John Paul Taylor

Part 1

This last week was really tough! Not only was I having contractions off and on, but I also started getting sick. It started last weekend. I just felt like I was trying to fight off a head cold but by Wednesday, I was totally congested. It really made sleep impossible. I had my weekly checkup on Wednesday and was a little encouraged by the doctor who said I was at 2 1/2 cm. Progression is always good. I was just praying that the baby would hold off until after Friday morning so I wouldn't have to miss a very important meeting. I woke up Friday and barely had a voice. All the sinus drainage started the cough. After we finished up our meeting, I had this feeling that I was going to have the baby that day. I even mentioned in my FB status that I was "willing" the baby out that day, LOL. I guess I got my wish. I was in the middle of doing laundry (because I had this feeling) and went out to the garage to get the clothes out of the dryer when I felt like I might have sprung a leak. I was already wearing a pad because I had been spotting so I wasn't quite sure. While I was walking back to the bathroom, it became pretty apparent that it was still leaking so I called Don and my parents and started getting some things together because no, I did not have a bag packed yet, LOL. When my parents got there, my mom really wanted to drive me to the hospital but I wanted to wait for Don to get home. There were several things about this delivery that didn't go as planned and this was the first one...my water springing a leak and I wasn't having contractions to go along with it. I knew they would end up inducing me and that would screw up my plans for trying to deliver without an epidural. So while I was waiting for Don to get home, I was sitting at the dining room table when I thought of something else I needed to pack. I went to stand up and as soon as I did, whoosh...my water came gushing out. Yuck...that's all I have to say about that, LOL. At least it happened at home and not in the car and at least my parents were there to bring me towels and to answer Joshua's questions. I had to bring towels with us because I kept leaking every time I tried to walk.

Part 2

We had to stop at triage when we first got to the hospital. They treated me like I had the swine flu because of the way I sounded. They kept asking if I had been in contact with anyone with HN1, etc. Then they had to put masks on their faces just in case. Thankfully, that was just in triage. They made me wear a mask while they were transporting me to Labor and Delivery but I was able to take it off as soon as we got in our room. None of the nurses in labor and delivery wore "the" mask. They get me hooked up to everything and then started the pitocin. After they upped the dose the second time, I went ahead and asked for the epidural. I knew I wouldn't be able to handle the pain. I think they checked me again around 11:30 or so and I was at 4-5 cm dilated. Then we played the waiting game. They kept upping the pitocin. I started shaking uncontrollably. I thought it was because of the epidural since I've had problems with the shakes with each of my pregnancies but later found out it was just because I was cold...really cold. I was also running a fever so that's probably why I was so cold. I had the room temperature at 85 degrees, LOL. The nurse kept asking me if I was starting to get hot. I think I was sweating them out, LOL. I started wondering when they were going to check me again around 1:30pm. I was curious to see how dilated I was and how much longer this was going to take. It was past my bedtime, LOL. They finally checked me a little after two and said I was fully dilated. They started getting stuff together and notified my doctor. They had to set up the stirups because the epidural made my legs totally numb and I couldn't move them at all. After they got everything together, got my legs in the stirups, took half of the bed apart, then they finally started having me start pushing. There were just the two nurses in the room with us. I probably pushed for maybe 6 or 7 contractions when they could see the head and told me not to push anymore. Even during pushing, the nurse asked me if I was getting hot and I kept telling them no. Then the nurse went to get the doctor. After the doctor came in, I think I pushed through 2 more contractions and John Paul Taylor was born at 3:22am. He was perfect and I was able to feed him fairly quickly after giving birth. He latched on right away and we had no feeding problems! The hospital was really crowded and they didn't have any rooms available in the post pardom section so I had to stay in Labor and Delivery overnight. Don and my mom went home to get some sleep after they took the baby to the nursery for his bath and assesments, etc.

Part 3

I dozed off for a little while but the nurse came back in to check on me...blood pressure, temp, etc. It was around 6am and I asked the nurse if they were going to bring the baby back to me or if I had to request him because I thought I needed to feed him soon. This is where everything got screwy. Of course in my defense I was really tired and really hungry (the last time I ate was at lunch on Friday). The nurse told me that I would have to feed the baby by 7:45am and that shift change was at 7am so they would bring him over after shift change unless I wanted him now. I said that it would be ok for them to bring him over after shift change so I could maybe sleep another hour first. 7:45 comes and they still hadn't brought the baby to me so I called the nursery. Of course I have no voice so it was pretty difficult. After I asked for them to bring me the baby, they told me they were just getting ready to do the assement on him and they would bring him over after he's done. About 30 minutes later, the phone in my room rings. It's the nursery telling me that when they did his assesment, his temperature was low so they had to stick him under the heat lamp to get his temperature back up. Then they checked his blood sugar and it was low so they wanted my permission to give him some formula to bring it back up. I was really upset about this because I didn't feel like I had any choice but to let them do it. The nurse said that if they didn't get his blood sugar back up, he would have to go to the NICU. The part that I was angry about was I think the whole thing could have been avoided if they would have just brought him to me to let me feed him instead of waiting so long. He ended up spitting up the formula a little later after they brought him to my room...good for him, LOL. He was spitting up a little the rest of the day and I swear it was formula and not colostrum that was coming back up. As long as he was awake, he did great eating. However, there were at least two times that I just couldn't wake him for nothing. I was thinking to myself that if we were home, I would be getting some good sleep right now, LOL. But we were not home; we were in the hospital where they pester and bug you for all kinds of things and if you go over that 4-5 hr. max for feeding, they take the baby away to check his blood sugar. They had to check his blood sugar two other times but he was fine thank goodness. So I was awake; trying to wake the baby. I felt like crap from being sick. They started me on anti-biotics and by Sunday I was blowing all kinds of "stuff" out of my nose. I probably had a sinus infection. It's now Monday and I have my voice back (most of the way) so I sound much better. Now if I could just get some sleep...yeah right, LOL.

So that's the birth story. Here's a few pictures of John Paul:

Rome...Paul and the Underground Church

Today was the last day for VBS and I'm so glad it's finally over! Don't get me wrong. The kids had a blast and the program this year was awesome. However, being a volunteer when you are 6 months pregnant was probably not the best idea for me, LOL. My feet have been swollen the past 3 days. Even though it was a little stressful having to memorize my lines each night and hard being on my feet all day, I really did enjoy myself. Our program this year was Rome (http://www.group.com/vbs/rome/). For some reason, Blogger wouldn't let me link the site because it didn't end in .com. My character was Lucia in the Underground Church. Since I was in MD up until the day before VBS, I didn't have anything to do with decorating. The guy that made the cave for the underground church did an awesome job! I tried to take some pictures but the pictures just doesn't do it justice. If I used the flash, it was too bright and it didn't look as realistic but if I turned the flash off, it just looked black with an orange light from the torch. I will post pictures anyway at the end. I wished I took more pictures because we were all in costume. They were taking pictures the whole week but I'm not sure if I'll have access to them or not. They are going to do a slide show tomorrow night at the 6pm Mass.

Last year, the program we used was the Rainforest. Shawn had fun last year but I don't think he really learned much from it. This year though he was very excited to tell me about the abacus in the grammatical shop and how to use it. He was also very proud of the scroll he brought home that he wrote the Roman alphabet on. He could tell me the bible point each day which I was very impressed with. He would tell me about Brutus each day and the games they played in the Apprenticeship games.

I also got to see how excited the kids were each day. Every day, 2 to 3 "families" would go see Paul and Brutus. Paul would always teach them the bible point and make sure to tell the kids to tell his other Christian friends what he said. When they came to the underground church, we would ask them what Paul said today which would get the kids to repeat the bible point again. Of course we would always get all kinds of other information too, LOL. The script was great. Brutus is a Roman Guard that is chained to Paul so he can't escape. By the end of the week, Brutus is converted to a Christian. On Wednesday, Brutus was sleeping when the kids came in to see Paul. He woke up startled because of a dream and then was embarrassed that he had fell asleep on duty. He was very impressed that the kids didn't try to help Paul escape while he was asleep and that begins his conversion. My favorite day was on Thursday. In the underground church, I had to tell the kids that the Roman soldiers almost caught Marcus but he ran away and I didn't know where he was. I had a lot more dialog and questions to ask the kids and then I hushed the kids and told them that I heard someone outside the cave. That's when we played the soldiers sound clip on the CD. The dialog was actually kind of funny but it still scared some of the younger kids. One of the soldiers wanted to search the cave but the other one talked him out of it because it was dark and dirty and he didn't want to get bit by rats. They ended up walking away talking about finding Marcus. When it was time for the kids to leave, there were several that didn't want to leave the cave because they thought the soldiers were still out there, LOL. Today, I snuck behind Paul's house to hear what was going on and the kids were really excited to talk about the soldiers almost finding them. They all cheered when Brutus announced that he was a Christian now. When they came over to the underground church, they couldn't wait to tell us that Brutus was a Christian. They also couldn't wait to tell us that Brutus had to shovel horse "stuff" at the Emperors stables now. I didn't really get a chance to see much of the Market but besides making some crafts, they actually learned what it was like to live in Rome during that time. There were dramas every day but most of them happened in the Market so I didn't get to see them. Yesterday, I know that someone stole a loaf of bread because they didn't have any money to pay for it and today the Roman Soldiers closed down the Metal Shop because they found out the owner was a Christian.

I think next year our Church is going to do Egypt which has to do with Joseph's journey from prison to palace and is by the same company that did Rome. I can't wait! Here's the pictures of my cave:

This is the entrance to the cave. At the end of the "hallway" you would enter the cave to the right.

The back wall of the cave

A close up of one of the torches. It actually had a flickering light bulb inside and looked really realistic in the dark.

They posted the pictures of VBS on our Church website. Click here and here to see more pictures.

Shawn's Flat Stanley Project

Shawn's class had to do a Flat Stanley project over spring break. If you are not familiar with Flat Stanley, Flat Stanley is a childrens book where the main character gets flattened by a billboard. He's not hurt though and is able to travel around the world in an envelope. So Shawn had to color and cut out his own Flat Stanley and send it to someone in a different town so Flat Stanley could see the sights. Shawn chose to send his Flat Stanley to his cousins Jeremy and Chris. They did a great job taking pictures and showing Flat Stanley the sights in Ocean City, MD. We almost didn't have enough room to show all the pictures! First they took Flat Stanley to Assateague Island to see the wild ponies. I was jealous because even though I've grown up my entire life in MD and went to Ocean City at least once a year, I've never been to Assateague. I may make that a mission when I go up in June. After Assateague, they took Flat Stanley to the boardwalk and buried him in the sand, lol. They took him to see a new firefighter memorial which looked pretty neat. They have a piece of metal from one of the world trade center towers in NY along with a statue of a firefighter. The piece of metal is very powerful and really makes you remember that day! Then they took Flat Stanley to Home Depot and Dunkin Donuts before taking him to the Berlin Fire Department to end their tour. We are so grateful for Jeremy and Chris to help us out with Shawn's project and of course their mother, Kandi, who took the pictures and drove them around. Thanks guys! Shawn was really excited to see the pictures and we had fun making the poster. Shawn made the title on the poster, helped place a few of the pictures, and made all the labels on the label maker and placed them on the poster himself. It turned out really good and he was so proud. Here's a couple pictures we took before we turned in the project (I had to use flip pages to get all the pictures on there so unfortunately all the pictures aren't shown). Enjoy!

Garden update

Sorry it's been so long since I've updated. I have no excuse but I'm going to blame Facebook, LOL. Anyway, I thought it was time to share some new garden pictures and report on our progress. Let me first say that we are beginners. I have no idea what I'm doing with this garden; just kind of winging it. The first tomato plant is looking pretty good. It finally has 3 little blooms on it so we hope to see little tomatoes soon. The second tomato plant was transplanted and it doesn't look as healthy as the first one but it keeps growing anyway so we'll see. My green bean plants started off looking the healthiest of them all but something started eating the leaves in the last 2 weeks. I seriously have to spray them with the organic insect spray my friends husband recommended. They do have lots of green beans on them though so I think we had success with this plant. I'll have to let you know how they tasted since I haven't pulled any off yet. My carrots look like they are doing pretty good. I have a few scallions that look like they are healthy. I used to have more but don't know what happened to them...something ate them maybe? The two types of lettuce I planted never germinated. Neither did the oregano or basil. I planted some beets later than everything else and I have a few things growing in the square I planted them in but I have no idea if they are beets or weeds, lol. I'll give it a little longer to see how they look. We also have a marigold plant that Shawn brought home in a little paper cup from school. It looked pitiful but we planted it anyway and we finally have a flower! Here's what the garden looks like now:

The small blooms on our tomato plant

Lots of green beans!

Shawn's marigold plant and a close up of the lone flower

Pool time

The weather has been really nice for the past few weeks now. Several times I have considered taking the kids to the pool because it was definitely that hot out. However, our pool is not heated so I was a little hesitant but yesterday I decided to brave it and take a chance. You know what? It wasn't that bad. Yes the water was a little chilly but it was bearable and you got used to it pretty quick. I'm so excited!!! I really want to spend lots of time in the pool. It wears the kids out and I don't have to think about how to keep them occupied. There is less fighting too so that's a plus. Just in time for Spring Break!!! Now I just need to buy Joshua some new bathing suits because his are a little small. He can still wear them until we get some new ones though.

Things are growing

Last year during the fall, Don and I decided we wanted to grow some veggies. Neither one of us have ever had a garden before but I was determined to grow something. The cost of fruit and veggies at the store was getting ridiculous and unless you buy organic, you don't really know what's been sprayed and what you're eating. Since our yard isn't very big, we decided to do a square foot garden. We got everything set up last fall but then never planted anything :(

Well now it's spring and thanks to my friend Julie's husband David, we knew what to plant and got a few things into the ground. I'm so excited because I really didn't have high expectations for this planting season since it's our first time but we have a few things popping up. I just hope I can keep them alive until we can harvest our bounty. Here's a few pictures of our progress:

Shawn's second birthday party...picture heavy

Well Shawn's birthday party was a success! We had about 8 kids show up plus a brother and a friend of my cousin. The kids had a ball!!! I highly recommend having a party at Oakfield Lanes. It was so cheap compared to other places we have looked at in the past. Best part is you only pay for how many bowlers are there instead of paying for say 15 bowlers and then only 9 show up, you pay for 9 instead of the 15 you made a reservation for. The party was 2 hours long and the shoes were included plus pizza and drinks and we only paid around $120 (we ordered extra pizza and drinks). Here are a few pictures from his party:

Shawn's Batman Cake

We had quite a few balls going backwards, lol