Being April

I feel like I have been feeding this kid constantly for the last 24 hours. He has been awake most of the day since 5 am, and has been wanting to eat at least half of every hour of the day. I think I've gotten maybe an hour and a half break at one point in the day, but the rest of the time he has been a hungry hungry boy. He has been awake today more than ever before. Usually he is awake for a few hours in the morning, and then sleeps most of the day and then is awake for a few hours in the evening. Today, he got his few hours in the morning, took a very very short nap, then was awake all afternoon, then took a short nap before his evening awake period. Now it is just after nine and I was hoping that after his long wakeful day, he would be exhausted and go to sleep early and long, but alas, he is still wide awake. At least he is happy. He looks around at everything, especially lights, and people. For some reason he likes to look at the ceiling fan in the fa...

Today is the type of day where you just want to stay inside wrapped up in a warm and fuzzy blanket with some hot chocolate and look outside at the snow blowing everywhere and be grateful that you're inside and not outside. Unfortunately I'm almost out of diapers again... that means I have to go to the store... I just can't go without diapers. I packed up my diaper bag, put my baby in his car seat and went outside to get all of the snow off my car. Not two minutes was I out there before I hurried back inside unable to feel my fingers. Very little snow was actually removed from my car. Every attempt I would make to brush snow off was met with wind blowing the snow everywhere including my face and into my jacket and up my sleeves. After I git back inside I checked the outside temperature. 6 degrees. I have no idea what the wind chill was, but I'll bet it was much lower. Heather reassured me that she would call Tejay and have him get me some diaper...

I keep intending to write something because I enjoy writing for my family, although I really don't have much to say. My life the past week or so has been very... busy... while at the same time, I feel as if I am doing nothing at all. I am rarely doing nothing though. I feel like I am constantly changing diapers, or feeding him, or just holding him and talking to him. The rare occasions when he sleeps for more than 15 minutes I sleep as well. I've been having a hard time getting much of anything done. I haven't even showered for several days now just because I don't want him to wake up and be screaming until I get out of the shower and hear him. I did finally wash some laundry today. That has been needing to get done for a while now. I've been planning on going to the store for days now. I just realized a bit ago that I probably don't have enough diapers to last through the night. I was given a bunch of diapers that are way too big for...

There wasn't really anything in particular that made today a good day. I think more it was just the fact that today was not as bad as I expected it to be. I didn't really do anything at all today, it was just a lazy day. Last night with some help from Tejay I got little Dean to go to sleep, and he slept surprisingly well. After finally getting him to sleep around midnight he slept until three. I changed his diaper and fed him and he went right back to sleep and slept until eight. I think I got more sleep last night than the rest of the week combined. This morning I got an email from Dean saying that he made it safely to Ireland, and then he called me this afternoon from Kuwait. Its amazing how fast he can get to the other side of the world. I miss him, but it's not nearly so bad as the first time he left. I guess I am fairly used to his absence by now. It just took me a day to remember. It also helps to have little Dean around. Yeah, I have a hard ...

I think over the past week and a half, I have averaged maybe two hours of sleep each night. Most days I have gotten to take at least a short nap, but not every day, and they usually are very short. I am exhausted. I am realizing more and more just how difficult this is. Yesterday we went to MaeLyn's house for Thanksgiving, and MaeLyn was able to get little Dean to stop crying fairly easily, but then the moment I took him back he started crying again. He does the same thing when handed to Tejay or to Dean or to pretty much anyone else. MaeLyn has had four kids, and has dealt with all of this before and knows some tricks of the trade. Its not a matter of him liking her any better than me. I know that. But it is still kinda hurts. Last week he was still losing more weight than the doctor felt comfortable with, so she asked me to pump milk for him and supplement him with that to get him to eat more. I didn't see any problem with that, so I did. Well, it...

What can I say... As I try to decide what to type, I look over behind me at my husband back from war, holding our brand new son. Wow. What am I supposed to say about something like this? It is the most amazing thing. There really are no words to express how I am feeling right now. Well... I guess there is always, exhausted, sore, happy, somewhat frustrated, completely elated, very nervous, overjoyed... I guess there are words... I just don't know which ones to put in here for my family to read. I guess I should probably give my "labor story." I feel as if I have heard a million different labor stories since becoming pregnant. Everyone seems so eager to share the story of their child's birth. Maybe someday I'll be like that too... but right now it just seems kinda weird. They decided to induce me because of some slight high blood pressure issues, but more because they took pity on me because Dean doesn't get to be here for ...

Dean James Dawes was born at 9:09 pm November 15th 2009, He was 7 lbs 8oz and 20.5 inches Long. Both Mom and Baby are doing fine.

So... Mom is here, and Dean is on his way, and I was just realizing... I'm going to be a Mom. No, I'm going to be THE Mom. I will be the person that has sole responsibility for a living being. He will be mine. I will have no one else to hand him off to when he has a needs a diaper change. I'll be the person who he is given to when he is crying inconsolably. I'm the one that has to clean up the spit up and get up with him at two in the morning... and at midnight, and at five... blah. Being a Mom is going to be hard work. I watch Heather day after day being a mom to her kids, but I guess it has taken a while for it to register to me that I'm going to be the Mom. I watch Heather's kids all the time, but whenever there is a problem I just hand them off to her. I spent some time with Kristy last January, and I spent a week each with Lindy and Lia, and I've spent several days over the months with MaeLyn. I have watched you all with your k...

Well... I don't really have any good pictures of me pregnant. If I pose for them, or even if I know the picture is being taken, I just look dorky and I just can't bring myself to post them. Not that these pictures are any better, but I feel better about them for some reason. So I had another ultrasound today. They just wanted to see how big he is and see if he is growing enough in there. The idea I guess is that if he hadn't grown enough since my last ultrasound they were going to induce him early. Apparently he had a good growth spurt this month, as his percentile jumped from 16 at the end of September to 33 today. So they will not be inducing him. I am very happy that he is growing, and I am quite pleased that he is healthy, and doing well, but I can't help being slightly disappointed that he won't be making an early arrival. It would be nice to have it scheduled so he won't come at a surprise time, and it would be nice to have t...

I'd say what is going on in my life right now, but to be perfectly honest NOTHING is going on in my life. I guess that really is my fault and I really ought to be doing something to make my life feel more eventful. I should be working on some project, or doing something to improve myself. But I'm not. I feel like my while life is on hold, and that my entire point of existing right now is just to wait. I am waiting for Dean to come home. I am waiting for my baby to be born. I am waiting to start school again. I am waiting for life to continue. I feel like someone pushed a big pause button and stopped my life, so now I am just waiting. I really need to just pull myself out of this and get on with my life. This really isn't good for me, and if I'm not careful it could lead to depression or some other selfish disease like that. At least some of my waiting isn't going to go on for too much longer. My baby is due in 20 days, but due dates mean ...

I have been living with Heather and Tejay for the past month, and for the month before that I was in Utah visiting my parents and a few other siblings. Dean left for Afghanistan June 5th, and so I'll be expecting his return sometime around that time period next year. He will get to come back for a visit in November to meet his son and spend a small amount of time with me and our baby. It has been two and a half months since Dean left, and even though every day seems to drag on forever, those two months seems to have gone by quickly. Hindsight goes a lot faster I think. The first several weeks were a lot harder. Missing him being around day to day. Now for the most part I have grown accustomed to his absence, and as bad as that seems, it does make the distance easier to handle. I still get an occasional day where I am consumed with loneliness but those days are getting fewer and farther between. Especially with Heather, Tejay, Natalie, and Ammon to keep me busy. I talk...

I woke up this morning feeling homesick. I am at home, so there is absolutely no reason for that. Usually when I'm feeling homesick when I'm at home it's because Dean is not with me, but he was there, so it had me pretty confused for a while. I finally figured out that I am feeling homesick because I am missing Mission Viejo. I miss being in one place for a long time. Ever since we moved away from Mission Viejo I've been moving around a lot. First to Utah, then Idaho for college, then to Heather's house for the summer, then here to Fort Carson with Dean. And now with Dean's deployment to Afghanistan looming ever closer, I'm going to be on the move again. I'll be all over the place for the next few months. I might be driving down to Texas with Jarom, and then I'll be in Denver with MaeLyn's family. From there I'll probably go visit my family in Utah, and I'll just be jumping around from place to place. After a couple of mont...