Birthday Fun

Cadence is 2! Her birthday is July 12th, which happened to be on a Saturday this year, so we planned a day of fun in her honor. Here a some of the pictures from throughout that day:

We started with a pancake breakfast, she's checking out the happy face I put on hers.

After we all got ready for the day we headed to Storyland in Fresno, a fun spot I remember going to as a kid where you get to explore some classic nursery rhymes and stories. Here's the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland.

I was going to get a cute shot of Cadence crawling into the maze...instead I got

this:

Here she is in the maze:

The old woman's shoe:

A cool part of Storyland is getting to hear the stories. You can purchase a plastic key that when inserted into these boxes at various stations, will begin the story being read. The park has been upgraded since I was small and each story can now be heard in either English or Spanish...your choice.

Stained glass in Noah's Ark:

Captain Cadence, "Yo-ho!"

Three Bear's chairs:

A castle complete with moat monster!

Fun on the merry-go-round:

Slides are good for kids of all ages!

Lunch at the wonderfully retro Chicken Pie Shop. A vintage spot in Fresno's Tower District with old fashioned lunch counters and great food.

That night we had some family over for a yummy lasagna dinner, presents and cake and (home-made) ice cream!

Happy Birthday Cadence!

Sticky Fun

Peel it: Stick it:
Ta-Da!

One of Cadence's birthday cards had a fun sheet of stickers inside. Cadence loves stickers as you can see. So far that's the only other place she puts them other than on paper. :) She recently had her 2 yr. check up and did the same thing with the stickers the doctor gave her...the doctor had a surprised expression and then laughed. Cadence has grown 4 inches since November and is exactly 3 ft. tall now. I guess she'll be needing all new pants this Winter...at least some of them work as capris now since it's summer!

All Boy

Duminsani has started smiling and cooing now! I haven't captured a really good shot of it yet, so this will have to do. I got my first real smile from him the morning of Cadence's birthday, before the day began. I was changing his diaper, and all was quiet throughout the house when a glorious emission of gas from my son broke the silence...followed by a big smile on his face. Definitely a boy!

Growing Boy

Baby Sani had a 2-wk check up Wednesday where I learned he has gained 2 pounds already and an inch and a half in length! No wonder I'm so hungry all the time!

Family Resemblance?

Me just a few days old: My brother as a newborn:
Baby Sani today:

Just pix

Great Grandma

Baby Sani got to meet his great-grandma last week!

Man at Work

We've slowly been redecorating our bedroom...something we thought we'd do once we realized it was the most neglected room in the house. Here's the latest progress of a mural we designed, Eric however got to do the whole thing since I'm not too available for painting these days.

So how was your weekend?

Nothing kicks off the weekend like getting to call the poison control hot line first thing Saturday morning. Just another one of life's little adventures with kids. Growing up, some close family friends practically had that number on speed dial as their daughter regularly consumed non-edibles, even well into her grade school years. So I felt a little a little silly as I tried to clear my head from fatigue to think about where I might find that number. After all, I've been doing this mom thing for about two years now, I'm fairly well educated, I'm trained in CPR and First Aid, and am a social worker by profession, who dedicates time and energy to ensuring the safety and future of other people's children.

It started after a fairly sleepless night. It seemed like I had just put baby Sani down and was drifting off to sleep again myself when Cadence woke up around 5 AM. Normally she doesn't get up until 7, sometimes 8. Needless to say, I was not prepared to be up and entertaining an energetic toddler. I told her it was still time to sleep and asked her to lay down in her room. She went back to her room where I could hear her playing. I did my best to supervise her from my pillows, but eventually succumbed to the inevitable, and drifted off to sleep. I woke up when my mommy senses started tingling....Cadence was standing by the bed, and I could smell a distinct sweet, fruity scent. My eyes popped open to see my daughter standing with a big grin and an empty bottle of medicine clutched in her hand.

While I can fully appreciate why pharmaceutical companies concoct delectable syrupy medications for kids, I'm beginning to think Mary Poppins might have been onto something when she said "Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down". I think I might prefer adding the sweet myself rather than my daughter actually being excited each time she needs her medicine.

So in a single bound I lept out of the bed and snatched the now empty vial from Cadence. I asked her the obvious, "Did you drink this?", to which she replied "Yeeess!" and happily scampered off. Since I could see no visable effects of the medication on my child, I did my best to calm my racing heart, collect my thoughts and form my game plan. First: read the warnings on the label...perhaps this will tell me what to do. Second: If the label does not provide adequate instruction, wake up Eric.

I was in luck! Sort of. The label stated "in case of overdose, call an emergency line or poison control center". Hmm...would've been nice if they thought to include that number along with the warning. Ok, so the bottle, though nearly full when found by my daughter, was actually only half an once in size, so I figured that was in Cadence's favor. Secondly, the medication happened to be gas drops for the baby, which you can give up to 12 times a day...so it seemed this was also in Cadence's favor. Thirdly, Cadence was busy singing to herself and playing....still no signs of harm...also in her favor. This was clearly not an emergency, so where could I find the number to poison control?

Instantly my mind flashed to my last first aid class, then to the backseat of my car where I left first aid handouts and poison control information for weeks, if not months, then finally to the trash can where I eventually deposited said materials. Dang!

To make a long story a little shorter, I did find the number in the phone book, talked briefly to a gentlemen that sounded about as excited as I did when Cadence woke up at 5, to be taking my call. He confirmed Cadence would be just fine, took a small amount of my personal information for their records, and thus I began my weekend. Eric was kind enough to buy more gas drops later that morning, in fact a double package...just in case and Cadence was pretty flatulence free for the rest of the day.

Amazing...

Our son has made his debut! Dumisani Charles Mason was born this past Saturday just a few minutes before 4 AM. He was 8 lbs. 7 oz. and 20" long.

For those of you who want more graphic details than that, keep reading. The rest of you can stop here and continue to "ooh" and "ahh" over the pictures.

After laboring at home since Thursday evening, we finally decided to head to the hospital Friday night around 9 PM. We probably could've waited a little longer, but didn't want to make any crazy trips in the middle of the night, especially with arranging care for Cadence. My folks came over and took her to the sitter for the night and we headed off of to Fresno. My contractions were only about 6 minutes apart at the point, but I was pretty sure this was going somewhere this time. For the past few weeks I would get regular contractions that would then just fizzle out with time. These just had a different feel to them. At the hospital I was however disappointed to learn at first I was only dilated to a 3, which is where I had been Wed. at my weekly exam. I had thought for sure in the past couple days more had happened with all the contractions I was getting. So after an hour of walking around labor and delivery in a hospital gown and socks, they checked my progress and the doctor so kindly confirmed I was indeed pregnant, and also in labor! Yeah! In that hour I had dilated to between a 4 and a 5 and was 70% effaced.

I was officially admitted and put in a birthing room where we were joined by my folks. After being monitored for a little while for baby's health, I was given the ok to walk some more. Eric and I then made the rounds again around labor and delivery for a while longer and came back for more monitoring as asked. My brother and his girlfriend showed up too at some point to see me in all my glory, but were wise and left before things really got interesting after midnight. Meanwhile my contractions were making some progress, getting stronger and closer together. Eric and went for another walk, but after about 15 minutes of this, I was done. I had to pee, I was tired, and the contractions were definitely picking up in intensity. After being checked once again, I learned I was only dilated to a 5 and now 80% effaced. (Groan). I still had halfway to go when it came to dilating. This was probably around 2 AM or so and I made the decision to try some drugs.

With Cadence I was induced so my entire labor was managed by drugs of some kind. It began with Pitocin to manage the contractions, and I elected to have both IV drugs and then a birth spinal as the labor intensified. I remembered when I did get drugs during labor with Cadence, they put me to sleep, which was a great way to pass the time. So sleep was really what I was after when I decided to try the first round of drugs this time.

The nurse gladly gave me a shot in my IV of some sort of narcotic, which she explained the first dose would be the best at taking a the edge off, and subsequent doses would not be as effective, but were available. The drugs hit pretty fast and I was basically flying high, except for the fact that the contractions were still coming hard and fast, and not much "edge" was being taken off. I was pretty disoriented and sleepy when not having a contraction, and then doing my best to get through the pain when it hit. After a few minutes of this, I decided the epidural sounded great. The nurse started pumping fluids into me through my IV. Before giving the epi, two bags of fluid had to be drained into my veins, so with each contraction, I just stared at that little bag dripping it's way into my body to see how much longer the wait would be for true relief to come.

So while my parents watched on, I was in a considerable amount of pain, and Eric was there to hold me through it as I cried and groaned. Let's face it, it was around 3 in the morning, I was exhausted, I was in pain, I just couldn't find a focal point other than that stinking bag hanging on my IV. At some point between contractions, I decided I needed to get up to pee. As I stood up to make my way to the bathroom, another contraction hit, stopping me, and the nurse came in saying she wanted to check my progress again and asked me to lay down. Laying flat on my back to be examined was the last thing I wanted to do at that point. But as I attempted to stand and make my way to the bathroom, I noticed an usually strong pressure like I had to do a lot more than just pee. My parents shuffled out of the room as I laid back down to submit to an exam and through the drug induced fog I heard the nurse proclaim, "oh, you're ready to go, with the next contraction you can start pushing". Say what?! She also said something about the bad news being the epi wouldn't be coming....yeah, I sort of figured as much at that point.

The next few minutes were a bit of a blur. As the nurse gave me instructions on how and when to push, I tried my best to understand though the fatigue and drug stupor. What I do remember is the nurse making several phone calls asking for more people and a cart and the doctor, the room quickly becoming more crowded as the team arrived, and the nurse bringing a squat bar for me to use (which was so awesome to have). My bag of waters broke with my first push and made a pretty good mess as it shot out all over the floor (at least it missed the nurse, mostly). Eric says it was probably about 10 minutes from the time I started pushing until the time our son was born. I will trust him on this one because my sense of time at that point was pretty gone. I do remember getting a sense of focus and even peace at some point during this period, and then being able to push when I needed to. People have asked what the pain was like during this part. I have to say, it wasn't bad, mild even. I actually am really glad I was able to feel what was happening at this point, to feel the actual delivery happen. That may sound strange, but it's something I will probably never forget. So with one last big gush of fluid and a tremendous sense of relief (sort of like I had just had the biggest bowel movement of my life), my son was born and I was holding him.

Meanwhile my poor parents were in the waiting room at first thinking I was just getting another exam and the epidural. They started to get a clue though as they saw all these people rushing to the room, and then eventually heard the first cries of their grandson. They said the hospital played lullaby music over the intercom when he was born.

My recovery has been awesome...other than being tired from lack of sleep, I am feeling pretty well. I did not have tearing or need an episiotomy with this delivery. My body perfectly accommodated the process, just as it was designed to do. My son is pretty sleepy at this point in his life, doesn't miss one of his dozen or so meals, and is content for the most part, unless getting a bath or a change of clothes, which makes him feel cold. He does spit up more than Cadence ever did, but nothing we can't deal with.

Cadence is fascinated by her baby brother, but also having to make some big adjustments in her little world. Last night she had a pretty big emotional meltdown. We are trying to be wise and sensitive to her needs as we all make room in our lives for baby brother. May the journey continue....

Not yet....

Yup...still preggo. I was due this past Saturday, but we all know those dates are an estimate...sort of like time lines for most remodel projects! So it could be any day, or hour, now that baby Sani begins his entrance to the world outside the womb. I think I am excited more than anxious at this point. We (myself, Eric, family and friends) all just want to meet the little guy. I know it will happen when the time is right. I am feeling good most of the time. At my weekly check-up last Wednesday I was dilated to a 2. I continue to have contractions sporadically each day, so I know my body is gearing up for the main event. Since I do not have any pics of our baby boy yet, I will post some others from the past few weeks you haven't seen.

Cadence created a new hat for herself one day (yes, it's a bubble wrap bag):

A cheesy grin while at great-grandma's on Memorial Day:

Playing in the fountain...I can see where she gets that grin:

Playing with a hose...never a dull moment when water is involved:

And finally, a peek into a a pregnant woman's freezer: