Baby love

For some, others weren't so keen!

I took my charges to a birthday party this afternoon and ended up offering my help to one of the moms there. She was having a hard time balancing her 3 month old with her very jealous 5 year old daughter, so i took the baby for her. Any excuse to get my hands on a little baby! He was so cute and was happy to be held by me and check out all the goings on at the party. My big boy on the other hand wasn't so happy about the arrangement. He'd play for a while, come over and see me with the baby, say 'baby up, me up'. Settle for a hug and go off and play for a while longer, before coming back to repeat the previous routine. He loved playing with the baby's car seat and helped me buckle the baby up once he'd fallen asleep. The other moms at the party were joking about me being the baby whisperer. And those that know that we're having a baby asked if i was getting some practice in. The baby's mom asked if i'd go home with her...i told her i'd love too, but that my boss probably wouldn't be happy.

I didn't make the midwife appointment on Monday as they changed the time because of a emergency c-section. But all checked out well. Bubala was sleeping so his heart rate was 128 bpm until the midwife woke him up with some pokes. He wasn't happy about that and kicked J all the way home! He's now lying transverse, having flipped since the last visit. I had told J to ask whether or not they advise taking evening primrose oil. Of course i hadn't really filled J in on what that question was about and she was a little shocked with the response. The midwife did recommend that she starts taking it, as i'd read that it's supposed to help soften the cervix, so she wrote down doses and dates for taking them. She starts taking them by mouth, then starts inserting them (the part that got me in trouble!) Apparently i'm banned from reading any more pregnancy books and threatened with having my computer taken away. What's a girl supposed to do with all the time i spend waiting for my boss' to get home after the kids are in bed?!

Hospital tour

I made it back from Florida in time to make our hospital tour last night. There were lots of us on the tour, but it was really cool to look around the place. Also a little scary to think that before too long that is where our little one will take his first breath. It makes it all seem so much more real!

I love the hospital. It's pretty small and they don't have a NICU, if that was needed mom and baby would be transferred to a big box place. But it does support our desire for a natural delivery. They have 4 birthing tubs, 2 smaller ones and 2 big ones. The rooms are all private apart from the room where women recover from a c-section. .

The hospital doesn't really have a nursery. All the checks done after birth are done in the delivery room. The baby stays with mom all the time, which is something we wanted. Nurses will take the baby to give you a break if they aren't busy, but i can't imagine wanting him to be away from us.

I'll be able to stay the whole time and they have this pull out chair for me to sleep on. They also don't have official visiting hours but i'm not sure how many people we're going to tell that we're there. J's parents will be there, but i'm not sure that we want to be inundated with visitors. We'll have to see though. Once word gets out that bubala has arrived we may not be able to keep the fans at bay!!

I spent my day off today catching up on jobs around the house and hanging out with my honey. Back to work tomorrow and hopefully it won't take long to get back into the swing of being back in NJ. Hope i don't have to work late as we have a midwife appointment and i'd like to be able to go along.

Florida

The weather here in Florida has finally started to warm up. Yay!!

We're spending our days swimming, playing and driving around on the golf carts. It's been fun but i'm definitely getting ready to head for home. I think the big girl misses having her friends to play with and gets bored with just me and her brother for company.

The little man is wild. You can tell that i had 2 weeks off and his usual boundaries were not enforced. He is also sooo becoming a 2 year old. Learning how to throw tantrums with the best of them ;-) We are frequently not included in 'family' activities as his parents don't want to deal if he has a melt down. The truth is he really isn't that bad, he's a toddler and some of this stuff is to be expected. Some of it can be avoided with a little forward planning.

We went to an event at their beach club the other night. It was a carnival and the poor little guy was so overwhelmed by all the noise, lights and activity. All he wanted was to be carried around and reassured that all was well. At 33 lb that's no longer an easy task and i sure was sore by the end of the night. These kind of club events are so strange to me. I guess it's because i didn't grow up in that kind of environment and really didn't know what a nanny was until i became one. You look around at all the families there and you see the parents, a couple of kids and trailing behind is the nanny, carrying all the kid related stuff or pushing a stroller.

I keep joking that we're being 'voted off of' everything..the beach, the boat, the pool, the club. You name it we've been sent home from it! Hopefully as he gets older they will get over it and he'll be included in more of the activities his sister and parents are doing.

Crazy

The last couple of weeks have been completely crazy. I keep meaning to write it all down but by the time i sit down at the end of the day and check everyone's blogs i'm just too tired to write anything here.

We had major storms in NJ last weekend and this resulted in us having no power for 4 days. It was no fun to have no power, no heat and finally no water. Luckily a friend came over and helped me get the basement ready for all the rain as we knew it was going to flood. I brought most of the baby's things up and was surprised by how much stuff we have already. Everywhere i turned there was more baby stuff and that wasn't even all of it. Anything that was already in plastic tubs stayed in the basement and swam in the few inches of water that accumulated before the generator was set up to keep the pump going. We stayed at the house the first night hoping they would fix the problem quickly, but it wasn't happening so we headed out to warmer places with electricity!

As if dealing with the storm wasn't bad enough poor J has also been pretty sick. What we thought to begin with was a cold ended up being pneumonia that she needed a course of antibiotics to shift. Obviously they couldn't x-ray her to see what was going on, but the dr said that it sounded like she had a fair amount of fluid in her lungs. Luckily it looks like she's finally on the mend and we're really happy about that.

The girls at J's work threw her a surprise baby shower. It was so cute of them to do that and of course bubala got lots of gifts. Some people picked off of our registry. And lots of people gave clothes, luckily mostly in big sizes. We have so many clothes for this kid that we won't need to shop for a couple of years!

We went to the midwives on Monday and had a great visit. I was really excited to hear that the baby is head down and to find out that what we've been feeling is his butt! I kind of thought it was a foot, but it felt too round. Now i know what it is it makes more sense. His heartbeat was 132 beats per minute and as always i loved listening to it. We also heard the placenta working away while she was looking for his heartbeat. The midwife talked a little about the delivery and positions that may be helpful, along with some tips for my role in the whole thing.

Tonight J is at a breast feeding and baby care class that they midwives run. If she didn't go tonight her next chance would have been May 20th, but we thought that may be cutting it to close. As that's our due date!!! I'm down in Florida with work. It's freezing down here, think it was warmer in NJ today. I'll be here for 10 days and am hoping it gets a little warmer soon. I'm going to miss one of our birthing classes but hope to be back in time for the hospital tour. I'm going to write about our class another time as it's definitely been an interesting experience!!