The McPherson Show: January 2010

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Hospital Stay

This is the first time I have ever spent time in a hospital for anyone other than myself. I will tell you, I don't like it one bit! Kendall was admitted to the Pediatric unit on Monday for monitoring. Basically her jaundice was causing some other concerns and they wanted to test and monitor her for a 24 hour period. Kendall took this all MUCH better than I did. Granted, she hated (and I mean HATED) getting her blood drawn MULTIPLE times during her stay, then the failed attempts (plural!) at an IV, but she was a champ at sun bathing under the bellirubin lights! She loved the warmth of the lights and just stretched all 19inches of her out and basked in the blue lights. She did not cry once the whole 24 hours she was under those lights. The nurses were very impressed:) I told Andy that I think we need to move somewhere where it's warm year round - of course it wouldn't be hard to sell that idea to Andy;) All in all we came out much better than when we entered the hospital...now, I hope that's our last visit to SCH for a long time!! I contemplated taking a picture of her sunbathing, but she had tubes all over her, a mask on and the blue lights made her look green...so I passed on the photo op!

After being released from the hospital, all I could think about was sleeping in my own bed, being with the rest of my family and possibly getting a little more rest...oh, that so did not happen! Everything was wonderful all the way up until halfway through Kendall's midnight feeding. Alley woke up throwing up...oh the joys! Now, as most of you know, I don't throw up and never have, so I am really not good with it. Andy on the other hand was wonderful last night! I don't know what I would have done with out him. I felt helpless in the situation so I stuck to cleaning the bathroom up and doing the wash. Andy basically took care of Alley all night and even "slept" on the bedroom floor with her. He did all this so I could focus on Kendall and feeding her. He truly is a wonderful daddy and husband!! Everyone seems to have survived, we're tired, but we survived the night..and Kendall got the best sleep of us all;)

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Day 3..whew..

As I have promised many of you, here is Kendall's birth story plus some pictures from the past couple of days:)

I went to the doctor on Monday and found that my amniotic fluid level was really low. The doctor struggled to find pockets big enough to measure, and the ones that were, had the umbilical cord in it. He wanted to induce right away, but since I was preterm, he had to consult my high risk OBGYN in Richmond. The doctor said to wait but that if there was anything that felt different to immediately go to the hospital. So, off we went (home that is). Usually Kendall is VERY active after my appointments because of all the poking, prodding and monitoring that gets done. Well, after this appointment I felt almost no movement. She would shift her weight every so often, but nothing big. Anyway, I was sent the next morning to the Labor & Delivery floor to be monitored. My doctor came up in the morning to see me and check me then said he's be back later to check me for progress. By the time he came back I had started contracting (slightly - I didn't know it, but I was!) and had dialated a little more, so I was immediately put in a room. They started my induction at 10:10pm.
Mom and Dad were in town, so they came out to keep us company and my Aunt and Uncle so graciously stayed at our house while Alley slept! By midnight my contractions were really strong, manageable but strong! I decided to get my epidural since I figured I had a long way to go in this labor! Well, the epidural worked on only my left side...oh Lord help me was all I could think. The poor anesthesiologist kept working to see if he could get it to numb my right side, but nothing worked. So, I continued to labor through it with a numb left leg...at 2am the nurse came in to check me and found I was 5cm dialated...Lord it could be another 5 hours of this! The pain was not pleasant at all - it never went away. Around 2:20am the nurse came in to ask if I was pushing...I laughed at her and said absolutely not! -as I'm grabbing the railings to hold on for dear life through the next contraction. I was not amused by her statement. She asked if she could check me...sure, why not. She looked up at me and said "are your ready to have a baby?" - I stared at her and laughed, sure I was, that's why I'm here isn't it?! She said, "you're 10cm dialated and she's coming out!". Oh Lord! Then the flurry of activity started...without going into any detail - the doctor had to hold Kendall's head in while they finished setting up, then 2 pushes and the head was out, 2 pushes the body came out...and at 2:36am Kendall Ann McPherson made her arrival:)
So that's how it all went down...Here are some pictures from the past few days...

Kendall all ready to leave the hospital (we left after 24hrs)

We stopped by to see Granny who is in the rehab center recovering from Hip surgery

Aunt Gayle holding Kendall

The introduction...Alley was unsure of Kendall for all of 2 minutes...now we can't keep her away!

"holding" Kendall

Checking out Kendall with Mimi

snuggling with Kendall

I guess she felt left out?!

We are all doing well, alittle tired, but we are surviving! Kendall has developed a small case of jaudice that we are monitoring and has dropped her weight down to 5lbs 12oz, but hopefully she'll started feeding better and all that will be in the past:) I will try to keep everyone updated!

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Early Arrival

Kendall Ann McPherson

Born January 20th at 36 weeks

2:36am

6lbs 7oz

19 inches

**We are all doing very well and enjoying the time we get to spend together. I will update later when we get out of the hospital on how her delivery went!**

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Chef McPherson

Over the past few weeks Alley has been more interested in helping around the house. I, of course, welcome ANY type of help from her, especially the closer we get to having our second! Alley has always loved sweeping, putting dirty laundry in the hamper, and putting away her toys. How did I get so lucky?! Recently she has become more interested in helping out in the kitchen. She wants to help put away clean dishes, get out her plate and silverware for dinner and help make dinner. We have a little stool she uses in the kitchen so she can stir things, put the ingredients in and/or clean up. She just loves being helpful!!

This morning we made mini muffins for breakfast. Alley was so proud of herself! Here is the picture of her while the muffins were cooling off.

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Baby Shower

Two of my friends threw me a baby shower for this second little one. It was so sweet of them to think of me and to celebrate the life of this new little one! It was something they really didn't have to do, but was much appreciated! We kept it small and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The funny thing was that over half of the people there were pregnant!! How crazy is that! All of them were having boys (except 1 who just found out she was 6 weeks along). They decided to have the shower over at my house, which was great because we were able to distract Alley better (even though she was slightly grumpy this morning due to an early early rise). While we were setting things up, I told Alley to go play in her playroom...This is how we found Alley right before the baby shower. "Nigh-nigh time"

Here is our pastor's wife helping out with Alley while we waited for the other guests and continued to set up

Here was our small group. What a great time we had...those missing from the pictures were my mother and grandmother

Here is my big present helper...she was a fast gift opener!!

Here is one of the gifts my friend made - I love it!!!

What a wonderful time we had! Kendall and I got some really great items and I feel as though we are getting ready for her coming...it could be any day;) My excitement (and impatience) has increased!!

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Weekend Fun

Isn't there a deal that if it's going to be freezing cold and extremely windy, that it's suppose to snow too??!! For some reason we got the two miserable parts of weather without the enjoyable part! Saturday was just down right cold...brr! Alley and I had traveled to Richmond for the weekend, since Andy was out of town, intent on doing some after Christmas shopping (better late than never!). We definitely did not last long shopping!! We did enjoy ourselves inside keeping warm by the fire Papa made though:) Alley even found some of my brother's old trucks and had a ball playing with them. There's always something new and interesting to discover at Mimi and Papa's house. (I need to remember to keep Alley and Kendall's old toys to bring out for our grandchildren!!!)

Alley is setting up an audience of stuffed animals to watch her play...who knew playing cars was a spectator sport!

doing ballet moves while digging into the truck bucket...gotta keep it girly! To top it off, she was singing jingle bells while doing all this!!

We did venture outside for a walk, just to change things up a bit...okay, let me clarify...Alley, Mimi and Papa ventured outside while I made sure the fire stayed in the fireplace...such a sacrifice;)

Papa and Alley all bundled up to brave the cold

Alley wearing Momma's scarf (so she could look like Mimi!)

Mimi and Alley stopping to warm up together

We had an enjoyable weekend despite the cold...but we're definitely looking forward to warmer weather!!!

Sunday, January 3, 2010

2009 through Pictures

A friend of mine does a recap of the year through pictures on her blog and I thought like that was a great idea:) What a great way to look back through the year and see how much we have been blessed. I have really enjoyed going through all our pictures (and man are there lots!!!) and re-living each memory. So, here it goes:)

January: Alley starts doing somersaults frequently...crazy child!