March Madness begins

{I'm going to split these posts up so it's not one super huge, long post ... }

March started out like any normal month.

Emmy and I watching Justin Bieber's "Never Say Never"

And Kate playing with tissues on her head.  And my head.  And the baby's head.

But it ended up being the craziest (and scariest) month of my life so far.

The girls had been sick with colds.  I have been super paranoid about RSV since the baby was born, so as soon as I realized they were sick, the baby was off limits to them and I tried to keep him in another room, away from them.  I did not want him to get sick.  He hadn't been to church yet and I'd only taken him to the store a couple of times.  I hadn't even been to the gym yet, which is a big deal since I go 5 days a week when the kids are all healthy.  But they don't take babies until they are 6 weeks old, and Christian was 5 weeks old at this point.

I noticed he sounded wheezy and rattley and he had a teeny cough.  Nothing too concerning but since I was so paranoid about RSV, I wanted to have him tested.  Our pediatrician, Dr. Newbold, was out of town so I took Christian to the ER,  knowing they could test him there.  They did the swab and it came back positive.  He was retracting pretty bad - I didn't even know what retracting was until then.  They did a chest x-ray which showed he might have pneumonia, too and they decided to admit him to the hospital, which surprised me.  I thought they would just tell me what to do/how to take care of him with the RSV at home.

(In the ER, waiting to see the doctor)

When they decided to admit him, they got an IV going:

Jake and my parents showed up and Jake and my dad gave the baby a blessing, saying he would recover, which was really comforting.

I thought we'd be at the hospital for a few days and then go home when the baby got a little better.  They put him on oxygen, since his oxygen levels were low and the waiting game for him to get better began.

Christian's many faces

I love how a baby can pull the funniest (and cutest!) faces ...

{From February.  And a special thanks to my phone for helping me take these pictures}:

Instagram February Highlights

Here's a peek at what February looked like at our house through Instagram.

 I love this ...

 Christian's first hairdo!

Such a sweet baby

Emmy's artwork ... her boyfriend (not really) moved :(

I'm in love :)

Emmy putting together her Valentines for her class

Heart-shaped pancakes for VDay breakfast

And more of the boy :)

Emmy left this note for us on our dry-erase frame:

Christian rolling to his side to sleep

Kate playing Temple Run in her undies.  I don't even know how long she played for ...

Yep :)

Smiles!

His first real smile was at 3 weeks old

Emmy got the Super Student award!
Not really sure what it meant but she was excited about it!

Out to lunch!
The baby was asleep in the car seat.

I took Emmy to get her nails painted while Kate spent a couple of days in St. George with Aunt Lindsey.  Don't worry - she had peeled it all off by the time I picked her up from school!

First bath!

Christian's first bath was not his favorite ...

He had the worst rash on his belly from the jaundice

He liked when I washed his hair :)

But overall, not a fan of the sponge bath.

Jaundice

Christian was/had jaundice when he was born so the day we got home from the hospital we had to put him right in the bili-bed.  Not what a mom wants to do with her brand new baby!  I was dying, I just wanted to hold and snuggle him.  

He actually did really well and ended up only needing to be on the lights one night.

 Poor little glow worm :)

 Little did we know that this was just the beginning of health issues with this little guy ...

January 2013 Highlights

The main highlight of January was, of course, welcoming Christian to our family!

But there were a few other things that happened ...

The girls love going on ATV rides, even in the winter.  They had to get bundled up (it was COLD outside!) and daddy took them for a ride on Papa's four-wheeler.

This girl sure loves pink!

Cutie :)

Daddy getting them extra bundled with a cozy blanket (or "blanklet" as Kate likes to call them)

My beautiful girls and handsome husby!

My wonderful friend, Brooke, threw me a baby shower!  It was lots of fun and I received some wonderful gifts for the baby (and myself - a pedicure!  Best gift for a pregnant mama!)

(From left: Natalie Shirley, Melissa Eggertson, Mary Armour, Brooke, Me, Audrey Nielsen (my girls call her Grandma Audrey - the sweetest lady ever!), Jess, Carrie Leavitt, Alisha Graf, mom, Daxey pants and Linds)

We had to get a pic of the Hansen girls :)

Remember the pedicure I mentioned above?  I decided to make it a double-date with Emmy so we could have some girl time before the baby came.  She loved it!

On Friday nights, we do a Family Movie Night.  This particular night, we decided to have some Velata, which is yummy fondue.  The girls loved dipping all of the yummy things in the chocolate.  That's why fondue is so much fun!

And, of course, the girls LOVE having a new baby in the house!  I don't even know how many times I've had to tell them to leave the baby alone for a minute - they love giving him hugs and kisses, holding him and talking in their baby voices to him.

So many pics of him sleeping ...

Christian Jacob Malie

Our baby boy finally arrived!!!

Christian Jacob Malie joined our family on January 22, 2013 - Grammy's birthday!

This was the day before I had him, my last belly pic:

I went in for my 39 week appointment on the 22nd.  I was dilated to a 3 and the OB/GYN stripped my membranes.  We set up an appointment to be induced the next morning and I was on my way.  About an hour after I left his office, I started having contractions.  I was Group B Strep positive and was worried that I wouldn't get my antibiotic in time if I waited too long to go in to the hospital.  My contractions were about 5 minutes apart, I called Dr. Gatherum's office and he said to just come in!  So we got our bags packed, got cleaned up and went to the hospital.  We got there around 2:00 and they admitted me.  After I got my epidural, it wasn't working like I hoped it would.  My legs were numb but I could still feel all of the contractions - no bueno.  The nurse anesthetist came back and gave me a stronger dose.  It did the trick!  But I started feeling a little nauseous and told the nurse.  She checked my blood pressure and it had dropped a lot and it was affecting the baby.  She gave me the oxygen mask and had me roll to my side.  Just a couple of minutes later, I started feeling pressure and she checked me.  I was ready to push!  I pushed through three contractions and little Christian was here!  I had him at 5:20 pm.  The umbilical cord was wrapped around Christian's neck, but luckily it didn't cause any problems.  He came too fast for me to get both doses of the antibiotic (I just got the first one) so they had us stay an extra night at the hospital to monitor the baby and make sure he didn't get the Group B Strep from me, which he didn't.

He was 7 lbs, 1 oz and 18.5 inches long.

He's my smallest baby, despite the fact that I was pregnant with him the longest!  (I had Emmy 10 days early, Kate 9 days early and Christian 5 days early).

Welcome to the world, baby Christian!

We named him Christian because that was Jake's birth name (we have his Chilean passport from when he was adopted and brought over to the USA).  We thought it was kind of special :)

Oh how I love this boy

Our first family picture with Christian!

It was so awesome.  Right after I had him, they had me pull up my gown so they could lay the baby right on my tummy with skin-to-skin contact.  He had a blanket on top to keep him warm, but I loved the skin-to-skin contact.  They left us like that for about two hours (apparently it was a pretty busy night in Labor and Delivery).  They didn't weigh him, wash him, put on a diaper, nothing.  We, and by "we" I mean I :), got to just hold him and cuddle him and love him for two hours without anyone bugging us.  I loved it.

Jake and I with Christian after they cleaned him up:

Sweet baby!

 We absolutely adore this boy