8ish weeks

So I don't know definitively how far along I am because my appt is this thursday but I figured I would start this up to!

How far along: 8 weeks (I'll find out for sure this week)
Total weight gain: not sure I haven't weighed myself.
Maternity clothes: No but I'm very bloated
Stretch marks: No new ones
Sleep: Sleep is much different this time around since I have a toddler. He hasnt slept well so therefore I havent slept well!
Best moment of this week: It's Sunday so it's just starting!
Miss anything: not being nauseous
Movement: Not yet
Food cravings: tater tots? I wouldn't say I crave them but they sound decent and don't make me feel sick
Anything making you queasy or sick: Uhh yeah. Everything! Smells, food, the smell of food cooking! I mean everything. Even water.
Have you started to show yet? I'm so incredibly bloated I feel like I'm showing.
Gender: No idea.
Labor signs: Nope!
Belly button in or out: In
Wedding rings on or off: On
Happy or moody most of the time: Moody and queasy!
Looking forward to: my first appt this week!

12 months.

One year ago today I was in the hospital watching a marathon of Flip or Flop on HGTV waiting until it was time to start pushing. I remember joking around and feeling really good for the most part. I was excited. Finally after a few hours of pushing and one C-section later I heard my baby boy cry for the first time. And then I started crying and I remember the nurse asking me if they were happy tears. Of course they were.

Isaac, this first year of your life has been the happiest of mine. The moment I found out I was pregnant changed me forever. Being your mom is what I feel I was born to do. Your toothy grin will light up a room. I can't count how many times complete strangers have come up to compliment you to me. If its not you're reddish hair (still not sure where that came from) then its your laugh or just adorable expressions. My hope for you is that you will love people around you and treat them kindly. That God will use you for his Glory. This parenting thing isn't always easy but your Dad and I are doing our best. Here are some of the things you can do today.
- Say Mama
- Walk assisted with a walker or holding our hands
- Clap
- Eat whatever you want
- One of your favorite toys is to play with the real remote to the TV. Not the old one that I want you to play with.
- You love to play chase
- You have 4 teeth on top and 2 on the bottom. With 2 more coming in on the bottom.
- We are no longer breastfeeding and you seem fine with it
- We are about to be done with bottles very soon.
- You love to drink Mama's kale smoothie
- You love books much to my delight.
- You have started swimming lessons

These are just a few things. I will try to cherish every moment with you and take nothing for granted.

I love you with all of my heart.

11 months.

Eleven months. Ahhhh....I don't want to believe it. He is so much fun. Sometimes he just sits in his carseat and will start giggling. I fall in love with him and my heart swells with joy. And he is so close to walking. I think he may be walking by his first birthday. His milestones are very exciting and that will be a big one! Isaac does  not like moving! Who does though? really. After a week he is finally sleeping better. He has enjoyed crawling and discovering the new house and yard. Oh how he loves the grass! At our last yard he wasn't able to play outside because the yard had stickerburrs. So our favorite thing here is go outside and play! One of Isaacs favorite games to play is chase! I can hide behind the couch and he will just giggle trying to find me and then either chasing after me or vice versa. It will definitely bring out the kid in me! He is such a good eater. He still breastfeeds at night and when he wakes up but he looooooves table food. Except for eggs. Don't try to feed him those! Ive been trying to plan for his birthday next month and its a little stressful! There is a lot of expectations for one year old birthdays! Its crazy! I know it will be great though!

Fear.

Sometimes when I look at Isaac I feel like my heart will explode. I just want to watch him sleep and I will stare at the monitor for hours. I hope God never takes him early from me. That is a huge fear of mine. Same with Justin. Every time he's away and has to drive at night or after he has been hanging out with friends I always get scared. I know I have a Heavenly Father who loves me and doesn't want to see me sad and hurting but it is still a legitimate fear. 

But sometimes after I watch him for awhile on the monitor I kind of hope he will wake up so that I can go snuggle him back to sleep. Even after he falls asleep in my arms I'll stare at him and just rest my cheek on his face. I cherish every moment and every breath he takes. This is the beauty of documenting our life so to speak so that I can always look back and see my thoughts and feelings and remember these moments.  I never want to forget how I feel right now.

Leaving the mini.

So Isaac is 10 months old and I have truly enjoyed spending every second with him that I've been able to. And I have had no desire to leave him more than I have to. I mean, a date with Justin is fine but I know some that are completely fine leaving their babies overnight. This just sounds scary to me. Not scary like something would happen to him but I think I would be miserable. Not only am I still partially breastfeeding him so its not really option until we are completely done but even then I don't want to leave him over night. Is this weird? Am I being too overprotective and clingy? He's just recently started sleeping through the night last week (can I get an AMEN!) so as long as I put him to sleep he would probably do just fine. I don't think there is anything wrong with parents that are ok leaving their baby with a grandparent or whatever overnight it just doesn't feel right for me at this point. Justin has mentioned going on a cruise or something and leaving him here so we could actually "enjoy ourselves". Uhhh no, I don't think I would enjoy that. I do want to get to a point where I could leave him overnight but I don't think it will be any time soon. Just hopefully before baby #2!

Ew.

Isaac has been so fussy the last few days. I suspected teething but I noticed that he was favoring pulling on his left ear only and it was red. I mean, I'm sure it was red from him pulling on it but you always second guess yourself when it comes to your baby! And Isaac has never really been sick. He had a small cold when he was like 4 months old but it wasn't enough to see the pediatrician. We have been so blessed to only go for well visits but today I decided to make an appointment, just in case. In fact today the front desk made a comment about how we don't look familiar. Its something to be proud of and I attribute his health to being breastfed for so long. Luckily he does not have an ear infection and he is just teething! Whew! But man was I grossed out being there. I figured if he wasn't sick already then we would both get sick from being in the waiting room! Isaac wanted to play with all of the toys and crawl on the floor which made me cringe and start sweating, haha. I of course hovered with baby wipes and hand sanitizer so hopefully he doesn't get sick now! I'm crossing my fingers that we will make it to the one year mark without another trip to the pediatrician or illness!

10 months.

I almost forgot to post Isaac's 10 month update! With everything going on it almost slipped my mind.
His first birthday is right around the corner and at this point last year I was large and very uncomfortable. Blows my mind. He is growing so fast and I cant stand it! He loves to pull up on all furniture. I don't think he'll be walking anytime soon because he cant keep his balance so he falls down a lot! He loves to eat everything and is breastfeeding less and less. I'm not sure if its a good or bad thing to wean from breastfeeding during a move but it looks like that's what is happening. He crawls and gets into everything! This will be our last milestone in Houston! I guess I better start planning his first birthday party!

Moving.

Well, everyone knows now that Justin and I are moving to Austin. We didn't expect to have to do it so soon but our landlord informed us that he is selling the house we are currently renting and that we have 4-6 weeks to find a new home. That weekend we went to Austin and found the most perfect home for us. We are so excited! I haven't seen Justin this excited in so long. We haven't ever really had a home that we are really proud of that has felt permanent. We can actually put down roots and know that we wont be moving in a year or two. I'm definitely not looking forward to the actual moving part. We have a lot of stuff and moving with a baby is going to be challenging. I have been pinning sooooo much stuff on pinterest and I see lots of home projects in our future!

Emotional.

I don't know why I'm so emotional about Isaac getting older. I know that looking back at these past 8 months I have soaked up as much time as possible and don't really regret anything. I also had an epiphany. One of the reasons I'm scared and sad to stop breastfeeding is because I feel like it's one step closer to saying goodbye to my baby and bringing on the toddler that he's quickly turning in to. I also realized that when we move we will in a way be leaving his nursery behind. The room where I have clocked in countless hours of rocking, nursing, singing, reading and just cuddles and laughes. That's going to be a hard one. I have his whole life ahead of me God willing but I'm still doing my best to absolutely cherish and absorb every moment. Each day is different and brings new joy and challenges and when I blink I can look at Isaac and all of a sudden I can see that he's changed. His nose is more defined and his hair is longer. When did that happen? He's getting longer and some of his chubbiness is going away. Each day is just a fleeting moment that is gone and replaced quickly with another. So I'm trying not to blink. I can't and I won't miss a thing. 

8 months.

Time is flying by. I know I say this all the time but its true. I have an 8 month old. We are approaching the one year mark rapidly. His personality is developing more and more every day and boy is he funny. He loves to do this smile where he sort of snorts at the same time. I don't know how else to explain it other than CUTE! He isn't crawling yet ( and I'd like it if people would stop making me feel like he's behind!) but he can get up on all 4's and rock. He scoots backwards instead of forwards. What can I say? He does things a little different. He has 2 teeth. When that 2nd tooth was coming in he let everyone know that he didn't like it. Only 18 more baby teeth to go :-/

He's somewhere around 23.5 lbs. He can wear some 18 month clothing and his 12 month clothing is looking tight and short in the legs. He's gonna be tall!

Don't eat in front of him unless you give him something to eat too. He will get very upset! 

Yummmm broccoli!!

He is a routine baby. Break his routine and it aint pretty. The kid likes his own crib and doesn't travel well. He may have Justin's good looks but he's definitely got some of my personality. Sorry kid. 

He is still sleeping in his Zipadeezip and every once in awhile he will give me 7 hours a row. And it is gloriouussss. 

He is a joy. People ask me how I like staying home with him all day and what do I do, etc. I get to hang out with him and watch him grow. He makes me laugh and I love making him laugh. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything and that's truly a blessing. This time is so short and I want to absorb it all. 

Isaac's birth story

Here I am 7 and 1/2 months later and I realized that I never documented Isaac's birth story. One of the reasons I blog is because I'm scared of forgetting. For that reason I wish I had done this sooner!

At 36 weeks we had an ultrasound to make sure he was in position and to also get an estimate on his size. At that time the Dr was expecting him to be nearly 9 lbs at that appt and close to 11 lbs if I made it to my due date. Everyone told us to just expect to have a C-section. That was a little devastating to hear honestly. I had my heart set on a vaginal birth. I wanted to experience everything. At that point I started to walk more and do things to help him progress down and hopefully start dilating. I drank special tea, walked, bounced, ate pineapple...everything! Fast forward to my 38 week appt where my doctor suggested that we induce the following week so that I would have the best chance to have him vaginally. I knew going in that there was a really high chance of ending up in a C-section but I was hopeful. I was set to be induced on Tuesday. My parents came in from Tyler Monday night and we woke up early Tuesday morning to be there at 5:30. I really wanted to go into labor on my own and feel contractions and water breaking but oh well. I was also really ready to meet him by this point. I got checked into the hospital and dressed in the hospital gown and they finally started me on Pitocin around 6:45. It was fun and easy at first. The contractions I felt weren't painful at all. Justin had fun watching the computer and looking for the contractions on the chart. Eventually they started to become more and more painful and less fun.

I had the best Dr!!

 

 



Around lunch time my Dr came over and checked me and decided to break my water. At that time they recommended I go ahead as ask for my epidural because it could take awhile for anesthesia to get there and my contractions were about to really start hurting. The anesthesiologist came about 10 min later haha. The epidural didn't hurt it just felt really weird. And there was a lot of pressure which I didn't like. It didn't take long for the anesthesia to take effect and eventually my legs were completely dead.

At this point Justin and I have been trying to sleep and watching marathons of shows on HGTV. I'm  pretty sure we watched every episode of Flip or Flop. The Dr stopped by a couple hours later and I was fully dilated! I progressed really fast. It was just Justin, her and I in the room and she just sat at the end of the bed and had me start pushing. It was really weird. The problem was I couldn't feel myself pushing at all. The epidural worked too well. I was to numb to even push. It was frustrating. She eventually had to go back to the office to see patients so a nurse came in and tried to help me push. We just weren't getting anywhere. I was trying so hard but everyone kept trying to motivate me by telling me I would get to eat after I had him and stuff like that. It was kind of ridiculous and made me mad. Obviously I wanted to meet my son. Food wasn't really motivating me to push. Eventually we had the epidural turned off so I could start to feel what I was doing. The Dr. came back soon after we pushed until about 5 pm. I started to get nauseous and like I was going to pass out with every try. In reality I wasn't pushing at all I was just straining. He wasn't progressing much at all and started to get very stressed. Finally, my Dr. said I had one more chance to push and if I couldn't do it then  I had to have a c-section. I gave everything I had and was feeling like a failure at that point. It was really sad for me. But at that point I was just so tired and ready to be done. They wheeled me into the OR and Justin was able to come with me. I was just trying not to throw up at this time. They strapped my arms down like crucifiction style because I could not stop shaking. It was as if I was having a seizure. I had no idea that the anesthesia could do that! Once they made the incision they actually had to pull and tug quite a bit to get him out. All I could hear was my Dr grunting and groaning trying to pull him out and the nurses joking about how she was going to be sore the next day. At 5:25 pm he made his way out and I got to hear his cry. It was so beautiful and I immediately started crying. The nurse wrapped him up and brought him over for me to kiss him. Justin and I hadn't fully decided on a name and wanted to wait until we met him. After we heard his cry Justin just looked at me and said, "Isaac?" It was perfect.

 

Isaac

9lbs 1 oz 21 inches long

 

I only got to see him for a couple seconds then they took him to the side and weighed and measured him. I could see him thankfully and Justin was right there with him. They let Justin walk him back to our room while they stitched me up. It seemed to take forever for them to finish with me and I was so tired. I felt like I was in another world. Its bizarre to lay there awake knowing your guts are open on the other side of the sheet and the nurses and Dr are chit chatting about random stuff. I couldn't stop staring at the clock. It took 20 min for me to get back to the room with Justin and Isaac. Our hospital had a policy about having an hour with just the baby and parents in the room for the first hour after birth called the golden hour. No nurses, doctors or visitors. I was really looking forward to this and wanted to breastfeed as soon as possible. Breastfeeding was so hard. That first hour ended up being kinda miserable because I couldn't get him to latch and he was screaming the entire time. There wasnt a moment he wasn't screaming and I thought he hated me. Looking back I know that was just the hormones and just being overwhelmed and tired from the day. We ended up calling a lactation consultant up to the room to help us. I really wanted to breastfeed  before all of our family came in and they were starting to become really impatient by this time and pestering the nurses about coming in. That was hard for me too. I felt pressure to breastfeed but also let them in. He finally latched and it was a relief when he did! Everyone briefly met him then left because he had to be under a lamp due to jaundice. We also figured out the reason he was screaming the whole time was because he had a dirty diaper! How simple! Its too bad I didn't figure it out sooner! By the time he got changed and had a bath he was a much happier baby. That first night was pretty rough with being woken up by nurses every hour it seemed and we also had to check his blood sugar before I could breastfeed him because he wasn't getting enough nutrition. I'll always remember how great all of the nurses were though! And boy was I excited about eating the next day! I think I went 36 hours without food! I was starving!

 

Even though it was hard it was truly the best day of my life. Every day since then has been the best day of my life and I cant imagine not having him here.

 

Some more pictures from the hospital day: