The Week From Hades

It's been a rough week.   Really rough.   Thank goodness for weekends because I don't think Nick or I would have survived one more day of work.  I was on the verge of slapping some obnoxious little pre-teens.

Now don't get me wrong- that's not a cry for sympathy or a request for advice.  It's also not a surprise.  Nick and I knew very well that this whole "taking care of a helpless human being" thing was going to be hard.  And it is.  And it will continue to be hard.  But when both adults have some aggressive, mutated, African-zombie stomach virus AND the little princess is colicky AND it's Mommy's first week back at work... it's the week from Hades.

I'm not going to go into detail with the stomach flu.  Really, I can't imagine that anyone wants me to.  If you have no idea what it feels like- drink a bottle of Ex-Lax, run around in the snow for an hour wearing only a swimsuit and have a horse kick you in the guts.  That's what it feels like.

The twist is that when you're sick you need MORE sleep, not less, and buddy- four hours per night is NOT going to cut it.  Claire has been getting steadily more colicky each week.  The trend has me worried.  If you talk to my parents about crying babies, my mother will tell you all about how I cried constantly for 9 months.  Nine.  Months.  That's as long as pregnancy.  It's a miracle either of my siblings were born.  It's a miracle I survived.  My parents deserve a freaking medal.

When Claire gets fussy, her favorite place to be is in Mommy and Daddy's arms.  She won't necessarily stop crying, but she'll back off on the intensity.  So Nick and I have a sleeping schedule.  I go to bed at 8 p.m. and sleep until midnight while Nick tries to sleep with Claire in the recliner downstairs.  Then, at midnight, we switch.  Nick goes to bed and I take Claire until it's time for me to get ready for work at 5.  Then Nick takes Claire from 5-6 and I take her from 6-7 so we can both get ready for the day.  The plus side of this schedule is that it guarantees each of us 4-5 hours of sleep, with the possibility of a few more while holding Claire, IF she decides to sleep.  The downside is that this schedule will drive you mad.

Thank goodness for our babysitter!  I thought that going back to work would kill me, and it has been very hard, but having a seasoned pro like Michelle watching Claire has helped us SO much.  She spends time with Claire so she gets to know her little idiosyncrasies and suggests ways to deal with them.  Michelle has given us ideas on bottles to buy, blankets for swaddling, and - best of all - a swing.  Nick's parents gave us a swing, but it died last week and Claire was never really into it for very long.  I figured that she would like it better when she could sit up, but then the poor old thing died.  Sad.  But!  Michelle has this swing that Claire LOVES, so she let us borrow it for the weekend.

It took one night with that sucker to convince Nick to spend money on a new swing.  We have tried every swaddling technique, bassinet, bouncer, wrap, and sleeper option and NOTHING has worked like that beautiful swing.  She'll even sit in it when she's awake!  That may not seem like a big deal to most people, but when you have to cook, eat, brush your teeth, and tie your shoes while holding a baby because apparently setting her down means that the world has come to an end,  it is a big deal.  A VERY BIG DEAL.

Last night I slept for 6 hours.  SIX!  In a row!  It was fantastic!

Since I've been so sick I don't have any updated pictures to post, but here's a link to a great spoken-word poetry piece about teachers.  I've watched this thing like 300 times and it still gets me revved up to be an awesome teacher every time.  Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuBmSbiVXo0

One Month Portraits

The last six weeks have been heaven!  I'm not ready to go back to work on Thursday!  I keep telling myself that this is the best decision for our family, financially, and that we're leaving Claire with a wonderful babysitter, but it's still torture to think of spending most of my day away from her sweet little self.

Look at this face!  There's so much intelligence behind her eyes!  I can't wait to see more of her personality and watch her experience the world.


Now for the professional pictures!  (Let's be honest, mine aren't going to be winning any awards!)

My friend Jessie offered to take some newborn portraits of Claire, but with Christmas and New Years, it wasn't until Claire's one-month birthday (?) that we could settle on a date.  Jessie was so great with Claire!  She had everything set up and the pictures came out beautifully.  I keep thinking how much fun it will be to look at these when Claire is a few years older and remember her cute baby faces.

First of all- this is Claire's "frowny face"  which she usually makes as soon as you stop holding her.  Little princess loves her snuggles!

Tiny baby feet!  Maybe she'll be a dancer like Mommy someday.

Claire Rule #4- Hands must ALWAYS be near the face.  Swaddling?  What's swaddling?

Another example of Rule #4, but this time it looks like she's a little flamenco dancer!  Ole!

My talented friend BreeAnna made this cute diaper cover and flower headband.  

We love the ruffle-bottom!

My sleepy little angel.

Jessie is so talented!  I don't normally love naked-baby pictures, I mean, Claire is adorable, but this set-up looks like it belongs in a calendar or something.  

If you want to see more of Jessie's work, her website is http://www.jessieonealphotography.com/

Picture overload

Claire is a month old! She's almost fits into her newborn clothes now, and she's started sleeping for longer periods of time. That also means that she's awake more often which is fun for mommy and daddy!

Sleep Stories

If there was ever any doubt that Claire has my genes- just try putting her to sleep.  NOPE!  I have always been a night owl- and my darling daughter takes after me!  

Claire, aka "The Napper" will sleep for 45-60 minutes as long as she is being held.  (putting her down = time to wake up)  Then she eats for about 5 minutes, cries for about 10 minutes while you try to burp her, and goes back to sleep for another nap.  This goes on for anywhere from 8-12 hours, usually starting at 10 p.m. and going through the morning. Yikes!

As tired as I am most of the time, I am so grateful to have this tiny miracle baby in my life.  I wouldn't trade one sleepless night or one poopy diaper for a nap.  Not a single one.  

Claire is really growing fast! Her face has filled out a bit and her little arms and legs aren't quite as skinny as they were.  She is fitting better into her newborn outfits, but still hates being dressed/undressed, no matter how gentle I am.  Claire is learning about communication and will give me her cute little muttering, complaining cry after a bath or a diaper change, just so I know that she is unhappy with the level of service being provided.  She loves looking at lights or windows and she's getting better at making eye contact when you talk to her.  Her favorite thing to do lately is cuddle with me or Nick in the rocking chair and coo at us.  

Sometimes I worry I'm teaching Claire that she can't sleep alone, but everyone says you can't spoil a newborn with too much attention, so we will just enjoy this cuddly phase while it lasts and catch up on sleep in eighteen years!

Christmas Letter

At one point in my pregnancy I thought I would try to send out Christmas cards/letters after Claire was born.  Yeah.  Right.  It's way more fun to sit on the couch and stare at her all day long.  Can you blame us?

 She is absolutely the cutest thing ever!

 Why is it that everything she does is adorable?

So here's an update on the Denneys for 2013!

Claire had an amazing year!  She spent 9 months chillin' in the mommy sauna before she was born, which was tough for her.  She got to meet her Uncle Kyle and Grandma, as well as a couple of neighbors.  Claire can't wait to meet Grandpa and Aunt Katie as well as her Denney relatives.

 Kyle got her this onesie... so appropriate.

 Claire loves her daddy!  He's so good with her!

She does NOT like bathtime. Here's hoping that changes eventually.

Nick and I had a rollercoaster of a year!

In May I graduated with my master's degree in special education after almost 2 years of work.  It was a relief to finally finish my education.  My family and in-laws came up for the graduation ceremony and we used the opportunity to tell everyone we were pregnant!  

There was one point when they were handing out the doctoral degrees where I thought, "Hm... Dr. Megan Denney..."  Maybe someday, but not now.

After graduation I got an offer from one of my professors to work at his school, so I left Heritage and started working as a case manager for 8th graders at a middle school in Murray.  The commute isn't great, but I love my students and my coworkers!  It's such a positive environment and I feel very supported by my principal and vice-principal.  It was hard to leave Heritage after 8 years, but it was time to move on.

Most of summer and fall was spent preparing for little Claire to arrive.  I don't think anyone can be prepared for having a baby- but we tried.  

Nick has been my rock this year.  He's been a great daddy to Claire, putting together furniture, getting up with her at night and changing messy diapers, not to mention taking care of Claire's mommy.  :)  

We went on vacation to Disneyland in May and had a blast!

 Funny story- we bought this little R2-D2 container of popcorn in Tomorrowland.  There were storm troopers wandering around so I walked up to one and told him I had found the droids he was looking for.  The dude flipped out and pointed his fake gun at poor little R2.  :)  Gotta love the dedication to his character.  :)  Nick caught the whole thing on camera.

 Nick was really excited to see the Ironman display.

Two goofy guys!  :)

Maybe next year we'll make a video like the Christmas Jammies people!  (No... not really)

Birth Story

Time to catch up on the last few months!  I thought about doing this chronologically, but let's be honest- most of you just want to hear about the birth story and see pictures of Claire.  And you should!  She is the sweetest lil baby ever!  So let's start with last Tuesday night.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013 8:00 p.m. - Contractions started.
Since this was my first experience with labor, I wasn't sure what was going on at first.  The contractions were pretty regular- 8-10 minutes apart, but not very strong.  I was awake all night timing them and waiting for the magic numbers.  At our birthing class, the nurse told us to go to the hospital when the contractions were "3-5 minutes apart for at least an hour and bad enough that you can't talk or walk through them".  She probably repeated that sentence 25 times!  So I slept a few minutes at a time, waking with every new contraction and hitting the timer on my phone.  The contractions got worse and worse, and closer and closer together.  Finally, at 4:00, we hit the magic numbers and I woke Nick up.

Wednesday, December 4, 4:30 a.m. - Hospital Visit #1
We got to the hospital and checked in.  The nurse measured me and told me I was dilated to a 3.  They watched for the next 2 hours but I only progressed a little bit, so they sent us home.  The doctor prescribed a morphine shot before I left to help me get through the next few hours of labor at home.  I called in to work to let them know that I wouldn't be coming in for a while!

Side note:  I worked with drug addicts for 8 years, so when I say that I will never, ever do drugs, it's because I have watched the horror of someone coming down from a heroin addiction.  I've seen what it does to people and to families.  That being said, morphine is GOOD stuff.  I don't remember everything that happened after the morphine kicked in, but I'm pretty sure I started singing "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" to Kyle at one point.  :)

I tried to sleep for a few hours, woke up around noon when the drugs started wearing off, and the contractions kept getting worse.  I tried to eat something, but that was a bad idea.  It came right back up.  Finally, around 2:30, I'd had enough and we went back to the hospital.

Wednesday, December 4, 3:00 p.m. - Hospital Visit #2
The look on the nurse's face was priceless.  I mean, I get it.  Labor and delivery nurses probably see tons of hysterical first-time moms who think they're in labor weeks before their due dates.  I wasn't looking for sympathy, but I could have done without the condescending smile when I told her I wasn't due for another week.  Then she measured me and her eyes got really big.  "Oh!  You're a 7!  Let's get you checked in.  Do you want an epidural?"  Music, sweet music.
They wheeled me to our labor/delivery/recovery room, gave me an epidural, and called my doctor.  Dr. Young had just left for vacation (figures) so his back-up, Dr. McCarter came to the hospital.  He walked in, measured me, called for the respiratory specialist and we started pushing.  I pushed for about 25 minutes when they suddenly told me to stop.  Dr. McCarter said the cord was around her neck THREE times.  We are lucky that Claire is so small, because the complication was easy to resolve.  He hooked his finger under the cord and pulled it over her head, we pushed one more time, and my sweet little Claire Emily was born!  All 5 pounds 7 ounces of her!
Nick cut the cord and I told him to go with Claire to the side of the room where they were cleaning her up and measuring her.  I didn't see it, but Nick told me that it was like a highly efficient assembly line.  Grab the little bottle of disinfectant, squirt in on her eyelids, chuck it in the garbage.  Grab the tape measure, measure her, chuck it in the garbage.  They were fast!
They wrapped Claire up and gave her to Nick while the doctor finished stitching me.  When he finished, Nick put our daughter in my arms.  Holding Claire for the first time was such an amazing, tender moment.  Morphine be damned- if you want a real high, try snuggling your firstborn.

My little angel! 

Nick and Claire- my two favorite people in the world! 

It's amazing to me how much she has already changed in 2 weeks!  She barely even cried the first night. 

After Claire ate, they took her for a bath.  Nick went with them.  When they came back, she had a cute little purple bow in her hair!  (Nick got to pick it out)

Compare this picture to her ultrasound from October- it's amazing!

 I absolutely hate this picture of me, but I think ugly pictures of new moms are obligatory.

She was so yellow at first!  We were worried about jaundice for a few days, but she's okay now.  

Our room was awesome!  It had a futon/bed thing for Nick to sleep on and it looked very homey despite all the scary medical equipment.

Also, I suck at taking non-blurry pictures.

This was kinda cool- the nurses would write their info on the board to help me stay updated.  At one point, Kyle wrote "cookies" under the medication list.  Because, well, he's Kyle.  That should pretty much explain it.  When the nurse came in to check on me, she asked me about it and I told her that my brother was being silly.  About an hour later she came back with these:

Freaking awesome service!  :)

Grandma came the next day!  My mother has been waiting an awfully long time to hold her first grandbaby!  

They were pretty much inseparable all week. 

Getting ready to leave the hospital!  Everything Claire owns is WAY too big on her!

 Pretty eyes!

This is the blanket that the nurses at the hospital gave us.  Daddy is trying to get Claire to sleep before we have to put her in the dreaded car seat!

 I love these people!

First family picture!  We are one sexy bunch!  :P

She's home!

Okay- last thing for this entry- here's a couple pictures of Claire's room.  :)

 Disney princess poster- what did you expect?

 I know, I know, bumper pads, pillows and stuffed animals in the crib!?  Bad mom!  Don't worry- she won't be sleeping in the crib for a few months.  Right now she rarely even sleeps unless someone is holding her. :)

  

Okay, one more picture of my sweet little Claire....

I may be biased, but I think she is the sweetest, prettiest, smartest two-week-old ever!