Duncan's Birth Day

The idea of me detailing my labor might bore you to tears...if you don't want to read this it won't offend me because I will never know! :)

I had resigned myself to the idea of an induction on 3/19...well it was more than resignation...I was beginning to see all the perks of a scheduled delivery. As we all know by now, Little D had other plans!

Thurs night, 3/15: Graem & the boys & I went to Sam's Club. As I was walking around Sam's I was having more frequent Braxton Hicks contractions (ie not painful but contractions nonetheless) and was feeling more pressure from the baby. Kept thinking about it being the 15th of the month...I went into labor with both M&R on the 15th of their birth months. Didn't go into labor but didn't sleep but a few hours that night!

Fri morning: Met Tara, Ruth Ann & Tripp at the zoo...beautiful day...I felt good! Tara made sure she knew how to get to first aid...just in case!



Fri pm: Dinner at El Chico...spicy food. Came home, put boys to bed. Graem started up the BGE and put on a boston butt to smoke overnight for his dad's birthday dinner on Saturday. I was getting ready to go to bed early since I didn't sleep the night before...water broke at about 8:45 pm! Sydney rushed over to STN with Mason & Roper. Grandparents headed to Lexington. They were in for a long night...



10:00-10:30 PM Admitted to hospital (had to first go through triage to confirm that my water broke...there was no doubt in my mind, this was the third time after all!) Moved us back to the labor & delivery room.

1:00 AM Requested epidural.

1:30 AM Nurse - "I'm sorry but we can't find your blood work in the lab. We'll have to re-do your blood work before we can give you the epidural." For real?

2:30 AM Finally get the epidural (1.5 hours and many contractions later). ahhhh...

2:40 AM The nurses call in my doctor because the baby's heartbeat is irregular.

3:00 AM They decide to put a scalp electrode on D's head to monitor heart. They discover he is ready to be born. Why did I get the epidural??

3:15 AM The delivery room is in a frenzy as extra nurses and doctors come in. Everyone is concerned about the heart rate. I just want to see my baby!

3:25 AM Baby Duncan is born!!

When Mason and Roper were born, I immediately got to hold them. When Duncan was born, Graem cut the cord, I got a good look at him, then the doctors whisked him off to listen to his heart. First they were listening to him with stethoscopes and I could see plainly on their faces that what they were hearing was not what they wanted to hear. It was really very scary.

They decided to take him down to special care to put him on a heart monitor, on the way out the door they let me hold him for about 5 seconds and they let Graem hold him for about 2.5 seconds! I felt so helpless. If it weren't for that blasted epidural I would have been right there with them in special care!

No one wants to see their baby hooked up to all these cords!



6:00 AM The nurses move us to our room.

6:30 AM Finally get to see D again, feed him. He can't come back to our room because they are still monitoring his heart.

7:30-9:00 AM Cat nap. Duncan has EKG that confirms irregular heart rhythms, aka arrhythmia. Pediatric cardiologist explained that there is a flap in his heart that is immature/not fully developed that is causing the arrhythmia. He expects that as he grows it will fix itself, possibly even by Duncan's 2-week check-up (scheduled for 4/3)!!

9:30 AM Doctors take Duncan off monitor and let him come to our room. He gets to meet his brothers and many other family members and friends! What a lucky little fella!!

At Duncan's 4-day check-up last Wednesday, our pediatrician could still hear the arrhythmia but said it is much improved. Although it was scary because it was so unexpected, I really have a peace about it and know that he is going to be just fine!

Third Time's a {Lucky} Charm

Our third sweet baby boy is now over a week old and I'm just now making time to put pictures on the blog!

I'm sleep deprived and really don't think I can put together more than a few sentences that make much sense, so I'll stick to the basics & then I'll just give yall what you want: pictures!



Let me introduce you to the sweetest baby on earth, Duncan McKendree Clark. Born in the wee hours of the morning on St. Patrick's Day, 3:25 AM. 7 pounds, 8 ounces. 20.5 inches long. A head full of hair (surprise, surprise!). Sometimes he looks like Mason, sometimes he looks like Roper, mostly he just looks like Duncan!



Graem gets him dressed in his St. Patrick's Day shirt...


His big brothers were so excited to meet him!










As were his grandparents...they saw him right after he was born but didn't get to hold him until the next day! More on that later...











Uncle Rob & Aunt Kelli...




Cousins Sydney and Kate...




Along with lots of friends!!

I went in to labor on Friday night so by Monday morning we were itching to get home! Thankfully Roper was on hand to assist with paci duty and safety patrol...






More details to come...

The Waiting Game

Could this pregnancy possibly be any different than my first 2??

As of Sunday, I'm 38 weeks...I've never made it this far before!

With my first two, there were no signs indicating I would be going into labor, it just happened!

This time, my doctors have been telling me for weeks that the baby could be here any day now! Way back in week 35 they had me all worked up by saying, "He could be here in a matter of days." Really?? Which explains why yesterday during my appointment my doctor said, "I cannot believe you are here at 38 weeks and still haven't had that baby!" Ummm...me either!

I can't complain, I still feel really good...I'm just ready to meet my baby boy! Obviously my prediction of 3/11 did not happen...Graem's prediction (based on his hunting calendar) of baby D coming on the night of the full moon did not happen...so maybe he will follow in both of his big brother's footsteps and make his appearance on the 16th (M&R were both born on the 16th of their birth months). Or maybe he will be like my cousin David and come on St. Patty's Day...which would be quite appropriate for a boy with a very Irish name like Duncan McKendree!

If he continues to show his stubborn side, at the latest he will be born next Monday. Yesterday my doctor scheduled me to be induced on Monday morning.

Since M&R came early, an induction was never something that needed to be considered...but now with my third it will be so convenient. Convenience is an odd word choice for having a baby, but I can't think of any other way to describe it. I can make sure to have childcare for my older two...I won't have to worry about who to call/what to do with M&R if my water breaks at 3:00 AM...I won't have anxiety about not making it to the hospital in time for the baby to be born...and best of all I won't have to deliver a baby in the wee hours of the morning like I did the first 2 times. Mason was born shortly after 3:00 AM and Roper was born shortly after 2:00 AM...which means we didn't get moved out of the delivery room and into a hospital room until the sun was coming up. As everyone knows, life with a newborn doesn't allow for much sleep, but when you start off with a deficit after being up for well over 24 hours straight, it makes for a hard adjustment!

I have heard horror stories about inductions...but I am not the least bit concerned. I'm confident that as soon as the doctor breaks my water things will get moving and the baby will be here shortly thereafter! And in less than a week from now at the most!!

Giving Myself Some Credit...

My brother and sister-in-law found out on Friday that they are expecting their second BOY!! This makes FIVE grandsons for my parents! Can you believe it??

All this time I have been blaming Graem giving Graem all the credit for our three boys...but maybe I should give myself some credit?? Could it be that the Roper genes can't produce little girls? :)

Another boy for Rob & Kelli is a good thing...Rob had a lot of pressure to have at least one boy because out of all my cousins he is the last one that can pass on the family name. So now both the Roper and Clark names should be good to go. :)

Update on Baby Duncan...
I am now in week 37 -- woo hoo! Two weeks ago my doctor told me, "It could be any day now or still a couple of weeks...we would really like to see you make it to 37 weeks." Done! I go to the doctor this afternoon so I'm curious to see if there has been any change since last week. According to Graem there is a full moon on Thursday so maybe he will make his appearance then! I'm sticking to my prediction of March 11...we shall see! This baby clearly has a mind of his own. And now that I've bought matching St. Patty's Day/Biggest Brother-Big Brother-Little Brother t-shirts for the boys I'm starting to wonder if he'll show his stubborn side and wait until after St. Patrick's Day to make his arrival. Oh the waiting game...

Egghead

I originally planned to title this post "The Newest Member of Our Family"...but that seems somewhat inappropriate considering I'm writing about our new grill and not Baby D! :)

My mother & I took a trip to Atlanta back in October, and while we were there, we visited the Big Green Egg Factory store. One of her patients told her that the factory store sold re-furbished Eggs and she wanted to check them out. I had no intention of buying anything, I was just along for the ride. They didn't have any of the re-furbished grills in the store that day, but we looked around anyway and sampled some of the food they were cooking (which smelled/looked/tasted delicious)!



There must be something about me that screams "sucker" to salespeople, because before I realized what was happening I was at the cash register paying for a new grill with all the accessories. The salesman convinced me that this would be the perfect Christmas gift for my husband. He made a comment that the grill would benefit me most because I wouldn't have to cook as much. SOLD!! {Sidenote that we really needed a new grill -- we hauled our grill down to our tailgating spot for the last football game and it all but fell apart during the ride to & fro. It was one of our first purchases as a married couple, $120 from the scratch & dent section at Lowe's 7 years ago. It had seen better days.}



It wasn't until later that I started questioning my decision...our old grill was gas, would Graem really want a charcoal grill? Not to mention we don't usually give each other big ticket Christmas gifts. And how in the world would I hide the thing from him for 2+ months? And what if he decided to replace our old grill before Christmas?? I found reassurance in my decision by reminding myself about a comment that a friend of ours made to his wife on the day he got his BGE...he told her it was the best day of his life. Strong words!

All of those things worked themselves out, I think Graem figured out at some point that I had gotten him a new grill, but I don't think he knew it was a BGE. At least he acted surprised. :) Thankfully he doesn't refer to Christmas Day 2011 as the best day of his life, but he has admitted that its hands-down his favorite gift ever and that I should never try to "top" it because that would be impossible.

And I have to admit that the salesman was right when he told me that I wouldn't have to cook as much, considering Graem is pretty much obsessed with the BGE. He cooks something on it every weekend and at least once during the week. So far he has made ribs {twice}, steaks several times, burgers, a pizza, pulled pork {twice}, pork loin {twice}, several different chicken recipes, and even a chicken pot pie! I had planned to make chicken pot pie one night and he said he would like to try cooking it on the Egg, since you can use it as a convection oven. It turned out really good! They claim you can bake a cake on it...I don't understand why you would do that but I'm pretty sure my husband will try it at some point.

Everything has turned out good...but the ribs & pulled pork are the BEST -- better than I've ever eaten in a restaurant. And the pork loin he makes with a blackberry sauce is one of my favorites. The steaks have been good too...of course being pregnant I haven't been able to enjoy mine medium rare, so that is something I'm looking forward to after Baby Duncan makes his arrival!



One of the delicious side dishes he prepared for us this weekend: prosciutto wrapped asparagus, to go with the pulled pork and ribs. {A little heavy on the pig during that meal, but at least we had something green, right?}

Framed Letters

A couple of people have asked me how I made the framed "D" for Duncan's room...way back when I was pregnant with Roper I made an "R" for him and an "M" for Mason (see this post). I also made one for my nephew that was horizontal with all three of his initials across it. The original inspiration was something I saw in the Restoration Hardware catalog, and since that was almost 3 years ago I can no longer find the picture!



These are pretty easy to make...I should have taken pictures as I was working on them but I didn't (sorry). I hadn't planned to post the "how-to" on my blog, but it should be pretty easy to explain.



You will need:
-a frame
-matboard with a letter cut out
-leftover fabric
-spray adhesive

The Frame:
You really could use any size, and it might be determined by how much fabric you have. For all three of mine I used a 16x20 frame that I picked up from Hobby Lobby (their frames are 50% off for three weeks each month). The frames that I picked out did not have the metal cording on the back for hanging, but the nice lady at Hobby Lobby put it on them for me and only charged a couple of dollars.

Matboard:
Hobby Lobby also sells matboard and they will cut out letters (and other shapes) for a small charge (maybe $3.00 or so?). I asked them to cut the matboard to 12x16 (note that if you choose a different size frame you will need to adjust the outer dimensions of the matboard -- it will "float" inside the frame so just decide how much space you want between the outside edge of the matboard and the inside edge of the frame).

Then I asked them to cut a letter out of the middle of the mat board (centered of course). Note that you won't need the actual letter that they cut out, just the 12x16 matboard with the silhouette of the letter cut out in the middle. They let me choose from different letter styles, and I chose a simple Roman font for all 3. In hindsight I kind of wish I had used a lowercase "d," oh well.

Fabric:
I used leftover fabric in mine, but there are lots of possibilities here...you could use scrapbook paper or wallpaper or wrapping paper. I like the fabric because I just used leftover scraps and it ties in with your bedding, window treatments, etc.

Make sure the fabric is ironed out flat. You will need one larger rectangle of fabric for the outer edge, cut to 16x20 (I just took the glass out of the frame and traced around the edges & then cut). The smaller rectangle of fabric will need to be slightly smaller than 12x16.

Spray adhesive:


Assembly:
Apply the spray adhesive to the back of the matboard and then stick it to the smaller piece of fabric.

Then, apply the spray adhesive to the back of the smaller piece of fabric and stick it on the larger piece of fabric (centered of course, unless you just don't want it centered).

Now you should have your matboard on top, stuck to the small piece of fabric (which shows through the letter silhouette), stuck to the large piece of fabric (which shows on the outside edge of the matboard).

Then frame the whole thing like you would a picture. I'm not used to writing up tutorial type things so I hope this all made sense!

I'm not sure what the total cost of this was, I'm terrible at remembering prices, but I think this is pretty close:
$25 for frame (normally priced at $49.99)
$2 to add metal cording to back of frame
$8 for matboard
$3 charge to cut matboard
$6 for spray adhesive

So about $44 all said and done, unless you also have to buy fabric. You might have noticed that Duncan's "D" has a lot of flaws because I didn't have one big piece of fabric to use inside the letter cutout. I had to piece together a lot of little pieces and when you look closely you can totally see it. But I'm not a perfectionist when it comes to these things so I'm okay with it. And I don't think he'll mind. :)

Tying the Perfect Bow

Hopefully you aren't growing tired of my Pinterest finds. I'm trying to share only the best pins!

I found this pin on "tying the perfect bow," which was particularly helpful when tying the bows for baby Duncan's crib bedding...


and for his curtains...


I'm sure all you mom's of girls know how to tie the perfect bow on your daughter's Easter dress sash, but if not, here you go...

Source: ellinee.com via Brantley on Pinterest