It was 80 degrees today!!! However, the humidity was lower so it was looveeely!!! Abbie slept through the night and then after Brad went to work and I got Abbie fed and swaddled up then I put her upstairs in her crib and she went back to sleep. Ben sleeps late (my fault, I need to work on his sleep schedule..) but that’s fine with me because I get to lay back down too! Oh, the extra sleep is LOVELY. Well, in total, I get about 5 hours but still feel good. A bit later then I got Ben up and had my little snacks, used the breast pump, and got Abbie back up to eat. I feel accomplished since I actually organized and cleaned a bit! Got the trash together and Katie took it out, swept the back porch and cleaned it up, cleaned in the basement a tiny, organized our little drawers in the living room, organized Abbie’s cart of clothes, cleaned out the fridge, and washed the top part of our trash can (the swinging top)! I went and sat in the front yard with Katie, while she played with her play sand and it was sooo wonderful outside.

Tonight was hectic, lol. Abbie has been pretty fussy all afternoon so this evening she was fussy again and I went to check her and she was poopie but I wanted to go ahead and give her a bath so I had to get that ready and then Ben was freaking out because Abbie was crying… AHHH. I got her bathed and she HATED IT lol but she also had a burp. Got her all bathed, dressed, fed, and she should be a tired little babe. Ben was getting tired too and started his annoyances. Brad helped me out a little but he hit his knee in the accident from slamming on the brakes so it hurts for him to walk too much, plus he had a possible sinus infection. I was sick recently with something similar and now he’s pretty bad off. Hopefully he’ll feel even better tomorrow.

Oh, meant to say like a month ago I sat down and had the birds and bees talk with Katie. She’s a pretty open book and willing to tell me everything, which is great. I want to keep that kind of relationship, even when she comes to me with comments that make me do a double take lol. Her friend at school recently started her period so she might be sometime this year. I started when I was 11 and she’ll be 11 in May. Bum bum bum!

Now Abbie is fussy again.. off to finish my late dinner and hopefully she settles down.

Finally sitting down to type more highlights of our life events since February! Bringing Abbie home was great and we wanted to be home ASAP so we told the nurses we were OK with going home late at night and that’s just what we did. My MIL and 2 of Brad’s younger sisters (17 and 21) were staying with us for 2 weeks or so. I was happy they were here to meet Abbie and help with the kids but more than a few days visit and it becomes overwhelming sometimes, esp with more than 1 visitor but it was okay. It was nice to get into a routine once company was gone but Abbie is a tiny over 2 months old and has recently started sleeping 6-7 hour stretches at night, which is awesome! I’m still mostly sleeping on the couch with her in the swing but I need to start taking her upstairs at night to sleep in her crib but I dunno, I’ve just found it easier to sleep downstairs. She’s a really good baby and SO SMILEY when she’s not gassy lol. She HATES getting her diaper and clothes changed… she gets SUPER mad, which makes me laugh haha. We’ve had all kinds of doc check ups and stuff lately for them and me. I had my thyroid levels checked again recently and they are good for now, which is great.

Katie is not doing the best in 2 classes grade wise at school- her last report card she had a D in math so I’ve just been trying to encourage her to try her best and work hard because the end of the school year is fast approaching. My mom is still hanging in there.. about the same but my aunt is slowly losing her sanity from dealing with and taking care of mom. My birth mom was in town a couple weeks back and so my aunt got a little bit of a break. I got to see my bio mom twice while she was visiting for 2 weeks, which is still somewhat different in it’s own way.. seeing her. March was both mine and Brad’s birthday and we got tax money, which went way too fast (OF COURSE). Brad ended up getting a new computer because his brand new video card didn’t work in his other one. Next to happen was that our washer wasn’t working right so we ended up buying a new one on another credit card.. ugh. I tried to convince Brad to look for a used one but he said we should get a new one instead. Our Benjamin is the typical 2 year old annoyance, haha. Pushing my buttons daily and he’s saying more and more words. We should start working on potty training him pretty soon. Someone posted online a video about grounding – you can google earthing and grounding to see more but Brad made me a homemade mat and I’ve been using that and I swear my sleep is a tiny bit better. I don’t seem to sleep that deep but have been waking up feeling not AS tired. It’s basically connecting humans to the energy of the earth to help us stay healthy, which I am all for!

We went out this Saturday to pick up one of my vitamins from Whole Foods then head to Wal-Mart for a few groceries. Brad was driving my car, which is the Toyota Corolla. He got into the left hand turning lanes (there were 2) and he was on the outside lane. Well, he got impatient because the red light didn’t change for a few minutes and wanted to leave the left turning lane and go right to the main flow of traffic. He asked me if anything was coming. I said, yeah. He moved to the right anyway and I don’t think my brain had time to really comprehend the fact that he went ahead anyway because I didn’t have time to say WAIT or anything and the woman came flying by and clipped the right side of our car. GREAT… the woman pulled up and stopped in the middle of the road out of traffics way and we eventually went and pulled off in a shopping place. Long story short- the woman was chill about it and it wasn’t too bad, no one was hurt and the damage to both cars was minimal but still sucks. Brad claims he thought it was clear, but I had just said YES to his question in asking if anything was coming??? I dunno. It’ll be a copay of $500 to get the damage fixed. Siiiigh. Sucks it happened to my car. And Brad got a ticket, of course, so there’s that to pay too.

I’m so HAPPY it’s been in the 70’s weather wise… so awesome. We went to the park weekend before last and had a BLAST. The park nearby is amazing.. has lots to do. There’s a skate park, dog park, walking track all the way around, and even a little water splash place for kids during the summer, with playgrounds for smaller and bigger kids too. We played frisbee and threw the football, Katie got to play on the playground, Brad took Ben to swing then came out where I was on the grass and let him run run run run energy off. We were out there for about 2 hours I think. We were gonna get a snowcone nearby but the place was packed and the parking lot was TINY with no parking.. boo. We ended up stopping for gas and getting raspberry ICEE’s instead, along with a small thing of dip-n-dots ice cream. We need to do that more often this summer and go to the nearby lake for swimming.

I’ve had some different fatigue today and it sucks. I went to change my dose of iron.. mistake. After all that I’ve been through I guess I need to really focus on getting my iron storage (ferritin) levels up to make a big difference in my energy and everything because I have literally tried EVERYTHING else and my thyroid levels are stable. So am gonna try to up my dosage of iron for a bit and see how that goes. My last lab check on ferritin I think it was like 14? It went from 10 to 14 in a couple months back when and this was before my pregnancy and birth with Abbie. I bled more than they expected when I had her so that might have made the ferritin drop back down. I’m still determined to get this figured out so I can exercise and gain energy again! I’m so thankful I’m way better than I USED to be but still a work in progress.

Enjoy your Tuesday! I’ll post some more recent highlights next time.

GRRR. I swear I will get regular with posting on here- for my own sake for memories!! I like being able to keep up with when diff things happened. I have sooo much to write, SO MUCH. Let’s back it up to the last time I posted.. the last day of January. Brad told me that day or maybe the day before that his Mom and sisters were coming for their visit/stay on FRIDAY. I’m like HUH? I thought they were gonna wait till closer to Abbie’s due date but decided to come on down, just in case. Well, guess it worked out because I had Abbie that SUNDAY! They arrived I think it was that Friday or maybe it was late Thursday? Anyway, Friday evening was CRAZY. Katie had-had a sore throat since Wednesday and Brad actually had to go get her from school a little early one of those days. By Friday she was still feeling rough. Me, Brad, and his sister went out and Brad bought a new supplement (not even gonna say what it was because it’s ridic) and he had a lot of caffeine that day and he takes meds for anxiety and such so all that combined created the biggest panic attack he’s ever had. He went to go lay down upstairs Friday evening because he said he didn’t feel that great and he sent me a text from upstairs that said “Come” – he was violently shaking, cold sweating, and it was scary. Long story short- I was having major contractions during this episode and the person on the 911 line took FOREVER to get everything sorted. Finally the EMT’s arrived and we eventually came to the conclusion that it was a really bad panic attack. He took some xanex and sat up, took some deep breaths and relaxed then he was alright. It stressed me out to the max. I was standing up against our bedroom wall while the EMT’s were there and was having pretty consistent contractions. I ended up taking Katie to urgent care, even with contractions. She was negative for everything, thank goodness. Just a virus that has to work it through but they gave her antibiotics. I had to walk down to their pharmacy, which was a nice little walk.. even with contractions lol. We came back home and I eventually started timing contractions and they were about 6-7 minutes apart and Brad and I were up till like 5AM? then the contractions slowed down. That Saturday was a rest up day pretty much but we did go to the store later but I was ready to come home. Sunday we went out again and then before we left got stopped by Catholic ladies walking our neighborhood. Brad and I stood outside and talked to them for over an hour. Uuuggh. That evening I was feeding Ben his dinner and had to pee. Well, my MIL and Brad’s sister had both been in the bathroom so I had to wait a bit. I eventually got up and went.. sat down to pee and felt a slight little POP. I thought – was that … ???? was that my water breaking??? I wasn’t sure because I was using the bathroom then got done and there was nothing so I thought, well, I’ll see what happens. Went to finish feeding Ben and when I was done and went to put up the dishes I felt a little something but by the time I walked into the kitchen… there was water running down my legs!!! Not a fast gush but slow. I told my MIL, “Um, my water broke!” So she literally ran upstairs to tell Brad, lol.

*Pause break to take care of kids*

Everyone in the house was running around, while I was standing in the kitchen.. thinking we’re about to have a baby!!! I change my underwear and put a pad on too since I knew there was more water to come. We grabbed our bags and went out the door. Hubby held my hand as we walked to the car. <3 I called the nurse line to tell them we were on the way to the hospital and that I have babies FAST. I emailed my MIL my instructions I had typed up for kids bed time and etc. Hubby was pretty calm but right as we were close to the hospital this ambulance was going REALLY SLOW. Brad tried to get around it but there was a truck. WHAT THE HECK. He tried to flag him down, get his attention.. nope. My contractions were really starting to hit. I told Abbie to stay put! We finally drove up to the circle drive for the hospital Women's Center and a guy brings a wheelchair up to the car- it was actually a comfortable one! Last time with Ben it was a hard seat wheelchair and that is so uncomfortable when you're in the late stages of LABOR. It took me a few minutes to get into the wheelchair because I had to wait for a contraction to pass. Finally wheeled inside and up to the front desk. Hubby gets my info from me (insurance card, etc) and I just brace the contractions. Hubby had to go move the car right quick. ARGHHHH. Sit there and wait wait. Geeze, come on! Get situated and hubby has to stay at the front desk and help fill out more info while they take me back. I am breathing through contractions. Get to the labor room and the guy and girl nurse were AMAZING. They help me out of my clothes and into the gown but contractions are SO-INTENSE. I have 2 diff contractions while I'm standing and the lady nurse let me bare down by holding onto her arms. OUCHHH. There might have been a 3rd contraction? It was either 2nd or 3rd and I said.. "Uhh, might be more than that!" She's like, "OK in that case, I need you on that bed since we don't want baby to fall on the floor" haha. Getting into the bed was not easy but made it up there but my back was arched so took a bit to get situated. The nurses talk to me for maybe 10 minutes? Asking diff questions, etc. Then the nurse I talked to on the phone they way there walks in! She said, "You weren't lieing about having them fast!" That was I think after we found out I was fully dilated and ready to go! More contractions and I feel the urge to bare down... her head was crowning!! Brad finally comes back into the room. He was about to almost miss it! There was no time for stirrups so nurses and Brad grab my legs and open up my pelvis... here comes baby girl!!!! Born at 10:49pm! It only took me about 20 minutes. Long story short- I finally got to bring a baby home fast! We came home when she was 24 hours old. My whole pregnancy this time? AMAZING. My birth? AMAZING. So very very very grateful and blessed. I'll continue this when I can.. to be continued!