OMG its been a LONG while

Its funny how I originally planned on using this blog to keep everyone in the loop about our family's happenings and then I don't update it in over a year. Definitely goes to show what adding a second child plus finishing up school can do to your spare time. So quick recap of the past year:

~August 10, 2009: My amazing Dr Fosnot stripped my membranes. The waiting begins for Emmy's arrival
~August 12, 2009: Labor started, I brushed off going to the hospital but finally at midnight, we start getting ready for the hospital.
~August 13, 2009 @ 9:43am: Emily Paige Crimella makes her long awaited debut and is absolutely healthy. A little jaundiced but thats ok. A healthy baby made 9 weeks of strict bedrest completely worth it. Noah is loving being a big brother!
~December 25, 2009: We celebrated our first Christmas together as a complete family. The best Christmas ever
~January 12, 2010: Noah turns 3. I can't believe he's so old. He loved his Thomas the Train party and we all had a blast. He truly is the best big brother in the entire world. He's also completed his speech therapy course. We're going to miss Jeanie desperately but we're so thankful that we've worked so hard to develop his speech.


As the months move on, we're getting more and more accustomed to life as 4 rather than 3. Emmy has a few bouts of pneumonia and bronchiolitis but no hospitalizations (yay!!!). Just enjoying life as it comes.


~May 2010: Our first family trip to Disney World. We did all 4 parks in 3 days. Call us crazy because we were. But we had a great time (minus day 2) and have great memories.
~August 13, 2010: Our little Princess turns 1. I can't believe this day has come. Her first year went by so much faster than Noah's. We had a celebration fit for a Princess (because that's what she is!!!)


About the same time, we decide to put Noah in Pre-K. He's attending St Patrick Catholic School (of course) and can't wait.

~September 11, 2010: USF travels up to UF for the first ever meeting between the schools. I thought my Bulls were going to pull off the upset but the Gators rallied back in the second half and won. I wish there was a different outcome but I'm glad I was a part of that game!


That pretty much catches everything up until now. Noah is loving school. He only goes for a few hours a day but he's learning so much. He can write his name like a pro. Its amazing how well he's doing after a few short months. I can't wait to see what the rest of the year brings. I'm finishing up my BSN at USF (finally). I'm in my last semester and cannot wait for it to be over. I'm sick of clinicals and papers and exams. I'm so ready for it to be over (ok I'm done whining). December 11th will be a very emotional day because I will finally be getting that USF degree that I started way back in 2000. I hate leaving things unfinished, especially when it comes to school. This is the closure I need in making my decision to leave USF in 2003, without graduating, an okay one. I know career wise it was the best (and I don't know if I would have ever met John if I stayed at USF) but it wasn't the educational outcome I ever envisioned.


So that brings us to the holidays. As we finished Halloween (and if it were up to the retail industry, we'd skip right over Thanksgiving), we're getting closer to the holiday season. I've already been planning out holiday outifts for our family pictures. I have a thing about color coordination when it comes to the kids and holidays. Our family pictures are no different. It is a huge, unneccessary stress that I put on myself but these pictures are the representation of us. Its what will hang on my walls. It is my way to remember where we came from. And of course, there is the all important Christmas card. I've been doing photo cards since our family began and there is no way that I'm abandoning that tradition. With Shutterfly being my "go-to" site for all things photo, I was so excited to hear about their new line of cards! It drives John crazy but I can look at Shutterfly for hours. So with only a month and a half to go, its time to start picking out our layouts. Here are a couple of my favorites!



I love the focus of the image with a very subtle, yet modern message



I love the untraditional aspect of this one. The colors don't scream holiday but its festive in its own way.

My absolute favorite layout. I love the simplicity of it. The photos set the tone and are the main focus. I love anything that allows me to add more pictures of my amazing children. Why wouldn't I love this layout? Plus its a Happy Holidays greeting, not Merry Christmas. I have a handful of non-Christian friends on my card list so this is a perfect way to have a beautiful card that does not offend any religion. Its perfect!

Check out Shutterfly for their promotion for bloggers. 50 free Holiday Cards. How can you go wrong with that?!?!

And now for my promise.....I promise to try my best to be a better blogger. I don't know why I've let it go so long. My kids are growing up so quickly and without this site, I'm going to forget about the little things (like how much my mailman aggrevates me....which he still does!!!).

Here's to a better blogging experience!!!

~JRC~

Just another problem

My doctor's appointment went ok today. I didn't dilate any last week so I'm still at 1cm but I do have a new problem. I have polyhydramnios, which means I have an excess amount of amniotic fluid. This problem can cause premature rupture of membranes (premature breaking of water) and abruption (something I'm all too familiar with). My stomach measured at 40 cm today and it should only measure 36. With all of this plus the fact that I'm completely over it, we're going to try stripping my membranes on Monday. What that means is that she's going to separate the bag of water from my cervix. There's a chance that she might break my water in the process but the goal is to just irritate my uterus enough to start labor. Usually you go into labor within 2 days of having your membranes stripped. So thats the plan for Monday. We'll see if it actually works. Good news that came out of today....I'm off bedrest!!! I can't go to work but I can go out in public now. Although I'm still not up for a lot of activity yet, its nice to know I can go to the store if I want to.

Its starting!!!

After not getting more than 2 hours of sleep last night because of waves of backaches and contractions, not to mention John snoring, today started out very uncomfortable. We had our US today. Emmy looked good again and she weighs in at a whopping 5lbs, 12oz. I was so excited to hear that since last month she was 4lbs, 14oz. She's dropped from 77th percentile to 60th percentile. So I think I might get a petite little girl!!! NST didn't look fantastic. Emmy tried to be reactive but it didn't work all that well. I had a bunch of contractions, about 12 minutes apart. They never got any closer. When I had my visit with Dr Young, after hearing about my lovely weekend and failed "sleep test" (if I fall asleep during my contractions and don't wake up, its false labor. Last night I kept waking up), she agreed to check me and I'm dilated 1 cm. So we're making some progress. I got the official "when to go to the hospital" speech....if my water breaks or if my contractions get to be 3-5 minutes apart and I'm having trouble tolerating them. She also told us that a baby born at 35 weeks (where we are right now) should have no complications. That was a HUGE relief. So we're looking no NICU stay, unless something arises during labor.

With that being said, I'm going to try to start walking. I'm taking myself off of bedrest (well off as much as I can tolerate) to see if we can get things started. Walking is pretty rough but I'm trying.

Only complication that has come up since leaving the doctors office was a random bleed this afternoon. They always tell me that I might have some spotting after being checked. About 4 hours after being checked, I had a pretty good bleed...more than the original abruption bleed. I called the doctors and they said if I didn't stop bleeding in an hour to call back and I'd probably have a trip to the hospital. Well its stopped, thank goodness, but I'm nervous about another bleed. I'm not sure if this was related to being checked and being dilated since it was so long after the doctors appointment but who knows. We'll just have to wait and see. Keep your fingers crossed that there are no more bleeds and we go to the hospital because my water breaks.

Off to try to fall asleep tonight. I think my body is totally prepared for no sleep by the number of sleepless nights I've had over the past 3 weeks.

The random things I find

Update on me.....still cramping/contracting with horrible pain but not in labor yet.

Since I've have had a little time on my hands, google has been my friend. I google everything....signs of labor, ways to stop backache, ways to survive bedrest. Yahoo discussion boards have the funniest conversations. I love when they pop up in my search results. However, last night I came across something disturbing. There are multiple websites that teach women how to check themselves for cervical dilation. I couldn't believe this. And the best part is women commented on their experiences. Who does something like that???

Anyways...thats it. Keep your fingers crossed that Emmy either decides she wants to stay inside for a little while longer (so the contractions will stop) or that she decides to just get it over with and make her entrance. I can't take her being stubborn right now

False Alarm again

So after 3 hours of contractions (which never got into a good pattern) and horrible abdominal pain, I was able to get some sleep...bad sleep but sleep all the same. So not true labor yet. Who knows what's going on. I think Emmy is getting cold feet. She wants to come out then decides not to. Stubborn little girl!

Same old, Same old

Well I'm sitting here at 34 weeks, 6 days pregnant. Today we had our first reactive NST within 20 minutes. I was off the monitor and in the car driving away 30 minutes after I got hooked up. It was a first and the doctor and nurses were all just as excited as Mom and I were. Dr Young signed off on my strip. She came in to see me and said "look at you still hanging in there." The way she said it made it very clear that she didn't think I'd still be pregnant. So we're surpassing everyone's expectations.

So what does that mean for us? Plan is to induce at 39 weeks. So we're looking at an induction around August 21st, unless I go into labor before then. We're adding growth to our ultrasound on Monday. I found out it doesn't really matter how big Emmy is on US right now. The only way they react to "large for gestational" age babies is if the baby weighs 11lbs or more at 39 weeks. Then they schedule a C-Section and forget vaginal labor altogether. I'm still on bedrest but I talked them into letting me walk a little more around the house. I've been tryiing to do some more walking but I've realized how weak I am and how hard this has been on my body.

Today I am completely uncomfortable. My back hurts and I'm having right sided abdominal pain. Whenever I'm standing, it feels like the baby is going to fall out. Not sure if this is a good sign or a bad one. All I know is that the abdominal pain is starting to feel like it did when I was pregnant with Noah and had to be admitted overnight. I had a lot of uterine activity on my end of the NST but I wasn't in a pattern and I think they aren't going to be concerned with it since I'm 34 weeks now. I'm sure if I was looking like I was going to get into a rhythm, I would have been sent to the hospital. So we'll see how the weekend goes. Fingers crossed Emmy wants to stay in for about a week or two more.

The big day!!!

We've made it to 34 weeks! So now if I go into labor, they won't stop me. Emmy's lungs should be mature enough to avoid any major respiratory complications. So how am I feeling now that I'm 34 weeks? I thought I was going into labor Wednesday night. I had 1-2 hours of horrible contractions and I was really nervous about them. But I was able to fall asleep so I guess it was a false alarm. I've been very "active" since then. My NST strip on Friday had an increase in uterine activity but not enough to send me to the hospital. I don't feel too good, I'm not sleeping, and I'm going stir crazy. Oh yeah....I'm uncontrollably itchy. It gets worse as the day goes on. Don't really know what that's from. Maybe Dr Fosnot will have an idea on Monday. Other than that, thats it.