Tons of Pics

Here is are a ton of pictures that I've been trying to find time to upload. They are all the way from back in June.

You can just click on the slideshow and it will take you to the album so you can view them yourself.

7/13/09

So it seems I am know posting about once a month...whoops...

Collin is doing awesome! We've gotten a routine down. He is taking great naps. The sleeping at night....ehh... that's another story. Well I can't say it's all bad. Sometime he sleeps a good 9-10 hours! Other nights he wants to wake up at 2, then again at 4. I have a feeling it is his gums hurting him though. They look like they are starting to get a little swollen and he is dripping pools of drool. I'm sure it won't be too long before we see a little tooth. :( I like the gummy smile!! Anyways, this is our schedule:
7 am - wakes up, gets a diaper change and eats
Then we play for a little while
8-8:30 - he starts to get tired so we read a story and he takes a nap
9:30ish - wakes up from his nap
we play a little until his next feeding
10 - feed
then we get to go run errands or get out of the house for a little bit
12:30ish - takes a cat nap for about 20 minutes
1 - feed
play again and read a story
3 - naptime again (sometimes he takes a long nap (2 hr) here)
4 - feed
then the rest of the evening is pretty random because it depends when he wakes up from his long nap and he also feeds on demand ever 2 hours or so to make sure he is full for the nighttime
8 - Stoli, Collin and I (and sometimes Pat if he can take a few minutes off) - go for a walk
8:30 - Collin gets his bath
8:45 - feed
9 - 9:30 - bedtime

Hmm... so I think we have a pretty good schedule down, but if you read this and it sounds absurd keep it to yourself!!! Hahah... it took me forever to get to a point where I felt like I have some control over my day and can plan any outings accordingly.

Anyways... as far as Collin's development, it seems like everyday he learns or does something new.

He started rolling over (purposely) from his back to his tummy when we were on McAllen (on June 30th to be exact). From then on, we haven't been able to get him to sleep on his back anymore. The first few nights it terrified me because all you read and hear about is how babies HAVE to sleep on their backs. I called the nurse at the doctors office and asked her advice on what to do if he keeps rolling over to sleep on his tummy. She sounded like she thought it was the dumbest question anyone ever asked. She was like "it's fine once he can roll over." Well.... NOBODY ever says that!!! Ugh... and to think of all the sleep I missed out on trying to make sure wasn't suffocating. I still try to lay him on his back sometimes but he immediately rolls over. He likes to sleep on his stomach like me I guess.

So why I'm really posting today is because we had a breakthrough with Collin interacting with Stoli today!! He was laying on the floor doing tummy time and Stoli walked up to him and he just started cracking up. Until now he had looked at her but not really taken any notice of her or tried interacting with her. I noticed he was laughing at her so I picked him up and sat him up by Stoli on the couch while she played with her toy. He just kept laughing and laughing at her. Then later we went to sit outside on the swing and I turned on the hose because Stoli loves to play in sprinklers. So I sprayed it like a sprinkler and Collin thought it was funny watching Stoli play in the water also. It was hilarious. THEN..and this is the coolest... when Pat got home he came and sat on the swing with us and Stoli jumped up to sit with us up there and Collin actually started petting her on his own!!!!!! He stroked her a few times and then very uncoordinatedly grabbed her skin. Hahah... She just sat there like the great dog that she is and let him. She almost went to grab her ears but we stopped him. It was so cute though!! I can just imagine what Stoli has coming to her in the near future with Collin trying to play with her.

Oh yeah... and last night was another funny scenario. So we finish bathing Collin. I feed him. Get him nice and full. Then I start reading to him before bed. He starts getting sleepy so I start rocking him a little to get him nice and ready to be put down. All of a sudden he poops and wakes himself up! Dang it....time to change and start all over trying to get him ready for bed. Ok... we sit back down. Start another story...Dang it!! Another poop!! Change again... Nope..not done yet... ANOTHER poop!!! THREE dirty diapers in like 10 minutes!!!!! Let's just say he was nice and relaxed and slept for like 10 hours after that.. hahaha.. I was worried he had diarreah or something. Nope... just wanted to keep it all in until nighttime I guess...

In other news, we converted our upstairs living room into more of a playroom for Collin. Our downstairs was starting to become an amusement park of baby rides. We moved the table we had upstairs into the attic and put down those rubber squares that connect like puzzle pieces. So now he has a place where all of his toys are and we can just sit up there and play and be close to the nursery also. Plus it's getting close to the time that he will start crawling and I don't want him banging into tables and stuff down here when he is playing.

Ok...well I have pictures on the camera, but I haven't had a chance to upload them....will do it soon.

6/18/09

Ok I finally got Collin to bed early (relatively speaking). So I have tons to update!

Let's see....

Collin is now almost 18lbs!! He's really big for his age. I'm not sure how long he is, but I know he's getting to big to burp sitting down because when I put him on my shoulder he just wants to try to stand on me so I have to stand up so that his legs hang. At this rate, next month I'll be able to say "hey collin.. go run around and burp yourself." Haha! That's what it feels like sometimes! He is already wearing clothes for 6 month old babies and he's only going to be 4 months. They're going to stop making diapers in his size before he is potty trained :-/ Although he is only in the 90% so I guess there have to be SOME babies bigger than him at his age..right?

He can now hold his head up pretty well. We got him a "tummy time" mat and he really likes it more than just being on a blanket because it doesn't move around and it has a little pillow to help prop up his chest. He also likes sitting in his Bumbo seat now that he can hold his head up. The only problem with him being able to look around is that he doesn't want to STOP looking around! Especially at bedtime!!! Arrgh!! He thinks he's going to learn all about the whole world between the hours of 10pm-1am!!! Well... it's probably also because we went to Hawaii and there is a 5 hour time difference so his schedule is off, but he didn't have any trouble adjusting over there... just coming home. However, I am happy to report that he did awesome on the plane ride!! I was really worried about it, but he did great! On the way over there he was awake most of the time (8hrs!), but he was laughing and just looking around. When we got there the people sitting in front of us turned around and said what a good baby he was and that they didn't even hear him once. Crazy! Then on the way back he slept almost the entire way. Unfortunately for me I didn't get much sleep because it's hard to hold a baby on your lap and fall sleep and not be afraid you won't drop him. So good plane travel is just one more thing you can add to the list for making him a perfect baby! :)

Man.. I can't wait till he grows up and I can tell him all the things I have gone through for him already!! Breastfeeding is supposed to be such a "beautiful thing," and don't get me wrong, I love being able to feed him now, but boy does it have its troubles. Let me tell you about just a couple embarrassing things that happened to me on the trip. The first one happened on the plane ride over there. As I'm sure everyone knows, women are supposed to wear pads to keep from leaking. Well I had to take mine off to feed him, so I very subtly set it next to me on my chair. Well... the MALE flight attendant decided that he needed to get ALL the trash from my area and proceeded to pick up my breast pad!!! I was like "ohh...ummm...no sir... i need that." hahahah... He just smiled and gave it back, but then did it AGAIN towards the end of the flight... only this time he goes "ohh no... sorry..that's your pad" hahahah.. how embarrassing. So as if that wasn't enough for one day, we are at the Honolulu airport waiting for our connecting flight to Maui. Collin started crying that he was hungry, but it was really hot in the airport since it is outdoors, so I had a hard time feeding him, especially since I have to put him under a cover up. So I gave him a bottle that I had brought instead. But the problem is that I had to find somewhere to go pump since I couldn't feed him. Of course I couldn't sit out in the lobby, so I went to see if I could find an outlet in the restroom and maybe sit in a stall or something. Nope... the only outlet is under one of the sinks (no where near one of the stalls). So I think... "ok... I gotta do what I gotta do.." So I sit down, and just cover up with my feeding shall. And after already being on an 8 hour flight before that, I looked like a homeless person sitting on the bathroom floor with a shall on. No kidding!! I probably could have put out a bowl and gotten some change. Hahah... NOW I know what people mean when they say you'll do anything for your kids!!!

Well then just a little while later, Collin decides to show us that he is not having any problems going to the bathroom anymore. It didn't really smell, so I was just lucky that I was thinking I should go ahead and change him before our next flight. I open the diaper and it's dirty, but realize as I start cleaning his bottom that it not only goes up his bottom, but up his back....waaaayy up his back!! I don't even know how it got up there!! I seriously contemplated throwing his clothes away. Yuck!

Haha... ok so now I realize that instead of writing down all the of the happy milestones Collin has hit, I've just been sharing some of the difficulties we've faced! Let me say that Pat and I both think that Collin is the greatest baby ever! We've both said that if they could all be like him we'd have a ton more. He is giggling now, which is the absolute cutest thing EVER! Whenever he giggles Pat and I make complete fools of ourselves trying to get him to keep laughing. He is getting to the point where he can almost hold his bottle. He grabs it like he wants to, and sometimes he will kind of hold it for a little bit, but he doesn't quite have control of it so hold it on his own.

He is getting baptized on July 25th. Mario Luis and Stephanie are going to be his godparents. I'm excited that Mario Luis is going to finally get to see Collin again. He hasn't seen him since he was 2 weeks old. Stephanie says he changes every time she sees him (which is pretty often), so I'm sure Mario Luis will be shocked. It's not the same in pictures!!

Ok, it's getting late so I'm off for now. I just wanted to give an update on some of the things that have been going on. Make sure to check out the most recent pictures on the post before this one!

6/15/09

Again, I haven't had time to blog. And right now I want to blog, but I'm still jet-lagged from the trip to Hawaii. Collin is napping right now so I'm going to do the same! But I wanted to post pictures that have been accumulating on our camera since early May! I didn't realize I had over 150 pictures to post! Here they are! Check back later today for a blog entry...

5/3/09

I'm sorry to all of you that actually read this blog for falling behind. I usually just make sure to write when I have pictures to add, but now that Collin will actually sit in his swing and entertain himself for all of about 2 minutes I might be able to write a little more often.

Today was a little bit of a difficult day. Well actually... I should say it started out pretty good! He slept for almost 8 full hours last night! Of course only him and Pat got to enjoy it since I woke up every 20 minutes thinking he was going to wake up soon, and then when he didn't wake up make sure he was OK and still breathing. And then after moving him because he kept sliding down in the bassinet staying awake for another 10 minutes thinking "Ok..now he's definitely going to wake up." So the whole family got good sleep except me.... I guess that's the way it goes :(

Well after he finally woke up around 7am I fed him and he stayed awake for a little while and then fell back asleep... so naturally I started to worry thinking something was wrong. Let me tell you.... parenting = worrying!!!!! And worrying = stress!!!!!! And he's only 2 months old!!!!!! Now I know why people say this is the hardest job ever!!!!

Anyways, he's been napping on and off all day and being pretty fussy. I don't know if it is a late reaction to the immunizations or if he is getting sick. I hope it'll pass tomorrow.

Pat and I had to go to baptism preparation classes this afternoon. So boring. Pat kept telling me to pay attention because I was trying to text anyone that would talk to me because I was so bored. We had to sit there for 2 1/2 hours. And to top it off, the air wasn't working in there for the first hour so it was like 95 degrees in there. I'm fine with sitting there listening, but I hate audience and group participation so much. We all (like 50 people!!) had to go around the room and introduce ourselves and say how we got our name. How on earth is that relevant to a baptism class??? Way to add a 1/2 hour to the class for no reason at all.

Well that was about it for today. Nothing else to report.... Ohh! except that we tried the next size (2) of diapers on Collin and unsurprisingly they fit him pretty well.

Ok well goodbye for now friends! :)

5/2/09

Things have been going GREAT!!!! Collin is such a happy baby. I feel like I love him even more every day. He is starting to smile so much and laugh. He also recognizes me...finally!! Which I love! :)

We went to the doctor yesterday for his 2 month check up. He got his first set of immunizations, which I'm happy about. It was sad though! He got 3 shots and one orally in the mouth (although he didn't seem to mind that one...he just ate it like it was nothing). They give them all of the shots in their thighs!! Of ALL the painful places!! I would think the thigh would not be a place I would want to receive shots. Poor little guy. He cried, but then I picked him up and tried to soothe him. He stopped crying pretty quickly, but was just fussing a little as we walked out. By the time we hit the car he was asleep. I was worried he was going to be fussy and have fever all day, but not our little guy! He was still smiling and everything. I mean there was a couple fussy moments, but for the most part he was happy as usual. We finally got an official height and weight.... 24 inches / 13 lbs. 4 oz.!!! He is in the 90th percentile for both!! Big boy!! I guess the good news is he is proportional... just short and fat or tall and skinny. He's perfectly proportional!!! Hahah :) Besides that, I have become one of those moms that wants to save everything. (Not that that is surprising since I am the biggest pack rat ever.) Is it weird that I saved the Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny band aids they put on his shots???? I'm gonna put them in his baby book.

I cut his nails for the first time 2 days ago. It was quite difficult!! I was trying soooo hard not to cut him that I don't even think I ended up taking anything off.. haha. I filed them down more than anything else. His nails aren't even that long. I just did it because he finally scratched himself so I thought it was time.

Also... he is now shooting up in size. I felt like it took forever for him to grow out of the newborn stuff, and now he's in the 3 month stuff (snuggly might I add). He moved out of the newborn diapers back in March (We bought the first set of Size 1 diapers the week of March 18th.) Now he is pretty much ready to move to the next size. The exciting part about that is that we have a whole new set of clothes he fits into!!

Ohhhh yeah! And I have to write about his turning over (although everyone that reads this probably already knows.) He has started turning himself over from his belly to his back. He did it a few times and now he starts but gets frustrated... I'm sure he'll do it again soon.

Well that's all I can think of off the top of my head for now. I keep saying I'm going to write more often, but let's face it...I have a new baby.... I am enjoying all my extra time with Collin... not playing on the computer... I'll try to type more often! :)

Check out all the pictures I have been meaning to post. They are from back in March all the way until tonight. Make sure you look at him in his Easter outfit! :) (Oh and not to brag, but the nurse at the doctor's office yesterday told us he looked like an Anne Geddes baby.... I personally think so too!!)




This is my favorite picture!!

From Collin (3/27/09-5/2/09)

4/13/09

I thought I'd write about our funny bathtub adventure last night. Collin is getting very very sneaky! He's already learning how to outsmart his parents.

So...for the past week or so we've been giving Collin a nightly bath, trying to set up a routine so he knows when bedtime is. (Which by the way is working because he falls right to sleep after his bath.) Anyways, we thought we had such a polite little boy because he doesn't spray us normally when we open his diaper. (Well...it's happened to Pat a few times... but he needs to be more efficient! Haha..) Ok..so as I was saying.. for the past week or so we give him a bath and he has started testing us. As SOON as we put him in the bathtub, he hits that warm water and decides to pee so we have to drain the tub and start all over again since we don't want him bathing in pee. (Although I have to admit after the second time I was like "okkk he's gonna have to bathe in it!" But Pat wouldn't let me...hahah) So I finally figured out that if I get a washcloth with warm water and cover his body while Pat dumps over the bathtub and refills it he isn't cold so he doesn't start screaming. We thought we had gotten so good at!!

Well... last night we tried to outsmart him... as Pat was getting the bath ready I opened his diaper and let some air get in there so maybe the cold air would make him go before he got in the water. But of course, I opened it and just covered it so it wouldn't spray everywhere. Pat came over and said I needed to open it more. So he proceeds to take off the diaper. We sat there for a second and sure enough... here comes the pee!!! Pat caught it all in the pee-pee tee-pee!! VICTORY!! We weren't gonna have to drain the tub!!!

So we go put him in the nice clean warm water and NOOOOOO!!!! Here comes the pee!!! hAnd he didnt just pee a little in the bathtub...he pushed so hard it came out of the water and made an arc over the bathtub wall!!!!! Two adults... outsmarted by a 7 week old. I think I even saw him smile and laugh a little as he thought "these two are gonna be so gullible in the future." Dang it.....he sure showed us...

4/9/09

Things are going great here. :) We are starting to get down a better routine, and Collin is sleeping much better. He doesn't go to sleep until about 11pm, but then usually sleeps until around 4am, then sleeps again until about 7 or 8. Not great, but at least there is a 5 hour sleeping period at some point.

Last night we went out without him for the first time. We went to see Bruce Springsteen and left Collin and Stoli with Pat's parents. It was kind of hard leaving him for a long period. I didn't cry, like some people say they do, but I was definitely a little sad. I told Pat I trust his parents completely to take care of him, but it's a feeling like what if he needs me and I'm not there??? Pat said "why would he need you??" I was like "ummm!!! I'm his mother!! He needs me!" Haha...I know fellow mothers can relate to me. :) We went to eat dinner and of course I had Pat call his parents after dinner, and again a little ways into the concert, and then again, and again when we left. Haha :) Oh well... At least I managed to get out for a night!! We had a great time.

I keep saying Collin is growing so fast, but he really is growing SOOO fast!!! It's crazy! Pat weighed him and we think he weighs around 11.5 lbs already!!!!!! He is such a good baby though. He really only fusses when he's hungry for the most part. He loves his pacifier though!! And he absolutely LOVES his nightly bath. The minute we put him in his eyes open really wide and he starts smiling and making noises. We tried capturing the smiles on camera the other day, but I think ended up with about 10 pictures right after he smiled so it just looks like we took a bunch of pictures of our son naked in the bathtub ;-/ He will appreciate those later.

I have started reading to him more during the day. We are currently reading Nursery Ryhmes. He loved Goldilocks and the Three Bears, but didn't like Three Little Pigs. Hahaha.. I swear! He cried every time I started reading it. It was funny...so I'd take a break and he'd settle down. Then I'd start reading it again and he would start fussing again. Tomorrow we'll try a different one.

He loves playtime too! He really liked being on his back, but when I turn him over for tummy time he does OK for about 2 minutes then gets really annoyed and frustrated. He can lift his head really well though. He can lift it and turn it from one side then to the other side, but can't keep it up. But when I'm burping him he can keep it straight up for a few seconds. He's strong! Speaking of...his hands are enormous! I mean...they're still tiny relatively speaking, but for a baby they seem really big! He is starting to learn to use them a little more.

I must admit, the first few weeks were really difficult...such an adjustment and a learning process, but I am really starting to enjoy the time I have with him all day. :)

3/27/09

I meant to blog a few days ago on March 24th because it was Collin's one month birthday!! But the day passed me by. I swear... I don't know where the time goes?!?!? I mean... I know I'm home all day, but I feel like I don't have time to do anything!! I'm sure any mom reading this can relate. It seems like my schedule is like this all day:
* Wake up
* Feed Collin
* Play with Collin
* Collin takes a nap while I clean bottles and stuff
* Feed Stoli
* Collin wakes up
* Feed Collin
* Repeat...
Sometimes.. and I stress..SOMEtimes I find the time to shower in there.. hahah.. My poor husband probably forgot what the girl he married actually looks like. :(

Update on Collin:
He is still eating like a horse.
He is still having trouble pooping.
He still has lots of gas though.
He is growing so fast. (I'm convinced he is up to 10 lbs)
He loves baths!
He started sleeping through the night (for the most part) 2 nights ago and stays awake most of the day.
He took his first trip to McAllen and San Antonio.
He coos a little bit.
He is still an angel :)

Update on Me:
I've developed mastitis (an infection in the breast). It's the worst pain ever. Seriously! At least during baby delivery you get an epidural!! I wonder if they could give me one to numb my upper body?? Actually...my whole body?? Everything hurts at this point. Last night I had fever all night. I was up with severe chills for over an hour...finally fell asleep...then woke up again at around 3:30 and finally decided to take my temperature...which ended up being 101.5. It persisted through the night and into the morning. I called my doctor as soon as they opened and after giving me the run around for a few hours until about 1pm, but phoned me in a prescription which will hopefully take care of it. What a pain. As much as I want to breastfeed it ends up being more of a pain than anything else. :( Is that horrible of me to say?? Oh well.... I will continue to do it. Collin's health is worth the pain.

Here are the latest pictures from Week 4, McAllen, Mario Luis's visit, and more!

3/16/09

Dang.... Where does the time go??? I haven't been able to post in a few weeks. Collin is already going to be three weeks old tomorrow!!! He is getting cuter and cuter everyday. I think he is starting to look more like me too. We think he has my eye shape now. At first his eyes were a little more squinty like Pat, but now that he is starting to be more alert he opens them a lot wider so they look more like me.. haha...but they are still blue like daddy. That could still change though...

I feel like I have so many stories, but I haven't had time to post any of them!

Today... our wall got a nice pee shower. I was downstairs with Taryn and Gabs and heard Pat call out my name. I went upstairs to see what happened and Pat was trying to hold a diaper over Collin and wiping down the wall with the other hand. He peed all over the wall, the changing pad, and the counter where we keep all the baby stuff..haha.. I told Pat he needs to be more prepared before opening that diaper! Although he did it to me too the other day, but luckily I had a wipe in my hand already and just covered it up and managed to contain the sprinkler before it did TOO much damage.

I haven't posted about Collin's health or anything either, but he is doing great. Much better than the first week! He no longer takes on any shade of yellow so that's good! He is peeing and pooping regularly. He is gaining weight like a madman and growing so fast he is going to be 6' tall before we know it!! He eats every few hours and never seems to be full. He must get that from me....

He is so funny. He makes the cutest faces. He even smiles sometimes. It thought it was so cute, but then I read that at this point they still don't smile out of emotion...it's just them passing gas or something.. hahah... He can also raise one eyebrow like I do! It's so neat looking at him and seeing all of the things that he got from Pat and I. He has my thumbs..which I think is so funny. They really look just like miniature versions of mine! He makes the funniest noises when he's eating. Pat's mom says he gets that from Pat. He like gasps and sounds like he is having the best meal of his life.... I mean .. I guess it is really the only meal he's ever had in his life...

He is still waking us up all night long. He wants to sleep all day and then be wide awake at night. We're hoping he learns the difference soon!! Pat and I are walking around like zombies. I think I put make-up on for the first time in 3 weeks this weekend. Pajamas have become my attire of preference. Today we were watching TV and someone said something that really made me laugh because it's so true! He said "I hate judgmental waistbands that leave those pink teeth marks on my belly." Hahaha.... That about sums up post-pregnancy. I'm definitely shrinking in size, but still don't fit into my old pants yet. :( Of course the McFlurry I just ate doesn't help the situation.

Yesterday Collin's umbilical cord fell out. I never thought I'd be one of those people to save it, but I feel really weird just throwing it away!! I mean..it was his lifeline to me for 9 months. I know it's gross, so I wont put it in the baby book, but I may keep it hidden away somewhere... pretty much for absolutely no reason since I'll never do anything with it...

Another first yesterday was that he shed an actual tear. Babies aren't born with their tear ducts developed yet so when they cry they don't have tears. One of his tear ducts got a little plugged but has cleared up and yesterday we saw his first tear.

Ok well I'll try to be better about posting more often. Here are more pictures!!\\

Again... if you want to see all of the pictures larger and not in a slideshow..just click on the picture and it will take you to another website where you should be able to scroll through all of the pictures.

3/1/09

Wow! What a week... I haven't even had a spare moment to blog to let everyone know what's going on or give any birth stories... I'm sitting here right now, Collin is finally asleep (although it sounds like he may be starting to wake up so I may need to come back to this again later..)

I'll start at the very beginning...

Monday during the day I stayed super busy. We went for our doctor's appointment, then came home and I sat outside with my mom while she planted flowers in the yard. We went down to Rice Village to look for this thing called a Moby Wrap that I've heard are awesome to carry the baby in and the only store in Houston that carries them pretty much is there. So we went down there and met up with Pat to get dinner since he works at a law firm not too far from there. Everyone kept telling me to eat Italian food to make the baby come, but we had just had Italian, so we went for Chinese (which probably isn't too healthy for the baby, but oh well..) I guess it was a great idea! Because Collin decided to start making his way out later that night!!

I woke up around 4am on Tuesday morning (2/24/09). I had woken up a couple times earlier that night with minor cramps, but nothing worse than I had been feeling for about a week already. Then around 4 I woke up to go to the restroom and thought my water started leaking, but instead I had some slight bleeding that wouldn't stop so I knew this would probably be the start. I figured I'd lay back down for awhile and see what happens, since everyone says it can still be awhile from that point until true labor actually starts.... NOPE!! Only about 10 minutes later I started feeling worse cramps/contractions. They started coming about every 10-12 minutes. So again, I figured it'd be awhile. I called my doctor to let them know and they said to go ahead and go in to labor and delivery to get checked. I figured if this was it though I didn't want to look like a total slob so I took a few minutes to straighten my hair! hahah... So I woke up my mom around 4:25 am to let her know that it was possibly time and we needed to go in. We all got our stuff together and left. Poor Stoli knew something was up... she was shivering when we left the house :(

Anyways, we got to the hospital and I was sure they were going to tell me it wasn't time. Then again, these contractions (still not too painful, but noticeable) were coming about every 5-6 minutes. We checked in around 5:15 and the nurse checked me and said I was definitely in labor and said "YOU'RE GONNA HAVE A BABY TODAY!" Wooww! I can't even begin to describe what it felt like to hear that.... VERY VERY VERY soon after that point the contractions started getting painful!!!!! I walked in at 4cm and went to 6cm within an hour. Great news since I knew I was already more than halfway there!! I was like "When can I get the epidural???" They said I could get it already at 4cm, so I was like "okkk bring it on!" But I kept waiting and waiting and they had a shift change so it took even longer! They finally came in to give me the epidural around 7:45 I think. Thank God!! Those contractions were really starting to hurt, but I think I handled them OK. I wasn't screaming or anything! I just laid my head back and tried to breathe. The epidural was the BEST!!! I couldn't even feel the contractions anymore! I could kind of tell when I was having one, but no pain at all. Anyways, I got to 10 cm pretty fast, Umm...maybe around 12?? Not quite sure... but they wouldn't let me start pushing because Collin was kind of stuck in the birth canal I guess because he wasn't pushing down. They kept having me turn on my sides to see if it would help. Finally around 1:55 I started the pushing. It went for an entire hour!!! It was really really really hard!! But the nurses were laughing saying they had never seen a patient laugh in between contractions. I think we were making fun of something on TV or watching comedy central or something. Anyways.. I had 2 labor and delivery nurses, who actually end up doing pretty much everything. They help you until the very end when the doctor pretty much walks in and takes the baby out. I'll save the gory details, but in the end.. Collin Brody Daniel made his way into the world at exactly 3pm on Februrary 24, 2009.

Pat ended up cutting the umbilical cord, even though he said he wouldn't. Actually, we forgot to mention it to everyone in the big commotion, but there was a big knot in the cord. The nurses/doctor said they were surprised there was no trouble with that during the labor. I remember Pat turning to me and telling me at the time, but I was so wrapped up in seeing Collin that I kind of put it out of my mind until I remembered later and Pat reminded me. It wasn't a tight knot though so I guess that's why his heart rate never dropped.

Right after delivery they put him on my chest and I got to hold him for a little bit, then I handed him to Pat and he got to hold his son, the first baby ever. It was such a special moment for both of us.

Then they had to take Collin to the nursery to get cleaned up and do some tests. Pat got to go with him so I stayed in the room and got cleaned up and everything. I think post-delivery is more painful than during!! They had told me they would bring him right back, but it felt like forever. They moved us to a post delivery room and soon after that was when Pat and Collin finally showed back up!!

Actually around the same time, a nurse came in and was asking if we had taken a few vials of Collin's blood from the delivery room. We were like "Whaaatt???" She said they couldn't find them. What the heck?? She said "ok well we'll try looking for them, but the other nurse said you may have picked them up when you got all of your belongings." I was like "okk are they labeled??" Who knows who's blood they would have assumed was his!?! She said they were. Then another nurse came in and told us they found it because it had already been sent to the lab. What kind of hospital just misplaces blood vials??? Ohh well...crisis averted quickly.

Wow! I just realized how long this post is! Collin is starting to wake up. Time to go feed him...AGAIN! I'll post some more when I get another free moment. I'm gonna go ahead and put the slideshows up of the pictures we have from our camera. There are tons more to come when I get them all from everyone else. Let me know what ya'll think!!!

FYI... if you want to post comments on here, you just have to create a google account. Then you can post. Or just email me with comments :)

You can click on the slideshow and it will take you to a website where you can look at the pictures individually instead of in the slideshow.

Here are pictures from the hospital:


Here are some pictures from Collin's first few days at home:

2/26/09

I'M A MOMMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyone reading this I'm sure already knows....but I went into labor early Tuesday morning around 4am. My early labor was so fast and I went into active labor almost immediately. My ENTIRE labor, from early labor to having Collin, was only about 10 hours.. sounds like a long time, but it really wasn't.

I had Collin at exactly 3pm on 2/24/09. He weighed 7 lbs. 8 oz. and was 20 inches long at birth.

It's been a CRAZY past couple days, but I wanted to post just to update that we're now at home, with our other family member Stoli. She did great when she met her baby brother! I have a TON to talk about, but I'm so exhausted right now. I'll update and post pictures as soon as things settle and calm down a little bit (which is probably never... I'll really be back in 18 years when he goes to college... haha) Just kidding...keep checking in! :)

FYI..... HE'S PERFECT!!!!!!!

2/23/09

Ok... just had a doctors appointment.... good news and bad news..

Bad news, well not really bad.. just unfortunate... is that I'm STILL pregnant waiting for the baby..

Good news is I'm already about 4 cm dilated...sheesh! You'd think I'd have had the baby already!! However... she set my date to be induced next Tuesday (March 3rd) if I make it that long. It's so much nicer knowing that there is at least an end in sight. I'm still hoping it won't be a whole week longer, but at least I know it won't be longer than that! Pat was laughing at me because he says I basically told her to induce me sooner than later.. haha. She said "Ok...well we'll go ahead and set your end all be all date should you go past your due date.. next week sometime...probably later in the week" and I said "umm... how about earlier in the week?!?!" She just kind of laughed and said "ok earlier"

Weird thing... I have actually started losing weight. I lost a whole 3 pounds since last week! I wonder if I'm just not retaining as much water?? I've read that women do start losing when they are close though...so maybe it's gonna be soon!!! I'll keep you all posted! :)

2/22/09

Countdown is at 5 days till Collin's due date. Discomfort just keeps getting worse. On the upside.. yesterday was a good day. My mom came in early in the morning and we had a full but relatively relaxing day. We went to HEB to stock up on food so she can cook for us, since my poor husband has been forced to eat out more than usual due to my laziness and overall being too tired to cook. We also went to Lowe's and she bought us some beautiful flowers to plant in our yard. I cant wait!! We haven't had flowers planted since we moved in 3 years ago :~/


Anyways... we came home and unloaded the car and my mom made turkey chili for dinner that was sooo good. I was hoping the cayenne pepper in it would help...but nope....

Well the highlight of the day was that we went to get pedicures. My poor feet haven't exactly been cared for for the past 9 months. It's the best pedicure in the world. They wrap your feet in this warm wax and then put warm booties on you while you sit and enjoy for awhile. Everyone tells me my toes need to look good for the delivery room.... I hope that's not where my doctor is looking when it comes down to it!!!

2/19/09

Excitement has worn off.... I'm still pregnant... I was thinking maybe I wouldn't make it through the week after my doctor's appointment on Monday..but here I am... almost 5 days later...still pregnant.......

At least tomorrow is my last day of work!

2/16/09

We got some exciting news today... well I guess kind of exciting..since it really doesn't tell us too much... But I had my doctors appointment this morning and she said I am dilated to 3 cm already!! Hey...that's almost a 1/3 of the way there!!! haha.. She said "well...we'll see if we see you here next week.." but then when Pat asked her if that meant I wouldn't make it to my due date she said that it was totally possible for me to walk around at 3 cm for awhile and that I could still make it to my due date..dang it!!! She said the good news is that I have a good head start on labor....

I have come to the conclusion that people don't want me to call them anymore until I am in labor though. For the past couple weeks every time I try to call or text someone they say they got excited because they thought I was calling to say I was in labor. Don't worry people... if my first words aren't "I'm in labor" or something to that effect.. you don't have to ask!! :) I'm not holding out on you! Today I called Steph to give her an update on my doctors appt and when I said "no i'm not in labor," I actually got an "uggh...what do you want?" hahahaha.... thanks Steph! I'm just not gonna call anyone anymore until it's time!!! Then people will actually be excited to hear from me!!!

In other news.. our friends Sarah and Eddy had their baby last night at 11:30pm. They had a boy too! He was born 30 minutes before his due date. That's pretty punctual! We went to visit them this evening, and it makes me want Collin to come soooo baddly!!! He was absolutely adorable! I held him for like an hour and I just couldn't believe that we will have our own baby so soon. Pat wanted to hold him, but he is holding out for Collin to be the first baby he ever holds. Can you believe he's never held a baby before???? I think it's awesome that the first baby he holds will be his own son! :)

2/15/09

Went for a 3 mile walk today........... Nothing.....

2/14/09

Ok...so I've been hearing a lot about different things that can bring on labor. I think I've tried just about everything!

One of the things I heard to eat is eggplant parmesan. Haha..good thing it's one of my favorite foods!! Pat and I didn't want to go battle the crowds in the restaurants, so we picked up Maggianos....my favorite!

The other thing I made today were "labor cookies." hahah.. Sarah, my friend, gave me the recipe that someone had given her. They supposedly make you're water break and make you go into labor. I'm very doubtful...but anything is worth a shot..right?? These cookies are kind of crazy...they have all these spice (including Cayenne pepper!) and molasses. I was pretty sure they were gonna be terrible, but they actually aren't too bad. They taste like spicy gingerbread cookies. At first.. they're just like regular gingerbread, and then as you're finishing them the cayenne kicks in! My mouth was tingling for like 30 minutes after eating them. The recipe says "eat as many as you can and lay down and wait for labor to kick in." Hahaha.. nothing yet....... They're just gonna get me fat! Damn!

2/12/09

Went to the dr yesterday. Nothing new to report. She will check me again next week for progress. I did test negative for Strep B though so that's good. I don't have to start off labor with any antibiotics. Baby's heartbeat is still great. That's about all that happened...

2/9/09

Went for a long walk tonight trying to make this baby come!!!! Nothing yet.... :(

2/8/09

First off.... HAPPY BIRTHDAY STEPH!!!!!! Today, Steph turns 22! Hope you have a great day :)

Second.. I've been wondering a lot..and I know others have too...What will baby Collin look like when he's born???? None of us will know until he's actually born, but I just thought I'd post a poll to see what everyone thinks... so VOTE on the poll on the left!!! :)

No news to report... no signs of labor yet....

2/4/09

Yeeess!! It's finally February! I feel like I've been waiting for-e-ver for this month to come! Finally we'll have a baby this month! Well..I guess unless Collin decides to be late :( I haven't updated since our last appointment last Wednesday. I've been so busy with school stuff trying to get everything ready for when the long-term sub comes in to take over.

I'll start off with what happened at our appointment today. I was so hoping to go in and she tell me I was dilated even more...but unfortunately she didn't even check me!! Ugh!! I'm so disappointed. She said there's no point because it just causes unnecessary bleeding and its really uncomfortable....definitely true! Plus I guess it would have been even more disappointing if she had said I hadn't progressed at all since last week. So... I'll just keep telling myself that I made huge progress in one week and the baby is so close to coming.

I asked her how I know if the baby had "dropped" and she said he DEFINITELY had because he is like waaayy down in my pelvis already. She is so nonchalant though...whatever "waay down there" means... I guess that's a good sign that it's coming soon enough. Although I'm pretty convinced it's never gonna happen and I'm just gonna be 30 lbs overweight and uncomfortable forever.

The rest of the appointment was pretty pointless. They were supposed to have the results to my Strep B test but the lab was still working on it so they said I'll get those next week.

As for this weekend.... all of my close friends from back home came up to stay with me this weekend for a "girls/baby shower weekend." It was so great to catch up and see them all. On Friday when I got out of school I came home and waited for Stephanie to come in. Then we headed down to the galleria to meet up with Sul and Bigz to look at wedding dresses for Sul!! So exciting!! Then we met up with Gabs and Taryn and went to dinner. After dinner Steph and I came home and they went to pick up Zina from the airport who flew in from D.C.! I have such great friends!! They all went out that night and stayed at Gabs's place. I was so tired.. I was asleep by 10pm.

On Saturday the girls were all over at my house by 4 or so. They kicked me into my bedroom and said they needed to decorate...haha.. I took a quick nap and when I came out they had streamers all over the living room and had set up a cute table set-up with food and another for presents. The theme was little duckies. It was soo cute! We all hung out for awhile and then got dressed for dinner. We went to a place called Arcodoros down by the galleria. It was "Sardinian Italian Cuisine." So many things on the menu looked really good...but it was mostly seafood so I had to be careful with what to order since I'm not allowed to eat much seafood and I had already eaten some shrimp the night before. After dinner we came back to the house and opened all the wonderful gifts the girls gave us. Ohhh...but first.. they had a goodie bag for each of us to open so we all opened them at once and they were all cute tank tops! Mine said "mom to be" on the front and said "collin brody" on the back. Then I looked up and saw all of theirs said "Aunt to Be" and had his name on the back like mine... HOW CUUUTTEE IS THAT!??!! I thought they were adorable! We all put them on (I had to wear a shirt under because Collin wanted to stick out the bottom of the shirt a little bit....haha) We got a tone of cute clothes from everyone and Taryn actually took the time to make Collin a baby scrapbook of pictures of me. The first page says "Collin, I want you to know a little bit about your mom" It was filled with pictures of us and it had cute little sayings. It ALMOST made me cry! It was so sweet! But we all know it takes a lot for me to cry.. haha.. After all of the gifts we had probably the most delicious tres leches cake I've ever tasted! It was totally worth the extra pound I gained this week :~/

After that we sat around and talked some more and then put on a movie, but we all started falling asleep. It was pretty low key, but so nice to catch up and see all of the girls again. We really need to do that more often. But it's so great knowing that anytime there is something big going on each other's lives we are always there no matter what...

Ok...well I probably won't have too much to post again until my next appointment next week (unless of course I go into labor!!!) Here's to wishing and hoping....

Here are some pictures of the Girls weekend!


And here are some more pictures of Stoli with Pat...

1/28/09

We had our doctors appointment today! Before the appointment we had an ultrasounds and they said Collin weighs just over 6 lbs. I'm still measuring for February 25th (2 days early). They said that is in exactly the 50th percentile so he is average. When I asked the doctor how big that means he'll be if he continues at this rate and she said about 7lbs! That's such good news!! At least he's not huge already!! I was afraid Collin was going to be like 11 lbs or something absurd!

The doctor did my group b strep test and then checked my cervix to see if I was dilated at all. I'm happy to report I'm 1 cm. I've been reading some people are like 39 weeks and still 0 cm. At least I know I'm making SOME progress. I know you can stay 1-2 cm for quite awhile, but at least I know I'm getting closer. Sooo...everything seems to be going good! We'll have our next appointment next Wednesday and see if there is any more progress...

1/27/09

Ok so I'm writing a day late...

Sunday was "nesting day" I guess. We woke up and decided to go run a bunch of errands that we needed to get done. We started off by going to Babys R Us to return a few things we had gotten doubles of. We thought it would be the smart thing to go to the one further away from us because it was the area we needed to go to anyway to go to Costco. Trouble was...we got there and apparently even though they have a Babys R Us sign they consider themselves a "Babys R Us Express????" They said they could only exchange the stuff they carried there at their store. Well they took back a couple of things so it wasn't a complete waste of time. Then we went to Costco. On our way home I told Pat to go ahead and turn towards the other Babys R Us that is close to us. I figured we might as well get it all done since we were out. So we went and returned the last thing we needed to take back and decided to buy a few different things that we hadnt received. It was a bunch of little stuff like a few different types of bottles, since I keep hearing you have to try a few different ones to see what the baby will actually use. We also got some hygiene/first aid stuff like nail clippers... haha...they are so tiny that they actually have a magnifying glass on them! .... We got a baby thermometer and a couple other things I can't think of right now.

So that was about it for our day out. We got home and I had to grade papers ALL DAY after that. I guess that's about it..

Update on me... I haven't been feeling too great. I feel like I'm lucky if I get more than 4 hours of sleep total in a night. I'm dragging myself around school these days. Only 3 more weeks of school..that doesn't sound too bad...but seems like an eternity!!!! I'm hoping they go fast (or that baby Collin decides to meet us a week or 2 early)!

1/25/09

This weekend was pretty busy! I got a boost of energy to do stuff on Saturday so we got up and took Stoli over to Pat's parents, and then went to the outlet mall. Pat had been talking about going to the St. Arnold's brewery here in Houston with his friends on Saturday afternoon, and he wanted me to go, but one..it's so not fun to go hang out with everyone else getting drunk while you are the only sober one, and two... it is so backwards for a 9 month pregnant person to be seen as a brewery. Is it just me that thinks that???

Ok so we went to the outlets and were there for awhile. Then we came home, and we were talking about taking a nap but as soon as we got here I wasn't tired again so I decided to finally wash all of the baby clothes we had received and put away all of the stuff that's been sitting in our dining room since the baby showers. Then by the time I actually got tired enough to lay down for a nap it was time to get ready to go to Sarah and Eddy's baby shower. We had to leave an hour early because it was way down by Galveston.

I was planning on wearing a dress, which meant I would have to wear open shoes. I realized I really need a pedicure again! Where are you Steph????? Well...I had to attempt it myself, and I was pretty much sweating by the time I was finished from having to find any position possible to first cut my toenails and then repaint them! I wouldn't have repainted them but when I was cutting them the paint started chipping off so I had like 2 toenails on each foot painted and the other 3 weren't...so I HAD to paint them. Let's just say some prenatal yoga would have really paid off.... Good thing I can't really see my feet at this point anyways... in my mind they look pretty good.. but who knows right?? Nobody tell me any different if they notice I have nail polish anywhere on my foot but on my toenails!! ;) Ugh...and then after all that.... I realized it was too cold to wear a dress!! So I ended up wearing boots anyways...

So we went to the baby shower.. it was pretty fun. It was mostly just friends hanging out. They did something cute where they had a bunch of plain white onesies set out with markers and people could make their own onesie for the baby. Our friend Dave was in the creative zone and making all these random onesies. I made one with a monkey on it for them since their theme is monkeys.

The whole night our friend CB had been trying to feel my stomach to see if he could feel the baby kick. He started kicking while we were sitting there so I told CB where to put his hand (of course, by my rib since that is where is kicks the crap out of me!) He was so excited to feel it. Collin has been kicking me soooo hard lately!! It is really starting to hurt!! I think he must be using 2 of my ribs as practice goal posts!! "He's gonna be a socca playa.... he is... he iiiiisssss..." (Billy Madisson)

Well that was all for Saturday... I'll fill you all in on Sunday tomorrow... It's late already, and I need to get to bed!! 4 weeks left!!!

1/22/09

All the pictures I've been promising my readers!!!

This slideshow is a revised one of the baby's nursery. The old pictures are still on there, so just scroll through them to the new ones.




This slideshow is of the baby shower from Kristy and Stacey! I don't have pictures from the other baby shower yet... I'll post those as soon as I can get someone to send me some digital photos :)

1/21/09 (part 2)

We had another doctors appointment this afternoon. We got to hear Collin's heartbeat again. It's so weird knowing it's not your own heartbeat you're listening to, but really neat! They took my weight again (the low point of my day..haha) but I had only gained 1 lb in 2 weeks so that's great!! I always dread stepping on that scale. I know it's baby weight, but it's still unfortunate seeing that scale go up and up and up and up..............

Then the doctor came in an measured my belly, and I forgot to ask what the measurement was but I must still be measuring correctly because she didn't say anything. I told her I had been feeling sick so she prescribed some medicine to help with the nausea. I don't know if it's a bug or if I'm just backwards and getting morning sickness in the 3rd trimester instead of the first. I asked her if I went past my due date how long she would wait to induce and she said only 1 week, so we know for sure Collin will be here by the first week of March. I'm hoping it doesn't come to that!!!!!

We asked her about the pediatrician we picked and she said she's heard great things about her so that's good news. She also felt around my belly, pressing on different parts to feel how the baby is positioned and she said he is head down so that's good news too! No breach baby! She said his head is "waaay" down low already so I'm really hoping that means he is getting ready to come soon!!! (Of course not TOO soon! but in a few weeks) We scheduled an ultrasound for next week so they can estimate the size of the baby, but I may reschedule it for a week later so it's closer to due date time and we have a better idea of what kind of torture I'll be in come delivery day!!!!!! :0/

1/21/09

I'm staying home from school today because I was up not feeling well ALL night long! Ugh... I hope those kids at school didn't give me the stomach bug that's been going around! I only got a couple hours of sleep so I decided to go ahead and take the day off to recover. I'm not feeling great, but much better than I did last night. I really needed the sleep though. So I figured I'd finish writing about the weekend now..

My mom, Patrick and I went woke up and went to The Woodlands early Saturday morning because my mom had never been there and I wanted to go look for a dress to wear to the baby shower that afternoon. We went to Gap Maternity (their clothes fit me the best!) I found a few dresses to try on... luckily they were having a sale too! I ended up getting a really cute dress for only $13!!!! What a deal! Then we looked around a little bit and went to Borders and my mom bought a TON of baby books for Collin! :) They are all so cute! She was specifically looking for "Pat the Bunny" (which she found). I think it used to be one our favorite books when we were little. As we were checking out we saw they also had a bunch of books in the bargain section so I went to look for one, and they had a little box of baby books about little sports characters that I knew Pat would love reading to the baby. I got them and when we got in the car and I opened I saw that one of the characters (the football) was named Collin!! With 2 Ls!! How cute is that?? The book is all about good sportsmanship so I think it will be a keeper!

When we got home my aunt, cousins and grandmother were here at the house waiting to see the nursery. I think everyone likes it!! It's come together really nicely! I hurried and got dressed for the baby shower that started at 1. It was so convenient because it was at my friend Stacey's house who lives literally 4 houses down the street, so we just walked over there. It was put on by my friend Kristy as well. When we got up to the door they had put a big wooden stork outside in the yard!! It was adorable! Then inside they had decorated soo cute! Everything was decorate in brown and baby blue polka dots. Kristy had gotten a ton of party favors that were personalized. She had hershey bars that were wrapped in blue wrappers that said "It's a Boy" on the front and the back had nutritional facts like "Serving Size: One Bouncing Baby Boy" and " Hammers & Nails 20%, Baseball 20%, Hugs 20%, Sweetness 20%....Love & Joy 100%." There were also little boxes with mints inside that say "Jessica R. Daniel's Baby Shower January 17, 2009: Thanks for celebrating our Special Delivery" and then a little bundle of Hershey Kisses wrapped up with a tag that said "Ten Little fingers, Ten Little toes, Oh how fast baby Collin will Grow!" Haha... I thought that was so cute. Stacey had hand made a diaper cake also that was adorable! It has 3 tiers. The top one has all newborn diapers and then they go up in size on the next tiers. It was wrapped in brown and blue ribbon and has baby socks, bibs, etc hanging from it and then topped with baby blue shoes. It's too cute to even take apart for the diapers!! There was a TON of food too! Kristy handmade chocolate covered strawberries that were sooo good! And they had turkey spaghetti and salad and a really delicious punch made with ginger ale, grape juice and punch. We played a game where everyone had to wear a necklace and if they said the word "baby" they had to give away their necklace or take it away from someone who said it. I think Steph won at the end with the most necklaces. We also played a game where they had to guess the size of my belly!!! I thought they were going to actually get out a tape measure...but they passed around a roll of streamers and each person had to pull out as much as they thought would fit around my belly. My friend Gabs was really really close, and then it got around and Julie was the last person's paper to be measured and she was SPOT on!! It wasn't as embarrassing as I thought it would be. Haha.. The day was really fun!

Later on that night, my mom, Steph, Sam (her b/f), Pat and I went to eat at Buca di Beppo because Pat needed to carb load for the half marathon he ran in the next day. We were all pretty exhausted and went home to bed after dinner.

On Sunday, Pat and I woke up at 5am so I could take him down to the start line of the marathon. He hadn't really trained at all, but I knew he would do great. The plan was for me to just go back to meet him at the finish line and pick him up, but I dropped him off and when I got home I was too excited to see the race and go see him run that I got dressed and went to find him at mile 9 on the course. I finally saw him! It gives me a boost of energy to see people I know while I'm out there running, so I thought I would surprise him. I took him some orange slices knowing that at that point it gets pretty draining! After I saw him I went straight to the finish line. I managed to squeeze my way in (huge belly and all) to the front of the gate so I could see him as he was passing. I yelled out his name as he was coming, and he managed to come give me a high five just before crossing the finish line! :) I'm so proud of him! Me and my bright ideas signed up for 2 half marathons last year, not knowing I'd be pregnant, and Pat ended up taking them both over and doing great in BOTH!! Right after the race we had to rush back home to get ready to go to my other baby shower at my mother and sister-in laws'.

We got to their house at 12:30 when the baby shower was supposed to start. It seemed like everyone got there right at the same time! We had a really good turnout! As you walked in they had cards out for people to write down their advise for me as a new mom. I haven't gotten to read the cards yet because they are putting them in a book for me, but I can't wait to see what everyone says! Hopefully people gave us some really good advise! I feel like I can use all the help I can get right now. They had a bunch of food set out also! We all started off the shower by eating and then started playing games. The first one was a sheet of paper where there was a list of different animals and you had to guess the name of the baby animal. I was sooo bad at it! I made a lot of mine up! Like an armadillo?? Who the heck knows what a baby armadillo is called?? I wrote down roadkill. Haha... That was what the majority of my answers looked like. I only knew like 8 out of 20 real answers. :( After that we played a word jumble game where there was a list of scrambled up baby words and you had 5 minutes to unscramble them and figure out what the real words were. I did a little bit better on this one... like 12 out of 20. Haha... I didn't win either game.. or even come close! After the games we opened gifts and ate cake. There were soo many gifts!! I loved everything we got, but my favorite thing we got this weekend was a photo shoot with the photographer from our wedding for 4 different sessions when the baby is growing up throughout the first year!! My mom gave us a box and I opened it and it had a few different things for bathing the baby, and then there was a card. I opened it and it had one of our engagement pictures on the front and said "You've come a long way, Baby!" And then inside it says the gift is for 4 photo shoots : when the baby is 1 week, 3 months, 6 months, and 1 year old. We will get to pick 10 pictures from each session and then they will be bound in a leather book for us to have. I can't wait!!!!!! Besides that, we got soooooo many nice gifts this weekend! THANK YOU SOOO MUCH to everyone for their amazing generosity!!! We are pretty much set for Collin to come! Now he just needs to decide when he'll make his appearance. Hopefully sooner than later!!!!!

1/19/09

It's been awhile since I posted! It was a really busy weekend!! I had a bunch of family come in this weekend, and I had 2 baby showers in one weekend!! We got soooo much stuff!!! Our house is full of stuff now. Our dining room is pretty much Babys R Us waiting to be unpacked.

Ok...well I'll start off with Friday. Stephanie came in and we hung out for awhile. Then we went to a basketball game at school. Our sophomore team lost by one point right as the buzzer rang! Bummer! Our JV team looked horrible so I'm sure we lost. We left at halftime. We waited for Pat to get off work and then decided to go met up with him for dinner at Joe's Crab Shack. Steph and I both thought it sounded good because they have delicious french fries. Pat was saying he didn't want to go there if they still got up and danced around. I was like "i'm sure they don't do that anymore." I hadn't been there in a really long time. He reluctantly agreed but said "if they bust out with the macarena we're walking out." Haha..so I agreed... being positive they wouldn't play that song from the early 90s.

When we were at the bar waiting to be seated the lady next to us had a glass of white zinfandel with like 5 cherries at the bottom. It looked SOOO good! Haha... I could definitely go for wine soaked cherries right now! My virgin strawberry daquiri will have to sufice for now. Ok so they sat us down and we had crab and shrimp balls as an appetizer and they were just as good as I remember! So this is about the point the first song came on when they turned down the lights and started walking around the restaurant singing. Oooops.... Well they have these new things on the menu called steam pots. They had a bunch of different kinds to choose from. We decided between the 3 of us to order 2 and share them. As we were eating my mom called and said they were almost here. While I was trying to give them directions on the phone I saw something that looked like gum on the side of one of the pails but I pointed it at it and neither Steph or Pat were paying attention. When I got off the phone I said "is that gum?" and Pat said "no it's just shell" and grabbed it. It DEFINITELY was NOT shell!! It was sooo gross!! I stopped eating! Pat went to wash his hands and came back and actually wanted to keep eating! Eeww!! We told the waiter and the manager came over and ended up comping our entire meal (minus the 1 beer Pat had). We only paid like $4 for the whole meal! No wonder people pull scams at restaurants!! hahah... Ohhhh and I forgot to mention...to make the meal EVEN better.. the macarena DID come on!!!!! Right around the time of the gum incident. Haha... I'm not sure we'll be going back there again!

Ok... I'm going to post the rest about the weekend later...

1/14/09

Last night was crazy....we went to a breastfeeding class... I thought it was going to be totally awkward, but it wasn't too bad...we didn't have to pull out our breasts or anything! I didn't know what to expect!! Haha...

Pat and I went in to the class in a bad mood though because as we were driving up we saw some of the MOST annoying people walking in. They were in our class on Saturday. Seriously.... MOST annoying!! Pat and I were rolling our eyes the entire time. So there is this girl and her mom was signed up for the class with her. It turns out that the baby's father came in from Louisiana so he came too. Is that fair...that the rest of us pay per couple and they get 3 people????? The mom kept making stupid comments the entire time. We walked in and it turned out there was a $10 charge per couple but they had accidentally notified people that it was free. Well as she was taking the money this lady kept saying she would have paid $50 for it....Pat and I were like "can we charge her $51 so she'll leave???" Even the lady the teaches the class obviously wanted her to shut up!! Haha... well hopefully we never have to see them again. Ohh...AND just to give you an idea of how crass these people were... I had to go to the restroom at some point during the class.. there was a single restroom near the conference room but this girl was in there. I tried going to the cafeteria where the big restrooms were but it was locked because it had closed for the night. So I went to wait for the single restroom and I literally waited like 10 minutes outside.... that's not the bad part... I understand if people have problems... but I hurried up and went and somehow beat her back to the conference room...just to hear her announce quite loudly that "her stomach was f*$&ed up!" Wow...really??... keep it to yourself....

Other than the trio of backwards individuals.... the class was really informative. She pretty much just talked for 2 hours about how to get started and the best positions to hold the baby. Now let's see if I can actually do it. I might have some trouble because of the PCOS, but when I asked her she said she would come help us when the baby comes and we'd just have to wait and see how it goes...

Other than that.. Pat and I went to meet with our potential pediatrician today. My friend Kristy recommended her. I wasn't sure if we were going to have to meet with other pediatricians, but after we met with her Pat was like "she's the one!" We both felt really comfortable with her, and she was really easy to talk to. She was super friendly and even though we were just there for a free consultation she never seemed like she was in a rush to finish the conversation or anything. She has 3 kids of her own.. actually 2 of her own and she adopted a little girl from China. I thought that was really neat. She answered all of our questions and she seems like she is going to be great with baby Collin. I also liked that she said she makes it a point to call people back personally, not just have the nurse do it. She also said no matter what that a sick child is always seen either the day you call or the next day. They don't tell you they are all booked up. And she said an infant is ALWAYS seen that day. They even see patients on Saturdays and they have a protocol for Sundays where the doctor will follow up with you and see if it can wait until Monday or if it needs to be addressed immediately. The other thing that I really liked right away was that when I introduced myself and said a friend of mine had referred us, she asked who it was. I figured she would pretend and be nice, but not actually remember who Kristy was since they have so many patients, but she right away knew who she was and started talking about Lexi and asked if I was a teacher also...so she must actually get to know her patients and families well. That makes me feel really comfortable...

Ok well that's all for now... 44 days and counting down...

1/10/09

Today was such a long day! We had our childbirth marathon class at the hospital. It went all the way from 9-4:30!! It was like information overload though... I can't say I actually remember any of it now that I'm writing about it..

Of course they showed the dreaded birthing video!! I wasn't ever planning on watching one of these...EVER!! The way I see it... I don't know why I need to see EXACTLY what happens!! I mean.. I'm gonna do what I have to do.. no need preparing visually for it!! I was fully expecting to watch the video and decide on keeping this baby in my belly forever so I wouldn't have to go through it, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Don't get me wrong.. it was pleasant to watch...but it wasn't traumatizing either..

The class started by all of us introducing ourselves..first the pregnant women and then the men. To get the partners involved the teacher had a bunch of index cards with "dirty" pregnancy words. Each guy had to pick one and say it out loud (sort of an ice-breaker to make everyone laugh). She then defined what the words were after each person. I was hoping Pat would get a really funny one.. but he got off easy with cervix... haha.. Nothing too embarrassing..

Anyways..the class continued with her giving us a bunch of information on all of our options when it comes to having the baby and signs of deliver and how to look for them...

At the end of the class we did some breathing exercises. The first thing she made us do was grab a handful of ice chips and squeeze our hand and hold it for a minute. Our men were supposed to ignore us and give no support to the pain. It was just to make us aware of what we do with our bodies when we're in pain... like walking around, flinching, etc..... go figure. It was totally painful though!!!! If thats nothing compared to childbirth I'm in trouble... Well then she showed us different positions that can help us relax while we're in labor and had our husbands help with relaxing techniques. The best one was at the end... she had us lay on the floor on our sides and had the men massage our backs. She was talking about relaxing your muscles (like they do at the end of a yoga class). Then she had us grab a handful of ice again but kept going with the relaxation technique. When she told us to get rid of the ice I didn't even realize it had been 2 1/2 minutes!!! Crazy!! I guess consciously trying to relax actually helps.... Hmmm..we'll see about that when I'm actually in labor....

Well other than the class.. everything is fine. Collin is still moving around a ton. I'm busy getting everything ready for my leave from work on February. My last day will be February 20. That should leave me a few days to rest before the baby comes. Then I'll have 12 weeks off work so I'll only need to go back for a week and a half at the end of the year. I wasn't sure how long to take, but I just can't imagine leaving our baby in daycare at 6 or 8 weeks. At least when I have to go back for the last week Pat will be finished with school, and then I'll be off for the summer. I'm excited that I'll be lucky enough to get to spend all that time with Collin when he comes! :)

1/7/09

Sorry... I promised my readers that I would post a couple days ago and fell behind... I'm here to give an update now...

Monday was our first day back to school. It was only a teacher workday so it wasn't too bad, but waking up early again after having two weeks off and sleeping in every day was very difficult. We got there and they had chick-fil-a breakfast for all of us, so I guess that's always a plus to any morning. We had to get our grades for the first semester finalized and then work in our rooms to get everything ready for the students on Tuesday. I got lesson plans finished too for the next 2 months... I'm so on top of things!! Once I got home from school I played with Stoli for awhile and prepared to watch the Fiesta Bowl to root on our Horns. The game was supposed to start at 6:30, but of course didn't start until an hour later. As I watched time go by all I could think about was how late I was going to be up and how tired I'd be on Tuesday. I figured if the game was a blow-out I could just go to sleep early... well NO SUCH LUCK!! Man... it was a close one!! I didn't think we were playing all that great. I don't know why we even had our O-line on the field! They probably could have just sat on the bench and the game would have ended the same... practically the same with the defense. Muschamp better step up his game before he takes over for us as head coach!! Haha... I act like I actually know what I'm talking about!! Well either way... I thought it was over when OSU scored their final touchdown. I can't believe we scored to win the game with only 16 seconds left!! They made that touchdown look so easy that I can't figure out why they were having such a hard time the entire game until the last minute!! Of course I was so excited about the game that I got about 4 1/2 hours of sleep the night before school started! Well worth it the bloodshot eyes I had in the morning!

Tuesday was brutal.... it was nice to see some of the students... of course, others not so much... But overall the day wasn't soo bad. I was just excited about Pat was coming home! It's lonely here at home without him. I was planning on taking a nap when I got home from school since I had gotten so little sleep, but I was too excited to have company again that I watched a movie instead. Him and Steph finally came in around 6. They brought me a "Fiesta Bowl Champions" t-shirt that even had the scored printed on it already!! We went to dinner, but as soon as we got home I hit a wall!! I was so tired! I went to sleep kind of early...

School was just another ordinary day today. Back to routine as usual...

In baby news:
We had another appointment today. I was shocked because we didn't even have to hardly wait. We sat down and they took us back in less than 5 minutes... that's never happened before at a doctor's office! AND the waiting room was packed! Even the doctor came into the room really fast too! Made my day so much better for not having to wait around... My weight was good today! Right on track... no extra holiday pounds this time! :) The doctor measured my belly and said I was measuring "spot on" so that's perfect! Also the nurse had us listen to the doppler for the heartbeat and said "sounds perfect... can't complain about that!" I guess that means Collin is growing just as he should! The dr. answered a bunch of questions for us about what to expect in the next few weeks, what will happen when the baby is born, etc... Overall.. it was a great office visit. They almost seem pointless since they don't do much, but it's neat to hear the heartbeat and have them tell us we are right on track! :) Now I just hope the days go fast!!

Oohhhh yeah!! And I can't forget how excited we were to get home and have a ton of boxes from UPS on our doorstep!! We got our big baby car seat from my dad that we can use from when Collin is born until the next few years of his life. I want to install it, but I don't want to be the weird lady driving around with a car seat and no baby... My family also got our infant car seat which you can hook into your car when the baby is an infant, and you can use it to carry the baby around everywhere!! AND they sent us the play yard!! Soo exciting!! It feels like its getting so close!!!! Ohh...and the final thing that was missing for the nursery came in! My brother and his fiance, Andrea, sent us the wooden letters of Collin's name to put in the wall. Thank you to everyone for sending us our great gifts!!! I was going to post pictures of the nursery already, but I'll wait and put them up as soon as we get the name put up. Will try to do it ASAP!! :)

1/4/09

I woke up this morning at like 9:30, but laid in bed until like 11:30. Then I was finally so bored that I got up, took a shower, and went to Wal-Mart and Blockbuster. Ever since then I've been laying on the couch watching "The L Word." I didnt realize how provocative that show was!! Well...at least it kept me entertained today. I've been working on the blanket I'm cross-stitching for the baby all day too. As long as it takes, if I keep working on it at this rate, I should be able to finish it by the time Collin is 3 years old!!

Speaking of Collin, he's been actively kicking all day. I guess he rested the past few days and now he's making up for it. Well I guess I've gotta get some sleep tonight so I'm going to head off to bed soon. I'll update after my first day back to school tomorrow.

1/3/09

Wow...it's been awhile since I posted!! Hopefully you guys haven't stopped checking in... I haven't had much to post about, but now I'll update on everything that's been going on for the past few days..

On the 31st, we woke up and Pat said he hadn't felt the baby kick in awhile so when he started moving around I told him to put his hand on my belly. He started out softly moving around..and then he started kicking REALLY hard!! Pat said one of them felt like he scratched me! Haha... It kind of hurt!! I think the rough-housing with his daddy has started already!! :)

My mom came up late the afternoon of the 31st with Simba, her shar pei. We were worried he would be difficult to have here, but he's been pretty easy-going. We had to partition the house into 2 parts though. We didn't really make any big plans for the new year, even though we had a few options. Some of Pat's friends from high school that were in town went to a club in Houston, but can you believe they charge $50 to get in?!?! And it's not like I can drink anyways! Forget it! Some of our other friends were going to another bar, but again..the no drinking thing makes it kind of boring. So instead we had our friends Kevin and Stacey (our neighbors) over and we bar-b-qued, watched football and played Battle of the Sexes. Stacey and I dominated the guys (of course)!! It was pretty low-key, but I know 2009 is going to be a great and exciting year!!!

The past couple days we haven't done much either.. just kind of hang out around the house and rest. I've been waking up late and then taking a nap in the afternoon! I don't know how I'm gonna handle waking up at 5:30 am again starting Monday!! Uggh!

Steph drove in this morning to drop off a bunch of stuff my mom had sent up with her from McAllen for the baby's room. She brought us our bassinet and 2 really neat paintings my mom got for Collin's room. They are both sports jerseys, one football and one baseball. They both have his name on it and the #21 (the day we found out I was pregnant with him)! Ohh yeah! And also a book rack that you hang on the wall for all the cute baby books we'll be reading him! Andrea (Pat's sister) already bought us 3 classics to put in there: 2 Dr. Suesse books (Green Eggs and Ham, One Fish Two Fish, Red Fish Blue Fish) and Polar Express. I can't wait to read them to him!! There's a few others I can think of that I need to make sure I get too.

Steph also came in to pick up Pat because they left for Arizona to see the Fiesta Bowl with my dad. Sooo lucky!! Not fair! I can't believe I had to get left behind. Ohh well...Hook 'Em Horns!!

After they left I went to get a prenatal massage.. it was actually really awesome! I was thinking of asking if I could get that message even when I'm not pregnant?? haha... They'd probably think it was weird, but I thought it was great! Maybe I just really needed it!!! When I got home from the massage my mom was putting together the bassinet.. haha..and having a hard time doing it! But she did it and it great!! It's already in our room waiting for the baby to come. I would post pictures of it, but Pat has the camera in Arizona, so I guess they'll have to wait. My mom is now upstairs putting all the stuff up on the walls in the nursery. Good thing she's here doing that because who knows when we'd actually get around to doing it!! Boredom has pretty much set in... I'm now on my second viewing of 27 Dresses today alone... I should probably try to get to bed early today since I have to get back in the routine day after tomorrow :(

I'll post new pictures of the nursery and bassinet soon!