Three Weeks Ago...

.....I had just painted Mikey's room the Thursday before


(Sorry, the pictures are blurry and the room is messy and the chair railing isn't up yet...but it's the best I've got)

and now it was Saturday, so it was time to grocery shop, weed, pick up dog poop, walk the dog, clean the house, etc...My normal schedule. I was going to bed at 11:30 and my normal braxton hicks that I'd been having regularly since 15 weeks started feeling like they were hurting more than normal. I ignored it and went to sleep.

At 1:30, I was awake and in pain. I laid in bed for two hours talking myself in and out of thoughts of whether or not I was in labor and then decided that if I took a bath and they went away, then I definitely wasn't in labor. When that didn't take them away, I walked around for a while, thinking if they went away after that, then I wasn't in labor. When they still didn't, we called Michaels parents to come to be with Mikey and we went to the Women and Infants Pavillion.

We checked in at 4:45 and at 5:30 they checked me and I was dilated to a 5/6. My doctor was out of town for Memorial Day weekend so the doctor on call decided that at 35 weeks she would rather just stop the labor. So she gave me some medicine to stop my contractions and for an hour I got used to the idea that I was going home. Then they checked me and I was a 6/7.

So I thought that maybe I had a chance, but they kept giving me the medicine that made my contractions very random and far apart. At 9 in the morning, the doctor said that there was not stopping my labor and took me off the medicine. Then I had my regular contractions back. It was actually the best labor because that was the hardest part and it only lasted just over an hour before I got my epidural.

The nurse checked me at 11:30 and told me I was at a 10 and was going to call the doctor. I didn't believe her. With Mikey, when I was at a ten, I couldn't NOT push. I didn't even know I was a ten this time. The doctor came and asked if I was ready. I said, sure. She said, wow, you're pretty calm. I said, ya, I know. Weird. (It really was wierd)

(WARNING: gross part coming up, but it's Michael's favorite part...)

The doctor told me I could push and so I pushed once, not even full out and my water broke and shot four feet ahead and soaked the doctor's hair and face. I was pretty embarrassed, but by the time I stopped laughing and two pushes later, Riley came out.

He didn't pass his APGAR for breathing so they took him to NICU for four hours, but then I finally got to hold him and really, he hasn't barely let me put him down since. Pretty easy day, really. I feel like I cheated. One month less of being pregnant, barely any pain (during or after labor) and a really good baby.

Riley relaxing while on his billirubin lights...he's a blue ET

With his early arrival though, I had an unfinished list of things to do that I've been working on slowly, but it's still looming over my every day tasks. These include:

Finish a quilt from the material my mom sent me. And cover my burp cloths.



Cover my bumper that I got for a dollar on ebay and hang the stars and vinyl in the nursery

Finish my bird mobile that looks like this

But is supposed to look like this

(Insert random nursery shots....)

Figure out how I'm supposed to fit in the walking the dog and playing with Mikey and excersizing and cleaning and cooking all while holding a baby and getting by on a nightly schedule that hardly varies from what happened last night:

11:30- Go to bed

12:30- Get woken up by Michael going to bed

1:00- Feed Riley

1:30- Get in bed

2:15- Comfort Mikey who is getting over a cold and the flu (along with me and Riley-yucky week)

3:00-3:30- listen to the blasted dog whine for food (why so early? I wish I knew)

4:00- Feed baby

5:00- Change fussy baby

5:30- Michael works in LA today so his alarm goes off

6:15- Mikey wakes up

Rest of Day- I walk around as a zombie making food, cleaning, grocery shopping, going to library, etc, etc, etc...other moms, you know the drill.

Will I ever sleep again?

Will someone nice take the dog off my hands so I don't have to feel guilty that I can't play with her or walk her like I used to?

Will my to do list ever end?

Things I have to say I love about having a new baby though:

Mikey loving "Baby Liley"

Mikey playing by himself more

Mikey flying like Buzz...

Mikey painting Mickey. My parents got him a bunch of stuff to do while I'm nursing the baby and as you can tell, he LOVES it.

Riley's soft little face that is getting chubby already (he's already grown over two inches too!)

The smell of Pampers diapers

The excuse to see family more

My sons with my husband

Saying "my sons"

Life is good....

Circle of Life

My grandma Turley, my dad's mother, passed away Tuesday morning. We had been kind of expecting it for a few days so we got to say our goodbyes, but it was still unexpected at the same time. Riley got circumcised yesterday and has an eye infection, so we weren't able to make the trip up. We send our hugs and kisses to all our family and we miss Grandma greatly. She was such a loving, funny person and I wish I could go and say goodbye.

This was the best picture I could find right now.

We love you, Grandma!

Happy Birthday, Mikey!

Today is Mikey's 2nd birthday!

To say we've had a busy week and Mikey deserved some attention is an understatement. I want to say before anything how grateful I am for all the help I had this week. My parents were here taking Mikey away while we got new carpet in our whole house, taking him to movies and making sure he had a good week. Michael's family had Mikey the first couple days and came in the middle of the night when I found out Riley wasn't waiting to come out. Thank you SO much!

Mikey is such a bright light in our lives and we are so blessed to have this funny little guy! He has been asking for a CARS party for months. I didn't get to do what I wanted with the party and we had to postpone any friends coming over and limit it to family with the addition of Riley, but Mikey seemed to have a good day and I was happy he was happy.

McQueen pinata and cupcakes and cake.

Mikey blew out his own candles.

Our families spoiled Mikey like crazy and we took a bunch of pictures, but he was sitting in front of a window and almost none of them worked out. Thank you everyone for his cool gifts, sorry I didn't document them. Mikey got this bike from his daddy and he hasn't had much time away from it since.

Mikey attempting to break the pinata.

I will tell the birth story of this little guy....

But, not today. Hopefully in the next few days I can post some more pictures of Riley and all the family we've had around. He's doing well. He's on billirubin lights right now because he's jaundice and hopefully those will start helping soon. He is such a calm baby so far, really just sleeps and eats. I know it's a newborn thing, but Mikey never did that, so it's been much appreciated.

Mikey has been a really good big brother...

But we've also had a lot of this....

So when things calm down a little bit, I'll be sure to have Riley's story and a LOT of pictures. For now...

Happy Birthday Mikey!!!!

Sunday's Surprise....

Someone decided to join our family four weeks early....

Riley Easton Creel

6 pounds

18 inches

May 24, 2009

What's New?

Things have been staying busy around here and I am too lazy to find the time to document it. Here are a couple pictures of what we've been up to.

Mikey went to his first baseball game. There's a triple A team here in Lancaster called the Jethawks and we went to a game a couple weeks ago. Mikey actually only watched minutes of the game. Not because he was running around, but because he was OBSESSED with the mascot. He has a picture of him in his room. We thought he'd be scared but he couldn't take his attention off of him. It was funny.

Mikey and Michael have enjoyed watching the Lakers games together. They barely made it past this last series and we're hoping for less nailbiting games coming up. I love watching Mikey and Michael together. Michael is Mikey's hero 100%.

Michael's sister and mom threw me a diaper shower about a week ago. It was beautiful. It's hard accepting a shower when you're having your second boy, but it was fun to get a break and get together with my friends. Here's a quick picture of the stash. Sorry it's not a very good one. We were really blessed and got way more than we needed.

Don't mind the mess in the crib, but these are the diapers and wipes we got at the shower. I am happy to report that I won't have to buy diapers for the first few months of our little guys life, maybe longer. Everyone is SO generous. I'm hoping I won't have to buy Mikey diapers either, but potty training isn't going so well....

Michael's sister made me this adorable diaper cake.

And gave me these beautiful roses.

Here's the only belly shot I have this whole pregnancy. I told you I've been lazy. Here I am at 34 weeks. I've been warning you I'm huge!

Training the dog has been going better than expected. She is behaving really well and we're happy with her. Mikey loves her. She gives him hi-fives and he thinks it's the coolest thing.

And, if you were thinking my son looked like a sweaty mop-head in all his pictures, you were right. I finally got up the guts to hold him down and let him cry his way through a haircut. It wasn't pretty and it took forever, but I'm happy with the results. Here's my cutie! Two in less than two weeks! Wow! This is his attempt at smiling for the camera. We're working on it.

As I've been promising, there are more pictures to come. We have yet to post pictures of the house or anything because I am weird and want it to all be finished. So, the nursery and Mikey's room should be finished this week and hopefully we'll be getting our new flooring as well. It would've been done sooner but I've been sucked into a few good books while Mikey napped instead of working on the projects that keep piling up. But, the nesting instinct is hitting hard and this is bound to be a productive week!

Pretty Colors

I love the colors this time of year. Everything is so bright and vibrant.

This is the tree in our front yard. It's been looking dead since we moved in so we were quite surprised to see it so beautiful. I love it!

Mikey is getting old so fast. I know he looks like an old man in these pictures, but that's not quite what I'm talking about. He's just so big though....