Miss Hannah

Hannah Eve Jones

February 9th 2012
8 pounds 9 ounces
20.5 inches
Taken the night before I had Hannah

We had to most eventful 4 hour labor/delivery with our sweet Hannah!! The weekend before she was born I started having regular contractions that were coming really close together (1-2 minutes apart). Following doctor's orders I decided we should probably go into the hospital. I was dilated to a 4.5, but my contractions weren't hard enough to make any further changes. SO, I was sent home. The contractions stopped being so regular and I spent the next 6 days obsessing over "When will I go into labor? A person can't walk around dilated to a 4.5 for TOO long, right?" I tried to stay active and get as many last minute things done as I could. On Thursday the 9th I was having some pretty regular contractions, but they weren't very strong. So, I picked Mckenna up from preschool and strapped the kids into the stroller and went on a LONG walk. We fed the horses in the neighborhood next to ours, watched the cows eat and then walked all the way to the duck pond in the neighborhood two away from ours. By the time we were walking home I was having some good contractions- woohoo! I fed the kids lunch and put them down for a nap. We had been working on our garden all week long and had just bought some marigolds to plant the night before. During nap time I decided I would plant the marigolds and get the rest of the bubblers/soaker lines put in. I worked for about an hour and was just cleaning up to head inside when my water broke. Full on gush, soak me to my feet broke. I was so surprised!
2:50pm- I called Jeff and told him he needed to come home. He left work right away and made all the necessary phone calls to get the kids taken care of for the night (a HUGE thank you to Marty, Heidi and Grandma Horne!!!!!) I was able to shower, finish packing my bag and get a few things ready for Mckenna and Andrew. Thankfully Andrew was still asleep.
4:15pm-Marty got here to watch the kids. Jeff and I headed off to the hospital.
4:30pm-I got checked in and hooked up to the monitors. I was dilated to a 5 and about 80% effaced. I am group b strep positive, so I got hooked up to the IVs quickly and started my first dose of penicillin. After being on the monitors for 20 minutes the nurse started noticing that the babies heart wasn't reacting normally to labor. They had me lay on my side and wear an oxygen mask. Laying down during contractions should qualify as torture. It was terrible. (During all of this, the person comes to draw my blood. She walks in and I see that it is a girl that I know from church and high school. OH MY GOODNESS---who wants to see anyone they know during labor? NOT ME!)
5:30pm-They wheeled me into the delivery room (side note- Chandler Regionals rooms are HUGE and you stay in the same room for labor, delivery, recovery AND postpartum. It is fantastic!!!) and at that point I was miserable. My original plan was to labor as long as I could without an epidural so that I could stand up and move around. BUT, I was being told that with the babies heart rate that I would need to stay on my side for awhile. I wanted to cry and then asked for my epidural.
6:15pm- My epidural had kicked in just in time for the doctor to come in and check me. I still hadn't dilated beyond a 5 and they were getting more concerned about the baby. My temperature was higher than they would like (100.1) and the babies heart rate was showing signs of distress. The doctor wanted to move things along faster in hopes of avoiding a c-section. My water broke up high, so I still had the membrane down around my cervix. The doctor broke the fore bag and hoped that it would help the baby move into position a little better. They also started me on pitocin to speed things up. THEN, the doctor talked to us for like 20 minutes about the babies heart rate patterns, my elevated temperature and possible c-section. I LOVED this doctor he was fantastic and I would highly recommend him to anyone (Dr. Guzman with Goodman and Patridge). I signed all of the c-section consent forms JUST IN CASE anything made a turn for the worse with the baby.
7:30pm- The doctor came in to check me again. I was still a five and the baby was doing worse. I had to really fight back tears as the doctor told us that he really thought we needed to do the c-section soon. He went over all of the information with us and then left to get ready. We spent the next 30 minutes getting prepped for a c-section. Jeff even got to wear the awesome daddy scrubs!8:00pm- My original epidural medication was starting to pool on my right side (the side they had me laying on) and I started feeling the contractions on the left. The anesthesiologist came in to give me the medication to numb me for surgery. He gave me one syringe of medicine and then 3/4 of the second when I started to feel a TON of pressure. He stopped giving me the medicine and asked the nurse to check me. No one could believe it but I was complete and ready to push!!! The nurse called the doctor and everyone frantically started re-prepping our room for delivery.
8:20pm- The doctor came in and gave Jeff a high five (haha). He was SO shocked. He kept saying to me "You're a rockstar! I can't believe you did that!"
8:31pm- Hannah Eve Jones was born!!!! The doctor called her a drama queen :-)

They took her away quickly because she wasn't breathing. After about two minutes the nurses called the level one nursery team. Of course I was panicked because we didn't really know what was going on. At about 3.5 minutes, after birth, the level one team got to our room JUST as Hannah started breathing. We decided that miss Hannah definitely likes to do things her way and she seems to love grand entrances!

Wow, how come no one told me my hair was SO crazy :-)

We got her hold her for about 45 minutes before the nurses came to check on her again. She was still breathing very fast and not very well. Her blood sugar had also dropped. It was very obvious that she did not feel well. The nurses took her to the nursery and I didn't hear anything else for another hour.

At 11pm the NICU nurse practitioner came in to talk to me. She told us that they had placed an IV in Hannah's head and that she was on oxygen. She said all signs point to her having an infection, so they sent a culture to the lab to be grown for two days. They also did another blood test that showed that Hannah's immature white blood cell count was high (and that is a great indicator in infants that they are fighting and infection).

Because I had been given almost a complete dose of the numbing meds for a c-section I was numb for a long time! As soon as the medicine wore off Jeff was able to take me to the nursery to see Hannah. It is heart breaking to see your baby sick and uncomfortable. She had a fever and looked miserable. We weren't able to hold her that night.

This recovery has been the easiest for me. I think it was all the walking to and from the nursery in the first 3 days :-) We are glad that Hannah is home and healthy now!!!

THANK YOU to everyone who brought us meals and presents. We appreciate all of the love and support people showed us!!!!

A VERY huge thank you to my mom who played "mom" to our two kids for a whole week! I don't think we would have survived without her!!!!!

Math

Our family is a never ending math problem...

2006.... 1+1=2
2008... 2+1=3
2010... 3+1=4

2012... 4+1=5

Baby #3 is headed our way! I am due February 20th. We are excited for this big change!

Funny Story and Some Fun Projects!

Since I am on a blogging roll I decided I needed to get this story "written" down before we forget :-)


A week ago Andrew got a really bad blister/diaper rash on his bum. You know, if you have had kids, that diaper rashes can be a big deal. You have to remember the cream every time you change them AND you have to change them more often AND as parents you talk about it (you know...something like "How is his rash today?" you get the idea). SO, I think Mckenna felt a little left out. She kept asking if she had diaper rash, BUT she doesn't wear diapers anymore (well that isn't completely true, she does wear them while she sleeps, but never long enough to get diaper rash).

So the other night Jeff and I were cleaning up dinner and she ran into the bathroom. She came out with no panties on and said "Mommy, I have PANTY RASH!!!!!!!"

HAHAHAhahahahHAhahahahaHaaa.........

We lost it. It was hilarious! She was pretty convinced that she had a rash on her bottom from her panties. What a silly girl!



On to the fun projects :-)

Cute stuffed owl I made for one of the kids little friend's 1st birthday. It is so snuggly. Mckenna keeps asking me to make her one!

Alpha Bags! I made these for my nephew. They are 31 bean bags with letters on them (26 with the capital and lower case letter on different sides and then 5 more with common lower case letters) It is all in a fun bag that matches- see below- and it has a little spelling game with the it. It is made to grow with your kids from learning letters all the way through basic spelling. My kids LOVE beans bags!!!

Baby shower gift for a friend who doesn't know if baby is a boy or girl. I can't wait for a few more weeks to find out :-) (burp clothes, boppy cover, and wet bag)

Another boppy cover for Jeff's cousin who just had a little boy. I LOVE this one! I think when we have another little one that I will make a boppy cover with the cute applique trees!

And finally, I know this picture is terrible (it was taken with my phone, inside, while I was packing to move to AZ) but I made this FHE board for my sister-in-law as a thank you for helping us SO much during our final weeks before moving to AZ. SHE IS THE BEST!! She had been wanting an FHE board for awhile, and it was my first big project with vinyl and my cricut!

Anyway, I have been making lots and lots lately. I love doing it. I wish there was a great way to sell it. Maybe someday I will be brave enough to try selling homemade things again :-) (You know the whole "fear of rejection" stuff totally gets me, haha, I thought that was just a teenager thing!) Until then my family and friends will just keep getting homemade stuff because I LOVE it and that's how I get my crafty FIX :-)

BLOG SPREE...

I figured I better get back into blogging since my biggest blog reader ( Kathy, my MIL) will be going on a mission again soon.... So, keep scrolling down because there are plenty more new posts :-)


Andrew found his new favorite hiding spot. Who also knew it would be a great spot to eat the sucker he stole from his big sister? Forgive the no pants picture. I am usually SO good at making sure he gets his pants back on after a diaper change, but this was Mother's Day and we were ALL sick :-( boo! Colds in May? That is just mean!


Also on Mother's Day, Mckenna wore the dress I made her! I started it WAY back in March when I took my little trip to Utah. My grandma help me decode the pattern (I can sew pretty well, but I am pretty much pattern illiterate). I finally put the finishing touches on the dress (including taking off like 26 inches from the skirt and 2 inches from the bodice- patterns are horrible the sizing is terribly incorrect!) Anyway, it turned out beautiful! I am so pleased with it. Now if I could just find a dress like this that I can make in my size :-) Also enjoy all of Mckenna's attempts at smiling "normal" the second picture is probably the CLOSEST...haha!








Please note that Jeff did her hair. Impressive, huh?

Irrigation

At my in-laws house their back lawn in water by flood irrigation. In the warmer months they get irrigation two times a month. Lately, they have been getting the water in the late mornings on Saturdays. It has been so fun for Mckenna to play in it. It is basically her swimming pool :-)


Here is a video of her playing around!

One Quarter of a Century!

Kinda scary picture, but oh well!

I turned 25! It was such a fantastic day! Jeff let me sleep in until he HAD to go (he got the kids dressed and even did Mckenna's hair). Then that morning my mother in law kept the kids while I got to go shopping BY MYSELF! It has been awhile since I just walked around the mall with no one else. It was kind of refreshing! After I got home, Jeff had a surprise lunch (NYPD Pizza- one of my FAVORITE places) delivered. It was DELISH! While the kids were asleep I just did nothing- fantastic. I am sure I played around on the internet and wasted time, but I also laid down and had a little nap. That evening my mother in law made one of my favorite homemade meals and a YUMMMY chocolate cake! After dinnner we got to leave the kids with my in-laws and Jeff and I headed out on a date. It was a big surprise, but we went to a Diamondbacks game. It was so fun! Fun fact: 9 years ago on my birthday was my FIRST date to a Diamondbacks game. Of course, that night, I completely "forgot" about healthy eating and order nachos- I LOVE baseball game nachos...yum! And THEN after the game (which the Diamondbacks won) we went to cheesecake factory and got some yummy appetizers and diet coke :-)

I ate WAY too much, but it was SUCH a fun birthday! My husband is the best (and the rest of my family, too)

OH YEAH...my gifts.... all I wanted for my Bday and Mothers Day (which are WAY too close together, in my opinion) was a weekend away with just Jeff and I- no kids! I want to sleep in and read and swim and do anything I want without having to worry about kiddos, just for a day or two. SO, we get to go next weekend to a fun resort in Scottsdale. I am beyond excited. Saturday-Monday with no kiddos. What am I going to do with myself? I will miss the munchkins, but this will be FABULOUS!!! Thanks Mom and Dad Jones for keeping the kids for us :-)!!!!! I got some fun extra surprises from Jeff too. A new pair of sandals, a few house decorations and for Mother's Day a PEDICURE while we are on our "weekend away". YAY! SUPER excited. Next weekend can't come soon enough :-)

Andrew Turns One

and we celebrated with a "Puppy Party".

When Andrew was about 6 months old, Mckenna and I were talking about birthday parties. When I asked her what kind of birthday party Andrew should have she said "A Puppy Party!!!", so the theme stuck!

His Cake
it was chocolate cake covered in chocolate cereal to look like puppy chow

The Favors
Puppy Chow in a bag

Eating his cake! I made him his own little dog bowl of puppy chow with yellow cake.
He loved it!

We are so happy to have our little Drew boy in our family. He is such a goof ball. He can say a few words now (Mom, Dad, a word for Mckenna, tweet tweet, ball, cheeeeeese- like to take a picture, ha- and there are probably a few more, but those are the only ones I could think of right now). He just started taking a few steps here or there. He definitely isn't a walker yet, but he is on his way. He LOVES to eat! When he gets put in his booster at meal time he "flaps" his arms and screams until food is on his tray. He knows just what he wants. He absolutely LOVES strawberries and bananas and anything with LOADS of carbohydrates (such as bread, pancakes, etc etc). He is a little lactose intolerant. He has been on sensitive formula for a long time and when I moved him to whole milk we had a MISERABLE week. He was fussy ALL the time. I wanted to die. I wasn't sure where my pleasant little baby had gone. Then we figured it out because he started spitting up a lot after string cheese or another dairy snack. So, we have switched to lactose free milk and voila! he is happy again! Yay for expensive milk :-) Andrew LOVES his Daddy. His face lights up whenever Jeff gets home from work/school. He has learned how to crawl up and down the stairs- woohoo no more baby gates! Andrew is super cheesy sometimes. When he wants your attention he will stare and you with these cute little eyes and a HUGE grin. He knows his way into his mamma's heart!

ANDREWS OTHER LOVES:
Playing with toys
Playing outside with Mckenna
Eating rocks and dirt
Crawling away from mommy and hiding from her


And some other fun first birthday pictures!

Eating his birthday breakfast (donuts) and opening his presents from mom and dad!