam decided that he really wanted some salad from Buca di Beppo's though, so we headed in that direction to get some take out. I stayed in the car while Adam ran in to get dinner. The gutter on the side of Buca's was barely hanging on to the side of the building and was quite creaky. Finally, Adam came back with the food and we headed back home. By the time we were heading home, many more stoplights were not working and people had NOT mastered the idea of the 4 way stop. We got back home and had lots of branches down in our yard. At that point, they were mainly small branches. We flipped on the TV and decided we would go ahead and eat dinner. We had no sooner begun to eat, than the lights flickered and then went off completely. That was about 5:00 pm on Sunday night. We have not had power since. Sunday night was INCREDIBLY long! We found candles and a flashlight. We even managed to find a radio that would take batteries. But, we had winds blowing up to 70 mph and as time passed some HUGE branches started to fall from our trees. We have a GIANT branch down from our big tree in the back yard and one of the smaller trees split in half and is now dangling dangerously over our power lines. Adam kept running in and out while there was still light to assess the damage. This was making me nervous because I was worried about his safety as well and just simply worried about how the house and trees were going to stand up to all of this. Sadie had spent much of Sunday sleeping, so she was not all about the sleeping on Sunday night. This only made things worse, since Adam and I were worried about what was going on, didn't have electricity, and were already running on less than great amounts of sleep. But, we survived.

Adam did have to report for work yesterday. Only IT's were allowed in to Cardinal Health because all power was being run by back up generators. Adam spent his day moving servers around to make sure that the essentials were going to be taken care of. I spent the day with my parents. No one in Central Ohio has had school because no one has power. This has been nice for me because I have more people to help me with the baby. But, the stinky part of this is that even though I am "losing" these days as part of my maternity leave, I will get to be the one who has to make them up at the end of the year. Grrrrrrrr! It does not seem quite fair!

My parents decided to get a hotel room last night because they both use CPAP machines to keep them breathing regularly at night. Obviously, with no power the CPAP machines will not work. They ended up getting a Hawthorne Suites hotel room. It actually has two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a full kitchen. They graciously invited Adam, Sadie, and I to stay with them. This was great because it meant that we had electricity and could move around much easier with the baby during the night time hours.

Adam had to go in to work again today, but he got an e-mail last night saying that Cardinal had power back up. It's kind of funny to me that they sent an e-mail since you would have had to have had power in order to get the e-mail, but anyways...

So, that's the story from here. AEP, our power company, is saying that it may be Sunday before we all get power back again. CRAZY! It's certainly going to make for some long days ahead. Hopefully they will get things back up sooner, but this may be my last post for a while.

On a final note, Adam and I spent this day two years ago with many of you faithful readers. It's our second anniversary today. I hadn't even realized it until Adam mentioned it last night. Neither of us even had a card to give the other this morning, but I guess we're both quite content with the gift of our beautiful baby girl. :) Hope you are all doing well!

1 Week and 1 Day Old

Well, Sadie has officially been a part of the "real" world for one week and one day. It's really quite hard to believe that it's been that long already. The week has really flown by. Here's a quick summary of Sadie's adventures during her first week.

Thursday September 4:
* Born at 7:50 am
* Nurses within first hour
* Nurses multiple times throughout the day
* Receives first bath in hospital room in front of Mommy, Daddy, and Grandma and Grandpa Stotts
* Immediately begins filling diapers with lots of sticky-icky meconium
* Watches first episodes of "Law and Order"
* Stays up much of the night and cries

Friday September 5:
* Seen by the doctor for the first time
* Seen by the lactation consultant who lets Mommy know that Sadie has one of the strongest latches she's ever felt (no wonder Mommy is sore!)
* Visited by Mommy's doctor who comments again and again about what a good team Mommy and Sadie make
* Visited by Aunt Holly
* Visited by Jackie Haworth, Mommy's friend from school
* Watches "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?" and already responds well! ;)

Saturday September 6:
* Visited by a couple from Mommy and Daddy's baby birthing class
* Visited by Daddy's friends Johan and Kristy, who are on a tour of Labor and Delivery for when they deliver in December
* Gets to take first ride in the car and go home!
* Spends the day getting acclimated and getting to know the kitties
* Enjoys being held or rocked while Mommy and Daddy eat sloppy joes

Here are some pictures of her grandparents holding her:






Sunday September 7:
* Visited by Grandma and Grandpa Brinkley
* Visited by Uncle Tim and cousins Codey and Noah
* Takes first bath at home
* Shows everyone how well she can already hold up her own head
* Still rather confused about her days and nights

Here's a picture of her first bath at home with Mom and Dad:


Monday September 8:
* Gets to take a trip to the doctor's office after the doctor "loses" Mommy's records when they put in Sadie's information
* Gets to take first ride in the stroller when Mommy goes to purchase some more nursing bras and tanks
* Visited by Great Uncle Kevin
* Continues to show off her amazing abilities to hold up her own head and do push-ups on anyone that's holding her

Tuesday September 9:
* Visited by Daddy's cousin, Dianne
* Sleeping improves slightly during the night time hours
* Spends a big chunk of time alone with Mommy while Daddy runs some errands
* Takes first ride in Baby Bjorn when Mommy takes her out on the back porch to enjoy the nice weather

Wednesday September 10:
* Feels very sad when Daddy has to return to work
* Excited that Grandma Stotts gets to spend the day with her
* Takes a trip to the pet store

Thursday September 11:
* Gets to visit the doctor for her first check-up
* Is up to 9 lbs, 2 oz - one ounce up from birth and 6 ounces up from when we left the hospital
* Pees all over the exam table - nurse comments on how well hydrated she is. :)
* Takes another stroller ride to help Mommy return the rented breast pump
* Enjoys afternoon in the stroller while Mommy, Sadie, and Grandma meet Daddy for lunch at La Chatelaine for an al fresco dining experience
* Waits anxiously for news that her friend Parker has been born
* Sleeps in 3 hour spurts during the night!
* Prefers sleeping on her side rather than flat on her back
* Tries her best to go through as many diapers as possible while she's on the changing table

Friday September 12:
* Hangs out at the house while the electrician noisily continues to work on finishing up several unfinished electrical projects
* Spends afternoon time fussing - maybe an indication that she'll sleep better tonight?
* Enjoys being held by anyone willing to hold her - but spent a good amount of time asleep on Grandpa

Our plans for this weekend include attending the Worthington Market Days celebration in downtown Worthington and letting Mommy and Daddy catch up on their sleep. Mommy will be preparing for spending her first day completely alone with Sadie on Monday.

I am feeling pretty good overall. I'm definitely still sore and expect that I will continue to be for at least a few weeks. After all, my body has been through the ringer and with my little barracuda latching on so strongly, it may take even longer than a few weeks for me to get back to feeling "great." I am loving being a mom and Adam is doing a FANTASTIC job as a new dad. I really have no idea how he's been able to go back to work, though I also know that he's had a really hard time leaving us in the morning. And, he texts us or calls several times throughout the day to make sure we're doing well and to tell us that he loves us both.

Well, I'm feeling pretty sleepy and it won't be too long before it's time for another feeding. So, I'm going to go and get ready for bed and in turn get ready for Sadie to go to bed. Hopefully it will be a good sleeping night.

Sadie Emerson Smith

Well, the last post's title was a lie. September 3, 2008 is NOT Sadie's birthday. She was a long time in coming and did not arrive until 7:50 am on Thursday September 4, 2008. I did arrive at the hospital at 7:00 am on Wednesday for the induction. But, we had a bit of a problem from the get-go. I have very deep veins in my wrists and the first time that they stuck me to try to get my IV going, things did not go well. The nurse kept digging around and trying to find something, but the only thing she found, in my opinion, was lots of pain for me. So, another nurse came and stuck me on my other hand. Basically, the day did not start off that well for me.

By 9:00 am, they finally had started me on the pitocin and things began to move along. I also had a follet (sp?) that was basically inserted into me to get my body to dilate with the need for prostaglandins. The follet was supposed to get my body to start making its own prostaglandins. Anyways, the follet usually takes 4-6 hours to fall out. Mine came out within 2 hours, but at the end I was only a little over 2 cm dilated and still not effacing much faster with the pitocin. So, they upped my pitocin. By 3:00 pm, I was up to 4 cm dilated, but they had to have a resident come to break my water and all of the on-call residents were working on C-sections. It was after 5:00 pm before they finally came to break my water. I had heard that this was not an altogether great feeling, but I actually didn't think it was that bad. I was more disturbed by the fact that the doctor got my socks all wet with amniotic fluid and then took them off of me. I didn' t have another pair of socks with me that I wanted to put on, so I was just more irritated than anything.

Unfortunately, breaking my water did little to get my dilated or effaced much faster. So, I did end up asking for an epidural when I was not much past 4 cm. I decided that it was silly to be in pain, particularly knowing that if it took as long to get anesthesia there as it did to get the residents to break my water, I probably wanted to get moving. Anesthesia actually got there really quickly and I had just had some nubain right before they put in the epidural. This was great because the nubain completely calmed me down. They went over with my all of the risks and such for epidurals, including that it's possible, though, rare that the first epidural will not take. Again, remember that September 3 was not my lucky day. :) The epidural did not take. It made me very itchy, but that was about it. So, about an hour to an hour and a half after the first epidural, anesthesia came back, removed epidural number one and started epidural number two. Epidural number two was great. It had me numb up to right underneath my breasts and down to right above my ankles. I could still feel pressure, but much less pain.

Many, many, many more hours went by and around 6:00 am, my nurse told me that my doctor had called and that if I did not make some serious progress fast, that she would be taking me to have a c-section for lack of progress. By this point I was 100% effaced and a little bit more than 9 cm dilated. And, I was darned sure not going to have a C-Section after all that I had already been through. So, my great and wonderful nurse got me into this position where I boosted by butt up into the air and did some pelvic thrusting. Then I laid on my side with my bottom leg straight and my top leg up like a flamingo. The nurse kept coming back and checking me. No progress after the butt in the air position. I started crying and basically mentally yelling at Sadie to please get moving. She FINALLY listened! When the nurse checked me one last time, I had come down to zero station and was fully dilated and effaced. Yeah! She called my doctor immediately and said we could begin to push with the next contraction. My doctor lives about 20 minutes away. My goal was to push for as short a time as possible. After all, we were nearing 22 hours of this actual laboring process by now and I was ready to go. I was completly out of epidural medication by this point, but I figured that it wasn't really going to make much difference at that point anyways. I was going to feel pain and I was going to have to deal with it. I just wanted this all over with and done! Within 3 cyles of pushing, you could see Sadie's head. The nurses actually made me slow down and do half-cycles because my doctor wasn't there yet. This, of course, irritated me further. Half-way through my second set of half-pushing, my doctor arrived and I finished the set pushing for the full 10 seconds. Within 4 more push cycles, Sadie was out! Her head was 15 cm in diameter. She weighed 9 lbs 1 oz (11 oz less than myself and my crazy mother didn't have an epidural!) and 20.5 inches long. Her first APGAR score was an 8 and the second was a 9. She has lots of REALLY dark hair. She has very chubby cheeks and is quite the beautiful little girl, if I do say so myself.

I did require about a half-hour of stitching up, but my mom tells me that the whole process took as long as it did because my doctor was very careful in her stitching and I should actually be pleased with this because there's much less chance of an infection with the thorough job she did.

As soon as possible, I got some breakfast in me and immediately started feeling better. Life was good! Here are a few pictures of Sadie:







The first two were taken yesterday shortly after she was born. The last one was taken this morning after she had had her professional picture taken here at the hospital.

You will be able to view more pictures of Sadie at the hospital's website. I can't give you a link yet, because I don't have it myself. But, I can tell you to go to Google and type in "Ohio Health". It will be the first web page to come up. Next click on Riverside Hospital. Then on the left side will be a link for the Peakaboo Nursery. Click on that link. Then you'll need to change the date so that it reads September 4, 2008. Then Sadie's name will come up as "Sadie S". Click on that and you'll be able to view the professional pictures.

Well, it's taken me nearly 2 hours to write this because of all of the people that have come in and out of the room in that time. So, I'm going to go and start filling out some of the millions of forms that are requried for us to go home tomorrow. Please send your glowing comments! :)

Today IS the day!

Well, it's almost 1:00 am and here I sit at my computer, instead of sleeping in my bed. I laid down around 9:00 pm and slept fairly restlessly until about 12:15 am. So, I've had 3 or so hours of not so great sleep. I woke up having some pretty intense contractions and decided that I would come and sit on my exercise ball instead of continuing to lay in my bed. This is a MUCH more comfortable position at this point in time.

Adam and I have to be at the hospital at 7:00 am to officially be induced. After talking to my good friend, Amy, I'm feeling a lot less anxious about the induction than I have been. Amy has two daughters and was induced both times. Things turned out quite well for her in the end, so there is hope and reason to believe that they will turn out well for me too! Both my doctor and my mother seem to think that once Sadie FINALLY descends into my pelvic bone that things will move fairly quickly. I'm very hopeful that they are both correct. My guess is that by the time most of you read this, I will have already ventured into the world of induction and things will be moving along. Then, Adam will likely be posting something later on in the day to give everyone an update and hopefully a picture. :)

To "enjoy" our final day as non-parents, Adam took a work-from-home day on Tuesday. He actually got called in on Sunday night/Monday morning and had to work on fixing a pretty big problem for about 6 hours, so he figured that working from home on Tuesday wouldn't be such a bad thing. But, since everyone knew that he wasn't going to be at work for the remainder of the week, not a whole lot got thrown at him yesterday. This is really a good thing, I suppose, but it left him a little bored. I, on the other hand, spent much of my day either playing on-line solitaire or lounging around in bed. I did actually get to talk with my sub. He seems like a very nice guy. He didn't have a ton of questions for me, so I'm hoping that's because my awesome team did an awesome job of explaining how things kind of work in my room and in theirs. He said he'd send me an e-mail at the end of the week to kind of give me an update. I hope to actually get out to school towards the end of next week and at least meet this man (and show off Sadie), but we'll see how well I'm actually feeling by that point. Anyways, Adam and I did actually venture out to Babies 'R' Us to make a few last minute purchases. We also decided to have one final dinner out without the baby and without needing a babysitter. We went to Bravo. I had a really yummy salad and cheese ravioli. This seemed to make me feel good and has sat amazingly well, despite my rather nervous stomach. On our way home from dinner, we stopped over at my parents for a final pre-baby visit and then headed home.

Well, I'm actually feeling a bit sleepy again and the contractions seemed to have died down a bit. Hopefully there will be at least a few more hours of sleep in my future, because I know it will be awhile before I get a REALLY good night's sleep again! :) Keep checking the blog throughout the day and hopefully sooner rather than later there will be official baby news! :)

Due Date Dud

Well, the day has come....and gone. Today is the day I have waited for for 9 months. It's 9:15 pm as I start to write this and I figure that even if I were to start having contractions right this very second, that Sadie would still not be here on August 31st. This is MUCH to my mother's delight. She has said ALL along that she didn't want her to be born until September. For some reason my mother has become obsessed with the Sapphire birthstone (also my sister's birthstone) and felt that the August Peridot simply wouldn't do. It seems she is going to get her wish. In fact, I just called her to tell her that she better be gathering the largest collection of Sapphires possible because I really feel pretty deserving of them at this point!

Anyways, here is a chronicle of things I did today to perhaps encourage Sadie to make an appearance. I began my day by bouncing on my exercise ball. I did this for quite a lengthy time while playing on-line solitaire. I wrote thank you notes to those people who have recently purchased gifts in Sadie's honor and whom I had been putting off the thank you note writing in hopes of including a picture of my daughter. I made Adam follow me around the house with light bulbs, installing them in all of the places where light bulbs were burnt out or missing altogether. I did some final rearranging in Sadie's room, including plugging everything in to all of the new outlets so that I could be absolutely certain that all the plugs were working and ready to go. I also convinced Adam to do some vacuuming after he had already emptied most of the upstairs trash cans. The two of us also cleaned off our desks and Adam spent a fair amount of time shredding those things that we did not need. Then, around 11:00 am, Adam's parents arrived. They decided to come down for the day, I think in hopes that I might go into labor. Obviously, no such luck. After visiting for a while and showing off Sadie's room, Adam's mom still hadn't seen it in person, we decided to go and eat some lunch at Buca's. We ordered eggplant parmesan and penne arrabiata. The eggplant is supposed to have labor inducing substances in it and the arrabiata is REALLY spicy! Even after filling up on those two tasty treats, Sadie does not seem like she's going to budge. We spent the afternoon back at our house with Adam showing Jerry how to play the many games of the Wii. Patty and I spent much of our time observing, but I eventually joined in when it was time to play Mario Party 8. Then, it was time for them to head back up to Louisville (right outside Canton) and Adam and I had some of the leftovers. Multiple servings of eggplant and spicy pasta and STILL nothing! Adam then headed upstairs to play World of Warcraft and I stayed downstairs to watch "Law and Order" and play more on-line solitaire.

So, for a day that I was QUITE confident I would be spending holding my new baby girl, I am left with still holding a sore belly and experiencing some tummy aches and heartburn from the spicy food! However, my dad assured me that he has read up on some new labor inducing technique that he will reveal to me tomorrow. So, since I will have met my mother's goal of having a September baby by tomorrow, maybe Sadie will be kind to me and start on her way out tomorrow! Plus, as several of you have mentioned to me via comment, e-mail, or conversation, perhaps Sadie already has a strange sense of humor and has decided that I should be laboring with her on Labor Day. If not, there's always Wednesday! :) No matter what, by this time next week I WILL have a baby in my arms! Hope you all enjoy your extra day off tomorrow!

Uncomfortable Update

Well, I had my final doctor's visit on Thursday. Before I get to the details of that appointment, though, I need to give you some additional background information about my week. On Monday we had our second and final work day. I spent much of this day getting things together and discussing plans with my team. Late Monday afternoon we (my principal and I) interviewed yet another person for my position while I'm on maternity leave. Unfortunately, there was a miscommunication about his certification and he's not actually yet certified in SpEd. He's going back to school to get certified, but he hasn't even started those classes yet. Because he is not certified, this means he could only work in my room for 4 days and then the 5th day would have to be covered by someone who is certified. So, needless to say this seemed to be more wasted time. On Tuesday we actually started school. Things went shockingly well. They weren't perfect, but I had had some serious worries about the behaviors to expect from my students and I think by explaining my policies to them and the rewards they could reap by doing the right thing, they realized that the year might just go ok. Wednesday went equally well and I was impressed that the students still seemed respectful and were getting work completed. This trend continued on Thursday, but I was feeling a little more stressed out. On Tuesday night my principal and SpEd coordinator interviewed another candidate. This person was certified, but my principal had some concerns. But, at least he was certified and available. On Wednesday night, my principal and SpEd coordinator inteviewed another candidate. They liked him better, but he couldn't seem to locate his license. They offerred him the job anyways and said to come to school on Thursday with his license. When my principal arrived at school on Thursday morning she had a message from this guy saying that on his way home the battery in his car died. He no longer had reliable transportation because he couldn't afford to fix the battery right now AND his wife said that this wasn't a good enough job for him. (Now, I would think this would have been something they would have discussed before he ever interviewed, but clearly my expectations of people seem to be WAY too high). So, my day on Thursday had already been a bit stressful. My doctor's appointment was at 2:45 pm. This meant that I had to have plans prepared for Friday and potentially for next week BEFORE I left for the appointment. I had to leave before school was actually finished for the day, so I spent most of 9th period scrambling to get the final things together to leave as plans. This meant I was pretty much neglecting my job, but what was I going to do?

Ok, now that you know some background leading in to my doctor's appointment, things might be a bit easier for you to understand what happened next. My doctor actually has 2 offices - one at the hospital and one in Dublin. My appointment in December to discuss getting pregnant was at the Dublin office. Since then, every other appointment has been at the hospital office. Strangely, I was put into the same room that I had been in in December. So, my first and last appointments were in the same place. Anyways, the nurse took my blood pressure and - surprise, surprise - it was something like 138/92. The doctor doesn't like it to get higher than 140/90 with either number being higher than that. When the doctor came in I wasn't overly worried because I really felt like my pressure was up because of my stressful situation at school. Also, I told her that I was pretty certain Sadie has descended at least a little bit and that I was feeling some pretty extensive pressure in my lower uterus. She agreed that she was at least a little lower because she had to move down further on my belly to get a good read on her heart rate. Then she completed the internal exam. I am still only 1.5 cm dilated and 60% effaced. This is because, while Sadie is putting EXTREME pressure on my pelvic bone, she has yet to actually go underneath my pelvic bone. Until she makes that deeper descent, there won't be any change. So, this was obviously disappointing and then she wanted to talk again about induction. Then, she wanted to take my blood pressure again to see if it had gone down. Now, let's think - I hadn't had a great day to begin with, then I find out my blood pressure is high, next I learn that I still haven't dilated or effaced anymore, and then she wants to talk about induction, something I really wanted to avoid. So, when she takes my pressure again, there's been no change. Now she tells me that she wants me to lay down on my left side for 10 minutes and she'll take my pressure again. If my pressure's still not down then I will need to have a blood draw. Ok - let's be real. If you know me at all, you know I HATE having blood drawn because this almost always leads to me feeling faint. You already know about all of the other stressors on my mind, too, so this is clearly not looking good for me. And with no surprise to me, my blood pressure was actually up at the end of 10 minutes - 130/102. So, the doctor comes back and tells me that I have two choices. I can either go next door and have the blood drawn or I can go to Labor and Delivery and have the blood drawn there. If they draw the blood next door, she won't be able to learn the results until Friday morning. If I go to Labor and Delivery, they can get the results much quicker AND if it's determined that I do have pre-eclamsia, she will induce me on Thursday night. Now, it seems to me to be rather stupid to not just go to Labor and Delivery, even though I'm still pretty darn certain that my pressure being up is solely related to my stress caused by work. She tells me to go home and get my things and have something to eat (since I won't be able to eat anything at the hospital if she does end up inducing me). So, I leave the doctor's office not feeling too well.

Now the real fun starts - I try to call Adam. He had told me pre-appointment that he had a meeting, but to call if I really needed to talk. Since I knew we'd have to head to the hospital and he would need to leave ASAP, I called him. He wouldn't answer his phone. He wouldn't answer his personal cell, his work phone, or his work cell. This worried me a bit. Then I tried calling my mom. She had actually called and left me a message while I was at my appointment. I called her several times, and she wouldn't answer her phone either (supposedly her phone never rang and she had no indication that she had missed a call). By this point, I was in tears. I couldn't get a hold of either of the people who are supposed to be accompanying me into the labor and delivery room. So, I call my dad. He can't understand me because I'm crying. I finally calm down enough to convey what's happening and he says he'll get in touch with my mom and to try and calm down. I keep driving towards home and eventually Adam calls me back. He had turned his phone on vibrate and didn't feel it. Grrrrrrr!!!! But, he drops everything that he's doing and gets in his car to head home. Then my mom calls me. I explain everything to her and this is when she tells me that her phone has never rung. She had been at the salon to get her hair cut and colored. We both go to the same place to get our hair done, so they had no problem letting her get up and leave and they, thankfully, hadn't started cutting or coloring yet. This is also when I learn that my dad has no car. My parents decided that now that they were back in school they would take their cars to get detailed. Goodness only knows why this seemed like a good idea to them when they had all summer to do this and have it not be an inconvenience to either of them, but that's neither here nor there at this point. So, my mom headed over to pick up my Dad and then they headed to dinner. I, in the meantime, had arrived home and was waiting for Adam to get here. He began gathering up all of our stuff to take to the hospital while I continued to clean and tidy up so that if we didn't end up coming home Thursday night we would NOT come home to a messy house. Eventually we headed to Wendy's. This is the Wendy's where Adam and I went on our first date (to get some water) and where my mom's water had broken when she was pregnant with me. We thought this would be a good omen.

We all (Mom, Dad, Adam and I) arrived at the hosptial and headed up to Labor and Delivery. Since I wasn't actually heading all the way back into the real delivery room, though, I was only allowed to have one "guest" accompany me. My parents then had to go and sit in the waiting room. After not too long of a wait, a nurse came back and started asking me a million questions. She then took my blood pressure (128/80) and said she would be back soon to do the blood draw. She held true to her word. I had to give three vials. But, she listened to me and took the blood from my surface vein. This ALWAYS hurts less and usually leaves much less of a bruise. And, since I had just eaten and my blood sugar was up, it really wasn't too awful to have the blood drawn. She then brought me some water and Adam and I basically sat around and played the waiting game. I was all hooked up to monitors. I had a fetal monitor so we could hear Sadie's heart beat and then I had a blood pressure cuff that automatically took my pressure every 15 minutes. Adam took a couple of goofy pictures of me to send to my parents and we kept conversing with them through text messages. After nearly two hours of sitting around, the results of my blood work came back. Everything was normal and my blood pressure was now way down (112/74). They called my doctor. She said that I was not to go back to work since it was obviously causing my pressure to increase and that her office would be contacting me about when to come in for an induction. Then we got to go home. I had already contacted my principal earlier and she assured me that she would have the permanent sub cover for me on Friday and then let me know the plan for next week.

As luck would have it, my mom didn't have school on Friday. No reason, that was just their agreed upon schedule. So, she came over and we ran a few errands on Friday. I got an e-mail from my principal telling me that they ended up hiring the "concerning" guy, since he was seemingly the ONLY person in the Central Ohio area to not already have a SpEd job. I also did some more cleaning and laundry. Adam then stopped at Yanni's, our FAVORITE Greek restaurant, on his way home and got us some delicious food for dinner. We then watched "Dan in Real Life", one of our options available on On-Demand, and Adam removed my toe nail polish and gave me an extensive foot rub. Isn't he a NICE husband?

This morning, it looks like it's going to be a beautiful day! It's the first Ohio State game of the year, a game Adam and I attended a year ago. I think we'll continue to do some last minute tidying up and a lot of trying to relax. Maybe that will convince Sadie to make her deeper descent. If nothing else, we are scheduled for an induction to begin at 7:00 am on Wednesday September 3, so we should, hopefully, have a baby on Wednesday. We have learned that the hospital does have free WiFi, so Adam will have his computer with him and we will hopefully be able to give some updates from the hospital. In the meantime, I would greatly appreciate all of your positive thoughts being sent my way. I can certainly use them! Hope everyone has a GREAT Labor Day weekend!

Definitely Descending on an otherwise Dumpy Day

Ok, I've already decided that I want to end this post with good news, so I'm going to start it with the frustrating news.

I get to school this morning. It was a work day. My principal finds me and tells me that my substitute got a full time job and that she is no longer going to be my substitute. Here's the worst part. To tell my principal this, she called her at school on Sunday morning and left a message. Now, I was with my principal when she called this girl on Friday and I KNOW my principal gave her her cell phone and home phone numbers to call her. Clearly this girl was embarrassed and didn't want to confront my principal, but come on! And, it gets worse. I had given the substitute the keys to my room. Did she keep them? No. Did she offer to drive them back to school? No. Did she suggest meeting somewhere to have them picked up? No. What did she do? She mailed them! Who mails keys?! So, goodness only knows if I'll ever actually get them back! Grrrr!

Continuing with my frustrations...I LOVE my team members at school. They are wonderful people with great ideas and they really and truly care about kids. The one thing I both admire and stress about, however, is how laid back our two male teachers are about everything. They had a general idea about what they were going to do tomorrow - our first day of school - but one of them didn't actually share those plans with me (I found out from another teacher) and the other one just happened to have written his schedule for tomorrow on the board. Now, the two ladies I work with were quite a bit better. They at least had some papers copied and/or power point presentations put together, but neither of them were in a particularly large hurry to get everything "finalized" either. I think this is because they are fairly used to what to expect and don't feel they need to worry. If I knew I was 100% for sure going to be there, I could relax and feel the way my team seems to feel. But, since I'm not quite sure what Sadie's thinking, I can't quite keep my cool. I did the best I could with the plans that I had and have emergency plans prepared if I should not be there tomorrow.

At 2:00, my principal came down to tell me that she had found someone to interview for my position, again, and that she would be meeting him at 2:30 pm. This was great! So, around 2:30 pm, in walks this guy. He's very nicely dressed and seems pleasantly intelligent. Then we start talking about his certification. It turns out that he's currently only certified K-12 in Phys Ed and Health. He is actually going back to school to get his special ed certification, but he doesn't even start taking classes until the middle of September. So, whereas I think students might be a little afraid of him (he does look like a very large and strong gym teacher), he can't legally work in my position for the length of time that I will be gone. Only after the interview did I find out why my principal had thought that he already had SpEd certification. My SpEd coordinator had called my principal and told her she found the perfect candidate on the Madison County substitute list. Under his certification it says, "Special, K-12, PE and Health." Now, I can completely understand why the label "special" could be misunderstood. What is meant by special in this context is that it is a special license. Very few licenses are issued for grades K-12 and those that are are for subjects like PE, Health, Band, Choir, Library, or Special Ed. However, if he were actually certified in SpEd, his listed certification would say Intervention Specialist, my actual "legal" title. So, needless to say, I got to whittle away a little bit more of my time by talking with this nice man who my district will very likely not be able to hire. Grrrrr!!!!!

Then, to top off all of this fun, I have started having a few contractions. I would imagine that this is due to the fact that I was at school today for nearly 10 hours and I am just a bit stressed out, as you may be able to tell from above. But, contractions coming are good because that means Sadie can hopefully move on out and this is actually leading to the good news bit of this blog. :)

It is clear to me that Sadie has begun to make her descent. Even when you look at me you can tell she is lower. It is also very hard for me to sit comfortably, making writing this a bit challenging. Additionally, when I am feeling her kick, it is no longer directly into my ribs. It's actually hitting me in my spongy middle! Woohoo! So, I am finally feeling that the end may in fact be very near! I don't actually have a doctor's appointment until Thursday afternoon this week, so it will still be a few days before I can give you an "official" report, but maybe Sadie will decide she doesn't need to wait until Thursday! If not, send good thoughts my way tomorrow as I start school one VERY pregnant lady! :) Take care everyone!