Answering Your Questions

I've heard from lots of you since Blake was born. Thank you, thank you, thank you for your kind thoughts and wishes! We've really felt loved during this exciting time for our family!!

That being said, I know that we haven't been as good at responding to all of you! Between having a baby who loves to be held and the sheer exhaustion of learning how to balance two children, our emailing has sat waiting. Hopefully this post will answer most of the questions you've asked....so without further ado, might I present the answers to your most Frequently Asked Questions.

1. How are you? We're all doing well. My recovery has been swift and we've had lots of help (with special thanks to my mom, Joe's mom, and many close friends nearby). With the possible exception of forcing my husband to break the Sabbath by making an emergency run to Stop & Shop to get me some Lansinoh, we've really been well-prepared and well-stocked on everything we've needed. (And I'm 99.9% sure that the Lansinoh run was what pulled my ox out of the mire.)

2. Are you tired? Yes. Very. I'm not gonna lie. But I'm no different, I'm sure, than the other millions of women who birth babies and--in turn--must then feed said babies around the clock. It's a rite of passage. I just wish it was more a rite of passage for my husband. =) (No, really, Joe DOES make a significant nighttime contribution. He tells me what time it is after I poke his shoulder for five minutes to wake him. Nooooooo.... he does more than that. He also changes all nighttime diapers. Which is an actual big deal. Telling me what time it is is also a big deal... but the whole making-it-so-I-don't-have-to-actually-leave-my-bed thing is an even bigger deal.)

3. How is Ian? I'm pretty sure that Ian is doing exponentially better than my post-partum guilt would indicate. He's had lots of time to play with grandmothers, friends, and Joe. He's happy, he's sleeping well, he isn't acting out or regressing in his behavior or potty training....really, he's still the kind, gentle, wonderful child that he's always been. And he LOVES being a big brother.

4. Wow! You homebirthed! Isn't that really dangerous? This might be one of the questions we're getting the most. First, let me preface this by saying that home birth is extremely safe for low-risk pregnancies. If, for some reason, you have a high-risk pregnancy, I realize that there is a reason we have hospitals and OB's--and for that, I'm grateful. Joseph and I both have family members who needed hospitals for their births, and we are so thankful for modern obstetric care. But when I speak of the safety of home birth, remember that I'm speaking within the confines of low-risk pregnancy. (I'll add here that I would also consider home birth for some situations which *could* be classified as adding increased risk: presenting breech, twins, and VBAC to be specific.)

There is clear evidence of the safety of home birth. In some studies of low-risk births, it's even been published that home birth offers increased safety. You can find links to several published studies in this post over at Birth Faith (her post on home birth is better than anything I could write). You might also enjoy this post regarding the same subject.

We chose a midwife with more than 30 years of experience....and in that 30 years she has never had a maternal death. (Can your OB say that?) In the last year, she has had only 2 hospital transfers, and one of those was for an epidural, not for medical necessity.

It didn't take us long to feel comfortable with the safety aspect of home birth. The evidence was clear and indisputable. Choosing home birth for us was then more an issue of choosing the kind of birth we wanted. And at 37 weeks gestation, we realized that what we really wanted was to be at home.

5. How's Blake? OhMyGoodness, this child is wonderful. He's cute and cuddly and amazing. It also appears that I have produced a blue-eyed child, which boggles my mind to no end. Oh, and also? He was spared my feet. I look at them often and tell him to be grateful for his father's wonderful feet. And he's tall. Still trying to wrap our minds around that one.

6. Is Blake sleeping well? I think so. Ask me again at 3am. =)

Life is pretty grand, I'd say. We stole away to the Cape this weekend to visit my grandparents... Tomorrow marks 3 years to the day that we moved to Massachusetts....and we're feeling pretty great about how far we've come in those 3 years. Also, it's the longest we've ever lived in one house. =) Three years without moving is pretty stellar, too. Ha!

More pictures to come soon.

...because GG needs to see pictures!

**Warning!! Warning** The following pictures may [will] contain many dark eye circles.

Got to meet Papa Pratt when the fam was passing through town on the way to the Cape for Easter. Not quite sure what's going on with Blake's lip here...but I think it's kinda funny.

Here's Ian decorating a cookie at the primary Easter Egg Hunt...

The weather really was beautiful Easter weekend. Ian was quite excited to find his share of eggs!

When Aunt Sharalea sent this sleeping mask along, I don't quite think she intended it for Ian. (After all, these days he's the one getting the most uninterrupted sleep). That said, he still looks quite disarming, don't you think?

Don't ever try and separate this kid from his legos. He's getting quite advanced with his building, I'd say. His favorite thing to build are machines and people...and they're excellent.

We had a little egg hunt on Easter morning at our house, as well. But we only found 10 out of 12 eggs....couldn't remember where we hid the other 2....oops!

Okay, so this was like the most beautiful gummy I've ever seen! This set of Veggie Tales gummies were [dare I say it] beautiful! Gelatin artistry at its best!!!

We recently became members of the Boston Museum of Science, and we ventured out for the first time as a family of four on Friday night. For the record, Blake was not a fan of the snugli.

Wish I'd done better with the angle...it really was a cool exhibit.

This was taken just moments before Blake got quite angry that we'd put him in the snugli again. He's very good at communicating.

Here's your one and only post-baby-body shot of me. It's all you're gettin', folks.

Ian has been a tremendous big brother. He's helpful and gentle and kind...I really couldn't have asked for a better sidekick in all of this. Though, he makes me pay fifty-six cents per diaper that he gives me. (He's decided to keep my downstairs stash of diapers in a corner of the living room he's set up to be his "store." Anytime I want a diaper, I must pay.)

Annnnnnnnnnnnd this is the view I have for most of my day....a baby sleeping on a pillow on my lap.

Blake is such a different baby than Ian was. Ian wanted to sleep in his crib, and only in his crib. No cuddling/rocking/snuggling to sleep. And forget about sleeping while being held. This had its [many] advantages, however. Like...um...he was sleeping through the night at six weeks....and I could shower. Or cook. Or eat. (I'm realizing now that I'll lose all of the baby weight with that magical combination of breast feeding and not-having-three-seconds-to-scarf-down-a-piece-of-toast.)

Blake, on the other hand, wants to be held/cuddled/snuggled 24/7. This is fantastic for my mothering self esteem. Not so fantastic for my personal hygiene.

A break from tradition.

We have just broken a tradition. Or perhaps a streak. Molly's streak. The snowpile savant has been dethroned. However, Molly, you may retain your special powers in your other magical realms. Consider it a part of your severance package.

For your very inquisitive minds, the snowpile met it's demise sometime between Tuesday night, March 30 and Wednesday morning March 31. In either case, the new champion of the culdesac snowpile contest is Joy811, for her guess which was within a day or so.

I would say your prize would be to come to Boston and be the first cousin to meet Blake, but I'm afraid Molly's already booked the trip. Molly, was that akin to putting the cart before the horse, or putting the trophy case before the championship?

Regardless. The snowpile is gone, the tiger lilies have shot up their greens, the maple syrup has stopped boiling, the vernal pools are filled, and the peepers are out. We are nearing springtime, I can smell it! Now we just need a few leaves to clothe our trees and some bats to call our bat-house home! Y'all come by for a visit, now, ya hear?!

And then there were four.

I've been told that ye readers have banded together and are nearing mutiny if we don't post something soon.

So that being said....

We're THRILLED to announce the birth of our second son, Blake Benjamin on Friday, March 19, 2010 at 11:34pm (after a healthy 19 hours of labor...and since I--the laborer--am writing this post, I'll take my liberties and add that in). He weighed 9 pounds even and has been adorable from the very moment he was born.

We are IN LOVE.

At 4:30am on Friday I rolled over in bed and felt/heard this {pop!!} followed by a giant gush. Since I'd never even considered this happening, I wasn't prepared for it at ALL. Never the less, I'd heard enough stories about how women don't go into labor after their water breaks, so after we cleaned up a little, I told Joe, "Well, things won't start for a while, so we might as well go back to bed for a few hours."

Famous Last Words.

Not fifteen minutes later, the contractions started....and they started at 4 minutes apart. Sooooo....that's when we headed to the hospital, right?

Wrong!

Rather late in my pregnancy, we opted for a change in prenatal care. After a lot of thought, research, prayer, more research, and the advice of a few friends, we opted to plan for a home birth. And I couldn't recommend it enough. We had long been uncomfortable with the incidence of interventions that is so common in American obstetrical care, and we knew that a home birth would be the most secure, safe, and comfortable way to get baby Blake from the inside to the outside.

I don't have anything to compare it to, so I'll just say that labor was labor. But at 11:34, out came Blake in all his glory--born peacefully in a pool of water in our living room--and he was eager to show off his lungs. =)

And without further ado, might we introduce Blake.

Equinox, end of gestation, and evanescence of a snow pile.

For those of you wondering, Jen isn't really due until Sunday which happens to be the Spring equinox. Wouldn't that be lovely and pagan of us? We can welcome the season of new life with a new life! I was urging Jen to aim for some upcoming holiday, such as April Fools Day, but she said no way. I guess the extra ten days is just too far out.

Okay, so there has been somewhat of an uprising in the comments requesting snowpile information. (And YES, I used a thesaurus to select the word "evanescence".) If you'd like meteorological information on our local forecast this week, we're looking at mid-60s highs, around 40 degree lows, and rain showers Monday. At this rate, we may be looking at a three-peat by Molly. (Officially, Molly and Valerie split the win last year by book-ending the true date.) It's hard to tell, though. The first week in April is definitely possible, as the pile is in the shade for much of the day. For your perusal, here are the official entrants:

March 9, Liz Johnson,
March 25, Miss Molly,
April 1, joyj811
April 2, Sharalea
April 4, Valerie
April 6, Brianne
April 7, (2009)
April 15, Linda
April 17, (2008)
April 20, It's Me - Jen E!
April 24, Jeanette

Sorry, Liz, but your well-wishes for us to have a nice warm spell were slightly optimistic. When I went out to get the pictures I noticed that the plows brought more than just snow to our pile this year. Looks like we're up one snow-shovel and one hoe this year!

And here's the classic perspective that you are used to seeing:

The good news: we are getting an early spring. The bad news: Maple syruping season, which accompanies our annual thaw, was down to a matter of days instead of a matter of weeks.

Rain stopped. Bring on the next adventure!

For those of you who think rainfall and weather drama is interesting, it looks like our total is just over 7 inches here. By our charts, at 8 PM it all stopped. We were spared of much excitement, but I did think the basement bubbler was kinda cool (in an annoying way).


From a guy new to New England, I would have much rather had the winter version of this Nor'Easter, because 6 feet of snow would have just been AWESOME! Floods? High water? We can do that in the south just fine! But blizzards are a new frontier for me.

We do live next to a swamp, but not with an outlet to a river like our friends the next town over. This is my good friend Peter going to buy some sandbags to try to protect his basement as the water was lapping at all four sides of his foundation. I'm hoping the water recedes for them tonight. They only have inches of leeway before reaching evacuation levels. They aren't likely to sleep very soundly tonight...

From their kitchen porch.

Next adventure? Bring it on. I've met my deadline at work today, so I'm ready to cheer on the birth of our second. I'm certain Jen is eager for this new baby, ***** ******** to arrive, too.

March Showers brings... panic?

Yeah, I guess that's about right. Jen was home sick from church today, so she didn't hear the prayers over the pulpit for everyone to get their basements dried out and for the rivers to calm down. Seriously, there is flooding everywhere. Ian and I got to splash through puddles the whole way to church. We knew it was serious when we went on our normal route and there were cops directing traffic into a single file down the center of the road where the water depth was the shallowest. (Still several inches, of course). The Shawsheen River looked bound to overflow the bridge next to the Playground Museum (a sales office, I guess), and lots of folks were missing from church because they were holding vigils over their sump pumps.

I found this picture on Boston.com of the "Playground Museum," retrieved March 17, 2010.

For fun, Ian and I camped out Friday night. Not because we knew this was to be a rainy weekend, but because we had been hoping to camp with the scouts, but the Pregnant One needs loving watch-care from her in-town men. So Friday after dinner we retired to a chilly backyard, snuggled into our sleeping bags and watched Shark Tales on the netbook. (We were camping in the backyard, after all!) By 10:30, it was lights out and we went to bed. We got up at 5:30 cause the birds were chirping like crazy, took advantage of a reason to visit a nearby tree, then went back to bed until 8:30. Then it was BONFIRE time! (A March tradition for us). All this before the rains really started to come down.

But when it rained, it poured. We're looking at like 4 inches. We got most of the wood burnt by 10 am, then cooked our foil dinners and ate them by 11:30. Marshmellow s'mores through the drizzle until about 1, and we achieved the desired result! We smelled like smoke, burnt up a winter's worth of deadfall, and had some quality Father/Son time. Everytime I came inside to check on Jen, she was sawing logs upstairs. I guess that was another desired outcome.

For those of you interested, here's the chart for today (from a local hobbyist's backyard weatherstation) that continued to exacerbate the flooding around Boston. Note that the rates of rainfall are per hour, and the bars are each one hour wide. Therefore, we accumulated ALOT of rain. Normally round these parts, an entire rainstorm will only leave us with as much rain as ONE of those bars represents. And now we're getting it nonstop!

Don't worry about us. We rent. :) Everything in our basement is up off the floor, and the burbling brook downstairs comes in one corner and out the other. We're not accumulating any water.

More Nesting.

We're just over 1 week from our due date, and the nesting reflex continues to swallow me whole. For some reason, I was sure my brain would not allow me to go into labor until I scrubbed and organized every inch of my refrigerator. And for a long time, I sort of ignored the not-so-gentle urgings, since, you know, I wasn't terribly interested in going into labor.

Yeah, but...then I got to that point everyone told me about--the point where you're sure having the child out is going to be easier than having him in. So, in my non-logical-pregnant-brain, I decided that the only thing keeping me from having this baby was the state of my fridge. So last night I tackled it.

Good News: The fridge is fantastic.
Bad News: Pregnancy logic is clearly flawed.
Good News: It sort of makes me happy that Baby Boy likes me so much. I must be comfy.

And, as if I needed another reason....but let me present yet further evidence why I love Ian. This afternoon, when I asked him what he wanted for lunch, here was his request:

Green Apple, Strawberries, Yogurt.

Take that, childhood obesity epidemic.

The future looks fuzzy...

Just a few quick things from the husband here.

First, we're a week away from the due date, and I am getting pretty excited. The scouts are going to New Hampshire to camp and work at our favorite Maple Syruping operation. Since we're under strict "Stay-clost-to-the-wife" orders, Ian and I are going to camp in the backyard tonight, and have our annual bonfire in the morning. Should be fun. It might even be a bit drizzly for us. Sweet! Whether the baby comes a week early or a week late, we'll be near enough to be supportive participants.

Second, have you ever reached a crossroads where you realize that you're at the tail end of your prime? I've got friends breaking their backs and getting knees scoped and hearing aids installed. (Note: Poetic license taken, but injuries are happening to my fragile buddies!) Recently my wrists, elbows, shoulders, hips, knees, and ankles have all been popping. When I go walking through the hallway at work people call to me for a bag of popcorn. (More license...) Seriously, I don't know why bodies make such noises, and I don't feel any pain. Maybe it's like the squeal of a fan belt or the low-brake pad indicator telling you something terrible could go wrong if you don't go in for servicing. I've heard of people lubing up with fish oil for joints, but I don't think rubbing the capsules against my elbow would really contribute much help. Another example: Today I was issued a reimbursement check for a business trip I had a couple of weeks ago. Everything checked out. My name, the amount, the dates. I read the security features on the back and the check was legit. Except one thing.

The Mircoprinting that I used to be able to read under the signature line? It looks more like a discontinuous line with gaps and wiggles. It USED to read "Authorized Signature Authorized Signature Authorized Signature..." Maybe I should make a trip to the accountant to get him to issue me a check using a LEGIT checkbook. Maybe I should just schedule an appointment with the optometrist. *sigh.

Three Pictures

It's been a long week. Somehow I managed to catch another cold right on the heels of the one that sidelined me last week...with the notable difference that I actually have things to do this week that couldn't be postponed. Nesting has fully taken over my brain, rendering me quite useless to anyone (that is, unless they want me to come purge their house of something...or rearrange their furniture...or clean their fridge.)

Suffice it to say, everything has been relegated to the realms of FUNNY. Not sad, not exhausting...just FUNNY. Because that's the only way to react to it all, I think. (Even though laughing sends me into violent fits of hacking and sneezing. But you know, whatever.)

So here are three pictures from our week....starting at the very beginning (because that's what Julie Andrews says to do. It's a very good place to start, you know).

Here is yours truly at the obligatory 37-weeks pose in front of the hall mirror. I'm down to about 4 shirts that actually fit...so when I got cocoa powder all over shirt #1 on Monday, I had to explain to my mother why I wasn't changing said shirt when I took Ian to the library. All shirts must last until the end of the day, no matter what their condition. So cocoa-covered though I was, I hid it well and ran several errands. I believe pregnancy has turned off the valve in my brain that controls proper decorum in public. Oops!

I know I mentioned I was busy this week. There are things on my to-do list that absolutely must be done before I go into labor. The project above was not one of them. But I did it anyway, because Nesting Brain said that it must be done. And all must bow to the will of Nesting Brain. I'd discovered the tutorial a while back and had it bookmarked, but didn't make the attempt until Nesting Brain gave me the go-ahead. Mod-Podge therapy is always a welcomed treat. P.S. Don't look too closely. Pregnant Jen is slightly craft deficient. Side note: this project also involved me going to Lowe's all by myself. Also: being sent on a wild goose chase around the store by an employee who didn't know the difference between the "tiny hooks" I needed and the "8-inch hooks that could only be used to hang your saddle" I didn't. And at just-shy-of 38 weeks pregnant, I'm not terribly interested in chasing wild geese.

Yes, I'm that mum. I had a conference call to take, so I set Ian up with The Jungle Book in my bedroom. He gets really excited about The Jungle Book. I especially love it when he giggles and belly-laughs even though I can't hear what's going on in the movie. It's hilarious. I tried to catch him here (mid-conference-call) during one of those belly laughs, but I wasn't fast enough. My reflexes these days are.....um.....lacking.