Kaitlyn Randomness

Kaitlyn LOVES to go to the grocery store. She knows them all by name. Without me telling her where we are going, as soon as I pull into the parking lot, she looks out and says "There's Harris Teeter" or Aldi, or Bi-lo. Harris Teeter is her favorite of course b/c she gets a balloon and a cookie. She LOVES balloons. Whenever she has a 'fresh' balloon she will literally carry it around until it dies. I am talking even when she is sleeping...she will not let go. At night time Kaitlyn is a really sound sleeper, but if we try and take the balloon out of her hand while she is asleep she immediately wakes up saying "BALLOON!" Too bad those HT balloons die the next day and she wants to go so often. A couple days ago she actually screamed for over an hour b/c she wanted to go to Harris Teeter. She just kept saying "Go Harris Teeter" over and over. I guess my couponing has created a little grocery store monster! haha!

What we've been up to these past 5 weeks...

It's been 5 weeks since our little baby boy was born and things have been going pretty smoothly. He is seriously the sweetest baby ever. He hardly ever cries and that is usually only when he is hungry. He is content just looking around with his paci when he is awake. It has been such a blessing to have such an easy baby after what we went through with Kaitlyn. He is a big eater. I have fallen back into my old habit of just pumping ILO nursing. But its not bad. He is already up to about 4 ounces or so per feeding and would eat more than that if we would let him. I do let him nurse in between meals if he is really hungry as a snack :)

He had his 1 month check-up this past week. He is already up to 9 lb 9 oz and 21.5" long, both in the 25-50%. He has adjusted pretty well to sleeping patterns as well. He goes to bed around 11:30ish and will wake up once around 3:30-4:00 to eat and then goes back to sleep until about 7:30 or 8:00 so not too bad! Kaitlyn has also been adjusting better since the first couple weeks. She is not quite as whiny and is happier now that we are up and about again. She likes to try and help out too which is sweet. Unfortuantly I forgot to take a picture of him at exactly 1 month, so here is a picture of us today before church on his 5 week birthday along with a few others of his first month here one earth.

Kaitlyn about to head out trick-or-treating

Crossing the bridge at Discovery Place

Kaitlyn and her BFF Brigham at the water factory

Brayden Thomas Wood

We are so happy to have our little baby boy here with us! He was born exactly 2 weeks early on Sunday Oct. 16, 2011. As you know, up until my last appointment before he was born he had been breach/transverse, but luckily he decided to turn on his own! Justin and I were watching Grey's Anatomy and I told Justin towards the end of it that I thought I was starting labor. I started having contractions at 10:00pm Saturday night. We stayed up until about 11:30 to make sure they were still coming regularly and they were. I decided to go try and take a nap since it would probably be awhile and Justin tried to clean up the house. Of course I couldn't sleep since I kept getting woke up by contractions, so I tried to start cleaning and packing as well. My mom was out of town coming home Sunday morning, so we had to call my brother to come and stay with Kaitlyn while we went to the hospital. We left for the hospital around 8 or 9 AM. When we first got there I was admitted into Triage. My contractions up until then had been painful, but not unbearable. Then all of the sudden he must have turned inside me and I started having the worst back labor ever. I literally felt like I was going to die! I was screaming and crying for an epidural, but the midwife was tied up in another delivery and I couldn't be admitted to the hospital room until she checked me again. The nurse made me walk for an hour to dilate to 4cm. I felt like my back was ripping in half. Literally the worst pain I have ever felt. I really don't know how I would have survived the entire pregnancy without pain meds. I was naseous from the pain. Finally my midwife came and checked me and I was at 4cm. I got admitted to my room and was able to start the fluids for my epidural. Unfortuantly the nurse couldn't get my IV in. It hurt so bad so she called another nurse in to put it in. Luckily the second nurse was able to insert it correctly and I was able to get my epidural about an hour later. After that everything was perfect! They broke my water and everything went quickly after that. I felt a lot of pressure like I needed to push but I guess they didn't think I would be ready so quickly. They kept waiting to check me even though I told them I was feeling pressure. Finally they checked me and said "Wow, the head is RIGHT there!" They paged the delivery nurse and suited up very quickly. They told me to push and he came right out on the first push!

They put him on me and I was immediately in love. It was different than with Kaitlyn. Not that I didn't love her, but I felt it more strongly this time. I think maybe b/c I already know what it was like to love a child now, when I didn't yet know with Kaitlyn. He immediately started sucking his thumb so they told me to let him nurse and he did for quite a while. They didn't even take him from me until like 2 hours later! I guess they could just tell that he was healthy. He weighed in at 7lbs 7 oz. and was 19.5in long.

Most all my family was out in the waiting room so they all came in right away. Kaitlyn did suprisingly well at the hospital. I think she really did understand that he was here and was part of our family. She has adjusted pretty well as far as acting like she loves him and doesn't try and hurt him or anything. But unfortuantly she is not taking the lack of attention as well. She cries a lot more now and whines all the time. If I am pumping or nursing she will just stand at my side and cry. She has also started doing a lot more bad stuff for attention. So hopefully that will all pass soon. I know it will get better, but I hope soon! So far Brayden has been a little angle and we love him so much!

About to head to the hospital

About 1 minute after he was born

Kaitlyn meeting Brayden for the first time

Welcome home!

Brayden's Room

So we are finally done with Brayden's room. Our house has been in shambles ever since we started converting the guest room into Brayden's room. We had so much storage in there and stuff that we needed to sell on craigslist and we are still trying to find places for it. I need a basement...or at least bigger closet or attic or something! Currently our loft area and master bedroom look like a tornado has went through with all of the random boxes and clutter lying around looking for a new home. But at least his room is now ready for his arrival! We went with a jungle theme. I am not as happy with his room as I was with Kaitlyn's, but mainly b/c I feel it is just too bland. But we didn't want to go through the hassle of putting up moulding to have two different colors and all that, and thought the green walls might be too much, so we just went with a cream color and I painted some letters for his name and a couple of canvases to hang up b/c I am too cheap to buy anything premade! haha! I thought they turned out pretty good, but of course it is a little hard to see on these small photos. My mom and I found this awesome giraffe on craigslist and then I bought some wall stickers of jungle animals.

Zootastic

Zootastic had a groupon a while back that my mom and I both bought. So Kaitlyn got to go twice in about a 2 week period. She enjoyed it, but I have to say that I personally think Lazy 5 Ranch is WAY better. Zootastic does have a few more animals that Lazy 5 does not, but overall the experience is more fun riding the hay ride I think at Lazy 5. But anyway here are a few pics of Kaitlyn petting and feeding the animals:

Happy Birthday Kaitlyn!

Kaitlyn turned 2 years old last week! I can't believe that she is now a "2 year old" That seems so old, but yet I still feel like she is a baby in so many ways. To celebrate, most all my family was not around, so we didn't bother with a party since she still had no idea what a birthday was. That morning I took her to a local place called "The JumpE Place." It was awesome and really cheap so we will be going there again for sure. She had a good time jumping on all of the inflatables and going down the big slides. I think having a sibling is going to be so good for her in the long run, b/c she is finally at the age where she enjoys playing with other kids around her same age. She had so much more fun at the JumpE place when this other little boy would jump around with her. I am so sad that I forgot my camera though :( She literally had a smile on her face for about 45 minutes straight (which is rare) and I wish I could have captured some of those happy moments. So then we came home and had a little lunch and then it was nap time. After her nap I tried to take her outside to get some pictures of her since I had forgotten earlier. This is about the only one that came out ok.
That night once Daddy got home, we ordered a pizza (which is one of her favorite foods) and just made her a homemade bday cake. A very laid back birthday, but we just didn't see the need to do very much for this one. We will definitely make a much bigger fuss about it next year when she knows what's going on!

Just a few comments on this stage in her life for me to be able to look back on:

She is still fairly behind on communicating and talking, but she is starting to get better. She still doesn't say yes or no and won't say any words on demand. But she has started just randomly coming out with quite a few new words here and there which I am happy about. A stranger probably could not understand even 90% of them, but we do, and that is good enough for me for now! I guess some kids are just slower than others at talking.

In other ways, I feel she is pretty smart for her age. She can identify most all the letters of the alphabet by pointing to them when we ask her where they are and can actually say about 3 or 4 letters. Her numbers are a little harder for her. She can only identify about 5/10 of the numbers on a regular basis. She also knows all of her basic colors and will even say each of them but blue for some reason whenever she randomly sees something that color. She also knows most of her shapes: triangle, square, oval, circle and sometimes rectangle.

We haven't had our doctor check-up yet so I don't have all of the stats to post yet. Overall she gets better with age! haha. She has gotten much better with her separation anxiety and will now stay with Justin and my mom with no problems. We have finally broke her of her milk bottle and she will now drink it on her own in a sippy cup. She is currently sleeping in a toddler bed and takes one nap a day. She is a pretty good eater and will eat most anything for a bribe of ice cream or candy :)

In a Funk...

I have been slack about posting anything lately and I blame it on the funk I am currently in. My baby is breech...well technically I think more transverse. Pretty much has been since the beginning, but the doctors were hopeful he would turn by now. He still hasn't and now they are worried that I am running out of time for him to still turn on his own. I have been doing all kinds of weird exercises that I found on the internet, but so far nothing is working. I REALLY don't want to have a c-section. I don't know why I am so depressed over it, but I just am. I think about it 24/7. My hands are constantly going to my stomach every few minutes to feel for the head to see where it is at. I cry at each of my doctors appointments when they confirm that he is still not head down. They probably think I am a nutcase b/c I have cried at so many of my appointments. First when they scared me to death with the marginal cord insertion thing and then I had a cry over some unpaid bills I was unaware of for them, and now this :) Yes I know I sound crazy...but I will just blame it on the pregnancy hormones for now :)

I just recently got even more into a funk over my situation after reading up on the difference between transverse and breech babies. Apparently transverse babies have a harder time trying to turn than a breech baby and the c-section itself scares me even more with a transverse baby b/c you sometimes will have to have the larger vertical cut rather than the horizontal cut at your bikini line. Then I imagine the harder recovery and Kaitlyn trying to crawl all over me (she has a really bad habit about doing this) and rupturing my scar, or me not being able to pick her up for a longer time period after delivery, or the fact that I want more than 2 kids and would most likely have to have mutliple c-sections. Plus the cost difference between a normal delivery and a c-section is ridiculous! I know these are all things I shouldn't worry about until the time actually comes and everything may work itself out, but I just can't stop thinking about it. I try and focus on other things but it is always in the back of my mind. I have soooo much stuff I need to get done around the house before Brayden arrives as well, but I just can't seem to find the motivation. I am always tired and find excuses. I am currently trying to focus on one thing at a time. Currently Brayden's room. It is almost done. Justing pained a couple weeks ago, and I have been painting letters for his room and now am working on a couple canvases to hang up in there. (I know this is extra time consuming, but I was way too cheap to buy everything that I was envisioning so I figured I will just do it myself)

Anyway I will stop rambling about my depressing funk. I just needed to vent it out somewhere else...b/c I am pretty sure Justin is tired of hearing about it :) In other news Kaitlyn turns 2 next week! Craziness!