So today was the 1st day of me watching Jackson, Bella, and two new little boys. I will be helping their mom out two days a week while she goes to work.  It was exhausting to say the least! I had to be out of the house by 7:20am and pick BG up on my way past her house, then on to the boys house.  I am caring for the younger boy (20 mo) most of the time and on Thursday afternoons the older brother (3) comes home to hang out… or nap!   Jackson slept really really well at their house which was really great but he also…. brace yourself… had his first tumble off the couch! OUCH!  The poor guy was propped up on the couch with some pillows and before I knew it he had thrust himself forward… which he likes to do… and went right off the couch. He had a nice red spot on his forehead for a couple hours, but no goose egg or black and blue thankfully!

So all in all I would say that today was very successful! Jackson has been asleep since around 7 and I am having a really hard time convincing him to wake up and play before bedtime! He was willing to drink a bottle, but headed right back to sleep!!   Don’t worry.. I’m not a careless mom who doesn’t know about concussions… That happened at about 11 this morning and he has been fine all day! No worries! I think that all the new toys and kids just wore him out today! He’s also liking the idea of waking up earlier… which I must say I am NOT so fond of!   He is great about playing quietly in his crib when he wakes up though! Sometimes I wonder if he has gone back to sleep or if he is just content in there playing with the feet of his jammies!  What a blessing either way! This mama needs her sleep! 🙂

Grammy and Papa Lee come to visit tomorrow afternoon! Yay!! We haven’t seen them since Christmas so it will be great to catch up and show them all of Jack’s new skills!   I understand that we have become chopped liver since the baby showed up.. but it’s alright! We love them anyway!

Until next time…..

We are ready for Spring!! This past weekend it was in the 50’s and sunny! It gave us a nice taste of what the weather should be warming up to in the next few weeks!   We’ve had 3 huge snow storms this winter and still have snow on the ground that is being stubborn about melting!

Jackson is growing like a weed! At his 4 month check-up he was 16lb 4oz and 26 1/4 inches long! He measures in the 75 percentile for weight and the 90th percentile for height.  We had a couple of weeks were it seemed like no one in the house was feeling well. We all had colds and were stuffed up and coughing, but Jacks started getting worse over the course of a few days. I ended up taking him in to see the pediatrician who tested him and diagnosed him with RSV (Respiratory syncytial virus).  My main concern was the fact that he was wheezing. Dan had horrible asthma when he was a baby and I was worried that maybe Jackson was going to be heading down the same road!  We gave him a breathing treatment in the doctors office and went straight to the medical supply place to pick up a nebulizer which I am sure we will use again!  We were using it every 4 hours around the clock for a few days and then just went to as necessary. He was put on a steroid to help clear up his lungs and an antibiotic for what looked like an ear infection that was forming.  I learned quickly that Jackson is stubborn and did NOT like the taste of any of the medicine that I was giving him! I ended up giving him half a bottle, unscrewing the top and squirting the medicine in, making him suck the medicine out of the nipple, then putting it back on the bottle and finishing it!

We took a trip down to North Carolina to visit our friends Kami and Dan Houghton the weekend of Valentine’s Day.  It was so nice to see them! It had been almost 3 years since I had been down there and Dan had planned a trip to Virginia Beach to help his brother with some stuff, so Jackson and I packed up and headed to NC.  Kami and I grew up together in Vermont.  We have stayed good friends over the years and Kristin, Kami, and I have all stayed really close. I cherish their friendships even though none of us live in VT anymore and we are scattered up and down the east coast!  Kami and Dan have three kids who are all precious and each loved Jackson so much! I got some great pictures of the kids camping out before bedtime one night!

Before I go…. incase you haven’t read Kristin’s blog –  http://jakeandkristinadopt.wordpress.com/ You need to check it out and see their amazing story about adopting Kemly! He is the little boy that they recently adopted from Haiti!  He is absolutely precious and has an incredible story about how he came to live in his new home in Massachusetts.   We are hoping to make a trip up to meet him in June. I can’t wait!

Hoping to see Grammy and Papa Lee this coming weekend and Josh and Jess the weekend after that! Looking forward to both of their visits.   Until next time…..

There is my little man… all grown up!

It’s really hard to believe that tomorrow will be 12 weeks since he was born! It’s been an amazing 3 months and they have flown by in no time!  Jackson is somewhere around 16 pounds and 26+ inches long! He looks like hes about 6 months old!  He hands out smiles freely these days… glad I could share one with all of you in this picture!  He got a ton of stuff for Christmas! We were in Vermont for a few days the week of Christmas with my family and everyone gave him tons of attention! My 9 year old sister was a huge help! She was willing to do anything I asked her for him! She gave him a beautiful mobile for Christmas that he absolutely LOVES!  It has tons of colors and animals and even a remote control!  He was a fairly good passenger in the car there and back so that was nice.  Twelve hours in a car can be unbearable for anyone in my opinion!

We came back on Sunday and went to Virginia Beach to see Dan’s family for the New Years Holiday. We also got to spend some quality time with our best friends Josh and Jess.  Jack got an exersaucer and some cute outfits and blankets from Dan’s family. He met his cousin Kimmy for the first time while we were there. She lives with her mom and dad out in San Diego now so we don’t get to see them very often.  She also adored the baby! She helped out a lot too and he enjoyed spending time with her!   I also have to send out a huge THANK YOU to April who gave me a Bumbo and a play mat for Jackson. Her son is a little older and had outgrown them. She also gave me a HUGE bag of clothes for the next size up! She is very sweet and even groomed the pups for us!

I have not gone back to work yet. I have been watching my friends 4 year old daughter during the week while her normal babysitter is on maternity leave.  She is such a sweet girl and a joy to have around. She is smart as a whip and asks a million questions a day. She wins the prize for being my biggest helper! She literally will do anything for this baby! She loves to smother him in kisses and is always making sure that his blanket is situated JUST right when we are out in public! If I had a dime for every time that people tell her shes such a good big sister… I would have a couple bucks!  I know they are only small for such a small amount of time, but she makes me think age 4 will be pretty exciting! Thank you Jenny for sharing her with me every day!

Well… our sleeping schedule hasn’t been as great as it was the last 11 weeks… maybe its a growth spurt, but I need to get to bed so that 4AM doesn’t seem so early!  I promise that I will try to keep up with this a little better now that all the holidays are out of the way!  I will leave you with a sweet picture of Jack and I out in the snow a couple weeks ago! God dropped about a foot and a half on us down here in Virginia! It was GORGEOUS!

Cutest bear I know!

Yes folks, that is socks over sweat pants! hahaha

Aunt Kristin took such good care of me!

Silly boy making faces!

Me and my little man!

Well Kristin is officially gone back to Mass… we had a great time together during the few days she was down! It was so good to see her again!  While she was here she introduced me to the world of BLOG READING!  She set it up so I can spend even more time every day on my computer reading what other people are up to! Isn’t it interesting how I would much rather read about a strangers daily activities than clean my house?? Maybe not so interesting!

Jack is growing like a weed! He’s 12.4 lbs now and back to 23 inches again. They promise me that he didn’t shrink between birth and his 1 week doctors appt.  Not really sure why they would do it this way, but they said that in the hospital they measure them from the top of their head to the tip of their toe, and when they measure them at the doctors they measure from the top of the head to the bottom of the heel.  Therefore, Jackson has ONLY grown since he was born! He smiled yesterday morning for the 1st time and I wanted to squeeze him when he did it!

He’s napping in his big boy crib now for the 1st time! Its the small things in life now that get me excited! So much work was put into making his bedroom just right and then we hardly ever go in there these days! I decided to try having him nap in there today and he has been asleep for more than 2 hours now! Its like a breath of fresh air to be downstairs and not have a baby sitting on my lap while I type with 1 finger! I think we will have to make this our new routine!   We’re off to Target as soon as he wakes up! I will post some new pics we took while Kristin was here later this afternoon!

Headed to VA Beach this weekend… hopefully! They are having some pretty significant flooding today from this storm passing through.  I hope it quits so we can go early tomorrow instead of Saturday!

Beautiful Boy

As I sat awake at 4:00 this morning feeding my little munchkin, I was extremely tired but still more than willing to be awake for this little guy who was hungry and needed me to feed him.  I am a person who loves my sleep and typically would be agrivated if I had to get up for 45 minutes at night to do something only to try to get back to sleep again when the feeding is over.  I have found that this motherly love that I feel for Baby Jackson is truely like nothing I have ever known. I actually have come to enjoy that little bit of time in the quiet of our bedroom where we just snuggle and my little baby gets the nutrients he needs to grow… and go back to sleep!

One of the things that has been really neat for me to experience has been how Jackson know’s who his mommy is alreay at such a young age! He really is soothed by my voice and when he seems to be extra fussy with other people, he calms right down as soon as they give him to me! I have been babysitting for a long time and have always been very good at getting babies to stop crying, but there is always the mommy thing that has always amazed me, but has never been something I have known for myself until now.  He also loves for his Daddy to hold him, read to him, and sing to him when hes upset! Dan figured out that if he plays the band Rush on youtube.com, Jack will stop crying almost immediately!  Josh and Jess were watching him last weekend while I was in the shower and he started fussing while I was gone.  They quick ran to the computer and turned on Rush and he went straight to sleep. By the time I got out of the shower, all was well and Jackson was happy as could be, sleeping soundly!  It’s actually pretty funny!

The good news of the day is… KRISTIN IS COMING TO VISIT!  Kristin has been my best friend since we were about 5 years old. She lives up in Massachusetts now and we haven’t seen eachother in over a year.  I can not WAIT to see her and finally be able to spend a few days with her! I know she is excited to meet Baby Jackson and squeeze him for a while! She went to Liberty for 2 years before moving to Indianapolis and a lot has changed down here since the last time she visited Lynchburg.  The weather is supposed to be gorgeous and I think we will spend some time walking around seeing all the big changes! I love you Kris and can’t wait for you to get here!!

Well friends, it’s time for us to get our day started! We’re off to the Gillespie’s to help Ruthie out while she goes to the school for parent/teacher conferences! Until next time….

So  I know I am off to a bad start of keeping up with this blog!  Give me a break though, I’ve never been much of a diary keeper or regular writer!  I much prefer reading about other people than writing about myself and our daily adventures!

Dan’s mom was kind enough to come and stay with us for 2 weeks after the little man was born. She was a life-savor in the sense that she did ANYTHING I asked her to without complaining and made it easy for me to relax and just make sure that my body was healing properly.  It was hard for me to not do anything… so I simply didn’t! I was up walking down the street the day we came home from the hospital!  I figured that if I had the ability to walk and it wasn’t hurting me too bad, then it was probably helping me!   I tried not to treck up and down the stairs too often as they did say that could really hurt the incision.   It was the small stuff that Nancy did that made her so helpful though. She would grab me a diaper if I was already in the process of giving Jack a bath…. she would grab the burp cloth which I forgot to grab every time I sat down to try and feed him… and she kept all of my bottles and stuff sanitized for me which I HUGELY appreciated!  Needless to say, I was very sad to see her leave last Wednesday when she had to pack her things and go back to work!   The nice thing about Wednesday was…. MY MOM ARRIVED TO MEET HER 1ST GRANDSON!

Mom’s visit was so wonderful! The worst part about it was that it was too short!  And add on that she was under the weather for most of her trip that didn’t help too much!  Thankfully she wasn’t suffering from the swine flu or anything, just a bad cold.  We had a fun time visiting some of the local consignment shops (if you know my mom, you know she has to check out the local shops each visit!)  and making some of my favorite foods that she cooks for special occations!  She loved, loved, loved, snuggling little Jackson and I think he loved snuggling her too! He is a very snuggly little guy!

So now we are on our own…. no one to do the dishes for me, clean my bathrooms, walk the dogs, or any of the other daily tasks I have managed to get out of doing for the last 2 1/2 weeks!  I hope we will survive!

Our best friends Josh and Jess are moving back to Virginia today and we can’t wait to have them within driving distance again! They will be here to visit this weekend for the first time together since Josh left for bootcamp back in April! It will be soooooo nice to have them back in the area! (sort of!)

Uncle Jeremiah and Aunt Emily will be here this weekend too! I know they are excited to meet Jackson and we are super excited to see them! We haven’t seen them since their wedding back in May! Busy weekend ahead of us, and I can’t wait for it to get here!! Add on that its Halloweeen weekend and daylight savings time too and we’ve got ourselves a full plate!

October 8th, 2009-  The day that our lives were changed forever by the simple introduction of our first baby boy, Jackson Elwood Lee.

We had to be at the hospital by 6:30 to check in and get prepped for the c-section.  Once we were there they hooked up some moniters to make sure that baby was healthy and got an IV put in so that they could administer fluids and some antibiotics before surgery.  We had a short amount of time where we were just waiting for them to come and say it was time to rock and roll!  The nurses were wonderful! They were very nice about explaining everything that was going to happen! Dr. Baker and the anestesiologist both came in to say hello and answer any questions we might have.  At exactly 8:30 they came in and told me we were ready to get started! They wheeled me back to the operating room and got started with the epidural.

The anesthesiologist wanted to use a spinal block but once she started she realized that an epidural was going to be the way to go. The bottom of my back has a pretty significant dip in it and she had a very difficult time getting the epidual into the spot. It was pretty painful as she was trying over and over to get it in the right spot and kept asking me to “arch my back like a mad cat!”  I would have been happy to do that for her had I not had this HUGE stomach resting on my legs causing them to fall asleep! It took a pretty painful 40 minutes to get the epidural situated and to get my body numb, but when it was good to go, I was thrilled for it to be over!

They called Dr. Baker to come in and let Dan into the room at this time. I was feeling slightly nervous, and very excited to finally be meeting this sweet boy that has taken such a toll on my body over the last few months! I wanted to know how much he weighed, how much hair he would have, what color eyes he would have, and who he would look like!  They made the incision and I knew it wouldn’t be long before we would be meeting our son!   We had an assistant to the surgeon who told bad jokes and thought he was pretty funny! Once Dr. Baker had everything situated, they told me I would feel “lots of pressure” but I never could have imagined what that would mean in the next 10 minutes!  I felt like a boulder was being dropped on my stomach as the assistant tried to push him down to the incision. I could hear Dr. Baker using the vacuum to try and suction him out, but the vacuum kepy popping off of his head! Dan told me later that the assistant was pushing down so hard with his elbow that his feet were coming off the ground! I then heard him say, ” Can someone please grab me a stool?”  Apparently his entire body weight wasn’t enough and he needed some leverage by using a stool to get high enough to push on my stomach!  I found out later while talking to Dr. Baker that Jackson’s head had not yet dropped and the doctor was expecting his head to be right there when he made the incision, but instead it was up  to my left side and he couldn’t get it to come down to the incision site.  This explains the “lots of pressure” I was feeling!  I must admit though that the second they pulled him out I felt a HUGE relief and started bawling immediately!

I heard him make a small sound (not a loud scream) and knew that my boy had finally arrived!  By the things that the people in the OR were saying, I KNEW that he was a big guy! We had all taken bets before surgery at what he would weight and the closet anyone had come to his actual weight was 9lb 15oz.  I finally heard him give a good scream and was so happy to know that everything was going to be ok!

They checked him out and we waited to hear the final verdict on his official weight………. 11lb 2 oz I heard them say!   WHAT?? 11.2??? I thought for sure the ultrasound was going to be off, but  I really had my hopes up that it would go in the other direction!   He was perfect though! Healthy as an ox! Big as a moose!

Dan got to head out of the OR with Jackson and they ended up removing an ovary due to a cyst that was located in the blood source to my left ovary.  They stitched me back up and took me to recovery where I was extremely exhausted and could barely keep my eyes open! Once the epidural started to wear off and I could feel my legs again, they let me go to my mother/baby room where they brought Jackson to me and let me hold him for the first time.

I wish I could put into words the way it felt to hold MY son for the 1st time.  I was in love with him instantly! His chubby cheeks and all!  Dan, Jackson, and I spent some time just the 3 of us on Thursday afternoon before Grammy and Papa Lee came into town and met the little man for the 1st time.

Overall, this was by far one of the most painful days of my life, but the pain was certainly nothing compared to the joy, peace, happiness and fulfillment I felt the day that Jackson was born.  The love that i have for this other human being who just happens to be half me and half Dan is unmeasurable.  I also have to mention that Dan has been absolutely amazing through all of this.  I knew he was going to be a great dad, but to see him in action is so special. He loves Jackson so much and makes sure to spend as much time with him as he can.  He has been working so hard this week despite staying up a little later and waking up a little earlier and I can’t tell him how much I enjoy watching him spend time with his little son!

So this is a wrap of our first day as a family of three! I hope to keep this blog up to date now that I feel like I have something worth writing about!

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