So…Nathan’s birthday. Oh crap. Isabelle is awake. But she’s playing with her piggy bank so let me get to typing.

On Nathan’s birthday, two weeks ago which was the 17th, I woke up to pain. I had been feeling it while I was sleeping since maybe about 7am but I ignored it. I say, maybe 7am, because I was asleep. I don’t really have a clue as to what time it was but it was near when Alan came to bed. And when the nurses who would later ask me, when my contractions started, that’s the time I pulled out of my butt. So that’s what I’m sticking with now, 7am.

Oh crap. Nathan is awake and wants milk. Ok, putting him on my lap at the computer to nurse and pushing on…

The pain, I ignored it. But then at 11am the pain would not be ignored anymore so I woke up and started timing it. After half an hour of pain that was 3-6 minutes apart, I tried to wake Alan up, saying, “either I’m having contractions or I need to go poo.”

Alan was surprisingly calm. He didn’t jump at the word contractions. But of course he WAS half asleep. He just sort of sleepily said, “which is it?” and closed his eyes again. CLOSED HIS EYES.

I just asked him about it. He says, “I wasn’t asleep. I was resting my eyes.” He must have latched onto the word poo because he doesn’t even remember me mentioning contractions.

So anyhoo, after an hour of timing the contractions, at noon, we called the hospital and they told us to come in to get evaluated. So Alan started packing. Yes, you read that right. STARTED. We were a week away from our due date but we hadn’t packed a single thing yet. I had written down a list but that’s as far as we got. Yeah, don’t ask me why. That’s just what happened. We’re oh so organized and prepared like that. So, 40 minutes later, after a whole bunch of painful contractions, we were finally packed and off to the hospital.

When we arrived at the hospital we COULD NOT remember where labor and delivery was. We asked a volunteer and she put me in a wheelchair and took us up to the guest entrance for labor and delivery. Guest entrance. She obviously didn’t know where it was either.

I’m not visiting woman! is what I might have said if I wasn’t having another contraction. I knew we were in the wrong place but couldn’t say anything through the pain. But it was ok. They still let us in. We just went around a bit to get to the right place.

You know, remembering all the details now is hard. Everything seemed to take forever. But of course I think that’s because of the pain. Alan is remembering it in real time whereas I’m remembering it through contraction pain time so everything was drawn out and not quick enough.

Alan remembers me changing into the oh so lovely hospital gown and taking forever in the bathroom. Like a good 10 minutes he said. Well that was because they wanted me to pee in a cup for them when I didn’t have any pee to give. I used the bathroom when I woke up and was still empty by the time we got to the hospital. I must have been in the bathroom staring at the cup for a good 5 minutes trying to figure out how to do the impossible.

Well, I finally gave up and came out saying I didn’t have anything so they said it was ok and put me into a room to get checked. They paged the midwife and hooked me up to some monitors. It took forever for her to come in pain time. In real time, Alan says she came right away. She checked me to find I was 7cm dilated and I was being admitted.

What?! Admitted? We weren’t expecting that. We hadn’t even told my friend Olinda to come yet. She was going to watch Isabelle. Alan hadn’t even grabbed anything from the car. We were fully expecting to get sent home. But nope. Admitted.

They wheeled me off to my room and checked me again and I was 9cm dilated. N.I.N.E in the space of time it took to wheel me over from the evaluation room. And the pain?! Where were my drugs damn it?! It felt like the contractions were one of top of the other not letting up. DRUGS PEOPLE!! I wanted drugs!

The nurses paged the anesthesiologist. It seemed to take forever. Every single time a contraction hit I would grab Alan’s hand. And all this while Isabelle was sitting quietly to the side. She was so good.

At one point one of the nurses said, “oh the anesthesiologist is right outside checking your chart.” I was thinking, “what the hell is she doing out there?! Send her in here!!!” When she finally came in, it seemed to take her a while to get my epidural drip in. I don’t remember it taking so long with Isabelle.

While the anesthesiologist was doing whatever she was doing behind my back, the nurses were talking about how quickly I was going and how maybe right after they put my drip in the baby would be born. After the anesthesiologist was done, they checked me again and I was at 9.5cm. But after the, thankfully numbing, epidural got put in, my contractions slowed down.

It wouldn’t be until 4:45pm that I was completely dilated. But that worked out fine because Alan got to go to the car to grab the cameras and our stuff along with some food for Isabelle. And it also gave enough time for Olinda to drive over.

When Olinda came she occupied Isabelle with pipe cleaners while I started pushing at 5:12pm. The nurses were great. Well particularly one nurse, named Julie. She gave a lot of direction on the pushing. I don’t remember them doing that with Isabelle at the other hospital. I remember being totally clueless that first time and not knowing if I was pushing correctly. But with Julie, I felt like I knew exactly what I was doing.

The pushing part was surreal. I felt like I was there but not. Maybe it was the pain. Even with the epidural I could feel the pressure of the baby. I could remember hearing everything they were saying but it didn’t really register in my mind. I can remember them calling NICU, “just in case” and that Nathan was stuck. Then next thing I knew, he was out and they rushed him away because he wasn’t breathing just like when Isabelle was born. I kept asking if he was ok.

I asked Alan later what happened. It’s amazing how I can’t know what happened at the bottom half of my own body. Here is what he said:

When Kuky started pushing, only one nurse, Julie, was there. Soon I could see the top of Nathan’s hairy little head. After a while the midwife came in and checked Kuky out. I don’t know if they saw something on the monitors or what but the midwife told a third nurse to go and get a hold of NICU.

The NICU doctor said that Nathan had a little liquid in his lungs and that his right arm was a little “stunned” from being stuck but that he should be ok.

And that’s how Nathan joined us at 5:58pm weighing 8 pounds 4.5 ounces.

Oh and I’m just kidding, his name is Nathan.

So anyhoo, onto other things. I’m 9 days from our due date. I haven’t really felt like posting or sitting at the computer. I don’t know how frequently I’ll be posting in the next few weeks. I’m really uncomfortable. When I stand up from sitting at the computer chair my back hurts and I can feel the pressure of the baby down low.

I don’t remember being uncomfortable like this with Isabelle. This time around I’m actually smaller than when I was carrying Isabelle. But maybe it’s being 4cm dilated. Or maybe it’s because I’m 4 years older now. I don’t know. All I know is that I’m waiting very impatiently for this little guy to come. And so is Alan. Every single time I call him at work he’s like, “is it time?!”

So today I didn’t really have anything to say and I didn’t feel like sitting at the computer for a long time going through all the pictures I have waiting to share. So instead I’m showing two quick pictures. My little pirate.

I think she was sad because she didn’t want anyone touching her pirate gear. I was going to draw something to accompany this post but no, too much computer time.

And this.

Alan found it in our yard today. It wasn’t there on Sunday. It reminds Alan of some punk wanna be gangster jewelry. So now he’s thinking some little punks were in our backyard. And we know it wasn’t thrown because the necklace was in one part and the cross was in another part. Maybe some little punk was wandering through? It’s gotten Alan’s protect my family instincts up.

And it’s sort of freaking me out that who knows who for what reason was in our backyard. Are all our doors locked? Our windows?! Ok let me go check again for the second time tonight.

Isabelle woke up asking, “Is it my party now?” I said, “sure it’s your party with mommy and daddy.” So we got up and went into the living room and Alan had put up decorations while we were sleeping. He even got her a pinata.

Isabelle wasn’t super surprised, it was sort of anti-climatic. She opened her gift and happily played while I made her some pancakes. Then Alan’s mom dropped by unexpectedly with pancakes. Isabelle didn’t touch any pancakes though. She was too busy playing.

A couple of times she asked where her friends were but she seemed to be having fun. She had cake.

And we went to the park so she could ride her new bike.

We asked her if she had a nice day and she said she had. But that night as we were all sitting on the couch she said, “everybody didn’t come to my party.” I just about cried (actually I did that night thinking about it). So, yeah, she had fun and I feel like crap.

But maybe that’s because I’m big and uncomfortable.

I feel so sooooo guilty. It’s the first year she’s actually asked for something party-wise. I think it’s because she’s remembering her cousins’ birthday party. And this year we planned not to throw a big party specifically because it’s so close to the baby’s due date.

We talked about it. And as Isabelle’s birthday got closer we were rethinking it. But, realistically, a party would be out of the question with me due in 16 days and not knowing exactly when it’s going to happen. It would have been stressful. Sure we would have had fun but it still would have been stressful. And then what if I went into labor the day of the party. So yeah, that’s why we decided against it.

We’re just going to do a little family party. Decorations, cake, and maybe a pinata just for the three of us. We went and ordered the birthday cake and got some decorations this weekend. And at the party store we got Isabelle a balloon so she wouldn’t feel like we left empty handed. But…but…I feel soooooo bad when Isabelle talks about her party. She drags her balloon around saying, “be careful, it’s for my party.” Aaaah daggers of guilt in my heart.

Very creepy bathroom. The woman before me had left toilet paper, wet toilet paper, all over the seat. And it was all over the floor. Ok, yuck! What was she doing in there?! I actually checked my shoes afterwards to make sure I wasn’t dragging toilet paper around behind me, there was so much everywhere.

But going to Ikea with Isabelle is actually fun. We went on Saturday and I didn’t even notice the press of people because I was too busy watching her toss her kitty into anything that could open.

Isabelle must have thought it was the freaking funnest place ever. Mostly every single picture I took, she had a big smile on her face.

And she got to leave with this little play kitchen.

And yes this post is titled Ikea weekend. We loved it so much we went back the next day! Ok not really on the love part. But we did go back. One of the pieces to a dresser was broken so we had to bring it back. Did you know that you just need to bring back the broken piece and not the whole entire two heavy boxes, one of which fell on Alan’s pinky toe? Good to know for next time.

I just asked Alan if he could cut my hair like that. But it would probably be smarter to go to a hairstylist, huh?

How crazy is that?! I couldn’t remember the word for junk mail. I described it as spam. SPAM!

Ok anyhoo. We got some junk mail and Isabelle was looking through it. She saw some page with a piggy bank on it and wanted a piggy bank. She asked for days so I thought we’d buy her one. Then I thought, even better, instead of buying a piggy bank, we could go and paint a piggy bank at a pottery studio.

So, that’s what we did on Saturday. We went to a pottery studio and let Isabelle paint a piggy. She was really into it, concentrating really hard.

It’s been over a year since we last tried painting pottery. And this time she didn’t lose interest and walk away. She actually painted the entire piggy.

And this time, I painted too, my first time. I sketched out an idea and then tossed that out. Now looking at this picture I wish I hadn’t started over.

It took me so long to think of something new and draw it out, I think Isabelle actually finished painting her piggy before I even started. So long that she started painting with my colors over what she had already painted.

It was so much fun. Now just to see how they turn out once they’re fired. I couldn’t remember the word for that either at first. I told Isabelle they had to be baked.

I hope they turn out ok. When refilling the colors I had a hard time remembering what colors I chose but I think I got them all right. Pregnancy brain again?

I really hope this doesn’t last the rest of the pregnancy.

The final step was the belt, just a rectangle piece of fabric. I don’t know why it took me so long to get to it. I should have done it weeks ago because I LOVE my cow shirt now that it has a belt.

I love it even though it might be too big. After I cut out the pieces, I bought Pattern Fitting With Confidence by Nancy Zieman. I had watched an episode of her show months and months and months ago. It was about altering patterns and at the end she mentioned her book. It’s been sitting on my wish list all this time and I finally bought it. But, as I said, I bought it AFTER I cut out my pieces.

And one of the interesting ways she measures is called the Right Size Measurement which measures patterns to fit your shoulders. Usually you go by bust measurements. I think she said, on her show, that alterations to the bust are easier than the shoulders. I don’t know, I can’t really remember BUT using her method my shirt is off by four sizes. FOUR! I made a size 22 instead of a 14. Oh well, I wouldn’t have recut it anyways because the pattern envelope I bought only went down to a size 16.

Hey stop talking about your shirt, mama! Look at me!!

Hee hee, Isabelle was jumping in front of the camera when Alan was taking pictures of me so I had to put one in. Back to what I was saying.

Even though it’s four sizes off, it turned out fine. It’s not a tight fitting style so the fit is good even with my baby bump. The only complaint I have is, the neckline is very wide. Maybe if I had made it four sizes smaller that wouldn’t have been an issue. But then of course maybe I would have had to alter it to fit the baby bump.

Oh and onto a random video of Isabelle. This is what our car rides are like. They are filled with singing and “I spy with my widdle eye“. She says WIDDLE! It’s so freaking cute!

Car rides with Isabelle on Flickr

Oh and if you follow my tweets you might already know this. We did go see the doctor about my itching. It’s nothing serious just irritating. He wants me to keep an eye on it but he’s not worried. He specifically asked if it was itching in my palms or on the soles of my feet. Which would indicate some special thing that I cannot remember the name of. I’m soooo useless.

He does want me to use unscented products for a while though. And also to stop taking folic acid or prenatal pills just in case. He’s had a few patients where that helped with the itching. And I also have to avoid hot showers. Bummer. I do so love hot hot water.

And can I just say he was soooo nice and had such a friendly manner. When we walked in, there was a note up on the board that said, Dr. Sanchez (I’m writing his name down for me otherwise I WILL NOT be able to remember his name in the future) was running 25 minutes late. Even though he was running late, I did not feel rushed through which is sometimes how I’m feeling with our regular appointments with the NPs.

Ok, now I cannot think of a way to end this post. I am a goober. I’m going to try not to scratch my legs now.