Thanksgiving Table
I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving with family. This was my view from the end of the table.
1 comment November 27th, 2008
Archive for November, 2008
Not forgotten
Carlee is here, but we haven’t forgotten about our other two! I got to spend the morning with Colby and Kennedy earlier this week. Haircut for Colby and then playground at McD’s.
Add comment November 20th, 2008
Nothing’s wrong.
Wow, what a week it has been. Carlee is 8 days old now and only recently have I been able to process the events that happened on the day of her birth. I’ll share Carlee’s birth story later (It is without a doubt the highlight of the whole experience, other than looking into sweet Carlee’s face.) but I wanted to recount some of the details from my perspective.
Carlee was born at 1:48 pm. EMTs arrived at 1:58 pm. Those 10 minutes were probably the quickest 10 minutes of my life, because I didn’t know what was happening to her and I didn’t want them to take my baby away from me. When she was born, I was so relieved and so excited to get to hold her; I scooped her up in my arms and held her close to me. She squeezed my fingers. Erin asked me to put Carlee down and gave her oxygen immediately. I vaguely remember asking what was wrong? Was she not breathing correctly? I don’t remember the answer because I could tell by Carlee’s blue face and her not crying.
In that instant, I should have panicked. I should have broken down with such emotion and heartache (which is what I’m doing now, just thinking about it). Instead, I was filled with peace, knowing that nothing’s wrong with Carlee. This peace was so overwhelming that I actually felt time stand still as I looked into my baby girl’s eyes. I knew she would be okay. I just didn’t know when.
Erin told me she was glad I didn’t start hemorrhaging, because usually when a baby crashes, the Mom crashes as well. The whole time I was thinking about John 10:27 – “My sheep know my voice and I know them…” I started talking to Carlee and telling her, “This is your mommy; I’m here! I’m so glad to see you. You are beautiful.” I knew Carlee knew my voice.
For 10 long minutes we waited. As soon as the EMTs arrived, she started “pinking up” and responding. As soon as she got to the hospital, the ER docs said she looked fine and they transported her up to the NICU. All the tests came back with glowing numbers. Nothing’s wrong.
I had quite a time delivering my placenta – when the EMTs arrived, I was sitting on the floor, placenta and umbilical cord intact. Erin cut the cord so they could take Carlee to the hospital. (It is common practice for midwives to delay cord clamping so that the baby receives all nutrients possible from the Mom.) So when I needed to deliver the placenta, I distinctly remember saying, “I can’t.” I didn’t want to be away from Carlee. I wanted her there with me. So Erin prayed something like, “Lord, you have this in your hands.” I prayed too, knowing that the pain was only temporary, because nothing’s wrong. Within a few minutes I delivered the placenta without any undue pressure or pain.
And yet, when I think about those 10 minutes, I now cry, thinking about what could have happened to precious Carlee. The other day Colby came in to find me in the midst of a crying spell. He had such a face of empathy and genuine concern. (He is so very compassionate for a 3 year-old.) He asked me, “Mommy, why are you crying?” I told him, “Mommy is sad right now, but I’m happy to see you. I am always happy to see you and your sisters. Nothing’s wrong.” Colby said, “Don’t be sad, Mommy. I love you.” which only made me cry more. Thank you, Lord, that nothing’s wrong.
1 comment November 18th, 2008
Bath-time for Carlee
Jenna and I gave Carlee her first bath at home and these are some of the pictures. Jenna rolls her eyes when I get out the flash and umbrella to take nice pictures. I guess eventually that will pass… I am also experimenting with a new way of displaying pictures, just click and see a nice little presentation of the pics.
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- Peek-a-boo!
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- Washin the body
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- Kennedy is a great bath helper
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- A nice hair washing
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- Ahhh… I like this! (Kevin’s photographic favorite… be sure to enlarge!)
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- My little Sous Chef
4 comments November 17th, 2008
Carlee Joy
Well she finally arrived on Monday, November 10th at 1:48 pm! She weighed 8lbs 15oz and is 21″ long. The story is quite amazing and I’m not really sure even where to start. I’ll probably let Jenna detail out most of it, but I wanted to go ahead and post something to let you all know she was here.
The last two days have been hard, very hard, but also very joyous for us. The Lord has blessed us with an incredibly strong and persistent little girl of which I am so thankful, but the world has pressed back at us just as hard. I don’t plan on putting all the details here in writing because it is a very emotional thing for us and we are still processing it, but we are willing to share our story in person with our friends and family.
Monday morning Jenna started having labor pains and she knew it was going to be the day. We called her mom to get the kids and Erin the Midwife (who was on the way to Temple this time but immediately turned around!) and got things rolling. Our good friend Rachel came as well to assist with the birth because she’s a Bradley coach with home birth experience, and because Erin’s assistant couldn’t make it. Leaping forward several hours of labor, things got very intense at about 1pm. Jenna experienced some back labor because Carlee was presenting face first instead of head first. Her water finally broke at about 1:30 or so, and then a couple pushes later Carlee was here.
Carlee had some trouble breathing on her own at first. She wasn’t responding to all the things she should have been right away, so Erin gave her oxygen. Her body started pinking up but her face was still bluish gray so Erin asked Rachel to call 911, which Rachel Did. The EMS arrived and asked some questions about when this and when that, and long story short recommended we transport her to the hospital. At that point she was doing better but still blue in the face, so we decided to take her. I went to the hospital with Carlee while Rachel and Erin stayed back to take care of Jenna and deliver the placenta.
We arrived to the hospital and took her into the NICU where we met the doctor and nurses that would take care of her. They asked many question about the homebirth, etc, but it generally appeared that she was doing very well. They also said that the blue in the face was actually bruising from her trying to come out face first. I was relieved at this point to know that all her levels and rates were checking out OK and so I was excited that we should be able to take her back home soon. Jenna arrived about an hour after she was born (after Erin finding a parking place) to feed her and at that point we started expressing our desires to take her back home.
Fast forward 5 hours… we had been talking with 2 different doctors in a bit of a “holding cell” trying to convince them that since all of their tests so far have checked out OK and that we did not wish to stay at the hospital any longer. One of the many reasons we decided to have a home birth in the first place…
Many hours later we consented to stay but we wanted to leave at lunchtime on Tuesday. The stay was uncomfortable of course, but we did get to keep Carlee with us the entire time. Tuesday night at 6:30pm we finally drove home.
There are more details to fill in of course, but we wish not to post them here, for now at least. Carlee is a long baby and has full head of thick auburn colored hair. We thank the Lord for blessing us with her and keeping her and Jenna both safe through all of this. If you were wondering, we don’t regret the home birth thing at all… we loved all of it. We were very comfortable at home and Jenna was able to birth Carlee the way we wanted. Even though Carlee was a big baby, she had no tearing and very minimal swelling. (Most of her swelling was due to sitting in a chair talking to doctors for many hours with no Tylenol and no ice for relief.) It is unfortunate that the hospital and the people at the hospital just couldn’t understand our birth philosophy and frowned on us for the decisions we made all throughout the day.
I want to share a Scripture that inspired us from the moment of her birth and will probably continue for quite a while. While the Scripture is not her middle-name-sake, it did seem fitting.
Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. James 1:2-6
Thanks to the many who prayed for us during this time. We witnessed many miracles that the Lord did the past few days. We apologize to any friends we haven’t talked to yet, but we hope you understand that we were (and still are) exhausted both physically and emotionally.
19 comments November 12th, 2008
Gallery Pics updated
Well, as promised, I finally got the rest of the California pics uploaded today… albeit a little late. But, better late than never, right? If you already checked out the ones I put up before, the new ones start on page 19.
I also uploaded pics of the kids for October. It’s got shots I did at my sister’s house, the pumpkin patch, halloween costumes, and then some “fall” portraits a co-worker and I did at his house of our families. We’ve got a few family pics in there as well, here they are:
1 comment November 8th, 2008
Colby the Boy & Kennedy the Skunk
Halloween costumes this year! We didn’t take many pictures because the kids were off and running through Kevin’s office to get candy. The Capsher-ians set out candy and the kids went trick-or-treating through the offices and cubicles. Our kids kept saying, “Please?” when asked, “What do you say?” (The Capsher-ians were looking for the not-so-obvious “Trick-or-treat” answer.)
So when discussing Halloween with Colby this year, we looked at lots of kids in costumes and discussed how much fun they were going to have. We looked at all his favorite characters – Thomas the train, Lightning McQueen.. and we looked at the ‘generic’ animals or superheroes, etc. etc. And then he said, “I like Bob the Tomato.” (from Veggie Tales) I said, “Okay, great, you wanna be Bob the Tomato for Halloween?” He said, “No, I’m Colby. I’m a boy.” And that was the end of that.
I did find a fireman’s jacket for $2 at Wal-Mart, and he wore it for about 2 minutes. Here’s the one picture we have with the jacket on.
And here’s Kennedy as a skunk! She was the cutest skunk ever.
We went from Capsher to our church’s Trunk or Treat. I’m sure there were lots of things to do there, but Colby wanted to stay inside the bounce houses for the entire 2 hours. They didn’t get any candy but didn’t seem to mind. We had a hard time dragging them out to go eat dinner afterward! So, we couldn’t get many pics of them in the bounce houses, and Kevin captured a lot of video of the event to use for promos for next year.
Happy Halloween!
1 comment November 8th, 2008
Rubber Ball Story
I took my kids to The Bounce last week. They have the inflatable bouncy houses, mazes, slides, etc. etc. They also have $1 rubber bouncy balls that are a little smaller than a basketball. I’m not exactly sure why they have these? Maybe for the younger kids that can’t climb up the very high stairs to the slide?
Anyway, there was a little boy (maybe 4 or 5 years old) holding one of these balls and then he came up to me and said, “Can I please have your ball?” He was looking directly at my stomach, as if I was hiding one of those bouncy balls! I told him, “Sweetheart, I don’t have a ball.” He kept looking at my stomach, like I was being mean to him and trying to keep the ball away from him!
To be fair, I do get his point, I mean, it does look like I am hiding a very large globe under my shirt. And, if I could have given him my “ball”, I would have gladly taken it out for him! Just kidding. For my Halloween costume, I really thought about writing “Pumpkin Smuggler” on a very large shirt. That was before someone alerted me to the fact that I’m not a very good smuggler.
Take a look for yourself.
I guess it’s not all that bad.
Belly pic – 34 weeks
4 comments November 7th, 2008
The View from Up Here
Actually Kevin took this pic because I really can’t see my feet anymore.
And, view the vanishing ankles!
Belly (and ankles) pic – 38 weeks
1 comment November 6th, 2008
Close, but no cigar.
This phrase could not be more appropriate right now, and if you don’t get it, I’ll explain at the end.
Saturday night around 7 I started having very regular contractions. Since I have faster labors than most other women, Kevin called Erin The Midwife at 7:45, just to let her know what was happening. Erin said, “Um, I’m in Austin right now…. but I’ll jump in the car and head to your home.” She had actually been helping a friend move to Austin but had everything ready for birthing because she was on call for another client of hers who was a week overdue but had slower labors than mine. (Run-on sentence I don’t know how to shorten.)
Erin and the crew got to our house around 9:30. They set up the birthing pool in the living room and then set up our bed in case I wanted to labor or deliver in our room, and all the while I was having contractions about 5 minutes apart, lasting about 45 seconds each. I kept saying, “Wow, these are totally different from Colby and Kennedy.” They weren’t overly heavy and I was so relaxed and calm and smiling, carrying on conversations with everyone.
I got in the birthing pool (with very hot water) around 10 pm and stayed there for almost 2 hours, and my contractions got to be nearly 2 minutes apart but still only 45 seconds in duration. Then around midnight, I had to get out of the pool to go to the bathroom and the contractions stopped almost completely. I told everyone I was tired and Erin told me to go rest in my bed; she thought I’d go back into labor once my body recuperated for a little while. (She also gave me this great heating pad for my back that smelled like cinnamon and cloves. I need to get one of those.)
At 2 am (which was 1 am because of the time change.. there was lots of debate about if the baby was born at 1:30 am old time, would she really be born when the time changed 30 minutes after, since it would be 1 am again?), I told Erin to go home, because there was Nothing happening anymore. No contractions, nothing. So she packed up all her stuff and left, and she told me to call me if anything happened. Nothing has happened. I’m now exhausted for laboring so hard and so long yesterday and my body is sore. But I’m not having contractions.
I didn’t go to church this morning, but apparently I was the talk of the town. We were supposed to ring handbells but the song was too difficult for anyone to step in and sub so we canceled it late last night. (I mean, I know Alicia’s good but sight-reading this part would be a little like putting her into spontaneous labor.) My mom made a few calls last night, mostly to family, and the word spread really quickly in such a large church… I should feel loved to know how many people care about us.
The funniest thing was when my mom sent a text to her niece (my cousin) who lives in Florida. She wrote something like, “Jenna’s in labor!” And so my cousin’s daughter, who’s almost 18, wrote back, “Who is this?” ha! As if she didn’t know who I was… I know she had my mom’s cell phone number in her directory; how many Jenna’s would my mom know, and be telling people when these Jennas were in labor? Funny girl.
We also had a few messages at home tonight while we were out grocery shopping of people were asking me how I was doing. You know – “Hey Jenna! I didn’t see you at church today so I was just wondering if you were in labor? And so-and-so told me you thought you were in labor yesterday but it stopped so I didn’t know if it started again…” I had lots of offers for help with my kids and just whatever I need, which I appreciate wholeheartedly.
I’m actually a little relieved that the baby isn’t here yet; I am excited to see her and hold her and everything, but I just had a long week with lots of things to do, and I’m looking forward to this week when I have almost nothing to do but spend time with Kevin and the kids. And, I had just finished cleaning the windows on Saturday, so I figured it would only be par for the course that I would go into labor later that night. 
Really, I’ve been having heavier (yet incredibly sporadic) contractions since about Wednesday because I’ve been on my feet a little too much and not resting in between. Yeah, yeah, the Nesting Complex has left the building and I’ve learned my lesson. I’ll be moving at a much slower pace this week and enjoying being pregnant while I still can.
So, I know this was very long and thanks for reading. Please pray that the Lord would bring this baby to this world in His timing, not anyone else’s. I do feel a great peace about this, even though I don’t know when that will be. I just keep praying that Verse from Psalms 138 over her – “Lord, I praise YOU, because she is fearfully and wonderfully made… all the days of her life are written in His book.” And, as for the cigars, we won’t be passing any out when the baby gets here, and I’m glad no one was smoking any last night, because they would have been a bit premature with their celebration. 
5 comments November 2nd, 2008
