Prayers.

Looking for virtual prayers today and over the next few days. My dad will have his knee replaced early tomorrow morning. It has been giving him so much pain over the last few months so we are all looking forward to his relief.

Due to his surgery and rehabilitation, my mom will be placed in respite care, or a nursing home, until my dad is ready to head back to the home. It is very confusing, scary, and lonely for her, and takes a lot of gentle reminding as to why she is there and how long her stay is.

There is light at the end of the tunnel... but at the beginning of the tunnel, it's the dimmest, right? Mom will return to the home, dad's knee will rebuild and he will be out of pain. During dad's recovery and mom's stay, I need to remind myself to take one day at a time. My mom's sisters are continually supportive and present for both of my parents from answering questions, visiting, helping out. Words cannot express how thankful I am that I am not alone as I attempt to balance support for my parents.

Just gotta keep swimming. Just gotta keep trying. 

A Winter Onederland

This past weekend we celebrated Sam's first birthday! Folks, it was a ton of work - and G and I were absolutely exhausted by the end of the day.

Party invite. I ordered a custom invitation suite off Etsy, and printed the invites at Staples and other paper supplies at home. Here's the link to the Etsy shop . It was great working this shop and her turnaround was super quick. 

  

Homemade milestone sign.

Hot chocolate bar for the 21+ crowd. We also had a satellite hot chocolate station in the garage for the kiddos with extra large marshmallows, chocolate chips, and gummy bear mix-ins.

Found this idea on Pinterest (of course) - I printed 25 photos at Walgreen's and used most to create a number one filled with photos of Sam's first year. I attempted to use shots that hadn't made their way to social media.

My guys. I ordered Sam's "1" shirt off Etsy. 

  

Singing Happy Birthday. The whole time we sang Sam just stared at his Grammy (my mom) to his right. Apparently he believed they were singing for her.

  

"What do I do with this?"

My family. Love my aunt Sis in the background with her sweet smile. She is the best!

He got into it.

Lil' smurf.

The aftermath of his smash cake.

Opening presents! Sam was interested in the envelopes.

After his cake, Sam was covered in frosting. We did a quick change prior to opening his gifts and much to my hubby's chagrin, I pulled out his Patriots jacket (a hand-me-down) in honor of the AFC championship game. I couldn't zip it over Sam's (lil?) belly!

Most of these photos are from my bestie and Sam's Auntie Lavie Jaime. J, her bf, and Sam's other auntie J gave Sam this amazing new truck. HE LOVES IT. I had to get a shot of his sports car next to his truck - he loves both of these vehicles!

Cruising in his truck.

  

Shot of the hot chocolate bar.

Party favors - hot cocoa to go! A packet of hot chocolate, mini-marshmallows, hershey's kisses, and a candy cane stirrer. 

Custom water-bottle labels from the Etsy suite. 

We had exactly 50 people in this lil' house. We were thrilled with the party - so happy that so many friends and family celebrated with us! We made it through a year. That is cause to celebrate!!

Sam's 12-Month Appointment

Whew! It's been a crazy few days. After celebrating Sam's birthday at the Children's Museum, we visited Gram and Grampy where Sam ate his first ice-cream sandwich. We also treated him to a cupcake for dessert on his birthday, which he pushed aside and demanded a banana. Sam double fisted a banana and pushed away his cupcake. I do not know whose child this is.

"Too much sugar. Where is my banana??"

We have been very busy prepping for Sam's first birthday party this coming weekend! Posts will be light through Sunday, and then I look to re-cap the party next week and get back on track with blogging.

Yesterday, we headed to the doctor's for Sam's 12-month appointment. He is 31 inches long, 24 pounds, and his head is 19.5 inches. He remains in the top percentiles for height and weight (99% for height!) and his head is back in orbit on the growth charts. He made it through three shots - including a chickenpox vaccine - I didn't know they vaccinated for the chickenpox! Woohoo! The office recommended Sam's blood be tested for lead and anemia due to his 7 months in a pre-1975 apartment in Boston. I brought him over to the lab and what followed was truly horrific. I do not know who cried more - Sam or I. It took four nurses to hold him down, including myself who was bear-hugging him, and after a failed attempt on one arm they pricked him again in the right arm. Ugh. We spent the rest of the day home, snuggling, feeling kinda miserable, and playing with some boxes. 

Here's a sneak peek of Sam's party - I made this bulletin board of his milestones. Love how it turned out! 

"What's that you say? I am having a party?!?"

Happy First Birthday Beautiful Boy

“one thing about having a baby is that each step of the way you simply cannot imagine loving him any more than you already do, because you are bursting with love, loving as much as you are humanly capable of- and then you do, you love him even more.” 

- anne lamott

"...Before you were born, I set you apart..." - Jeremiah 1:5

We love you through and through, yesterday, today, and tomorrow too.

Thank you for blessing us, for making us a mom and a dad, for coming into our lives. 

You are our greatest miracle and the best thing that we have ever done.

Happy Birthday, our love!

Figgy's Journey

Fair warning, this post is long! Tomorrow I will post the reader's digest version in photos of Sam's birth day.


I am writing this blog post, and I write many other blog posts, for myself, G, and Sam. I really enjoy this virtual journal and it's even sweeter to be able to share our adventures with family and friends in other states.

I've wanted to record Sam's birthing story for some time now and feel that this is the ideal venue for it.

My pregnancy with Sam was overall very easy. I was incredibly sick for the first trimester, but it was as if a switch flipped the second I made it through 13 weeks. Every morning I ate crackers before I got out of bed or else I would become incredibly nauseous and then vomit. I just needed something on my stomach before I got moving. One horrible morning, I got out of the shower feeling nauseous and light-headed, fainted, and woke up covered in my own vomit. Gross. Not a fun memory. I used those ugly Sea Bands to help with nausea, but to many of my coworkers, it was a dead giveaway. I had ugly black bands on my wrists as the temperatures warmed in Boston - not a good look.

Sam was due on January 7, 2013 and after an epic afternoon-evening at the hospital on December 31, 2012, it was decided that we would induce Sam on his due date. I was determined to get Sam out without induction or c-section, so G and I went for many, many a walk in that week. Two days before I went into the hospital, we walked 3 miles in the BITTER Boston cold around a reservoir in Chestnut Hill. I ate curry for the first time hoping some spiciness would kick start labor. 

No luck.

The weekend before I went in, I continually checked the toilet for my mucous plug. One night, I thought it fell out! Labor was progressing! Woohoo! I called G in to see it, and he shared that it wasn't my mucous plug, but his contacts that he had thrown in the toilet before bed.

We arrived to the hospital in the early morning of January 7. We took a seat in the waiting room with our pillows, hospital bags, blankets, jackets. A nurse came over to us and explained that the rooms were at capacity and we would have to wait, perhaps until that afternoon, before the induction process started. Because our induction was not an emergency we had to be flexible to those that were in actual labor or emergency situations.

The nurse left and I burst into tears. We had mentally and physically prepped to welcome Sam on January 7. Of course we did not know how my body would respond to induction, but we needed to be mentally and physically prepped to start the process. I really wanted to be in control of the process (shocker) and allow my body to do it's own thing, and I felt that all control had be ripped away from me.

While we sat and awaited confirmation on what time to return to the hospital, another nurse came over to us as I sat there in tears. She gave me a hug, rubbed my knee. I could barely get out words to articulate how I was feeling, but they eventually came. She told me her daughter's name was Caitlan and she going to ensure I started the induction process that day. She then left us to attempt to find a spot for me in a very busy maternity ward.

I thank God for that nurse. She was an angel. Because my mom has been so sick for so long, I never really imagined her to be in the delivery room with us. Some friends and family have said that their moms will be in the delivery room with them and I never related to it. It was outside the realm of possibility so I never took the time to dread on it. I think God sent me my mom through that nurse in that moment. I needed a maternal hug, a maternal presence.

We were told to go home for a few hours, eat lunch, and then return back to the hospital in the mid-afternoon. As a nurse hooked me up to the monitors later that day, she asked, "Twins?". Errrr, no - there's only one in there. I was huge!

The drugs started to take effect and my contractions began shortly. We were moved to a delivery room and set up camp. G and I walked the halls of the maternity ward and were bored silly. I remember we spent a good thirty minutes looking at the holiday cards the ward received and ranking them in order of cutest picture, best card design, best child's name, most unique names.

G and I also started watching the Sons of Anarchy series during the month prior to Sam's arrival. It was December, I was 9 months pregnant, we needed a show to get into as we didn't have much of a social calendar. We brought G's laptop to the hospital and watched a few episodes. Whenever a nurse came in while we were watching, I made G shut the laptop because I didn't want the nurses to think we were unfit parents watching Sons of Anarchy!

Monday turned into Tuesday. The contractions continued but labor was not progressing. Some of the contractions were painful, but not scream worthy. We continued to walk the halls and heard the sounds of other babies joining the world. I felt like Rachel in her birthing episode of Friends.

Tuesday night I woke up with intense back pain. The doctor and nurses were unsure if it was back labor, or simply back pain due to the fact that it wasn't centered in my lower back. I continued to sit on a birthing ball, walk, hug the back of the hospital bed. I also began to lose my mind. I woke G up and said, "Please get me off these monitors. We gotta get out of here. Let's go home. I won't be in pain at home." Because that logic makes TOTAL sense. The nurses gave me a pain killer as I hadn't had any drugs (other than the induction meds) and I was able to get some more sleep.

Wednesday morning they suggested we go home for a bit and then return on Wednesday afternoon in order to give us a break from the medications, and a break from the hospital. I also woke up terribly ill from the pain killer and spent the morning vomiting.

So we packed up our bags again. Got back to the car again. Still just the two of us. We drove back to our apartment, G set me up in the chair in our living room, and I slept until it was time to go back to the hospital.

We returned to the hospital room we had left, with our bags, and set up camp again while I was administered another dose of induction meds. We walked the halls, the contractions began, but the labor did not progress. We woke up on Thursday, January 10, feeling incredibly exhausted and frustrated. And then, my mucous plug fell out! PROGRESS! We were elated. The nurses were elated. Everyone was feeling so positive! The day continued, the contractions continued, but my labor did not progress.

By this time, I had been seen by all of the doctors in the practice. At around 6pm on Thursday, as they congregated in my room, the doctors pushed to have the c-section that night, or give it another day of waiting for the meds to kick-in and then have the c-section on Friday. 

G and I just looked at each other and said, we are tired, we are exhausted. If I had to push Sam out I was unsure if I had any strength left to really push, and to push a big baby. We agreed to move forward with the c-section. I cried. G hugged me. It wasn't what we had planned... but it was Sam's plan, God's plan, for us.

The prep began. The anesthesiologist visited us, the nurses prepped G and I for surgery, the doctors drew their track lines on my belly.

During these days, G and I were fairly radio-silent from our family and friends. Not purposefully, but we just had no idea what was happening! While we prepped for surgery, we received an email from G's dad and brother. G's dad had wrote a poem about "Figgy", our nickname for Sam while he was in my belly. G's brother set the poem to music and made a lil song. "Is there a Figgy in the house?" - the song let us laugh a bit before surgery, put a smile on our faces. We were so thankful for that lil song in the moments before the procedure. We shared it with our nurse, our doctor. They all loved it. It calmed us down in moments of anxiety.

It was go-time. I was wheeled into the brightest, whitest room, I have ever seen. G needed to wait in another room in full scrubs until the anesthesia had been administered. I took the shot in my back, with my head against the nurse, and she and the anesthesiologist laid me down on the operating table with my arms stretched out wide and a sheet just below my chest.

G then came into the room, held my hand, and was shaking uncontrollably. I wanted to comfort him but I didn't have the words. I had no words. I nodded, I let out "Yes" and "No", but I really wasn't speaking. The anesthesiologist's voice at the top of my head was the most comforting force I have ever experienced. G held my hand and the procedure began.

Two doctors talked me through the procedure. I felt a sense of pressure relief as they moved Sammy out of my belly, I could actually feel him leave my body. I am so thankful for that. I felt as if the pregnancy was a marathon and when we decided to have the c-section, I wasn't allowed to finish the race. It is probably strange to understand, but feeling him leave my body was a gift. I wanted to experience the push, and the pressure release was what I was given.

I did find words soon after Sammy left my body. I looked at G and asked, "Why isn't he crying?" I was petrified - G was in tears, I wanted to sit up SO BADLY and couldn't. I needed to see Sam. They made a phone call and another doctor came into the room. Soon I heard the screaming. The most beautiful sound I had ever heard, the screams of my new baby boy.

He is here.

Our 11 pound, 1 ounce miracle arrived.

Sam's head had a slight dent, a little cone, not what you would expect for a c-section baby. They arrive with perfectly round heads from skipping the birth canal. The small cone was a sign to us that he had tried to head out through the birth canal, but wasn't having much success. There was also a lot of water in my belly, due to Sam's size, and because my water never broke, he was in a sense "stuck" in the water.

We spent another five days in the hospital as I recovered and relied on the nurses to help us navigate the early days of parenthood. I was in a cloud of painkillers so I don't remember most of the stay, but I do recall Sam being so big he wore a hospital wrap top, and a second hospital wrap top on bottom with his legs through the armholes because he didn't fit in the actual pants; sending my grandmother, aunt, and dad out to the mall to get us some clothes that would fit Sam for his going-home outfit; and peanut butter on toast every night at 2am. The kitchenette was across the hall from our room. Super convenient.

So many nurses popped in our room, even those not assigned to us, to see the 11 pound baby. He was the hospital's celebrity. 

He will always be our celebrity. 

Snow Day Blocks

During the blizzard last week, Sam and I busted out the blocks he got for Hanukkah. He played and enjoyed their box and paid no attention to the actual blocks behind him.

Ringing in the New Year

We brought in 2014 with the R's. They live in Massachusetts so we road tripped down south! They did not have a lick of snow on the ground. It was like we were in Mexico.

Last NYE, I was very pregnant and G and I spent the day in the hospital running tests. Sam was measuring quite large so we visited the high risk pregnancy center in the hospital. We were told that Sam could be as large as 14lbs. I thought the doctors had lost their damn minds and I laughed them off. I assumed Sam would be toward the 9lb. range. Due to his size, we made a game plan with our ob-gyn in the early evening hours of New Year's Eve. We chatted in the waiting room of the office as the nurses and the admin had left early to celebrate the new year. Our ob was dressed in a pretty silk top. I remember looking at her with amusement, as she was dressed and ready to go out on the town. It was also one of those moments when you realize that life goes on, no matter what you have on your own plate. Here she was discussing the end of my pregnancy and the delivery of my first child, the fears of his large measurements for his own life and my own. And then she went out to have a glass of champagne with her loved ones. 

It was decided that we would induce Sam on January 7, my due date, if he didn't make his appearance prior to that date. G and I went back to our apartment and drank sparkling cider as we welcomed the year that our lives would change forever more. More on Sam's story to come. 

Needless to say, we were looking forward to a new year celebration that was a bit more low key and filled with laughs. Reuniting Sam and little M was just what we needed. 

Dinner date with fun hats!

Too cool.

NYE dinner date for the adults. Delish filet mignon, anjou pear salad, and mini potatoes. The kiddies ate chicken, corn, and fruit. Too bad for them.

Reunited with his girl and his auntie J. Life is good.

"Can I turn this thing off with the remote?"

Sam was a lil uneasy with the pup.

Lovin' his lady.

Adventurers. They climbed the couch to the bay window. Because that's safe.

Quickly became besties with this lovable doggy.

Sam doesn't appreciate this form of torture.

Up to no good in the kitchen - his first new year tee! Thanks C and MJ!

The most adorable birthday card. Ever. Ever. Ever.

Thank you R's for the fabulous kick-off to 2014!

Sam's Baptism - Decor & Menu

Following Sam's baptism, we hosted a small reception in the hall of the church. It was so convenient to be able to utilize the space, but it's a fairly blank (mundane) canvas. There is an industrial kitchen off of the hall so we were able to set up, chill, and warm our food prior to mass.

This is the invitation suite we ordered from Tiny Prints http://www.tinyprints.com/. This is obviously not our invitation! Sam is not Michael Lucas, I am not Sylvia. Nor do we live in California. Although as we are in the midst of a blizzard right now, I wish we did live in Cali! I loved the blue and green in the invite and incorporated those colors into the decor.

One of our centerpieces. I've used this piece numerous times before. Just slice some limes, lemons, or oranges, or all three, and fill a glass vase. Easy. I used limes and white daisies to compliment the invitation. It's helpful to use a piece of Tupperware that matches the size of the vase to hold the flowers, and the fruit, in place inside of the vase. We didn't use the Tupperware here and it still stayed in place.

The welcome table.

Tissue pom-poms. These are a part of a kit from Martha Stewart and Michael's. I placed them on top of a glass candlestick.

Our dessert table. Cupcakes, chocolates in the glass pillars, and white powdered donuts. Sam's godmother made the bunting - how ADORABLE? We used it over the numerous windows in the room as well. I topped the tablecloth with wrapping paper. Close up shot in the picture below. I found this trick on pinterest, of course. It was a cute, and cheap, table runner and it also protected the tablecloth a bit. We used those cheap-o tablecloths, the ones where if you spill a drop of liquid on the it, it basically saturates the entire cloth. The wrapping paper caught some spills so it didn't look super messy throughout the reception.

The wrapping paper table runner.

Cupcakes made by me and decorated by godmomma A. I love how they turned out!

Favors - sugar cookies from my favorite bakery in Cape Elizabeth. We placed them in treat bags, printed labels based on the invitation and some labels that said "thank you". This font is from my favorite font source, http://www.kevinandamanda.com/. 

Our buffet line. We did order some catering from Whole Foods including bagels, chicken & egg salads, and a fruit display. My grandmother made two quiches, my aunt a delish pasta salad, and we made a garden salad, pumpkin french toast, egg & sausage casserole, muffins, and an apple danish. The wrapping paper runner really helped to keep this table looking tidy.

The only recipe online is the pumpkin french toast. This was quite the hit! I've made it twice since and guests have loved it. Here it is - http://www.twopeasandtheirpod.com/baked-pumpkin-french-toast/. Enjoy!

This was an all-hands on deck operation. A huge thanks to my hubby, my brother and sister-in-law (and Sam's amazing godparents), and my cousin C for their help prepping. And a huge thanks to my family who made a dish, cut some quiche, made coffee, helped place items on the buffet, and most importantly graced us with your presence on this special day!

Sam's Baptism

My cousin C was our photographer during Sam's baptism in November. I have been anxiously awaiting the photos and thought she was holding them hostage - turns out, she was! C and my aunt put together a collage of photos for my parents for Christmas. I was not allowed to spoil the gift by seeing the photos first!

While my dad was putting away some of his Christmas decorations, he found my baptismal candle. It turns out that I was baptized on Sunday, November 18, 1984. Sam was baptized on Sunday, November 17, 2013. How crazy and special is that?! Nearly the same date, and the same weekend, just 29 years later. Pretty special. 

Here are some of my favorite shots!

Dad and godfather K getting Sam dressed after mass while little M looks on.

My family.

With his godparents.

With his Gramps.

I LOVE this picture. Look at that smirk!

  

With the Monsignor - also the monsignor who married G and I.

Thank you C for capturing such a special day! We love the photos - they are beautiful.