Bedrest...sort of

Well, I called my doctor last night because I was having contractions about 5 minutes apart. They weren't painful, and were very clearly braxton-hicks, but too regular for my comfort. I tried the old stand-by of drinking water and laying on my left side for an hour to see if they went away....they did not. So, I called the doctor on call and she sent me to the hospital. The nurse hooked me up to 2 monitors, one for contractions, and one for Emery's heartrate, and I sat...Emery did not. She did not at all like the monitor and literally kept kicking it off. Fiesty little girl! Every time the nurse would get the monitor positioned correctly, Emery would twist, move, or kick and knock it right off the signal. That at least kept me entertained while I sat and waited for the next contraction.

After about an hour of still continuous contractions, the nurse came in and said that they were going to keep me overnight and give me 2 shots of brethene (sp?) 30 minutes apart and then oral tributaline (sp?) every 4 hours all night long. These are medications (the same thing, I think, just different ways of giving it) to stop contractions and calm the uterus. Well, it worked and after the first shot I only had a few contractions all night long.

The doctor came in this morning, and said he was going to keep me one more night for monitoring, and I just about cried. I asked if there was any way I could go ahead and go home, since I hadn't been contracting, and the baby is clearly fine (still kicking at the monitor constantly). He gave in and let me leave, but not before a first shot of beta-methadone (spelling again?) which is a steroid shot to mature Emery's lungs in case she is born too early (I had the same thing with Bekah, and her lungs were great when she was born).

I have to go back tomorrow morning for a second steroid injection, and I'm now on the trebutaline every 4 hours around the clock. If anyone has ever had to take that, then you know how awful it is. It makes your heart race and you feel shaky all over. I was on it with Bekah for about 2 weeks and it was pretty un-fun. I'm not looking forward to 3 months of it this time!

I am also on very restricted activity, though not official bed-rest. My doctor says I need to take it easy, and sit or lay down whenever possible (has he met my kids??). I can still work, but no coaching, and I have to be sitting down the majority of the day. Oh, and no lifting, exercising (ha ha!), driving long distances, or intercourse (TMI, I know, but it's 3 months!!). At least it will be easier with 4, 5 and 1o year olds than it was with a 6 year old and a 12 month old.

So, I am almost 28 weeks, and she is NOT ready to be born. I will do whatever is in my power to keep her in and give her the most comfortable home I can for the next 3 months. My goal is 40 weeks, but given that I haven't yet gotten past 36, I am really aiming for anything past that.

I know this is a lot of information, and it is really more for me to remember than for anyone else, but I thought I'd keep everyone posted! Thank you in advance for your prayers for our healthy little girl.

Disney World!!

**I swear I started this post right when we got back, but life got in the way. I still haven't gotten the pictures up, but I figured I could post those later.**

We had a fantastic trip to Disney World, and I'm sorry it has taken me so long to get the pictures up! The kids had a great time, and were definitely not ready to come home even after 6 full days in the parks. Devin remembers our last trip 3 years ago, but Caleb was only 2, and Bekah was not yet 1, so they don't remember anything. Devin was tall enough on this trip for every ride in the all the parks, so he had a great time riding everything as many times as Dad could handle it.

Caleb was tall enough for a lot of the rides, but he is just not a "roller coaster" type kid, so he spent a lot of time with me and Bekah (who was still not tall enough for any of the big rides) and we met a lot of characters and got lots of autographs. Caleb was wonderful with the characters on this trip, and hugged them all and talked the ears off all of them that would listen. Bekah was still very hesitant with the bigger characters, especially the ones with big heads that couldn't talk to her. She did much better with the princesses and the other "face" characters that were able to ask her questions and talk to her. Her favorite characters to meet were Cinderella and Jasmine. Cinderella is her favorite princess, and Jasmine was just very friendly and talked to the kids for a long time.

We're going to Disney World!!

Yup, we leave first thing in the morning (okay, 12:30, but it means getting up early for us on a Saturday). We'll be there from Saturday to Saturday, and the kids can't wait!! They are all old enough to understand it this time, and are very familiar with all the movies, so this should be a really fun trip!
I'll try to post updates and pictures while we're gone, but I'm not promising anything...

It's all in the Name

After careful consideration (and a little bit of arguing) we have finally, I think, decided on a name.

Emery Christine Molander

I know it's not one of the 3 that we had everyone vote on, but when I checked the top 5 baby girl names for 2008, Isabella and Emma were both on it. And someone suggested that I look up the meanings of the names, and Leah means "weary or tired" which I figured she will definitely make us, but I didn't want to help her out!

Emery was my first choice from the beginning, but I had to talk Bryan into it. Well, he got the final decision on the color of our new hardwood floors (more about that later), so I get the final decision on the baby girl's name. I also told him that if our next one :-) is a boy then he will get the final decision about that one.

So, I hope everyone approves of our choice...and if not, well, it's not your kid! Just kidding, everyone take care!

Stray Dogs

We had 3 pit bulls that broke our back fence and came into our yard. I had just gotten my kids and dogs inside moments before the pit bulls broke the fence, so it was very lucky that no one was hurt. I called Animal Control and they came to get the dogs, and said they would be issuing a citation to the owners (who weren't home at the time). I do not know for sure what will happen from here, but I did file a police report about the broken fences (they broke 2 sections of our fence). They also broke the fence between my house our neighbor's house next door, so Bryan got to repair both of them on Tuesday night after this happened.

The dogs originally came from the neighbors behind our next-door neighbors, broke into the people's yard behind us, then into our yard, and finally into our next door neighbors (I wondered if they might get confused and break back into their own backyard to make a full circle). I did tell all the kids in the cul-de-sac that afternoon to go inside because I was afraid they might break out of the front of my yard and get to our street. Thankfully they were content in my yard and stayed there until Animal Control came to get them.

It was a scary afternoon, but I'm really glad it ended well. I hope that the dogs don't get to come back, but if they do you can bet I'll be calling Animal Control as soon as I see them coming the next time!

We had our 20 week ultrasound this morning...

And....drumroll please....it's a GIRL!!



The pictures are not great because my scanner is not wanting to cooperate with my computer and so I had to take pictures of the ultrasound pictures.

The first picture is her face, which we couldn't get a great picture of because she was head down and kind of hiding. The second picture is the gender determination....you are either looking for a hot dog or a taco, and we had a taco :-) There are 3 lines, which is supposed to be very clearly a female.

So, now it's time to go shopping!! Yes, we already have clothes, bedding, etc., but it's still fun to get new pink stuff that is just for this baby.

And in case anyone is wondering about names, we have narrowed it down to 3 choices:

Leah Christine

Emma Christine

Isabella Christine

If you'd like, leave me a comment and let us know what your favorite is!

Bekah's Favorite Hobby

Bekah has always been a little strange...make that unique. Have I ever mentioned that her favorite toy in the world is rocks? Yes, you read that right...ROCKS!! She is fascinated by them. Everywhere we go she insists on bringing home rocks. She keeps them all in a treasure chest in her room and I swear she plays with those more than anything else she owns. So, for her birthday last year, I went to Target and bought a $3.99 jar of rocks. It was her favorite present!! I had to take them away from her for awhile, though, because I kept finding them all over the house. She recently had them returned, and here is a couple of great shots of her and her most favorite playtime.

And in case you're wondering why this blog has been AAB (All About Bekah) lately, here is what the boys do in their spare time:

Not very exciting, huh? Devin stayed home from school sick on Friday, so the boys spent all day watching movies. Bekah's just not that kind of kid... so she spent most of the day playing with her rocks.