The Big Sleep

This week was really exciting at the DeShazer household. Grevin had decided from day #1 that the only place he would sleep would be in in our arms. I don't think he realized that the cord was cut on the 10th! We would try to put him the swing, in the crib, in the cosleeper, in the bassinet, in the pack'n'play, in his rocker chair, on his playmat...and he would sleep for a maximum of 30 minutes before waking up and wanting to eat. The only place he would sleep would be in our arms so Zippy and I would take turns sleeping with him on the couch...and he would sleep for 2-3 hours at a time as long as one of us was actually holding him. On Wednesday, I took him for a walk and he fell asleep in the stroller. As we got back to the house, we sat outside on the sidewalk because I was sure he would wake up any minute. After awhile, I brought the stroller back into the house and left him there. He ended up sleeping for almost 4 hours!! Yay!! I tried to put him in it at night, but he keeps waking up...but at least during the day, I can get him to sleep in the stroller for at least 2 hours at a time. There is hope! But I know as soon as he starts sleeping on his own, I will miss all the cuddling. He loves to cuddle and I hope that never changes.

The Big Sleep

Grevin also has found his fingers. He loves sucking on them but hasn't quite figured out what to do with the remaining ones. I didn't have my camera handy to get the best shot earlier this week. He had his thumb in his mouth and the rest of his hand was covering his entire face as he was looking out at me through all of his fingers. Here he is falling asleep and looking like he is poking himself in the eyes!

I am just amazed at how much alert he is getting every day. He definitely knows my voice and Zippy's. On Saturday, he started cooing and smiled a real smile at me(not one of those gassy ones!). He is staying awake longer and focusing on objects and watching the world go by. He loves to stare at the dogs, at the black and white picture frame in our living room, and the bricks of the fire place. He loves going for car rides-we try to go somewhere every day-but he never falls asleep. He loves getting out and is such a good baby!

One Week Later

Grevin shared his one week birthday on St. Patty's Day with his Uncle Ben. We made our first outing for sushi-which I HIGHLY suggested as I had been craving it for almost 10 months. Grevin did amazing in the baby wrap, sleeping the entire meal until he had a blow out right at the end. As we were walking out, we needed to get a quick picture of the men of the family-you can tell Grevin was really excited about taking this picture with a full diaper!

Grandpa Doyle, Zippy, Grevin, and Uncle Ben

Enjoying our first outing-what a good baby!

Uncle Ben,Grandma, Grevin, me, and Grandpa

Grandparents and Uncle Ben left yesterday and Grevin misses them so much! Everyone was fighting over holding him and even who got to change his diaper. Grandma got to change his first poopy diaper! It was so helpful to have them here so Zippy and I could rest and start getting into the groove of family life. They helped us mount our flat screen tv, put together baby gear, did the dishes, fixed meals, did the laundry, played the Wii, and even organized Grevin's dresser! Thank you so much, I miss you already!!

Now, the other set of Grandparents have arrived and Grevin is enjoying hanging out with Grandpa Kearney. I don't think this kid has been put down since he was born. He is loving life!

Hanging Out...

As promised, here are pictures of Grevin hanging out in the belly cast that we made a few weeks ago(check out the earlier postings). We needed to do this photo shoot before he got too big to fit!!

Just Chillin'

I think this is how he was the whole time with his feet up near my ribs

I am sure many people are wondering about his name. He is named after his three grandpas: Greg and Darvin combine for Grevin("Gray-vin") and William is my stepdad's middle name.

We have family in town for the next week so I won't be posting much but I have tons of pictures to share with everyone when I get a chance. His grandma and grandpa Oglesby and his Uncle Ben came in on Saturday and have been helping us out by holding the baby as much as possible! He is such a good baby and Zippy and I are really enjoying being parents. He only wakes us up about 3-4 times a night! I never realized I could survive on such little sleep and be happy about it!

Labor Story-ALL THE DETAILS!

I am going to share as many of the details I can recall so it is long and I tried not to be TOO graphic....



From my last couple of posts, you could probably tell I was about done but that I seriously doubted that I would be having Grevin on his due date. It turns out that he got that eviction notice and decided to SLOWLY pack his stuff. Around 6 pm on Monday, March 9th, I started having contractions but they were anywhere between 20-40 minutes apart and not very long. We decided to ignore them, have dinner with a friend, and head to bed at 10 pm. Zippy fell straight asleep and I started to doze before the contractions became closer together(around 6 minutes apart). At about 1:30 am, I woke up Zippy to have him start timing the contractions and they were going on 2-3 minutes apart for about a minute long. We slowly started to prepare for the hospital because I really didn't want to get there and be told to go back home!! At 2:30 am, we hopped in the car and headed to the hospital. By 4 am, they admitted me at 4 cm dialated and my water had not broken yet. Zippy and I tried to be good and use what we had learned in class-our bag of tricks(walking, shower, back massage, birth ball, etc). The only thing that seemed to help relieve pain was the shower and by 8 am, the contractions were so intense and mainly in my back so they checked me again and I was only 5 cm!! Eek!! I really wanted to go natural the whole way and was scared to death about getting an epidural but the back pain was so intense and just wouldn't stop like a normal contraction that I decided around 10 am, to get it and get some rest.

By 11 am, the epidural was in and working, I was laughing and the happiest person on earth(my labor had started almost 15 hours ago...). They checked again and I was at 7 cm so they broke my water and I took a nap. When they broke my water, they were a little concerned because it had meconium(the babies first poo) in it. They called a pediatrician to be onsite when Grevin came out just in case Grevin had breathed any of this fluid into his lungs and to make sure nothing else was wrong as this could indicate stress to the baby. Around 1:30 pm, my body was ready to push but Grevin was still taking his sweet time making his way down. We decided to try to let Grevin and gravity continue to work so as not to where me out in pushing and waited until 3:30 pm to start pushing. Even with an epidural, I was having alot of intense pain in my back(his face was turned the wrong way and I was having back labor). We found a position that worked and started pushing.

Around 5:15 pm, I was able to see the top of Grevin's head in a mirror and the midwife suggested we bring in the pediatrician and invited Zippy to join her as he was getting ready to crown. Zippy and the midwife worked together to help bring out Grevin's head. If you have never seen this, it is truly one of life's miracles and it is so amazing what our bodies are capable of!! I watched his head start to crown, Zippy was helping steady it, and all this HAIR just kept coming. I kept expecting a face to show up and thought maybe I was delivering Cousin It from the Adams Family but then his face appeared. At this point, the midwife was in a rush to get him out because he wasn't crying yet but luckily he wasn't limp. She tugged and tugged but his shoulder didn't want to budge. Finally it did and the rest of him followed quite easily into Zippy's hands and the midwife told him to pass him quickly to the pediatrician. The pass was done over me so I could see he was a boy(Zippy hadn't seen yet).

The pediatrician went quickly to work with the help of a nurse to try to clean out his passage ways and get him stimulated. Those had to be the longest moments of our entire life as we waited to hear that first cry. Finally he did and it was the best sound on earth!! As soon as they realized he hadn't swallowed any meconium, they gave him to Zippy who handed him to me.

His official time of birth was 5:48 pm, almost 24 hours after I had my first contractions. It was a long intense day but so worth it. We spent more time in labor and delivery with our little guy than we did in postpartum! We were released from the hospital at 1:30 pm the following day, not even 24 hours after he was born. Even though he was SOO big (his head was 14.5 cm!!) I did not tear at all and even with the meconium scare, he is super healthy and strong...so it is nice to be at home instead of trying to share a room at the hospital and being stuck in a hospital bed!! And today, I am writing this while Grevin and his dad are taking a nap on the couch-not even 48 hours after he was born.

Grevin William DeShazer has arrived!

Grevin William DeShazer

Born March 10, 2009 5:48 pm

9 pounds 13 ounces

23 inches

Just thought I would share a quick picture of our handsome little man! I will share more details later...

Eviction Notice

EVICTION NOTICE

Date: March 9, 2009

To: Baby ZJ

To the above tenant in possession of below described premises: I am issuing a 7 day notice for EVICTION. You will have 7 days in which you can either gather your belongings and promptly vacate the premises, or wait until the final day. After which, you will be physically removed from the property. You are being evicted due to breech of contract and destruction of property. Expansions only to the FRONT of the house, within reasonable limits, were discussed. Not only have these limits been exceeded, but additions to the back of the house were also made! Remodeling and gutting of the home was never approved, nor was changing the initial layout and base structure. And due to property damage, there are now leaks in both the upper AND lower levels of the home. On top of which, the landlord has received numerous complaints about nightly disturbances. After 7 days from this day that you don't comply with the notice will result in immediate and forceful removal at my discretion.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Love,

Mommy

Happy Due Date to US!

Interesting Statistics:
Only about 5% of babies are born on the estimated date
16.2 percent more babies are born on Tuesday than on the average day.

Hmmm....doesn't look too good for us today even though Zippy thought he would tempt fate by having a presentation in San Francisco today at 1 pm. We are willing to try anything to make this happen without having to be induced next week. We are really crossing our fingers that baby arrives some time this week as my mom, stepdad, and brother will be arriving on Saturday and will be leaving the following Wednesday...and then my dad and stepmom arrive for a few days. Hopefully we will have time to get home before everyone starts showing up.

Last week, Tanya and I painted the belly cast. Of course, we painted it as a monkey! It turned out sooo cute! It almost doesn't look like a pregnant belly and boobs!! LOL! I do have to admit that I am quite impressed with our paint job.

Still Waiting...

We have had alot of inquiries over the last couple of days so just to keep everyone in the loop, we are still pregnant! Once baby does arrive, we will try to put up a quick post to let everyone know that baby DeShazer has arrived and also if it is a BOY or a GIRL. We are getting so excited, it is getting really hard to wait patiently!!

We had our "40 week" appointment on Friday with a midwife. Everything seems to be progressing and she said if she had a crystal ball, she would have made millions by now being able to predict when they baby will arrive. Luckily, she wasn't as sure that the baby was big even though I am measuring big and that it could just be the position of baby or just alot of fluid around the baby. It was great to meet with her because she works in Labor and Delivery and could possibly deliver this little one.

Not so Wordless Wednesday!

This has to be one of my favorite times of year here in Sonoma County. It is constantly raining but spring is close. Everything is green and the fields of mustard are in bloom. From growing up in Missouri, it is so bizarre for me to have this time be the most color rich part of the year and the summer be so brown and dry. I get so excited when I see all the vibrant green hills and the huge fields of yellow mustard. I absolutely love it!

Weekend Update

We had a busy weekend. Zippy's work threw us a baby shower on Saturday and it was so much fun having a co-ed shower. I made Zippy open all the presents, too! It was alot of fun and the weather was nice enough for us to have it outside!

Yummy cake and ice cream bar

All this stuff for such a tiny baby!

And something for dad, too!!
On Sunday, I headed down to my friend, Tanya's house. A few of us girls hung out and decided to do the pregnancy belly cast that Tanya was not able to do when she had Fletcher 6 weeks early. I wasn't too sure about it to begin with but it is actually really cool. It is similar to doing paper mache or maybe putting a cast on your arm. Luckily it dried really quickly and I didn't have to stand around for a long time waiting for it to dry! It will be neat to put the baby in it afterwards to see how he/she fit in there -- and also to hold it up to my belly in a few months to see how big I really was!

I wanted to also congratulate Bill and Paige on their precious little girl who was born on Sunday, March 1st. I am sure you have seen her comments on my blog and to see her little one, you can use the link to her blog on the right side of the page, Robers in the Rockies. Hayley is such a cutie!

Zippy and I are trying to wait patiently for our baby's grand entrance into the world. He is hoping it is tonight so he doesn't have to go to work tomorrow which is a huge meeting day. He has been talking to my belly trying to convince the little one to go ahead and come out and play. It is hilarious!!