Mr. Kai...and baby too

I really should update more on new stuff Kai does. He makes me laugh :P

When we had his Dr. appointment they asked if Kai says at least 200 words. I was like...well, I dunno, does he? But when I think about it, of course he does. He has a book "Baby's first 100 words" and he can name everything in it, and says tons more than that.
He TRYS his colors, but sometimes gets them wrong. 80% of the time he can correctly name red, yellow, purple, and blue.
He loves to point back and forth from me and Rob and say "Mama....Dada....Mama.....Dada" and sometimes does it so fast that he gets backwards and then fixes it.
He loves to do "knuckles" and "spive" (he says "SP" instead of "F" almost always). The other day we were at Rob's sisters house, she has horses, and he loves to go look at them, but is a little scared. He held up his fist to the horse and said "Knuckles!" it was SOOO cute and SOOO funny!
His current favorite movies are Rio, all the Shrek movies, occationally Alvin and the Chipmunks, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, and lately we've found he likes Beethoven. Rob insists Kai wants a dog. He's really been into this Elmo dvd of songs lately too.
He will color for a very short time, then he just eats the crayons....no bueno! BUT he's been bringing home masterpieces from daycare....they're on the fridge :)
He's started kinda singing along to songs, it is so cute! He LOVES music. The other day he was humming a tune of one, I thought that was pretty good. He's been trying to sing "twinkle, twinkle little star" lately. Its adorable!
If I dance and tell him to dance, he tries to do what I do....hopefully that doesn't make him a bad dancer in the future....
Unfortunately he's learned he likes to pull the chair to the kitchen counter and have a utensil and pan or bowl so he can "Make it" he says. Can be annoying.....especially if the kitchen is messy. (maybe motivation to clean it more....which I have)
He still loves his baths, but started not liking his hair washed, so I'd try to act like I forgot to, he'll tell me "Hair". Heehee
Kai can give kisses, but for some reason if its not your lips, he acts like he's blowing his nose on you or something. He does that to my belly for the baby. It IS cute though ;)
We are ALMOST done with the bottle. He is just having a hard time giving up his morning one. Any tips? He freaks out if we give him a cup.
He is DONE with the binky.

This pic is at 12 1/2 weeks. I popped early, because those darn stomach muscles have not come back yet, after Kai. :P

I am 16 weeks along now and my appointment a couple weeks ago was good. Heartbeat is great, they found it instantly, and I'm measuring right on. They scheduled an ultrasound for 19 weeks, but I can pay $25 for one at 16 weeks to see the gender if I want to know earlier. So....we're doing that wednesday!! I'm too excited to wait!! Of course there's things we'd be happy about either a boy or a girl, but it'd be nice to have a girl, so we can have our one of each. Because after this, we are done. :P
People have asked us about names, but we really haven't discussed that much yet, so we will see. I need to speak to the geneologists of the family to see some family names too. I'd at least like a family name for a middle name.
Nausea is pretty much completely gone. I just can't let my stomach get completely empty, and avoid bad smells.
Kai is at a point where he likes to jump all over you, so this poor baby is going to come out black and blue, I'm afraid. Ah well....that will be his/her life for a while I am sure. :)
I'll definately post what we find out at the ultrasound.
Rob and I got a nice break, my mom watched Kai this weekend while we went up north to my cousin's wedding in Springville. It was gorgeous up there and I got to see a bunch of my family that I never see. It was wonderful! I missed Kai a TON, but it was nice to get away.
I'll post some of the pics from the wedding, and another belly shot soon I'm showing so much already! :(

And I slack....so here are some pictures....

A couple with April:



This one was just too funny!


I just wanted to post SOMETHING...so these are some pics I took of April's boyfriend and his baby.

Kai laughs

This was the second time he really laughed. It's so fun!!

This just in....I'm a slacker!

I get so busy and tired so often now, I'm slacking on blogging. Kai's napping, but might not be for long...so I'll update you all.
A few weeks ago Kai had a Dr. appointment at 6 weeks. He was 11 lbs, 5 oz, and 22 inches long. He's getting so big. he's in the 77th percentile in weight. That might be because I had no idea how much I should be feeding him and turns out I feed him more than my 5 month old niece eats! oops! I've tried to slowly cut down, but then Kai acts like he's starving all the time. So we're trying to work on that. Kai's been really good most nights. We've had a couple where I'm up until 1, and once I was up til 4 am, but also a couple nights where he slept for 8 hours straight. So I'm very thankful for that.
He hasn't been too happy with his swing or bouncer, which sucks, because if I want to shower I have to wait for him to fall asleep enough to put him down, and then he usually wakes up while I'm in the shower, so that's been tough. I am the kind of person who gets irritated if I can't finish something I've started, so if I start getting ready, I just want to be done with it. Hopefully it will get easier.
Kai gets his shots this week, so that will be sad for me. I feel so bad when he's hurting. He's been pretty gassy/colicky so he can get pretty fussy and pained.
My mom took some pictures of him when he was a couple weeks old, so I will post those when I have the laptop, and she just took some more pics today that I will post when I get them!
But I hear my little man stirring from his nap, so I am off!!

Baby Kai

I will have to find some time to do a birth story, but for now I'll just update. Kai was born on Wednesday, August 19th, at 4:27 am. He was 8 lbs 5 oz, and 19 1/2 inches long. He's got blonde hair, and grey-blue eyes, he looks so much like Rob. In my last blog I mentioned how miserable I was, well, thats because I really was in labor. Good to know! We ended up staying a night longer than we were going to in the hospital because Kai had Jaundice, but he had the light treatments, and I think he's doing ok. Last night being our first night home was pretty hard, he's got his days and nights mixed up, and since I didn't have him until early morning, I had spent a day in labor with no sleep, so I still can't manage to catch up. I got maybe an hour and a half, or two hours last night. Everyone keeps saying "sleep when he does", so I'll be trying to do that so I can catch up a little.

Kai is so precious and I love him so much, and its so awesome to see Rob in his Dad role. Rob's been amazing. He stayed at the hospital with me the whole time except to stop by the house twice to get somthing. He helps me with feedings and anything else I need. He's even at the store as we speak getting girl things for me! Now I have 2 amazing men in my life and I couldn't be happier!

Resting

Warning: may contain TMI
So yesterday started with me losing my mucus plug. I wondered what this meant for me. Would I start having stronger contractions? Would other weird stuff follow?? Well, not right away. My mom came and got me and we went and picked up my urine collection kit...YAY. I hung out at my moms for a while and began collecting my urine in her fridge. My step dad was none too thrilled to hear about that. My mom helped me to make sure the nun's cap I was peeing in would pour nicely in my brown jug, and was convinced that I started having the "bloody show". Then I had to go get monitored at the fetal monitoring office at the labor and delivery unit. (so much for bedrest!) My mom and Rob came with me and I had to make sure that on this outing I didn't have to go to the bathroom, because we had to leave my pee jug in the fridge. I made it alright. I was hooked up to the machine for just over a half hour. My blood pressure was A LOT better 143 over 84. Kai's heartbeat was good, and I had 5 contractions in the time I was there, but they were mild. The tech monitoring me said she thought it wouldn't be long before the baby was here, with all the contrating and the baby being so low. I guess we'll see. I keep having contractions off and on, but nothing strong.
Rob worked all night last night, and I think he was a little worried about me. I told him I'd be fine. And I was...other than not getting much sleep because I can't get comfortable AND because when Rob's gone, I don't sleep well. This morning my mom came to get me and my jug of chunky urine to take to the lab. They had to take my blood (again, I hate needles) and the girl looked to be about 16. I was worried she wouldn't do well. It took her a while to get my vein up and she even suggested using my other arm, but I promptly told her "No, that vein rolls!" So she figured it out and got the vein, but I could tell she wasn't quite a pro, I could definately feel every time she changed the vial. With that done, I called the Dr's office to let them know I didn't get everything done wednesday night, but it was done now. But I'll probably have to wait til monday to hear anything about my urine, blood, and monitoring.
I'll just hope things start moving along on their own, since I can't go walking or any other stuff to move things along. *crossing fingers*
But to end on a really good note, Rob is sooo good to me, he's been cleaning up and making me dinner and everything. And now he's asleep on the recliner since he worked all night. Poor boy!

Getting closer?

This is me at 36 weeks and 4 days (my lips are blue because of the shaved ice I was craving!):

Went to the doctor on wednesday. Had to have the Strep B test...girls...not so fun! But I got checked and I am thinned 60-70%, dilated 1 cm, cervix is soft and baby's head is down. I have 22 days left, but everyone thinks I'll be early. I kind of hope so, but I have to wait until after this wednesday! I'm still training people to cover me while I'm on maternity leave. I have had a LOT of pain in my hips and pubic bone. It feels like someone wrapped a chain around my pubic bone and tied it to a mack truck on the freeway...so it feels nice as you can imagine! :P My ankles are so swollen, and don't go down at night anymore. They're ridiculously huge! I can only wear flip flops now, and almost all of my maternity clothes no longer fit. I've been having Braxton Hicks contractions quite a bit, so I guess my body is getting ready. Also....we have decided on a name! Kai Tanner Dammann. Rob kept coming back to that, and I liked it a lot too, but I really wanted Rob to have a big part of choosing it. We're getting very excited and I am also getting very nervous. We didn't do a birthing class because we wanted to save the money, so I hope Rob will be ready for this.
Gizmo has been such a turd, she's been getting into everything and knocks everything of counters, tables, the desk, everywhere, but this is how she likes to lay now, shes funny: SUPERMAN!!!! (I think she's just hot and trying to cool of on the tile)

31 days and counting..

One month until the baby is here!! So crazy to think. I had a Dr. appointment on tuesday, everything's still going good. I'm measuring perfect and all seems well. My feet are still swelling like mad, and I'm still getting migraines. :(
I just keep checking my blood pressure to make sure I'm ok. Lately if I don't eat in a couple hours I get SOO shakey, lightheaded, sweaty, and hot. So I just gotta keep up on that. I am definately to the point of being DONE! I feel so huge and swollen and nothing fits me right now and my hips and pubic bone hurt all the time. In the evening I am so stiff. But one good thing is Rob's gotten to feel the baby move a ton lately. He sticks his foot or butt out a ton and it amazes Rob. Rob also will pull me to him and kiss my stomach, its so cute. I'm so excited and so freaked out at the same time. We have the car seat in the car and my bag is pretty much packed. I just wonder how my cats are going to handle this! :P I still don't know what I'm going to do after my maternity leave, I have to work, but don't want my baby in day care. I'm just praying that something works out. Or maybe I'll have to change jobs. Thats the LAST thing I want to do! My job pays well and I enjoy it, no other job will pay as good right now. Too bad Rob doesn't make double his pay!
My next Dr. appointment is next wednesday, I guess we'll see how that goes. I'll be 36 weeks, maybe they'll start checking me?

Last week (week 33) and stuff

This was last week at 33 weeks:

Today I am 34 weeks. SO CRAZY. We started getting the baby's room a little more ready. Not exciting enough for pictures yet, I still don't have my bedding, but we have the crib, dresser, and an extra twin size bed all set up where they're going to be. Its so weird that its getting so close. I'm washing some of his blankies and clothes right now, and I'll be getting a hospital bag packed this week.
At work we had our annual "Freedom Breakfast" at work this week and I helped Paula decorate for a few hours, my feet were CRAZY swollen! They've been pretty swollen consistantly lately, they did go down one day, so I took a picture:
then I got one of the day after decorating to see the swelling: (I'm lucky any shoes fit!)

We had Maddie and Brycen over for a night a couple weekends ago, it was pretty fun, we ate pizza, played Rock Band and other Xbox games, and had fondue!! We finally broke out our fondue set we got for our wedding from my cousins Shawna and Jason, it was WAY GOOD and WAY FUN!

Lately Gizmo has a new place to lay, she's so funny!

Rob and I ate at Panda Express the other day and when he openned his fortune he just smiled and handed it to me. I said, "What do you think it means?" and he said, "The baby!" It was soooo cute

Yesterday the girls at work gave me a baby shower, it was way fun and the food was sooo good. Here are some pictures from it. Ok...in all reality I am SWOLLEN ALL OVER. I look sooo huge!! :/





And although this is very blurry, I wanted to post it anyway, this was the girls from the shower Amanda, Marge, me, my mom, Cheri, Paula, Michelle, and Debbie. Cheri is the girl in front of my mom, and she is pregnant, and due 4 days before me. Shes so small!! :P

My doctor appointments have gone ok, I had to go two weeks in a row because my blood pressure was up quite a bit, but its gone down now. Things are looking ok. But I have had a few more migraines in the last few weeks, which is torture, All I can do is take tylonol, and lay down with a cold rag on my head and try to sleep.
I think I've had a Braxton Hicks contraction or two in the past couple weeks, but that's it. I've been watching my belly move around a lot when the baby moves, its so fun!
We're still thinking through a couple names....so hopefully this kid has a name when he's here! I tell Rob maybe we need to see him first, and he said, "I don't think its going to help me to see him, unless I can see him when he's like 14!" hahaha. Hopefully we figure it out!

Welcome!!!

Lelah Riley was born on Friday, April 24th. She is 5 lbs 15 oz, and 19 1/2". She was 2 and a half weeks early, which means I just have that much longer now. :/ You see, Jalee was due 15 weeks before me, but since she was early, I still have 17 weeks left!! BLAH. Anyway, I went to see Lelah Friday night, but she was in the NICU because the respitory therapist wanted to watch her closer, so I didn't get to see her until around noon the next day. She's so tiny and so pretty. I expected her to look just like her siblings did, but she didn't! She's got kind of strawberry blonde hair (and very little of it), and everyone says she looks like Jalee's grandma. But of course I had to ask Lelah if she'd talked to her future cousin and found out his name...she kept quiet...figures.
This weekend, I had been looking at my kitchen floor thinking, "I need to really clean this darn thing". So finally I got to it. I hate mops, don't really beleive in them (they just push the dirt around), so I sweep and wet swiffer my floors, but every few weeks I just have to get down and scrub it with a sponge. So Sunday was the day. grrrrr. I hate doing it!! And I've put it off too long, being pregnant and not feeling good and all. So I got down on my butt and did it. I sat on my butt the whole time because I have a bad knee that won't allow me to kneel on it. So I scooted around with Gizmo bugging me the whole time, trying to get close to the action. It took me an hour and a half!!! GOOD HELL!! When I finally got up, I could barely stand and barely walk. My hips and legs hurt so bad. Today was very painful too. Getting out of bed, I remembered the pain, "OH NO, that HURTS". Stupid dirty textured crappy linolium. At least I have a very clean kitchen floor now....lets just see how long that lasts.

22 weeks: good/bad

22 weeks and 2 days down…17 weeks and 5 days left. Crazy to think of it as time left.

Some positive things lately: 1) I’m starting to feel the slightest movements in my tummy. 2) I feel pretty good for the most part, especially if I am wearing clothes that aren’t squeezing me too much. 3) AND now that it’s getting warmer out, I have skirts with elastic and other stuff that actually can fit me! 4) I’m definitely looking more pregnant than fat. I actually had my first stranger comment on my belly, I was at Albertsons, and the checker said, “when’s your baby due?” It was nice not to have to say, “I’m not pregnant, just fat”. Like I had to with the couple customers a week at Wells Fargo that would have to put their feet in their mouths because I had gained weight.
Some negatives lately: 1) Rob still hasn’t been able to feel the baby move (sad). 2) We still don’t know about a name for the baby. 3) We had to get rid of our old Love Sac, because it was hanging out in the room we’re going to use for the baby, and we had to accept that there was no way we were going to be able to fix the fact that LaFawnda had completely ruined it by peeing all over it about 30 times or more. It was really hard to just get rid of it. We only bought it like 3 years ago, and I loved it! Not to mention, it was just throwing away $400. And now we are back to not having enough furniture in our living room…just a couch. We need a rocker/recliner, then I can rock the baby!

4) I thought I was supposed to have more energy this trimester, but I’m always sooo tired! Might be due to the fact that I haven’t been sleeping well. I had been taking Unisom every night, but I stopped because I realized I shouldn’t be doing it EVERY night, dang it. 5) I have been having some major round ligament pain mostly on the left side. Its killing me! 6) My bras are breaking! (and hurting me in the meantime)
BUT, now that I’ve been feeling pretty good, no longer nauseous, I have been more experimental with foods. This last weekend we were watching an episode of “Guy’s Big Bite” that Rob had recorded, and he made some yummy looking pot pies. So we just had to try making them.

They were way good.
Then yesterday for some reason I wanted to make a quiche. I’ve never made one before, and have only eaten one once. A little frozen one you reheat from Costco, it was ok, but for some reason I wanted to try making one. So I got the stuff and made a chicken and broccoli one. It was GOOD! This is good, I gotta keep trying all this new stuff, so we have a bigger list of possible dinners. We make such basic stuff all the time (spaghetti, tacos, steak, variations of chicken). But this will hopefully get our children to eat many different things.
Lately I’ve been craving a lot of fruits. We finally got our first watermelon of the year, and it is a really good one! And salads. There are still some days that nothing really sounds good, but usually a salad always sounds good.

It's spring for sure, poor birdies are getting tossed out of their nests! This made me sad the other day....and made it hard to pull apart the rotisserie chicken for the pot pies...

Its....A...BABY!!!!

My ultrasound was really fun today. The baby was jumping up and down the whole time, so cute!! The ultrasound tech said she was pretty sure its a boy. I was like, "pretty sure?" And she said that it's a little early still, but she said that the parts looked "very boy-like" and that she'd be "very surprised if it came out a girl". And I said, "so it's not a 100%?" and she said, "well, my personal opinion is that its 100% a boy, but don't go all crazy with that, they'll be able to see better at your next ultrasound" So....I had a feeling it was a boy, and I think its easier to mistake a girl than a boy, and even when I saw between the legs, I was thinking, "Uh....those are boy parts!" So...we're going with that for now. :P
So here are a couple ultrasound pics:
Spine:

Profile:


And Rob's favorite one because he's being a poser with his arms behind his head:

At work they call me "Preggo"

14 weeks….I’m now in my 2nd trimester. It does feel better. I have felt a lot better. I still don’t have my energy back yet, but I only feel kind of sick if it has been a while since I’ve eaten. I can’t wait to find out if I’m having a boy or girl. My Dr. appointment this morning went well. We got to hear the heartbeat and he found it really quick today, and while listening you could hear a static scratching sound on the doppler, and the Dr. said that when you hear that, it’s the baby moving. SO CUTE! I have to have an ultrasound next Wednesday to check the length of my cervix, to make sure I’m ok, and we’ll get a peak at the baby. I will only be 15 weeks, but one of my friends told me she found out it was a boy at 15 weeks, so if it is a boy, maybe we’ll be able to see! So I told my mom if she wants to go just in case, she can. I’m excited to see the baby again. I now know how all those pregnant ladies out there feel when everyone else seems to say, “wow, that pregnancy was fast” and the women think, “Holy cow, whatever!! Its been DRAGGING ON FOREVER!” That’s how it feels.
Rob has been so cute, he’ll roll over in bed in the morning and put his hand on my stomach and he always asks me “How’s the baby?” I think once we have an ultrasound where it doesn’t look like a blob of something, it’ll all become more real. I’ve been starting to have the “round ligament pain” in my stomach, and I’ll forget to be careful sometimes and sit down too hard, and it hurts my pelvic region. Hopefully now that I’m feeling better, I can get some energy and start going to the gym a little bit again. I want to start walking and swimming so I can stay strong. I’m really excited for the next couple of weeks when I’m supposed to start to be able to feel a little movement from the baby! My friend, Cami, is due in about 2 weeks, and I’m excited to see her little girl! Then next is Jalee!! Its funny how many people I know that are pregnant! Its nice to not feel “alone” in it.
Last Friday Rob had to work from 7:30pm until 6:30 in the morning! I was so sad. So I went to dinner and rented a movie with my mom. It was really nice to spend some time with her. I had a hard time sleeping, though, because of Rob being gone. I didn’t know exactly when he was coming home, either, so that kept me up too. So Saturday and Sunday we bummed around a lot because we were so tired.
This week following such a hell week last week, has had a decent start, so I hope it continues on that way. And the excitement of my Dr. appointment also helps! I’m glad Rob’s boss is easy going and doesn’t mind Rob missing a little of the morning to go with me too.
I don't have any new tummy pics, I get so tired after work, I just don't get around to it, I'll try to this next week. I just feel fat, so it doesn't look good. Pictures I DO have are from Valentines Day. Rob got me roses, candy, a big stuffed frog, a belly band (I've been wanting one badly, since my pants don't fit anymore), and preggie pops (for morning sickness). Rob's so sweet and he always makes sure I feel special on Valentines day.

Our room in Zion's was small, but really nice. Its an old hotel that had been remodeled.

The view from our room:

To the doctor...

Like I said in my previous post, I’ve felt pretty queasy, but that’s about it. I should have knocked on wood. On Tuesday in the early hours of the morning I woke to my head just pounding! I tried to go back to sleep, but it wasn’t happening. So I just laid there very still until my alarm went off. I got up to go take a shower and get ready for work. My head just got worse…Lovely…a migraine. I was out of my migraine meds, but I wouldn’t be able to take those anyway! My migraines are usually visually triggered (lights, glare, bright colors, etc), there is only one time I can remember getting one in the middle of the night, it was in middle school. Since it was further into the migraine, the blind spots were gone already, so I tried to just get ready for work anyway. I had too much to do to miss work. As I started showering, the pain got SO much worse that it made me nauseous and I started violently dry heaving in the shower. Rob heard me and came in right when I collapsed to the tub. I plugged the tub and took a bath instead and Rob got me water and crackers. So I ate those and tried to just keep getting ready. When I was out of the bath and trying to brush my hair and all that, I got so weak, so I laid down for a minute and a few minutes later had to get to the toilet. I was violently throwing up the crackers. This was NOT going to happen. I had been trying to get ready for over an hour now, and I was going to be NO GOOD at work. So I finally called my manager and she told me to stay in bed, and call the doctor. So I laid back down, and laying still seemed to help a little. Rob called my OB doc and they said they had nothing I could take that he should take me to the ER or Instacare. So Rob called my family doctor instead and got me an appointment in a couple hours. When we went in, the Dr. talked about what kinds of drugs are graded certain ways because they can’t be given to pregnant women, but they had a shot they could give me that wouldn’t hurt the baby. It had something for the pain and something for nausea in it. And since we all know how much I LOVE shots you can imagine my excitement. But I was willing to do anything to stop the migraine. So they gave me a hugely painful injection and said they wanted to do an ultrasound so we’d better know how far along I was and hopefully see the heartbeat. He told me I’d start to be out of it from the shot, but they did the ultrasound in time for me to see it. We saw the heartbeat and he measured the baby at almost 7 weeks. After that, I was in a daze, the shot totally knocked me out. I went home and laid on the couch, and was barely able to lift my head to eat some soup. Good thing Rob was home to take care of me, the headache eased quite a bit, which was good. And the Dr. suggested me to take Vitamin B6 3 times a day to ease the nausea, and that seems to help a bit, along with a prescription for anti-nausea. So hopefully things will start to look up. I can tell I’ve been gaining weight already, but that’s because at night my appetite comes back more, so I eat when I feel I can. Rob has been amazingly good with me, he’s been doing his best to clean the house, he’s had to take over cleaning the cat pan, of course, and he’s been doing most of the cooking. I’m grateful that I have such a wonderful husband. It was cute, last night he said that he’d been thinking about seeing the heartbeat, and how much more real it seems. He thinks about the baby a lot, he says. So adorable!! I am NOW knocking on wood when I say I hope things stay going well!

A new Nephew!

This weekend my sister, Lizzi, had her baby! Aidyn Reece Fortner was born 7 lbs 4 oz, 21 1/4 inches. I have only gotten a text from Lizzi, and from her myspace pictures I can tell she's been exhausted. So I hope she's getting rested up! Congratulations Matt and Lizzi, and WELCOME AIDYN!!!



AND my pseudo-sister, Andee had her baby today around 3!! Welcome Little Ethan!!! I can't wait to see both little babies!! CONGRATS Andee and Steve!!!!
I love you guys!!! ***This is Andee's picture, and I'm not sure who took it to give the credit to, but I hope you guys don't mind that I posted it, its just too cute!!**