Today we closed the sale of our old house on Holiday Drive... isn't that a friendly name for a street? We sold the place to a nice older lady who really seemed to love it (and the colors we painted the rooms), who has lots of grandkids who will be visiting her there. I'm happy to have the financial burden of two mortgages removed, and happy to have all my furniture at home now - especially my kitchen table!
But it was a sad day, too. This was the first house that Jon and I bought. We did all the landscaping (by "we" I mean mainly Jon, of course!) and the plants, trees, and hedges are all nice and tall and well-established now. It was the house I brought my first two babies home to, and I can still picture them crawling and toddling through the yard and rooms. It was a good, solid house in an older and friendly, though not so trendy, neighborhood. Perhaps I am a sentimental fool, but I will miss my old house even as I rejoice at selling it and enjoy my new one.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
The Birth Story of Evan Michael
On the evening of Friday, April 24 I started having contractions, which I thought would translate into giving birth on Saturday afternoon, which I thought was odd given that Anna and Will had both started with contractions during the daytime and entered the world in the early dark morning hours. Anyway... Saturday the contractions stopped and I was bummed, though still excited, knowing that we could only be getting closer to the birth.
So Saturday evening it started up again and I employed my Hypnobirthing visualizations to maximize the effect of each contraction/surge. At 12:30 am the contractions were strong enough to wake me up. About 1:00 am I woke Jon up to time them and found they were 4 minutes apart and 1.5 minutes long. So we were farther along than the recommended 5 minutes apart, 1 minute long guideline. Time to call the midwife... Nancy said she'd meet us at the birth center in about 30 minutes. We called Jon's mom to come stay with Anna and Will, got our stuff together, and headed off in the darkness. Fortunately we only live 10 minutes fro the birth center because as we drove the contractions got stronger and I started to get a tingly sensation. I told Jon to hurry. Turning into the birth center, my water broke in the van - I'd had the good sense to sit on a big underpad that caught it and saved the upholstery!
I didn't think I would make it inside the birth center, but Nancy said I had to so I did somehow. Made it back to the first bedroom, lay down on the bed, got my shorts off, and told Nancy and Jon I had to push. Nancy said to try not to push yet since she didn't even have her gloves on yet. So I tried, but Evan was ready for his grand entrance, and Nancy managed to get her gloves on just in time to catch him! Ta da! How exciting!
So much for my vision of trying out the birth tub for relaxation, using the blue room, listening to my Hypnobirthing CD, gazing at my photo of Anna and Will for inspiration... We were there five minutes and had a baby - which was kinda cool and such a relief and really quite comical all at the same time. Evan was born at 2:24 am and we didn't even have a boy's name settled upon, so we had to figure that out. By 7:00 am the nurse told us we could go home when we were ready, which we did after eating bacon, egg and cheese biscuits for breakfast.
Some people have said they couldn't believe I was going to a birth center and midwives, etc, but the funny thing is that I wouldn't have made it to a hospital anyway! And I'm so glad for my choices all along the way through the pregnancy.
So Saturday evening it started up again and I employed my Hypnobirthing visualizations to maximize the effect of each contraction/surge. At 12:30 am the contractions were strong enough to wake me up. About 1:00 am I woke Jon up to time them and found they were 4 minutes apart and 1.5 minutes long. So we were farther along than the recommended 5 minutes apart, 1 minute long guideline. Time to call the midwife... Nancy said she'd meet us at the birth center in about 30 minutes. We called Jon's mom to come stay with Anna and Will, got our stuff together, and headed off in the darkness. Fortunately we only live 10 minutes fro the birth center because as we drove the contractions got stronger and I started to get a tingly sensation. I told Jon to hurry. Turning into the birth center, my water broke in the van - I'd had the good sense to sit on a big underpad that caught it and saved the upholstery!
I didn't think I would make it inside the birth center, but Nancy said I had to so I did somehow. Made it back to the first bedroom, lay down on the bed, got my shorts off, and told Nancy and Jon I had to push. Nancy said to try not to push yet since she didn't even have her gloves on yet. So I tried, but Evan was ready for his grand entrance, and Nancy managed to get her gloves on just in time to catch him! Ta da! How exciting!
So much for my vision of trying out the birth tub for relaxation, using the blue room, listening to my Hypnobirthing CD, gazing at my photo of Anna and Will for inspiration... We were there five minutes and had a baby - which was kinda cool and such a relief and really quite comical all at the same time. Evan was born at 2:24 am and we didn't even have a boy's name settled upon, so we had to figure that out. By 7:00 am the nurse told us we could go home when we were ready, which we did after eating bacon, egg and cheese biscuits for breakfast.
Some people have said they couldn't believe I was going to a birth center and midwives, etc, but the funny thing is that I wouldn't have made it to a hospital anyway! And I'm so glad for my choices all along the way through the pregnancy.
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