Well, tonight is our last night at the Hagerty home in Edinboro, PA.
Health check:
Healthy-8
Vomiting-0
It's been a different Christmas than I ever could have imagined. I actually spent the WHOLE day in bed with a fever, body aches and the chills. I never did vomit thought and I'm taking that as my Christmas gift from Jesus.
Bruce still hasn't gotten sick and I hope he won't this next week as we are heading tomorrow afternoon to my parents in NJ. It's a six hour drive and both sets of parents are driving half way to drop us off/pick us up.
Despite the almost daily vomiting by some member of my family here, it's been a great visit. Rachel has really enjoyed her time with Hannah. I look forward to seeing how Hannah, Rachel, Ben and Sarah get along as they get older. I have a feeling they are going to continue enjoying each other more and more each year.
As always, time with Erin is a treasure. She loved me especially well this trip by waiting on me while I was sick, getting up in the middle of the night to take a turn with Sarah, and by making me my favorite chocolate, caramel pretzels.
I'm continually thankful for my inlaws and feel blessed to be a Hagerty.
Yesterday: We built a rockin snow man with a slide on the back. It was PERFECT snow for packing, and we had cocoa.
Christmas Eve: My mom started puking. Christmas: Nicole is going south. We are waiting for her to blow chunks at any minutes. We did have fun opening gifts this morning. We were able to Skype Jeff in from Okinawa this morning so that was really nice.
Puke toll from before I came: Erin, Hannah and Ben Puke toll since I have been home. Dad, Rachel, Mom, and we are waitig for Nicole. I am trying to be as useful as I can before I go down hill.
And...Currently we are watching the movie Burned After Reading. Don't rent it.
So Hannah, Rachel and Ben got Chrsitmas outfits from Luli and Erin hooked us up with Sarah Bookhammer who is trying to start a photography business. Some of them turned out really well.
As you can see from Bruce's posts, we had quite a day yesterday. We barely made it out of Portland, we barely made it out of Chicago, and we arrived in Cleveland, OH with no bags or car seats. Thank God, truly, that we got out because as I understand it, Portland airport is closed until Monday and more storms are heading across the country.
Sarah Kate was a dream traveler. She slept and ate the WHOLE day and barely made a sound. The rest of us didn't fare so well. Since Southwest doesn't provide meals (for free or to purchase) we spent the day eating nuts, cookies, dried fruit and pretzels. For me, it was physically harder than I imagined. I thought since I'd be tired anyway it wouldn't' be a problem, but maybe flying two weeks after giving birth isn't the best idea. I'm guessing it will take me a few days to catch up on rest and have my body stop aching.
We spent the night last night at Bruce's Aunt Kay and Uncle Henry's home in Cleveland. Bruce's dad came to get us at the airport (a 2 hour drive from their home) but since we didn't have the car seats and it was late (11 PM EST) we thought it best to spend the night and get our luggage in the morning.
Please pray for us all. Bruce's dad came down with the stomach flu last night and has been throwing up all morning. I hate throwing up! And, I can't imagine getting sick and still having to nurse a baby.
On a good note, our luggage did make it and Bruce is picking it up as I type. Once we get the car seats, we'll venture the two hours to Edinboro, PA with the girls and Bruce's dad. Please pray with me that he doesn't throw up the whole ride home and infect us all. I really want to stay healthy while we are here.
If you don't hear from us, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and a Happy New Year!
Consider it an act of God. At the expense of a few travelers from Chicago. Our last chance flight to get to Cleveland tonight was delayed just long enough t turn what should have been a 6 plus hour lay over into a 10 minute layover. Mom: 'If we get our luggage, Southwest will be MY airline.'
This is a picture of Rach-11 and Mom anticipating a short flight before seeing Grampa, eating dinner, and heading home for some sweet dreams.
Last night I tried to schedule a cab to take us to te airport. There were no cabs that were willing to schedule a pick up with a minivan. I ended up renting a minivan instead. That worked well. Then today at PDX Southwest had 3 de-ice trucks all of which were broken. I have rescheduled my connecting flight twice now and it appears that we are going to have to spend the night in Chicago. I feel bad though for the folks who were scheduled to fly out after 10-45. All their flights were canceled. It is Currently 1-16 PM and we were supposed to take off at 8-30. As amazing as Sarah K8 is, she apparently is not our good luck charm when it comes to flying. To her credit she has barely made a peep.
Here are some pics from the first couple of days at home. Kaya is SUPER intersted in Sarah and Rachel is a great big sister. She wants to kiss her before bed and loves to hold her. When Sarah crys and Rachel is holding her. Rachel strokes her head and tells her its going to be ok. Its super cute.
So I am home tonight with Rachel while Nicole and Sarah spend one more night in the hospital, and thought I would take some time to add some new photos and maybe get a video of Rachel uploaded that show how much she likes her present from her big sister.
First let me say a few things. 1. Nicole is amazing. She stuck with about 3 hours of back labor before getting an epidural and then when it came time to push got Sarah out head to toe in one push. You can see the look on Abby's face in that last set of pictures which pretty much says it all. Seeing her today with both of our children reminds me of how stinkin smart I am for asking her to marry me. She is a great mom.
2. Sarah is amazing. She is already a solid feeder and takes a pacifier and is super cute even with her diaper loads of tar poopie.
3. Rachel is amazing. She took the day away from mommy and daddy with absolute ease. And when it came time for business she did her job well by welcoming every guest into the hospital room and introduced them to her "baby sister" who by the way got her a rockin present.
4. Abby Doula is amazing. Havinig her there was truly terrific. I can not speak about all Doulas, but I speak about Abby Doula. She rocked. She encouraged Nicole and was just a huge source of confidence and comfort in the delivery room. When its your turn to bring a new one into the world you should definitely give her a call.
5. Our friends and family are amazing. Special thanks to Alison Dyer who came at 3AM to sleep in our house so we could leave for the hospital, the Crawfords who watched Rachel for full day including Rachel's First Slumber party, Molly who is now 2 for 2 at Hagerty births and is organizing meals for us, Jabke who is an amazing midwife, and 85 year old Ginny across the street who let Kaya out repeatedly today even though she is undergoing cancer treatment (some people can't be stopped). Thanks to everyone who visited and showed enthusiasm by checking the blog and calling us. I do this because I particularly love my family who live across the country and know that they wish they could be here as much as much as I wish they could be here. It has been a crazy couple of days and it has been a blast to read all your comments and receive all your phone calls. Also special thanks to Colleen "good eyes" Martin!
Lastly a quote from Rachel who is currently obsessed with poopie.
"Mommy wheres your poopie, its over there in your butt. -singing- Old Macdonald had a butt and on that butt he had some poopie E I E I O. With a poopie poopie here and a poopie poopie there"..... and so on. Know that if Nicole were doing this blog that would have not been a memorable quote. However for me, it was hysterical. Note that there was no part of the quote were Mommy responds. Rachel was off playing with her new baby and talking to herself and was perfectly content to let this one evolve on its own.
A quick aside. Several times now I have had to go back and change the pronoun "she" to an actual name of someone in my immediate family. That pronoun is becoming less and less useful for me in situations where I am trying to be specific.
She is a trooper. Nicole had some back labor. She tried walking it off, swaying it off, jacuzzi-ing it off and just toughing it out. We are convinced she shortened her labor by her efforts however she ended up with an epidural. Now we are hoping for a short nap.
Oh I can already tell this baby is going to be a joy! Nicole Started some contractions at around 10:30 and we knew we had better get to bed quick so that we could get some sleep. Its a good thing because around 2:00 she was up and having them more frequently. Nicole is currently in the shower at the recommendation of her midwife. My guess is we will be at the hospital by 5AM. Keep checking as I will try to keep updating with photos.
