WHEN DID MY KIDS GROW SO FAST? I MUST HAVE BLINKED!
It's hard to believe that Carolina is now 10 1/2 months old. Where has the time gone? Between school, work, dance class, and a bunch of other time consuming tasks, Carolina continues to grown into a small person with her own ideas and thoughts. She's starting to protest in her own way, can sign "more" and "hi", and has begun to see the power behind self-propulsion. She is not yet crawling, but she is moving intentionally on the ground now, and I believe she will be crawling any time now.
Here are some cute pics from Christmas. Jeff took them for me as a gift, and I love them all!
Victoria and Kaylei at Jordan Valley Park I love her free spirit!
They will always be my babies
Doesn't this picture make you want to hug her?
Victoria is such a free spirit...I love that about her! I hope that she continues to be true to herself, even as others begin to change into what others expect. Victoria will be celebrating her 8th birthday in 11 days!
Carolina loves her big sis! Her face lights up like a Christmas tree whenever big sis is in the room. I'm so glad she adores her big sis...we all think Victoria is pretty cool:) Carolina will be 8 months old in 2 days!
I need help getting it all done! Now that I am working 4 jobs (I know, I'm crazy), I have decided to hire someone to help me clean my home. We will have a woman clean our place every other week, and I'm looking forward to feeling a bit of relief. Jeff is not as excited about this, but I know this will help our marriage.
I am also getting help organizing my space as well as with decorating our space. I feel that the 1st step is to admit I have a problem, and now that I have done that, I'm ready for whatever intervention deemed necessary, even purging some of our junk from our lives. If I had the guts, I'd pack up everything I haven't looked at in the past 6 months and take it to our local homeless shelter, Fresh Start. The problem is I feel like there may be a time when I would "need" that something I haven't looked at in the past 6 months.
On a child note: Carolina is sitting up now:) She loves life from her new perspective. She also loves her new daycare setting at MSU, as do her parents! They are so positive. Victoria will be starting at a new school on Wednesday. We decided to send her to her home school as opposed to sending her to Delaware. We want her to start making friends she will have in middle school. Wish us luck!
I promise we are all alive and kickin'. We've had a busy summer, and haven't had as many opportunitites to blog. Here are some quick updates:
VICTORIA: Victoria attended Summer Pals in June and loved her class. She studied dinosaurs and can now tell you our state dinosaur, as well as facinating facts about these beloved creatures. She has even adopted her very own dinosaur, Marisol, and helped host a dinosaur baby shower. Victoria will be in 2nd grade this fall, and is thrilled to be possibly sharing the same teacher with Kaylei.
CAROLINA: Carolina is now approaching her 5th month, and is a very happy baby. She has been sleeping through the night (8pm-5am), and enjoys rolling from her back to her belly. She has discovered that she is delicious, and therefore "eats" her hands all day long. Bibs don't stay dry very long in our house, but she manages to make saliva look adorable. Carolina will start going to a sitter when her mom goes back to work in the fall.
JEFF: Jeff has taken over as Southwest Sports Editor for CPI, working with two other sports reporters on three publications, covering eight schools. Check out his sports blog @: southwestsports.wordpress.com. He is getting close to attaining "Apprentice Barista" status at Kaldi's and is also carving out time to train for his second 1/2 marathon.
MELODY: Melody taught summer school in June, and despite popular belief, she LOVED it! She taught the Developmental Speech and Language class, and had 9 students. She learned a lot about teaching, and hopes to teach the class again next summer. She has also started worked prn (as needed) at Cox South Acute Care Therapy Dept. as a Speech Pathologist. She loves the challenge presented in the acute setting and will work one weekend a month and occasional holidays throughout the year. She will continue to work for Springfield Schools full-time.
Carolina had her first of many vaccinations today. 7 years ago, I remember Victoria receiving 2 shots at 2 months, but Carolina received 4 vaccines--3 shots and 1 oral vaccine. She has been pretty fussy today. I can usually calm her down when she is crying, but it's been a bit more difficult than most days. I took today off from work, and I'm glad I did!
I have been back to work for 1 week now, and I must admit it's been easier than I expected. Other than feeling extremely sleep-deprived, I have managed to see my kids at work, and keep a smile on my face around my coworkers. Carolina is now 2 months old, and I have 13 workdays left until summer break!
Mother's day was a treat. Carolina (and Jeff) gave me my 1st gift--Jeff fed Carolina a bottle at 3 am so I could get 5 hours of sleep. Despite walking with every cry, I still managed to sleep most of those 5 hours. Victoria and Jeff gifted me with a gift certificate to Grove Spa and breakfast. Then, Jennifer and I took the girls shopping and to the park. Eric made us lunch, and we finished out the evening at Ocean Zen for an amazing dinner and Andy's for dessert.
No, I'm not talking about Jeff or myself taking to the bottle. Carolina took her first bottle of breastmilk today. There was a lot of whining, crying, and one huge scream...and that was from me! Carolina was confused at first, but after I held her and the bottle for a while, she figured out that this bottle-feeding thing wasn't too bad after all. I, on the other hand, still felt saddened by the fact that my daughter was now taking a bottle. This is the beginning of my personal wheening from my daughter. A week from today, I will be back at work, and throwing my own little fits that I am not with my daughter 24/7. But, I think that I too will get used to it.
You read correctly, Carolina has reached a developmental milestone...
Carolina cried her first tears. While I was changing her diaper, Carolina had a bit of an accident, therefore her diaper change took longer than expected. She started crying, and before I knew it, her tiny little eyes were welling up with tiny tears. They did not leave her tiny eye sockets, but they did pool up. I knew it was developmental, but it still made me sad that I made my baby cry tears.
From left to right: Melody with 2 week old Carolina, Sarah with almost 3 month old Asher, and Kim with 3 week old Luke I think the adults enjoyed the playdate more than the kiddos, but we will label this event their first "playdate" nonetheless!
The doctor released us Wednesday morning, after Carolina's bilirubin levels fell off the chart. She was all the way down to about 7.5, two points below where she was last Saturday. No bili blanket, no restricts, nothing. Just go home.
So we are finally getting settled in and figuring out what "normal" life will be like now with two beautiful daughters. Carolina is feeding well, except for a span of a couple of hours early this morning where she couldn't make up her mind if she wanted to eat or sleep. She got her first bath at home today and really seemed to enjoy the first day of the NCAA Tournament.
Victoria seems to be doing well, too. She was kind of quiet for a few days. I think it wore on her having Mommy, Daddy and baby sister in the hospital for about 5 1/2 out of the past 7 days. Luckily we have incredible family members who have taken good care of her and are trying to make her feel special.
Thanks for all the kind words, prayers and support over the past week. They have helped more than you know.
Here we are at the hospital again, on the pediatric floor. I'm on the hospital bed, blogging away. Melody's in a chair next to me enjoying American Idol. And Carolina? She's in a bili bed, trying to get rid of her jaundice.
She had to stay an extra day at the hospital because of her jaundice, but was released to go home Saturday afternoon. We took her in to see Dr. B. Monday for a check-up and her bilirubin levels had spiked pretty high. The decision was made, then, to admit her for a day or two for some extensive phototherapy to get the bilirubin down and some normal color back to her skin (she had begun to look pumpkiny).
So far so good. Her bilirubin had dropped from 18, to 15. From 15 to 11 and from 11 to 10.3. Dr. B wants to get it into the single digits before letting her go home Wednesday morning. The "acceptable" range for her at 5 days old was around 14, so she's well within that now as a 6-day old. I'm just trying to remind myself that she will be okay.
This has been hard. Carolina's heels are spotted red from all the times they've had to draw blood. Both Melody and I are a bit stir crazy from being in a hospital room for so long and it's just hard to see our Sweet Pea go through this.
We also battle feeling selfish. Here around us are all these children with real, serious illnesses. Things that may affect the rest of their lives. Our baby just has jaundice and, really, that's not so uncommon. It's possible that this could cause her some long-term problems, but it's not very likely. Who are we to think we have it so hard?
Keep us in your thoughts. We're trying to put a positive spin on all this. Carolina's health will be good and soon we'll all be at home together. Plus, she's just so adorable in her bili bed. She has these cool shades velcroed to her head right now. I think they look like stunner shades. I want t draw some horizontal lines on them so she'll look like Kanye in the "Stronger" video. Come on, tell me this:
doesn't remind you of this:
Hopefully we'll have more good news to share tomorrow.
She was born at 6:37 p.m. today, Wednesday, March 12. She checked in at 5 lbs, 8 ozs and - knock wood - has managed to stay out of the NICU. They are making sure she is able to maintain both her body temp and blood sugar. Her blood sugar is looking good, though she's still a bit on the cold side.
Melody did fantastic! Once things started moving, they really moved! She only had to push a couple of times. She's resting comfortably right now. She is an amazing mother.
Victoria got to meet Carolina today and is just over the moon. Big ear-to-ear grin plastered on that girl's face. She keeps saying "She's so cute!" She hasn't gotten to hold her yet, but hopefully that will change tomorrow.
Carolina's lung capacity drew rave reviews from passers-by in the hall and she has curly, wispy dark hair. I think are eyes are dark brown. Melody and Victoria say blue. I'm still not sure how our perceptions could be that far apart.
We're pumping milk for a while so they can monitor how much Carolina's eating. Once she's all stabilized we'll be able to feed. I'm gonna go catch a nap now. We pump again in about three hours.
Thanks to everyone for your prayers, love and kind words today. Delivering a baby at 35 weeks has its pitfalls, but so far we've managed to twice deliver two very healthy babies 5 weeks early.
Here''s a Slide Show of the newest citizen of the world, Ms. Carolina Lily Kessinger. Leave your love as a comment here and I'll pass it along.
Jeff
P.S. - Just so there's no confusion, it's pronounced "Care-uh-LEE-nuh", not "Care-uh-LINE-uh," like the mighty Tar Heels.
I don't intend to keep the weight of this "weigh-in" on my shoulders for too long. Now that I am at this weight, I've decided to take it easy when it comes to when and what I eat. Don't worry, I have entered into a nauseous phase, so I really am not stuffing my face. On the contrary, I really need to focus on eating something even if I don't feel hungry. I have a "little" bundle of joy to nurture!
Weight gain: 30 lbs @ 34 weeks of pregnancy (+4 in last 2 weeks)
We are thrilled to be able to share this experience with our family and friends. Check it out often, as we will be updating our blog frequently. As Carolina grows, we hope to continue to share all the fun things our family is doing!
