Life With Two Kids

Everybody tells you it's different when you have two kids. Well, yeah, obviously! But you never really understand to what extent until you have them! It takes a LOT longer to get out the door. I have to remember to bring a LOT more things with me even on short errands. Anything- and I mean ANYTHING- can happen! And you get stopped by a LOT more people wanting to comment on your kids, your parenting techniques, or anything under the sun that they felt like randomly stopping you to talk about. Basically, I've decided that we're mostly going to stay home for now- I'll try to go out once a day for something for Serra, but it really is taxing! Anyway, enough complaining- here are some of my new favorite pictures. :)

What a cute family!

I put Alex on Serra's bed for a minute so I could put away her laundry and she started playing with him like one of her dolls!

It's official, Serra inherited my "baby wisps"! [This is after swimming and spending the day out in the wind and heat]

Serra is showing Alex one of his new toys- it used to be hers.

Serra in her pool- she asks to swim every day now.

Our little "buddy"!

Library Pond Party

Not sure what any of it had to do with a pond... but we went to a free "party" at the library today and Serra had a blast- see for yourself!

Father's Day

I really do have a wonderful husband. We've been through a lot this year, but he has been so wonderful and supportive lately that I've almost forgotten about everything before now. I love you, Ian!!!

To celebrate Father's Day, we went to a park and played tennis [something Ian and I are trying to take up together for fun]. Here are some pics of Ian with the kids and Serra with her tennis gear- so cute!

HOME

Things are going great- I'm healing extremely well and have little or no pain. Alex is typically a very happy baby- we've had a couple of mysterious wailing episodes for no apparent reason, but that's not unheard of! I had a lot of problems trying to get Serra to breastfeed and ended up having to pump instead, but Alex is EASY compared to her! He feeds just fine and almost like clockwork- the only issue we have is that he has a preferred side which sometimes makes things interesting. My sister was here to help out for a few days but went home on Monday. And Ian took off a few days to help out but went back to work today. Surprisingly, I don't feel overly stressed- I was worried that I'd be spending all my time with Alex and Serra would get ignored, but she's been really good about letting me know when she needs "tent" [my attention]. My favorite thing is when I'm just sitting there feeding Alex and she comes running in and out of the room in different ways or making different noises. I get to focus on her while doing something mundane for Alex- and she gets some much needed attention. Anyway, what's a post without pictures, right? So here are some of my recent faves. :)

First picture we got of Alex with his eyes open. Unfortunately, his eyes were swollen shut for the first few days and they're still red and puffy in this picture!

Serra holding Alex for the last time in the hospital- he's in his going home outfit.

Our family- all at home! :)

Alex doing what he does best- sleep in whatever position he might be in!

Alexander Gene MacGregor

On Wednesday morning I had an appointment with my OBGyn and he discovered that I was 5cm dilated and 75% effaced. I was told to come to the hospital if I was having 1 minute long contractions every 5 minutes for an hour. On Thursday I was experiencing constant back pain and uncomfortable pressure in my belly. I decided that we should go to the hospital to at least figure out how much farther along I was.

We get to the hospital and explain what's going on and they tell me that I'm now dilated to 6cm and they'll break my water so we'll have the baby tonight. But after some further examinations, they discovered that Alex was breech [bum down- which is a HUGE no no]. So the doctor comes in and says he's going to try an external version- where they push on your belly in hopes of turning the baby around. After several painful attempts, they realized that his bottom was too far down in my pelvis because of how much I was dilated. There were no other options- I was going to have a C-section.

I was terrified and frustrated that things had gone from good to bad so quickly, but at the same time I was in so much pain from the attempted version that I was ready to just have Alex out! I was prepped for surgery and Alex was born at 11:20pm on Thursday, June 3rd. I got to talk to him for a bit and kiss him before he was whisked away to be cleaned off and measured. I was stitched back up and sent to post-op recovery where I had a lot of interesting and frightening side effects.

Apparently I have a lot of hormones [more so than the typical pregnant woman] AND I was more sensitive to one of the anesthesia medicines used on me [oxytocin]. So I started to have some violent shaking episodes where my entire upper body would convulse and there was nothing I could do about it. I also got to a point where my eyes had drooped shut from some other medications making me sleepy and I couldn't open them when I tried to. After a while, I was given some more medication to offset the affects of the oxytocin on my body and everything went back to normal. After over an hour in post-op recovery, I was finally sent upstairs to see my baby and tell Ian what had happened.

Alexander Gene weighed in at 8lb 3oz and 20 inches long [not bad for 2 weeks early!] He is such a cute bundle of joy and hardly gives us any fuss right now. Serra loves her little brother and constantly asks to kiss alex, hug alex, and hold him. Hopefully that love stays there when she realizes he's taking some of her attention- or some of her toys! Alex cried and pinked up really quickly and has shown no signs of being premature- he's a completely healthy boy! I have been recovering so well the doctors and nurses are surprised. I used very little morphine right after the surgery and have only taken a couple of oral pain meds today- I'm just not in any pain. I was up and walking this morning without any problems- was able to take a shower a little later in the morning. So things are going well and it hasn't nearly been as bad as I thought it would be!

The hospitals here keep C-section mothers for 48 hours, so I'll be leaving either Saturday afternoon or Sunday morning depending on how I'm feeling. My sister, Paige, drove up from
Lehi to help out and we've had lots of offers from friends in the area to take Serra when we need moments to just worry about Alex. Alex was having some trouble eating at first- he was just too tired to even try. But finally a couple of hours ago we got him to latch on and he seems to be getting the hang of it. Hopefully he and I can figure it out and not have the problems that I had with Serra! Well, I think that's pretty much everything- now the part everyone has been waiting for- PICTURES! :)


Alexander Gene MacGregor [Alex]


Mommy & Alex right after post-op recovery


Daddy and Alex a few hours after birth.


Serra kissing Alex during her first time seeing and holding him.


Our little family!


As a little side note- some funny things I was told. After I had given birth to Serra the doctors then had told me that I was "made for making babies". Ironically, after giving birth to Alex the doctors here said the same thing! I was also told by the surgical doctors that they were all impressed with my ab muscles- they're apparently great for a normal woman and superb for a pregnant woman- I would have never thought that about my abs, but I figure who would know better than the doctors who have actually SEEN them?

Updates

Like I said last time, we went camping this last week. We went with one of Ian's coworkers and his family. It was a lot of fun- Serra especially loved playing in the tents, going on walks, and throwing/kicking/chasing balls. I wasn't as uncomfortable sleeping in a sleeping bag as I thought I would be. The weather was perfect and just overall it was a huge success! We made a lot of great memories and we hope to be able to make camping a regular family tradition. I don't know if we'll be able to go again this summer with Alex being so little- depends on what the evening weather is like at the end of the season. But next year we'll definitely be going lots!

Serra in the tent.

Ian in his new "mummy" sleeping bag.

Serra eating sausage for breakfast. [It was pretty cold at first in the morning, but the sun soon warmed us all up].

Ian making scrambled eggs for breakfast.

I also had some time on my hands to finish up a few craft projects. Here's what I made this month:

Serra's coloring bag.

I finally reupholstered the rocking chair and ottoman that Serra scribbled in black Sharpie all over a few months ago!

And a couple of bibs for Alex [the blue and white one is hard to read, it says Born in 2010- my mother in law used her embroidery machine to stitch the lettering.]

Here's a silly picture of Serra- she loves to get in Daddy's car and "drive". Can't wait til she turns 16...

And here is a pregnant picture of me- 8.5 months along [and actually in the beginning stages of labor, too!]

In Labor

Now, don't get too excited- those of you who are unaware of how being in labor works, just because it's started it doesn't mean it'll be over soon- and it doesn't mean you get to sit in the hospital and wait til the doctor says you can push! This morning at my doctor's appointment I was 5 cm dilated and 75% effaced- that's halfway on dilation and obviously 3/4 of the way on effacement. So I'm getting close, but not close enough to be admitted to the hospital. So now I'm sitting here trying to figure out if I'm having contractions or not, if I should go the hospital or not. I don't want to go and get sent home, but I don't want to wait too long and have Ian deliver the baby here! Since I was induced with Serra I'm not really sure how any of this works, so I'm completely clueless and kind of losing my mind over it!

On a random side note, I have a bunch of pictures to post, but I've been uncomfortable all day and haven't felt like sitting at my computer long enough to upload them all to my computer. So it'll have to wait. But I have some more crafts to show off, and I think some pictures of Serra, and pictures from our camping trip this last weekend [I know, I'm apparently crazy for going camping this far along but it was totally worth it- I'll talk more about it when I post the pictures]. So not sure when I'll post them- either tomorrow because I'm still sitting here wondering if I'm in the final stages of labor or not- or in a couple days after delivering a baby!