What, you don't like cold beet soup?

Hey folks. Long time no writey. I've just been having too much fun doing the mommy thing. Roan is showing more personality every day, and she is such a joyful creature I just love my time with her. Latest developments:

• she is very interested in her toes, often grabbing at them
• she likes to shove a hand/ finger/ thumb into her mouth whenever possible
• she gets into cooing spells where she makes all kinds of adorable noises
• she's given the thumbs down to several of her major toys, prompting me to go out and buy a new exersaucer to keep her entertained
• she loves standing on her legs (assisted of course)
• she hates spending time on her tummy
• she is sleeping through the night!!! yesssss!!!!!

Since my last post we took a road trip down to Texas to pick up our cat, celebrate Arwen's grandpa's 90th birthday (!) and put some face time in at the home office. I must say, we were rather leery undertaking a 16 hour drive with a 2-month old, but it went amazingly well. She slept a lot (Arwen drove through the night) and wasn't very fussy at all. And while we were in Texas she was so good and so happy it was incredible. I would've thought she might get cranky or out of sorts, but no sir, she was a gem. She even slept through the night 3 nights in a row. I think she really liked being around so many people, having lots of folks fussing over her and keeping her entertained. Our first two days back in Denver she went into a bit of a cranky spell. I think she missed being the center of attention! "What, it's just you and me Mom? Borrrring!"

While we were traveling she had her second growth spurt. You know it's a growth spurt not because she suddenly shoots up overnight, but because she starts nursing around the clock like crazy. I basically didn't sleep for 3 days. But this time just knowing what was going on, I didn't stress out about it. Eventually she returned to normal.

The only other hiccup on our trip was she got another somewhat bad diaper rash. I hadn't packed our super special hospital-issued diaper rash cream. Instead I packed the prescription refill our pediatrician gave us to save space. I figured if we needed the stuff, no problem, just run by Walgreens and pick it up. Wrong! It could only be filled at a compounding pharmacy (one that mixes stuff up) and all the ones in Houston were out of one key ingredient. A day of phone calls and $53 later, Roan had a different cream that works not as well but well enough to get her bottom in good enough shape to sit in a car seat for 20 hours.

Anyhoo, the funny thing is that once we got back to Denver and the rash cleared up I picked up some Desitin, the only diaper cream I hadn't tried and by far the most popular. I don't know, I guess I figured since everyone uses it it must not be any good? Or maybe I just had to be different? As it turns out it has not only cleared things up, it's kept the persistent recurring rash we're always fighting at bay. Go figure. Lesson learned: Save yourself some time and trouble and just do what everyone else does.

The last thing I thought I'd mention is I've been a little short of time lately because I've cranked up the cooking. I got really spoiled having Jen here cooking wonderful healthy meals all the time before she got a new terrific job. Now she has better things to do with her life than be my personal chef. When Arwen started to say things like "Are we ever going to eat at home again?" I figured I better pull it together. Happily I heard about this menu service, http://www.kitchenmuse.net/, which provides a week's worth of nutritionist-prepared menus that are healthy and wholesome along with a shopping list and a food prep To Do list to save time. For me, the recipe hunting/ grocery list making is the most taxing part of cooking so this is treat. And the Muse is into all kinds of ethnic foods, which I love, and she also has recipes for eating various foods that I don't really know what to do with normally.

Like beets for example. I don't think I've ever purchased beets or attempted to cook or eat beets. Beets were always sort of a mystery vegetable to me. They seemed to harken back to some quaint distant time in the past in which people ate things like collard greens and rhubarb pie. A sort of vestigial vegetable in today's modern produce section. Anyway, in last week's menu there was this recipe for summertime beet soup. Of all the recipes in the list it seemed the most iffy to me, but I thought to myself, Do not fear the beet. Embrace the beet. I figured if ever there was a time, it was now.

Flash forward to dinner a couple nights later. Arwen: "Are we having one of your new recipes tonight?" Me: "Yeah and I think it'll be really good. Different. Earthy. Here try some." At which point I served him three ladelfulls of bright fuscia soup with a dollop of plain yogurt, a handful of cucumber and a smattering of dill. I just forgot to mention one thing: this is a cold soup. He took one bite and I wish I had a picture of the look on his face. Horror. Disgust. Confusion. Me: "I like it, what do you think?" Him: "Well it's definitely different."

This is a man who will eat anything. I have sometimes complained that he will wolf down a delicately prepared meal that took hours of care and attention with equal enthusiasm/indifference as a pot of mac'n cheese straight out of the box. In fact, I think if it were up to him mac'n cheese would find its way onto our table much more often. Anyway, I looked over midway through my bowl of purple puree and actually saw him gagging. And then dutifully shoveling in another spoonful.

Oh we had a good laugh over this culinary adventure. Since then I'm happy to report the dinners I've prepared have been resounding successes. But then when you set the bar that low, it's hard to do worse!

PS. To any of our beloved friends and family in Texas who we did not get to see on this trip (and/or who didn't even know we were in town), we love you and miss you and are sorry we were so short on time. We didn't even get to spend a proper weekend in Houston and were working during the weekdays so it made for a hectic trip. Big hugs from the whole Vaughan family.

aw hail no

It hailed yesterday. Marble/grape sized. It looked like it was raining a million white marbles really hard and really fast. Thank goodness for carports.

In other news, wow it's really hard to find time to blog. Or shower. Or brush teeth. Or [insert activity of your choice here]. Babies take up a lot of time.

On the mooshy gooshy cutesie tootsie front, aw I just love my little girl to pieces. My daughter. Still seems strange to say. Like maybe that repo man might show up again and take her back. I'd like to see him try. Did I mention that she's adorable? And also brilliant. She is cooing and gurgling more and more. No doubt she'll be working on her masters thesis soon. Also she is getting huuuge. It's good to know the thousands of hours of nursing time I've clocked since her birth are not for nothing. We estimate her to be 12+ pounds now. She has a checkup coming up on Friday, so we'll report back with exact facts & figures.

Oh so I guess the last time I had much to say about Roan we were about to try putting her on a routine, and also dealing with more and more crankiness. Boy, we've come a long way baby. I learned that 1) if you think your child might have colic then he/she does NOT have colic and 2) if you don't let your baby nap enough they will get so grumpy you might think they have colic. I read this book (yes! another book) called Babywise which I do not agree with in its entirety but I must concede totally saved our bacon here. They suggest putting your child on a 3-hour eat-play-sleep routine, allowing them to sleep as much as 1-2 hours out of every 3.

This was a lot more sleep than we were letting Roan get, especially after 6 pm or so when I thought she better stay up to help her sleep longer at night. It's not like I was using the sleep deprivation techniques employed at Guantanimo or anything; I just wasn't recognizing that her fussy cries in the evening were because the poor thing needed a nap. The beauty of the eat-play-sleep routine is that it pretty much takes the guesswork out of why she's crying. When she wakes up crying I know it's because she's hungry. After feeding we play until she gets fussy again, which I know means she's tired. It's that simple. I couldn't believe that the very first day we started trying this approach she hardly cried all day, and when she was awake she had many more happy moments.

The other thing that's great about the Babywise routine is that now I feel much more confident about leaving the house with her and not having to worry about her having a major fuss attack. Basically, after I feed her we can go for a walk or go to the grocery store or get in the car or whatever. She'll stay awake as long as she wants and then fall off to sleep. I usually get a 1-2 hour window before she then wakes up and needs to be fed again. It's worked great.

PS. We have some new photos posted on Roan's site: http://www.babysites.com/sites/roanvaughan

If you forgot the username/password, just email me.

If these walls could talk

It's been a while since I checked in... I'll post some new pictures soon. In the meanwhile I thought I'd mention some puzzling anecdotes about our house. It seems this place comes with a a history.

You all know of course about the pipe bomb we found under sheetrock in our attic. In addition to the mystery explosive, it seems every time we open a wall we find some new curiosity. In the course of converting the old 1-car attached garage into our new office, we opened two walls and found a small aluminum frying pan (what?) and three truly hideous ties pinned together that must've been in there since the house was built in 1952.

Since we have lived here we've also had some curious visitors. One day Arwen answered a knock at the door and found himself face-to-face with some sort of repo man. The guy was asking for someone we'd never heard of - niether the former tenant nor the previous owner. When Arwen assured him he'd never heard of the individual in question, the repo man looked him up and down suspiciously and then reluctantly left.

But the most perplexing encounter was one day when Jen was home alone and answered the door. She heard a knock and was surprised to find a very short Asian gentleman standing on the stoop, wearing an eye patch over one eye inquiring into the whereabouts of a certain "Miss Ambrosia." When she replied that the lady in question was no longer living here, he was undeterred. "But where did she go? Have you seen her daughter? She used to live here too..." Jen could hardly get the guy to leave. When she told me about it, I couldn't help but wonder what kind of person goes by the moniker 'Miss Ambrosia'?

So we're left to surmise that this house has had a storied past. It seeming has served as a workshop for a would-be joke bomb maker, a home to some mystery man who loved fried eggs and wore ugly ties, a hideout to debtors, and a brothel catering to one-eyed Chinese midgets. Wow we must seem really boring by comparison.

Happy Mother's Day

To all the mamas, grandmamas, great-grandmamas, doggy mamas and so on out there: Happy Mother's Day. Mine sure was.

It was just a quiet day around the house for me looking after Roan. I love the weekends because I can just focus on her without trying to squeeze in work or other distractions. Not so quiet for Arwen who worked like crazy on the house yet again. We've (he's) made great progress, but man! the list of what remains to be done is long.

This was our first weekend on our own without Aunt Jen around. (She went out of town to hang out with a dear friend and attend a book signing with Chuck Palahniuk.) I'll be honest. I was worried this weekend would be a disaster. I rely so much on Jen day in and day out to look after the baby here and there while I work, clean house, run laundry, grocery shop, etc. I am happy to report, however, that not only did we survive the weekend, we did just fine.

The weather in Denver is beautiful right now - daytime highs in the 80's and lows in the 50's at night - so we did a lot of hanging out in the backyard hammock (me) and swing (Roan). We took walks to the park, the library, the yarn store (just browsing). And then tonight Arwen took me out for my first sushi dinner in nearly a year. It was fantastic. We took Roan along and she was not a perfect angel, but she didn't cry too much. Eventually she passed out and we enjoyed dinner out like two civilized adults. Refreshing!

Roan is doing well. She's still struggling with cranky moments here and there, but in between she is smiling more, cooing more, and more aware of the world around her. Arwen and I think she's ready for some added structure in her life. Up to this point we've pretty much gone with the flow as far as her eat/play/sleep schedule is concerned. She and I have also been sharing a bed at night, to help facilitate those middle of the night feedings (and, to be honest, I have just loved sleeping next to her at night).

Now we're going to try getting her on to a more regular routine, so both she and I know better what to expect from our day. She is also going to sleep in her crib for the first time tonight (a big step for both of us). It's hard to explain, but she just seems ready to become integrated into our lives rather than have us revolve around her.

Did I *actually* say this child never cries?

Uh, scratch that folks. We have entered a new phase. Gone are the good old quiet days, so tragically short-lived. Roan has begun to find her voice. The good news is that she has strong lungs. Very strong.

They say it's pretty typical at around 4-6 weeks for babies to start getting fussier, crying more, being harder to soothe, and having a harder time with gas. These are the symptoms of what gets the blanket label of "colic." And it seems our perfect angel is not exempt from this next stage in development.

For the most part it hasn't been too bad. And by "too bad" I mean I haven't jumped off any bridges yet. It's weird. She can go from smiling and cooing one minute to writhing and shrieking the next. She pulls her legs in and makes the most piteous frowny faces, seeming to suffer from terrible gas pains. And she can produce a symphony of bodily function noises to go with it - burping, gurgling, farting, pooping and spitting up.

One of the challenges of dealing with these fussy periods is that they are unpredictable as to when they will strike. If we get a hankering to go out to eat, we don't know whether she'll sleep through the meal or scream through it. And when I wake up in the morning I don't know if we'll be having a fussy start to the day or if all will be well till it's time for bed at night. It's just sort of moment to moment.

I think we're managing pretty well. When it's really bad Arwen, Jen and I take turns passing her around, patting her this way or bouncing her that way until finally something works. It's usually a matter of working our way through the dozen or two possible methods of soothing her until finally something does the trick.

I will say that I had two horrendous nights with her last week. I think the problem wasn't colic but a growth spurt instead. For two days straight she basically wanted to nurse all the time - instead of every 2-3 hours it was more like every hour. And instead of sleeping at night for a 4-5 hour stretch, she was awake and crying every hour or 2, sometimes every 45 minutes. And for those two days, if she wasn't nursing or sleeping she was screaming. I would get up in the morning wrecked but still facing a full day of Mommy Duty. It was not pretty. Jen and Arwen really stepped up though, watching her so I could sneak in a nap or a shower. And then - mercifully - after two days of agony she resumed a more normal routine as far as nursing and sleeping. All I can say is I'm glad that's behind us.

Even though it turns out our child is an actual human baby and not a perfect angel, she is still pretty terrific. Even on the days with the worst crying (except for the 2 days mentioned above which will forever live in infamy) she has her funny cute moments too. She always wakes up with a big, contagious smile on her face. She cracks me up with how engrossed she is by the mobile that hangs above her crib. I can lay her down crying for a diaper change, and one glimpse of that mobile and she's smiling and cooing. I mean what is it about clouds, moons and stars that is just so freaking hilarious? I also love the way her cheeks are taking over her face as she fattens up nicely. I adore the dimples in her elbows and the backs of her hands. Her little feet with their oversized toes are so cute. And when she's not crying with tummy pains, she sure smiles a lot. More rarely, she coos. And once she even seemed to laugh. I love the way she looks right into my eyes as she nurses. And when she falls asleep at my breast with a look of utter contentment on her peaceful face. Those are the moments I just soak up like a sponge.

Happy One Month Roan

Well over the past weeks I've posted quite a bit about the ordeal we went through getting Roan here, as well as how I've felt about being a mom so far. But I haven't shared very much about what our little girl is like, and what she's been up to so far.

I would have to say that Roan has a great disposition. She seems by nature pretty easygoing, not especially prone to cry or fuss for no reason. She doesn't usually cry when I change her diaper; often the only sign I have that she's hungry is the way she sticks her tongue out. She's very tolerant of noise - whether it's the tv or loud voices or doggies barking.

The morning is her best time of the day. She always wakes up with bright eyes and a big smile on her face. When I smile back at her sometimes she even brightens more and gives a little coo.

One of her favorite things to do is to lie in her crib and stare up at her mobile or into her mirror. She's very interested in faces - whether mine, her Daddy's, Aunt Jen's, or her own. She also loves her playyard that rocks (literally!) and has a mirror. She loves to be held, talked to, read to, and sung to. I feel bad for the poor kid on that last account, given the fact that I can't carry a tune in a bucket.

The evenings are the tougher time for her. As bedtime approaches she starts to have a harder time nursing and just being her normal happy self. She seems to have more tummy troubles as she cranks out the dirty diapers one after another. Mom, Dad and Aunt Jen usually take turns swaddling, shushing, patting and jiggling her back to contentment.

Lately she's been working on some new tricks. She has been seen sucking her thumb - although this is a rare occurrence - which I of course am convinced is a sign of intelligence. She surprised us from birth with how strong she is, but as each day goes by she gets stronger and more coordinated. She can support her head pretty well, and she can even lift her body weight onto her legs. She gets a little "tummy time" every day, which gives her a chance to build her arm, neck and leg muscles. I'm convinced she'll be crawling before too long.

She is also starting to become more vocal. It seems to happen more in the morning that she will emit an occasional coo while staring at her mobile or mirror. We all hang on every noise and talk back to her, trying to encourage her to express herself.

FYI, I posted some new photos of Roan at her web site (If you don't have the login info, email me and I'll send it to you) : http://www.babysites.com/sites/roanvaughan

Happy Birthday Jen

I haven't managed to get to the blog since Jen's birthday last Thursday, the 26th. Happy 29th Jen! I thought I'd post a photo. Doug happened to be in town on business, so he graced us with his presence out to dinner at LOLA, a trendy Mexican-nouveau restaurant in our hood. We drank well, ate well and enjoyed good company. And it was Roan's first dinner out. She slept through the whole thing, can you believe that?!

Roan's Birth Story - Chapter 3: The Final Cut

Shortly after the doctor had determined that an emergency C-section would be necessary in order to deliver Roan, the anaesthesiologist visited me. He wanted to know what I'd had to eat in the last 4 hours. When the pushing had started - about 4 hours prior - I had realized I was famished. By now I was starving. The hospital is very particular about letting women eat in labor, though, because of the fear that in the event a C-section is necessary and they have food in their stomach, it can aspirate into their lungs and cause suffocation. Of course I had always thought this precaution was silly because I had been so sure I'd never need a C-section.

I explained that all I'd consumed in that time was a couple of honey sticks and some ice chips. Instead of getting any sympathy from the anaesthesiologist at how hungry I must be after 4 hours of hard work on an empty stomach, he explained that he would have to confer again with the doctor to confirm that this was in fact an emergency C-section. If not, I would have to wait another 4 hours without so much as a glass of water or bite of ice chips before surgery! I was floored.

Given that Roan had already had a couple of heart decels, there was no way they were going to delay the C-section for even a few minutes. Next thing I knew the nurse was back, asking whether I felt able to walk down the hall to the OR. I realized at that point that after all my body had been through there was no way at all I could do anything even as straightforward as that. So they wheeled my bed out of the room with me on it and Arwen helping to push it.

When we got outside the door to the OR, the nurse exhorted me to get up, walk in and sit on the operating table. This seemed at the time a herculean task. I eventually made my way over, but sitting on the table was the worst part. I was hunched over, sobbing, when they suggested I reposition myself so they could give me the spinal. That last few minutes of excruciating pain was mercifully contrasted moments later by the incredible feeling of relief when the spinal started to hit me. All the pain was magically gone. It was the best I had felt in two days, I realized.

I hesitate to speak for Arwen, but this did not seem to be a high point for him. It had been such a long, tough labor and right there toward the end when he insisted I get up and walk - which is what had gotten me to 9.5 cm - it seemed like we had turned the corner. He knew how much I had wanted to avoid a C-section and he'd done everything within his power to help me reach that goal. I think he probably felt helpless and disappointed that it wasn't going the way we hoped. And I think after seeing all I went through in labor it was really hard for him to watch what my body was going through now.

There was a whole team of doctors and nurses in the OR, all very friendly and personable. I was pretty out of it at this point though, and just trying to concentrate on trusting in their care believing that everything was going to turn out all right. They laid me down on the operating table, which is an incredibly skinny piece of stainless steel. They had two even skinnier mini-tables on wheels, on each side of the operating table for each of my arms. I was laid out in the shape of a cross with all kinds of wires going into me - IV fluids, blood pressure monitors, fetal monitors, and an oxygen tube in my nose.

They draped a big blue curtain in front of me at about chest level so that I couldn't catch any gruesome glimpses of the procedure. Arwen was seated by my head. Even though I was trying to be brave, there was no way I could've gotten through this without gripping his hand tightly in mine. Just as he had been throughout my labor, he was my rock. From where he sat, Arwen could choose to watch or not to watch the procedure. He ended up watching most of it.

I will warn you: the next few paragraphs are a little gory. If you have a sensitive stomach or would rather not know the details, feel free to skip ahead.

First they wipe you down with iodine. Then they make a horizontal incision in the neighborhood of the top of a pair of bikini bottoms. The incision just cuts through the skin and a layer of fat; they don't cut through the muscle beneath. Instead they use a wratchet type of device to crank-crank-crank your stomach muscle fibers apart. The docs seemed in many ways like auto mechanics, especially with this maneuver. Once the stomach muscles have been pulled wide apart they make a secondary horizontal incision, this time on your uterus. I of course could not feel any of this, but I was awake and could hear what was going on in the room. I could also feel vague pressure as they pulled and yanked on various body parts.

To give themselves plenty of room to move around inside your body, they take out all the stuff in their way: namely, your organs. Arwen watched in horror as they pulled out all of the organs in my abdominal cavity north of my uterus and set them on my chest. Although he couldn't really recognize each part as it was brought out into the light of the OR, he tried to make a mental note of what he was seeing to make sure everything eventually got put back where it belonged. I think it was probably around this time that Arwen was focusing every thought and hope on something along the lines of "Please let Heather make it through this ok."

Around this time, the docs were about ready to start getting this baby out. They discovered pretty quickly, however, that she was really wedged in there pretty good. They tried pulling from above and pushing from below, and neither worked. So then they determined that another incision on my uterus would be necessary, this time a short vertical one. When they still couldn't get her out through the larger incision, they started to freak out. The tone in the OR became noticibly tense. I heard a nurse make an emergency call to some team of specialists: "I need [such and such] in here STAT!" Arwen said there was a lot of blood coming out of me at that point. I heard the nurses remarking that my blood pressure was dropping dangerously low. The doctors seemed to be panicking that they couldn't get this baby out. I remember lying there, gripping Arwen's hand as tightly as I could, looking up into the bright lights and trying to think positive thoughts.

Next thing we knew, the petite Asian woman doctor who had made the determination that the C-section was necessary to begin with piped up. "Everyone out of my way! I've got the smallest hands!" They started cranking the operating table down to it's lowest setting, and Dr. Lindsay got on top of me. She began yanking so hard on me Arwen said I looked like a rag doll being flopped around on that table. I can't imagine how hard it was for him to see them doing all this to me.

It felt like there were 10 different docs, each one with a hold on a different organ, all pulling in different directions. But it worked. Next thing I knew I was hearing the first cries of our baby girl. Right as they got her out, that team of specialists came busting in through the double doors of the OR. "Nevermind, we got it!" someone said. I was looking to catch a glimpse of our sweet baby, but with the stupid blue curtain in the way I couldn't see anything. That was a very lonely moment. I knew they had her over in the baby warmer to my left, just barely out of view, and I just felt this terrible ache at not being able to see her, to touch her.

Arwen got up and went to her side. He snapped some photos of her first moments. And then he came right back to my side, grabbed my hand again, and told me through teary eyes that she was just fine, a healthy baby girl. I think at this point a huge sense of relief completely overtook Arwen. She was fine, I was fine. Everything was going to be ok. Finally he could take a break from having to be so strong for us, and his emotional floodgates opened.

In a few minutes they let Arwen hold her. He brought her to my side and put her right next to my cheek. I turned my head and tried to just stroke her face, but the nurses admonished me harshly. Apparently I was screwing up their blood pressure readings, which was no joke at this point given how low my BP had dipped. So I didn't get to touch her or hold her in the OR. It seemed like it took forever for them to put me back together and sew me up - again with a lot of uncomfortable tugging. Next thing I knew they were wheeling her away, and me after. I was pretty disoriented at this point. They put us in separate recovery rooms. I could just barely glimpse her past the curtain. It was killing me to be so close and still a world away from her. It felt like she wasn't mine yet.

But the wait wasn't long before they had bathed her, wrapped her up and brought her over to me. I looked at her little red face and her tiny swaddled body and tried to let it sink in that this incredible gorgeous creature was mine. Ours. A nurse offered to help me try to feed her for the first time, and wouldn't you know she took right to it. It was such a relief - finally something was working just the way it was supposed to.

Over the next hours and days as we began to get to know Roan, it was a tremendous comfort to see that she was healthy and strong. All her vitals were good, she had no sign of jaundice whatsoever, and good night that girl could eat! The lactation consultant was floored. "This baby is one in a hundred," she said. She is one in a million to us. And I tell you I would go through that incredible ordeal of bringing her into this world again and again just to have her come to us healthy.

So whew! That's it. The story of Roan's birth. Thanks for sharing in the agony and the ecstasy with us.

Day 5

Here are some thoughts I thought I'd share with you that I jotted down when Roan was 5 days old. (She's 20 days today.)
.........................................................................................................
Today is Day Five of young Roan's life. I can't believe how much she has already learned and changed in these few days. Her first day on this planet she seemed completely overwhelmed by everything. Any time I moved her - even just a few inches - she went immediately from silent contentment to a red-faced scream. But by the next day, she seemed to have developed enough trust in Arwen and me to give us the benefit of the doubt before erupting. Each day she's learned to become a more accomplished nurser. And yesterday out of the corner of my eye I thought for a moment I saw her trying to move her hand to her mouth. I dismissed the notion as silly for such a young baby. Then today as I was watching her play I plainly saw her fold her fingers into a fist, flex her thumb, and erratically thrust her arm into space. It didn't go anywhere near her mouth, but her intent was clear. She amazes me.

I've had time over the past 5 days to reflect a little on her birth. It's ironic that I put so much thought and energy into preparing for the pregnancy - from nutrition to reading to exercise. But I never read much on what to do with a baby after it's born. In fact I never allowed myself to indulge in thinking at all about what she would be like or how it would feel to be her mom. I told myself that I didn't want to go setting a bunch of expectations, but really the truth was I was afraid.

This baby just meant too much to me. We had tried for so long to conceive. I had ached to bring a new life into this world with the man I love more than anything. I just could not bear the thought that something would go wrong, and that ultimately I would lose her. It seemed tremendously unwise to hope for, to believe, or even to think about holding that sweet baby in my arms.

The only possiblity I did not consider is that she would be born beautiful and strong and healthy and perfect in every way. I have been flooded with a sense of relief and joy, knowing that she is okay.

The other thing I worried about is what my reaction to her would be. Everyone wants to meet the ideal of maternal bliss, but postpartum baby blues are a reality for so many women. The radical changes in your hormones, the extreme and perplexing demands put upon you as a new parent, and chronic sleep deprivation are all very real. I hoped that I would find myself content as a new mom, but it worried me in the back of my mind.

Again, the only possibility I didn't really consider is that I would feel such a deep sense of gratitude and wonder at this little person. And an all consuming love. I thought - stupidly - that after all the buildup to her birth over the past two and a half years from attempted conception through pregnancy, that her arrival would be in a sense anticlimactic. Now that thought is bizarre to me. Anticlimactic? She is the most significant thing that has happened to me in my whole life! I can't wait to see what she will do in the next 5 minutes, who she will change into tomorrow and next week and next year. I am simply overjoyed that I get to wake up every day for the rest of my life and be her mother.

Update

I know you guys haven't heard much from me lately. The last week was a little bit of a rough one. Hopefully things have calmed down now and will stay nice and boring for a while.

Last week Roan developed a diaper rash that continued to get worse and worse, despite a visit to her pediatrician and us trying everything we could think of to improve it. Finally on Saturday a week ago it looked worrisome enough to warrant a phone call to the pediatrician's on-call nurse. She told us to be on the safe side, we'd better go ahead and take her into the emergency room at Children's Hospital.

We arrived expecting to be sent home as overprotective first-time parents. Instead, the docs in the ER were very concerned about what they were seeing. Roan was 12 days old at that point, and they explained that babies under a month of age have extremely limited immune systems. What can be a relatively innocuous infection at a few months of age can wreak havoc on a tiny infant, getting into the organs, the spinal fluid, or even the brain. They explained they would have to run cultures from every orifice, as well as doing a spinal tap to check for bacteria and viruses. They also explained they would have to keep her overnight and get her on some IV meds as a precaution.

We were shocked. She had been such an incredibly healthy baby from the very moment of her birth - no jaundice, a good eater, no fevers, a mild disposition. It was hard to believe that she could be so sick. It was awful watching her stuck with needles, swabs going into all sorts of uncomfortable places, and getting her IV placed. I just plain broke out in tears when they said the words "spinal tap." We were overwhelmed all at once with feelings of total responsibility for this little life, and yet complete helplessness to do anything for her. It was gut wrenching.

But Children's Hospital in Denver is one of the top 10 in the country for kids, and all the docs and nurses did everything within their power to make us feel as comfortable as possible. We were given a private room, and they encouraged us to stay with her, breastfeed as usual, and keep her routine as normal as possible. I was so relieved that her hospital stay did not mean an end to breastfeeding.

Anyway, long story short, they kept us for nearly 4 days waiting for all the cultures to come back, dosing her with IV meds and monitoring her vital signs. I stayed right by her side the whole time, feeding her, playing with her, bathing her like normal. And she kept her sweet disposition through it all. She never developed a fever and all the cultures finally came back negative, so they sent us home last Tuesday night with a diagnosis of "contact dermatitis." I can't even tell you how relieved we were.

Meanwhile Arwen was up to his ears in home renovations. My dad had come in for a quick home makeover stay, during which he, Jen and Arwen worked together to demolish and partially rebuild a custom shower as well as convert our laundry/storage rooms into a new office for us. They would work all day doing heavy labor, then bring dinner up to me at the hospital, and Arwen would stay the night with us on this tiny cramped hard bed, being woken up at all hours when the nurses came in to administer medications or check vitals.

Anyway, it was a rough time all around, but it's over now. Everyone's happy and healthy and safe and life is good again.

Roan's Birth Story - Chapter 2: A Hard Day's Night

Once the smoke had cleared and our home was once again deemed inhabitable, Jen, Micah, Josefa, the two dogs, the 26-foot moving van, and I returned home. Soon my mom arrived on a flight from Houston. At this point I badly needed to be alone with my coach and get some help focusing on working through this labor. Everyone went downstairs to the basement to give us some space.

At this point my contractions were still about 5 or 6 minutes apart but were growing in intensity. I took a warm bath, Arwen checked in with our midwife, Neko, and she suggested we take a walk in the fading afternoon light. I was feeling pretty uncomfortable by this point and having a hard time focusing after all the day's excitement. Arwen took me by one arm and I grabbed a trekking pole in the other and we headed very slowly out the door. I was moving at an absolutely glacial pace. I only made it 2 or 3 blocks before feeling wiped out and needing to get back home.

On the slow walk back I thought I felt - but wasn't sure - a tiny trickle of water breaking. I was hoping to put off the moment of my water breaking for as long as possible. Because I was GBS positive, the hospital would require that I head to the hospital as soon as it broke to begin a course of antibiotics and prevent infection. And at that point, the clock would start ticking, giving me no more than 24 hours to get that baby out.

Once we got back Jen brought up a nice healthy dinner of homemade minestrone soup and hearty bread. Where just a day or two before I could gobble down spicy, rich foods with enthusiasm I now found my tummy very sensitive. I ate what I could, which wasn't much, and Arwen turned on a movie to distract me, Stranger Than Fiction with Will Farell.

We only got about 15 minutes into the movie before all hell broke loose. Contractions started coming every two minutes apart with a nearly unbearable intensity. I couldn't sit down any longer; I was hanging off of Arwen with my arms around his neck, moaning, when all of a sudden in a gush my water broke. Looking back we realized that the little trickle I had felt earlier was probably indeed amniotic fluid, and its release, even in a small quantity, got things kicked up to the next level.

So now began the mad dash around the house to pack all the last minute odds and ends into the car, phone Neko and let her know we were on our way, load ourselves into the car, and head out. It's a short ride to the hospital from our house, but I assure you I felt every bump and pothole along the way. My mom and Josefa rode to the hospital with us, and my mom rubbed my shoulders the whole way.

We got the car parked, up the elevator and into The Baby Place. I had a hard time answering the lady's questions at the front desk, and at one point I asked to borrow her trash can because I was pretty sure I was about to spew. They ushered me into an exam room in a wheelchair to check my dilation, and to my surprise I was already at 5 centimeters. "We're already halfway there!" Arwen encouraged me. "I'm gonna barf," I replied, and next thing you know I was wearing and standing in the hearty minestrone soup from earlier.

They got us settled into a Labor & Delivery room, which are really nice at St. Joe's. They have wood floors, dimmable lights, and - most importantly - a huge jacuzzi tub. They hooked me up to a fetal monitor and dosed me with antibiotics for about half an hour. At this point I felt a new burst of energy. I was ready for this challenge. We walked the halls, did the hula dance that's supposed to help the baby turn and move, and sat and laid over the birthing ball we brought with us.

Things kept progressing well for a while. Over the next few hours I continued to dilate at a steady pace; about a centimeter every hour and a half to two hours. Although the contractions continued to be strong, my mind had had time to adjust to them by this point and I was able to deal with them. Arwen kept reminding me to "moo" - making low moaning noises is supposed to help you relax (and make you laugh). Things were going swimmingly.

Then around 8 centimeters I hit a wall. All of a sudden I began to experience such intense pain in my back I felt like I was losing my mind. It wasn't just every few minutes when a contraction hit either; it was an excruciating, sustained pain that came to an even more intense crescendo with each contraction. Neko explained that this was "back labor" - caused when the baby is rotated face up instead of face down. (This is different than a breech birth, where the baby is head up/ feet down. Roan was head down but rotated the wrong way.)

I completely lost my composure now. I was moaning and crying, thinking that if there were any women laboring in the rooms next door they probably would be wondering if I was dying in here. It hurt so bad I couldn't think or breathe or do anything other than beg Arwen to rub my back furiously and not stop. Even now when I think back on that intense pain it brings tears to my eyes.

Maybe if we had made some different choices at this point the ultimate outcome might have been different. I try not to second guess it; I don't have any regrets. But I do realize now that this pain was so intense that it completely stopped me in my tracks in terms of being able to put into practice the training we'd had for situations just like this. There was no way I could get up out of that bed and move, much less get on all fours, arch my back and roll over - one of the most effective techniques for getting a baby to rotate properly.

Instead I stayed put for hours, blubbering and begging for the pain to stop, wearing out Arwen's arms and shoulders from massaging me. The midwife checked me again and found that not only was I still stuck at 8 cm, but I also had some swelling on my cervix, which would make it even harder for the baby to navigate into the birth canal. We would have to do something about the swelling in order to get this baby out.

So Neko drew a bath for me and got the jacuzzi jets going. I could barely make it across the room to get into the tub, and once I got in the water wasn't nearly hot enough to do much for my back. They won't let you go above 100* for the safety of the baby. I was in a very bad state at this point. Arwen was encouraging me the whole way. I know it was hard for him to see me in so much pain. I stayed in the bath for a while, at least until I reached a semi-calm resignation to the misery I was in.

Before long it was time for the midwife to check me again. Much to our chagrin she found that I was still just at 8 cm and the swelling on my cervix had not improved at all. She gently suggested that I consider trying some Pitocin, an IV drug that intensifies contractions. I started crying at this point, because I felt there was no way I could handle contractions of even more intensity without the help of pain medication. Or, she suggested, if I could muster the will to get out of bed, we could try walking the halls for the next 30 minutes and see if that helped things progress at all. She left Arwen and me alone for a few minutes to talk about our options.

I started begging for some drugs. "I just can't do this. There's no way. This is f-----g torture." He knew that just about everyone going through natural childbirth reaches this point. He didn't want to see me get so far and then give up. "Ok honey, for the next 30 minutes you are going to listen to me. You're going to try what I say. After that we'll do whatever you want. Just give me 30 more minutes." He wanted me to get up and walk the halls with him. I tried to explain that that was a physical impossibility, but he wasn't having it. "Come on honey. We only have 30 minutes left. You can do this."

It wasn't pretty. I felt sorry for the nurses, doctors and other patients who had the misfortune of encountering my poor pitiful self in that hallway. I was not exactly a rousing endorsement of natural childbirth. I was crying, moaning, hanging on Arwen, my sister and my mom. I was in a pitiful state, but I was doing it. We walked up one hall and back, and when Arwen asked if I wanted to get back into our room, I said no, we still had a few minutes left, let's walk the other hallway.

When our 30 minutes were up Neko found our efforts had paid off. I was still swollen, but had dilated to 9.5 centimeters. She also said the baby had rotated some. We were almost there. But the midwife still felt it was necessary to start a Pitocin drip to get us the last bit of the way. Again I started crying because I didn't want to take pain meds, but I also didn't want to suffer even more intense contractions. "Just try it for a few minutes," Arwen said, "and if it's too much you can have all the pain relief you want."

So they started the Pitocin drip sans epidural, and to tell the truth it really wasn't that bad. I guess Roan had rotated enough that she wasn't putting as much intense pressure on my back. By this time it was the wee hours of Monday morning, and it was time for a shift change at the hospital. It was time for Neko to go home and another midwife, Christi, to come on duty. The midwives at St. Joe's are in a group practice, and we'd had the pleasure of working with both Neko and Christi during my pregnancy. In fact, they were two of my favorite midwives, so I felt lucky to have them both.

Christi found before long that the Pitocin had done its job and gotten me to 10 centimeters. My cervix was still swollen, however, so I couldn't start pushing yet. Even though I had managed to take some Pitocin without an epidural, she suggested I consider going ahead and getting the epidural so they could really crank up the Pitocin all the way. I didn't even have to say anything to that suggestion; she could tell by the expression on my face that this would be a very disappointing turn of events. "Well, before we do that, let me try one more thing," she said.

She started pushing hard on my cervix, and when contractions would come she had me push. It only took a few minutes, and she had gotten the baby's head past the cervix, into the birth canal and ready for pushing. "How did those last couple of pushes feel? Do you think you could keep pushing?" she asked. "I get to push now?!" I was ecstatic. I felt like I could push as hard and as long as necessary; I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. In a few minutes this baby would be in my arms.

Well, that's what I thought anyway. They set up a mirror so I could watch my progress. As each contraction came, Christi directed me in how to push most effectively. At this point we invited my mom, Josefa and Jen into the delivery room. It's not what I expected at all; I had thought I'd feel more comfortable with family around in the early stages and want my privacy at this point. As it turned out, I wanted to be alone with Arwen in the beginning stages to get my head straight after the bomb scare, and now in this last stage I was comfortable with the pain I was experiencing, excited about being so close to the end, and wanting to share this magical moment with them.

Arwen and Jen were by my side throughout the whole pushing process. It seemed like we were making good progress. Before I knew it two hours had passed. They kept me on a fetal monitor continuously throughout this time, and were amazed that the baby showed no signs of stress.

I knew from our Bradley training that most women complete the pushing stage somewhere between 20 minutes and 2 hours. I wasn't discouraged at all when we hit the 2 hour mark; I felt like I could keep going forever. What I didn't know at this point was that although Roan had rotated, she had only come 90* instead of the full 180*. This position is called Occipit Transverse. And apparently babies don't come out this way.

Christi let me keep pushing for another hour. By this time we could see the baby's head appear during each push, and then recede again after the contraction. The baby had had a couple of minor heart decelerations and was beginning to show some signs of stress. At that point Christi said she'd need to get the opinion of a doctor as to whether we could keep going. I was still feeling completely optimistic at this point though; I had every confidence that I could do this. The doctor came in - a young Asian woman - and took a look. She didn't mince words.

"We are looking at a possible forceps delivery right now. Actually the baby is not even far enough down the birth canal to use forceps, and forceps are going to be very uncomfortable for someone who has not had any pain relief." She explained that the baby was turned Occipit Transverse or "OT". As we would come to find out days later from another midwife, in the time before C-sections, the outcome for OT babies who failed to make the final turn was grim: both mother and baby died. The doctor offered, "I can give you another half hour to push as hard as you can, to see if you can get her into position for the forceps. Otherwise we are looking at a C-section delivery."

I heard the words she said but inside my head I scoffed. Not only will I get this baby in forceps range in the next 30 minutes, I will be holding her in my arms by then. Forceps schmorceps.

Well it didn't exactly go the way I thought. When she next came back, I had pushed some of my biggest, hardest pushes. With each effort everyone in the delivery room - Arwen, Jen, the moms, the midwife and the nurse - shouted encouragement. "You can do this!" "Push that baby out!" "You're almost there!" It sounded like the sidelines at a highschool football game. Despite all our best efforts however, when the doc returned she found the baby had not moved one bit. All of a sudden the reality of where we were hit me.

She explained that the anaesthesiologist would be coming in to talk with me before they wheeled me into the OR. The nurse handed Arwen the familiar blue paper scrubs, hat, booties and mask. He looked a little defeated and scared. Avoiding a C-section had been my preeminent goal in preparing for this labor. Now I was facing my biggest fear.

Strangely though, a sense of calm and grace came over me. I had felt so loved and supported throughout my labor. I had been surrounded by people who cared about me and honored my choices. The midwives and nurses had honored my desire for natural childbirth, not pressuring me with drugs and giving me every opportunity to make things work. Niether of the moms ever said one discouraging word. And I had the world's best coach who was there with me every step of the way, without whom I would never have made it to that point.

I grabbed Arwen's hand in my right and Jen's hand in my left and gave them a squeeze. I said through teary eyes, "Even though this isn't what I had hoped for, I think we all have a lot to be proud of. I want to thank you all for the incredible support you've given throughout this birth. In a little while our baby will be here, and that is all that matters."

Despite my best efforts, a natural childbirth just wasn't in the cards for me. But that's why we decided to have this baby in a hospital; now that medical intervention was clearly necessary, we knew we'd have the best care available. I felt like I had done all I could, and now I was in good hands.

Coming soon: the next and final chapter in Roan's birth story...

April 10th

Two notes of interest today.

1. Roan lost her umbilical stump today. Aw, already growing up so fast!

2. Exactly 3 years ago today we hiked Roan Mountain on the Appalachian Trail. It was a brutal but beautiful climb. We were rewarded at the top with gorgeous views. After dilly-dallying around the summit most of the afternoon we had a long exhausting hike down the mountain, and were again rewarded with a stay at the most magical shelter on the trail. Overmountain Shelter is a big old red barn that was converted to a shelter. They removed one entire wall of the barn that overlooks a gorgeous lush valley. We shared that night with dozens of other hikers, also nursing blisters and aches and pains, glad to have a cup of hot cocoa and a dry place to sleep. Next morning we were awakened to a sunrise that stretched orange and purple from one end of the sky to the other across the fog steeped valley. This picture just does not do it justice.

Here's a link to our journal entry from that day.

Roan's Birth Story - Chapter 1: The Denver Bomb Squad

So hello again everybody. I know many of you have been curious to hear how things are changing for our new little family. It's proven more difficult than I expected to find time to sit down and blog. As it turns out Roan nurses every 2 hours for about an hour at a time. So out of every 24 hours, there go 12 right off the top. Then when you subtract 5 or so more for sleep, it doesn't leave much time for anything else.

But suffice it to say that we are adjusting very well to our new life. Having my mom and Arwen's mom and of course Jen here has been a tremendous help. Since I have been recovering from unexpected surgery, it's made the first few days even more of a challenge than I expected. But with their help, our house has stayed clean, laundry has been washed and we have been well fed. We definitely could not have made it without them.

So anyway, more about our new life in days to come. But I didn't want to let any more time pass without getting down in black and white the story of Roan's birth. It was a nail biter the whole way through. It's a lit of a long story though. So I thought I'd try and tell it one chapter at a time. It all starts on April Fool's Day with a call to the Denver bomb squad.

You might recall I was starting to get discouraged being overdue and having the threat of induction looming. I tried some suggestions our midwives and friends made to help get labor kickstarted, and sure enough it worked. Around midnight on Sunday, April Fool's Day, I started feeling some mild contractions. When I began timing them I was surprised that they were coming 4 minutes apart! They were so mild I knew this was just the very beginning of early labor, but I was elated. Somehow even with the distraction of contractions I still managed to get some good sleep. I knew I'd need my rest.

The next day I took things slow. We knew that those early stages can last from 12-48 hours, and sometimes they just stop altogether and get started again days later. I stayed in bed most of the morning resting, not sure what lay ahead. Little did I know things were about to get very interesting.

Arwen came into the room quietly around noon and gently woke me up. I could tell he wanted to say something but wasn't sure how to say it. In a calm, quiet voice he said, "Sweetie, I need you to go ahead and get up and leave the house for a little while with my mom and your sister." I'm thinking, Is this man crazy? I'm in freaking labor over here! He continued, "I found something in our attic that needs to be removed but I don't want to touch it." He paused. I was thinking Gross! There's a dead body in our attic! And then things got really weird.

"There's a box in the attic that has what looks like a pipe bomb in it." Although it was April Fool's Day, this was no joke on Arwen's part. He had been in the attic organizing things and found what looked like an old metal army box under some sheetrock he removed. He had thought, "Oh cool, maybe there'll be some old letters or something cool in here." He flipped the lid open and found a pipe bomb instead.

He sat back, took a deep breath, and started making mental notes about what he was looking at. He saw that the pipe was made of the right material, was of plausible proportions, and the inside of the box had been lined with cottony material to prevent sparking. He noticed it didn't have a fuse, but knew it could have a mercury switch or chemical timer to set it off. There was a handwritten label taped to the outside that said something to the effect of "High Explosive, Do Not Tamper or Drop."

So Arwen's mom, Jen, the dogs and I evacuated the house while Arwen waited outside for the police to arrive. We went to the park and briefly walked the dogs, just as Jen's husband Micah rolled into Denver from Miami in a 26 foot truck containing all their worldy posessions. What a crazy day. My contractions had grown stronger at this point and fairly regular at about 6 minutes apart. The whole situation seemed so absurd all we could do was laugh about it.

We ended up heading over to a sidewalk cafe, getting Micah some lunch and sitting outside for a couple of hours. At least I had a chair to sit in, a bathroom nearby, and a street scene to keep me distracted from the growing discomfort I was feeling. Arwen called Jen and filled her in on what was happening back at the house - with strict instructions not to relay the information to me.

At this point the bomb squad, two firetrucks, several police cars and a news van had arrived. They had cordoned off our block and pretty much every one of our neighbors were standing in their front yards wondering "What's up with the new people?" Dozens of experts had paraded through our house and near as they could tell, the alleged bomb seemed like it could be the real thing. One of the bomb squad guys pointed out that 99% of the time when you see a handwritten label, it's a fake. But they had seen cases where savvy bomb makers put a handwritten label on a bonafide device to throw the bomb squad off, they end up moving it and someone gets killed.

Were this to be the case with the bomb in our attic, it was of sufficient size that it would kill the dude in the bomb suit moving it. They weren't willing to take that risk, so the only option left was to try to diffuse it in place. They explained that if the bomb proved to be real, we would probably be blowing some holes in our attic. Arwen said the various emergency response folks seemed very competent and professional, but there seemed also to be an element of boyscout about them. They all sort of milled about having a good time. "My wife is in labor down the street, and you're telling me you might blow a hole in my new house?" Uh yessir, that is correct. "Well come on then, let's get the show on the road."

Meanwhile I was growing decidedly uncomfortable. We had migrated over to my friend Amanda's house to wait for the call from Arwen. I was starting to have a harder time at this point, and I really did not enjoy being away from my coach. It's not easy to sit there with contractions and keep making polite conversation. But before too long we got the good word that all was safe back at home.

The bomb squad had evacuated our nextdoor neighbors and one of the fire crews had a hose fully charged and aimed at our house. They set up a contraption in our attic, sort of a shot gun on a tripod. They shot a single clay bullet at one end of the pipe bomb, risking igniting its contents but diffusing any pressure inside, thereby eliminating the possibility of explosion.

After the dust cleared, the bomb squad took a closer look and was surprised to find a number of other details the maker had included. They used a cardboard liner whose purpose is to insulate the gunpowder from sparks and friction. The threads had also been lined with glue as if to prevent the them from sparking when screwing the ends together. Basically it would've been a very dangerous bomb had its one key ingredient not been missing: black powder.

So, you know, all's well that ends well, but we certainly should have taken this as an omen that little Roan's entrance into this world would be an explosive one.

Announcing Miss Roan Marie Vaughan!

Hey folks,

That's right, she's finally here!! Sorry for to leave you hanging but man it's been a rough week. I've been working so hard to get the story in complete detail down in writing, but it's awful tough to squeeze in time in front of the computer when feedings happen every two hours!

So until I can lay down all the details, here are the basic facts:

• Roan Marie came into this world on Monday, April 2nd, 2007, weighing 8 lbs 8.6 ozs at 20 inches long.
• She was born by emergency C-section after a very long, difficult 36 hours of natural childbirth.
• She is healthy and beautiful and perfect, worth every bit of trouble and pain, and we are so lucky to have her.
• She is a champion eater, just like her Mommy!
• Mom is recovering well, but it will be a long, slow road.
• Dad was not only a brilliant coach and a reassuring steady hand through her challenging birth; he seems to have a magic touch with her and can always get her to stop crying when no one else can.

Much much more to come soon! Including LOTS more pictures!!

"Don't be discouraged"

...my midwife said today. "It's perfectly normal for first time moms" to be a week overdue and show essentially no signs of progress. That's right. No dilation. No effacement. No nuthin! She added, "You never know, you could go home and start having major contractions tonight." Uh huh. Right.

I won't lie. It bummed me out. Especially since every single day - I swear - there is more and more pressure, it is harder and harder to walk, and I couldn't help but think that we were getting somewhere. And now to know we haven't even gotten started yet... It sucks.

Darn. Oh well. There are a couple of things we can do on our own to help encourage labor, and the midwife recommended we go ahead and get started with those, especially since we'd like a natural childbirth. We didn't schedule an induction date yet, but she said the hospital feels strongly about not letting us go past 2 weeks overdue because of the rapid degradation of the placenta.

So the plan is to go back on Monday for an ultrasound (to check the amniotic fluid level), a "non stress test" to make sure baby and placenta are healthy, and to set a date for induction. At least the upside is we'll get to see the baby's sweet face again! And who knows... maybe we won't even make it till Monday. At least a gal can hope!

Random

We're just twiddling our thumbs waiting for this baby to get here. I thought I'd post some random shots from around the house. (We finally managed to purchase the camera that had me in tears several posts back.) Jen took this picture yesterday that made us laugh. You can just barely see what used to be "normal Heather" above the belly, and you really get a feel for how much the little peanut has overwhelmed my poor unsuspecting body. You can also get a glimpse of our super cool sock monkey sheets, which were courtesy of Mommy Too when she was up visiting a couple weeks ago.

I thought I'd also take a moment to post a photo of Sasha & Hallie. They are the best of friends - sharing toys, food and a spot to cuddle. Here they are doing what they do best: begging for food.

And last but not least, here's Jen whipping up yet another fantastic meal for us. Not only is she living in a basement with no shower and a leaky sink, she has been cooking endless meals around the clock for us. At dinner time with the afternoon sun blaring into the kitchen window (which of course has no blinds on it yet) she's found a need to add a new kitchen accessory to her collection: a pair of dark sunglasses. Despite such hardships, yesterday she cooked us lunch, made 2 trips to the grocery store (because I botched the list) to get supplies for making my sick friend some fresh chicken soup, and then she finished up her day by cooking us another fabulous dinner and insisting that we spend the evening just the two of us, having some quality time. Yup, she's the greatest.

And the good news just keeps on coming

That is sarcasm my friends. In addition to the mystery leak under Jen's kitchen sink which is yet to be resolved, we learned today that the shower pan in her bathroom is leaking - badly. What should've taken up to 24 hours to see any evidence of leakage actually made itself known in under 10 minutes. That sucker is leaking like a sieve!

So now we're facing the prospect of having both her kitchen and her bathroom torn up, just days before Micah arrives with a 26 foot truck containing all their worldly posesssions, before Arwen's mom arrives for a weeklong stay, before Miss Roan decides to make her entrance into the world, and before my Mom arrives as well. Perfect timing really.

Oh well, life's an adventure right? Somehow things always seem to work out. And anyway Arwen's ordered me to bed and not to think about it. So off I go...

"Exploratory Drywall Demolition"

...are not exactly the three little words you are longing to hear about your new house when you're waiting to go into labor at any minute. But this evening as Arwen was washing dishes downstairs at Jen's (after yet another delicious meal) a mysterious pool of water formed at his feet. He opened all the cabinets, only to find the insides clean and dry. He pried off the cabiniet trim and peered underneath with a headlamp and still found nothing. And then he got out his drywall saw.

By the time he had the hole cut in the wall, we had lost our ability to reproduce the leak. So for now it remains a mystery. We'll just have to keep an eye on it.

The leak was a bummer, but it didn't spoil our evening. We brushed up on baby calming techniques by watching the video "The Happiest Baby on the Block." Now we know how to shush and swaddle our baby into bliss. Jen was teasing me because I also read the book, compiled notes from it and filed them away in my homemade baby reference binder. I know. I need help. I think it'll be real funny when after all this preparation I still end up - inevitably - as clueless and frazzled as anyone else.

After the video we broke out our new Snappis (rubber cloth diaper closures that have replaced safety pins) and Bummis Super Whisper Wraps (waterproof velcro closure cloth diaper covers). Here's a closeup of Snooty the Elephant wearing an organic cloth diaper in the "Bikini Twist" configuration with a purple Snappi.

And here is the whole array of unsuspecting stuffed animals that served as our diapering guinea pigs this evening. Notice Hallie in the background, wearing a look that seems to say "Don't even think about coming near me with those things!"

We are having fun, just waiting for our little peanut to show herself.

Before and After

Thought you guys might like to see some before and after photos of the house. (No we still haven't had the baby yet.) These are just from the ground floor part of the house. (There is also a 2 br/1 ba basement apartment, where Jen is living, that is not pictured.)

Click on the picture to see it enlarged.

The Living Room
Before: After:

The Nursery
Before: After:

The Kitchen
Before: After:

The Bathroom
Before: After:

It's amazing what a little paint and de-cluttering can do huh?

All Quiet on the Western Front

Nope, we still haven't had the baby. Today is our official due date. Not that Miss Roan Marie is paying any heed to it. I haven't had much in the way of indicators that labor is anywhere close to imminent. I did have 3 little practice contractions spaced widely yesterday morning, but nothing since then. There are other indicators that have also not happened yet, but we won't go into the details there to spare you from the "ick" factor.

Sorry I haven't had a chance to post many updates the past couple of weeks. We have been going nonstop trying to get things done around here. And I'm finding that I have much less energy these days. The other night I ran out to pick up the new camera Arwen and I had researched (and meant to purchase weeks ago). It was a simple, straightforward errand and yet I managed to come home in tears, no camera in hand. Arwen sent me straight to bed and told me I was not to leave the house again until it's time to head to the hospital. (He has since lightened up on that order, but I am under strict instructions not to get myself and the baby stressed out.)

As you can see from the last 2 weeks' belly photos, things are starting to get out of hand. It is hard to believe that through most of this pregnancy I was smaller than most of the other ladies in my group. Now I seem to have left them all in the dust. Needless to say, getting up and moving around just gets harder every day. My hands, feet and face are swollen. Walking used to be one of my favorite things to do, especially around our neighborhood. But not lately, when it feels like the bowling ball in my tummy might just fall right out. But I'm hanging in there. I'm trying not to think about the fact that this baby may decide not to come from another 2 weeks. One day at a time...

Even though it's getting a little harder each day to keep lugging around this load, my spirits are up. I love our new house - and I'm so relieved to be out of our crappy apartment with it's nasty ancient carpet. We are starting to get settled. There's still lots to do, but it's mostly the fun stuff that doesn't really *have* to get done.

Arwen has been super sweet. He's in total take charge mode, making sure everything gets done - which usually involves him doing it. After two solid weeks of painting, renovating and moving us I scheduled him a one hour massage yesterday. He at first coyly tried to refuse, but after the fact he was so glad that I had insisted. I want to make sure we're both in a good place before the really challenging part begins.

The other thing that makes me so happy right now is having Jen here. She has been just amazing. She's done everything she can think of to be of help, from grocery shopping to cooking healthy meals to heavy lifting to making me a cup of tea and reminding me to put my feet up. And she's done it all as if it were effortless, with a graciousness of spirit about her.

One last quick note. The gals in my knitting posse threw me a surprise shower this week. Jen and I popped in on our regular Thursday night Stitch Therapy session, just to say hi and that we couldn't stay. (The week before when I didn't show up because of the move, I got several frantic phone calls wanting to know if we'd had the baby. So I didn't want to cause another stir!) When we got there they had the whole place decorated with pink streamers, and they had a spread of all kinds of dips and cheeses and crackers. There was wine and sparkling cider. And there were german chocolate cupcakes. And then there were presents. Mary Kay, one of the gals, crocheted me this beautiful baby sweater. We also got an assortment of baby care goodies, as well as mama care supplies. And the really incredible part was the huge stack of coupons everyone made offering all kinds of things - from home cooked meals, to clean bathrooms, to postpartum massage... It was really overwhelming. I never expected to make so many good friends so soon after moving here.

These days I am feeling like one lucky lady.