More family resemblance

O.K. Danielle here for a brief moment. I was looking through some of our pictures, and came across some old ones. I have been taking most of the credit for the looks of our children. I have always stood by the fact, however, that Natalie is now looking more and more like Dan and that Aiden was born with, at the very least, his daddy's eyes. Well, here is a picture to take in. This is actually Dan...but I swear to you this is Aiden in disguise!!! By the way, baby boy is now 11lbs 10oz and 22.1in long. He's doing well, but is in reflux meds (thank goodness). They seem to be helping a bit, but it's still too early to tell. Natalie is still enjoying being a big sister, and I think we are finally getting somewhat used to being a family of four. I am feeling much more normal now...so bring on the visitors (if you so wish)!!!!

Somebody call Guiness; I think we have a record here.

Aiden pooped on the ceiling.

This entire post will be about this event, so if that's not the sort of thing you'd like to read about, then you might want to browse through the older posts and see if there are any that you missed. Or you can look forward to my next post, which will be a nice one about Natalie's joy at being a big sister.

Ok, now that we've gotten rid of those people, we can continue. So, as I was writing, Aiden POOPED on the CEILING. Mind you, this was not as a result of a game of Spiderbaby (think Spiderpig from the Simpsons Movie). Aiden is too little to appreciate being Spiderbaby -- unlike SpiderNatalie, who laughs uncontrollably -- so we haven't tried it. Even if we had tried Spiderbaby, he would have been wearing at least a diaper, and, in keeping with the law of gravity, one would expect that a game of Spiderbaby would result in poop on me, rather than poop on the ceiling. But I'm starting to digress. The point is that Aiden was on this changing table, which sits 32" above the floor, when he managed to poop on our 8' ceiling:














This actually happened about two weeks ago, just a day or two after we brought Aiden home. I had his diaper off in order to change him, and shortly after peeing on me, he had a particularly explosive bowel movement. I hadn't noticed the mess on the ceiling or the wall at the time, because, frankly, it never occurred to me to check whether he had pooped on the ceiling. So it was the next day that I happened to notice a stain on the wall. Investigating the source of this stain caused me to notice another stain on the wall, and the stain on the ceiling. If one drew a line connecting these three dots, it led right back to the changing table.

I think this may be record-worthy because of the distances involved here. First, he got the ceiling. Based on the way I usually place Aiden on the changing table, I measure the distance between the stain on the ceiling and the launch-point at 6'8":

This picture was taken with the camera on the changing table at the approximate launch point. In order to avoid a distorted sense of scale, I set the focal length of the lens to 35mm, which, for a digital SLR camera, is approximately equivalent to the focal length of the human eye.

With the camera set up the same way, I measured the distance to a cluster of stains located between 7'3" and 7'8" away:

Thanks to my lovely assistant who helped hold up the tape measure, albeit with a lot of sighing and eye-rolling.

Finally, the one that I will submit for consideration as the world's record for distance covered by poo propelled unassisted from an infant less than 1 week old: a wall 9'8" away:

Because of the angle, it was too difficult to get a picture of this one with the measuring tape in place, but the stain is located behind the nightlight, which appears near the center of the frame, just to the right of the first round wooden post.

So that's all for now. As you might imagine, we have quite a bit of cleaning up to do, and not just because of this incident.

No. of times Aiden has peed on Daddy: 6
No. of times Aiden has peed on Mommy: 5
No. of times Aiden has peed on the new carpet: 8

A Little Family Resemblance

Aiden at 1 day old.

Natalie when she was a few days old.

I think Natalie's forehead is a little taller and her nose is a little longer, but other than that, they look quite a bit alike. Danielle says that their mouths are different, but I'm not convinced.

Happy Birthday Aiden!

Aiden Daniel Smith was born at 6:23 pm on Christmas Eve. He was 9 lbs. 13 oz. and 20 3/4 inches long. That makes him and inch or two shorter than his sister was at birth, but over a pound and a half heavier.

Aiden started on his journey at about 2:30 am on December 24th, when Danielle's water broke. She wasn't having contractions then, so we took our time getting ready and headed to the hospital at around 3:30. Danielle starting having contractions every 3-4 minutes along the way.

When we arrived, Danielle seemed to be in active labor, having strong contractions every two to three minutes. She continued to have them for several hours, but after 11 am, she stopped making progress. Her doctor convinced us to try Pitocin at around 1 pm. But Danielle, being exhausted and worn down from almost nine and a half hours of labor, decided that she would not be able to bear the pain of Pitocin-induced contractions without an epidural.

The epidural turned out to a great decision. Danielle got a little sleep while she had her strongest and most frequent (and painless!) contractions. Unfortunately, after a few more hours of hard contractions, she still hadn't made any more progress. Danielle's doctor recommended a c-section around 5:30 pm. Although it was the last thing she wanted, Danielle agreed that it was probably best for Aiden.

The surgery started about ten minutes after six. Around 6:23, we heard the doctor and her 3 assistants all gasp simultaneously and cry out "Oh, my GOD!"

That, of course, threw Danielle into a panic. But we quickly realized that it was not an aortic hemmorage that has caused them to cry out, but rather shock at Aiden's size. The rest of the dialog among the surgical staff went something like this:

"Wow! That's a big baby!"
"That's 11 pounds, at least."
"I'll bet 11."
"Get that baby on the scale; I can't wait to see what he weighs."
"Ow! He bit me." (the surgeon)
"That's future linebacker there."
"Oh, he's peeing on me."
"He's breathing well. Nice and pink, that's what I like to see."
"I'll help you clean him off."
"Oh, he's peeing again."
"He got me that time."

A few minutes later it was all, "congratulations," and "here's your baby." It turns out that he was not even quite 10 pounds. But he was more than big enough. A mark on his head showed that no matter how long Danielle had pushed, he would not have come into the world any other way. So the delivery was not what we had intended, but we feel like we make all the right decisions.

Danielle says that surgery was painless, and that she did not even experience discomfort while the surgeons pushed and pulled on her belly. In fact, the only discomfort she experienced was from her IV, which was rather poorly placed in a small vein in her hand.

Danielle is now experiencing the pain and discomfort of recovering from major surgery, but Aiden is by every indication, happy and healthy. We expect to come home on Thursday.

Aiden managed to pee on the nursing staff a third time before we left the operating room. We're going to have to be careful about keeping him covered.

Under New Management

Dan here. So I think this blog thing is supposed to be my deal now. What does that mean for you? Probably less frequent and shorter posts, and almost certainly poorer spelling.

So here's what new (I started this post a month ago, so actually, these things aren't really new any more. Consider this fair warning about the future quality of these posts):

(1) Baby shower. I thought we shouldn't have a baby shower because we've already had a baby and we have most of the stuff we need. But, I was told in a diplomatic sort of way that I'm apparently a baby-grinch, and that I should just pipe down and clean the house.

Anyhow, we had the party a few weeks ago. It was a huge success, with a much larger turnout than we expected. I think Danielle was a bit overwhelmed by the preparation and the number of people, but she had a great time. We received many thoughtful gifts. Many thanks to all those who helped make the day special for Danielle, and a special shout-out to Mia, Anna, and the Moms (Turner and Smith), who all went way above-and-beyond in helping us get ready.

Not that anyone cares, but I vacated the house during the estrogen onslaught, and went to see Dan in Real Life, which was very good.

(2) Carpet. We bought a lot of it; just shy of 900 square feet. It looks great. We should have done this a long time ago.

Those of you in the market for carpet might want to know this about Home Depot's much-advertised special featuring whole-house carpet installation for $199: it does not include removal or disposal of the old carpet, which adds $299 to the price. It also does not include installation on stairs ($4/stair) or moving furniture. After learning all that, we went elsewhere.

Pictures

Nikki was in town from Texas a few weeks ago. Amanda and Josh stopped by to catch up on old times.

And here are some pictures from Thanksgiving at Grammy and Granddad Smith's. Aunt Connie helped the kids make a gingerbread house.

Natalie loves her cousins. And she especially likes to shower Alex with hugs and kisses, whether he likes it or not. (Connie took this one.)

Grammy bought T-shirt transfers for the inkjet printer. Every kid got a T-shirt with his or her picture on it. Natalie is decorating hers with a fabric marker. (Connie took this one too.)

Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire!!!!

O.K. First off, thank you to all of you for the well wishes for Aiden's speedy and safe entrance; however, it looks like it will not be nearly as speedy as we had anticipated.

First: The good News:

Baby boy is doing great, though still inside. He is moving around, growing, doing everything he's supposed to. I had an u/s yesterday when I went in for my amnio appt. I was starting to get nervous about things like the cord being wrapped around him and all that stuff, but the nurse said they listen to the blood flow to make sure there isn't an issue and everything sounds great with him. She laughed several times because Aiden would get extremely annoyed with the poking and prodding. She asked, "Does he always move around this much." YES!!!! That's why he needs to come out...he is too big to move this much!!!! It actually hurts now!! Anyhow, the point of that is that he looks extremely healthy and happy to stay put for now. They estimate him to be 9lbs 14 oz (yes, 2 oz shy of 10 lbs). But, as the nurse said they are just estimates and they are based on measurements of the limbs, head, belly, etc. So, it is possible that he is just very long and not necessarily all weight! So, I am going to be wishful thinking that he is over 9lbs, just not that much!!!

Second: The irritating, disappointing, lies...

I scheduled the amnio last week for this past Thursday. There was some confusion about when the results would arrive. At first, I was told possibly not until Monday (Christmas Eve). To which I replied, "Then there's no point, because I will be 39 weeks and would not need an amnio for induction). So, after talking to the lady at the health center I decided to keep the appt. and chat with my dr. at my next appt. (which was this past Tuesday). She asked if I had scheduled the amnio, and I told her yes but that we needed to discuss the timing issue. During that appt. she said that she would get results from the amnio within a couple of hours and if they came back saying that Aiden's lungs were mature, then she would induce that night. So, based on that information Dan and I agreed to go along with the amnio. She even had her staff call to "make reservations" for yesterday. When I called back to see what I was supposed to do before and/or after the amnio, the staff at the office said that my dr. was waiting to hear from the director of ob at the hospital to make sure they could get me in Thursday night. I was confused, and kept calling to find out because neither Dan nor I wanted to do the amnio if it wasn't going to make a difference in induction. So, I made one last phone call as I was waiting to be called back for the amnio appt., and the office said they would get back to us w/in 20 min. So, went ahead with the ultrasound (which had to be done anyway), to check on the baby's well being and weight. We told the girl doing the u/s our predicament and that we were reluctant to move ahead with the amnio w/o hearing back from my ob first. So, the nurse and dr. that were supposed to do the amnio came back to talk with us, and said they didn't really see the point since I was so close to being 39 weeks and that usually these appts. are in the morning (o.k., but that's not up to me when I call and this is the time I am given!). This dr. didn't think I would be able to get in until at least Friday afternoon time. He said he would call Dr. Duroseau to talk about it and decide whether or not we would proceed with the amnio. They came back and said, "No amnio. Dr. Duroseau said she will see you 6 a.m. on Sunday the 23rd." Well, I was irritated and relieved at the same time. I am kind of glad that I did not need to get the amnio, but the whole reason we were considering this anyhow was because we did NOT want to come in on Sunday since that would be I wouldn't be home until Christmas Day at best (not counting if a c-section would be necessary). So, I had to continue on with my Non-Stress Test (something I've had to do every week since about 34 weeks), during which I called my dr. and said, "No, we will not be here Sunday...unless he comes on his own then. If he's not here by Christmas, then feel free to schedule something anytime after that."

So, the new plan is, if he is not here by Christmas I will be going in either Wednesday the 26th or Friday the 28th. You know what this means though...he's going to come on Sunday (or Christmas Eve)...all on his own!!!!!


I have been having some serious contractions since the appt., so I am hoping that it actually won't be much longer and he will come on his own.

So, we're waiting again!!!!!