Samuel's Birthday Party!

We delayed and finally got there!  We celebrated Sam's birthday last Saturday evening.  I think he had fun too!  Here are some photos to see some of the festivities:

The cake that everyone got to eat.

Samuel was sort of indifferent during gift opening, but don't let that fool you, he's loved playing with them!  Especially clapping the pieces of this wooden puzzles together!

Again indifferent, but he does enjoy the camera, when we pull it out for him.  :-)

I think we did most of the wrapping paper work, but sometimes he'd grab a piece of paper and throw it to the side.

It took a few tries, but he eventually pulled this gift out.

Sitting under his pile of goodies.

So...  What are we doing now he wonders.

Getting reading for his smash cake!

Ok, so I have this cake in front of me, what do you expect me to do with it?

Ahh!  I have frosting on my fingers!

And it won't come off!  (He kept trying to shake the frosting off his hands...)

Now to dig in...

Yup, I pretty much demolished it!

Except for 1st, it was my first birthday and you shouldn't forget!

So that was a lot of photos, but I figured it would tell the story of his birthday party better than me.  We had some pork loin for supper with some fruit salads and veggie tray.  We also printed off monkey coloring sheets to be colored, we will be putting those in a little book for Samuel.

We decided to celebrate his birthday late (he's about 14 months old now, but only 11 adjusted) because his birthday (January 27th) is super close to Christmas and he just didn't act like a one year old at all.  He definitely acts older now and it isn't even his should have been due date yet!  In the future we do not plan on celebrating his birthday 2 months late, it just fit our situation really well this year!

We had fun and are thankful to everyone who came and made his 1st Birthday Party a good one!

To Have a Preemie or to Not Have a Preemie...

This is a question I have received a lot regarding my current pregnancy, "Are you expecting a preemie again?" or something to that effect.  The answer is a resounding NO, however that would have been the same answer I would have given the day I went into labor with Samuel!  So the answer is, no, we are not expecting another preemie, but you just never really know.  At this point though we have NO reason to anticipate a preemie.  Here's maybe a little more detailed explanation:

When I went to my OB history appointment they ask us a ton of health history questions regarding both sides of the family and of ourselves, including past pregnancies.  One question that I was never asked was if my family had a history of preemies.  We would get asked if we had a history of high-blood pressure, heart attacks, asthma, iron deficiencies, well, really anything health related, but not preemies.

This is because sometimes preemies can seem totally random with no clear reason for why a person had a preemie.  That is the case for us with Samuel and actually for Ben when he was born!  My husband was born 2 months premature and if you asked his parents, they were never given a reason why.  In fact, as the oldest of 3, his brothers came pretty much on their due dates or after their due dates.  We think (as opposed to know) Samuel was 3 months premature because his blood work showed that he had an infection (I had no infection, just him) and it is not uncommon for Mom's body to go into labor to rid itself of the infection.  That is why we think he was early, but again we don't really know for sure.

There are a lot of things that can lead to premature birth when it comes to the health of the mother.  My husband being early could have dealt with something his Mom was dealing with (but I am definitely not saying she was, just speculating), but what happens with her body does not have impact on what happens with my body, because I got mine from my family, not my husband's.  I do have a cousin that was born 3 months early, but again her Mother is not blood relation (married to my blood Uncle), so my cousin being early also has no impact on family health history (and in fact, I don't know why she was early either, or if they even know...).

So Samuel being born early is not a connection to his Dad being born early and also did not necessarily deal with any complications in the pregnancy (which we had none that we know of until I went into labor, which that would be considered a major complication I think!).  Sometimes preemies happen to the least likely candidate and even if a person is at risk for premature labor, no one actually thinks it could happen to them.

I'm not trying to scare anyone (as most pregnancies end completely normally at roughly 40 weeks), just letting you know some of the facts behind what causes premature births.  Sometimes we know why and sometimes we don't.  At this point in this pregnancy (and we're at 17 weeks today) we have no reason to believe that we will have another preemie.  Only time will tell if that will be true or not, but for now I'm not going to worry about something that might happen.  Besides if we have another preemie, at least I kind of know what I'm in for in the NICU (though each preemie can have a vastly different experience in the NICU depending on their own struggles and issues) and I know that the NICU staff at our hospital is first rate and I would be happy to know that they would be taking care another one of my babies.  Until that happens, I'm just going to plan on a long hot summer until August 29th for this Momma!

Due Dates

WOW!  I cannot hardly believe it's been since November since I posted last!  I guess that makes me the slacker, ha!  Anyways...

Due Dates are REALLY important, even though babies are generally not born on them!  Samuel turned 1 year old (is that really possible?!?!) on January 27th, however we have not reached his due date yet, which makes him just over 10.5 months adjusted now.

He's doing great though!  During the day he likes to keep busy grabbing any papers/keys within reach, watching Momma work out and just generally causing any mischief he can get his hands on.  The music set and little car Oma and Opa gave him last weekend have been great for funneling his energy!

That said he's not mobile.... yet.  I truly believe he is able to crawl, just doesn't.  He does LOVE being on his tummy and goes in circles like it's nobody's business and eventually makes it a few feet across the floor.  He is increasingly enjoying standing (with support), but is definitely not interested in taking any steps at this point.  My only request is that he is fully mobile by August (more on that below if you haven't heard our news).

Currently he is also experimenting with dropping his morning nap, which means he will only have 1 afternoon nap.  I'm saddened by that because I love having 2 nap times to do things or nap myself, but alas I'll adjust to only 1 nap time!

So I really want him mobile in the next few months because...  I want to deal with the challenges that come with a mobile child before we have a newborn!  Samuel's baby brother or sister (don't even bother asking if we know the gender, we don't and we're going to keep it that way until birth) is due August 29th.  Samuel's due date was April 28th, so I guess we are trying our hand at the other A month.

So far this pregnancy has been easier on my than Samuel's.  I believe I had more morning sickness problems (which were still more naseau than actual sickness) this time, but overal my energy level has been much higher.  With Samuel I was simply exhausted and everyone would tell me that that is just the way it is when you're pregnant.  I really wanted to start asking people if they'd borrow my level of exhaustion for a few days and then tell me that it's normal.  It was not normal, I was more tired than most pregnant women and it only went away when Samuel was born.

A contributing factor to my exhaustion level might have been allergies.  Due to getting sick a lot last fall I switched doctor's, went on allergy meds and have had more energy than I have had in years.  In fact Ben told me one night that he had no idea what to do with me having all of that energy (that was just before we got pregnant).  I was definitely tired during first trimester, but it wasn't anything a nap couldn't help.  With Samuel sleep did not help my level of tiredness, I was simply tired all the time.

Right now everything is going completely normal with this pregnancy (and other than exhaustion, it did at this point with Samuel as well).  At the last check-up our baby was definitely hiding from the doctor and it took her quite a while to find him/her so she could get a decent read for herself (and so I could hear well too of course).  So this child is also proving to be quite active in the womb just like big brother.  My doctor asked me if I could feel the baby move already, well I hadn't at that point.  Since that appointment I think I have felt somethings that felt like it did when Samuel moved, but I am not 100% certain.  I'm sure I'll feel the baby in the near future!

That is the big update for now!  Hopefully I will not forget about my blog in the future and keep everyone updated!  We have been quite busy this winter and the coming months do not appear to be slowing down at all!  I'm loving my time home with Samuel!