Life of leisure

It is such a privilege to be able to write down what has been going on the last few weeks. Email, blog and facebook have replaced my scrapbooks. I can look back at them and remember the precious moments of life. Thank you all for letting me share with you!

Keegan is a month old now. I can't believe how fast time has flown by. It was just moments ago when I sat on the couch watching TLC Baby Story episodes, my stomach swelled and ready to have a baby, wondering if that time would ever come and even if I would survive! And now, here I am with Little Man experiencing the outside world and thriving. At his one month check, he weighed in at 10 lbs, 14 oz, (78%), 23 inches (92%), and with a head circumference of 38 1/2 cm (57%). Since birth, he grew two pounds and two inches! All is well.

He likes to swing his arms and legs around like he's going somewhere. He occasionally smiles -- and that lights up his whole sweet face. He smiles and coos when I bring his burp cloth to his lips. And when he drinks his bottle, he makes a big production out of it. He drinks very leisurely, as if he has all the time in the world, and -- in reality -- he does. It doesn't matter if it's 5:00 in the morning or 3:00 in the afternoon, he's going to drink four ounces in about 45-60 minutes. He also enjoys being out and about in the house with all of his brothers and sisters. He's already spoiled because he knows that if he cries, someone is always around to pick him up and take him around.

I have to lock my room when Keegan is in his crib sleeping or Keva will come right in and touch and squeeze him. She loves to sneak in on him. Kody does, too, but he usually stays at the door's threshold hoping for permission to come in, too. Keva and Kody are quite the duo.

As I type this, I am trying to get over a pretty nasty head cold that I've been fighting since Monday. It started innocently enough with a lot of sneezing. But yesterday (Friday) was the worst, with a lot of miserable coughing and sniffling. Today, I think, I feel better. I just really need the weather to warm up! We are in the 20s at night and in the 40s during the day. I spend a lot of time holed up in my room where it is the warmest! This weekend, though it's supposed to get into the 50s with some sunshine. I am really ready for spring to come!

Tomorrow, after church, is my baby shower! I've gotten so many lovely gifts already, that I feel kind of weird having a shower, but it's coming anyway! Keith will be picking Keri Lynn up from school tonight so she can be here for tomorrow's festivities. Kathleen and Kylie are looking forward to coming, too! I'm just hoping that I'll keep up a better trend. I do feel a little better today, but I'm nursing a sinus headache. Blick!

Now what to do about breakfast? I guess I should grab something to eat while Keegan is sleeping. And I suppose I should also get dressed. The life of leisure!

First smiles!

Keegan's impersonation of "Bill the Cat"

Keegan is three-weeks old!

A very unusual day today. We have a Snow Day. No school. A perfect way to ring in the Winter Break week! This is great for me because I don't have to wake up with the kids to get them off to school until Feb. 22. Less sleep deprivation! Yay!

It's been snowing since about 2:00 this afternoon. So beautiful and COLD! All the kids, except for Keva and Keegan, are off at friends' houses either playing in the snow or hopefully sensibly holed up with their friends staying warm!

Keva is in her room right now so she will stop going around opening up all of our doors to the outside. Also she's there so she will stop sneaking into my room to pinch Keegan! I've been spending most of my time in my room where the temperature is about 10 degrees warmer than the rest of the house. I try to keep the thermostat at about 65, but that makes the family room and living room at about 55 and the bedrooms at about 75. Needless to say, I've been spending a lot of time in my bedroom! And in the closet, where Keegan's room is. Keegan's "room" is the warmest room in the entire house!

Keegan is currently napping. He is already three weeks old! I can't believe it. On the other hand, it feels like he's been around a lot longer than that, mainly because I'm sleep deprived and everything is a little fuzzy!

Every day, I continue to feel a little better. I've now dropped 30 pounds since Keegan's birth. I'm hoping to start in on a good exercise program as soon as I am physically able in order to keep the pounds OFF. I've been wearing all of my regular clothes again. This is so nice, since I had a very limited maternity wardrobe! Also, because I still have to watch my blood sugar, I'm working on a food schedule where I eat smaller more frequent meals. This is tricky because I've always eaten basically two big meals -- lunch and dinner. However, I feel much better and my blood sugar levels are much happier if I actually eat a small breakfast and a bunch of smaller meals. This has been my Grandmother's call to action for YEARS, so here I am at last following her advice!

We've gotten a lot of meals from neighbors and church family. I haven't had to cook since I've been home from the hosptial! When we haven't gotten a meal, I've either ordered pizza or we've eaten leftovers. There's one more meal that Ginny froze while she was here that I'm planning to use for dinner tonight, then I'll have to dust off the pots and pans and see if I can remember how to cook!

Keith called from work this morning to say that he'll be spending the night at a local motel paid by Delta to make sure he gets back to work tomorrow morning because of the weather. This means he won't be home to build a fire, but he may be getting some good overtime! He's been having to work more and more weekends these days, but we feel blessed that he has a job at all.

Keegan calls. He thinks he's hungry again.

Routine?

I'm having a time trying to find a routine in a non-routine season of life! I'm tired and sore and sometimes headachy/nauseous. But Keegan is cute, and even when he wakes me up at 4:00 in the morning, I get such a big kick out of his bright eyes and sweet concerned expressions that I can't be upset about sleep deprivation. Plus, since I'm not working, I get to rest during the day whenever Keegan is resting. It's a nice treat for as long as it lasts.

I can't believe that Little Man will be two weeks tomorrow. This time two weeks ago, I was strapped to a hospital bed trying my hardest to give birth to a kid floating up near my ribs. The hardest part of that particular labor was when nurses kept trying to get blood samples for various tests. I still have bruises up and down my arms from that!

Kylie, Kade and Konner will be coming home from school soon. The first thing they want to do when they get home is to hold the baby. "Where is Keegan?" "Can I hold him?" Sometimes I hold back because he's sleeping, but most of the time he's up by then and ready for some play time. By 6:00 pm, he's conked out from all of the attention he gets in the afternoons!

Keith has tomorrow off and will go see Keri Lynn to help her with some laptop issues. Any excuse will do, though. He loves to drive over to see her at school, even though it's a rather monotonous two hour drive to get there. I remember when my own Dad would come and see me at Biola. He didn't have a car at the time, but took the bus to see me on his day off. We'd usually eat lunch at the cafeteria and get caught up on things that were going on. I love that Keri Lynn has that Daddy time. So important to a growing young woman's maturity.

Someone from church is bringing a meal tonight! Yay! Love those meals. I even have a few more meals that Ginny prepared and froze while she was here for a few more nights. We also got a bunch of food from a family that moved out of the neighborhood -- they were cleaning out their freezers and wanted to know if we'd be interested in their extra food. Ha! Would we? Let me think a half second. Let me give you a mental picture of my wee baby birds with their mouths open. "Yes, extra food would be just fine, thank you very much!"

Three ladies from church are also planning a baby shower for me and Keegan! It's going to be Sunday, February 28, 2010 at the Warehouse, the youth building at our church, from 12:30 - 2:30. If you already attend our church, then you'll probably be getting an E-vite, but if you don't and you'll be in the area, and you want to come, let me know and I'll give your name to one of the ladies in charge of the shower.

It has been the time of many blessings. A friend has come around for several hours every day this week to help clean house. Can I tell you how lovely the smell of bleach is? The carpet and wood floors have never looked so clean either. And the laundry is nearly all caught up -- which is frankly rather a miracle in and of itself. It has been a big boost to my spirits and one of the reasons I felt so great on Tuesday. I then did a bunch of my own laundry that day and promptly felt TERRIBLE the next day. Too much stress on my stomach muscles, I guess. I keep forgetting that I still need to take it easy.

One of the biggest tricks these days is getting to bed at a decent time. I am quickly getting used to being able to fall asleep by about 10:00 or 11:00 pm in my very own bed (not on the recliner), but Keegan has other ideas. He likes to leisurely drink his bottle from about midnight to 1:00 and then he's up once more usually before morning. This actually is not a horrible schedule for a newborn, but I know I can do better if I schedule him more carefully during the day. BUT, I'm so groggy from the night, that I catch my Z's while he is sleeping right through the next bottle feeding schedule! Argh!

Last night, I woke up to feed Keegan and was just starved! Keith had gotten us some pizza at Papa John's last night while the kids had Wednesday night supper at church. He got one pizza for him (pepperoni, sausage and bacon) and one for me and Keva (mushroom, olive and pineapple)! It was perfect! All it needed was some anchovies! Well, last night, I had another piece of my pizza at about 5:00 am. STARVED, I was! In fact, while I'm typing this, my mouth is starting to water again. It may make the perfect quick lunch. Bye!

Getting back into a routine

Keegan is already 11 days old! We are getting into somewhat of a routine, as I try to find my own routine after so many months of not being able to sleep until the early morning hours and then sleeping until noon.

Last night, I actually had some chili and then was able to go to bed without the use of Tums! It was amazing and so wonderful and so comfortable to snuggle into my nice warm comforter and just fall asleep! This is discounting a certain short person who needs to eat a few times a night, but this is still infinitely preferable to the other option!

I was feeling really good coming home from the hospital last week, but my body still has had some adjusting to do. I needed to once again get used to my regular blood pressure meds. This has caused headaches and some nausea.

Then, there's the meds I've been taking for gestational diabetes. It is not known yet whether I will still need to deal with diabetes post pregnancy, but I still need the medication to control it, so I'm not hopeful that it will go away. On the more positive side, it does help me eat healthier. Too much sugar makes me feel yucky.

I also have a little bit of an opening at the incision site where the stitches tore at a stretch mark -- the skin was just too thin. So, I'm also on antibiotics to prevent infection.

I still have some of that lovely Percocet left. Man, that's good stuff. But it's starting to give me a bit of a buzz when I used it whereas before it just helped mask the pain. So maybe I might not need it so much anymore.

I feel like a drugstore.

Keegan, however, is doing great. He has upped his bottle intake from barely 2 oz. to a "whole" 3 oz. He's still a pretty sedate eater compared to other siblings, taking time to burp and watch the many faces all peering at him at any given hour of the day. He gets a little bit of a break from his popularity during school hours, but then explodes into activity as soon as kids start dribbling home. He loves the attention, though. He's very alert, staring right back at all of his loving subjects.

Kody watches over him carefully and wants to sniff and lick him, but we are giving Keegan some space for now from dog love.

Keva knows there is someone to reckon with as well. She came up to him one day last week and stroked his shoulder with two fingers, all sweet and loving. She walked away and then came back and stroked his shoulder again, then, in typical Keva style, gave the little brother a pinch! So now we know where she stands in regard to that pesky little brother!

Keith decided that I was getting too much attention, so he got his truck stuck in the mud in the backyard, after bringing home some firewood for our cold nights. The boys were all down there trying to help get the truck out, and so was a neighbor. I was worried that one of the little kids might get hurt, but it was Keith that I really needed to worry about! He had a car jack that he'd put in place to help get the truck out, and somehow, the handle came loose or something, and hit him right across his eye. He went to urgent care and got six stitches on his eyelid and treatment above and below his eye. The next day, he went in for a CT scan to make sure there was not any further damage. We are VERY grateful that he didn't damage his eye or cause himself brain damage!

Aside from the drama, we've been enjoying the many blessings of friends and family as we welcome Keegan to our family. Gifts have been pouring in, along with meals! Yum! I've even had some help with housework, which has been a HUGE blessing. So I'd like to take this time to give a BIG THANK YOU to all of you! I'm trying really hard to get some real thank you cards out, but I wanted to express my thanks this way, too. I am so touched by the joy that is shared for and with us. We are truly blessed!