Easter 2015

When planning Easter this year our plans were up in the air.  We had no idea if we would be at home or in the hospital.  We did know however, we wouldn't be traveling and that my parents would be here for the weekend.  In the end, we were at home with my parents, Elsie, and our five day old little baby.  It was low key.  We did our grocery shopping the day before and took it easy.  

On Saturday, we ventured out to a nursing home that hosts a little egg hunt.  I followed with my camera and my dad followed with his video camera.  It was so funny to watch her because she was very selective of the color of eggs she chose-I think she was trying to only pick up "girl colors":  pink, purple, yellow, etc.  I am not sure where she picked up this whole girl and boy color business but it impacts her decisions quite a bit.  It was a nice day so it was nice to get out of the house for a little bit.  

The next morning Elsie was so excited to head down the stairs to see if the Easter Bunny hid any eggs and brought her an Easter basket.  She has been obsessed with hiding and finding eggs for awhile now   

She found her basket hiding by the couch and instead of pulling the whole basket out, she pulled the items from her basket out one by one.  She got a kite, a soccer ball, new Minnie Mouse nightgown (you can see from the pictures her current one is a bit small ;), some candy, a couple of card games, and a Easter book.    

She also received some goodies from Grandma Bonnie and Grandpa Craig like a Frozen dish set and some books.

The rest of the morning was spent enjoyng the day,  Elsie, John, and my dad walked my mom down the street to the Catholic church for Mass while I stayed back with Evie.  when my mom got back we got to work preparing Easter Dinner.  My brother and Magda called in on Skype around 1:00 PM so we chatted with them for awhile and introduced Evie to them and talked about their upcoming arrival of their baby.  Afrer visiting with them we enjoy dinner, took some pictures and then my parents had to take \off to head back north.  

Evelyn Jo's Birthday

It is crazy that is has already been almost four weeks since all of this has taken place.  Some parts I remember like it was yesterday and some parts are a little fuzzy but I will do my best to recount how the day played out so I can remember this VERY special day.  Also, this is a very long, wordy text and has lots of little details about a birth so if you don't want to hear this info I would stop reading now :) 

As my due date approached, I really started to get prepared for the arrival of our second little girl.  I put the finishing touches in my hospital bag and tried my best to keep the house in order each night before bed in case that night was "the night."  On March 31st before I went to bed I told Elsie that one of these nights she might wake up in the morning and instead of mom and dad being there Grandma Bev would be there because we would be at the hospital.  That night she asked for a few extra hugs and made me promise that I would still be here in the morning and wouldn't go to the hospital.  I promised her, which I felt terrible about doing because I knew it was not something that was necessarily in my control.  For me, when the time came the ideal situation would be to get Elsie off to daycare and then got into labor.  

As we know we don't always get what we want.  At 1:20 AM I had my first real contraction.  I had been sleeping but it woke me up.  I laid there for awhile and waited for another.  I ended up having another and by the third contraction I decided to start timing them, which was easy because I downloaded an app on my phone.  They weren't consistent on the frequency yet coming anywhere from five minutes to ten minutes.  At one point John woke up and asked if he should take Tally to the shop and I told him, no they weren't close enough together and that we wouldn't be going anywhere anytime soon.  I am sure had I got up and moved around I could have made things progress faster but I kept thinking about my promise to Elsie and how I really wanted to see her in the morning before we headed to the hospital so I just laid there waiting for the time to pass since I wasn't able to fall back to sleep.  Around 4:30 I decided to get into the shower and get ready.  This was also the time that my contractions picked up to being 5-6 minutes apart and lasting for at least a minute.  This kept going for at least an hour and just before 6:00 I called First Nurse to see when I should be going in.  They told me now was probably the time.  So we called Bev and had her come over and I waited as long as I could to go so I could see Elsie.  I ended up going in there around 6:30 and woke her up-it was about the time she wakes up anyways.  We gave her hugs and kisses and headed out the door. 

One more pic belly pic :)

Also around this time my contractions started slowing down.  By the time I got to the hospital they were at 6-8 minutes apart which isn't good. We arrived at the hospital a little after 7:00 AM.   When the Dr. came in to check on me and I told her how the contractions were slowing down she said "Well it looks like she is playing a little April Fool's joke on you, making you think she was going to come today".  But when she checked me I was at a 4-a good 4 she said.  She said if I wanted to have this baby today she could break my water since I was already progressing on my own.  She gave me some time to think about it and said she would check back in with me.  One of the things about this is that I had my doctor there vs one that was on call-which was reassuring.   So John and I walked the halls over and over and over trying to get my contractions to come together more.  I called Erin and Amber to get their opinions on whether to have Dr. G break my waters or to go home and see if I progressed better on my own.  After much deliberation, we decided just to go ahead and do it.  I just REALLY didn't want to do pitocin again this time around like I did with Elsie. I wanted things to just happen on their own.  At least this time I did go into labor on my own, I was just speeding it up right?  

  

I had to wait a little bit to get settled into a room.  Apparently, Birthways was really busy because we had to wait to have a room cleaned because they were all full.  But by 9:30 AM I was into a room and settled-and really tired because I had been up since 1:30 AM.  By 9:40 Dr. G had broken my waters.  When she broke my water she noticed some "thin" meconium present which later she said it was a good thing we didn't wait too long to have this baby.  With meconium present there is a possibility that they would have to suction her out when she was born-another thing I obviously wanted to avoid.  I wanted to be able to hold this little girl the minute she was born instead of being whisked away (Elsie had to have a couple of puffs of air to get her to breath when she was born).  But the nurse said it was so thin that they probably wouldn't have to do that and probably wouldn't call the pediatrician to be present so that was a bit of relief.  

John and I walked around some more.  They kept asking when I wanted my epidural since I had said I would want one.  They told me I might "miss" my opportunity. Apparently, when you have your first child you can get an epidural at any time.  But any subsequent births there is a window and once you get too far you might miss your chance because you tend to progress more quickly the second, third, fourth time around.  After walking some and having three hard contractions within just a few minutes I decided to get an epidural.  By 11:45 AM I had received my epidural.  My contractions still weren't consistently getting closer and closer.  When Dr. G checked me again between 12 PM-1PM I was still at a "good" 4.  No progress what so ever!  So dissapointing and I also just felt terrible.  I hated the way the epidural was making me feel and I was so nauseous.  I ended up getting sick.  they ended up getting me something for the nausea and changed out something with my epidural which can cause that.  I was also a bit emotional at this point, frustrated and dissapointed that things weren't progressing-in fact they were slowing down.  I knew that sometimes an epidural can slow things down but with Elsie, it sped things up and I was hoping that would be the case again.   Around 1:00 PM my contractions were still anywhere from 3-7 minutes apart. 

Taken at 2:45 PM

Taken at 4:34 AM

 Around 2:30 I decided to finally get pitocin.  By 4:00 PM I could tell it was working, despite the epidural I could feel my contractions, I would have John test me.  I would tell him when I thought one was happening and he would look at the monitor and tell me I was right-and I always was.  By 5:00 I was actually uncomfortable, I felt a lot of pressure and my nurse Sharon was in my room all the time.  I hadn't been checked since noonish but we both new I had to be close but Dr. G was planning to come over shortly after 5:00 when the clinic closed (it is just across from the hospital) so we were waiting to check.  Around 5:30 Dr. G told my nurse just to check and if I was ready to push to go ahead and start pushing and she would be over.  Also around this time, my friend Shanna who is a NICU nurse was coming in to work and she would be assisting with delivering our little girl.  It was nice to have someone you know and trust in the room taking care of our baby if anything should go wrong.  She wasn't scheduled to come in until 7 PM but they called her to come in at 6 PM since they were so busy and she ended up getting there in time to deliver our baby.  So anyways, the nurse checked me and I had a lip but through the next contraction that dissapeared and was "complete" and ready to push.  We did only two practice pushes and the nurse told me to stop and that I couldn't push anymore until Dr. G got there.  She put in another call to her and by 6:00 PM Dr. G was there.  I pushed normal through one contraction and then little miss Evie was born while pushing through the next contraction. I couldn't believe how little I had to push (I pushed for 2.5+ hours with Elsie.  

Welcome to the world Miss Evelyn Jo!!

Evelyn Jo Sorem

Born on 4.1.2015

6:11 PM

8 lbs 9.5 oz

20.25" Long

Elsie's Dance Recital-Candyland 2015

This past weekend Elsie had her first dance recital.  She has spent the last 12 weeks attending a dance class with parks and recreation and it concluded with a dance recital.  Her class danced to the song "Candyman".  Despite her misbehaving/being distracted during class and especially during the two rehearsals on stage she amazed up by actually doing the dance on recital day.  We definitely had our doubts.  In fact, I was really worried but we really stressed to her that she had to listen to the teachers and just do the routine and if she couldn't remember what to do she needed to look at the teachers.  Because is rehearsal it wasn't just that she didn't know the routine or had stage freight-she was not listening and being naughty-like playing in the curtains, sitting on the floor and picking at the tape that marked her spot, and laying on the floor making "snow angels".  Yeah, I was a bit concerned.  But in the end we had nothing to worry about. :)  In fact, I was so proud of her!

In the auditorium we took up a whole row of seats-in attendance were :  Dale and Bev, Brandi, Emma, and Olivia, John, Myself, and Evie, and my dad who came down for the afternoon just for the recital.  My mom had planned on coming but she had been pretty sick the previous few days and with Evie it was best for her to stay home.  My dad took a video of the recital so I plan to post that as soon as I can get a digital copy.  I can't wait to see it!

Well here's a few pics of the day:

Elsie with her Daddy

John got her these flowers and she said these would be the flowers that she will have at her wedding to her Daddy when she gets bigger :)  It was pretty sweet.  

Elsie with Grandma Bev and Grandpa Dale

Elsie with Grandpa Craig

 Brandi and Elsie

Amber and I with our girls

Evie during the performance-I guess she wasn't too interested ;)

Teeny Ballet Class

2015

Puerto Rico-2015

This past January, John and I were lucky enough to take a little trip to Puerto Rico for work.  We went two years ago with one company and now this time we went with a different company.  They were very different experiences.

Last time in 2013 we were at a resort in San Juan, this time we were to the east of San Juan in Fajardo.  It was absolutely beautiful.  The trip was Jan 12th-15th so four days, three nights.  It was actually a perfect amount of time.  We had a very early flight on Monday morning.  WE were up by 3:00 for our 5:30 AM flight.  We connected in Chicago and then had a 4.5 hour flight to San Juan.  We arrived in San Juan just before 4:00 local time.  We then had about an hour shuttle to the resort. Upon arriving, we got checked in, found our room and walked around a bit before the Welcome Reception.  The dinner was really good and John enjoyed the drinks.  It is a good thing this time I pregnant because it is no an all inclusive place.  Drinks were only covered when it was for a work related event.  After dinner we headed back to our room and had an early night-we were exhausted from a long day of travel.

View from our Room

The next morning, I got up with John and we went to grab breakfast before John had his meetings for the morning.  While he was in the sessions, I found a nice shady spot to try to catch up on some random things like blog posts, shutterfly books, etc.  

View for the deck where I spent the mornings.  

John got done around 10:00 AM so we decided it would be a good day to check out Palomino Island.  We had the option to do other activities but with being pregnant, a lot of them were out of the question like ATV trip, horseback riding, and catamaran trip (I was worried about motion sickness).  We could have gone on a trip to Old San Juan but we had done that the last time we were there so we decided to just take it easy and relax-something that doesn't happen too often at home.  

This resort was nestled along side of the cliff which provided beautiful views.  The picture below shows the resort from the water taxi.  There was the upper section and then the lower side and we had to use a little tram to get down to water level.  Because of this, the resort actually doesn't have a beach right there on the resort but they have a private island accessible by water taxi so we spent Tuesday afternoon there.  

The island was really pretty and peaceful.  The first spot we sat at was a little more secluded and quiet which was nice.  

My Virgin pina colada.  I was definitely missing the rum :)

After awhile we decided to grab some lunch at the little restaurant on the island and then we moved more the the sandy side of the island.  

This is a picture of the tram that took you up and down the cliff.  

When we got back to our room we discovered that our carpet was soaking wet!!  So after a few calls to management/housekeeping they discovered there was a leak in the room above us which was causing the water to seep into our room.  They ended up moving us to a new room.  After making the switch we headed to dinner with our sales rep and all of the other dealers in his territory.  Our table was filled with dealers from MN, IA, and SD.  It was interesting to hear how different businesses run compared to ours.  We decided to call it an early night again-I know we aren't too exciting.  

The next morning we woke up to our new view from our balcony.  

We headed down for breakfast, John had breakout sessions, and I hung out by the pool again.  

That afternoon we decided just to hang out at the resort vs head over the island again.  We found a some chairs by the pool and just lounged all afternoon.  It was wonderful!!   Then we headed back to our room to get ready for the banquet.  This is when our relaxing vacation turned not so relaxing.  As we were walking to the banquet room I tripped and fell on and floor outlet that was missing its cover and was located right in the middle of the hallway.  Ugh I kind of got nervous because I fell and called my Dr. just to confirm I had nothing to worry about.  The nurse immediately told me I needed to go into the hospital to be monitored!! What?!? I was not going to go to a hospital in Puerto Rico.  After talking to the Dr. the nurse called me back and said I just needed to take it easy and to go in if I noticed any signs of trouble.  Thankfully, I never did and the hotel staff were super awesome.   

They brought up food from the banquet for us to eat in the room and I just rested for the remainder of the night.  It was scary though-all I could think about was going into preterm labor, having a premature baby on an island and being stuck here until my baby was strong enough to head back to the states.  Thank goodness none of that happened but after I fell I couldn't wait to get back to the states.  

The next morning we packed up our stuff and just lounged around.  We didn't have to leave the resort until after noon so we had a relaxing breakfast and just relaxed until it was time to catch our shuttle.  

We had this yummy fruit plate for breakfast along with this amazing corn bread and then shared an omelette.  It was perfect!  

All in all we had a great time minus the incident with tripping the last night (I cant' believe I am so clumsy!).  It was good to get away and spend some time with John, we met some nice people who are in similar businesses as us, and learned some too.