The Berry's Blog

Favorite things for Baby #2.

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 03:42:00 +0000

I know you have all been anxiously awaiting this one. I have been bouncing this post around in my head for a long time, but am just getting around to composing it. Here is a list of my favorite things for my second baby. Some of these would also have also been good to have for my first baby too but I didn't, so they are new favorite baby things.

Britax B-Ready Stroller I can not tell you enough how much I love this stroller. This is my SUV for the city streets. I won't lie it is BIG, its got one heck of a footprint, but even fully loaded with upwards of 80lbs on those wheels it pushes and maneuvers like a dream. I LOVE how versatile it is. I can have both kids on it, or if I drop Colin off at school and go shopping I can leave his seat off and just carry Meghan's car seat in the top position. I can also leave Meghan's car seat connector on and Colin rides on it like a buggy board. Meghan's car seat can face forward or back, as can the front seat but not while the car seat is attached. When she outgrows the car seat we have a second seat that will fit it the lower position. LOVE IT. I also got a really good deal on it thanks to the free ride event. We got the second seat free and if you recall I got the car seat at 40% off. Awesome! I probably should have gotten it the first time around and saved some money, but I resold Colin's old stroller (that I got an amazing deal on) for $80 so I didn't do too bad. One of the best features of the stroller is how well it deconstructs for transport. I was able to it it with all our luggage in the car by removing all the parts (including the wheels) and stuffing them into whatever space would fit. Did I mention that I love it?!?

Nosefrida Baby Nasal Aspirator . Trust me, when I first learned about this thing I totally wrinkled my nose at it. Since Colin didn't get sick until he was almost a year old I never really needed it. Thanks to Colin being in preschool, Meghan got her first cold at two months old. I looked this up and bought it right quick! Holy Cow it works like nothing you've ever tried. One go around in each nostril and she is a happy camper again (not during, no she hates it, but after...ahhhh!) I highly recommend it. You just have to trust me on this one. Sean fears I will suck her brain out, but I'm pretty sure that isn't possible, the filter makes it pretty difficult to suck too hard.

Ergo Baby Carrier plus ERGObaby Infant Insert (which i was able to borrow). I had/have a few different baby carriers and this is hands down the best for traveling and maneuvering in the world. I have a Moby but out of the house it is a bit too cumbersome for me. The Bjorn is a back killer if you are using it for more than 20 minutes and my hotsling is good for a bigger baby but not a little one. This one is great. In fact, it has a weight limit up to 40lbs I think, and I kid you not I have put Colin in it in a pinch. I was already wearing it but had put Meghan down. Colin had an epic meltdown over something silly and wanted to be held. Since we were in a cafeteria like setting I still needed to push the stroller and carry a tray of food, if I couldn't pick him up he would continue to loose his marbles so I just picked him up, pulled the straps up and moved on with life. He wasn't exactly thrilled about it (more than likely because I said something to the effect of "if you are going to act like a baby I'm going to treat you like one") but he calmed down and I set him down, we paid for our food and off we went. My new mantra is "Roll with it." This carrier helps me do just that. Even Sean prefers this carrier now, despite the bulky look of it.

Primo Infant Bath Seat For Colin, we had a small stand alone bath tub that fit in the kitchen sink. We liked it but I sold it long ago and felt we needed something that would go in the tub so we could bathe the kids at the same time (presuming Colin is healthy). This tub fit the bill and I love it. We even bought a second one to live at my moms house (at $12 its worth it). We use it in and out of the tub when I just need a place to set her down briefly (e.g. to help Colin in the bathroom). It is still great now that she is semi-stable while sitting up. I can help her sit up and this seat supports her really well (obviously she is still unsteady so I generally keep a hand on her to make sure she doesn't topple forward). It is really a great little bath seat. It is supposed to fit in the kitchen sink too, but I'm just skieved out by the idea of her touching the same surface raw chicken (or other gross things) touches. Plus, in our house, the bathroom is warmer than the kitchen and this allows her to be deeper in the water than the old tub did.

Arm's Reach Mini Co-Sleeper Bassinet. Colin's bassinet was a hand-me-down which was no longer sturdy enough to reuse for Meghan. A friend in the neighborhood was selling this bassinet after both her kids didn't like it. I replaced the mattress in it and it has really worked well for us. I use it simply as a bassinet instead of attaching it to the bed, and I love that it has a higher weight limit than most other bassinets (23 lbs). We only have a 2 bedroom apartment so when Meghan graduates to a crib she goes in the room with Colin...I'm trying to put that off as long as possible in fear that they will wake each other up or Colin will decide to share something inappropriate (a pillow for example) with her in the middle of the night. I'm thinking she is going to get too long for this before she gets too heavy! I have also appreciated its potability, it folds like a pack and play so we have brought it with us for trips to the grandparents houses. I really like all the storage too, although the cats seem to have taken over the bottom shelf (bunk beds!). In fact I think a small portion of the customers use this bed for their pets!

Vacation Rewind!

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 03:21:00 +0000

WAY back at the beginning of December (the week after thanksgiving to be exact), Sean had a conference in Chicago, so the kids and I tagged along. I had never been to Chicago and wanted to visit so while I realized a week in a hotel with two kids wouldn't be easy the idea was preferable to staying home alone with two kids! Sean and I really enjoy traveling together, as we have very similar if not identical travel persona's (go go go, see see see, do do do) and we both like exposing the kids to new and different things. So when half the trip is paid for as a business expense its a win win. I didn't take very many pictures because most of our non-travel days it was just me with both kids and wielding a camera proves a bit challenging but here are a few pictures to give you the gist. Overall, despite the December chill I really loved Chicago and would like to go back.

"Sorry Meg you'll get used to all the pictures"

Our first solo day we took a cab from our hotel to the Shed Aquarium. LOVED IT! I have very high zoo and aquarium standards and this is a good one. The main section is older and not as awesome but the newer part (the part you pay more money for) was really really great. The person who took my money told me Colin didn't look three and therefore didn't charge me for him..I don't think she could tell than I also had Meghan in the bottom of the stroller or I might not have gotten them both in free. This is the only picture Meghan is actually in!

This show pool was really stunning with the windows overlooking the lake. So cool. The show included a visit from Santa flying in and onto the water. Colin was fixated. Unfortunately, no flash photography was allowed so non of the pictures came out.

OOps I used a flash for this one (I thought they just meant during the show not in the entire aquarium!) and got yelled at. The white blob in the water next to Colin was a beluga. Colin really loved just standing and watching, very usual behavior for a three year old (even for THIS three year old) but he is my son! Meghan chilled in the stroller or Ergo baby carrier and was happy as a clam. Sean joined us for lunch and after the cab ride home, I decided to take a break from cabs. (crazy drivers = car sick mama, not to mention the whole lack of a car seat for C)

Day 2: I took the kids to the Chicago Children's Museum. WOW. We didn't have to pay since we are members of the NY hall of science but I would have paid twice the price for this museum. I couldn't believe the number of cool things Colin could do. Unfortunately he was feeling a little inhibited by the mounds of school groups that were there but after a snack he warmed up a bit. Here he is driving a fire truck.

And now he is driving a car. There were tons of other cool things that didn't involve driving vehicles but when I look back at the pictures it looks like Colin only drove things. This is likely because he was contained and not needing to be followed and therefore I could pull out the camera. Here he is driving a car in kid town. He also filled the gas tank and changed the tires.

Driving a bus! There was even a street light in front of the bus which is just visible in the picture. Colin loved pretending to stop and go, and I even showed him how to use the gas and break pedals. I should mention that we took the subway here, which involved some know-how since I needed to have elevators for the stroller, but I was really quite proud of my ability to navigate without much trouble. I guess once you know one subway system the rest are easy to figure out. I did have to walk a mile or so each way to get to and from the museum but it was totally worth it.

Another view of driving the bus. We had a ton of fun. I had to pull him out of kid city to get him to see the rest of the museum which included a place to dig for dinosaur bones! We didn't even get to half of it.

This was an indoor forest room with a tree house. There was a ball ramp along two walls that Colin really got into, and a place to go fishing with magnetic fish. We had a problem with another little girl hording the fish while her mother threatened to make her go home if she didn't share but never actually followed through on that particular threat so Colin got a bit frustrated that he couldn't play with that. What was I going to do wrestle her for them? The muesum is in a mall and in another section of the mall was a large Thomas the tank engine like ride on train. Colin LOVED that!

Later that night Sean met up with us and we went to visit the bean, which likely has another name but I don't know what it is. Here is the best photo I got of the city in the reflection of the bean. It was very pretty. It was about this time that Colin's behavior took a turn for the worse while in a restaurant. But really? What did we expect. This was his second week in a row of travel (Thanksgiving in Syr the week before) and we were eating 2 meals a day out. Its a lot for a little guy. We rolled with it and just ate dinner in the room the next night. (go go go, see see see, do do do has to be flexible to accommodate a preschooler)

Day 3: This day I had pre-booked us some tickets to "If you give a cat a cupcake" This was actually something I was very nervous about because of Meghan. If she pitched a fit I would have to take her out and I wasn't sure what I would do with Colin in that scenario. Thankfully it didn't happen. She didn't sleep peacefully but she didn't scream. I spent a lot of time bouncing and shushing in her ear but Colin just LOVED the show. Our seats were LITERALLY on stage.

The stage was actually the floor and the seating when up from there, our seats were front and center. This was one of those cases where Colin looked terrified during the whole show but as soon as we walked out of the theater he asked to do it "again sometime" and then talked about it for a long time. The cat character was rather loud and spent some time actually engaging the kids in the audience (at one point he pretended to take Meghan from me, without actually touching her at all) so I think he made Colin a little nervous but overall it was a TOTAL success and I look forward to taking Colin to other shows here in the city. Later this day we wanted to go to a different museum but Colin definitely had had enough, so it was back to the room for a nap and some Chicago style pizza which I famously ate four pieces of before digging into my dessert. All that walking left me with quite the appetite.

Over all we all had a great time. The flights were a little trying. There were only two seats to a side, so I had Meghan with me (next to a stranger) and Sean had Colin across the aisle. Sean definitely had the harder job even with jet blue's tvs. It is just hard to keep Colin from kicking the seat back in front of him and keeping him entertained for three hours. Meghan was good but not easy, she basically just wanted to be put down and obviously that wasn't an option, but no one screamed (much) so it was a success. Next time I go to Chicago I might like to see some of the more adult focused activities but hey, this is my life right now and I embrace it.
Fun times.

Meghan is 4 Months Old!

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 01:44:00 +0000


Gumby!

Meghan is 4 months old! We have traveled nearly two weeks of this month and this has caused some set backs in Meghan's sleeping. Can't be helped I suppose, we travel frequently, but it is a bummer. We are hoping to get her back on track after the holiday travel. Since Colin had pink eye and Meghan has a runny nose we havn't gotten her weight/height checked yet.

Sleeping: Overnight sleeping is less than 3 hrs at a shot (often less than that even) and she often just wants to be snuggled. She prefers the company of mommy and daddy overnight to being in her bed, but she has good nights and bad nights. She usually naps 3x a day (sometimes 4) for about 40-50 minutes each time. If we are home all day she naps more consistently, but she also sleeps very well in the car seat/stroller. She doesn't seem to do as well if I have to transfer her into the stroller if we have to go get Colin from school.

Tri-pod.

Likes:

Colin. I have some cute videos of Meghan laughing at Colin if I can ever figure out how to get another copy of the software to upload them from the camera.
The bath. Still a big favorite! All things are better at bath time.
The TV. She is mesmerized by the lights, just like Colin was. If Colin is watching a show and we are in the room, it is hard to pull her gaze from the TV.

Dislikes:

Dirty diapers. She really seems to notice when she has a wet diaper. This seems like an obvious statement but Colin was never seemed bothered by it. Meghan's mood rapidly improves after a diaper change.
Teething. Bummer, another kid who seems to really suffer when teeth are on the move.
Loud screams/noises. Colin has some trouble with volume control and poor Meghan seems quite startled by his random outbursts of loudness.
Bottles! She has done very well this month taking a bottle. I finally found a nipple that she likes and she took to it like she has been doing it all her life. Nothing special, just the new version of the standard medela nipple. I purchased a hand pump and it had the newer style in it, wala! Just in time for me to leave her for a few hours to give a talk!

New and Notable:

Her ability to sit up is improving, but she isn't stable at all. She is much happier during tummy time play than Colin ever was.
Colin started solid food at 4 months but Meghan doesn't seem to be showing are the readiness signs that Colin did at this age so we will hold off for a bit yet. She is very interested in the food we eat and wants to put everything in her own mouth but since she can't sit up on her own yet we are waiting.

My happy girl.

Meghan is 3 Months Old

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 03:43:00 +0000

Oops, this is late. The pictures weren't (okay maybe they were on the 20th) but the post is. Couldn't be helped unfortunately!

3 months old

Weight: 14 lbs 3 oz
Height: 23.5 inches

Sleep: Pretty good. Her naps have yet to regulate, but she generally takes one or two morning naps between 9 and 12 for a total of 90 minutes I would say, an afternoon nap around 2 for about 45 minutes and an early evening for about 30 minutes. We have moved up bedtime to coincide with Colin's so we can get both kids down and away by 8. She had been sleeping 5 hrs at least but this is no longer an every night thing. She rarely gets up more than three times but I have to stop nursing in bed because it is way too easy just to fall back to sleep snuggling with her and this is going to come back to bite me I know it.

munch munch

Likes:

Her hands. They are always in her mouth these days and she has much better control over them
The bath. She gets very fussy in the evening right before bath time, this is her way of telling us she is ready to go to bed. On two occasions now she has actually smiled when I asked her if she was ready for a bath. The bath takes my fussy baby into smiles and giggle and then it's p.j's and one last meal and she is out.
Her reflection. After the bath we usually play "Who's that baby?" in the bathroom mirror. She is all smiles and coos for 'that baby' (although in the early part of this month this was not true, she hated getting out of the bath and would cry so we didn't play any games!)

Happy girl in the bath.

Dislikes:

Bottles. Oh man not another one! She is doing better but doesn't take more than an ounce or so and never gets into a rhythm. She will be forced to try once a day until she figures it out. This child must take a bottle, I will be teaching in the spring so she doesn't have the luxury of being picky.
Being buckled into the car seat when it isn't moving. She is totally fine once we start moving or if I just set her into the car seat briefly without buckling it, but if you strap her in and then try to say put your shoes on, forget it! scream fest. I now have to plan out our exits so I have everything ready to go before I buckle her in.
Being stopped at red lights. See above! Stop the car, start the crying. Although this is generally just for the first few minutes she is in the car after that she falls asleep pretty quickly.

Pulling away from the couch to try to sit up.

New and Notable:

Teething. The doctor confirmed she is teething, her bottom gums are swollen and raw and she is drooling quite a bit as well as munching on her fingers. I have given her a few teething toys to chew on but this seems to make her more cranky, rather than relieve the pain.
GIGGLES! Meghan giggled for the first time on November 3rd while we were all at a playdate for Colin and a couple of his little buddies. She was nursing and then just started smiling up at me so I tickled her a little and she started giggling. It took another week or so before Sean was able to hear it since she seems to only like to giggle in the early afternoon but not so much after 5pm when Daddy is home. Thankfully I was able to get those first giggles on my phones video camera so he could hear it (thank you Dawn for taking the video) but I haven't downloaded it to the computer yet.
Sitting up. Sort of. She can do the tripod sit and wants to sit up but she can't hold it very long before folding completely in half. She often will try to pull herself into a sitting position when she is semi-reclined, it is pretty cute to watch.

Silly smile.

Back to the Bronx.

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 03:26:00 +0000

We are always so busy in the summer that we miss out on the fun things right here in NYC. Now that it is fall we have full weekends with nothing planned, and this last one the weather was perfect for a trip to the zoo. We ended up purchasing a membership which will pay for itself in two trips so I'm pretty sure we will get our moneys worth out of it. Here are the pictures from our day.

I actually make some appearances in the pictures in this post! Colin and I took a second to pose with a giant rhino statue.

Sean trying to help Colin get a better look at the flamingos. Sean kept trying to focus it on one animal then hold it steady for Colin to look through but the second Colin got near it he pulled it out of position. Oh well we tried.

We actually had to wake her up to feed her after sleeping soundly in the stroller for nearly three hours. The combination of crisp air and constant motion kept her out for the count.

More little telescopes in another exhibit. He said he could actually see the animals better looking through it this way (backwards), I never tried so I'm not sure if that is true or not but he certainly couldn't work the focus ring on the other side.

Colin and I rode a camel! It was surprisingly high up and frankly not very smooth ride. We did a whole lot of swaying from side to side.

Colin really enjoyed it! It was a rather short little track and Colin would have loved to go longer.

Fall colors on the Bronx River as seen from the zoo's train (tram?) ride. We actually almost got poop thrown at us by an elephant. I was sure she was going to toss the poop she was carrying in her trunk at the train as she ran aggressively over to us, but instead she just made an elephant noise and then walked away and played with the poop.

Sean had to carry her around to force her to be awake for a while.

This fish tank may have been Colin's favorite part. A trip to the aquarium might be in order! Good thing that is also included in the membership!! I am so impressed with Colin's attention span. He will really sit and watch the animals for long periods of time (for a three year old). We were probably in the gorilla exhibit (arguably the best exhibit in the park) for over a half hour just watching and talking about their behavior. It didn't hurt that they also had the telescopes in this exhibit too.

Halloween 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 17:52:00 +0000

Happy Halloween!
Two years ago Colin was a cowboy for Halloween, but only because I had to throw together a costume at the last minute because I couldn't get him over his fear of the puppy dog costume that I purchased for him. As it turned out he was totally adorable in his little cowboy outfit and it shifted my appreciation for the custom made costume. Last year he was so into baseball and David Wright that that costume was easy. (While I'm adding links, here is Colin's first Halloween). This year I had two to work with and I love the group themed costumes so I just had to do something matchy with Colin and Meghan. My sister suggested Peter pan and Tinkerbell and I knew I wanted to do it. I wasn't sure Colin would go for it since he didn't know who Peter Pan was but randomly in the opening commercial of a Handy Manny DVD that my mom recently purchased was a shot of Peter Pan jumping of a window ledge and flying into the air. After seeing that scene a few times (it is literally less than 2 seconds!) he was on board. Then I bought him the book and he saw that Peter Pan carried a dagger and that was the icing on the cake! So I went hunting for costumes. Nothing I saw was all that nice and you simply can't get a Tinkerbell costume in infant sizes. So I figured how hard could it be! Well! Having sold my sewing machine a few months ago after it sat unused for nearly 6 years I found myself with no plan, hand sewing and hem taping this costumes together. Meghan's went together very quickly, but Colin's tunic was a bit more complex. I should mention that I have little to no experience making clothes of any kind! The end result wasn't half bad but there were a few moments where I wondered what I had gotten myself into.

I ended up finding a pair of neon green pj's that served as the base of Colin's costume. Turns out my color scheme is reversed from the tradition Pan, but I went with it anyway. I had intended on getting felt to make the tunic, hat and boots but no-pill fleece was 50% off so I got that instead. Thankfully, it is easy to hand sew! I played with some large paper for a long time trying to figure out the dimensions for the hat, and in the end I just started cutting the felt and tired something, realized it was way too small and started over. If you are going to 'make it up as you go' I suggest having LOTS of extra material. I spent a lot of time thinking "what would Grandma do?" since my grandmother is the original Martha Stewart and can do just about anything with anything. I figure I must have some innate crafting ability from her to have this come out as well as it did.

Here is a better view of the boots, and Colin is nicely modeling his sword. My cameras white balance was a little off and I had some rather large finger print smudges on the lens that I didn't notice until this morning, so the pictures aren't as good as they could be but you get the point. Colin's shirt was going to simply be a vest, but along the way I thought it needed sleeves (which I had to put on twice because I put them on at the wrong angle the first time). Once the sleeves were on I thought it needed a collar, and that one I had to think about for a long time before eventually diving in and just trying it. The boots and the belt were the easy parts!

The sword and wings were a last minute pick up. I bravely entered Party City on Oct 30th, since the wings I ordered were not arriving until Nov 3rd, and I never had a solid plan for the dagger. I survived and the line was only 10 minutes long so I figure I did pretty well. I'm thinking these wings worked better than the ones I ordered would have. I have yet to see them but my suspicion is that they are much bigger.

A better view of Meghan in costume. My favorite part of her outfit is the booties. These were another miracle throw together. The first one I tried was a total disaster so I figured I would have to buy them... seeing infant ballet slippers for $50 I figured I could try again! I googled a few things and got inspired and the second try worked perfectly. Thankfully I was smart enough to cut two before I started sewing! I missed my calling as a cobbler! I'm thinking I might just make her a few extra pairs! (If it isn't obvious the onesie and tights were purchased not made!)

Lest my head get too big from my success, take a look at what Dawn and Tom 'threw together' for their family. I will totally admit I had absolutely no idea who they were, having never heard of Mad Max or Road Warrior, but I was still impressed with the details of their costumes. (P.S. I say 'threw together' but they really were working on it for over a month!)

Colin and Leo. At least I wasn't the only one who told my kid what he was going to be for Halloween instead of asking what he wanted! Thanks to the sword (for us) and the boomerang (for Leo) they weren't hard to convince! Got to love the accoutrements!
Honestly, everyone thought Colin was Robinhood, but I figured that was close enough.

Kip in the amazing goldfish costume his mom made for him. Seriously! My competitive nature just throws up its hands! I can't compete with these people!

Cute kids!

Meghan slept through the entire parade and so everyone came over to see what she was dressed as and went "oh a little bear" I just ran with it. I wasn't undressing her and waking her up only to have her freeze! She was happy so I was happy. I got the pictures before we left the house!

The moral of the story is: If you are going to make it up as you go, have lots of patience, extra materials and low expectations and everything will be fine.

Halloween Snack

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 14:15:00 +0000

Colin's preschool asked parents to send Halloween snacks in for school today. I saw this idea last year but didn't have time to pull it off. Not sure how I even managed to remember it but I did and TA DA Candy Corn jello! SO cute! (and only about 6g of sugar each! Not bad for Halloween!

Thanks Jelly Shot Test Kitchen

Coming Soon: Pictures of the kids in costume!

Perfecting my Pizza Dough

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 02:54:00 +0000

I am taking a quick side trip from posts with pictures of the kids (sorry mom) to share my current food obsession. Making the perfect pizza dough at home! After having some delicious homemade pizza at my Aunt Sue's house (thank you Heather for the inspiration), I wanted to have a make your own pizza night at our house, figuring Colin would get a kick out of it. Turns out our grocery delivery service doesn't carry pizza dough. So I went hunting for a recipe. I made it and it was pretty good, but I knew it could be better so I've been tweaking it ever since and I think I have it just right, although I have some more ideas for further tweaking later. Here is my recipe:

1pkg (.25 oz) active dry yeast
1 cup warm water (110 degrees, or as hot as your tap goes)

2.5 cups bread flour
2 T olive oil
1.5 t salt
2 t white sugar
2 t oregano (I love oregano! This addition and the next are optional, use what you like)

.5t garlic powder

mix yeast and water, set aside for ten minutes.
mix together remaining ingredients then add yeast mixture. Mix until well combined. Cover and let sit for at least an hour (longer is fine too)

Roll out to the desired shape (mine isn't always a circle), place on a baking sheet (I spray with oil and then sprinkle corn meal and it always slides right off) and cover with your favorite toppings. Bake in a 400 degree oven for 10-15 minutes. (To feed the three of us I only have to use half the dough)

OK one picture for my mom.

I'm going to experiment with whole wheat flour but haven't wanted to change too many things at once. I'll let you know how it comes out.

I've been really enjoying Ragu's Pizza Sauce but will likely experiment with my own sauce at some point.

Oh and I should note this freezes really well before cooking and can be thawed overnight in the fridge. I was sure it would never thaw in time after removing the block of dough from the freezer the night before but it did, no problem. I like to divide the recipe in half and freeze half for later or make cheesey breadsticks (although I have yet to make one that doesn't explode and ooze out the cheese)

Pumpkin Picking 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 03:16:00 +0000

Fall is my favorite season in NYC, and it is my favorite time to take pictures of Colin. For some reason, I always get really great photos in the fall (see here and here and here for a walk down memory lane). This year so far we are keeping with that trend. Poor Meghan once again slept through the whole thing, only waking up right at the end so she missed most of the photo ops. Here are some of my favorite photos of our trip.

My big boy! I keep reminding myself that I will look at these pictures and see how little he was someday. For now I just see him looking so OLD! He is wearing the sweater GiGi made for him last year. I think there is a chance he will get in it next year too.

This kid knows how to be photographed I didn't even have to ask him to do this, he just does it. I guess that is what happens when you are the child of the 'mama-ratzi'.

I couldn't pick between these last two so I just uploaded both!

Aunt Katie and Cousin Jaylee.

Colin is very enthusiastic about his sister. She is wearing the fall outfit that he also wore as an ity bity (although I can't find a picture of him in it).

Meghan was pretty hungry at this point and was not really in the mood for pictures!

I like the light in this one.

All laughing at the little cousins. The large pumpkin behind them is actually a bounce house and the highlight of the trip for me was watching Colin bounce in there with all his young cousins: Brenna, Mia, Keegan, Danny, Haylee and Jaylee (Ellis and Meghan were too little this year for the bounce house)

1st Cousins with the 2nd Cousins (who just so happened to almost match on this particular occasion) We actually have matching outfits for them so stay tuned for that... Ellis is a year (and two weeks) older than Meghan, so...Meghan is to Ellis as Colin is to Lukas =)

Apple Picking Again.

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 03:00:00 +0000

Before I can get to the photos of this past weekends pumpkin picking adventure, I have to post the previous weekends apple picking adventure! Due to a series of cancellations we found ourselves with a free weekend. Since the week days seem a little like 'groundhog's day' around here right now I was really hoping to get away and do something fun. So I got in touch with some colleges friends who live in Massachusetts and they also had a free weekend so we drove up. The drive was only a bit over 3 hrs so we were able to get all the way there without stopping which was nice. On Saturday we joined another college friend and went apple picking (yes, that would make it two weekends in a row for us but Colin loved it and we didn't get nearly enough apples the first time so we were psyched to go again!)
Here are the pictures from apple picking. The pictures came into the post in a very strange order but I'm too lazy to rearrange them and frankly blogger doesn't make that part very easy to do so they will just have to be in a strange order.

Colin and Syler. Syler is our friend Sarah's son, and he is a year younger than Colin. Sean and I met Sarah our freshman year of college. She lived on the same floor as us...we sometimes pretend argue over who would get Sarah in a 'divorce' because we are both equally close to her and met her at the same time...

There were a few goats in a petting area of the farm. Colin had a particular affection for this guy.

Colin posing on the ladder used to get apples from the higher branches. This orchard was much different than the one we visited the previous weekend. Here the trees were almost like grape vines, where the trees at the first orchard were traditional looking trees (albeit low to the ground trees).

Bad boys bad boys, whatcha gonna do...

Meghan was here too, although she doesn't make much of an appearance in the photos! We had to take a picture with the pumpkin tree, which completely threw me for a loop. I kept looking at it thinking "am I crazy? Pumpkins don't grow on trees... do they?" They don't! They were all zip tied to the tree, someone went to a lot of trouble to do that!

2 of our 3 hosts for the weekend, Brandon and Nolan. Missing is Elaine, my college suitemate for both freshman and sophomore year. Elaine is another friend we argue over possession of. I think I have the stronger claim since we lived together for two years. Sean disagrees.

Another sweet shot of cutie pie Nolan. I should mention that Nolan is a year younger than Syler and Meghan is a year younger than Nolan. We had every age represented that day from 0-3.

Syler posing on the ladder as well. Don't worry Sarah was right behind him.

Toddlin' around with his apple. Too cute.

The closest thing I got to a shot of all three boys. Three boys ages 1 2 and 3 are not easy to tack down in the same position.

Colin and Nolan with their apples.

This picture cracks me up. It just exemplifies what the first child experience is like. Both parents doting on the one toddler, I can't wait to compare this in a few years to what Elaine and Brandon's say 3rd child's experience is like. =) I remember Sean and I being exactly the same with with Colin at a year old.

Syler and Colin apple picking.

See! He loves the ones with leaves on them.

Syler and Sarah.

Nolan and Elaine.

Thanks for such a great weekend guys! Can't wait to do it again soon!

Meghan is 2 Months Old

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 19:34:00 +0000

Meghan is celebrating her two monthiversary with her first head cold. I knew it was only a matter of time since Colin was beginning to show symptoms of something last Friday. All of our hand washing and shirt changing (Sean and I would change our shirts after dealing with Colin before holding Meghan) was in vain, she still got sick. So far she just has a runny/stuffy nose, hopefully it doesn't turn into something worse than that. I'll probably take her to the doctor tomorrow just to be safe, she is due for her 2 month visit anyway (although she will not be getting any vaccines while sick!) Anyway, on to her 2 month stats!

BIG Smile!

Weight: (check back)
Height: (check back)

Head to toe.

Sleep: Overall, this month has not been too different from last month, however in the last week or so she has started skipping her normal first feeding. Even if she still wakes up, she will accept the pacifier and go back to sleep until around 5. So we are inching toward 1 nightly wake up around 5 am. I obviously expect that to get worse while she isn't feeling well. She generally is asleep by 10 every night and rarely falls asleep while nursing which is great, no bad habits to break yet.

Likes:

The bath! No matter how cranky and tired Meghan gets she always is completely content and smiley during bath time. She loves kicking her feet in the water and even enjoys having water poured over her head (although we don't pour it in her face).
The pacifier. Thank goodness! Even when we thought we found one she liked it was still triky to get her to take it every time. On a whim I picked up a package of the ones Colin liked best and she took to that one (avent) even better than the first. Which is good because the avent ones have a real handle and a hygienic cover, which makes them easier to strap to her and keep clean while in the diaper bag.
Being put down. I'm not sure if this is just a typical 2nd child thing or her personality, but she does not need to be held constantly and sometimes she just wants to be put down and left alone to fall asleep rather than be held.
Snuggling. Odd that I can say that she is both a snuggler and likes to be put down, but it is true. When she wakes up from a nap or when Sean first picks her up when he gets home, she just loves to snuggle right into our necks. It is like she is saying "Oh you're here! I missed you!"

more tutu pics for aunt sue.

Dislikes:

Being removed from the bath. Oh how she can howl when you take her out of the bath! If she really gets going there is no talking her off the ledge until I can feed her! Wow, we are often nervous she will wake Colin up, but if she has he hasn't complained yet.
Being scratched. Oops! The other day as I put her in the swing I must have bumped into Colin's easel because the felt board started to fall and would have landed on her head if I hadn't caught it. However, on my way to catch it I grazed the top of her head with my finger nail and left a small gash. Yikes was she upset! Sorry dear!
The snot sucker. This is kind of obvious, what baby enjoys this? It helps her breathe so it must be done but she is definitely not a fan.
Bottles. I'm not giving up on her yet but so far she hasn't figured out the bottle thing yet. I've tried a good half dozen types of bottles and nipples and one combination if held in the exact right position she has latched on to, but not for very long. We are still working on it.

New and Notable:

Blue eyes.

Smiles. They are much more consistent now and easy to elicit
Cooing. Nothing cuter than a baby cooing!! I'm hoping to get it on video soon.
I don't know if I've mentioned it yet, but Meghan's 'book' was retired before she was 4 wks old. I kept a log for Colin's entire first three months hoping to find some logic in his sleeping behavior (there wasn't any), but after a rather difficult day where I felt ill and Colin was overtired and cranky I just had to let something go, and the log keeping was that thing. I tried using the baby timer after that but Sean wasn't really on board with it so I let that go after a few days too. We are running blind with her but honestly, she is so easy going it doesn't really matter.

cooing for the camera. Can you hear it?

Apple (and Pear) picking

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 18:48:00 +0000

Last weekend we took a trip up to Marist to visit Aunt Nin at school, and while we were there we took the kids apple picking. Colin had a great time, and they even had my childhood favorite available to pick (Cortland apples). We came home with a ton a fruit that I am looking forward to creating some wonderful treats out of. Colin prefers his straight up and in the living room! Here are some photos of the event. By happy coincidence Katie was also visiting Lauren that weekend so she joined us too. Fun times!

Reaching for the perfect pear!

He loved it when the leaves stayed on the stem!

The apples required two hands to pull off the tree!

Sean gets Meghan in on the action. She slept through most of the picking.

We pulled her out to let her cool off. Her and Daddy were pretty hot in the 80 degree heat!

Overlooking the Hudson dropping Nin back off at school.

Group Photo! Bathed in the afternoon sunlight.

Daddy's little girl.

Goodbye Aunt Nin!

Goodbye Aunt Katie.

Grandma Jo's Camera

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 13:29:00 +0000

The kids and I were up visiting my parents while Sean was at a conference last week, so I took a second to pull some photos from my moms camera from her visit right after Meghan was born. Here are those pictures.

mother and daughter

brother and sister

such a sweet baby girl

joy

love

the middle grandchild.

Fresh from the bath.

Leo visits Colin and Meghan

Colin picked this hat from the stack for her to wear.

Meghan is 1 month old!

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 19:01:00 +0000

Almost a smile

Happy One Monthiversary Meghan! Although I have to say when people see her they guess that she is two months old and are surprised when I say she is only a month! She has gained three pounds since birth and is 1.5 inches longer. (I don't have height and weight for Colin at 1 month so I can't say how she compares)
Weight:11lbs 10 oz- 89th %ile
Height: 22 inches 59th%ile

Sleep: She is doing pretty well. On her best nights she sleeps about 5-6 hrs then 2-3 after that, but even on her worst nights she typically pulls off at least 4 hrs in the first shot. She also always goes right back to sleep after eating, only once has she decided to be awake for a while and that was because she went to sleep at 7pm instead of 9:30/10:30. Daytime naps are totally unpredictable but she generally does very well in the morning (sleeping for 1.5-2hrs at a time) but from 3:00 on she only sleeps about 40 minutes at a stretch, which isn't terrible either. She is having more quiet alert periods these days and is even preferring to put herself to sleep with just the pacifier sometimes. This child plays by a totally different set of rules.

Profile: kissable cheeks!

Likes:

Colin. Smiles are illusive right now but she will flash the for us, and often for Colin.
The car seat: We have another excellent traveler on our hands! (Not that she has a choice) You strap her into that seat and out she goes! That is where she is now, still sleeping after picking up Colin from school (car seat doubles as stroller). Ahh! Two kids napping at once! WINNING! =)
The high chair: The space saver high chair has a really deep recline to it so it lives on the kitchen table and she sits there while I'm doing things in the kitchen. She naps very well in this seat during the day.. oddly even though she sleeps great overnight in the bassinet she doesn't nap well in it.
Daddy and Mommy: what baby doesn't?!

For Aunt Sue.

Dislikes:

Gas: She isn't terrible about gas because she is generally a very good 'burper' but she does have some issues between 7 and 10 in the am with intestinal gas issues as she attempts to clear the poop she has been saving up overnight.
Being made to wait when she wants to eat: who likes that? Poor kid sometimes has to wait a minute or two while I deal with her older brother.

I see you!

New and Notable:

Like I said before we are getting some social smiles but haven't caught the full smile on camera yet.
Still tongue tied but it isn't interfering with eating so we are holding off for a few months before we get it clipped
She is finally taking a pacifier with some regularity (Avent ones like the ones Colin used). It generally takes her about 30 seconds to latch on to it but she takes it so that makes our life easier.
We haven't tried bottles yet but that is on the schedule, I just have to get everything sterilized for the first use. I really am looking forward to letting Colin try to feed her (although obviously not the first time we try it!) so hopefully that will get going soon.

She wants to eat the tutu!

Credits: The term "monthiversary" was stollen from Stephanie Rezsnyak and the stickers on the onesie idea I stole from Kristeen, although I didn't make my own I bought them.

Going Strong

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 15:06:00 +0000

Megan will be 4 weeks old tomorrow and things are still going remarkably well! Meghan is a really good baby and Colin is an amazing big brother! He loves holding her and 'helping' with her, the only time we have trouble with him acting out is when we have company and even that isn't too bad.

We have started getting some social smiles but they are rather fleeting and hard to catch on camera. Here is one in profile that she flashed for her big brother. I brought out the crib quilt for her to lay on in the living room and as soon as I put her down Colin joined her and has done so every time since. I'm in awe of him.

Colin took this next photo, where Meghan appears to be flashing us a peace sign. He does seem to get a bit jealous when I try to take a picture without him in it. He is very likely to just stick his face or hands between the camera and Meghan. This is not a problem for me at all, I just take a few extra photos of 'just Colin' to make sure he doesn't feel left out. The boy likes having his picture taken.

just Colin

Here is one last photo of Meghan with her eyes open. So precious.

Kid Comparison: Early Days

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 01:48:00 +0000

The funny thing about having a second child is the constant comparison to the first. It can't be helped, people seem very curious about how similar or different Meghan is to/from Colin. I'm embracing this need to compare and have found some similar pictures of the two kids around the same age. For your enjoyment, here is a comparison of the kids.

Him

Her

Him

Her

Him

Her

Him

Her

First Day of School 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 17:40:00 +0000

Colin had his first day of preschool! Sean went into work late so he could help with drop off in case things didn't go well. Colin really did great for the first day. He didn't cry when I left but Dawn told me that he got upset shortly there after and she calmed him down and then he sat with one of his teachers and was fine by the time she left. It was a very stressful energy in the room since there were quite a few kids crying during drop off, even I got a little emotional after walking out of the room even though Colin was okay. He was very excited to see me at pick-up and told me all about the apple he painted (not sure if there was more paint on him or on the apple!) We quickly changed out of his school clothes so as to hopefully not pass preschool germs to Meghan. He got a special first day of school present when he got home (a left over big brother gift [thomas dvd] we never needed to pull out because he was so good!)

Same backpack as last year. All ready for the rain.

Looking a little nervous but not too bad!

There is the big cheese! A little caught in the flash unfortunately! It was a pretty dreary day.

The second day went even better than the first! He reported that he did not cry at all. I couldn't confirm that for sure but the teacher did say that he did well and was adjusting well to school. Hopefully, things won't get worse before they get better like they did last year. We'll cross that bridge when we get there I guess.

My two kids!

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 14:19:00 +0000

Today is our first day as a trio and it is going very well. The kids are trading off their needy periods well and I even have a minute to upload this picture that I took last night.

So far so good.

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Sun, 04 Sep 2011 22:40:00 +0000

We are just over two weeks into Meghan's life and so far things have been a fairly smooth transition. I won't have both kids by myself all day until after the long weekend so that will be the real test but these last two weeks have gone better than I expected.

One of the few pictures with her eyes open. So far they are dark blue like Colin's were but the appear to be getting lighter in the center.

Colin has adjusted like a champ! He is totally in love with his little sister and is extemely sweet natured with her. The other day I watched him hand her a toy (her toy not his) while she was in the swing and heard him say "Here you go sweetheart." It was so sweet. The only real adjustment issue we are having (if you can even call it that) is that he asks to sleep in our room or in our bed on occasion. He clearly is feeling a little left out since Meghan is sleeping in our room, but we have been able to redirect him explaining that everyone sleeps in the bed that fits them best and remind him that Meghan will be sleeping in his room with him soon enough. This morning when we were discussing that Grandma Jo was going home today he asked her if she was taking the baby home with her. She of course said no that the baby was ours, and he moved on. I didn't get the impression that he wanted her to take the baby, just that he wasn't exactly sure what the story was.

Smitten

Just watching her.

As far as Meghan goes, she has been a very easy going baby so far. She is just starting so show some discomfort when she is trying to get a burp out or prior to a large bowel movement, and the last two nights has not slept as well as she had been (she put around 5 hrs together for about 5 or 6 nights) but even with the gas disruptions she hasn't done that poorly. I haven't tried gas treatments (mylicon or gripe water) because it has mainly been overnight that she really has problems and I don't want to giver her something like that for the first time when I can't monitor her for an allergic reaction. I imagine we are coming to the end of her 'honeymoon' phase but honestly I will say it again, so far so good. This child even wakes up happy on occasion and I don't even realize she is awake unless I come look at her to find her eyes open. As I type this she is just passing hour 2 of a nap and get this...she isn't even swaddled!! That was absolutely unheard of for Colin. In fact I would guess that he didn't pull off a trick like that until he was well over a year old. I never really thought of Colin as a very challenging baby because I was able to soothe him when he got upset (however Sean and I were really the only ones who could, my poor mother is still traumatized by her inability to comfort him while Sean and I were across the street at a Christmas Eve party). However, the comparison between him and Meghan is like night and day so far. Now at least part of that is because we know what we are doing this time around, but part of it is just their different temperaments. I actually looked up how long infants should sleep because I was convinced she was sleeping too much. Turns out they should sleep 14-18 hrs a day and she is on the low end of that usually sleeping 14 or 15 hrs. Colin averaged 11 hrs a day (and this isn't just my memory, I looked it up in the baby notebook that I kept, and yes Meghan as 'a book' too..I'm not that relaxed the second time around that I could forgo 'the book', although it could just be my love of data that keeps me logging her every minute).

Snuggling with Daddy.

Other differences between the kids are that Colin was put on a feeding 'schedule' pretty early on (for a variety of reasons) and I didn't allow him to nurse more frequently than every 2 hrs during the day, and he would eat for 40 minutes straight (actually he would have gone longer if I let him), I didn't understand the concept of 'cluster feeding' until he was older. Meghan has been allowed to cluster feed at her whim and has truly been fed 'on demand' (I thought I was feeding Colin on demand but only if he didn't demand to be fed within two hrs of the start of the last feeding). She is a much more efficient eater and will often only want to eat for 10 minutes before moving on and she often goes more than two hrs between feedings because she is asleep (like now). So it is possible that part of the reason Colin didn't sleep that long was because I didn't cluster feed him in the evenings particularly when the milk supply is lower.

Colin asks to hold her all the time. I love it.

Her first trip to the playground.

Sleeping.

What's in a name?

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 19:41:00 +0000

Sean and I went into the delivery room with a list of 6 possible names that we had agreed on. It really took us a long time to come up with this list and there were many debates over it as I got more and more invested in the names I liked that he didn't like. I did share this list with anyone that asked but I never got around to listing them on the blog... I guess because no one asked... These were our choices kind of in order but not really (more like top three and bottom three):

Meghan/Megan
Tess
Natalie
Emma
Leah
Allison

We both wanted to look at her before we choose the name. After she was born things were so crazy that to be honest we didn't get much of a chance to really LOOK at her until we were up in the room and by that point it was getting late and we were tired so we didn't even begin the discussion at that time. Then in the morning Sean left pretty early to go get Colin and I thought we would discuss the names while Colin was there, but 101 other things happened, we had pictures taken, the lactation consultant showed up, the nurse came by, the pediatrician came by, lunch was served..and we had a three year old running around! So before we knew it it was time for Colin to go back home with Grandma Mo (he didn't really bat an eye at leaving both Mommy and Daddy at the hospital again). We didn't even start talking about names until almost 2:00pm on Saturday, and it was mainly because we couldn't be discharged until she had a name. So we basically stood over her playing with all of our names trying to find one that fit. To be honest, none of our names seemed to fit right away, she was pretty swollen from her rapid trip down the birth canal and she was a bit of a fussbudget those first 24 hours. All our names seemed airy and light while she seemed so sturdy and disgruntled. As the swelling went down and she started to actually look more like herself it got a little easier. The even bigger problem was that we never really had a solid front runner. Colin was my favorite name on our list but someone else used it for their own child three days before ours was born. I was sure Sean wouldn't want to repeat (as the overlap is on his 'side': a childhood neighbors child) but even Sean couldn't deny that he looked like a Colin. I think what finally tipped the scales was that Meghan has the same origin as Colin, it is an English name that people often think is Irish/Celtic but technically it isn't (obviously if we have more children the chances of finding yet ANOTHER name like that is pretty rare but I'm okay with that). Anyway probably around 4:00 we agreed that we both liked Meghan best even if we weren't entirely sure it fit this baby at that point. Now we had to choose a middle name and that was an another debate. We had decided that since Colin's middle name was after Sean's brother that this child's middle name would be a nod to one of the women on my side of the family. So our choices for middle names was narrowed down to:

Kristine/Kristyn (after my sister Kristy)
Suzanne (also after my sister, as it is her middle name, but it is also a nod to my aunt whom my sister was named for)
Carolynn/Caroline/Carolanne (both my mother and grandmothers first names are Carol but my mother goes by her middle name, Joanne, which for the record is also my middle name)

Basically for Meghan we liked Meghan Kristine or Meghan Suzanne. Here is where we got a little tripped up.. To me Kristine should be spelled Kristeen because that is how MY Kristeen spells it, however I didn't want to spell it that way because I wanted my sister to be the person we were honoring by using this name (since Kristy doesn't make a good middle name before Berry). I also was having a hard time with the asthetics of Meghan Kristine, the K was really throwing me off. I just wasn't a fan of MKB. The final name in the coffin on that one was that we didn't really like the idea of both kids having middle names with essentially the same root. Plus I really really liked Suzanne as a middle name as it is so familiar to me as such. So that was that.
Sometime around 5:00 pm we finally wrote it on the paperwork and announced it to the world. I apologize for the stress and missed sleep our delay caused people, it just wasn't immediately obvious to either one of us what her name was. Five days later she is definitely a Meghan, so no buyers remorse.

Weight Pool

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Wed, 24 Aug 2011 01:31:00 +0000

I was weighed at the hospital upon admission which makes the final weight gain +39! Which means it is a tie between Aunt Kathy and Julie! There is no prize, just bragging rights! Congratulations!

In other stats: my final weight was only 9 lbs less than my final weight in P1 despite being 21lbs less of actual weight gain! However, those extra lbs I had to start were not a failure to 'loose' the original weight, I was actually attempting to gain weight in order to maintain a more healthy weight before getting pregnant. According to our unofficial bathroom scale I have lost 13lbs since delivery but since Meghan was almost 9 of that, it isn't very impressive! It wasn't just water weight this time so I don't think it will come off as quickly.

Meghan's Birth Story.

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 23:32:00 +0000

Well that was certainly a whirlwind few days. Thursday I finalized everything for my Ph.D. and Friday I had a baby! Talk about timing. As you probably read in my last post I had no real expectation that I would go into labor without assistance so you can imagine my surprise when the very next morning it happened. Here is the story of how Meghan Suzanne Berry came into the world.

Friday early morning (5:55am) I was about to make my fourth trip to the bathroom of the night when, upon standing, my pants become saturated. I made a sound of surprise which altered Sean to ask what was wrong. I told him I wasn't sure but I think my water just broke, either that or I wet my pants. He obviously assumed the later and rolled over to go back to sleep. After checking everything out I was 90% sure I had NOT wet my pants but put on a pad to see if I continued to leak fluid. The 'gushing water' that you see on TV and in movies, was certainly not what I was experiencing and over the next few hours I was certain I had a slow leak. I called the doctor and was told to come to the hospital after 6 hours or if the contractions got regular. We also called Sean's mom so she would have time to come and take care of Colin before we had to go. So I just 'labored' at home (not much was going on so it is hard to really call it labor) doing various chores to prepare to be gone for a while, getting a grocery order together to be delivered after we got home, you know the usual!
We called the doctor back at 12 and she said to eat a good lunch and then come in. So we left for the hospital around 12:45. We were in the waiting room for a while chatting it up with another couple being induced with their first child. Her due date wasn't for another week but she was dilated and 100% effaced so they decided to move things along I guess. We got admitted to labor and delivery around 3 I think and I was checked by the resident. I was 3cm dilated 80% effaced and having contractions every 3 minutes but they weren't all that strong yet. We got comfortable, Sean started making me laugh about something and with every laugh more and more of my 'water' was coming out, not the most comfortable of feelings. We were sitting chatting (probably about how I was hungry!) when Dr. #5 walked in... in street clothes and a coach bag and not looking very dr like. In fact she looked more like someone visiting who got the wrong room. She says "Do you know me?" and I must have looked at her strangely because she eventually introduced herself as Dr #5 and I said oh of course it has just been awhile since I didn't go down to that office during this pregnancy. So she decides to check my cervix (still in street clothes mind you, seemed very odd to me), however she doesn't wait for the contraction to end and just goes to town, I didn't know it at the time but I she decided that was a good time to strip my membranes which was not painful at all when I had it done in the doctors office with Colin but was extremely uncomfortable mid contraction. Things went nuts and I was practically trying to crawl up the table to get away from her. She asked me if I was opposed to an epidural and I said no and that now was a good time! At this point it is 5pm and I am 5cm..Sean was looking forward to that text (5 at 5) but there was no break in the action for him to even get out his phone. The contractions were coming on top of each other, particularly when the baby started moving around. So a little while later my nurse comes in to tell us that the epidural has been requested but that the anesthesiologist is next door and will be over as soon as he is done. I think 20 minutes went by and things are going from bad to worse so much to Sean's dismay I push the call button and get the nurse back in the room to find out why I haven't seen the anesthesiologist yet. She reports back that it shouldn't be much longer... I am in some SERIOUS pain, pain I have never felt before, pain I never even got to when I labored with Colin. Sean is being a great coach and helping me remember to breathe through it. For one reason or another one of the hospital logo's on my gown became my focus point and I just kept trying to blow it off the gown with my breathing. I have NO idea where that image came from but it gave me something to concentrate on so I kept with it. Another 5 or so minutes and I feel the contraction monitor slip off and I fear they will think I'm no longer contracting and not rush the guy so I push the call button again, the nurse comes back in ready to tell me it will only be a few more minutes and I'm quick to explain that I want her to fix the monitor..she just laughs at this but fixes it.. I think it was about this time that I really felt Meghan move and twist and engage in the birth canal. I think I was asking her to please not move and then looked at the nurse with what can only be terror on my face and tell her shes moved and she is LOW.. She leaves and comes back seconds later with the resident who checks me and says, yeah shes 9cm, we might not have time for that epidural, someone call Dr. #5. Turns out she LEFT to go get something to eat and had to high tail it back to the hospital. All of sudden 5 doctors are in the room, one of whom says "Don't worry I'll deliver you if Dr #5 isn't back" I'm thinking who the heck cares about the doctor WHERE IS THE ANESTHESIOLOGIST? All I'm thinking is that there is no way I can push for three hours feeling like this without drugs. One very sweet dr (I have no idea if she is a resident or attending) is right by my head trying to assure me that the worst is over and that the rest is nothing compared to what I've just come through. And I'm trying to just communicate with a look that no you don't understand I'm going to push for three hours and I'm not going to make it because I have absolutely no ability to talk. Eventually I tell them I have to push and the resident checks me again and says, "its just a lip" I have no idea what that means but apparently it means I can push.. Dr. #5 now rushes in and I hear her ask if she can change first and everyone tells her NO get ready now. People do a wardrobe change and for some reason I never put that together as baby coming out, I just assumed it was 'pushing attire' at this point, particularly because she is still in street clothes!
I honestly don't think I pushed more than 5 times and the baby was out (everyone said "Woa that is a big baby" and various versions of your so small how did you have such a big baby) and immediately placed on my chest. It was 5:49pm. Again, Sean was amazing, while I was still thinking it was going to be hours he said "It is almost over I can see her, I can see our little girl" I must have looked at him like he had three heads because he said it again. Even the resident as she was giving me the baby said "You should see the look on your face, you are in shock". Then the baby goes to the warmer and they start getting her cleaned up and foot printed and all that jazz. Now this is the part I have no real memory of from Colin's birth, but I now had to deliver the placenta and get stitched up without an epidural. They kept telling me to push again and I kept telling them they were nuts if they thought I was capable of that. At this point the resident and Dr. #5 disagree about the 'readiness' of the placenta and the resident is getting annoyed with Dr. #5 for thinking I should be pushing before it is ready. I just had a good little internal chuckle about that one since I'm apparently not the only one who isn't a fan of Dr. #5. We finish with that miserableness and then they give me the baby to nurse. Sean starts now to get the info out to everyone and begins taking photos with our camera. None of these photos are for public view since I'm overly exposed, without actually exposing anything. We never really got a good shot of Meghan because we could only see half her face. She nursed for almost 45 minutes and Sean held her for another 2 before they took her up to the nursery. Sean went with them but had to come back to transfer me to a room. I actually was standing up and getting into a wheelchair an hour after pushing that baby out, I thought they were kidding when they brought in the wheelchair. Somehow we got a private room again without having to pay for it, and shortly after the baby came back from the nursery and we were able to take the first photos of her entire face, on our phones so that they could be distributed.

The rest of the hospital stay was pretty uneventful, and we were discharged a short 28hrs after her birth. In the next post I will explain our name choice and why it took us nearly 24hrs to decide.

Indroducing: Meghan Suzanne

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 17:31:00 +0000

Meghan Suzanne: born 8-19-11 at 5:49 pm weighing 8lbs 14.3oz measuring 20.5 inches

Minutes old.

Colin meets his baby sister for the first time.

He was so excited! Such a sweet moment.

Grandma Mo meeting her for the first time.

Sean and his baby girl.

Colin with his new doll to take home since Mommy and the baby have to stay at the hospital.

We have a nearly identical photo of Colin I will have to look for it.

What you can't see is the shirt says Ph.inisheD. My graduation gift to myself.

Our first morning home.

I thought I would put up her birth story first but it is taking me longer to write out than I hoped so I wanted to get some pictures up. I realize that I am on facebook now and can put pictures there but I expect the blog to remain my primary mode of information distribution. I have just started putting a book together of all the blog posts from Colin's first two years which will hopefully include all of your comments as well. So for posterity sake I want to do the same thing for Meghan. Facebook still feels foreign (and a little schizophrenic) to me since I was only signed up for about 11 hrs before I went into labor. I've had to turn off notifications since my inbox absolutely exploded. Lots more to come I promise. Sean and I are doing remarkably well managing our new family but as you can imagine sleep is hard to come by so we have been trying to take turns napping with the baby. I am feeling better everyday but the 1.2.3. punch of sciatica (worse than pre-delivery oddly!), being tattered and torn from a very quick delivery, and really bad postpartum uterine contractions (they were not this intense the first time!) have left me only operating at about 50%. We are getting there but 'free' time is still pretty limited. Sean is doing a great job, and even Colin is coping with this change amazingly well..the only jealousy we have see is minor (e.g. Daddy can you give the baby to Mommy so you can .....) and he is really mostly excited about having a baby around..sometimes over exuberant about it but this is better than the alternative.
Lots more to come..

39 Weeks- Bump and Drs Appt

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 02:07:00 +0000

Another twofer! This weeks doctors appointment was a little more interesting than the last although just barely. I'm a full 2cm dilated and the baby has apparently dropped further into the birth canal because I am measuring smaller (I did the same thing with Colin but I have to go back and figure out if it was the same week or not). I have gained another pound bringing me to +37. I also found out that doctor #2 is on vacation next week so my plans for having her induce me are out the window. Now my earliest induction date is 8/26 when doctor #4 is on call. Doctor #2 is sending me for another ultrasound on Monday to check weight again... this seems very odd to me but apparently she is a big fan of the ultrasound while Doctor #1 never was. Its actually kind of annoying to go to the hospital all the time but I don't really have a good reason to say no...I'm curious to see how big she is measuring now (although grated they aren't 100% accurate). I will then go back and see Doctor #4 later in the week and she is supposed to put me on the schedule for Friday. This is all assuming I don't spontaneously go into labor.
I have pretty much have zero expectation of going without assistance, but that is mainly because I can't live in the 'it could be today' mentality all the time. Sean is a little less convinced and told me today that we can't make plans for Sunday in case I'm in labor.. I would rather make plans and cancel them personally, I can't sit around the house just waiting all the time...Our bags are packed, the car seat is installed, Colin is totally prepared (although Dawn mentioned that I might want to have a bag packed for him in the event I go in the middle of the night and have to drop him off at her place). The only thing we have to do now is get the house put together a little more. I wrote up a 'house schedule' of our typical routine for Sean's mom or whomever else might need it. This was Sean's idea and a very good one. Silly stuff like what Colin likes to eat for breakfast, when the cats get fed, what time he should be in bed, where the closest pharmacy is etc. I still have to write out the TV instructions for using the dvd player or on demand shows but I'll get to that tomorrow.

In other news... I DEPOSITED MY DISSERTATION TODAY! It is officially official, I have a Ph.D. Crazy! I can't wrap my head around it yet... I'm actually done! I'm also very very sore from all the walking I had to do today not just for the deposit but to drop off and pick up Colin from Dawns. I better not go into labor tonight, I'm not sure I have the energy for it! Anyway, here are the pictures..Enjoy.

38 Week Drs appointment and weigh in

noreply@blogger.com (Becky) — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 21:30:00 +0000

Nothing to report from this doctors appointment. Once again no change in weight no change in dilation. I have to admit I was a bit dissapointed by the no change in dilation. The sciatica is getting pretty bad and yoga is pretty much out of the question now. I'm just not able to maneuver anymore, and any kind of inversion (e.g. downward facing dog) makes fluid move to my head so much that it is painful. I also loose feeling in my hands in the poses where they are above my head... yoga didn't seem to be helping as much lately anyway so it isn't so bad. I have an appointment to deposit my dissertation on Thursday. While I hope the baby waits until after that to make an arrival, I almost don't care if she doesn't (I can get another appointment and the true deadline is Sept 15th). Now that I have the go ahead I can deposit anytime. Obviously it will be 'simpler' to deposit before she comes out, although traveling to midtown Manhattan 2 days shy of my due date doesn't sound like a good time to me. But gosh, if I can go through the process pregnant I can certainly get myself to the building and drop it off (there is some paperwork involved where I have to get signatures from a bunch of offices saying that I don't have any outstanding debts). Dawn has graciously volunteered to take Colin for the morning even though Leo will be at day camp that week. I owe her big time, it isn't ever her turn in the rotation to watch Colin!
Oops I got off topic. This doctor (probably my 4th choice, if i have a choice) said if I go a week over my due date they will discuss inducing but the other doctor (my 2nd choice) previously offered to induce me on the 17th so I think I'll split the difference.. if she hasn't shown up by the 23rd I'll likely ask to be induced then, for a 24th delivery (when my 2nd choice Dr. is on call). I'm pretty sure 2nd choice will be happy to do that. (if it isn't clear my 1st choice is my real doctor, my 3rd choice is another dr in the practice who works out of a different office but she did Colin's circumcision and I really enjoyed her during the last round, my 5th choice is also at the second office and honestly I would rather deliver in a taxi cab than deal with her again.)