Back to blogging! And the story of McKindrey's birth.

Well, it's been a full 2 months and 19 days since my last post on this blog. I've given myself the excuse of "first time mother."

I will do a brief birth story for McKindrey, since I can't possibly call this blog complete without one. And everyone does one for their first child. Who knows if I will be continuing this blog into our second, third, fourth... children.

On Sunday January 27th around midnight (so technically the 28th) I started having really bad stomach cramps... or so I thought.  I went to the bathroom and went back to bed.  But they continued and I couldn't sleep.  I realized that they felt like the worst cramps of my life, and that's how some people describe labor.  Could I possibly be going into labor? I hardly believed it, especially since so many of my friends had false labors, AND I had convinced myself I would probably have to be induced.  Either way, I decided to try to sleep through it, even if it was true labor. Ha! It wasn't working.

So, I've always heard that laying in bed awake doesn't help you fall asleep and that I should get up and do something (maybe return to bed later).  Surprisingly, the dishes were already done, so I just surfed the web, read a Martha Stewart book, and watched Downton Abbey.  At some point, I downloaded an app to track my contractions.  I was having them every 7 minutes when I started tracking them. Around 3am I decided to take a hot shower in case we did go to the hospital today, and to ease the pain of the contractions.  That woke David up and he came in and asked, "Are you in labor?" I said "Maaaaaayybeee...."

He decided to stay up with me, and we watched some movies, finished packing our bags, and David cleaned the snow off the car (it was snowing pretty hard).

Around 6am I called the on-call midwife, because I had been having contractions about 4 minutes apart since 3am. She recommended I try to stick it out at home longer.  So I made a goal to wait until 8am when the midwife delivering babies that day came on duty.

I made it to 8am, and boy were those contractions hurting by then!  The only thing that got me that far was Aunt Boni's advice that "You can stand any pain for 1-2 minutes." Anyways, the on-call midwife wasn't available when I called, so I spoke to her nurse who said I could either go to the clinic to be checked or head to the hospital. I decided to got to the hospital, because if it was real labor, I wanted an epidural ASAP.

David and I got to to Timponogos Hospital around 9:00 and got checked in.  The nurse Deb came in  for the moment of truth-- how far progressed was I?  Turns out I was fully effaced and 5 cm dilated!  I was so happy to be in labor and already half way dilated!  I asked for my epidural and the nurse had to give me a liter of fluid before I could get it, so we got that pumping in and an hour later the anesthesiologist came in to give me my epidural. I have scoliosis, which made it really tricky for him, and he had to poke me twice for the epidural.  But man once it was in, I was so happy!  I was once again happy to be having a baby!

I kept progressing on my own, and once I reached 10cm around 1:30 we allowed for rest and descent another hour.  By then my initial bolus of anesthesia from the epidural had worn off and I was thinking of pressing the magic button to get more numbing, but my midwife told me not to so I could feel in order to push effectively.  That was a rough hour of hard core contractions!

I started pushing around 2:30!  I was on my left side, but McKindrey's heart rate was going down, so they flipped me to my right side and gave me some O2 and all was good.  Then around 2:59pm, McKindrey was born!  I loved holding her warm little body right up against me while David cut the cord.

Summer got to be there for everything, and was an incredible support and photographer. We got to see Shaun and McKay that night.  My mom got there the next day (it was still snowing hard outside so travel was difficult). I enjoyed 2 days in the hospital eating great food I didn't have to prepare, and holding my beautiful little girl!

I can't believe she is 9 weeks old now! Slowly we are figuring things out.  Baby's are a BIG investment of time and patience, and even physical stamina! She is a joy, though, and smiles A LOT. Her full name is McKindrey LeAnne Parkinson.  McKindrey is from the Shelley family tree, and LeAnne is David's maternal grandmother's name. McKay pointed out that she has 5 capitals in her name.  That was not on purpose! We just liked the combination of names.

Born January 28, 2013 at 2:59pm
20.5 inches long
7 lbs 14 oz.
born at 41 weeks, a week past my due date

Well, David will be finishing his Bachelor's degree in chemical engineering here at BYU in the next 3 weeks!  We will be moving to New Mexico, too.  It will be a very busy next couple of weeks. We can't wait for all the great things that await our little family of three!

Leaving for the hospital!

I have monitors on my tummy under the sheets, which account for my extra huge, lumpy appearance!

With our nurse, Deb, and our midwife, Michelle.

With Dad in the hospital.

Pictures taken at 5 days old!

About a month and a half old... I think. All bundled up for a walk, making a classic "McKindrey face."

Hurry up and wait!

Well, it's that time in pregnancy where every day feels like a century!  I'm not necessarily uncomfortable physically (although I am looking forward to the perks of no longer being pregnant), mostly I'm just anxious to have a cute little baby already!  We are due this upcoming Monday, January 21st, Martin Luther King Jr. day, 4 days from now.... you know the one.  However, I have a feeling she will be late.  Most first pregnancies are, right?  I'm trying to enjoy my last days on Earth prior to eternal motherhood.  This is what the midwife recommended, rather than going crazy trying to induce labor, but I will admit I get a little tweaky and excited when ANYTHING happens that seems remotely related to labor. Ha!

Last weekend some good friends threw me a baby shower here in Provo.  We played some fun games, ate pancakes, and were serenaded live!  It was very fun, and I was reminded of how lucky I am for friendship :)

Last night we went to the BYU basketball against St. Mary's.  It was a close game the second half and we thought we had won when we scored a two pointer that put us ahead with only 3 seconds left.  Amazingly, a St. Mary's player recovered the ball and shot from nearly half court...and MADE IT.  We were all astounded.  And very sad.  BUT, it was a fun game to watch, and we had great company.

Baby shower games!

BYU basketball game.

9 months pregnant! This picture makes me look a lot like the Pillsbury Doughboy...

Welcome 2013!

We are in Los Alamos for the holidays, and I am finally getting around to writing another blog post.  We've been extremely busy being lazy, you see. Watching movies, playing games, eating, reading, eating even more... I think I've driven myself to the brink of diabetes with all the sweets I've consumed.

Christmas was fun, with lots of gifts, luminarias, and SNOW (that made David very happy).  It was even snowing on New Year's Eve.  Last night we played with sparklers to celebrate the new year--see pictures :]  David and I also spent 2 days celebrating our 2 year anniversary.  We stayed at Buffalo Thunder Resort.  We ate at Outback one night, and the Pink Adobe in Santa Fe another night.

 I can't resist telling a funny story about the Pink Adobe.  We trekked all over the plaza in the bitter cold looking for it, because I couldn't remember exactly where it was.  When we finally found the Pink Adobe, we read the menu posted outside and realized how expensive it was.  We were about to go somewhere else, but we looked in the window at the cute, warm little tables and David convinced me we should eat there after all.  We were seated by a fire and had just gotten the appetizer when the room began to fill with smoke.  The fire in the little kiva pit had gone out and was smoldering like crazy!  A man from the other room called "are you okay in there?"  Smoke must have been billowing out of our dining room!  Some staff rushed in and we were moved to another table while they tried to get things under control.  We got a free slice of apple pie because of that funny disaster!  Despite it all, the Pink Adobe was still had very good food, an intimate atmosphere, and of course, the best company I could ask for.

I am in the middle of writing resolutions and making a general "to-do" list for 2013.  I am also dreading our return to Utah and the start of school (and the 10 hour drive that accompanies that-- yuck). However, getting back to Utah does give us one thing to look forward to-- our baby being born!  It's crazy to to think that I'm 37 weeks pregnant. Who knows, maybe the next blog post will have a baby in it...

Enjoy a smattering of holiday pictures!

Gingerbread cookies made by the Shelley women.

Enjoying our anniversary retreat.

Our Chirstmas tree!

Loading the tree up (this pictures was taken with a special filter).

At the Christmas tree hunt.

Die hard sledders.

Baby gift from Sev and Kerami.

Opening presents.

Luminarias.

Skating with a gorilla!

New Year's Eve

Stocking and Camera Love

Last day of school!! For David, that is. We went bowling with his Tau Beta Pi Chemical Engineering Honor Society.  We got to bowl two games, both of which David scored well over 100!  We won't mention my scores, but let's just say I was happy to have a strike each game :)

The past few weeks have been like early Christmas.  David and I bought a new camera for our Christmas present, since we are going to have cute children to record now.  It got here about a week ago and we have had lots of fun playing with it ever since!

We've also been getting baby gifts in the mail! And, I've been making my own gift for baby-- her stocking!  I thought of sewing her a stocking several weeks ago, and it didn't occur to me until recently that she won't even get to use it for like 12 months. Oops!

Anyways, I found a cute quilted pinwheel stocking design on Pinterest, bought the pattern, and had lots of fun picking out the fabric.  It is almost done-- I just need to add her name on the top cuff, but I'm waiting to do that so it will remain a secret until she's born.  Since I can't control my pride (this is my first time piecing AND quilting something of my own), here is a picture of the almost-finished stocking. Taken with our new camera, too!

(Front)

(Back)

Turkey and Baby

We're back at school after Thanksgiving break... but not really.  Now we just can't wait for Christmas!  This very minute David has a Christmas Pandora station playing in our little apartment.  We've also hung up our few Christmas decorations, and I plan on putting up the Christmas lights today!

Thanksgiving was wonderful!  We played lots of games, talked to family, baked, and saw movies in the theater.  We also had a baby shower! That was probably the most exciting part for me!  David was the best husband ever and helped a TON with the preparations, and even agreed to stick around for the party, since it was open house style and we weren't doing any goofy group games or a mass present opening.

The theme colors were red, pink, and white, with snowflakes and "It's a girl" decorations.  We had a big buffet of yummy food, and also collected a bunch of family baby pictures to hang int he living room for people to enjoy.  We also had two games available for guests to play, a "Guess the name of the Baby Animal" game, and a "Wishes for Baby" game.  "Wishes for Baby" was my favorite, because I got to read them all afterwards. It's a fill-in-the-blank type of game.  Some were really sweet, like the one David wrote, and some were very funny, like the one our friend Daniel wrote.  Here's Daniel's for your enjoyment:

Wishes for Baby
I hope that you... are awesome.
I hope you aren't afraid of... your dad.
I hope you love... uncle Daniel.
I hope you get... a brother.
I hope you laugh... at Westley.
I hope you never forget... how awesome your parents are.
I hope you ignore... stupid boys.
I hope you become... a mom.
I hope you respect... your parents.
I hope you [insert DON'T] grow... facial hair.
With love, Daniel Mason

Even more photos can be viewed on our Photo Stream (link found under the Photo Albums tag).

Colored

Last weekend we went to St. George to celebrate Grandma Joy's 80th birthday with the Parkinsons.  Well, the fun actually started when Julie came to stay with us the previous Sunday.  She was here in Provo to help McKay through hand surgery that he had on Monday, November 5th. So, our little apartment was full of Parkinsons all week long! It was fun.

On Friday we finally headed down to St. George to meet up with more Parkinsons! We drove more than half the way in a giant snowstorm.  Yikes! Luckily, we made it in one piece.  Saturday morning David and Shaun ran in a "Color Me Rad" 5K in St. George.  It was a cold, windy morning, and those poor boys only had on shorts and t-shirts.  They warmed up while they were running, though.  In short order, they were caked in colored chalk/powder, too.

It was pretty special surprising Joy for her birthday.  It was great to hang out with the grandparents/aunts/uncles/cousins.  We played games, talked, and ate lots of food!

While in St. George, we were able to retrieve the hardware to put together the crib we are borrowing from Scott and Julie.  Interestingly, once we got back to Provo, we realized we had no instructions for how to put the thing together. All we had were four sides, some springs, screws, pins, and long skinny poles.  Of course, David LOVED that fact.  It was like a big engineering puzzle for him.  Since I can't remember ever having a crib in my house growing up, and not really know how they work, I was all for googling SOMETHING to find directions.  But no, David wanted to figure it out by himself. And guess what?  He did, and it's awesome. The crib looks great :] Although we haven't had a baby (or even a mattress) in it yet, it appears to function properly, too.  We have already filled it with 2 boxes of stuff (story of our lives-- stuff, stuff, and more stuff!).

Now we get to look forward to Thanksgiving, which is less than a week away.  Yaaaaay!

Cheese Bread and Cheesiness

This weekend Clark and Joanna came to visit us on Friday night!  We ate lots and lots of pizza, cheesy bread, and dessert pizza.  It was so delicious, David and I felt like hibernating at the end of the night.  We also enjoyed a planetarium show at BYU, where we learned about creation and destruction of stars, and other wonders of the universe.  We also learned about constellations in the November sky.  After the presentation we got to look through some telescopes on the observation deck.  It was all very intriguing and inspiring.

Saturday we got to RELAX!! Oh my gosh, for once we had nothing set in stone for our Saturday.  Those are the best days, ever.  We went shopping together, did homework/study, and finished reading Cheaper By the Dozen together (one of my all time favorite books).

Today, we went to a stake conference for church, where we heard from Tad Callister, of the Presidency of the Quorum of the Seventy.  He is an excellent speaker, as is his wife.  Then we came home and David made Cheese Bread, or Pao de Queijo for a dinner get together that we are about to go to.  Pao de Queijo is a Brazilian food.  It's a ball of bread with a cheesy center-- so delicious!  I can't wait to scarf them down!