Worries

Ryan and I thought we'd be smart and take all three kids to the pediatrician's office for their respective checkups at the same time. Yes - three kids at the same time. We got there at 8:30. We got home at noon. Seriously.

After filling out some paperwork for Evan, we were whisked back to our exam room with no delays, which is not surprising since we had the first appointment of the day. All three were weighed and measured. All three got their temperatures taken and Sydney got the added bonuses of a blood pressure check, eye exam and hearing test.

Frankly, we were only worried about Evan since it was his two week checkup. I just wanted to make sure he was gaining weight and wanted to ask about the goop that's been building up in his eyes. As it turns out, he was the least of our worries.

Not only was he back to his birth weight, but he was actually five ounces past it and 1.5 inches longer than at birth, proving that he is indeed eating enough. Some simple massages to his tear ducts and a few eye drops will take care of the goop. Case closed.

Liam was there for his 18 month checkup. While his height and weight were fine (a little below average, but consistent with his last few checkups), the pediatrician was worried about his verbal skills. She obviously thought we were nuts because we couldn't tell her EXACTLY how many words he says (animal and vehicle sounds apparently count, but his sign language words do NOT count [which is totally stupid, if you ask me]). Honestly, she's more worried than we are; Sydney didn't really start talking until 21 months and now we can't get her to stop.

Sydney was there for her 5 year checkup. She passed the hearing, vision and blood pressure tests with flying colors (we're still waiting for the results of her cholesterol test). However, her height has the pediatrician worried. Apparently, she's fallen to the 5th percentile from the 25th percentile over the past year and now we have to monitor her growth over the next few months. But, given that neither Ryan nor I were blessed with height, I don't think there's much we can do.

Also, the pediatrician warned us that Sydney's tonsils may have to be taken out. She commented on their size and asked about sleep apnea symptoms. We're supposed to start watching for those as well.

I thought that parents were supposed to be the worriers, but it turns out that our pediatrician is a bigger worrier than we are. I know she's just doing her job, but jeez, like we don't have enough going on in our lives right now! But, I guess we'll start counting Liam's words and measuring Sydney's height on a monthly basis.

The things you have to do when you're a parent.......

Adjustments

Evan's been home for over a week and we're still trying to adjust. Well, I say "we", but I really mean Liam.

Sydney hasn't missed a beat since Evan arrived; she is still going to pre-school and has accepted Evan as another member of the family. She tells me everyday how much she loves him and has asked to take him to school for Show and Tell. She's also an expert at accepting a new sibling into the family having done it once before.

Liam, on the other hand, is not doing so well. Unfortunately, Evan's arrival coincided with the beginnings of Liam's temper tantrums. He's hit Evan a couple of times and he has a new affinity for biting when he doesn't get his way, which is quite often. Luckily, he hasn't bitten Evan yet (just the rest of us).

As expected (although I was hoping that Liam would be the exception to the rule), he's been ignoring me, which breaks my heart. And the roller coaster of hormones on my part doesn't help at all. For a few days, he wouldn't let me hug or kiss him or even get anywhere near him. He's warmed a bit and will sit in my lap to read a book and has let me kiss him and has even reciprocated. I'm sure that once I'm given the "all clear" to pick him up again, the issues will be resolved; I'd have to say that not being able to pick up your older children is the absolute worst downside to having a c-section (well, next to death and paralysis). I'm sure he's confused, frustrated and angry with the fact that I cannot pick him up to get him into his crib or even to comfort him.

He's also being a bit nicer to Evan. He likes to pull Evan's head to his for a rough "hug" and has even planted a few juicy, open-mouthed toddler kisses on Evan's face. Hopefully, the brotherly love will continue and I'll actually have my camera ready to capture the moment.

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In housing news, we are set to close on our new house on June 5th. That's NEXT week!!! We're hoping to move at the end of next month. Each child will have his/her own room, we'll have a yard and a garage to park our cars in.....so far The Land of Fruit = Heaven on Earth.

Evan, Part II

As promised, here's a little more about Evan's arrival and name.....

We checked into the hospital at 10 am on Thursday, May 15th, with nothing but our camera and baby book in hand. I changed into the lovely standard blue hospital gown that we all know is impossible to close in the back and sat in a recliner for an hour and a half. Unfortunately, instead of getting a pedicure or something fun like that, I spent half an hour hooked up to a baby monitor, answered a million more questions ("When was the last time you ate or drank something?", "Any drug allergies?", etc.), signed more forms attesting that I would not sue the hospital if I died (as if that's even possible), being poked and prodded so that the IV could be placed in my left wrist, and being forced to drink a shot of the nastiest antacid known to mankind, which is just cruel seeing as I was not allowed to have any water afterwards.

At 11:30, the nurse walked me to the freezing operating room (still wearing nothing but the gown that won't close in the back) while Ryan was relegated to the "Daddy Waiting Room". After covering me with a warming blanket since my teeth chattering and severe shivering were preventing the anesthesiologist from administering the epidural, I eventually warmed up enough for the anesthesiologist to do his thing and my legs immediately became numb. They had to help me lie down since I couldn't move my legs at all - kinda scary, but comforting at the same time since the thought of going through a c-section with feeling below the waist is terrifying.

Then came my favorite part: the nurses attached a large circular metal frame on either side of the table right at my rib cage and then flipped the bottom part of my gown over it so that I couldn't see what was going on. So basically, I'm lying there naked from the ribs down with about 15 people roaming about the room. Talk about losing what's left of your dignity after making the walk down the hall with your gown half open in the back.

The nurses did some more prep work, but I can't tell you exactly what they did because 1) the hospital gown drape prevented me from seeing anything, 2) I was numb and just felt some jiggling and 3) Ryan wasn't in the room yet.

With my OB poised to make the first incision, the nurse brought Ryan in the room and he sat/stood right behind my head. After some cutting and then a lot of tugging and pulling, we heard, "I've got the head, here's the torso, and it's a boy!" And what did my precious little boy do? Well, he screamed, of course, but then he peed on me as the doctor held him up for me to see. We have a picture of that, but I'll spare you from all the pee.

He was taken off to the side, cleaned up a bit, weighed and tagged with numerous hospital bracelets and umbilical security tags. While I was being stitched up, a nurse brought him over for a kiss and then whisked him away to the nursery. Ryan went with him and I went to recovery where I stayed for about two hours.

Ryan visited me in recovery where I munched on ice chips (my first "food" since 8 pm the night before) and I laid there staring at my toes willing them to wiggle a bit since that particular movement was my only ticket out of there. As we still hadn't settled on a name, we scrolled through the pictures of our little guy on the digital camera trying to decide who he looked like. We settled on a name but kept it a secret just a bit longer.

I was eventually moved to a private room and our families followed me in, anxiously awaiting the announcement of a name and the arrival of the baby (who was required to spend four hours in the nursery). Once they brought him in, Ryan whispered the baby's name to Sydney who announced it to our families. They were all happy with it, but Sydney declared that she wanted to name him "Dylan Jason" instead. "Too bad," we told her.

We took lots of pictures, opened presents, I ate more ice chips and then our families left for the evening, leaving Ryan and I alone with our newest little addition.

As for his name, we had lists going for both boys and girls seeing as we were unaware of the gender.

Girl names: Alyssa, Allison, Audrey, Callie, Cassidy, Eleni, Elizabeth, Lily, Lillian, Maya, Megan, Meredith, Olivia, Rebecca, Sadie and Tabitha

Boy names: Aaron, Andrew, Brandon, Connor, Evan, Linus, Matthew, Quentin, Seth, Stephen, Travis, Wesley and Zachary

We had already decided on James as the boy middle name and Rose as the girl middle name; both are family names.

By the day he was born we had it narrowed down to Callie, Cassidy and Elizabeth and Connor, Evan and Matthew. We decided that he looked like an Evan. I have a feeling that had he been a girl, he would have been Elizabeth. We really liked the name Lillian (in honor of a relative who recently passed away), but the thought of naming a baby Lillian Rose just sounded too soap-opera like. Or like we lived in 1920.

As for his homecoming and how we are all adjusting, that will have to wait for another day seeing as Evan is now ready to eat, yet again.

I'll just leave you with another picture of our little guy instead:

Evan

Sorry for the interruption in blogging, but we've been a little busy around here lately!

We got home from the hospital Sunday afternoon and this is the first time I've had a chance to sit down and upload some pictures from our camera. To say we're tired is an understatement, but we are extremely happy with our new little addition and would not change a thing.

I'll post more about his arrival, name choice and homecoming in a few days, but to get you through until then, I'll leave you with some pictures:




Lots of hair, just like big sister:













Proud big sister, Sydney:



Sydney blowing out Evan's b-day cake (there were four candles because he was four days old):



Enjoy the cuteness!!!

Baby Lozado #3 Is Here!

We are happy to announce the arrival of Evan James
Lozado. Evan was born at 12:10pm on May 15, 2008. He
weighed in at 7 lbs, 1.5 ounces and is 18.75 inches
tall. Both Evan and Jana are doing well and will be
home Sunday.

http://picasaweb.google.com/rlozado/EvanJamesLozado

"Tomorrow..."

"Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you, tomorrow. You're only a day away."

Yes, that's a line from "Annie" and right now it's my mantra.

The level of discomfort with this pregnancy has been much higher than my last two, and while I know I'll miss feeling the little kicks from within from Baby #3 (who STILL doesn't have a name!), I'm ready to have him/her enter the world.

Some of the discomfort may stem from the fact that this baby could be much larger than my other two. My OB is a predicting an eight pound baby (and I'm only five feet tall)!! Ryan and I don't think he/she will be quite that large, but it would explain why I've been so much more uncomfortable.

Anyway, this is my last post as a mom of two. I'll have Ryan post all the important statistics and some pictures tomorrow evening.

Keep us in your prayers around noon (central time) tomorrow!

She's Five!!!

My first baby turns five years old today! She has gone from helpless to independent, quiet to talkative, tiny to huge. It's hard to believe that she'll be starting kindergarten in a few short months; seems like yesterday that we brought her home from the hospital.

May 2003:




May 2004:




May 2005:




May 2006:




May 2007:




May 2008 (not the best, but the most recent I have):




Happy Birthday, Sweetheart! We love you!

Birthday Madness

I know everyone else is doing touching, poignant posts about Mother's Day today, but I'm going to go against the grain and not do a post about Mother's Day. Don't get me wrong - I love my mom and I love being a mom, but we just have too much going on this time of year for Mother's Day to be the center of attention.

For instance, yesterday was Sydney's 5th birthday party. A simple get-together at the park turned into a full blown party with about 50 people showing up to play, eat pizza and whack a pinata.

Here's Sydney blowing out the candles on her cookie cake (although the wind pretty much took care of that for her):




Here she is taking a whack at the Princess Aurora pinata, which amazingly did not seem to traumatize anyone at the party:




Ever seen the movie "Parenthood"? Remember the part with the pinata that wouldn't break and Steve Martin had to pull out a saw to get it open? That was almost us. After each party goer had several turns of three whacks each, Ryan had to do the honors with four huge hits to break it open:




Mayhem and chaos ensued once it was opened. You've never seen so many determined little kids! Each party goer went home with a bagful of candy. I'm sure the parents just love us for it, but hey, it made my life a lot easier since I didn't have to put together goodie bags.

After the party, our families came over to the house to open presents. Ryan and I got her one of these dolls and our parents bought outfits for it. My sister got her a bag to hold all of the doll clothes. She has spent the last 24 hours changing the doll's clothes and carrying around the satchel of outfits. Despite the fake smile in the picture, she really likes the doll:




And what did Liam do during the festivities? Well, he played with the balloons (the boy is obsessed with balloons):




He played in the water fountain and was so tired from all the playing that he lounged for a while:




He is STILL playing with the balloons today. Who knew that he didn't need five million toys? Give the boy a balloon and he's occupied for hours.


Liam also turned 18 months old over the weekend. He is such a big boy now! His favorite word is "uh oh" and he says it all the time. Here he is playing in the sandbox on Friday (the day he turned 18 months and yes, it's blue sand):




Baby news: We're still set for May 15th, although my uterus apparently didn't get the memo because I've been having some pretty serious contractions the last few days. The combination of the contractions and the horrible carpal tunnel in my hands has had me pretty grumpy the last several days, but now that I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, I'm in a better mood. Speaking of baby news, any guesses on the gender based on my belly?





I get a lot of "boy" guesses when we're out and about (and Ryan thinks it's a boy, too), but I get quite a few "girl" guesses, too. Personally, I have no guesses either way. Guess we'll find out in a few days!


House news: We are set to close on our house in the Land of Fruit on June 5th (as if we don't have enough going on around here). It's a one story, four bedroom, 2 bath home on a really quiet street. It's zoned to a great school and there's a fabulous deck in the backyard. We're very excited and we're keeping our fingers crossed that the inspection goes well this week.


Whew! I think that's it for now. I'll be posting more this week before the baby arrives (unless he/she decides to make an early appearance) and I'll be sure to have Ryan post the big baby news (and pictures) sometime on Thursday.

Happy Mother's Day, everyone!!!

Still Here

I'm still here. I'm still pregnant. We're still on for Thursday, May 15th. And I'm still tired.

I'll post again when I'm not so grumpy.

And I'll even provide pictures of the world's tackiest pinata being split open to make up for all of the grumpiness.

Dear Liam

Dear my sweet boy,

I love you to pieces, but you are driving me nuts. PLEASE stop pooping two seconds after I put a clean diaper on you. I realize that you appreciate having a "fresh bowl", but diapers are not cheap and I'm going to have to start dipping into your college fund soon to pay for them. Also, hopping onto your zebra toy and going to town immediately after pooping is a less than desirable situation, too. It would be much easier on both of us if you would just do your business and then not move until I can grab a new diaper and the wipes. Thanks so much for understanding!

Love,
Your Mom

May 2nd

Five years ago today was my last day of teaching. I taught high school for five years before quitting on May 2nd to stay home with Sydney. She wasn't born yet, but I did take off a week to "rest" before her due date of May 12th. To celebrate my last day, I drank not one, but two Route 44 Cherry Limeades from Sonic (Ryan didn't want his) and then we went out to eat at our favorite Cajun restaurant (it has since closed). I had the crawfish etouffee. Yum.

Ten years ago today was my last college final exam (History of the Middle Ages, to be exact). I didn't do much celebrating since I was poor, but I do remember taking one long, last walk around the campus I had called home for four years. I graduated one week later.

In the ten years since that last exam, I moved into my own apartment, bought my first car, taught approximately 600 students, got married, bought a house, had two children and started a business.

Where were you five or even ten years ago today?