Last couple of weekends Wrap Up

The Alford family has had a busy couple of weeks. Last weekend we went to the National Farm Machinery Show in Louisville and Tucker had his first nights stay in a hotel. We walked around all day with little man riding in his stroller. It was the first time he had ridden without being in the carseat in the stroller and he loved it!

I can not believe the day went by and I only managed to get a couple of pictures and none of anyone other than Tucker but none the less, he loved his first of many farm shows!

While in Louisville we also got to meet up with our good friends the Kruckenbergs and have dinner at The Melting Pot. Little man slept through the whole 3 HOUR meal thank goodness, the farm show really wore him out but we enjoyed catching up and having a great dinner!

This past weekend Tucker had his second stay in a hotel for the whole weekend. Daddy is the vice president of the Young Farmers Association in our area and this weekend was the State Convention in Hopkinsville. I wasnt quite sure how well T would do but there were tons of kids there. It was a lot of meetings for Daddy so we went to the mall (very small mall at that!) but we had fun none the less. Tucker did so good during all of the dinners and banquets. It is no small job I tell you keeping your child quiet during a 3 hour long banquet but there was a band there and Tucker just pretty much looked around at everything going on or slept the whole time. I was one proud mommy!

Here are a couple of photos from the convention:

Tucker and Daddy at lunch

His sweet little shirt Aunt Brooke gave him that he wore to the dinner banquet!

On Sunday we got up and drove to Clarksville, TN which was just about 20 minutes from where we were to meet up with Daddy's good friend from high school and his family. It was the first time T was around another baby really and they just loved looking at each other and talking. Here is a photo of the 2 dads and their little men!

All in all it was a crazy busy weekend and we are glad to be fun but we had a great time!! Hoping for a calm week!

12 weeks old

My little man is now 12 weeks old. He will be 3 months old on Tuesday. I seriously can not believe how fast he is growing! You hear people say it all the time that it flies by but it REALLY does!



So just for myself, here is what T is up to these days:



He is consistently sleeping at night from 10-5. He actually usually goes to sleep in his swing from about 8-10, then eats and then is down for the night. He still sleeps in his bassinet at night in our bedroom.



He is now eating 6 ounces as of a couple of days ago and he has been eating every 4 hours during the day for a very long time now, since a couple weeks after birth he has been consistent on that.



He is really starting to have a personality in the last month. He is constantly trying to talk and smiles all the time. He is really a mommys boy, which I dont mind at all! He loves being read to and he loves music. Anything that makes music he loves. He has just started sitting in his jumper seat and loves playing in it. He is getting more coordinated and can touch things he sees like his toys on his playmat and the toys over his carseat. I love watching him grow and learn to do new things.



He is still wearing size 3 months clothes but I would say here in the next couple weeks we will be moving up to 3-6 month sizes. At his 2 month check up he weighed 11 lb 12 oz and was 23.5 inches long. He was in the 50th percentile for weight and the 75 for length. Dr. said he was tall and skinny which he clearly doesnt get from me! I might be in the 25th percentile for heigth! I am interested to see what he weighs now. He goes back to the Dr at 4 months and will then start eating baby food/cereal. My sweet little man is growing up!

Mommy's Top 5 Baby Items

So being a new mom, there are a few things that I have found that every new mommy needs.

1. Mylicon

Our little man is a BIG FAN of Mylicon. We actually use the walmart generic brand which is only $3, the real deal is $10! Babies get gas just like us but on their tiny tummies, it reaks havoc and can result in one fussy baby. By giving T some gas drops before he ate he was a brand new baby. Not to mention the fact that he loves the taste so if he is really upset, you can dab some in his mouth or on his paci and he will stop screaming instantly. It is definitely our #1 baby MUST HAVE!

2. Cloud B Giraffe

Our little man loves noise. We can be in a loud restaurant and he will sleep right through it. In the car he loves music. Constant noise will keep him asleep. This little giraffe is like a travel size noise machine. It has a strap that will attatch it to the carseat. We are in the car a lot seeing as how we live 20 minutes away from town. We had a few screaming fits in the car (of course while mommy was by herself!) and there is nothing worse than being alone in the car driving a crying baby when you can do nothing to help them. Well this little giraffe has 4 different sounds: a play sound, a calming sound, a relaxing sound which is basically just white noice and by far little T's favorite and will keep him asleep for hours, and then a sleep sound which sounds like mommys heart beat. It has made our car rides much more enjoyable when we have a sleepy baby and a happy mommy! This was the best $25 I have ever spent. I got this at Dillards but I think Toys R Us also carries it.

3. Medela Pump in Style

For those breastfeeding mommies, a pump is your new best friend. This one is electric and works great. Without pumping I dont know how I would have gotten anything done. I have had to switch to formula feeding due to not making enough milk but that is another story but while I was breastfeeding, this pump was great. It doesnt take very much time and it helps give mommy a break so someone else can take over a feeding every once in a while.

4. Soothie Paci's

Our baby LOVES his paci. He has taken it from day 1. And his favorite is the kind they give you at the hospital although you can also buy them. Here is a picture of him from the hospital with his paci. These paci's are also supposed to be best if you are breastfeeding.

5. Swing
Tucker not only likes noise but he also likes to be moving. He LOVES his swing and so does mommy! He will sleep in it for hours during the day. Other than his swing, the only places he regularly will sleep right now are his carseat and his bassenet at night time. Just to lay him down on the couch or bed or anything, he will wake up but if you keep him moving, he does just fine.

Those are the top 5 for now, we will see how they change in the next couple months!

Delivery Day

I am really breaking a record here. No post in over a year and now two in one day! I just really want to document Tucker's birth before I forget some of the details.

So I was actually due on November 29th. I was getting pretty miserable and also a little upset that this little dude was taking so long to get here! I had gone for my 39 week dr appointment and was only 1 cm dialated. I had an appointment on December 1st, which was the next wednesday, for an ultrasound to check Tuckers size and then we were going to go from there as far as induction or scheduled c-section. I had talked to my Dr. on more than one occassion about being leary of a C-Section but due to my height (which is 5'2) that we worried if baby was too big to come out the natural way. (Which in my opinion there is nothing NATURAL about it!).

Well I never made it to my appointment. On Tuesday night or should I say Wednesday morning as 12:45 I woke up to go to the bathroom and realized that my water had broken. So hubby and I got dressed and drove to the hospital thinking that we were going to see our little man soon. Well he had other plans! We knew that after your water breaks they typically like you to deliver within 24 hours due to risk of infection. Well our little man already likes to push the limits because he was forced out after around 22 hours! We should have stopped at Waffle House for breakfast instead of rushing to the hospital!

So we get checked into Labor and Delivery and debate about calling our family since it is in the middle of the night. I did end up calling my sister and then called our parents at about 4 since the Dr on call had decided to start me on pitocin since I was still only 1cm dialated when we got to the hospital.

I have already forgotten a lot of the timing of the whole day but after they started my pitocin my sister suggested I go ahead and get some pain medicine because there was no way to tell how fast I would start feeling contractions. Here I was thinking I had a little tolerance for pain! I was starting to have horrible back labor so the nurse brought she some fenegran and some pain medicine in my IV. Well it went into effect immediately and I automatically felt like I had drank 17 alcoholic beverages in 10 minutes! I told Andy that I felt drunk, I could barely talk and of course he laughed at me! That medicine also made me very sleepy so I was in and out of sleep.

Then after a little while the anastesiologist came in and gave me my epidural which was so much easier than I expected! The nurse made me sit indian style on the bed which how I was able to 10 months pregnant I dont know but I did it somehow! She held my shoulders to keep me still and he gave me the epidural.

After this another nurse came in to give me a catheder and I kept telling them all, I can feel everything. I can move my legs, is that right? The nurse kept saying well we will call the anastesioligt back in and see what he says. Well in the mean time I could feel EVERY contraction and let me tell you it was AWFUL! I was miserable and in so much pain. The contractions were about 2 minutes apart so I would fall asleep between them due to the pain medicine, and then wake up during the contraction and want to CRY! My sweet hubby and sister were massaging my lower back during the contractions. Finally the Anst. came in and said let me put in more meds, everyone is different. Well that didnt work either. Then a little while later he came back in and it still wasnt working so he said lets just redo it. Well when I raised up my whole pillow behind my back was wet so all of the meds were going to my pillow and not into my spine! Thankfully the second one worked like a dream and all of the pain was gone in a jiffy! I was feeling much better! The rest of the day was just a lot of waiting and eating ice chips. I was back and forth between trying to rest and having visitors. My progress of dialating was very slow. I think by maybe 5 pm I was finally to 6cm. The goal is 10cm for those who dont know!

At about 7pm I started pushing and pushed for a long hour and a half. They could see his head but everytime I stopped pushing he would go back up. By 8:30 my Dr said she thought we needed to go ahead and do a c-section, that he just was not coming out. That by 9 I could be getting prepped. Well after she left I started crying. Andy could not calm me down. It was a mixture of feeling defeated, being scared to have a c-section and being in extreme pain. The nurse had to give me another catheder since they had taken the first one out for me to push. Well they had also turned down my epidural during pushing so I was feeling everything and the worse pain of the whole day was that nurse putting the new catheder in. Not to be too graphic but I was extremely raw from pushing and in major pain when she put that in. Finally after my dr, parents, sister, husband all did their share of consoling and after watching an episode of the Nanny, I finally calmed down. Then what started out as going to be prepped for surgery at 9 turned into 10:15 being prepped because an emergency c-section came in right before me.

I then went into the the operating room seeing bright lights and 25 DR's all around me. There were 3 new anestesiologists behind me and Andy came in to hold my hand which was shaking due to the medicine. Tucker was born in a jiffy and the c-sec was nothing like I thought it would be. It was no big deal at all! The worst part was that Andy got to take him out for everyone to see and I just got a glance in before going into recovery.

Well I never knew this at the time but apparently Tucker wasnt breathing like he should have been and they had to run tons of blood tests on him and make sure everything was ok. I didnt get to see him until 3am!!

I finally made it into a room (which was I think a closet they pushed a bed into!) and signed my life away without even knowing what I was signing. All night nurses were in and out and so was my baby nursing but we finally made it through it! Now we have this sweet sweet little man and I wouldnt have it any other way. Now I barely remember it but it was all worth it either way!

Over a year has passed and a new addition!

Ok so clearly I am not great at blogging. It has been over a year since the last time I did this! I can honestly say that A LOT of things have happened in the last year to the Alford's. For starters, we now are a family of 3!

December 1st, 2010 we were blessed with the sweetest little boy ever! It was a 22 hour long labor that ended up with a C-Section but little mister Tucker Alford finally made his grand debut into the world at 10:37pm.

Today is Valentines day and I have to say that being a Mommy is the best Valentines present ever! Your life is no longer your own and of course I miss having a straight 8 hours of sleep but his sweet little face definitely makes up for it!

What better way to catch you up on our current life that to give you a few snapshots of our new little babe!

And the sweetest little Valentine Ever: