On the 12th day of Ryder....

my true love gave to me...Ryder!

Ryder was already late; depending on what due date he was between a week to a day late. Ryder told grandma, "I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date!!" I was to be induced on the 17th of June.
As I mentioned, the day before we spent at Camerons brothers birthday party; sitting around the pool, just hanging out. I felt totally fine, just HUGE! *See picture in previous post* His parents were in town for the weekend, but they left Sunday morning.
On Sunday June 14th, 2009, I woke up with, what I thought was, cramps all morning. I finally got out of bed at 3 a.m. I came out to the living room and watched TV. Cameron woke up for a bathroom break around 7, and I said, "I think we're having a baby today." He went back to bed. I continued to have "cramps" all day. Finally at 2 in the afternoon I called the nurse, and she told me to come in to get checked. So I had a little something to eat, packed up the car, and off we went. We arrived at the hospital, they checked me out, and the nurse said exactly this: "You're 4 cm. dilated, you aren't going anywhere but the delivery room! If you need to make calls, now is the time to make them." So, off we went to the beautiful huge delivery room, as Cameron was on the phone with my mom, his parents, and his brother Jason. Originally I didn't want the drugs, but I got them. I also wanted to wear my own clothes, but I wore the gown. Jason & Christy came down to the hospital, and spent the whole time with us.

Now, the time in the delivery room, was not fun. Ryder had turned around so I had to put a huge exercise ball between my legs and try to move him around. I was thirsty beyond belief but could only have a few ice chips. When I was finally able to lay down without the ball, all hell broke loose. Ryder and I weren't communicating very well. Rather, our hearts weren't communicating very well. His heart rate dropped WAY down. Half a dozen nurses come running in, doctor in tow, and start moving me around like I'm an Olympic gymnast. His heart goes back to normal. 3 minutes later, my heart rate goes crazy, up and down, like a roller coaster. They get me calmed down...dun dun dun guess what happens? Ryders heart rate goes down again. Same scenario, half a dozen nurses and doctors come in, position my bed so I'm doing a head stand. He returns to normal. They shove a paper in my face and tell me to sign it. They tell me to sign it because I have to have  a C-Section. They throw some plastic clothes to Cam, and tell him to get dressed.
Oh, and have I mentioned my water didn't even break yet?
So, 5 minutes later they're wheeling me down the hall. I used to have a picture that Christy took of Cameron before entering the doors, but alas I cannot find it for the life of me!
The entire time they were doing the C-Section, I was in complete shock. Shaking so much and hard that Cam had to hold me down, and at times my anesthesiologist had to help him. All the while, the two doctors doing the procedure were having a casual conversation. Not too happy about that. They finally got him out, they didn't show him to me, and I didn't hear him. Cam made the choice to stay with me, until I yelled at him to go see my son. I finally heard him cry, thank god!

Here is the 2nd picture ever taken of him, the first one showed his little peepee. :)

So while they're cleaning him up and whatnot, Cam is going back and forth between us, all while the anesthesiologist is holding me down.

So, they close me up, I have to listen to them count the thousand instruments before they wheel me to a room. Not my room, a special room, to make sure we're both ok. And we were! We go back to our room. I honestly don't remember much after that. I know that I was awake from 3 AM Sunday, and didn't go to sleep until Tuesday midmorning. I know that Jason and Christy were there, Jeff & Heather stopped by. Other than that, nothing. Except this.

My son. Ryder Jefferson Kimball. He was amazing. He, at ten minutes old, could focus on your face. Could look you in the eye. Unbeleivable.

And then the fun began.
We went home on Wednesday. Moving was not a fun aspect of life. I was on so many pain killers, I looked liked I belonged on Intervention. Cameron left us at home while he went to pick up my mom from the airport. There isn't a lot to talk about for the first month of his life. It was hard, it was tiring, Cam left for a festival not long after getting home from the hospital, breastfeeding was a battle, and BM's were next to impossible.
But this little angel...

was perfect. No kidding. He rarely cried, he loved being held and rocked, and was just all around happy. And even just a few days old, loved the camera. Look how he looks intently at it, like it's the best thing he's ever seen.

He was very social too. We had visitors, and he would just go to them and smile. Yes, my child smiled as a newborn. I'm telling you, he's special, you just don't know how special he is until you meet him.
Look at how he looks at his grandparents, and smiles, and knows that they love him with all they have.

On the 13th day of Ryder my true love gave to me......ultrasounds, dozens of doctors appointments, a scary birth experience and a baby shower!!
On the 12th day of Ryder my true love gave to me......Ryder!

On the 13th day of Ryder....

In honor of Ryders upcoming birthday, I have decided to do a 13 day series!
We are starting on the 13th day of Ryder because we must start at the pregnancy!!

On the 13th day of Ryder my true love gave to me......ultrasounds, dozens of doctors appointments, a scary birth experience and a baby shower!!

I found out I was pregnant on November 5th, 2008. I swear up and down I had the flu for three months; boy was I wrong. Cam was already living here in Arizona, so that was a weird phone call. I continued going to school, and finally finished here in AZ in Feb of 09. Then, I became a housewife. Weird.

Barely pregnant:

The day before Ryder was born

Ultrasound photos:

Invite for baby shower

And of course the cupcake cake!!

The months before Ryder was born, I spent in bed. Mostly. I read about 3-5 books a day. I read the entire series of Gossip Girl and countless other teenage girl books. I rarely unpacked (since we moved in in January!), rarely went to the store, rarely did anything. I just layed, read, and got fatter and fatter. It was quite a scene.
My friend Heather threw us the baby shower at our apartment pool. It was great! Friends, family and a dragonfly cupcake cake! Woo!
The day before I gave birth we went to Cam's brothers birthday party! I was already late, depending on what due date you went by. I had three due dates. The 6th, the 10th, and the 13th. So technically I was due the day of the party!
That is the end of todays post as Ry is still feeling a little sick, and Cam is in bed right now sick. :( Not a fun house! Tomorrow, look forward to the birth story! And Ryders first month on earth!

Chronicals of a sick baby

It is way too hard to see a child go from this: happy and laughing 

To this: passed out in the play pen for the first time ever

 

And then to this...sick, throwing up, can't eat, and yes, that is a towel behind him. A towel is handy 24 hours a day now. Even when he slept in bed with me last night, he was surrounded by towels. 

I hate that my baby is sick and I can't do anything about it.

Busy bees we are

This is officially the beginning of festival season. Cam has been gone since Wednesday, and comes home on Monday. He has been to a festival this year already, but it was when I was in San Francisco, so I didn't have to really deal with it. I hate festival season, and I will tell that to anyone that will listen. Sitting at home with the baby just waiting for Cam to get home every night, and he just doesn't come. Not fun times. Especially today.

I started giving RJ 2 ounces of whole milk in his bottle of formula on Wednesday. I started with just a little bit to get him used to it, and also Cam is lactose intolerant, so I was/am worried about that with RJ. And I was right to be worried. Once we started the milk he started spitting up; which he hasn't done in months. Then last night he straight threw up, a lot. Didn't want his dinner or snacks. Today, he threw up again and also had runny poopy. Which he did when he was taking a nap in the crib, and it leaked out, got all over the blankets, all over him and all over the crib. EW. So we are done with milk since last night. If he doesn't stop puking and having icky poop, his doctor will be called.

To top all that off, my tummy doesn't feel well either. I feel like if I throw up, I'll feel so much better, but I can't really make myself puke; I could never be bulemic. AND, while I was putting all the poopy things in the washer, the lid fell on my head. hah

Okay. Onto better, wonderful things! We have been very busy this week!! On Monday, we had a complete worldwide catastrophe. RJ's chair broke. He can't go to sleep without being rocked, for his naps at least. Totally horrible. So we had to go to Toys R Us and get a new one. This one will be better anyway, it holds up to 40 pounds, turns into a toddler chair and rocker. Best part about it? It has a frog on it. :)

It is a little difficult to rock the way that we rocked the old one: with our feet. But it's doable. Catastrophe avoided.

Tuesday we went to my friend Stacys for a playdate. I got SO lost on the way there it isn't funny!! She has 4 kids in total; 12 year old boy *possibly older, i don't remember), 9 year old girl, 2 year old boy, 16 month old girl. The playdate was with the little ones, and her friend and her son who is almost 2 I think. RJ had fun, which is great! I want him to get more socialized with kids and whatnot. He went in the grass for the first time EVER.

Thursday, we had a playdate with some girls from the nest at Busy Bodies. I met Shelly, Shannon and Elyse. And of course thier wonderful kids! They have open studio for an hour, and the kids just get to play in the tunnels, houses, sea saw things, with balls, slides, etc. Ryder was only interested in the balls. We then all went out for lunch at Sonic. After this, we went and did a little shopping for blackout curtains, a project I'm still working on.

Now, onto Friday! RJ's first trip to the zoo!!!

We met up with Stacy, her mom and the kids at 9. We figured the earlier, the better because of the heat!! We walked around almost the whole zoo, we skipped one loop with the elephants because we made the mistake of sitting down to eat lunch.

RJ with the giraffes

There's a vulture back there!

Sleepy lion...

Tiger hanging out in the shade

Stinky rhinos, up close and personal

 These little cuties were fighting, so the rhinos they live with had to break it up

The only meerkat not digging...

And of course some flowers....

Flamingoooooooooooooos, and not of the plastic kind

And now I will leave you with the image of the beautiful angel boy of mine, just hours before he started getting sick. At the moment, he is passed out on my lap, which he hasn't done sine he was 3 months old. And he wasn't even getting rocked, he just flat passed out. Poor baby!

Small Talk Six: May 29, 2010

 

http://www.momdot.com/category/memes/small-talk-six

Today’s topic is “6 of your favorite flowers.” You can answer this with a list of 6 words, 6 phrases, 6 sentences, 6 paragraphs, 6 photos, 6 videos, etc . . .

1. Here is a beautiful hibiscus that I took a photo of yesterday at the zoo

2. Tulips at Fairlyland

3. Not sure what this is, but taken at Fairyland

4. Not sure what this is, but taken at Fairyland

 5. Again, no clue what this is, but taken at Fairyland

6. And the last one, still no clue what this is, but taken at Fairyland. 

Love all these flowers!! Super beautiful, so lucky to have been able to photograph them.

With a tidbit here, and a tidbit there, here a tidbit there a tidbit everywhere a tidbit

I have decided that I am just the worst blogger ever. Maybe when things calm down with Ryder, I'll be better.

So, something I want to talk about is Bountiful Baskets. It's a wonderful organization!!! Every week on Tuesday/Wednesday we order a basket. The basket has 6-8 different veggies and 6-8 different fruits. Over a pound of each usually! For, get this, $15!!! On Saturday morning my wonderful friend Taylor goes and picks up our basket for us (and hers of course), then I go pick it up from her later in the day. I have been loving this experience. We usually aren't huge veggie eaters, so now that we get the basket, we are forced to eat healthier. We are forced to open up our horizons, and I am forced to cook new and exciting things.

For example, last night I made cabbage rolls. I hate cabbage. Maybe, loathe is a better word. That being said, I ate four of these rolls!! We have also had homemade butternut squash ravioli with brown sage sauce, squash and corn salad, stuffed tomatoes, grilled romaine, etc.

Also, with the fruit we have had peach cobbler and apple banana bread. Ah-Maze-Ing!

We have also implemented Fish Mondays. We have had salmon, swordfish and soft shell crab! I know these sound like expensive fishes, but let me tell you, it's worth it. We are spending the same amount of money on groceries as before, even saving some. These baskets are beyond cheap when you think about it. Fifteen bucks for a whole lot of produce, that if you bought it at the store it would be about $30 - $40 depeneding where you shop! Thus, we save around $20 on that alone, so when we buy fish, we buy fresh wonderful fish that does cost a little more.



Onto other things in life. My little boy is WALKING. Straight up walking everywhere, and starting to run. Crawling is only for the sleepy. We are also starting him on whole milk! He is growing up way too fast.
We had a birthday party for him on the 15th of May, so daddy could have one with his little boy. We had a lot of fun with our friends and family!

 The Happy Family

The Three Musketeers!

He of course had cake. Banana cake, with banana frosting, banana pudding filling and an extra layer of banana inside!! He LOVES bananas!

He didn't get as messy as expected, daddy was happy about that

In other news, we had our first date night!! The wonderful Christy came and picked him up Friday afternoon and kept him until Saturday afternoon! AMAZING!

So Cam and I went to dinner at Jaspers. It was good, expensive, but good. Not the best food I've ever had, but the appetizers were amazing. As was the mango margarita!! Here's a picture of me all dolled up (for the first time in a long time) and my new hair! 

And one last tidbit. I made my first fondant cake!! It was a silver white cake covered in fondant. The first layer of fondant was perfect. No cracks, no bumps, no seams, nothing. The decorations on the other had, weren't that great. They could have been, but I was in a hurry. I will be practicing more soon. :)

As you can see, the decorations are a little rough. Not my best work, but good enough. AND the fondant was made from scratch. :)

I do beleive that this post is long enough already. I will make an effort to be a better blogger. There are also two pages on this blog so far. One is the 5000 questions survey, where you can find out random tidbits of information about me, I'm only on question 300 though. The other page is my 101 in 1001 list. Which, by the way, I have also been neglecting!!

Ta Ta for now!

I will just have to admit to failure...

Ok...I give up on this blog. This will now be THE blog. :) I will transfer everything over from my other blogs, and put them here.

For the first post I have just taken The Color Career Counselor test, and here are my results!

Best Occupational Category

You're an ORGANIZER

Keywords
Self-Control, Practical, Self-Contained, Orderly, Systematic, Precise, and Accurate
These conservative appearing, plotting-types enjoy organizing, data systems, accounting, detail, and accuracy. They often enjoy mathematics and data management activities such as accounting and investment management. Persistence and patience allows them to do detailed paperwork, operate office machines, write business reports, and make charts and graphs.ORGANIZER CAREERS
Suggested careers are Administrator, Secretary, Printer, Paralegal, Building Inspector, Bank Cashier, Private Secretary, Statistician, Operations Manager, Financial Analyst, Bookkeeper, Medical Records Technician, Developer of Business or Computer Systems, Clerical Worker, Proofreader, Accountant, Administrative Assistant, Banker, Certified Public Accountant, Credit Manager, Store Salesperson, Actuary, Dental Assistant, Business Education Teacher, Food Service Manager, IRS Agent, Budget Analyst, and Underwriter.
ORGANIZER WORKPLACES
Your very careful, conscientious, conservative nature gives others the confidence to trust you with handling money and material possessions. Structured organizations that have well-ordered chains of command work best for you.
Suggested Organizer workplaces are large corporations, business offices, financial lending institutions, banks, insurance companies, accounting firms, and quality control and inspection departments.

2nd Best Occupational Category

You're a RESEARCHER

Keywords:
Independent, Self-Motivated, Reserved, Introspective, Analytical, and Curious
These investigative types gather information, analyze and interpret data, and inquire to uncover new facts. They have a strong scientific orientation, enjoy academic or research environments and prefer self-reliant jobs. Dislikes are group projects, selling, and repetitive activities.

• Section I: You and Your Team
  This personality overview section highlights your natural workplace talents—the tasks you pursue with passion. You'll learn how your natural strengths complement those of your coworkers and how, joining forces, you can resolve on-the-job dilemmas.
• Section II: Your Key To Success
  Here you discover your capacity for dispelling disruption and maximizing profitability. Use this proven, beyond-self-perception advice to create a more positive career path free of detours.
• Section III: Managing Strengths and Weaknesses
  Your evaluation's highest and lowest scores result in this section's recommendations for staying on-track in your career and reversing wrong turns. In focusing on your talents and missteps, you'll re-stoke your energy and enthusiasm for managing costly mistakes.
• Section IV: Leadership Power Moves
  This final section identifies your "street sense," those power moves that turn obstacles into insignificant details. Here suggestions based on your color-ranked evaluations will guide you towards making the most of an interview or harnessing your fast-paced workday.