Drainage problems and Renters!

So.... our beloved Mississippi house didn't sell. We were just about to take it off the market and have our friends house-sit for cheap and just try again in the spring when we got a text from our Realtor, Jay, that some friends of our neighbors would be interested in renting.  This was a heart-wrenching decision: do we lose money but have people we know and trust rent our house short term but hopefully sell in 8 months so we can buy/settle permanently here in Utah soonish... or do we make money, have things temporarily settled for a year and a half to "precious, responsible, trustworthy" friends of friends but not be able to buy/settle permanently here in Utah for almost 2 years.  We needed to decide fast because it sounded like the friends of friends wanted someplace ASAP.  I felt incapable of making big decisions with my exhausted new baby brain and my stunted, I'm-dealing-with-a-constant-pain-from-a-Kidney-Stone brain.  Finding someway to get our own space has been more and more of a priority as I've struggled to figure out how to Max-proof someone else' house/things, and how to minimize our audio footprint during the beginning of a school year chaos.  Poor James and Dixie! They have been so so great and accommodating and kind but I don't want to drive them mad or strain relationships.  (Including, Chris and my relationship... he's been able to get involved with a lot of fun things at BYU/Provo/his family like basketball during lunch, a singing group, Men's Golf association, sport/show watching with his dad, piano playing, local hikes, a calling at church etc. Its contributed to me feeling even more isolated and uninvolved with fun things in life and I feel like we rarely get an hour together, just the two of us, awake.)

ANYWAY... we prayed about it and I feel like the Lord was merciful in giving me inspiration despite my ability to really work/sacrifice a lot for it. I woke up one morning just feeling really good about renting to the Gibsons... the friends of our neighbors.  

Going from hopefully being 'done' with our house to landlords has made us more sure we want to fix to drainage slopes out front.  This will be both pricey and difficult to do living states away. We asked/hired our friends, the Pages who WERE going to house-sit for us, to sort of act as property managers for anything that required someone to actually be on the premises.  They've been really great and on top of things.  But its been hard to get landscape people to get back to us about pricing for our drainage problem.  One company quoted us almost $15,000!!! Theres no NO way we can afford that. Every penny we put into this house goes down the drain as we won't get anything back when we sell it.  We're already probably going to lose a little money with all the renovations we did when we first bought it thinking we'd live there forever.  We've still got to figure everything out about that. 

Kidney Stone Part 1

My brother, Jordan and his wife, Estefi were celebrating their son's 3 birthday at a splash pad on Saturday night.  It was so fun to get out of the house and enjoy some family time. My mom was still here and would be over the weekend, although she had planned to stay at her sister, Tara's house in Orem since Chris' parents were coming home the next day and she had already washed their bed sheets.  I felt great at the beginning but during the evening I felt some cramping-like pain. I figured it was more after-labor uterine cramping which I had felt occasionally, it was easy to ignore since I was having so much fun talking with my family and watching our kids play. Towards the end of the party, the pain was getting harder and harder to ignore and as I noticed how pinpointed it was in my lower back and front left side it reminded me of the kidney stone pain I felt with my first and only diagnosed stone right after Freddy was born.  I also wondered if the very mild UTI symptoms of feeling like I never could totally empty my bladder that I'd experienced over the past week or so was more evidence of a kidney stone.  I got up from the camping chair I'd been sitting in to find Chris and tell him I wasn't feeling great. On my walk across the splash pad I suddenly felt nauseous. Chris expressed concern and helped me gather up the kids and our things to head home. The pain was very uncomfortable at this point and I'm sure it was starting to show on my face and my breathing and posture but I didn't want to make a fuss so I tried to hide it and just whispered to my mom that I wasn't feeling very good and may need to go to the hospital since it felt like a kidney stone and asked her if she would be able to stay with us for the night again so she could watch the kids while we were gone... which she happily agreed to do. 

I threw up over and over into the bushes at the front of our car while we got the kids loaded and moaned and groaned all the way home. Chris asked if I wanted to go to the hospital right then, but I thought that we should get the kids settled at home first and I guess I sorta just hoped the pain would stop on its own.  It was getting even more intense and also I couldn't find ANY position that relieved the pain, even for a second, and I feel like I practically crawled into the ER with Chris and Theo around 9:30 pm.  They tried to get an IV in 5 different times (and I had big bruises for a few weeks after all over my arms!) When the pain meds and nausea med finally got in me, the pain lessoned to a manageable level and it offered such relief. Why did I wait so long to go to the hospital?!  They did a CT scan and found a LARGE (6 x 8 x 9mm) stone right at the valve before entering the bladder. They said a stone that big usually won't pass on its own and they recommended meeting with a urologist to see about having it removed.  They gave me some more pain meds and sent me home around 1:00am. Even though I took all the meds, the pain continued to increase slightly after leaving the hospital. I woke up around 5 am with strong pain and couldn't really sleep and I sadly wondered if I'd need to go to the ER again.  But by 6:00am the pain stopped. 

I called the Urologist on Monday hoping to maybe get in to see him and have it removed that day or the next. Turns out, He doesn't work on Monday's so the soonest appointment to see him was Tuesday and that would just be to talk about options. Brittany watched Max and Freddy was at Kindergarten so just Chris, Theo and I went to the Urologist on Tuesday. He looked at the CT scan from the hospital and said the stone was big and probably stuck right at the junction to the bladder and said it was up to me on what I wanted to do about it.  I could just leave it and see if it would pass on its own (which he again said he doubted would happen) or just hope it never presents a problem and just leave it there. Neither of those sounded good, I just wanted this OVER so I could focus on recovering from after Theodore and the move etc.  We scheduled a removal procedure for that Saturday, and the stint removal for a week and a half after that. 

All week long, I had random pains, and UTI symptoms of painful and frequent urination...but it wasn't the constant, crazy pain like the previous Saturday.  I was also trying to find time between normal nursing and taking care of Max to pump extra and get a supply ready for the 24 hours when I couldn't breastfeed. 

To be continued...

Distracting Max

Max loves to wait for the kids to come home on the front porch.  Having him home all day has proven quite challenging.  He loves on Theodore, but interprets any attempt to dissuade him from showering his affection on him as a challenge and goes about it twice as forcefully.  He loves to pull stools and chairs around the house to enable him to climb up on things and get into things that he really shouldn't.   Case in point: he loves to look into Theodore's bassinet while he is sleeping.

Which is fine by itself, but it invariably leads to something like this: an attempt to climb into the bassinet on top of the unsuspecting Theodore. 

In an effort to keep Max better entertained at home we purchased a bunch of fun inside toys: a small trampoline, a plastic slide, and Grandma Heather got him with a doll and stroller, and a fun car track building set.  Freddy and Max had a fun time playing with it the first day that it was here!

In addition to distracting toys, we have about 6 baby gates to block off various doors and hallways...and thats just for the downstairs.

Utah Drive-In

Tiff and Ashley and their families almost yearly do a "drive-in" movie at the end of summer. The kids make 'cars' out of cardboard boxes and they rent a movie from Red Box. The kids are given monopoly money and the adults run a concession stand.  I remember them telling me about this idea and I sort of copied it once when we lived in Canada. (just the cardboard box cars part).  This year we could join them!!  Its moments like these that we LOVE living here in Utah.  My kids had already started school so they didn't have tons of time to create their cars, Alec only had about 20 minutes. But it was still so fun. Max sat in his little box for a few seconds every now and then but his favorite thing was the concessions. So many treats all at his level. He loved stealing Freddy's treats for some reason. He wouldn't really steal anyone else’s. 

Charlie spent a lot of time on his car... it was an old-fashioned style car with a long hood. Gwen helped Freddy make his car. 

Tiffany holding both babies: Tessa and Theo. It makes me wonder again how Kayla and Eddie managed with their twins!

Loving on Theodore

Everyone loves Theodore! He is in high demand for being held and kissed and cuddled. 

We had a bunch of my family down to meet him. Tiff's new baby Tessa was born just a week and a half before Theodore. We went outside and enjoyed the perfect summer evening weather, sat on blankets and ate treats (Yay! I can eat treats!!) while the big kids played.

My mom has been here for almost a week and its been LOVELY to have her. James and Dixie took the opportunity to go down to southern Utah for a little vacation and so its just been Mom and our little family...or not so little actually 8 is kinda a lot! Our first couple of rides in our van with every seat full has been fraught with contention and bickering. :( But anyway, I was talking about my mom. She's been so helpful to get meals ready, watch Max and Theo while Chris and I figured out the first few days of school, and provided lots of emotional support. I love my mom.  Its been SO necessary to have two adults around just between Theodore and Max and Chris has enjoyed the chance to get back into work full time.  Besides the fact that I had to go to the ER one night and needed someone to stay with the kids! (more details coming) Grandmas are the best.  I'm so grateful she was able to take time to come stay with us.

First days at Freedom Prep Academy

Living in Utah without being able to buy a home since our home in Mississippi is still on the market presented some challenges, like, where should we send the kids to school? The registration deadlines for a lot of schools was way back in February.  When Chris was out in Utah for the interview at BYU in February he was talking to Jess and Thom about this.  The french / spanish immersion schools that Jess' kids go to already closed their registration. Thom and Brittany's kids were going to the free charter school just off of Grandview Hill, directly below Chris' parents backyard. I remember talking with Brittany about why she chose this school when they moved to Utah last summer.  We decided just to register the kids at Freedom Prep with Thom and Brittany's kids mainly because the deadline hadn't passed yet and it was super close to James and Dixie's house, also if we lived at James and Dixies for the beginning and then found a house and moved mid-year, we could still keep our kids at the same school. 

We still had hope to sell our house and then find and buy one in Utah before school started but we figured we should just plan/live like we'd be at James and Dixie's so we went ahead and bought all the kids everything they'd need to comply with the Dress code.  I kept everything in bags with the receipts just in case we didn't end up going to the school and the kids have been begging me to wear their new clothes - especially the shoes which have to be all black so we used permanent marker to color in any white spots. ha!

Gwen and Charlie were the first kids to start school this year.  Gwen is in 4th grade and Charlie in 5th. Then Alec's first day of 7th grade at the Middle school was the next day and Freddy's first day of Kindergarten was the day after that. 

Freddy has afternoon kindergarten. He gets to sleep in and have a lazy morning. Then we eat lunch and I load up Theodore and Max to drop him off for his class to begin at 12:00.  Then he walks home with the kids. His first day, Chris came home to help park. We misunderstood that his teacher would be taking the class (who had lined up out front waiting with their parents) in at 11:50. So Chris and I had to walk him all the way into his class.

Meanwhile, Theo, Max and I enjoyed a quieter house and nap time.

Grandma Heather and I loaded up the younger kids in the double stroller and walked to the edge of Grandview hill to meet the kids as they walked home from school.  As soon as Freddy spotted us, he started running, slung his backpack off his shoulder, threw his head back and yelled as if he had been in captivity for years, "Freedom!"  He'd only been to school for 3 hours, once.

15th Anniversary

Even though we had a one week old baby, Chris and I wanted to get out for some MUCH needed one-on-one (+ a baby) time.  Grandma Dixie kindly put Max to bed for us and watched the kids so we could eat out at one of our favorite places in Provo, Bombay House. 

15 years is kind of a long time.  Chris and I have had some really good years the past little while and I'm so grateful for our happy marriage. He is a beacon of strength, positivity, wisdom, patience, love, silliness and tenderness.  I love to celebrate special milestones and I'm trying to not be too sad that such a big one has to have a such a typical date-night feel but at least we got to do something, right?

An Early Surprise: Theodore Bryce

Baby number 6 was due on August 20.  We arranged our move to Utah to be as settled as we could with job and living and insurance well before he was set to arrive.  And a good thing too.   On Wednesday night, July 31,  as we were getting settled and going to bed, Brittney's water broke.   I was just trying to go to sleep, and it had been a long day.  I got up and looked up how soon we needed to go to the hospital and we decided to try to hold off until morning.   We weren't really prepared for any of this, as in our minds we still had three weeks to go.  We didn't have a bag of stuff to take to the hospital with us, baby clothes set out, car seat, or a name picked out.   I slept a bit for the rest of the night, but Brittney couldn't sleep and got some things packed and ready to go.

Alec, Charlie, and Gwen were in Idaho for That Famous Preston Night Rodeo with Grandma and some cousins.  We had decided it wouldn't be good for us to be that far away from the hospital, and a good thing too.   This meant that we just had to find someone to watch Freddy and Max, but also that Grandma wasn't home to watch them.  We texted Thom and Brittany in the morning and Thom came over and took them to his house, and then we headed to the hospital.  Throughout all of the night Brittney had been having on-and-off contractions, sometimes closer together, but as we made our way through the streets of Provo and Orem to Orem Community Hospital the frequency dropped down to only every 20 minutes or so. 

When we arrived at the hospital Brittney said she felt like an imposter because she wasn't really "in labor." But we knew that her water had broken and that they wouldn't send us home.  The nurses first took us into a small triage room where they confirmed (quickly) that her water had indeed broken.   Then they took us back to a nice big labor/delivery/recovery room and we got settled in.  We were expecting to be given pitocin like happened with Freddy (water broke 3.5 weeks early) and Alec (induced 5 days late).  The doctor on call thought it would be best to wait until about 1pm and give Brittney a chance to have things progress naturally.  This was a little discouraging as I was anticipating just sitting around in the room without much happening until then, and then being in labor for most of the afternoon and potentially into the evening.

Fortunately, Brittney starting having more regular contractions and things progressed on their own.  Brittney tried to move around, she sat on an exercise ball and we took a few walks around the hallways.  By about 12:30 they told the doctor to come in the the hospital because she was getting close.  He checked her once he got there and said that she "Still had a little ways to go."  That was discouraging for Brittney as it made it seem like there was still so far to go.  Heavy contractions continued for a while and finally the doctor said she could start pushing.  After pushing through 3 or 4 contractions, he was finally here!  Brittney was amazing!  Theodore didn't cry at first and they had to siphon some gunk out of his mouth.  But once they did he gave a nice strong cry and it was music to our ears.   He kept crying until they laid him down on Brittney's chest, when he calmed down instantly.  I am always amazed at how instant that calming connection is made, our kids have always known at once that they are safe and at home once they are in her arms.  (Sometimes I think that is the most basic definition of our family, a group of people for whom Brittney is safety, peace, and home.  I guess that doesn't really describe her, though, but it works for the rest of us!)

The afterbirth stuff is always not fun, and this time was no exception.  They let Theodore stay on Brittney's chest for a good long while which was nice.  Finally they took him and did measurements and cleaned him off a bit.  Everything seemed like it was doing good.

Thom and Brittney brought Freddy and Max to see their new little brother later that afternoon, and it was so fun to see them all together.  Freddy was super interested in holding him, while Max seemed appropriately interested and concerned. 

Since Brittney had gestational diabetes during this pregnancy, the doctors were concerned about Theodore's blood sugar levels.  They had to test him periodically (I think every 2 hours for the first little while, then every 6 hours after that), and he was always just above the concerned level.  But to make sure he stayed high enough we needed to make sure he was getting something to eat.  This was a bit of a problem, since Theodore was not at all interested in eating for about the first 24 hours.  He didn't want to suck on anything, but he would drink if we syringed formula into his mouth.  We ended up trying to breast-feed him like normal, but syringe formula into his mouth when he was on the breast since he wasn't sucking enough to get anything out.  This was pretty annoying, since it took someone helping Brittney but we were lucky to have a wonderful nurse the first night that helped Brittney through the night feedings.

Theodore (barely) passed all of his blood sugar tests and by the second day started to be a little more interested in eating.  Alec and Gwen were able to come visit him on their way back from Idaho, and again it was wonderful to see the kids holding him and loving on him.   That morning before their visit we had finally decided on a name.  Since he came early we hadn't quite gotten around to the final discussions regarding his name.   But we both decided that we loved "Theodore," especially when we saw the meaning: "God's gift."    Charlie and Alec came to the hospital again on Friday night, and then I went home to help with the nighttime routine for Max and the others.  At what seemed like long last, Theodore had met all of his siblings.

Another hospital adventure was the echocardiogram that Theodore had to get.  Because Brittney had gestational diabetes, after we moved to Utah we were referred to a specialty clinic for handling that complication.  On our first meeting with them they did a super in-depth ultrasound, like 45-50 minutes long.  The doctors noticed that Theodore had a small hole in his heart, a ventricular septal defect.  The doctor said this was the most common type of infant heart abnormality, and that it almost never posed much of a long term problem, often closing up on its own.  He said that we should do an echocardiogram once Theodore was born, and then just make sure our pediatrician was aware of it.
So the day he was born, later in the evening, we went to an area in the nursery to get it done.  The machinery wasn't working (it was unable to connect to the database at another hospital that it needed to or something), because apparently they hadn't had to do one at that hospital for a while.   So it turned out that actually did the echo the next morning.   The echo confirmed the hole in his heart and also showed another small one between to other parts of the heart that from what the doctor said probably wouldn't close up on their one, but also shouldn't pose much of a problem.  From reading online it seems like each can be corrected with a surgery if they are causing trouble, but for right now we don't have to do anything about it except be aware.  We are grateful that it seems that none of this should impact Theodore's life and health at all.

On Saturday morning everything was still good, so we got to go home.  Our kids were out on the driveway waiting to welcome us home, which was pretty fun.  On to our crazy lives as an 8-person family!  Welcome, Theodore!  We love you!