Happy 12th Birthday, Jessica!

Twelve years ago today, I had a beautiful baby girl.

My friend and former BSMer Michelle also recently had a beautiful baby girl, and reading her birth story made me want share mine!

(So I guess I should make the same disclaimer she did..."WARNING: This may be graphic in detail.")

Jessica was due January 21 (3 days before my 31st birthday). My birthday came and went with no baby, which meant I had to get a new driver's license picture when I was 9 months pregnant! I looked like a pumpkin head.

My parents came to Idaho from Arkansas, and still no baby. Mom went with me to a dr appointment on the 25th, and my doctor said we could induce if we wanted to, so I said sure! Mike and I went to the hospital that night, so they could start softening my cervix before starting the pitocin. They said sometimes that's all it takes, so we spent the night at the hospital just in case. (Looking back, I say "HA!") They started the pitocin early the next morning...3 bags of it and 12 hours (and a lot of discomfort) later, I was only dilated to a 2 and they SENT ME HOME. It was not a happy time. They said that obviously nothing was going to happen, so we'd just have to wait.

The good thing was, since this was my first baby, now I knew what contractions felt like. And the next night, watching ER, they started again. I didn't sleep much that night, either, since I had them all night long. We drove the 45 minutes from Lewiston to the hospital in Moscow around 7:30 the next morning and they decided to keep me there, even though I was still only dilated to a 3. They gave me my epidural when I reached 5...I still remember looking at the man and saying, "I think I love you." He said he hears that all the time. It took all the pain away. For two hours. That hospital didn't do epidurals on a drip; they administered a one-time bolus. When it wore off I told the nurses, and they tried to reach the anesthesiologist, but there had been a bad car wreck and he was busy in the ER. And then they told me it was time to start pushing. I pushed for an hour. It might not have taken so long, but Jessica's heart rate kept slowing down when I pushed, so they had to screw that little monitor thingy in her sweet little head, and they would have me push through one contraction, put an oxygen mask on me and breathe through the next, over and over. They were talking about doing a C-section, but the dr. decided to try vacuum extraction first. Putting that suction cup on her head, which at the time seemed about six inches across, was the worst part. By far. But she finally came out (Mike's reaction: It's out! It's a girl!! It's a Jessica!). I needed quite a few stitches--45 minutes worth. They put Demarol in my IV, and it made me LOOPY. I hated it. I felt like I was floating over the hospital room, watching everyone hold my baby. I was so weak that when everyone left and I was holding her, I couldn't even put her back in the bassinet without help. But I slept pretty well that night, except for waking up to (try to) feed her. She had low blood sugar, so the nurses fed her formula out of a little medicine cup once in the night. She loked like a little kitten, lapping it up. The next night the hospital gave Mike and I a candlelight steak dinner, and the next morning we went home. And everyone was right, our lives have never been the same since, and I am so very glad. I wouldn't have it any other way. I love my Jessica!

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Good friends

While Angie and Charlie were in the States for Chris's wedding, they somehow found time to come to my little ol' town and have supper with us! We had a great time, talking and teaching them how to use the Wii, and laughing together. Some friends are just like family.

They also brought us these hand-made Christmas ornaments from Mozambique--aren't they great!

Wedding Highlights

Okay, so I went to a wedding over a week ago, and I'm just now finding time to post about it! Crazy! But I always tell people not to apologize for letting real life interfere with blog life, so I'm not apologizing. Just saying.

My friend Angie has been friends with the Walker family forever--the kind of friends that are more like family. So when she and I became roommates/sister-friends in college, I got to know the Walkers, too. Then last May, when I went to Mozambiqe to visit Angie on a mission trip, Chris Walker was living with them while he taught school there for a year, so I got re-acquainted with him over games of hearts and practical jokes. So when I was invited to his wedding, and then found out that Charlie and Angie were going to get to be there, I was thrilled!

So I packed up my 2 oldest girls on a cold, rainy Saturday and drove to Ruston, La. for the first time ever. Here are the highlights of the day:
1.) Seeing Angie and Charlie, of course! I love them.

2.) Seeing Chris so happy, and meeting his bride--I'm so happy for them.

3.) Pulling my dress out of my panties when we all stood up as the bride came down the aisle. Yes, that's what I said. I'm just glad it was then and not at the reception.

4.) Seeing the bride's strap on her dress keep slipping off her shoulder and remembering Angie, my matron of honor, having a similar problem at my wedding, and my mother's solution. *snort**

5.)Seeing the unity candle appear to go out after they lit it, then poof! burst back into flame. JUST like it did at Charlie and Angie's wedding!

6.) Wedding cake--mmm.

7.) Seeing Angie portrayed as an angel in a reception kiddie table coloring book--yeah, right. ;)

I know there was something else funny or neat that I meant to post about, but that's what happens when you're 43 and wait a week to write about something. Sigh. Feel free to visit Angie's World to see a picture.

*Her bra strap kept showing, so my Mom told her "Just take your bra off!"

Q & A Time

Meredith, of Life at 7000 Feet, has been answering fellow bloggers' questions lately. Well, since I forgot to refer to her in my 10 on the Tenth post, and since she has asked 2 questions in comments which I have failed to answer, I will remedy that today!

The first has to do with snow. "Do you find it hard to live in a place that gets so little after living in ID? I don't know if I could stand moving back to AR for that reason--I'd really miss it. I'm glad you had a chance to experience it when you lived in the NW."

I do miss the snow!! I never lost the excitement of waking up to a fresh snowfall, and I always loved watching flakes fall past my big picture window. I didn't get to ski a whole lot when we lived there, because of pregnancies and finances, but I had a blast whenever we did. But in the summer time, I missed weather hot enough to swim without shivering, and I always got a little depressed having snow at Easter, and really hated the gray, wet, cold Springs that seemed to last forever. I love snow in December and January, but when Valentine's Day comes, I'm ready for Spring to start. I have yet to find a place where both of those happen!

The second question was about kids. "Do you find that your girls pair off and one of them gets left out? My three rarely all play together..." There are the rare, beautiful occassions when they all 3 play together amazingly well, and even for extended periods of time. But usually Jessica and Mikayla, who are almost exactly 2 years apart, play together and Rebecca, born 4 years after Mikayla, plays by herself. And she usually seems okay with that--she gets to be in charge and make decisions that way, as opposed to being bossed around by her older sisters. Mikayla has seemed to enjoy picking on Rebecca since the day she came home from the hospital and Mikayla walked by and kicked her car seat/carrier. It's been a major prayer of mine for quite a while that Mikayla would have a special love for her little sister. Well, very recently (since Christmas) there have been a few days when Mikayla and Rebecca played together, and since it was something Jessica felt too grown-up for at the time, she would go off by herself and read. While I'm never overly happy at seeing Jessica grow up, I am delighted at seeing the other two having fun together. This year Rebecca goes to school every day while the other 2 are home schooled; I'm interested in how things change next year when I home school all 3!

As long as I'm answering questions...Melissa, for Christmas Mike and I bought each other a comination VCR/DVD player/burner, which dubs video tapes straight to DVD, and it has little plug-in thingies that hook up to my old video camera, so making the DVDs from those little tapes was really pretty easy! I had directions to follow and everything. :)

10 on the Tenth

Oh my goodness! I didn't even realize it WAS the 10th until I sat down to read blogs.
How about...10 things that give me satisfaction.
1. Figuring something out--like finally putting my mini-DV tapes on DVD this afternoon! We can now watch Rebecca's baby videos!
2. Finishing a project--like the mosaics I helped the girls make yesterday after learning about a mosaic in history. I'm still working on making a photo book out of my Africa pictures...
3. Listening to my girls play. When they're getting along.
4. Teaching a child to read.
5. Making somebody laugh.
6. An un-interrupted prayer/Bible study time.
7. Getting a baby to stop crying.
8. A full night's sleep.
9. Having all my family together. When they're getting along. ;)
10. Crossing things off a list. Check!

Snow!

*Update* No snow today, just disappointed children
Look closely...do you see those white things in the air? It snowed all morning on Monday. It barely started to accumulate when it stopped, and then it melted away.

It was a great day to be home schooled. Believe it or not, Magnolia did not cancel school for our skiff of snow, so poor Rebecca was in a classroom with no windows and missed most of it, but I gave Jessica and Mikayla lots of time and opportunities to watch it come down and go out and play in it. They even scraped together enough for a few snowballs!

The snowflakes showed up really welll against Polly's black fur.

Can you see the snow on the azalea leaves?
Now we're extra excited because we're supposed to get more snow tonight and tomorrow morning. Hopefully it will be enough to measure this time!

Holiday Happenings

I love the month of December...I just wish it would go more slowly! My girls were counting down the days to Christmas all month, and as the number got smaller and they got more excited, I tried more and more to slow it down. We were quite busy, but had lots of fun. I hope next year to keep it a little calmer and quieter.
We got up Christmas morning and the girls found the Wii that Santa left for the whole family. We're all enjoying it more than I even thought we would!
Here are the girls seeing the Wii:

I love Rebecca's face looking at her stocking:


Rebecca asked Santa Claus for a pink polka-dot suitcase, so that's what her daddy got her.

And he got the big girls mp3 players, the first ones in our family. They're not the big name kind, but we've all been impressed with them so far.

And Jessica got the boots she wanted more than anything.


After we opened all the presents we threw some clothes on and some in suitcases and drove (past some snow!) to Conway where we opened presents and had dinner with my Mom, both my brothers and their wives, the younger half of my neices and nephews, and my Aunt Sue. We hadn't seen Matt and his family in a year and a half, so it was great to spend some time with them.
Emily helped Rebecca--
Van is a freshman at Oklahoma State. It was fun playing games with him.




Kennedi's always the bow-head of the family!

(I just realized my brother Mark isn't in any pictures...he's been really sick, and the doctors can't seem to figure out what's wrong with him. I'm thankful his CT scan came back clear, but I wish he felt better. Pray they figure it out soon!)

We saw lots of old friends at church Sunday morning, and after lunch Mike and I drove back to Magnolia, leaving the girls with Mom, so they could spend more time with Emily and so we could go to the Independence Bowl in Shreveport on Monday!

We shopped at the boardwalk before the game, and I've never seen so many Aggies in all my life! The game was chilly, and Texas A & M got beat by Georgia, but we had a good time together.

I drove back to Conway again the next day to pick the girls up and bring them home. That was a long day.

And now I have all the decorations packed away; I just need to vacuum and everything will be back to normal. Time for the girls to make paper snowflakes for the windows!