Thursday, October 29, 2009

I'm Still Alive ...

Aron went back to work last week and took the Lovely Laptop with him, so posting has been sparse. He brings it home every night, but uses it for ... actual work til like midnight every night.

I've been also lost in the land of Cub Scouts, Halloween, thank you notes and completing our Passport to Adventure (you go 15 places out of 22 in KC and get a stamp at each place like on a passport ... then the kids each get a "price package" in the mail).

I've also been lost in Rich and Famous Land since I sold my 10th e-book ... I know ... VERY impressive. I'm headed for Oprah any day now.

Anyway ... I'm slowly working on more blog posts that don't revolve around pregnancy or baby brain. I have a particularly compelling one about tacos that I just have to somehow get off my home computer and onto a thumb drive and then onto the laptop. Sheesh. So don't give up on me, Bloggy Friends.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Lame-O Baby Brain

Lack of sleep truly makes you stoopid! Right now Aron is at church with the boys scouring the grounds for good kindling wood for winter fires. Eva is playing at the kitchen sink. Sam is sleeping in a nice vibrating bouncy seat ... a rare moment out of my arms and off my boobs. Callie is watching some TV and hopefully staying out of trouble. I got some "me time" and submitted a bunch of reprint articles last night and today have been sending out invoices and being thrilled with some positive responses. Gotta go change a nice poop of Eva's, and she's waking up Sam with some good crying at me right now (tired but won't go to sleep).

Such is my life these days, and life is good.

Friday, October 16, 2009

We Love Weddings (and Wedding Favors)

Who doesn’t love a good wedding? Aron and I love weddings, and now our kids do, as well. I recently came across this site for wedding favors that you should definitely check out if you know of someone who is planning a wedding or if you are planning one yourself.

I think that what guests take home from a wedding will remind them of the happy couple long after the festivities are over. For example, Aron’s cousin recently had a nice wedding reception outside of a barn. The decorations were amazing … beautiful flowers, Christmas-type lights, candles, etc. The take-home wedding favor was a beaded candle holder. Here are a couple of pictures from that wedding:



Whenever we light a candle in the special candle holder, we remember that evening fondly … a cool evening for August for sure. If I had our wedding to do over again, I would get these cute little candy jars with our names printed on them and fill them with M&Ms or some other naughty chocolate treat.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Woo Hoo!

Tonight I type as I hold my sleeping baby in my arms. Couldn't get to the task of uploading new pix, but will soon! Just know there are good ones of all siblings holding little Sam. On top of endometritis, I also have hypertension and am supposed to be just hanging out, which is hard to do. Anyway, more later, as Sam is screaming hungry now and nursing is going just okay so far ...

Monday, October 12, 2009

Day 6 Without Sam at Home

Today I had to go to the doctor and was diagnosed with endometritis. Thankfully it was something simple that explained the chills, fever, huge belly and so on. I'm on antibiotics now. Got to see Sam at the hospital for a few hours also! I prayed as I latched him on, and I think I even heard a couple of tiny swallows, although my milk is far from in.

The plan is to bring Sam home Tuesday evening, so don't expect to hear from me too much after that! I'll be snuggling my baby and wrenching him away from all the friends and relatives who come to visit him!

Everybody have a great week ... I know I will!

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Progression!

Saturday Aron and I got to hang out at the hospital for hours while my mom took care of the kids and they were actually GOOD! Eva didn't even cry ... amazing! Sam got his feeding tube out of his nose, moved to a big-boy crib, and I got to try to nurse him (so far I'm empty, but still pumping, and our nurse said her milk didn't come in until Day 10 while she had gotten to take her own baby home on Day 9). Saturday night Aron took the 3 oldest kids up there (only 4 people at a time, so no family picture so far). Here are some pictures! Ignore the creepy IV in Sam's head ... he wiggles too much to put it in his foot or hand anymore.







Breast Pump Fun



Callie agrees: you gotta take your fun where you can get it during stressful times. I hate pumping with a passion, but I'm doing it anyway for Baby Sam ... I usually have zero problems nursing (I do realize not everyone can or even wants to), so I love the cost, environment, convenience and diaper odor benefits. Today is Day #5 since he's been born ... wish me luck in getting that milk in for him so we can sit around on the couch all day nursing and watching Flipping Out and Mad Men.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

UPDATE! Meconium Aspiration, the NICU, Samuel's Birth Story and 10 Years Later!


Samuel Scott McLoughlin
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
7 pounds, 7 ounces
Labor started around 7 a.m.

Freaky facts first
All my boys’ names end with –el
My girls' names end in vowels
All my kids’ names and my own real first/middle name contain 11 letters
All my kids’ names start with a different letter so I can quickly jot down an initial when I journal about them or write an initial on a sandwich baggie
Only one of my kids’ births took our doctor away from his office patients; the others were born either at night, on a weekend or on his day off

Thank you, Tresa (my husband's cousin who is the closest thing I have to a sister), for posting about Sam's arrival here!

I woke up around 7 to contractions. Since my shortest labor had been about 5 hours, I figured I had plenty of time to get to the hospital. I lay around snuggling Eva, making sure she was asleep so I could get up and start timing contractions. They seemed very close.

I went to the kitchen to have a fruit popsicle (my breakfast for the last couple of weeks since I’d been waking up to my own personal summer daily!) and time contractions, but wasn’t getting anything regular at all. I called my friend Eva to get the rule on contraction spacing at 7:55. She said if I can’t talk through them, I needed to get to the hospital.

Each one hurt quite a bit worse than the last, so around 8 I started calling Mom to watch the kids, Aron, Sally the Doula and the doctor’s office. Accordingly, everyone took their time. Called Mom around 8:20 to find out she was just leaving her house, then had Aron try to call some friends, neighbors and finally his mom, who showed just in the knick of time it turns out.

Poor Aron! By the time he got home I was in deep labor sitting in the kitchen chair and was in pain nonstop, but I knew I had to get to the couch or lay down somewhere. I barely made it to our living room couch and hung out on my side moaning through the contractions, which had almost no break between them, which was freaking me out.

I couldn’t even consider the possibility of WALKING to the truck and RIDING in it on the way to the hospital, so I freaked out a little and spat out “911” at Aron, who was still skeptical at this point about me being in such hard labor. As he was on the phone explaining the situation, I’m yelling “5” at him … as in, “tell them this is kid #5 and they’ll haul some serious butt.” When I heard him tell them the contractions were 2 minutes apart I just about growled at him, “NO space between!!!!!”

Aron says to me, “The operator wants you to do a few things.” I glared at him. He goes, “He wants you to get down on the floor.” I glared more. “He wants you to take off your pants.” DUH … like I can have a baby with my sweats on! But I COULD. NOT. MOVE. I was thrilled when I heard the ambulance coming about 8:45. They were great about getting me on the stretcher and out the door. Eva and Callie were still asleep. Aron’s mom just arrived. Aron followed the ambulance in his truck. WHY oh WHY do they go normal speed to the hospital while telling you over and over NOT TO PUSH? I’m like, “HURRY UP … you’re an ambulance … if you can’t speed, WHO CAN?!”

The ride was insane. Imagine feeling like you’re dying and being hooked up to an IV (which doesn’t work and turns your arm purple), then another IV then having an oxygen thingie strapped to your face. Then having these guys asking you questions to DISTRACT you from dying! One of the guys went to my church, so I knew all my good cuss words were going to be wasted, and I simply breathed and panted the whole way, pausing only to spit out the occasional answer to a question like, “How old are your other kids?” or “Where do your kids go to school?” or “How old are you?” I think one was hitting on me with that last question, but I had to concentrate on not birthing no baby. I did, though, respond at one point with, "Could you please take my sweatpants ALL THE WAY off?" I hope that wasn't like a turn-on for them: me in my sexy blue sweats.

After a nice bumpy ride, they get me out and we stroll toward the elevator. Someone makes a comment like I can name a girl Ellie if I have it in the elevator. As we round the corner for the birthing room, I GOTTA PUSH just one tiny little time. And there was Sam’s head. Saw a bunch of people in the room, but not my doctor … they moved me from stretcher to bed (ouch), a couple of nurses pulled my legs back and I was told to push. FINALLY. I did, and there was Sam’s body. Covered in poop, evidently. The delivering nurse tried to suction out as much of it as she could. They took him away from me to clean him up and here comes the doctor. Then Aron showed up … because they kept him delayed in the ER. I’m so disappointed because he’s never missed a birth. I think we might chew out the ER person who held him up and make them invent a time machine to fix the situation.

I was so proud of my unmedicated birth, but then I was bleeding too much due to an old and well-used cervix, so the doc had to do a painful exam and gave me Stadol for the pain, which made me feel nice and drunk and weepy for the entire rest of the day.


I finally got to hold him around half-hour after he was born, then they told me he’d ingested meconium and they needed to take him to the nursery for tests and that I could not nurse then (hated that). I wasn’t too worried until he’d been gone a few hours and the doc came back in with another doc to explain that they needed to take him to the best NICU at another hospital. WHAT?!

So around 2 p.m. they rolled him in in his transporter box all hooked up to tubes, and when they took him away I cried harder than I ever have before in Aron’s arms. Second prize for crying goes to when we rode home on Thursday without him in our van.


Yes, you may call him a little poop. It’s some meconium aspiration humor and it is acceptable in our home, especially since he is going to be just fine! His tubes are out and as of this writing he is being fed with a tiny bottle while I try to pump milk for him. He still has an IV in for his antibiotics, which is the only reason he will probably have to stay until the middle of next week.

Thanks for all your love and prayers and good thoughts! And to our parents and very best friends for their support and to the nurses and especially to Ellen, who came up to spend the night in my room in a recliner (and hunted down Coke for me at 5 a.m.) while I slept in my queen-sized Murphy bed with Eva and Callie and tried desperately to get some sleep by deluding myself into thinking I was still pregnant and that was why my Sam wasn’t snuggled up next to me.

Obviously, we can’t wait to get him home! Aron’s home from work but working (you know how that goes), so I’ll steal the laptop when I can for updates.

*Aron’s probable birth story version: “Dang, that went FAST! Hated to miss it, but I’m sure she was beautiful while pushing.” (He has this great set of goggles, folks, and thinks I look good no matter what I’m doing … thank God I snagged him!)

This is how he was all hooked-up when we first saw him at the NICU:


Never fear, parents with a baby in the NICU, because the very next day I got to hold him and "feed" him (my finger in a binky for him; his food in a nose tube). Now he's only hooked up to an IV.


Here is Samuel today! Healthy and happy and ornery as any McLoughlin/Solsberg child would predictably be :-) Thanks be to God for our children.


By the way, here is a piece I wrote about how to support a friend with a baby in the NICU.

And this one is called Life After the NICU.

2019 update and here is Sam at double digits 10 years old!

Happy 11th Anniversary to Me

Since I’m blogging way in advance in case the baby came sometime last week, this one is to let ya’ll know today is my 11th wedding anniversary. Aron was gunning for having the baby TODAY since it’s also his mom’s birthday, but I was gunning for a different day. We’ll see …

In the meantime, I’ll direct you to this post, which I wrote a year ago about how Aron and I met and which eventually turned into a cool little article in The Kansas City Star.

UPDATE: Today my mom is coming over to watch the kids so Aron and I can go see Sam by ourselves ... that's our date :-) Then to grab some food. The kids' treat is McDonald's for lunch FINALLY since they got scrooged out of it the day Sam was born since I delivered so fast!

Friday, October 9, 2009

Appearances

Just because someone is doing something, it doesn’t mean that’s necessarily what they WANT to be doing, what they LOVE doing. People get so hung up on other people’s choices and attach those choices to who they ARE as a person, which is a big mistake.

For instance, cloth diapers are great for saving money and landfill space. They aren’t an inconvenience to me and I could say good things about them all day long. But I’d rather be using disposables all the time.

And my homeschooling method is such that I use bought stuff, like a Catholic-based program of workbooks and other fun-ish (secular … oh, my!) workbooks. I try to stick with it. But I’d rather try radical unschooling. I’m just afraid of the State. And my husband probably wouldn’t be a fan of something so unstructured and fly-by-the-seat-of-our-pants.

Think about these things the next time you visit a friend’s huge, beautifully decorated house that you are jealous of. Maybe she hates it, but her husband wanted it to show off. Maybe she hates all the time it takes to clean it. Maybe she is in debt over having such a large home. Maybe SHE is jealous of YOU because you have a smaller house and you husband doesn’t mind if you have toys strewn all over the stained carpet floor every now and then.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Samuel is here!!

Hi, this is Tresa writing for Kerrie, who's chained to a hospital bed (picking the lock, as I was talking to her this morning, though), unable to get online to write and say hi.

Samuel flew into the world yesterday morning, and has since been transferred to a different hospital NICU because of meconium aspiration at his birth. As soon as Kerrie is released from the hospital she's at, she will go to spend a week or so with him until he's released also. I talked to her this morning and she says he's a little fighter, already trying to cough out the tubes they have running into him, and she hopes to be able to nurse him in a few days. She's doing well, feeling better after some sleep last night, and will be back soon with pictures and (I hope/request) a birth story.

Welcome to the world, Samuel, and congratulations to Kerrie, Aron, and their family!

Floam and Moon Sand

We like to provide a service here at The Kerrie Show, so I’ll let you in on what to buy and not to buy your kids, grandkids, whatever for Christmas.

Don’t by Floam. It sucks. It sticks to your carpet. It’s hard to get off your table. It’s like tiny Styrofoam dots in goo. I hate it.

DO BUY Moon Sand. Prepare to lose some along the way, but it vacuums up like a dream and wipes right off the table. Aron says it’s the consistency of what you’d get if you sat and erased stuff all day … it’s like eraser dust that sticks together. But it’s not sticky. Get a set with the blow-up “pool” for it so you can keep it contained.

And don’t worry: I’ll post pix of the new baby as soon as it’s born and as soon as I can make it to a computer with Internet access.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Gurgling Eva (like a babbling brook)

Dangit, sometimes I hate Blogger. I keep trying to upload a video of Eva gargling and cracking up. Wonder if I'd have better luck putting it on YouTube and then linking there? I don't have time for this crap. I have slothful things to do. Don't cry; someday maybe you'll see the video. It's all about exploiting my kids, right?

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

MYOB

Thursday night comes and that flipping neighbor who can’t mind her own business comes to my door at dinnertime to bug us about bikes in the yard. Gripes that these other kids leave their bikes out front overnight and wants to make sure we don’t. Which we don’t. We put our crap up every night in the garage.

She asks when I’m due. Aron tells her in 2 weeks. I say, “Any day now, and you’re gonna make it come faster by bugging us, lady.”

Tells my kids to put their shoes on so they don’t step in dog crap. I’m sorry, lady, but last time I checked the kids came out of MY vagina. Caring about their wellbeing because I’m incompetent is one thing, but assuming I’m a deadbeat mother all the damn time gets old when you don’t even know me. Loves to snipe at the kids when I’m not around. Snipes at my little babysitter about keeping Eva out of the street. Ya think?!

Why do people do that? It just makes ornery people like me wait until my upstanding husband leaves town and then put ALL our bikes in the yard and park my van in the front yard overnight and jack it up on blocks. Ooh, and devils and skeletons in the yard for Halloween.

Aron’s so sweet and listens to her and nods and makes her think he agrees with her. I get snippy and yell from the other end of the house, “Get a life! You bug everyone on this damn street and the next.”

So I get all pissed off and then I think, “Crap, that could be me when I’m old. I mean, I hope I don’t snipe at kids and stuff, but what if Aron’s dead and my kids never come around because I’m bitchy and I alienate people and all I do is call the city on people’s cars being 2 inches past the sidewalk? I have to NOT be like that.”

Monday, October 5, 2009

Another Brick in the Wall



Hey. Teacher. Leave them kids alone (grammatically incorrect sentence, dangit). Eva clearly is going to be a difficult student.

Can you tell I feel like crap and don't have the energy to put out thought-provoking posts? I'm doing these in advance in case I head to the hospital. Wouldn't want to leave you high and dry on the blog, pals.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Aron’s Family

You’re actually getting a pretty current blog post here … not a stale one that’s been put into the system a week in advance. This one is being put in on Saturday night about Sunday. So …

Lately I’ve been WORTHLESS. If I don’t feel sick to my stomach, I feel feverish or have a headache or sinus issue or just plain must lay around until I build up my energy reserves to be able to do something simple like go to the grocery store alone. Like today I had to lay around until almost 2:00 to be able to go do a fun family thing with Aron and the kids.

So tomorrow I’m going to church at 9 a.m. at Aron's insistence (holy crap!), then we’re driving about an hour away to see Aron’s family (which only happens twice a year … I really want to go so Joel can spend time with his treasured cousins), then later I’m being taken out for ice cream by 2 of my best friends (God bless them).

The NORMAL me would have no problem with this schedule … this would be a light day. The me as of late kind of wants to cry at the prospect of Sunday. And no, I’m not even worried about going into labor an hour from my hospital.

What was my point? Oh, my point is that I’m excited to see Aron’s family (his mom’s family … she’s the oldest of 11 kids). I love his cousins and aunts and uncles. They are nice, down-to-earth people. They will understand if I can’t get up off my butt at all. I love these people! And let’s not forget that my first husband’s family consisted of a bunch of materialistic jackholes. The dad had a some promise, but my biggest accomplishment in his eyes was the year I pulled in $18,000. I don’t make squat writing articles and mothering these days, but I’m the happiest I’ve ever been.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Tresa versus Callie

I have to shut up about Tresa because I’m starting to sound like I want to be her or something and I’m getting a little creepy. But here’s what happened the other day:

Aron was out of town and I was trying to get the boys ready for their fishing trip with him the very next day. I’d been to the doctor. I was trying to make dinner. I needed some sleep. And a drink. Then Callie starts in on one of her horrific tantrums … she wanted me to take a chair downstairs and I told her to wait and was on the phone with my doula. The screaming and crying and exorcist stuff started when Tresa offered to help her take the chair downstairs instead.

The second Callie started in, Tresa grabbed her and took her to her room, explaining how “Mommy’s making dinner and we’re not going to act this way right now.”

I was shocked.

In a great way.

How many people are you good enough friends with who would do that for you? I hope Ellen and Eva read this and know they have my total permission to do the same. Just watch out: Cal’s a real kicker and flailer.

Callie was not hurt. She was not yelled at. She was SERVED.

Friday, October 2, 2009

Recent Doctor Visit

So because Aron’s job took him out of town an extra day, I dragged all 4 kids to my 36 ½ week doctor appointment.

There’s a 6-month-old baby in a carseat at his mom’s feet waiting to be checked in next to me. Eva, of course, goes for the baby to just SEE him … didn’t touch him or charge him or anything like that. The mom YANKS the kid away; Eva tries to come SEE the baby again. The woman snottily goes, “Go find your mommy.”

I go, “I’m right here. It’s not like she’s going to hurt him or anything … she’s very gentle with lots of baby experience.”

Probably Lying Bitch: “He’s sick.” (he’s laying there looking happy as a freaking clam)

Totally Nice At This Point Me: “Oh, we don’t care. We’re totally healthy.”

Bitch: “I do.”

Me: “Dang, First-Timer Stereotype! You don’t have to be so rude!”

Then I went to give my glorious pee sample. I should’ve gone and TOUCHED her kid! Or at least the carseat handle. It’s not like I have the swine flu, but I wish I had the WINE FLU.

Yeah, I know, I’m a preggie on the edge. Then I went to my doctor and BEGGED him to please not do the dilation check (fingers in my hoo-ha for no good reason) today because I was going nuts today and just wanted to go home. And how is it that my blood pressure is always fine when they check it?

Upside: before we left, Joel sold the doc some popcorn that he’s selling for Cub Scouts.

Then we went home and had strawberry shortcake to celebrate my ZERO weight gain! I think everything I’m eating is going to the baby’s kickin’ foot.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Bedhead




Here's Little Eva's daily case of bedhead. She also looks like this when getting out of the car, no matter how much I brush her hair. But, hey, at least she HAS hair, unlike her Papa Dave, whose birthday is today!

The countdown is on for Baby #5 (due on 10/10, our anniversary), so if you see me skipping posts anytime soon, you'll know it's because I'm nursing nonstop. I'll try to be a good Bloggy Friend and post new-baby pix as soon as I'm able!