Conference specifics

So my favorite session at the conference was a very practical one. Priscilla shared with us a method she uses to study the Bible. She went through her notes, shared with us what she got out of a specific passage (going through all steps) and then has us practice it with two verses. Very practical. I have decided that I will study the book of Ruth, 2 verses at a time using Priscilla's method. I am excited to see what I learn through it. Here are the notes from that session in case you are interested.

Can we talk?

1. Position yourself to hear from God

Habakkuk 2:1 – engage in silence and solitude.

Psalm 27:14 – expect God to speak

2. Pour over the passage and paraphrase the major points.

- James 1:25 – Look deliberately and intentionally into the scriptures.

- Joshua 1:8 – read slowly and meditatively

- Read thoroughly and slowly – Don’t Rush. Read it again

- Helps for Paraphrasing – Consider the context

Who are the major participants?

What are they doing? Saying?

Where are they going?

What is the happening?

When is this occurring?

3. Pull out the Spiritual Principals

- Spiritualize the major points

- What is God teaching? What is He revealing about Himself?

Is there a command to follow or a promise?

4. Pose the question

Form a personally directed question from each of the spiritual principles

5. Plan obedience and pin down a date

Record the time and a plan to obey God

James 1:22 0 Plan to obey

Jeremiah 7:23 – Obedience proceeds blessing

Conferences, birthdays, anniversaries & ER's

It has been a crazy weekend and beginning of week. I will try to summarize but who knows how good I will be at that.

Friday and Saturday I was able to go to the Priscilla Shirer conference at church. My sister had asked me what it was about and I really had no idea. I will take any chance I have to get out of the house, be with other women, and learn more about God so why not just go. It turned out to be very good and I am so thankful I was able to go. To learn more about Priscilla and the conference see the following link http://www.goingbeyond.com/home.asp (more specifics to come)

Saturday Josh and I went out with the Hannon's to celebrate our anniversaries. We had a ton of fun catching up with them and celebrating with both of them. I have decided I have the best husband ever. He is so amazing and knows exactly what I need all the time. I am so thankful that God gave him to me and I love how 7 years has flown by and I can't wait for the next 77.

Sunday we celebrated Dad's birthday which is actually today. Ben's favorite thing about Opi is putting his face in the cake at every birthday celebration :) I just think that my Dad is the greatest Dad and am so thankful for him. Happy Birthday Dad.

Monday was our actual anniversary so Josh came home with PF Changs for dinner and some flowers for me. He dropped a 6 pack of beer in the garage however on his way in and split open his chin. We were thinking he was going to need to visit a clinic of some kind but we butterflied it and stopped the bleeding. Here is a picture of his injury (He is also sad to be one less bottle of Oberon)

Today is actually Dad's b.day. To Celebrate Jacob found some of Josh's migraine pills and maybe ate one. I don't know if we will ever really know but there were three and now there are two. So, off to the ER Ben, Jake, Caleb and I went. The monitored Jacob for 4 hours (let me tell you 4 hours with three kids under 5 in an emergency room is not all that fun) and he seems to be fine. Thankfully that crisis was averted and our little man is looking good. Here is a picture of Jacob hooked up to the monitors looking very cute if you ask me.

It is has been a crazy week hopefully the rest of the week was be fun but without any more injuries or ER visits :)

Edited to add a few classic comments by Ben at our ER visit:
One the way to the hospital I was explaining to Ben that we had to take Jacob to the hospital because he might of eaten a pill and that he could get very sick from doing that. Ben asked if Jacob was going to die (to somewhat scare him into obeying) I told him that we needed to take him to make sure he would not die (somewhat true right?). Anyway on the way (all 2 miles) Jacob fell asleep in the backseat. Ben asked "mommy I think that Jake is dead" I told him that he was just sleeping but he insisted that he was in fact dead. When we went to get out of the car Jacob opened his eyes and Ben said "well I guess Jake is not dead". I don't think that he really understands death. I guess a four year old shouldn't.

when we were checking in one of the nurses thought that Ben was Jacob. She looked at Ben and asked him to come over so that she could put the bracelet on him. I said that Jacob was the one on my lap, Ben said "I am Ben the talkative one" isn't that the truth :)

Easter

I only have a few pictures of our Easter celebration because I left my camera at my parents house (where we stopped for 30min after church on the way to the Nast's). Anyway, here are a few cute pictures of my little men. More to come after my camera is back in my possession.

All Done

As of last Thursday Caleb is done with the light :)
His levels were 13.5/.7 and he gained 4oz so he is doing great. I am happy to not have a glowing baby who is attached to a wall. Life is back to normal around here (whatever normal is)

a new visitor

This is who I saw out my window yesterday evening

Closer but not there yet

Yesterday Caleb's levels were 16.8 and he was up 1.5oz. He is doing good but not quite there yet. He needs to stay on the billi blanket until Thursday. We will then go back to the hospital and then off to the ped to see what is next and do a weight check. I have been trying to feed Caleb every 1.5 hours and pump in between to see how much he is eating. So far it feel like I am hooked up to a machine. I am either feeding Caleb or pumping for Caleb. Josh did get me a new game for the wii that I can play while I am feeding/pumping so that helps to take my mind off of the fact that i am in the same chair all the time. Life with three is going to seem really easy I think once Caleb is off the machines and since both the boys are finally feeling better. I am going to try to take a few more pictures of our glow bug later on when it get's darker but I will leave you with this for now.

Our Little Glow Bug

On Friday I took Caleb to the Ped for a weight check. It is a regular thing that you have to do for infants until they reach their birth weight again. Thursday Mom and I were noticing how Yellow looking Caleb was. Considering it was Day 5 of life for him I kind of hoped it would go away and was just part of the natural progression of life. Unfortunately Friday morning he was much worse. Caleb's weight was down an ounce since Tuesday and he most definitely was Jondice. The Ped was concerned about the weight but most likely it is a combo of the jondice levels and the timing of when my milk came in. So after the Ped appt. I went off to the hospital to get his levels checked. His level was 18.5/7 I know that at 20 they admit him so it is a pretty high number. We now have him hooked up to a billi light 24/7 and I am trying to feed him as much as I can. It is becoming rather old and starting to mess with my emotions. Caleb can really easily move about 5 feet in a room without unhooking his machine which leaves me pretty much stuck in a chair all day. I have been trying to feed him every hour and a half during the day to get his weight back up and his levels down but it is hard. Last night he slept all night. Now that may sound great and amazing and I would love to say that I have a good sleeper on my hands but he really needs to be eating. I did wake up around 2:30 (thanks to Ben's bad dream) and tried to wake Caleb up to feed him. He ate a bit but not nearly as much as I would have liked. Hopefully all the hard work on eveyone's part will pay off at tomorrow's hospital visit/Ped appt.

Below is a description of jondice just in case you are wondering what it is and what causes it.

While the baby is in the womb it is dependent on the mother for food and oxygen. Both these reach the baby through the umbilical cord that connects him to his mother. The baby's blood has additional red blood cells to help in the distribution of oxygen through out his body. After birth the baby begins to breathe through his lungs and hence does not need the additional red blood cells. His body will start disposing off the extra cells. These red blood cells are destroyed in spleen and a major by-product thus produced is bilirubin. The liver removes the bilirubin from the bloodstream and passes it on to the intestines. As the baby's liver is still developing, it is unable to manage, the sudden increase in bilirubin during the first few days. The large amounts of bilirubin in the blood will make the baby's skin appear yellow. Immediately after birth it is normal for babies to have a small amount of jaundice. But if the concentration of bilirubin in the blood is high it could damage the baby's brain. You should ask your doctor to monitor your baby constantly if he has jaundice. Things that you can do:

• Breast-feed your baby as often as he is willing to feed. This will aid is reducing the bilirubin in the blood.
• Breast milk is sufficient to remove the extra bilirubin you do not need to give him any other fluids.

If the amount of jaundice your baby has is high, your doctor will treat him using phototherapy. They will place the baby under a light, naked expect for an eye patch for a few hours, for a few days. This light will not harm your baby in any way. He can be treated in a mobile unit in your room.

More pictures

Here are a few pictures of Mr Caleb. It is much harder to take pictures of #3 I need to remember to try and get a few everyday. Here are a couple, enjoy

Birth Story

I have tried to write out my birth story for all three boys (I need to figure out where it is for the other two however). Anyway, every birth has been different but amazing so . . . Here is Caleb birth story.

3-28
7:30 I woke up and realized that I didn't feel right again. My head was really spinney and I was kind of seeing spots and I had a headache. I slept really well the night before so I didn't think that it was lack of sleep. I went downstairs (with the boys) and had a nutritious breakfast and drank lots of water. After about an hour I realized I was still not feeling any better. I just kep on going however thinking that I would 'wake up' soon. By about 10:00 it was obvious to me that I needed to call the Dr and see what he wanted me to do. So I called mom and Josh to warn them of what was going on. I called Dr. Bart and he wanted me to go up to the hospital to be checked out again. I truely thought I would be home later in the day. I even had Mom just drop me off at the hospital and go back home with the boys. My blood pressure was up a bit but not as high as before. They also did blood work, monitored the baby, check to see how far dilated I was (2) ultrasound baby to check my fluids and made sure there was no protein in my urine. Dr. Bart finally decided that since I am not a complainer it was time to get the baby out. He was obviously starting to cause some issues in me and Dr. Bart wanted to make sure that I didn't go into full preeclampsia (which is kind of were it looked as though my body was going). So I called Mom and Josh and had everyone head over towards the hospital. I knew it was still going to be awhile but I wanted to make sure that everyone was somewhat close.

3:00 - I finally had all my tubes hooked up to me. Here is a list of everything I was on.
1. I was put on a Magnesium Sulfide drip for the preeclampsia. Let me tell you this is nasty stuff. It basically works to make sure your body is not to rigid causing you to become truely eclamptic. The drug also makes you instantly feel warm. I think that I was making everyone freeze that was in the room with me because I was so hot all the time. Since it is such a yucky drug, I had to have a catheter in to make sure my kidneys were working properly. They had to make sure that was was going in was also coming back out of me. It definitely made for a different labor since I couldn't get out of bed at all.
2. I had to be on pitocian to get the contractions moving. However by 3:00 I had already dialated to 3 and was having regular contractions on my own. I didn't feel them at all though. I was pretty shocked when Dr. Bart told me I had progressed this far all on my own.
3. I had tested positive for Group B Strep so I needed to have at least 2 doses of Penicylin before I gave birth so that was another tube hooked up to my IV line.
4. Finally they were pumping fluids into my body (although not a lot).

4:30 For about an hour and a half or so I was feeling great. I was not really in a lot of pain but I was feeling some contractions. I sat up in bed because my back was killing me and at that point my contractions stopped all together. Well actually they didn't stop but I didn't feel them at all. I think that was having back labor and was thinking that the pain in my back was from being in bed with the big belly and not from contractions. My blood pressure was back down in the normal range by 4:30 and I was starting to see less spots. It was kind of hard to tell how much better I was feeling because the Mag was making me feel so yucky.

6:00 Dr Bart checked me. I was still feeling pretty good but was dilated to 4-5. They took this as a sign that I didn't have much longer to go so they started to prep the room for delivery. I told Dr. Bart when he came in that I would like to have a baby by 9:00. He laughed at me and said that somehow since I can read my body so well that will probably happen. I think that it was around this time that the grandparents all started showing up.

6:30 the pain started coming. This is when I think that active labor really started. It was only coming with every other contraction but according to the monitor I was contracting every 2 min and the level was off the paper. It was at this point I finally asked for some drugs. Dr. Bart told me I could have an epidural but the Anesthesia dept was a little concerned because of the Mag they wanted to take another blood sample to make sure all was ok before they gave me any other drugs. In the mean time I had some Nubian which is a great drug it seems to relax you. It seems like it was only a few min later that more people walked in my room for the Epidural. I guess they got the lab results back fast.

7:00 I had the epidural and was feeling much better. I was able to joke around. We were taking bets on when the baby would arrive. I bet 7:57 but really should have stuck with my 9:00.

Anyway around 8:25 or so Dr. Bart came in a checked me. I was 7 and 100% effaced. We all knew it would not be long at this point. As soon as he left the grandparents started coming back in but I kicked them out because I started feeling pretty bad. I threw up several times at this point. (that was a first during labor for me). About 25 min later I knew it was time to push. It was strange though because I was really quiet and didn't want to open my eyes at all this time. I think that was the Mag in me.

9:00 Started pushing. I was joking around with the Dr's and smiling that I would get to meet my new addition soon.

9:11pm Caleb arrived. I felt so much more in control of pushing this time. I just seemed slower and much more controlled than my other pushing experiences. I know that sounds strange since it was only 11 min worth of pushing but with Jacob I pushed one time for the head and one time for the rest of the body and it just seemed to fast for me.

It was another great labor experience. I had to stay on the Mag for 12 hours after delivery and really that was the worst part of the whole thing. I was unable to eat until 9:00 the next AM and I just felt so out of it and weak until the Mag wore off.