Our Little Gymnast

We put Laura into Gymnastics this spring and she had a blast. The only time slot we could fit her into was the 4-5 year old class, but as tall as Laura is, you really couldnt tell she was only 3. She actually towered over some of the 4 year olds. She kept up with the class pretty well also. Some of the 5 and older 4 year olds were more advanced, but Laura did quite exceptional given her age. It was a blast watching her learn mad new 'skillz' and learn to follow the direction of someone other than her parents. She really enjoyed herself and always after each lesson she would ask,

"Are we coming back tomorrow Mom?"

"No, not until next Thursday."

"AWE!" Pause. "But we are coming back tomorrow, Mom, right?"

Sigh. "Right."

The teacher always had fun obstical courses that he would set up in between sets for the kids to work on their balance, tumbles and other stuff.



Laura was a regular monkey!

Benjamin's First Haircut

As adorable as Ben was with his feathers of fine hair a top of his little head, it was deffinately time for a haircut for my 9 month old son. It was hard to let go of my infant and graduate him to...well I guess a baby/toddler. (But the kid had so much hair!) Dale needed a cut as well so we went to Dale's barber, Brad Store, and after Dad got his ears lowered, Brad put an apron on Dale and Ben sat on his lap for the most squirmish haircut I think Brad has completed in a long time, if ever. I have to hand it to him though, Ben's hair was amazingly perfect and he looked so handsome afterwards. Awesome job Brad!

Before the haircut (with a little improvising on the mohawk so that you can see how long it was on top)

In the barbers chair with Dad before his first big boy haircut....AHHHHH how cute is he!

...and the finished product! I know he looks scared, but he was actually just really ready for a nap. Way to go son. We are proud of you!

Property of Mom Forever

I loved, loved, LOVED this outfit. For one, it says Property of Mom FOREVER, for which I plan attempting forever ownership in regards to my adorably handsome son ( can you say "momma's boy?"), and for two, he looks so darn cute in blue because of his deep baby blues. So I ordered this outfit online from Penney's with a coupon that ended up costing me, including shipping and handling, only 6 bucks. Score!

Well as you can see, he had grown out of this particular size, disapointing his momma and crushing her dreams of showing him off as, ofcourse, HER precious baby boy. That's ok, him still makes his mommy so proud!

I had to atleast put him in it for picture sake. Dispite the pot budda belly, I still think he's adorable! "Ooooh! What a tubber tubbers!"

Laura's Song

I made up a song for Laura about the itsy bitsy spider and she loves to sing it and likes it so much, I have decided that I need to write it down for her to remember when she gets older. For all of the body parts mentioned in the lyrics, we point to them while singing.

The itsy bitsy spider climbed up the Laura Lou
He ate her ears, nose, mouth and eyeballs too!

(she thinks the eyeballs reference is hilarious)

He ate her fingers, toes, knees and her Beeboo (Belly Button)
And the itsy bitsy spider ate all of Laura Lou!

We have sung this song so much that it's getting hard to remember that her actual middle name is Madelyn and not Lou.

Oy...

This will go down as one of the worst years, with the exception of Ben being born ofcourse.

At the beggining of October I had a relapse of my Mulitple Sclerosis and it continued to get worse. I tried to see a Neurologist, any Neurologist, here in town and no one would see me without an MRI and alot of dough. So we went to the ER with paperwork stating my diagnosis from years ago that I had faxed over from my Neurologist in VA and they gave me the steroid medication I needed to stop the progression of my symptoms. I am still numb from my toes to my upper chest with my left hand not working all that great. I stumble and fall into things all the time and have too many bruises to count from it all. It scares me, but I just live with it and hope that it will go into remission, and soon.

Dale on the 29th of November went up to the mountains to get our Christmas tree with his uncle and was in a car accident. His uncle slid off the dirt road into a boulder and Dale suffered a broken L1 vertebrae. They called in Life Flight to get him but there was too much fog. Then they sent an abulance whom when half way broke the oil pan and couldn't reach him either. They finally sent some EMT's up in a snowmobile trailer and got him off the mountain and to EIRMC. While in the hospital his blood oxygen levels were extreamily low and he was taken to get a cat scan of his lungs. Come to find out that he had two large pulmonary embolisms, one in each lung, and they transfered him to the ICU for a 2 and half day stay to get those disolved and under control. He was on major pain killers and a medication called Cumadin (later to find out is rat poison) to thin his blood to stop the clots from traveling to his heart or worse. I didnt stop crying until he left the hospital a week and a day after he was admitted. Needless to say my face was quite sore. He has to wear a turtle shell for the next 3 to 4 months with no lifting. He missed his finals as this was all during the week he had to take them so he will have to make them up in the next 2 weeks and he will not be able to work until healed as he cannot lift more than 10lbs and no twisting, bending or turning.


And if this is not enough stress, hey, lets add on a selfish, deceitful 14 year old who kicked and screamed and made us all miserable until she got her way and is now leaving our home to go up to Alaska to live with her biological mother who abandoned her and her brother 3 and half years ago so that she could go be single and resposibility free thousands of miles away from her children. There is not one person close to the situation at home that has not said to her, "Chelsea this is a bad idea on so many levels." Time will tell I suppose. Chelsea has a borderline personality disorder and is Oppositional Deffiant and her mom hasnt been a very responsible parent thus far either. Who will end up being the parent?

Ok, enough of my rant over that...

Here are some pictures of Ben, Laura and my poor lovey in the hospital.

Benjamin Alan is Here!

Well Sunday was a normal day...no contractions, no signs of labor and I was getting geared up to return again to work on Monday with nothing. Dale went to work around 2pm and the rest of us just hung out at home on our lazy Sunday. At about 10pm or so I started to get crampy and the normal BH contraction like symptoms, only these werent going away. I called Dale as he was on his way home from work to complain about the irritating contractions that were probably doing nothing for me as far as efacement or dialation. He reminded me about my appointment on Monday and that the doctor said we would get the baby out. So I hung up with him and went to drink some ice water and lay down. The contractions kept coming, but not very steady and not intense so when Dale got home we just went to sleep around 11pm or so.



At 1am I woke up with the contractions hurting more. They were really weird too. I would have a good solid contraction for about 30 seconds and then it would continue with what felt like menstral cramps until my next contraction that would come every 3 to 4 minutes or so. So I got up and paced the hallway and because that was exhausting and wasnt giving me relief, and the ice water wasnt giving me relief either, I decided to get into a hot bath and see if that would help me relax and perhaps if this wasnt real labor it would stop the cramping. It took the edge off and the mentral like cramping stopped in between, but the other contractions kept coming and were getting to be about 2 minutes apart.



I took a quick shower and then woke up Dale to let him know. He called L&D and they said to come in when I felt I needed to. I really didnt want to sit in L&D all hooked up to the machines and unable to labor while walking and stuff so Dale and I decided we would take a walk to see if that would help. We didnt get more than half a block when the contractions started to get more intense. So 10 minutes after calling L&D, we woke up the girls and took them to my moms and headed to the hossy.



Now what is it about husbands wanting to take the bumpy roads when you are laboring? Dale's excuse to me was that he knew that is how we got Laura here Thanksgiving of '05' and he was just helping me along. I then gently reminded him that he was WRONG and would not be a happy hubby if he did not get on a less bumpy road.

The whole 15 minute ride to the hossy felt like an hour I swear as the contractions were coming fast and hard. We pulled up to the front entrance which is supposed to be open at 4am at 4:10am and the person who's job it is to open the entrance aparently thought it would be funny to make me drive over to the other side of the hospital and go through the ER and be wheeled the extra 5 to 10 minutes down to L&D contractions and all. (Thank you Mr. Front Door Opener).



They got me all changed and into the delivery bed and checked my cervix and I was at 6cm. They asked me if I would like an epi and at that point I was like ooh it must be Christmas because that would be the best present ever! They put the epi in and I felt my right side go numb but my left side was only slightly without pain. So they had me roll to my left side to see if the medication would by gravity travel to that side. But that didnt work so I labored for like 2 hours on just my left side breathing very heavily every 2 minutes as I was having a hard time concentrating on the contactions laying down and in the same position. But they wouldnt let me get up and move or anything remote because of the epi.



They checked me again at 7:30 and I was at 9cm and at that point the epi had completely wore off and I was in hard heavy labor and screaming through every contrations. I accidently punched Dale in the groin during one. Poor baby. They called the anesthesiologist in and he gave me another shot of medicine, but it didnt kick in and Dr. came in to deliver me when I reached 9 1/2cm as I was laboring so hard they were worried I wouldnt have the strength to push if they waited until 10cm. So I pushed my son out all natual in about 4 very excrutiaing pushes and I swear if Tara didnt hear me in VA, I atleast woke up the whole 2nd floor.



Benjamin Alan Gneiting was born at 7:52am on 8/4/08 weighing 7 lbs even and 21 inches with a full head of dark brown fuzzy hair. He is so precious, and we are so excited to have him here finaly. His 2 year old sister is the most excited as he is "her" baby Ben.

08/01/2008 & Still Pregnant

I am still with basketball on my belly and no real signs of impending labor. At our appointment yesterday with our OB I was checked to be at 2 cm dialated with little or no effacement. Oh joy. Although we are not expecting until the 8th, it was a technecality that I was not planning on as with my other pregnancies I had always delivered in the 37th week. Today marks the official 39th week and I am feeling very anxious, and a bit like a failure. My body is just not completing labor like it has in the past. We have an appointment again on Monday the 4th where our doctor said that we will discuss, how he put it, "getting this kid out." So heres to hoping he's out by the 4th if no later than the 8th.

I am at figgure B bellow. It's not A thank goodness, but it's not E either.