It's nap time, so......

I blog. Well, actually, I did the dishwasher, cleaned up the nursery, put a load in the washer, and now....I blog. I am the world's worst blogger. Actually, I think the world's worst blogger is the one who doesn't even have a blog. So, I come in second. My baby is now one day shy of 10 weeks old, and I haven't even made a blog post about him! I have decided blogging is not my thing, but I will make every attempt to post updates and facts about my sweet baby so I can look back and gush over all the memories.

I'm going to back it up to right before delivery (since my last post I was 35 weeks pregnant). I'll TRY to make this short and sweet. My due date was June 19th. I was set to be induced on Thursday, 4 days after my due date. My doc swept my membranes on Tuesday (I was only 1 cm dilated and 75% effaced), and my mom made me some "speed up your labor" cookies (courtesy of Anna Ziegler), and lo and behold I started having contractions the next day. They started out about every 6-12 minutes. By 3:30 pm (this was Wednesday, the 22nd), they were a little stronger and happening every 5-9 minutes apart. I called a nurse from my OB's office, and she told me to go ahead and go to Labor and Delivery. Well, I couldn't go to the hospital looking the way I did, so I took a shower and dried my hair. I felt a contraction coming on, so I went to my trusty little cell phone app to time it, and as soon as I sat on my bed to wait it out, my WATER BROKE!!!! Sweet, this was it. Time to go to the hospital. BUT, I still couldn't go to the hospital looking the way I did, so yes...I straightened my hair, did my makeup, all with a towel between my legs. :) I should mention that at this time Billy was running around like a mad man trying to get things together, bags packed, everything turned off in the house, the cat fed. We had both planned to be at the hospital by 5:30 the next morning to be induced, so we were prepared, but not THAT prepared. So 6:00 pm...time to go to the hospital. By 6:30, I was in a triage room. They confirmed my water had broke and checked me - I was 3 or 4 cm dilated. In my room by 7, epidural by 8, dilated to 10 cm by midnight. My wishful thinking was that I dilated to 10 cm so fast...the next part (pushing) should be a breeze. Not quite. I pushed for 3 hours. My epidural wore off halfway through. My over 8 lb baby was turned slightly, so they needed to use the vacuum device to help turn him to the correct position. The first vacuum broke while trying to attach it, so they had to try again. In my mind, it took about 30 minutes to pull our baby out once he was past the birth canal. But according to Billy, it happened quickly. To say childbirth is painful is a complete understatement. Although I would get an epidural again and again, unfortunately for this time, it didn't work, and I felt everything. There were definitely moments when I screamed at the doc and nurses I couldn't do it anymore...take me in for a c-section. But I'm so glad they had faith in me that I could get through this. And to see and hold my precious newborn for the first time was worth every single inch of pain I went through. And as everyone knows by now...IT'S A BOY!!!!

Post epidural...Heavenly, while it lasted. ;)

Last family pic while it was just the 2 of us.

Introducing...Mason Benjamin Boatman
Born: June 23, 2011
2:48 am
8 lbs. 6 oz.
22 in.





First family pic of the 3 of us!

Evan and Julia were very excited to meet their new cousin Mason.

L.O.V.E.

Coming home

First trip to the pediatrician!
8 lbs. 1 oz.

By two weeks, Mason weighed 9lbs. 7 oz. - he gained all of his birth weight and then some!

I have MANY more blog posts that I need to catch up on. Hopefully this trend will continue, and I'll actually get it done! If not, just know that I'm busy loving on my little man. :)

Counting the days...

34 to be exact. Seriously. I am 35 weeks and 1 day today. Holy moly. And boy am I feeling 35 weeks. My back hurts, my feet are sausages, and this whole retaining water thing is so not attractive. And yes, I understand I'm doing this all for my sweet baby growing inside of me, but man...the last couple of weeks are not so fun!!! I'm just looking forward to school being over, and hopefully I'll get some much needed rest before Baby B graces us with his/her presence.

Since I am a total slacker at this blogging thing, I'll give a small rundown of what the Boatman family has been up to lately:

I had a brief stop at L&D about 4 weeks ago. I thought my water was leaking. I'm ok and it wasn't amniotic fluid, but it did help Billy and I answer be the experts for our prepared childbirth class when we went on a tour of the hospital a few days later. :) We completed 4 weeks of prepared childbirth and also took a not so helpful infant care class. I went to get a 4D ultrasound when I was at 32 weeks, and they told me I should have come 4 weeks earlier. :( The baby was so squished that they couldn't get any good pictures. And of course, the placenta was right next to the baby's face so we couldn't see a profile or a really good face pic. Umbilical cord, placenta, arms/hands....it's always something getting in the way! I celebrated my 29th birthday and got a new digital SLR camera to take pics of my little one. My team at school and some wonderful friends and family threw me a couple of showers. I feel much more prepared than my scare at L&D 4 weeks ago. My wonderful Mom, with the help of my wonderful husband, painted and decorated a fabulous safari nursery. Pictures to come later. Really....a BIG HUGE SHOUT OUT to my mom for all of her hard work. I know it wasn't easy, but it looks spectacular and I just can't wait for the baby to see it. Honestly, Billy and I will just go in there and hang out, just excitedly anticipating what's about to happen in our lives. We just love our nursery. Thank you Mom!!! I go back to the doctor next week for a 36 week ultrasound and growth check. This will start my weekly appointments. I think this about sums up what's been going on lately. Oh, can't forget to mention that there are 12 days of school left. TWELVE!!!!!!!

My 29th birthday...31 weeks
35 weeks
Baby Boatman at 32 weeks

Oh I do have a blog....that's right, I forgot!

One thing that I've learned about myself this week: I'm really bad at blogging. Will this get better? Time will tell. I want to update my friends and family on what's going on with babies and bellys and whatnot...but taking the time to actually do it has been a challenge. I'm workin' on it.....

So, the update....

In a few short days, I will hit the big 3-0. Yep, 30 weeks! It has gone by pretty fast, but I have a sneaky suspicion the next 10 weeks will probably not seem that way. My fatigue is back...everyday after school I accidentally pass out on the couch. Other than that, I'm doing great. I'm up to 2 week appointments at the dr. so that means I already go back tomorrow for my 30 week. Now for baby... I have a rolling machine inside my tummy. The baby doesn't do too many kicks lately but rolls all around. I just sit and stare at my belly and watch it go up and down and up and down. Definitely alien-like! B got the hiccups for the first time 2 weeks ago, and has gotten them pretty frequently since then. One morning, it lasted for almost 20 minutes. It's a very neat feeling, but I have to admit, it gets irritating after awhile! I start to feel bad for my baby because there is nothing he can do about it! So that's about it for the update. I'll leave you with a few pics...(sadly, no pics of baby this time).

26 weeks at the rodeo

28w4d

Mom and I at the Cowboy Stadium

And check out this very rare site...how sweet!

24 down...16 to go!

Yes, you read that right! I am now a whopping 24 weeks pregnant. These weeks are cruising by so fast, but it gets me closer and closer to meeting my sweet angel. I'm feeling good these days, with the minor exception of some round ligament pains every now and then. Baby B is moving around a lot more. Billy got to feel a kick for the first time last Sunday. It has to be one of the most special things for a daddy-to-be to feel the baby for the first time. I am just loving every second watching how excited he gets.

Babycenter.com says the baby should be almost a foot long, about the size of an ear of corn. At my 24 week appointment this past Thursday, B weighed in at 1 lb. 8 oz. Everything looks great! We got to see a few shots of B's face. Unfortunately, we couldn't get a full frontal profile or a 4D because the umbilical cord was right in front. Oh well...the views I got were more than enough. I am in love!

Who do you think B looks like?
Profile
A foot

Here is the bump at 22 weeks
24 weeks
And of course, not to be excluded, Billy and Lola

We are live...

After 3 months of saying I'm starting a blog and about 2 months of sporadically working on it, we are live people. Welcome to our blog! This is my attempt to keep all of our loved ones up to date on Baby Boatman. I've tried to set this thing up for weeks now, but haven't had the patience to figure it all out. It's all a little complicated for my pregnancy brain, what with the headers, templates, etc. But since my loving and adoring husband got me a laptop for Christmas, I have no excuse. I can watch tv and blog at the same time. Sweet! :) Oh and as for my header above, I can't figure out how to put pictures there, so until I do, it will have to be blank.

As for the name...The Boatman Fleet. Billy vetoed all of my "normal" names; i.e. The Boatman Family, The Boatman Bunch. So we tried to think creatively with our last name and it was either The Boatmans Set Sail or The Boatman Fleet. I think it implies we are going to have about 20 children. See, that's our real goal. To get our own show. "20 Kids and No Money." Nice ring to it. Kidding, kidding...

We'll see how long I like the name...

So on to Baby Boatman... :) I am now 19 weeks pregnant. My due date is currently June 19th. I go for my 20 week ultrasound on Thursday, and I can't wait! It's hard to believe I am almost halfway there. Although we're not finding out the sex, a tiny part of me is a little sad since I'm sure we could find out in a few days. But I know it is going to be so worth it on the day of the birth. And I know Billy can't wait to announce it to everyone once we know. So back to baby... According to babycenter.com, the baby is now the size of a large heirloom tomato. This means nothing to me since I don't like tomatoes. I have no clue how big they are. And heirloom? What's that supposed to mean? As far as movement, I started feeling something around the end of 17 weeks. At least I think it is the baby. I don't have the fluttering or butterfly feeling. It is more like tiny pokes around where the baby should be. I am assuming it's Baby B because I've never felt it before, and I'm sure it's not gas. ;) Hopefully soon I'll be able to know for sure. I've been feeling pretty good lately. I had bits of nausea in the 1st trimester, mostly at night. I had a weird thing with water where I hated it at first, then I couldn't have anything but Kroger water. I think our NYC trip a few weeks ago helped me break that a little bit. I was able to drink bottled water again. Other than that, no strange cravings or aversions. I do have a sweet tooth like no other, but I had that before I was pregnant! :) I love my chocolate and cookies!

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So like I mentioned at the beginning of my post, it is taking me FOREVER to actually sit down and do this thing. Case in point...I am now almost TWENTY TWO weeks pregnant. I will make sure any future posts are not this long, or I'll never get this blog going! Update on Baby B...I had my 20 week ultrasound 2 weeks ago. Everything looked great...all except Baby B refused to look at us. But that just means I get to have another ultrasound 2 weeks from today to try to catch a glimpse of that sweet face!

I'm feeling pretty good these days. I have had a few cases of bad indigestion though, and with that comes this HORRIBLE backache. I'm not kidding, it is some excruciating pain. I even had to leave school early one day because I felt like I was going to faint. Luckily, this doesn't happen too often. Other than that...things are good!

Here is a look at my pregnancy so far!

October 7, 2010

Proud Daddy!

Here are a few pics of sweet baby B!!!!
(Sorry for the bad quality of photos...the ultrasound film doesn't photograph well - there are a lot of glares)

7 weeks
10 1/2 weeks (tiny nubs for arms and legs)
12 weeks (amazing how much they grow in a week!)
20 weeks
spine
B's sweet feet!

And here's a short progression of the bump :)

15 weeks + Christmas
18 weeks in New York!
20 weeks

21 1/2 weeks (taken today)

So I think that's all I have for now. New York post and pics coming soon!

XOXO