Hopeful Thoughts

My hands have been really full for the last 6 weeks, but things are finally settling into a bit of a routine. Looks like there will only be one load of laundry today instead of the typical three, and I’m figuring out when I can lay the little guy down to get a few things done for myself.

This week, it’s been especially important that I find time to pick up the house and make myself presentable. My tutoring business, Hope4Math, is officially up and running. I have a total of 14 students, 10 of which were inherited from my friend when she was relocated. This load takes 12 hours over the course of 4 days each week. I have sitters coming to the house to watch Grayson while I attempt to guide young minds down the road to improved math comprehension.

But, what you’re really interested in is the “little” guy, right? He’s already TWELVE pounds! I think my body is making pure butter! Here are a few pictures taken since his arrival.

A BRAND NEW Grayson

On the way home from the birth center. So tiny in the car seat!

One Day Old

Three days old, hanging out in a sunny window. Look how big his diapers seem to be!

Five Days Old

21 inches and only 7 pounds at five days, my sister dubbed him a "string bean".

Almost three weeks old

Silly Grayson! At three weeks, he loves to bury his face in Daddy's arm.

Meeting his oldest cousin, Jocelyn, who just turned 5 at then end of August. I can't believe I've been an aunt for 5 years!

Four Weeks Old

Almost 4 weeks here. I love this face! It's his polite way of telling mommy that he is hungry. It was taken right after a bath.

One month old, on our way to church. He's just beginning to appreciate toys.

He's almost 6 weeks in this photo. It's amazing how much bigger he is!

At 3:30 in the morning on July 28, 2010, I got up to go to the bathroom, as is normal for most pregnant women. The difference this time? When I got back in the bed, I felt the spill of a gush of water. “Crap!” I thought, “he’s not due for another week and my sister won’t be here for two more days!!”

I knew the process had begun, though, and there was no changing the course of events. My life was about to change forever!

I leaned over and woke up my husband, told him what happened, and then called the midwife on call for my birthing center. She told me to go back to bed and come in to the center at 9 AM when it opened. “Great! I get to go back to bed!” I called my mom to let her know what happened, and then crawled back into the bed. But, there was no more sleep. I laid there for a couple of hours before giving up on sleep and going to do some laundry.

I called my sister about 6:00 AM to let her know what was going on. She was waiting for her ride to the airport so she and her kids could go to my parents’ house. The original plan was for her to spend two nights with my folks, and then come here on Friday. Over the course of the next 2 hours, between my mom and I, we were able to find her a flight into DFW for that night, landing at 9 PM. I was so relieved that she was coming, even though I didn’t know if she would arrive before or after the baby.

I tried to sleep again at 7, but mom called again almost immediately after my head hit the pillow. I couldn’t get off the phone again before I walked out the door to head to the birthing center.

We arrived at the birthing center just after 9:00 AM, where I was examined. The exam revealed that there were essentially no other signs of labor and I’d only experienced a partial rupture of the waters. I felt crampy, but I wasn’t having “waves” of individual contractions like I expected. I was told to walk and pump in 30 minute intervals to try to get contractions to start.

By 3:30 in the afternoon, 12 hours after my water broke, I wasn’t even dilated to a 2, though I was slightly effaced. My midwife began mentioning the “H” word (hospital). She was concerned that I was going to need pitocin to get contractions going stronger since I didn’t seem to be progressing. They were also concerned about the possibility of infection.

At 5:30, I wasn’t any further along. The midwife decided to break the rest of my water in hopes of jump starting labor, but she was really talking hospital at this point. We set back to walking and pumping, only I was instructed to do squats every time I had a contraction.

As the evening progressed, I could tell my contractions were getting stronger, but not fast enough for my midwife. She was still really concerned about the length of time that had passed. I told her my sister was on her way and asked that I be allowed to wait until she arrived before transferring. She consented, and agreed to stick it out with me as long as I wanted.

The sun set, and things were still moving slow. The midwife realized how tired I was, and mentioned that I would be able to rest at the hospital. I was exhausted, and the idea of rest was so appealing. My husband and I both really wanted to avoid the hospital, but there came a point that we felt we were just postponing the inevitable. We began to ask questions about what we could expect to happen at the hospital. Even so, something told me it was all going to be OK once my sister arrived.

It must have been around 9 PM when it was suggested that my sister meet us at the hospital. I knew how many people were praying for us. I’d been posting updates on Facebook and seen all the responses that were coming in from church friends and family. Regardless of what happened, I wasn’t ready to give up yet, so I told the midwife that I didn’t want to go anywhere until my sister arrived at the birthing center.

My sister’s flight was delayed an hour and then they were stuck in traffic, but I stuck to my plan and waited for her to get there. She finally arrived after 11:00 PM. A check by the midwife revealed that I was dilated to a 4. Still a long way from 10, but certainly progress in the right direction. She was still talking hospital and even mentioned that a c-section was a possibility. The baby was face up when he should have been face down. After chatting it over with my sister and husband, we all decided that we wanted to stay. The midwife consented, but only if I agreed to an IV for antibiotics. Of course I would agree to that! I was going to be allowed to stay!

We weren’t out of the weeds yet. A deadline was set. If I wasn’t to a point where it was apparent that a baby was coming soon by 3:30, I was going to the hospital, no more negotiations.

The details of the next 4 hours are fuzzy. I was so tired that I slept between most contractions, and even through some of them (the mild ones). I fell asleep sitting up on several occasions! The contractions continued to get more painful. Because of the baby’s position, they radiated around my middle and down through my thighs. Not fun! My midwife patiently observed and waited. I could tell she was convinced that I was going to be headed to the hospital.

My 3:30 deadline arrived and I was checked. My midwife’s analysis? “Hope, you’ve made a liar out of me! You’re dilated to a 9!!” I knew she was thrilled to be able to tell me this, and I was thrilled to hear it! We discussed the tub, but I was told that wasn’t going to be an option because of the face up position of the baby. However, I was allowed to take a hot shower. The water felt so good on my aching body! It was so relaxing that I felt my contractions seem to wane and become less intense. This concerned me, but I didn’t mention it. About 10 minutes later, I leaned over on the seat to cope with one of the contractions that did come and I felt a strange sensation that I could only identify as a need to push.

“I think I need to push!” I called to those outside. I was whisked out of the shower and back into the birth room. After nearly 2 hours of pushing and an episiotomy, Grayson Parker was born at 5:50 in the morning on July 29, 2010. 7 pounds and 2 ounces, 21 inches long, with a dimple!!!

Praise God! We did it! No hospital, no pitocin, no pain meds, no c-section.

I’m not going to look down on anyone that has those things as part of their delivery. They are not bad. For me, however, it was important that I have my baby naturally. I’m only 5 feet tall, and I’ve heard negative comments all my life about things I wouldn’t be able to do because of my small build. I have to short friends and both of them had complications with delivery. I think I felt deep down that I had something to prove for the short people! 🙂

It was an experience that I will cherish and I am so thankful that everything fell into place. I give God the glory that it did, because, without His divine intervention, I would have been just another medicated hospital delivery.

I knew being pregnant in the summer wasn’t going to exactly be “fun”. I expected to be hot and uncomfortable. I didn’t expect to be unable to be cool in my own home.

At 35 weeks pregnant, I’ve gained 28 pounds and am finding it much harder to assume comfortable positions around the watermelon that now resides where my stomach once was. Add to that the fact that our air conditioner hasn’t been functioning for nearly 2 weeks, and it’s pretty hard to take.

We knew the AC unit was old when we bought the place. However, it WAS cooling the house. At least it was until we woke up on June 21, the morning after the big party, to a house nearing 85 degrees at 8:30 in the morning and we heard a grinding noise coming from the unit. NOT cool! We shut it off, since it wasn’t working.

So, we called our Warranty company to send out an AC repair guy. Due to busy schedules, no one could come out until Tuesday. On Tuesday, the brilliant man who came out told us that there was absolutely nothing wrong, that it was just old. He claimed we needed a new unit. We turned the unit back on and left it running and grinding, however, so we could at least cool the air a bit.

Unhappy with this diagnosis, we called the AC company and asked that they send us another guy. This guy came on Wednesday. This time, the unit was cleaned, inspected, and we were told we needed a new fan motor, which couldn’t be replaced because the unit was so old they didn’t make the bracket needed to install it. He also tried to sell us a new unit, naming a price that he obviously pulled out of thin air. He claimed the warranty would cover part of the cost, but he didn’t tell us which part. These guys left, we still had no cool air, and later that night, the unit completely quit running altogether. Ryan even resorted to going to Wal-mart at midnight to purchase a small window unit which he finished installing in our bedroom at 3AM.

We again contacted the warranty company and asked that they send us a different AC company, because we felt the prior company wasn’t being honest with us about prices. We were finally assigned another company last Friday afternoon, but were unable to contact them until Monday. When I called this guy, I was told that he no longer worked with our Warranty company. He listed several other companies that he would be happy to do work for, but not ours. Needless to say, our confidence in the resolution of the situation was wearing thin.

The call was re-dispatched at least twice more, but it wasn’t until Tuesday afternoon that we finally got another AC guy out to the house to look at the problem. This guy didn’t really tell us anything different, but it’s what he didn’t tell us that made us a bit more confident. He didn’t give us any estimates until he could talk to the Warranty company to see what they were willing to do. At last! Someone who seemed trustworthy!

However, our problems were still a long way from being solved. As I write this, it is Friday, a full 11 days since we first called the Warranty company with our complaint. We are waiting on them to decided what to do. They asked for a copy of our inspection report, which we’ve sent. However, no feedback has been given. Since this weekend is July 4th and many people will be off work on Monday, we can’t expect anything to be done until Tuesday at the earliest.

In the meantime, we’re spending lots of time in the bedroom and not even able to enjoy the rest of our house. I tried to cook once, which only resulted in my nearly having heat stroke with the additional heat from the over.

I’m trying to enjoy the cooler weather God has provided though the rains over the last week. I’m grateful for the break from the 100 degree days. However, I will be much happier when this whole situation is resolved.

I really need to stay on top of this! SO much has been happening in the last few weeks that I want to share, but it can’t all fit in one post! So, for today, we just have a shot of my new hair cut.

This will likely be my last visit with my favorite stylist at Salon La Page until after the little one make his grand arrival. So, when she suggested highlights, I decided it was now or never! The belly is 3 days shy of 31 weeks!

Yes, we DO still have a wreath hanging in June. I’m not taking it down until I have something else to hang there. That space looks horrible if it’s left blank.

The highlights are subtle; just enough to look like I've been out in the sun. Good thing, too, because I do NOT want to be out in the sun this summer!

Recently I was able to go back to North Carolina for my 10 year College Reunion. I can’t believe it’s been 10 years since I graduated from Meredith! The weekend was very much a trip back into times long forgotten. Looking at my girlfriends from 10 years ago, it was easy to think that no time had passed. We drifted into easy conversation just like old times. It was only the content that disclosed the fact that we are all years older. Most of us married, years into careers or even career changes, many with children, some of us with kids on the way. At the end, we decided that we are too old for the dorm beds and we’ll plan to stay in a hotel at the next reunion!

The girls from my Senior Suite back in 2000.

The girls from my Senior Year Suite now . No change, right?

Me and Meredith. We were room mates Sophomore and Junior years.

Leigh Anna and are are Preggo Twins. We got pregnant about the same time. She's having a girl, and I'm having a boy. Here we are both about 28 weeks.

Ever since we moved into our little rental house, we tossed around the question of “What if the landlord were to sell this place? We’d dream about whether or not we could afford it, and what we would change if the place were actually ours. We knew they were just dreams, but we talked about it a lot.

Well, back in January, while we were hanging out with our neighbors from the adjoining apartment, stuck inside due to a giant snow storm, the landlord called. Much to our surprise, he announced that he wanted to sell the house.

Seems great, huh? But we felt we were in NO position to buy. Since Ryan was laid off back in June and I quit my job, we’d only just gotten back to the point where our savings was building up instead of depleting. Where would we get a down payment from? Not to mention, how could we afford such a place?

After going around and around with a new series of “what ifs”, Ryan started to do some research. We contacted a mortgage broker just to see if we could even qualify for a loan. Turned out that, due to amazing credit, we did qualify for enough to buy a house. We decided to pursue the possibility. It turns out that our next door neighbors are realtors. We hooked up with them and went looking to see what else was on the market in our price range.

After looking at houses all weekend, it became more and more clear that the rental house would be a great deal. It costs a bit more than we’re comfortable paying on our own, but we’d ben getting the rent from the apartment, which makes it more affordable on a monthly basis than a lot of cheaper houses. In fact, since nearly half the mortgage would be paid by the rental unit, we would save nearly $100 a month compared to what we are renting for! Not to mention the location is great. We are close to the university, which means any improvements we make will only add to the value over time.

So, the decision was made, we just had to figure out what we were going to do about a down payment. Sometimes all you have to do is ask, and Ryan’s Dad came through for us. He has provided the entire down payment. Praise God!

At present, we are under contract for the house, just in time to qualify for the $8000 tax credit. Inspection happened over the weekend, and we’re in the process of final negotiations. We’re hoping to see several professionals in the next day or so to assess some of the problems found on the inspection. There wasn’t anything unusual, but we do want to make sure we can come up with the time and the resources to make some needed repairs.

Hopefully, if all goes well, we will be home owners by the end of the month. And we don’t even have to move!!!

1) Weight gain? I’ve gained 12 pounds since I started counting at week 5. My midwife wants me to stay as close to 20 as possible and not go over 25, but with 5 pounds gained in the last 3 weeks alone, I’m not quite sure I’ll make this goal. Thank goodness Ryan and I were both under 7 pounds at birth!

2) Cravings or aversions? I haven’t really had any experiences where I have to have one thing in particular or I’m going to go crazy. I was talking to my friend about rubber bands the other day and said “watermelon” instead. I have enjoyed watermelon recently, but may fruits have been favorites. Grapefruit was a desire in the first trimester. I like sweet tea from Chicken Express (it would be Bojangles if I was home!) Early this morning I dreamed about the Pancake Combo with New York Style Cheesecake pancakes at IHOP, but I ate a bowl of cereal instead!

Coffee hasn’t tasted right to me in months, although I did have quite a nice cup yesterday. I’ve drunk it off and on, but yesterday was the first time it tasted like I expected since I got pregnant.

This wasn’t due to a craving so much as the great 50% off after Easter sale, but here’s what I cam out of the drug store with on Tuesday!

There were some purple Peeps when I left the store, but they didn’t make it into the photo. Let it be known that I did NOT eat the whole box by myself. Diane helped!

3) Boy or Girl? Name? Most people already know that we are having a boy. I joke that I’ll believe it when I see it in August! However, we are indeed planning on a baby boy. Our current plan for a name is Grayson (or Greyson) Parker. We maintain that we reserve the right to change this at any time, but at the moment we are pretty set on this. The only point of discussion is whether to use the “a” or the “e”.

4) Is he kicking? YES! I started noticing it shortly after my 16 week appointment, but it was just the little flutters that are often confused with gas. It reminded me of the sensation you get when you run your tongue along the inside of your cheek. Around 20 weeks I started to notice patterns. He seems to be more active beginning around 5:00 PM and responds to food, especially sweet things. About 2 weeks ago he kicked hard enough that Ryan could feel it with his hand on my stomach. That sort of behavior wasn’t consistent until a couple of days ago. This morning he was squirming enough that I could actually see my stomach moving!!

5) Maternity Clothes? I’ve been in them since early February. I was only able to make it about two months with unbuttoned pants. Pretty much the only thing I wear from my regular wardrobe now are t-shirts and PJ pants.

6) Belly button? I still have one, but it’s getting more and more shallow by the week.

7) How am I feeling? I had what felt like motion sickness for the entire first trimester. It was really bad in the car. However, I only actually threw up 3 times during the first 13 weeks. I came pretty close a few weeks later after eating at a favorite chicken sandwich restaurant, but I think my body was not reacting well to peanut oil. A different location almost made me sick a week later, and it’s a place a eat at almost weekly with no problems. So, I’ll just avoid it until delivery.

I felt really good from week 14 or so until about 3 weeks ago. With the faster weight gain, I’ve had abdominal pain off and on as I stretch. It gets worse if I walk too fast. That seems to have subsided some this week, but I’ve moved on to back pain. This is especially bad if I have to sit for a long time, which I do twice a week.

8) What are you doing with the baby’s room? Nothing! Well, at least nothing any time soon. Grayson will stay in our room for a while since I’ll be nursing, and we’ll set up a crib in the second room if we need to. Really, we’re just not sure how long we are going to be in this house. It could be anywhere from 5 months when our lease run out to years if things work out just so. There’s just too many unknowns to move forward at the moment.

9) How are you sleeping? The more pillows I have, the better! I really only sleep badly if I have to be up early in the morning, and that’s simply because I’m not used to getting up early anymore. I think I worry too much that I will oversleep.

So, there you have it!

I’ve just finished week 21 of my pregnancy, and I can’t really focus this post on all one thing. So, we’ll consider it a summary of the week!

Spring has sprung in Denton, TX and you can see the proof all over the ground and feel it in the air. The weather has been beautiful for most of the last couple of weeks. (We don’t need to mention the freak snow storm that blew threw last Sunday morning when Ryan and I were out of town at my mother-in-law’s house. That make the second snow we’ve missed this season.) On the pretty days, my neighbor, Allison, and I have enjoyed walks around our neighborhood with her dog. We didn’t have to venture any further than our front yard to see these beautiful Texas Blue Bonnets. I’ll never consider myself a Texan. I’m a Carolina girl forever, but I do love the Texas state flower.

When I haven’t been basking in the sunshine, I’ve been working to finish up some craft projects. This week saw the completion of the giant stack of baby wipes and my first real knitting project.

The wipes are simple squares of flannel that I cut and stitched around using the zig-zag function on my basic sewing machine. It should have been an easy project, but sewing machines and I do not get along well. It took me many days of sitting for just a bit at a time to get through my pile of squares. My machine constantly jams up. The thread pops out of the bobbin feeder, breaks off from above the needle, or a myriad of other issues that cause me to stop mid seam to set things back up correctly. I was SO READY to be finished.

Knitting is now one of my new favorite past times. I learned the basics several years ago and managed to make a scarf that I wore when my husband and I traveled to Russia back in 2005. I was happy to have that project done and decided I was pretty much done with knitting because it had been so difficult, and even painful. However, something was tugging at me recently to just try one more time to create socks. You may have noticed that I never posted a picture of the blue crochet socks from months ago. That’s because they didn’t shape up right and I finally pulled them out altogether. Well, today I can show you finished socks at last, but they are KNIT and not crochet! It turns out that I never really learned my basic stitches correctly, and this project allowed me to figure this out and now knitting is almost as easy as crochet. I’m looking forward to all the new types of projects this will allow me to do.

And finally, here’s the belly shot for the week. This was taken Friday, the end of week 21.

As most of my dearest friends already know, we are choosing cloth diapers for Baby Inselmann. It’s been amazing to me to hear all of the opinions that people seem to have about cloth. My goal here is to help people understand my reasons. Feel free to make your own opinions, but here are mine!

Reason #1) The Environment

Cloth diapers reduce the amount of waste that I will be adding to the landfills. I’m choosing organic cotton, so their production is even more friendly to the environment, and since they are cotton, they should degrade more easily when the few dozen diapers that I have do wind up too worn for use.

I’ve also taken the contamination of the water by detergent into account. By the time I begin cloth diapering, I will have switched to a natural detergent that is low in cost, safe for sensitive babies, AND BIODEGRADABLE. It’s even certified safe for SMALL bodies of water. Too cool! Check out Charlie’s Soap for yourself! It’s amazing! (A clean rinsing detergent is really important, as most detergents cause build up in fabrics over time, which can decrease absorbency of your diapers).

Reason #2) COST

My needs for cloth diapering will include the following (which I will be ordering from this site): 4 newborn covers at $11 each;1 dozen newborn size organic cotton pre-folds for $25;1 Dozen small covers and 3 dozen pre-folds, FREE from my awesome sister; 8-12 Bummis Medium covers at $12.25 each, $98-$147; 3 dozen Medium size organic cotton pre-folds at $35 per dozen, $105; and flannel cloth wipes that I made, cost is for materials, about $8. The newborn size diapers will also serve as doublers to increase absorbency for night time use, so that will be one less thing to buy. The cost per load to run my washer and dryer is about $0.75, plus a bit for detergent, so we’ll say $0.90 per load. This means I’ll spend about $94 on the extra two loads of laundry I’ll do each week for a full year. That gives a total cost for diapering of about $423 for a whole year. Assuming I diaper for the second year, too, I’m only adding the cost of another year of laundry, so we’re talking just over $500 for two full years of diapering. If we have another kid, we only add the cost of the laundry since the diapers can be used again and again.

Disposable diapers seem to sell for about $0.40 each, depending on the size. I did an average cost of the smallest and largest per diaper cost to get this number. I got my information from a bulk package that was on sale at diapers.com, just to be fair to those who shop cheap. Estimating a use of about 8 diapers a day, this would cost $1168 per year. Not to mention what will be paid for the wipes, which run about $0.03 each. Using 1-3 per diaper change would work out to about 16 per day, adding another $175 to your diapering total for the year. We’re at $1343 by now. Over the course of two years, we’ve spent close to $2700 on diapers!

Looks to me like I’m saving over $2000 by choosing to cloth diaper my one kiddo! If we have a second, it’s even more! What could I do with $2000????

Reason #3) Better for Baby

There are always exceptions to this sort of reason. I know plenty of kids who’ve worn disposable diapers and haven’t had any diaper rash problems. However, overall, babies in cloth diapers experience less skin irritation than those in disposables. In addition, many sources show that kids in cloth tend to potty train sooner than those in disposables.

Reason #4) They are EASY to use

Cloth diapers have come a long way since my mom used them on me. You can still use pins and plastic pants if you like, but I’m not! I will have an extra step when compared with disposables in actually putting on the diapers, but it’s really not that big of a deal to lay a cotton pre-fold into a cover before closing up the diaper. We’re getting covers with hook and loop tabs, so they will be just as easy as disposables to put on.

As for washing, that’s easy, too! Since I’m choosing to nurse, we’ll be able to throw all of our diapers right into the pail without any rinsing. Nursing poop washes out just like yogurt! We’ll be lining our pail with a waterproof, washable PUL bag. On washing day, I’ll simply turn the bag inside out into the washer, leave it in the washer, too, and I never have to touch the dirty diapers. I’ll run a cold pre-rinse, a hot wash, and an extra rinse at the end, then toss them all in the dryer. You really don’t have to fold them, either.

Once Baby starts on solids, we will have to swish the solid waste out in the toilet. Provided you do this ASAP after taking the diaper off the munchkin and BEFORE tossing it in the pail, this is really not a big deal. It’s waiting that causes the big stink! Personally, It’s worth it to me to swish poop if I get to keep my $2000!!

I hope that this blog has been helpful. I’m excited about our decision and can’t wait for the little guy to get here!

This week marks the half way point to the arrival of our sweet Baby Boy! I thought this would be a great time to share some of the things I have been doing to prepare for the little guy.

Pond Friends stacking toy

My first project was completed a few weeks ago while we were snowed in. I knew I wanted to crochet something, but I have lots of crafty friends and he is sure to receive plenty of fuzzy yarn blankets to keep him warm, so I opted for a plush toy. This pattern was available free from the Lion Brand web site.

Frog stand with pond base, dragonfly, ladybug and bumble bee.

I also have a few projects in the works. My little guy has to have his very own flannel receiving blankets. I’ll be getting a few of these form family as well, but you can never have too many. They wash up great after spit up or diaper blow outs and only get softer over time. Baby Boy Inselmann will get two made by his Mommy. It was so much fun to be able to pick out prints with MY sweetheart in mind! I’m currently trimming the froggy print in white and the bugs will be framed with a bright red.

We’re planning to cloth diaper our little bundle, so another project in progress is flannel wipes. Here’s the stack of white flannel waiting to be trimmed in a zig-zag stitch to prevent unraveling and to add a bit of color. At the moment, I’ve only had time to trim about a third of this pile. I had to take a break to rest my back after bending over the sewing machine for two days getting the first few done! I’ll post final pictures when they are all done, as well as my thoughts on cloth diapering.

And, for those who are curious, here’s a more recent shot of the belly. This was taken Thursday, so towards the end of week 19.