Rounding out March

Theodore was sad to turn 1 month old :(

But happy to see spring arrive.

And meet his two of his great grandparents!

He looks like such a little man in the new jeans grandma got him!

Crazy Eyes and Crazy Arms

Just a quick clip of his movements at about a month old.

Spring!!! (And St. Patrick's Day)

It was the most beautiful day of the year Saturday, a great start to spring.

We started it with a trip to Babies R Us.  They were having a promotion for a new type of diapers. We got a bunch of the new Pampers with Dry Max feature. And an outfit for baby to wear to his daddy's softball games this fall, a picture will come eventually of that. We also got him some new shades to protect his eyes.

Then we headed to Main Street to stroll, eat, and watch basketball.

We had lunch at Grotto Pizza, and watched Villanova lose.

We then finished walking along Main Street, with lots of people commenting on how cute Theodore looked in his stroller with his shades on.

And then we participated in a 20 year Newark tradition. Apparently, Rita's gives out free water ices on the first day of spring. We stumbled upon the line that stretched at least 200 feet from the counter. I've been wanting to try water ice for a long time, and we liked it, and will need to return this summer. It's one of area's claims to fame, along with pretzels and Philly cheesesteaks.

Earlier in the week, we also made a big deal out of Theodore's first official holiday:  St. Patrick's Day! He wasn't at all excited though :(

Visitors!

Theodore had some more visitors recently...

His grandpa E

Aunt Emily

And Grandma E

He was good the whole time, and even showed off stretching out to his full 22 inches.

3 Generations

Newborn Baby Videos

I will be posting many, many more pictures of the baby boy soon. Here are a few videos until then... Brian has taken over 20. Most of them are of Theodore and I sleeping.

Newborn Photos

For a few more days, you can access our hospital photo shoot at the website below:
http://www.bellababyphotography.com/
Password: 0223theodorejoseph

My friend Ashley also took some AMAZING photos while she was out here. They are fabulous: http://aacook.blogspot.com/2010/03/theodore.html

Feb. 22-23 Getting Theodore Joseph...

So... we have our son! After a long day, with little sleep, Brian and I became the parents of a bouncing brunette baby boy. Here is a breakdown of the timeline:

8:55 pm- We check in at the maternity ward. Actually, they didn't have our paperwork and we had to wait until they contacted the doc before we could check in... I was a little panicked that we weren't going to get to be induced.

9:15 pm- For about 45 minutes we sit in the waiting room upstairs, waiting for a room to open up. The hospital has 16 delivery rooms, we are taken to room 15.11:30 pm- By this time we have received the introduction to the unit, and I'm in bed with my IV in. The first doctor I will see comes in and starts to get me ready. The goal is to get me to 10 cm, and I'm starting at about 2. They do a procedure that should take all night, but I am farther along than they think so I get to 3 cm in a matter of seconds. We are then encouraged to sleep... me in an uncomfortable bed, with monitors attached and an IV pumping me full of fluids. Brian on a small little mattress in a very drafty part of the room. Needless to say, neither of us got very much sleep.

5:30 am- Now the ball really gets rolling. They start me on the oxytocin, which should start my contractions.

8:00 am- I am already having small contractions, and they break my water. I cannot believe just how much water there is!! For the rest of labor I will be releasing more and more water. Over the next hour my contractions get very strong and get very close together! Brian guides me through our relaxation exercises and breathing. As the contractions increase to 90 seconds apart I decide I will go ahead and try an epidural.

9:00 am- Epidural in. I'm asleep within the next half hour.

12:00 noon- I'm at 5 cm. They estimate that I'll be progressing at 1 cm an hour, and should have the baby by 5.

1:15 pm- I'm already up to 7 cm!! I'm very excited that labor is progressing so quickly.

3:00 pm- Still at 7 cm. The doctor starts to suggest we may need a C-section...

4:00 pm- Still at 7 cm. Feeling a lot of pressure with each contraction.

5:00 pm- Still at 7 cm. I puke all over the place! Something is not right between my stomach and bladder... The doctor strongly suggests we go through with a C-section. The baby doesn't be seeming to come down right, which is why I can't get the last 3 cm that I need. I'm pretty upset by this, but am in a lot of pain and very frustrated that nothing has changed in the past 4 hours except the pain getting stronger and the epidural wearing off. We agree to the procedure. There are already a few people in front of us in line, so it is going to be a while.

6:00 pm-The nurses get us ready for the procedure, I receive a spinal, and get sick again from that. Time starts moving very fast!

6:30ish-We get to the Freezing operating room and the c-section begins.

6:47-Brian gets to see Theodore for the first time! Due to his white blond eyebrows, and tints of red in his hair, every nurse and doctor proclaims a different hair color! But everyone tells me how beautiful he is.

6:58-Brian cuts the cord. Theodore has an APGAR of 9. Minus one the for color of his hands and feet.

7:00-His weight is taken... just shy of 9 pounds at 8 lbs, 15.6 oz. He's also 22 inches long!

7:01- I finally get to see my son up close. I am shaking pretty bad, and strapped down to the table, but I can still kiss him.
7:05- Getting his footprints.
7:30- I FINALLY get to hold my son after they have stitched me up (first stitches I have EVER gotten). We then travel to recovery where we spend about 4 hours... Theodore cries quite a bit, but eventually settles down. Brian does a great job with him while I'm still coming out of the shock and numbness that my body has just gone through. He gets to meet his Grandma Knight here.

Around midnight we are released from recovery and wheeled up to the maternity ward. Brian pretty much passes out at this point and doesn't remember much more... however I remember the nurse giving Theodore his first bath, and getting woken up a few hours later for an assessment and meds.
Our hospital does "rooming-in" (no nursery) so from this point forward, we are totally responsible for little Theodore, and our world has changed forever!
*We didn't officially name him for about 24 hours.*

40 weeks pregnant with a 9 pound baby

We took these right before we went in to get induced...

Within a week...

So, no real changes in my pregnancy today, except that this baby seems to be pretty big! My doctor is getting a little nervous about letting me go too long, since she thinks he's going to be so big and have trouble getting out. So, I'm scheduled to go in and be induced Monday, Feb. 22 at 9:00 PM, if he doesn't come on his own by then! I guess we really need to get to work picking out a name now!

She sent us over to get an ultrasound to get an estimated weight of the baby. According to their measurements, he is measuring 40 weeks, 6 days (instead of the 39 weeks, 2 days he's estimated to be). And his weight is 9lb 3 oz +/- 21 oz. Hopefully not on the plus side! The tech also mentioned that my fluid is on the high side, so that is a slight concern.

I love this picture below! His lips aren't really that big, they are pursed because he was practicing sucking! It was pretty amazing to see his little mouth moving like that.

Winter Storm Round 2-Part 2!

The craziness of this winter continued as we received a second snow storm before the first one was even cleaned up. We ended up with a whole week off school, plus more for President's Day.

Book Recommendation: The Time Traveler's Wife

Read the book.

Watched the movie.

Cried too much.

Doc's Apt

Today is the date of our first due date. Our adjusted date is the 21st, but the 10th was our original one.

Yesterday, we had a check up. I'm still the same, and the baby is still really high! I don't see this baby coming for a while still. She also ran a quick ultrasound to make sure he is head down, which he is. Had me a little worried though.

I'm starting to feel the uncomfortableness... and sitting around for three snow days in a row isn't helping anything! I've had to start pacing the house since I don't have any shoes that will fit to walk out in the snow in. I'd rather be up moving than sitting too long, I get very stiff. But if I do too much, then I get pretty exhausted. And I'm not that comfortable sleeping anymore... I must have gotten up 5 times last night.

I just want the baby to go ahead and come soon. To give you an idea of what this little one might look like, I've included Brian and I's baby pictures.

Baby Update

2 Weeks to go!!

So, it's been a while since I've written any updates on this pregnancy. There's actually been a lot going on in the last two months. Here are some of my pregnancy related events:

Right now we are at about 38 weeks, and according to the doctors for the last couple of weeks I've been 75% effaced and 1.5 cm dilated. I take that as a good sign that things are starting to get going. I've actually got another appointment tomorrow, so we'll see if I've had any changes.

My plan is to stop teaching on Feb. 23, whether the baby is here or not. It's the start of a new term, and I figured it would be good to just put a start date on my maternity leave. If I use all of my FMLA time, I'll need to go back for about the last two weeks of school (more if we keep getting snow days :( Right now, I'm counting down the school days left.

Mon. Feb. 8 -CANCELED
Tues. Feb. 9 - CANCELED
Wed. Feb. 10-regular day, plus parent teacher conferences all night
Thurs. Feb. 11- NO Kids in school, parent teacher conferences all day
Fri. Feb. 12- NO SCHOOL
Mon. Feb. 15- NO SCHOOL (President's Day)
Tues. Feb. 16 REGULAR DAY
Wed. Feb. 17 REGULAR DAY
Thurs. Feb. 18 REGULAR DAY
Fri. Feb. 19 LAST DAY!!!

We've started to get the nursery together a little bit. We mainly have the changing table area set up. We need to start working on getting some cool "sea" themed prints up on the walls.
Jan. 2, with Brian's cousin Jessica. She's due a little bit after me.
While we were home for the holidays, my mother took us to her hospital and ran a stress test on us so we could track the babies movements/heart rate in relation to mine. Her nurses also played with their ultrasound on me. We could see that the baby had hiccoughs at the time. I couldn't feel them, but I've been able to feel them since then. It is pretty cool.

I had showers on Dec. 26 (in Ohio) and Dec. 27 (in Indiana) and got a ton of stuff we needed for the baby. Ashley had a really cute posting, so I'll just direct you there for the photos of the Indiana shower.
Ashley's Link
I finally finished up most of my thank-you cards today... while doing so I got to thinking about how many aunts this baby is going to have. According to my calculations, when he is born he'll have... 5 aunts, 18 great aunts, 14 great-great aunts, and at least 6 great-great-great aunts!

I loved my super cute winter pajamas. I'm about 31 weeks here (and looking huge).


We also had an ultrasound mid-December, confirming he is still a boy. They calculated him to be about a week and a half too big at the time.

Winter Storm, Round 2

Beating our record in December, we were treated to a weekend storm of about 2 feet this past weekend. It started snowing on my way home from school Friday, and didn't stop until about Saturday afternoon. It blew quite a bit on Saturday, and our church canceled services for Sunday. Even though we can easily get out of our parking lot and around the streets here, a lot of the housing developments and back roads down south where I teach aren't getting plowed as well. They canceled school Monday, and already for Tuesday! This already makes 4 snow days for us... I was told not to expect many days when I moved to Delaware, but whoever told me that was apparently wrong.

And we're supposed to get more snow starting tomorrow!

Super Bowl :(

Like almost every Hoosier I know, I'm thoroughly disappointed that the Colts lost... I really did not see that happening.

It was a bit of a long game for me, sitting that long makes my back start hurting, so I had to keep getting up and moving around. Cori loved stealing Brian's seat in this picture.


Even though it was just Brian and I, the food is still my favorite part of the Super Bowl.
First, we had left over leg of lamb from yesterday, so Brian wanted to make some sandwiches out of the chopped meat. He wanted to make his own bread, and he did a great job making these Kaiser-like rolls from scratch. They were pretty fabulous, and made the sandwiches great.

Second-we had ham roll-ups, my family favorite. Nothing fancy this time, just ham and cream cheese rolled up together.
Third-we made my Grandma Knight's famous cheese dip. It was pretty close to hers, and was delicious.
The final dish we had were brownies... I thought that I was making these brownies, but it turned out that I made a box of the double-chocolate variety. Brian thought it was pretty hilarious b/c he doesn't like nuts in his brownies, but I do. And I didn't even realize we had two different boxes in the house.
We were going to make a cookie pizza for desert, but we were too full.

Newark Restaurant Week 2010

This year we thoroughly tried to embrace downtown Newark's Restaurant Week. January is a great time in Newark because most of the students are not in town (UD has a full J-term) and that leads to better parking, less crowded restaurants, and incentives to get us into stores.

We made a pact to try and go to completely new (to us) restaurants, or at least ones we had only been to once before. The following was our week:

Monday Lunch (MLK Day-no school): Wanted to go to Ali Baba, but realized it is not open for lunch. Went across the street to Klondike Kate's instead.

Shannon: French Onion Soup, Country Club
Brian: Jalapeno Beer Cheese Soup, All Tied Up sandwich

Wednesday Super: Finally went to Deere Park Tavern... "Newark's oldest restaurant featuring hearty and savory dishes in a beautifully restored historic hotel frequented by Edgar Allen Poe."

Shannon: Homemade Fried Fierro Mozzarella (Brian looooved the herbs on top.), Buttermilk Fried Chick with Mashed Potatoes & Gravy (I could eat mashed potatoes and gravy every day of this pregnancy if Brian let me).
Brian: Black & Blue Steak (as normally, not quite blue enough for Brian, but I think he liked it).

Friday Super: Dined at Home Grown Cafe. Found out the place is a little bit restaurant, a lot bar. And it was a little crowded. But once the crowd thinned out we were able to enjoy ourselves, and Brian really loved the flavors here. The band was pretty good too-The John Bryne Band (folk rock). "Home Grown Cafe is an independently owned and award winning restaurant. We focus on providing our clientele with an eclectic unique experience that will be memorable for a diverse spectrum of tastes. With fresh local ingredients, internationally inspired menus, beers and wines from around the world. Home Grown is a great place for families, students, professors and travelers. We make 99% of our menu items from scratch, utilizing local and seasonal ingredients. We have a friendly, professional and knowledgeable staff. Home Grown is truly an enjoyable experience for all.

Shannon: Burger
Brian: Baba Ganoush, Waffle Crusted Chicken, Brandied Pear Bread Pudding

Sunday: We went to the Stone Balloon Winehouse, hoping to get soup, but found out they only had a brunch menu on Sundays. We went with it anyway, and had a very fancy Sunday brunch.

Shannon: Day Break Potatoes
Brian: pastry platter, Crab Cake Benedict

Reading Log

Kids Books:

The Hunger Games: My librarian read a teaser about this on the announcements last year, and I've wanted to read it ever since. I got it from my Aunt Jorita for Christmas, and was done with it before the holidays were over. It is a pretty depressing book, but it just draws you in to it.

Chasing Fire: And it turns out, there is a second book that follows Hunger Games. I think I read through this one even quicker-and can not wait from August when the next book comes out.
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Historical Literature: My other goal has been to read some of the "classics" that I have not read. It takes me quite a while to get through most of them, but I finally got through all 634 pages of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Once I got used to reading the dialect, I was finally able to get into the story. It seems so strange the book was really written so long ago, before emancipation. I can see how this book spurred people into action.

Winter/Christmas 2009

Picture of the Atlantic snowstorm:

Dec. 19. Saturday: I wake up early to find the entire complex covered in snow. It’s been coming down pretty hard for a few hours, and no one has really mussed up the streets yet. I make Brian get up to see it, and Cori loves bouncing around in the snow. The car dealership closes, so we can’t take our car in to get its oil changed like we had scheduled. We take our Christmas card picture with the windows open so everyone can see the snow. “The Blizzard of 2009” ends up being pretty substantial, definitely setting some records for the area. I see on facebook that our church has canceled services for the next day.

Dec. 20. Sunday: I bake pretty much all day… We get a call in the afternoon that Appo has already canceled school for the next day!! Get a lot of wrapping and letter writing done.

Dec. 21. Monday: The baking continues. I’m making up for last year, when I didn’t get any Christmas cookies made at all… I get another call saying that Appo has called the next day as well, and am officially on Christmas vacation! Get the Christmas letters mailed.

Dec. 22. Tuesday: Bake a few more things… decorate our sugar cookies! I normally don’t have the patience to decorate, but tried to make them cute this year.

Dec. 23. Wednesday: Wake up to find a tragedy in our fish tank. Apparently a bubble fish anemone has attacked our Nemo fish. Brian got it knocked off, but by then the fish was pretty much a goner. We hoped he would perk back up, but he never did. Good-bye Nemo fish.

Started on our way home. First stop is the Gap cheese shop, to pick up some extra aged gouda (Rembrandt) for Brian’s sister. We also add the following to our cart:
· Campo de Montalban (semi-hard Spanish cheese, made of cow, goat and sheep’s milk)
· White Stilton with Mango and Ginger (AGAIN! We always get this)
· And one of Bill’s Christmas Cheddars (Beecher’s Flagship Reserve, Seatle, WA)

We then decide to stop for lunch at the Gap Diner, since we always drove past it. We finally get going, and make the following progress, averaging 30 mpg. The cat and dog actually traveled very well together. No fighting, hiding, or getting sick.
· Left Newark at 10:17 AM
· Estimated Drive Time: 10 hrs, 43 min, Estimated Total Mileage: 627 miles
· Actual Drive Time: 12 hours, 33 min, with 2 hr, 44 min in stops, and actual mileage of 637 miles · Arrived Huntington at 10:50 PM

Dec. 24: Thursday: Spend the morning in Huntington, and head up to G & G B’s for our early Christmas. We then head to my old church for communion, and then up to Roanoke for a Lutheran Christmas Eve service. We sleep at Brian’s house. I’m too tired to make sure someone put out cookies for Santa.

Dec. 25: Friday: My mother ends up not having to work another shift, so we do get to have Christmas morning with my family when she comes home from being at the hospital from 7 pm-7 am.

We then head to Grandma Knight’s and see some of the family there. Little cousin Madison does a good job of leading Cori around like a steer and tiring her out.

Then we make it back up to Huntington to spend the afternoon with Brian's family, including Grandpa Eddie, excluding Mike and Ashley.

Our last stop of the day is the Banter Christmas that evening, where we get to meet baby Dylan.

Dec. 26: Saturday: We head to Ohio for Brian’s family Christmas. After a freakish car malfunction that left us sitting in a parking lot for about 45 minutes, we make it to the party. After eating, the Hutson aunts do an awesome job showering us with gifts for the little one.

Dec. 27: Sunday: Brian and I attend my church for worship, and then I have a “last super” (before one of us is a mother) with Mariah and Ashley. Following this we head to my second baby shower, hosted by my sister. She did a great job with it! We did the candy-diaper game, one where they had to guess my girth, a guessing game, and also the game where you lose your necklace if you say “baby”. It was cute, and pretty fun. My older sister in Alaska got to attend over the internet through Skype, which was really cool. I’m not much for video cameras, and this had the same feeling to it, so it took a while to get used to, but it was really awesome. Nephew Aydan acted like it was totally normal for him though. Good food and great gifts rounded out the shower.

(Pictures from the showers to come...)

Dec. 28: Monday. This was our first break in a while. We returned one double gift we got, went to the Bath & Body Yellow Sale (a personal favorite of my mothers, and a big surprise to Brian-“This normally costs $12????” Everyone in the store heard his opinion on the price for a bottle of lotion), and ate at Biaggi’s for lunch (you can now get refills on the soup!!! I have not had the chicken Florentine in years and was very excited). I got to read through most of “Hunger Games” and Brian spent most of the night playing poker with Matthew and my father.

Dec. 29: Tuesday. We ended up going to see my mother’s new hospital unit… see more in baby update posting. We then headed up to Huntington to have our official Christmas dinner with all of Brian’s siblings.

Dec. 30: Wednesday. Hung around in Huntington all day… I finally finished this needlepoint for baby Alison. I almost had it done with she was born, but it took me forever to get the last details done. Picked up “Chasing Fire” to start reading.
Cori had a lot of fun playing with Gus, most of the time. She had more energy to play than he did though, and he got grouchy about it a few times. Here they are in her cage together.... they both went in together on their own.

Dec. 31: Thursday. We had a busy day, having breakfast with my grandparents, and then eventually heading over to Megan and Ben's for a late lunch. She made us really tasty chilly, and we enjoyed some time with them. My sister thinks she is moving to Germany soon to live with Ben while he is still in training, but I'm not thinking about that until I see the actual orders in her hands.

We then have a quiet New Year's celebration with each other. For TEN years (!!!) Brian and I have visited the Marion lights every New Year's eve. We continued that again this year, and then headed to Ivanhoe's for tenderloins and ice cream. It was fantastic, and a nice little quite night together. We then headed to my parents where Brian worked on cooking meatballs and I fell asleep long before midnight. Brian missed waking me up to see the ball drop, but we said our "Happy New Years" a few minutes later.

Jan. 1: Friday. We partipated in my cousin Joel's 8th Annual Meatball Contest. There were 13th entries.  Even with crumbled bacon on his, Brian was not able to pull out a win. Afterwards we spent over an hour packing the car, getting almost all the Christmas and baby gifts in the car. We finished with dinner at BWW with Kari & Josh and Mariah & Kory. Even though it was absolutely FREEZING out, we finished off with DQ ice cream. My ribs hurt quite a bit after today-I think it was all the giggling.

Jan. 2: Saturday. We attended our last Christmas party in Toledo at Brian's grandpa's. Afterwards we drove straight through for nine hours and finally arrived home. Unpacking and getting our house back in running order will be on the agenda until we go back to work on Monday.