A Christmas Miracle

Remember how last year I made Emmy a quiet book for Christmas and then proceeded to lose it a few weeks later? Guess what? I FOUND IT!!!!! In the box of Christmas decorations. Oh joyous day!

I seriously thought it was gone for good, and I was not about to slave over making another one. I was almost jumping for joy when it was laying there under my wreath. Merry Christmas to me!

Dear Santa

Dear Santa,
This year my Christmas wish is to be able to...

-have a good night's sleep,
-take a shower,
-go to the bathroom,
-and eat a meal

....without any interruptions!

Love, Christy

Seriously, these past 6 weeks have been SO HARD!!! I've had a really hard recovery. Once I got home from the hospital, things took a turn for the worse. I was in a lot of pain for about 4 weeks, and poor Zach is not a calm, happy baby. I really don't know what's bothering him. I've tried everything I can think of...gas drops, gripe water, massages, a warm rice bag, essential oils, having him sleep on an incline, eliminating dairy (and some other things) from my diet...and none of it seems to be helping.

He just grunts and spits up and fusses all day long (and night too). And won't sleep for very long stretches. It seems like he's in a lot of pain. He gets all red in the face and arches his back and seems like he's trying to push something out. I took him to the doctor this week to see if he could find anything wrong with him. We're trying some reflux meds for a few weeks. So far, they don't seem to be making a difference though. :( But the doc said to give it 2 weeks.

I really hope it works or that we can figure out something that works because if not, I'm really going to lose it here pretty quick. Sometimes I feel like I don't have what it takes to be a mother. And poor Emmy is suffering too. At least she tries to be helpful and goes to get Zach his binky or his medicine or whatever when he is crying.

Zach's Newborn Pics

I finally got around to getting Zach's newborn pictures done.  Here's some of my favorites of the handsome little guy.

He is 5 weeks old in these pictures.

This is the poor little face I often see. It just seems like he's in pain, grunting and twisting all over. Poor little guy. I hope he gets over his gassy issues SOON!

So when I was at the JCPenny getting his pictures done, the lady in front of me had an extra gift card that she gave me. So the pics ended up being FREE! What a Thanksgiving blessing. It totally made my day. Thank you, random lady!

And just for fun, here are pics of Zach and Emmy at around the same age.

At one month old, Zach spits up a lot, grunts a lot, gets up at least twice in the night, seems to have a lot of gassy pains, likes to be on his tummy, loves to be held, and he even rolled over yesterday. He is a pretty cute little fellow. We love you, Zach, and are glad you are in our family.

Pumpkins and Turkeys

A few days after Halloween, Emmy wanted to put on her Halloween costume again. My mom had found this cute Dalmatian costume and got it for Emmy before she knew that we had already gotten one. So this time, Emmy wanted to wear this one. She stood in front of the mirror and admired herself for quite awhile.

She was so proud to be a little doggy.

I finally decided to do something with the pumpkins that we never got around to carving, and let Emmy paint them. She had a ball.

After she was done painting them, she wanted to put them back on the porch, so now I have some really interesting looking pumpkins on my porch!

For FHE last week, we had a lesson about being thankful. We talked about the things we can be thankful for, and Em colored this lovely picture.

Then we made thankful turkeys where we traced her hand and made a turkey out of it and wrote the things she was thankful for. You probably can't see it in the picture because she wanted to make more and more turkeys and then color on all of them, but she was thankful for: her grandmas and grandpas, Rivers, Roxy, snow, flowers, Jesus, ovals, blankets, pillows, turkeys, and scriptures.

It was really cute.

Trick or Treat

Halloween this year was so fun! Even though I was still in quite a bit of pain, I did not want to miss celebrating with my Emmy girl. We went to a special Halloween storytime at the library, and trick-or-treated around the library in the morning. My mom was nice enough to come watch Zach so I could have some one-on-one time with Emmy.

We also went to our ward Halloween party/chili cook-off the weekend before Halloween. Emmy ate a cupcake, some fruit, and some candy for dinner. What a stinker! They had pumpkin bowling and some other games where the kids could get tickets to redeem for prizes.

Emmy's costume was so cute. She was a little dalmation.

Zach was also a dalmation.

And I was Cruella Deville, of course!

Matt was Horace, the dog catcher. On the way down the driveway to go trick-or-treating, Emmy had a fit because Zach was riding in her orange stroller. So we sat her on the front edge of the stroller. She was ok with that for awhile, until her foot got stuck in the wheel. Oops! I guess we really should get a double stroller.

My aunt Loretta made Emmy this cute trick or treat bag. Emmy was so excited to go trick or treating. She would march right on up the steps so confidently and then whisper trick or treat so softly that you could barely hear it.

She loved getting candies in her bag.

In fact, a few days later I told her we were going to go on a little walk to the neighbor's house. (I had to return some dishes from a meal they had brought over.) And Emmy said, "And get some candies at the neighbor's!" Ha! Then when they weren't home, she said, "Let's try the next house!" and kept trying to go knock on all the neighbors' doors in hopes that they would give her some candies. What a silly!

There is a house in our neighborhood that gets all decked out for Halloween. I wish I would have gotten a better picture. They had a graveyard, flying ghosts, a bunch of skeletons, etc. There were spooky noises coming from the house at all hours of the day. To trick or treat there you had to walk through a big maze in their front yard. There was fog and fires and even lights on the lawn that looked like spiders crawling across the lawn. Then you got to the house and went inside the entryway, and the inside was just as decked out!

After hitting our street, my dad called and wanted Emmy to come trick or treat at their house, so we went over there. Then Matt thought we'd better go to the other grandparents' house too. We ended up being out a lot later than I anticipated, and poor Zach was starving! But it was a fun Halloween, and I'm glad Emmy had such a fun time!

Snow Day

We had our first snow a couple of weeks ago. When we opened Emmy's curtains to show her it had snowed, she exclaimed, "What is that?" We told her it was snow, and then she said, "There's snow on the grass, and the trees, and the dirt!" Then she went and looked out the back window and said, "There's snow on the swing! And the slide!"

It was pretty much the cutest thing ever. She was so enchanted by the snow. And of course she had to go play in it. Here she is taking her first steps into the snow.

Then she wanted to touch it.

And eat it.

Then every morning since then she has to look out the window when she wakes up to see if there's any more snow.

And here she is just being silly dancing around in her tutu and jammies!

Lately she's whenever she hears kids outside, she wants to go sit on the porch and, "wait for her friends to come." It's so funny. She loves to sit and watch the kids, and loves it when they come over, but she is super shy and won't go over and play with them. I love how magical she thinks everything is. It makes life so much fun to see her eyes light up over things like snow and friends.

Here she is enjoying the snow!

Life of a Newborn

Newborns have the cushy life. They get all bundled up nice and warm, get carried to the car.

Have someone to bathe them and get them all nice and clean.

They get to snuggle up on big, fuzzy blankets.

Sleep to their hearts' content.

Or snuggle up on big, fluffy pillows.

Ah, the life of a newborn!

Zach loves to sleep on his side with his hands curled up near his face. It's super cute. Too bad we can't leave him alone like this. He is not such a big fan of sleeping on his back in his crib, like he's supposed to.

Big Sister

Emmy was so cute when she came to see her new baby brother at the hospital for the first time. She came running through the door saying, "Where's Mommy?" She got right on up for a closer look.

She wanted to hold his hand.

And then she found some cookies, and was uninterested in baby brother after that.

She was so funny. She called the hospital the "hostable" and after we got home, I asked her where Baby Zach came from and she said, "the hostable". She was also very intrigued by the elevator (the alligator) and the nurse (the moose). She loved looking out the big window of my room at the horses and cars.

The next day, she wanted to hold him, and it was super cute. She was pointing out his chin, eyes, ears, etc.

And she wanted to give him a hug.

The first couple of weeks were REALLY rough. Emmy was being a holy terror. She liked Zach, but she wasn't so sure of the situation. She was ornery and bossy and whiny ALL THE TIME! She has gotten a lot better, thank goodness.

She is such a good helper. She is always getting him diapers or toys or his burp cloths or whatever. And when he cries, she says things like, "Mommy go get him." or "He needs his binky so he don't cry." or "Should we put him in his swing?" It's really cute.

She has said the funniest things lately. Like...

Matt: "Where's Mommy?"
Emily: "In Baby Zach's computer room." (We still have the computer in his room.)

Emily: "I need another kiss."
Me: "I just gave you one."
Emily: "But I took it off already."

Emily: "Where's Daddy?"
Me: "Daddy's at work."
Emily: "Emmy needs to go to work with Daddy."

Me: "Time for scriptures."
Emily: "Read about Alma?"

Emily: "Emmy's going to go to the cabin tomorrow with Grandma and Grandpa."

Emily: "That's a chocolate one!" (In reference to the black deacon passing the sacrament at church. I hope it wasn't offensive.)

Whenever I tell her she can't do/have something, she says, "Emmy can have it when daddy gets home."

When some kids were getting taken out of church, Emmy said, "They're going to get their bums changed!" 

What a little stinker/cutie! I love my Emmy girl.

Zach's Birthday

I posted a little bit about Zach's birth, but here's the whole story. Like I said earlier, my doctor said he would induce me at 39 weeks if I wanted. I was pretty miserable, and my blood pressure was getting high, and Zach was measuring pretty big, so I went ahead and scheduled the induction. However, as it got closer, I was feeling really nervous about it and had mixed feelings about going ahead with it.

The induction was scheduled for Monday morning (Oct. 15), and on Sunday night, I was about ready to call the hospital and cancel the induction. I just didn't feel like there was a good reason to get induced and that I should wait for him to come on his own. Matt and I prayed about it Sunday night, and right after we finished our prayer, my water broke! I guess we didn't have to decide after all! I'm glad Zach decided to come on his own. What an answer to a prayer, right?

Zach meets Mommy.

Anyway, my water broke about 10:30 p.m., we woke Emily up and took her over to my parents' house. My mom was out of town, but my dad didn't have to work Monday, so he was the best choice to watch Emily. We got to the hospital about 11:30. I was having some major issues. I had extreme heartburn, a fever, GBS, and there was meconium in the amniotic fluid coming out, so I was on a bunch of antibiotics. Zach's heart rate was skyrocketing because of my fever, and the doctors were afraid I would pass on this stuff to Zach as he was being born, so they took a bunch of extra precautions.

Luckily, they were just precautions and Zach was fine. I had an epidural, but I was still feeling a lot of pain, even after pushing the "magic button" so they upped my dose of whatever is in that epidural, and I finally got some relief.

Getting all checked out.

I didn't sleep at all that night because of all the pain even with the epidural, and by the time they gave me the extra dose, it was almost 6 a.m. My doctor arrived about 7:15, and after 20 minutes of pushing, Zach was born at 7:46 a.m. He was a big boy at 8 lbs, 13 oz.

Zach meeting Daddy.

Other than being tired, in the hospital, I was feeling pretty good. Zach got the hang of eating right away, and he slept most of the time. I was alone most of my time in the hospital on the second day since Matt was taking care of Emmy since my dad had to go back to work, and Matt didn't want to call a neighbor or someone. I was almost getting bored in the hospital!

Snuggling.

Once I got home, however, I took a turn for the worse. I was in so much pain, it was awful! I called the doctor several times and even got tested for a UTI and another infection. I didn't have an infection, but Zach's big head sure did a number on me! I am starting to finally feel like the pain is manageable now...thank goodness!

First Bath.

Our neighbors have been awesome! People keep dropping off food and gifts, and checking in on us. Which was really nice, especially with my mom being out of town and the rest of the family being  busy with work/school/whatever. Even now, 3 weeks later, we are still having neighbors come by. I have really been impressed! I haven't even had to break into my stash of freezer meals I prepared a couple months ago.

Washing that curly hair.

Zach has been a REALLY gassy baby, especially at night. It sometimes takes him 2-3 hours to go back to sleep at night. I'm trying to get used to this whole having no sleep schedule again. It's been rough. But at least he's pretty good during the daytime.

Sleeping on Daddy.

Anyway, that's our Zach, and we are grateful to have him here! By the way, we chose his name, Zachary Charles Lively because a) Zach was the only boy name we could agree on. b) Charles is Matt's middle name and his dad's middle name. c) Zachary means spiritual, Charles means manly and well-loved, and Lively means lively! What better qualities could a little boy ask for? Although Matt has started calling him Screech because of his dark, curly hair and screechy little cry. Ha!

P.S. My sis-in-law, Jessica wins for guessing the closest to Zach's birthday...she guessed right on! October 15.