July 4th, 2009

In addition to celebrating our Nation's birth every 4th of July, we also get to celebrate Grandpa Bill's birthday! We decided to take Liam on his first road trip and headed down to Pennsylvania to celebrate (and to hang out in the pool). Some highlights of the weekend:

Liam - ready for some pool action, flip-flops and all.

Liam and mom swimming - he really loves the water but the weather was abnormally cool so we didn't stay in the water long.

All decked out for the festivities!

We decided to get Bill tickets to the Phillies game for his birthday. Unplanned, Grandma Marie had gotten Bill and Liam Phillies hats for his birthday!!

The gang at the Phillies game. It was a great day for a baseball game and they won! Liam also got a certificate for attending his first Phillies game. Six weeks isn't too young for professional sporting events, right?

Other highlights that I don't have pictures of:
Will riding in the backseat with Liam the whole way to PA
Grandpa dancing with Liam to patriotic music (I do have video, I should learn how to post it)
Intense tailgating at the baseball game
Philly Cheesesteaks after the game
A fantastic pool-side Sunday afternoon BBQ

Liam was a trooper - he was excellent in the car. He may be rethinking the decision to behave so well because this was only the first of several roadtrips in July!

Tummy Time

June 24, 2009 - One Month!

We can't believe that this little guy has been in our lives for just more than one month. It's amazing how quickly he is changing and growing and becoming a little person with a personality (not that he hasn't had quite the personality since before he was born).

At his one-month checkup, he weighed 9 lb, 6 oz and was 21 in. long so he's grown two pounds and two inches! He's starting to get perfectly chunky and eats a lot. He is also very vocal and makes noises all the time, whether eating, playing or sleeping (makes him an interesting roommate). Our favorite noises so far are the laughing in his sleep and the sheep noises - his favorite noises seem to be grunts.

Mom and Dad are also growing into our new roles and learning to live with new sleep patterns. We have a lot of fun trying to keep him awake when it's time to be awake and almost as much fun trying to get him to sleep when it's time to sleep. I'm hoping he'll learn to blog soon so he can keep everyone updated on his adventures!

We're going to try to remember to take pictures with the monkey every month to show how much he is growing.

I also did an impromptu photo shoot during his awake time on Wednesday and it turned out pretty well - he was very cooperative!

He is a really sweet boy. I think this picture almost captures how sweet he is.

His less serious side.

Showing off the milk belly.

William Martell Doutre

Baby Liam
more formally known as
William Martell Doutre
born
Sunday, May 24th, 2009 at 4:11 pm EDT
weighing in at 7 lbs. 6 0z.
(not bad for coming three weeks earlier than planned)
19 in. long

Many more pictures and fun stories to come!

We're getting around to putting some pictures up of our new little guy. More to come after we're home and settled in a little (we're headed home from the hospital tomorrow after a week and are very excited!).

***Disclaimer - the next few posts were written from a hospital bed following a week of extremely limited sleep and consumption of various narcotics. Read at your own risk!***

The New Parents

Grandma Ronda

We are so blessed that my mom was able to fly right out as soon as we found out we were coming in to the hospital. She has been such a wonderful help and a lot of fun to keep me entertained and happy while cooped up here for a week. We love her and are very grateful for her. (I think we're also wearing her out!)

Liam Love

Liam was so blessed that he had so many people here to meet when he arrived. Grandma Ronda flew in on Friday from Utah and Grandpa Bill and Grandma Marie drove up from Pennsylvania early Friday morning. Uncle Dave flew in to be here for Will's graduation and got to be here for Liam's big day as well!

Liam's Birth

Thursday evening at 7:00 we checked in to Women and Infants' Hospital. We met with an in-house midwife who informed me that they were going to start "ripening" me to be induced right away. Starting at about 9:00 on Thursday night until Sunday morning, they did exactly that. I will spare you all the gory details, but it was not a fun 60+ hours. They did all they could to get labor going. Unfortunately, my body and the baby were well-informed and knew that this pregnancy still had at least three weeks left to go and did all they could to reduce the induction. Baby Liam was not ready to come out and my body was doing all it could to keep him in there.

As a bit of history, Will and I had been working very hard the past nine months preparing to have this baby with as little intervention as possible. We were planning on birthing in the alternative birthing center at the hospital and took classes to prepare us for a wonderful natural birth. When we came into the hospital on Thursday we still thought that could happen, for a few days (!!).

After all of the trying including an entire day of extremely painful induced labor on Saturday and a night of a really strange reaction to morphine, I was exhausted beyond my ability to cope. About 4:30 on Sunday morning, Will gave me a beautiful Priesthood blessing and I was finally able to sleep. Will got up early Sunday morning and went to his graduation from Brown (Yay!!!) and when he came back, together with an amazing midwife and surgeon, we decided that my body was just not going to give us this baby and that it was urgent enough to get him out that a c-section was probably the best option. Once we had made that decision, everything came together very quickly. We told the midwife our decision right around 2:00 and Liam was born at 4:11. The operation went super-smoothly and there were quite a few confirmations that we made the right choice for him to come to the world the way he did.

Here are some pictures:

This is the view from our room (nice sunsets saved my sanity more than once).
Heading in to the OR.
Also heading in to the OR.

Just a few minutes later. Baby Liam's first photo.

Dr. Bowling giving me a peak at our little guy. Note how unhappy he is that we found a way to get him out despite his strong resistance for several days.

First family photo.

Mom and Liam in recovery.
Dad and Liam a couple days later - the first time we were able to catch him with his eyes open.

Itchy Feet

About a week and half ago, my feet started to itch a lot at night. At first I just added it to my list of pregnancy conditions that inhibit sleep and encourage restlessness, but they continued to itch more and more each night. At my appointment with our midwife last Tuesday, I decided to ask her if it was normal for my feet to be so itchy. She said that it might just be something random happening but that there was a very small chance that I had developed a condition with my liver. She decided that we should run the test for the liver problem just in case, but assured me that it was very rare and that I didn't have any other symptoms so we weren't worried. As we were leaving, she mentioned that I should call the office if any other body parts started to itch...

Talk about power of suggestion - as soon as we got home I was convinced that my whole body itched. I had a very itchy night and while it calmed down a little Wednesday morning, it was clear that the palms of my hands were itching from something other than just paranoia. I called the midwife's office and they asked me to come in Thursday morning to have a non-stress test and ultrasound to check on the baby. (Meanwhile, Wednesday night we went to Boston to a club to see my cousin sing, which was very fun!)

Thursday we went into the office and they did the non-stress test (listened to the baby's heart for twenty minutes while monitoring his movements) and the ultrasound and he looked great! They also decided to do some other tests on my liver because the results from the initial test would take at least a week. The midwife assured us that the possibility of any abnormalities in the tests was very rare - even more rare than the other test.

Then, about 5:00 on Thursday afternoon, the midwife called. She said that the liver function tests had come back with some really elevated results and that they felt they could diagnose me with intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy (google it if you want to know more but basically the pregnancy hormones affect gallbladder and the liver and cause a build up of bile acids in the liver which can spill into the bloodstream). Because cholestasis can cause stillbirth and is harmful to both the mother and the baby, they don't like to let moms with cholestasis go beyond 37 weeks in their pregnancies. Since I was going to be 37 weeks on Friday, they had booked a room for me at the hospital to come in Thursday night and be induced as soon as possible to make sure we had a healthy delivery and baby.

So, that's how we got to the hospital Thursday night, much much earlier than we had planned. I can't believe we've been here almost a week.

Fenway Park - Opening Day

April 7, 2009 -- Red Sox vs. Tampa Bay

Not long after we moved into our ward, we found out that our Bishop and his wife have season tickets to the Red Sox. We secretly were hoping that they would invite us to a game sometime this season but were blown away when they invited us to opening day! It was supposed to be on a Monday but was rained out so we went on Tuesday with Sister K and her sister. We had a fabulous time and are so grateful for such generous friends.

From the pictures below you can see that seats were pretty amazing. We were behind home plate, probably 25 rows back. We had a great view and luckily, it was a great game. Fenway Park really can't be beat, Senator Kennedy threw out the opening pitch, there was a flyover, the Easter bunny was there, we didn't freeze or get rained on, and the Red Sox won!

I've even found myself becoming a bit of a Red Sox fan. It's nice to live somewhere where the team wins at least some of their games (sorry Nationals). I'm sure if we live here very long, the baby will grow up being a Sox fan. We've even bought him his first Red Sox clothing. And, speaking of clothing, I must say that the shirt my mom and I found for me to wear to the game was quite cute! Another pregnant woman sitting near us told me she had looked everywhere for a maternity shirt but didn't find one. (If you can't see it in the top picture, it has a cute baseball on the belly that says "Future Fan.")

My bump, my bump, my little baby bump...

I've had mixed feelings about posting pregnancy pictures on the blog. (Maybe I've had mixed feelings about blog posting in general.) Pregnancy has been pretty good to me. After 22 or so weeks of throwing up almost every day, that finally stopped and I've felt pretty good the last half of my pregnancy. I'm learning to adjust to getting up to use the bathroom in the night and I suppose I'm being prepared for not sleeping much when the little one arrives. Luckily I have a pretty flexible schedule and can sleep in most mornings.

Another reason pregnancy has been pretty good to me is that I haven't gained much weight. In addition to throwing up, being disgusted by anything sweet or rich led to some weight loss the first of my pregnancy and even now, I've only gained six pounds. Unless something crazy happens in the next few weeks, I will probably weigh less when he's born than I did when I got pregnant. However, as a result of being overweight when I got pregnant and losing weight, I haven't really felt like I've looked very pregnant. Even now, people think I'm not nearly as far along as I am and friends think I look smaller each time I see them instead of bigger. Not complaining about that, just saying...

February 2009 (5 months)

March 2009 (6 months)

April 2009 (7 months)

May 2009 (8 months)

Nephews

This past month, we were able to spend time with both of our nephews and it was so fun! Alecia and Brett flew out to visit Bill and Marie in New Hope, PA so we drove down for a weekend and hung out. We had a great time being entertained by Brett and playing with all of the new toys that Grandma Marie had at her house. We rode a carousel, went to the park, ate great food (Brett got to try jello jigglers for the first time), and spent a lot of time laughing together. Hopefully we didn't traumatize Brett by throwing (foam) blocks at him and convincing him it was a fun game. I'm sure he'll repay the favor in a few months when he can play with his new cousin. We'll just have to remember to have foam blocks on hand and not wooden ones.

We also got to spend time with Sam while we were in Utah. I was able to spend an entire week at my parents' house with Sam and Becca and had such a fun time spoiling Sam. I'm not sure what he'll think when the baby is here and he no longer has my undivided attention. It will be good practice for his younger sibling in the fall. Highlights of the week include daily four-wheeler rides to the barnyard, visits to Grandma Rudd for loves and crackers, talking on the phone to Uncle Will a lot (he doesn't ever talk to me on the phone but loves to talk to Will endlessly), several car rides, and eating lots of good food (seems to be a common theme when I'm around). I was amazed at how much more he is talking now than last time I saw him (in March).

Hopefully all this quality time with our nephews is helping us prepare for parenthood in a few short weeks. Luckily we have a while before he'll be running around and talking up a storm like our nephews are now.

Cowboy Up!

When we were making plans to go to Utah a while back, my Grandpa Rudd said to be sure to tell Will to bring his boots so he could get them dirty. Get them dirty he did. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of him helping my grandpa and cousins move two bulls and a cow from the pens at the barnyard to the pasture which involved a lot of manure and two fairly stubborn bulls.

What I do have pictures of is the less dirty part of being a cowboy. Will rode my grandpa's horses for the first time, as did my nephew Sam. Watching Will ride was fun, but it was much more fun to watch Sam explore and enjoy the horses for the first time. I actually have some video, but left my new video camera in Utah so I decided not to wait for it. The whole week we were there, Sam was infatuated with the dogs and horses and we spend many hours walking around outside looking at the animals. On Easter, Ross was kind enough to go out in the pasture and lift up all of the kids to sit on the horses' backs, but we didn't have bridles or saddles so they couldn't ride. That was all it took for Sam to be hooked.

Later in the week, Ross came over and caught and saddled the horses and Sam had his first ride. I led him around the pasture and he was awesome, no fear at all. It was also a fun moment to spend with Grandpa Rudd - he was thrilled that someone was riding the horses and it was fun to see him and Sam interact. Friday, we talked my dad into catching and saddling the horse so he could ride again. It was fun, I think everyone except me ended up riding for at least a few minutes. I thought about trotting around a little to see if we couldn't have a Utah-born baby, but decided that 35 weeks was a little early for him to arrive. I must say I'm pretty impressed with my dad's and Ross' cowboy skills - and my sisters and mom as well. My dad even did some real cowboying and helped round up the bulls to take them to pasture.

I look forward to taking our son home to experience cowboy country sometime soon.

May 2009 - Ross' USU Graduation

Will and I were blessed to be able to travel to Utah to watch Ross graduate from USU and to be at Brynley's baby blessing. I don't have any pictures from the baby blessing, but we did take quite a few pictures of Ross' graduation. It's pretty amazing that my immediate family (parents and siblings) all now have at least one degree from Utah State. Go Aggies!

Stomping around

For quite some time now Sara has been feeling our baby move around, and tried to get me to feel him move, but I couldn't. But just this last week while we were sitting on the couch watching TV (Lost I think, since we'd been watching seasons 3 and 4 on DVD to catch up to this season) our baby boy started kicking again and Sara showed me where to put my hand and I felt him kick it, as if telling me to stop intruding on his space. Since then I've felt him kick several more times, each time in response to something pressing lightly Sara's tummy. Our boy's quite the kicker, he's always kicking around in there, so when Sara mentioned that she wanted to refer to him as something other than baby I suggested Pele, after the great soccer star. I don't think she likes it, but as nicknames go, I think it fits perfectly for now.


Speaking of confined spaces, Sara and I went to see Stomp at the Providence Performing Arts Center. The theater was very ornate and beautiful, but the seats not all that comfortable, especially for Sara, she kept shifting around trying to find a comfortable spot, so that Pele would settle down and let her watch the show. The people next to us probably thought she had some kind of ADHD or restless everything syndrome. The show itself was awesome, the noises they get out of every day things, rubber hoses, brooms, dirt on the ground, and their ability to each keep their own rhythm to weave a wonderful musical experience was amazing. For the next couple hours I found myself drumming out little beats on whatever my hands were resting on, and of course when that happened to be Sara's tummy, little Pele kicked back.