Time to go home!

(I'm blogging late at night while watching TV...Peter is working on some contract programming work...Maxwell is sleeping in his bed...Emmalyn is laying on the couch next to me, sleeping.  Life is GOOD!  I am grateful for my family.  I am also grateful for moments to myself!)

4/17/14
Great big sigh - the day had come to leave the hospital. I will miss the great snacks...especially the ice cream and Popsicles.  I will miss having people get me water 24-7.  I will miss being able to have help with the baby at the push of a button (or get a break from her too).  I will miss the alone time I have been able to enjoy with Peter.  I will miss the fantastic nurses who have been so compassionate, warm, friendly, helpful, and loving to me and my family.  It's so weird because they have played such important roles in this important life event and when I leave the hospital, or when their shift ended, the relationship ends.  There have been a few that we have really connected with and had great conversations with.  I know they probably do that every day with many of their patients so maybe for them it isn't quite as special as it is for me.  I would have liked to have found a way to offer them to continue to be in our lives (maybe via facebook?) without it being weird or them feeling obligated if they didn't feel the connection that I did.  But alas, I am too shy or self conscious to even bring up the subject.  There WAS one of Emmalyn's nurses, Jennifer, that absolutely loved her and I could tell she always hoped that we would ask her to take Emmalyn to the nursery so she could take care of her.  I called her one morning before her shift ended and awkwardly (at least it felt awkward to me) said that we had really enjoyed meeting her and appreciated the way she took care of Emmalyn and if she wanted, would love to stay connected on Facebook.  I told her she could find look up my name and then sort of left it in her hands.  (She sent me a friend request later that day!  I wish I would have had the balls to do that with a couple of the other nurses.)

Things I won't miss... the "public" style toilet in the bathroom, my tailbone hurting from the way I was sitting in the hospital bed, certain bossy nurses with an awesome accent telling me what to do, having to state my name and birth date each time I take a pain pill, running out of space on the little table thingy, feeling wasteful because they brought us iced tea with every meal that we never touched, being away from Max and not being able to cuddle with him in the morning and put him to bed at night.

We took a couple pictures with Emmalyn that were like pictures we took with Max so that we could compare them later.  Here's the post with those pics - click here.

Picture like one we took with Max

Trying to buckle this little baby into that big car seat.

All ready to go in her "going home outfit" - thanks Tida for the cute dress!

That's the toy Maxwell gave her 

Another picture like one we took with Max

All packed up and leaving!

We made it home!  (I sat in the front seat on the way home - I knew she'd be okay back there without me)

I was pretty emotional today, about everything.  We got my pain med prescription filled a little later in the day so that didn't help because I was in more pain than I needed to be.  I was having to over-articulate my words because I could hear myself slurring my words (didn't realize until later that it was a result of the meds).

Such a little bum.  

Look at how different her skin tone is compared to mine.

My new home was basically stuck on the couch surrounded by pillows and nursing pillows and my water.

First time sleeping in her crib.  She is a great sleeper.  She wakes up only to eat and then falls asleep towards the end of nursing and pretty much stays asleep - she sleeps hard and nothing disturbs her.

I went in to check on Maxwell when he was napping and teared up because he looked so sweet and I had missed him so much.

...Then the breakdown happened...

Getting my carpets cleaned had been on my "to-do" list forever but I never got around to it.  I had finally called a company while we were in the hospital and because it was the week before Easter they were basically booked.  He said that they could fit me in on Thursday afternoon.  I figured that would be okay because it was the day we were coming home from the hospital and we should be around in the afternoon.  I did NOT think this through thoroughly.  So the guys came over late that afternoon and cleaned the carpets.  I took the baby to the guest bedroom since we weren't getting the carpets cleaned in there.  The carpets looked great after they left but unfortunately everything was wet and smelled like the cleaner they used - which wasn't a bad smell but it still smelled a little chemically.  

After they left it quickly hit me what a bad idea it was to have them come today.  I couldn't really be anywhere else in our part of the house because it was all wet and I didn't think it was good for the baby to be breathing the chemicals.  I escaped, with Max, over to Chris and Mary Ann's next door.  I just showed up on their doorstep, with my 2 kids, and asked to hang out over there (while crying of course).  They welcomed us in and immediately started taking care of me.  I rested on the couch while they got Max some dinner and held the baby.  Then after Max ate, he went upstairs and played with the "boys" (Chris and their son Jared).  They were so sweet.  While Max was playing upstairs, he had an accident and wet his pants.  I was MORTIFIED!  My son had NEVER had an accident like that.  Of course, they were so nice about it and didn't seemed phased by it but I felt so bad.  Here I crash their house and hijack their evening and then my son wets his pants and they have to take care of it?  Ugh.  And I couldn't do anything about it.  Peter came and picked up Max when it was time to go to bed.  I stayed for a little bit longer and ate dinner with them.  I will forever be grateful for their friendship toward me on this day.  I felt completely broken and overwhelmed with being home and having to take care of everything topped with the inability to be in my home due to my stupid decision to have the carpets cleaned - and they opened their arms and just took care of me.

Chris loved holding her

That night, Emmalyn and I slept in the guest bedroom (Peter slept in our room).  She slept in the pack-n-play and I called Peter on his phone in the middle of the night when I needed him to bring her to me to eat.  I felt that it would not be healthy for her to spend a night sleeping in our master bedroom above the wet floor breathing in the chemicals.  It certainly wasn't how I visioned our first night at home.  Sometimes in my focused drive to get things done I lose sight of the bigger picture.  I need to work on this flaw!

Maxwell was happy to have us home but he wasn't completely un-phased by the new "normal".  He had a total of accidents today.  Not just little leaked-in-his-underwear accidents...real full-on accidents.  I don't think he had 3 accidents in the last 2 months let alone in one day!!!  This is what many people warned me about... bring home a new baby and your potty-trained toddler will revert.

We should have gone to Mooyah...

Christmas vacation continues...

The day after Christmas, Kimberly, Kaitlyn, and I hit the streets for the after-Christmas clearance sales.  I had wanted to get out of the house before 7 am but we didn't leave until around 7:30.  I was worried everything would be picked over.  NOT AT ALL!!!  We should have snow storms every year on Christmas Day.  The roads weren't cleared yet so people weren't venturing out.  There were like 5 cars in the parking lot at Target.  And it was the same at Lowe's and Joann's.  It was awesome.  The only downside was that the parking lots were sheets of ice.  So you walked super carefully and still ended up sliding.  Trying to push a shopping cart on ice is interesting. :)  It made for great shopping though.

Max had fun hanging out with dad while the girls shopped.  Peter sent me this picture of him taking advantage of his new table.  Ugh!

Naps were pretty tough during the holiday break.  Max wouldn't sleep by himself in the pack-n-play so I ended up laying next to him, stroking his face until he went to sleep for nearly every nap.

Kaitlyn, Tyler, and I tried to make a snowman.  It was NOT good snowman snow.  Here's our sad snowman.

More playing in the snow!

Snowball fight

Max loves the tablet Aunt Kimi gave him for Christmas

He thought he was pretty cool drinking water out of this big kid cup

I loved watching all the cousins play together.  They did such a good job!

Kimber and her kids were hanging out at Brittany's one day so we had an afternoon to ourselves.  We decided to get out of the house and go to lunch.  We couldn't decide where to go.  We finally chose to go get hamburgers at Mooyah (similar to a 5 Guys).  When we got to Mooyah I pulled a last minute change and suggested we go try a Mexican Restaurant in the same parking lot, called Ernestos.  The parking lot was pretty empty and I did what I usually do, park a few spots further from most of the cars so we could get a few more steps in.  :)

Max enjoyed himself coloring!

He also enjoyed snacking on the chips.

We had eaten the appetizer we ordered and had just gotten our entrees when one of the employees of the restaurant came up and asked if we were the owners of a silver Toyota Highlander.  We said that we were.  He then said that someone had hit our car and the guy that hit it was in the restaurant trying to find the owners of the car he hit.  WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!

So the guy came over and apologized, said he would take care of the damages, and gave us his business card.  We were calm and nice but inside I was FREAKING OUT!  As soon as he left, Peter went outside to check out how bad the damage was.

I was inside with Max envisioning how bad things were going to be.  Would we have to have our car towed?  Was it drivable?  etc.

Peter came back in and showed me the pics he'd taken:



As you can see, it was not as catastrophic as I was imagining.  So this guy had a big old u-haul and wanted to park it.  I don't know if you can tell or not, but the parking lot was really empty.  So why he had to park so freaking close to other cars versus parking further out stumps me.  But anyway, he pulls this big truck in and a part of the truck swipes the side of my car, breaking my tail light and scratching my bumper.

I was glad it wasn't as bad as I thought but of course was still super bummed about my car.  So our meal was ruined.  I think I had 1 bite of my entree.  I instead went into "problem solver" mode.  While we were still in the restaurant I got onto Yelp to find a body shop with good reviews, called the shop and arranged to bring the car over for an appraisal.  We drove straight there from the restaurant, the guy appraised it, and we set up a time for me to bring it back in the next week to get the taillight replaced and then bring it in a week later so it could be painted while I was traveling out of town.

We called the guy who hit it to let him know how much it would be, he agreed to pay the full amount (over 500.00 in damages!).  By the next day, Peter and this guy met back up at the "scene of the crime" to get the guy's check and we had cashed the check.  I am so grateful this guy owned up to what he did and took responsibility for it, especially since he just paid for it and we didn't have to deal with the hassle of insurance companies.  It was solved easily and quickly.  Yeah!

I LOVE the owner of the auto body shop we went to.  He is absolutely fantastic - great service and great work at a fair price.  If you are in North Texas and need a good auto body shop, let me know - - I've got the guy for you.

Things about Max recently:

• When he sleeps at night he takes his blanket and sleeps on top of it
• He says "blankie", "on", "ow", "bubbles", and "down" (he uses down for both down and up)
• He has been super clingy and won't go to Kimberly or the kids so far
• He loves eating Oatmeal Squares cereal
• As you have read, he's had a couple of firsts this week - first time eating bacon, first time going to McDonald's, first time blowing kisses, and today after all the car drama we stopped at a liquor store to get supplies for New Years Eve and so Max has now been in a liquor store for the first time (yeah, we were those parents...but the shopping carts DID have spots for kids to sit in so we can't be the only ones)