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Busy.

Even if things aren't really extra busy, it just feels that way.

Ricky works 65hrs a week at his full time job, plus comes home to do the occasional maintanance around the complex when it is needed, or if we have a vacancy(s).

I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, because I'm not. It's just a huge adjustment now that we have an infant in the home.

We are still trying to figure it all out but I'd say we are doing OK.

At times I can't help but to feel guilty for takeing an hour of time out of our busy schedule to do something as a family because there is always sooo much to do and get done or that needs to be done.

We will survive! Or at least I hope so...

Next Friday, July 27th at 9am I have to take Adalyn in to Mary Bridge Childrens Hospital to be seen by a GI specialist.

Why? because she chokes. a lot. no matter what she is fed with (breast or so far 6 different types of bottles/nipples) she chokes during feedings. Sometimes she will choke up to 4 times per feeding. my poor baby!

So, they need to look inside and see what is going on while she 'eats' to cause her to choke so much the way she does.

Could be a couple of things, or could be nothing and she is just a "choke'y'" baby.

THEN,

a month later, August 31st Ricky goes in for surgery on his shoulder. The surgeon will make a slice, then go in and shave off a piece of arthritic bone (from a work injury-6-8wks recovery time).

This same exact weekend, we will have family coming to town because on Sunday, September 2nd at 9am, Adalyn will be given her name and blessing at church from Ricky.

We are excited for this event.

I went out and bought her white dress over the weekend.

(couldn't find a pic of just the dress, but I will get pictures of her in her dress soon and post them)

Ricky seems to think he will be fine and ready to give her her blessing, either way Ricky will have help holding Adalyn from the other men participating in the blessing.

Along with all of this, that same week, September 6th is Hyrum's 4th birthday!

can't believe he will be turning 4yrs old! he will also be starting 2 days a week of preschool!

Where has the time gone.??

 

I'd like to say things will calm down by mid September but Ricky will still be recovering from his little surgery, plus depending on the results of Adalyn's GI apointment, it's possible she will have MORE doctors apointments or even surgery. (I dont think I could handle sending my baby in to surgery!)

We never know any more around the Leiser household but we are making things work.

If I dissapear for another month... or two, I assure you we are fine and well!

you might have better luck keeping up with us on facebook.  ;)

p.s. for those non-LDS (Mormon) readers who are interested in learning more about what this "baby blessing" is all about, you can read information here.

http://www.lds.org/manual/family-guidebook/priesthood-ordinances-and-blessings?lang=eng

Cousins and Jesus Christ

Now that we are settled with Adalyn and getting feeling comfortable with getting her out of the house, we have been back to church for a good month now.

Hyrum loves it. At least he appears to love it outside of church, I haven't asked his teachers at church how he does and behaves in class..

If we have had to leave a little early, he get's upset and tells us (while crying) "but.. I have to go to class.. I need to go to class mommom."

It brakes my heart, then I feel bad for trying to make him leave church early. :/

With that--- He has started talking a lot about Jesus Christ. He mentions or asks me questions about him every day. Mostly "where is Jesus Christ?"

Apart from that, he has also been very interested in 'cousins' lately.

I'm not sure why, he rarely sees cousins here in WA so I'm surprised when I hear him even say the word.

The other day Hyrum came up to me and asked "mommom, where's your cousins?" I told him that my cousins for the most part are all in Texas.

He thought about it for a minute and said "...Oh. where's my cousins? Are my cousins in TX too?"

His voice sounded sad/concerned, but I told him that yes, he has cousins in TX.

Any time he prays, he prays for his mawmaw, pawpaw, auntie elma, auntie adrienne, and his cousins in TX. (that's all who he knows really well (names of), sorry to any other family members that read this.)

A couple of weekends ago Hyrum attended his very first baptism. The baptism of his two twin cousins Maddie and Emma. (perhapse this is where he started the cousin thing)

While getting ready for the Baptism Hyrum kept asking if Jesus would be there, if Jesus was going to see his nice shirt, and if Jesus could see his then new, Teva sandals.

I answered yes to all of these. Hyrum keeps talking about how he wants to go see Jesus Christ.

I feel bad, and will admit, that I haven't been the best parent when it comes to teaching him more about his Heavenly Father until this point. :/ but he is now a very curious little guy about this 'Jesus Christ' man. He gets excited when he sees a picture of him and will point and let you know "there he is, that's Jesus Christ."

In a conversation with Hyrum today he again asked me "mommom, where is Jesus Christ?" my answer "...umm (trying to think of a child like answer)... he's in Heaven.."

Hyrum--"Oh. He's at his house in Heaven? Is he at his house with his cousins too?"

...I feel like I need to take a class on how to teach a toddler about our father in heaven.

I apparently also need to get him to a place where he can see and play with cousins and family more often.

p.s. it was so cute that he came home singing (surprisingly knew the words very well) The Wise Man and the Foolish Man song.

Thanks primary people for doing such a good job with my little man!!



Our Boy--The Rest of the Story

There are some parts of the birth of Adalyn that I didn't talk about in her birth post because I felt that it deserved a post of it's own.

Hyrum was in the birthing room with us. Not just while we waited for it to be push time but for the before, during and after time.

Yes, he saw Sister be pushed out into this world.

In the weeks prior to Adalyn's birth, Ricky and I decided that we would like Hyrum to be in the room with us if the situation and circumstances were right when the time came.

First, we needed or wanted to have one more extra adult in the room other than Ricky and my mom for extra help if need be for us to be comfortable having him in the room.

Also, the time of day/night would determin if he would be in the room as well. I figured that if I was in active labor and pushing at 2 or 3AM it would be best for him to stay home or with someone where he could stay asleep. (wouldn't want a tired little one running around the room)

Once we decided that we would feel comfortable having him in the room for the birth with circumstances permitting, we ran it across with our OB, and a few other people in the medical world as well as a few friends...

Each of the people we spoke to had the same response.

"oh I don't know about that"  "it might make him hate the baby"  "if he sees you scream in pain, he will hate the baby for hurting his mommy"  "it might be a traumatizing event for him to experience with all of the... blood." (for those of you who have not had the oportunity to be present at the birth of one of my children... I birth in silence.. meaning i speak not a word, peep not a sound)

Few people REALLY know our Hyrum as well as Ricky and I do. Yes, he is 3 turning 4 in a few months, but despite what people see in the maybe 1hr a week they see him he is an extremely mature little boy for his age.

He knows his limits, what he is allowed to do and not allowed to do, he cleans and cleans appropriatly when asked.. very obediant when he hears you ;)

...and despite his monsterous size for his age, and his love for super heros and wrestling with his daddy, he is a HUGE softy.. he can't and won't hurt a fly. he let's kiddos smaller than him push him to the ground in play.

That being said. WE knew he would do fine if he were able to be present.

After talking to the OB and asking if it was ok for him to be there, and despite what they thought about him being traumatized, she said, "yes" he can be there for the birth as long as a complication didn't arrise, in which point he would have to be taken out.

Perhapse prayers were answered..

Three weeks prior to Adalyn's arrival we got the news that Auntie Elma would be joining mom and coming to WA to be with us for the rest of my pregnancy and birth of Adalyn.

Awesome.

The only thing standing in the way after this was at which time Adalyn was going to make her arrival..

Good news, I went in to labor at 4:30AM which resulted in an AFTERNOON delivery.

Hyrum was able to attend the birth of his little sister!

He didn't scream or cry or get cranky (until he had to leave us and return home for the night with Mom and Elma).

He didn't get scared or traumatized.

He smiled the entired time and even jumped with excitment with the arrival of baby sister.

Was he at the foot of the birthing bed to see everything? No.

He stood at the head of the bed next to daddy, holding my arm and counting to 10 with everyone else while I pushed.

While you would think that all of my thoughts and energy were spent focusing on pushing, they were to an extent, but how could I ignore the little hand of my first born holding my arm?

I couldn't and didn't. I was in my own perfect little world at this point. Maybe that's how I managed to get her out in 25min..?

Either way.. It worked for me.

Adalyn will be 5wks old tomorrow and he hasn't shown any anger towards her or the fact that she is here. but there are times that he thinks she may be broken or defective...

This morning in the car Hyrum and I had this short conversation that I can't stop smiling and laughing about.

Hyrum-"Mommom, we need a new baby."

Me-"We need a new baby?"

Hyrum-"yah, a new one."

Me-"Why do we need a new baby?"

Hyrum-"Because this one cries."

Adalyn Denise Leiser

I planned to lay down and take a nap, but ended up here on the blog instead.

I figured I should blog about the birth of Adalyn while I still remembered some of it... I'm fairly positive that I will have full on Dementia in the next 20yrs. Or maybe it's just post pregnancy brain bcuz I typically have the most amazing memory ever.

Any who.

At the moment I can't remember the exact date, maybe the 13th of April, my mom and Aunt Elma arrived from Texas to help prepare for the arrival of little A.

We all thought she was going to come a little sooner than she ended up coming because my OB told me that I wouldn't be going past my due date, and at 34wks I was already starting dilation and effacement.

 

Once mom and Elma arrived the waiting game started. Well.. not 'waiting' exactly. It was more like "Project force Adalyn out of the womb right now and get overwhelmed and frustrated if things didn't work as fast as hoped."

It wasn't always fun. I was soooooooooooooo over being pregnant and wanted her out, and others wanted me to make her come out also and I couldn't, at least not as fast or soon as we wanted.

On Monday April 23rd, I woke up having contractions. I had contractions all day. They lasted from about 7am to 11pm. I even had a doc apointment that day and when I was checked I was 'two fingers' and 50% effaced.

 

My Mom kept asking me that day if I was feeling anything. I'd just shrug it off because I had had contractions on and off for probably 2months by this point and was even sent to the hospital one of the days during that time frame to get IV fluids to make the contractions stop. (they were dehydration enduced)

Tuesday the 24th came and I wasn't feeling any contractions at all except maybe one per hour..

I don't exactly remember what all we did on Tuesday. Every other day we were out and about running around to shopping or eating or trying to do something kind of fun, or getting more things needed in prep for Adalyn's arrival.

 

I went to bed Tuesday night convinced that I would in fact be pregnant for at least another week and go all the way to my due date and my mom would have only 2 days left to get to know Adalyn, then her and Elma would leave and I'd be stuck at home with a 3day old infant and a 3yr old todler..

Thankfuly that didn't happen.

I woke up around 4am to use the restroom. I figured my stomach was hurting due to constipation. I felt crampy. After sitting on the toilet for a bit, I went to the living room and got on Valley Medical's website to look at "signs of labor and when to call" lists, as I would usualy do in the middle of the night when I wasn't feeling the best...

 

I had/have the list memorized, so I probably just got on the site to look at the signs and rule them all out and talk myself out of calling the doc. and going back to bed.

 

I took some Tylenol in hopes that it would take away the little cramping then went back to bed. The Tylenol had no affect what so ever and I kept getting up and going to the bathroom... sitting on the toilet felt comfortable.

By 5am I decided, "oh my.. today is the day.."

I decided to sit on the couch and try to time this "cramping" and maybe sat there for 2 or 3 of them and decided "oh, I guess they are 3min apart." I honestly couldn't focus long enough between contractions to actually time anything. All I was thinking about was "hmm, when should I wake somebody? maybe I will just wait it out until my doc's office opens and call them at 8 or 9am if I still feel this way... but this is starting to hurt.. so, how much longer should I wait.. if I tell mom how I'm feeling, we would be headed to the hospital.. am I really ready to go to the hospital?"

 

After 15min. of battling my thoughts to myself, and realizing how much things were starting to hurt, I went back to my bedroom and told Ricky, "you aren't going to work today." he of course asked me 'why?' and I said "because my baby is coming out!"

Ricky got up and went to the couch to lay down and I was back and forth between the couch and the toilet because I started second guessing everything again despite the pain and told Ricky that I wanted to focus and time things for 30min... again... yeah right!

My mom ended up coming out of the bedroom to use the restroom and saw us up and I decided not to fight it anymore and said "It's time to go to the hospital." Once I decided that it was time to go to the hospital, I wanted to go.. right that second.. but Ricky and mom wanted showers before leaving. (REALLY?) I made my thought known when I asked in a groaning/frantic voice, "You're taking a shower!?"

 

Any way, we finally got in the car and on the road and in to the labor and delivery unit at Vally Medical. They have a new area and system now (at least new to me since giving birth to Hyrum almost 4yrs ago) where you have the be triaged and monitered and checked by nurses in a triage unit within the birthing unit for whatever amount of time, until the OB on call looks at your stats and info. via the nurse's to decide if you are at a point to be admitted.

When I arrived and got hooked up to the monitor so they could check my contractions and 'be checked' (dilation and effacment), I was 5cm dialated, 80% effaced, and contracting every 3minutes.. the OB at the hospital at the time was about to head home, and shift changes were about to happen. The first OB nearly sent me home!!

Thankfuly the next OB arrived, the new nurses were on their game and comunicated with the OB right away to get their shifts started, and I was admitted!

Things moved along, but sometimes not quick enough.

At 9:20am I got an epidural, and at 9:21am my water naturaly broke. The anesthesiologist joked that his needle did it... scary thought?

Any who. We got settled in, aunt Elma and Hyrum came to the hospital to join us.

Things weren't very exciting for a long time. They were reluctant to check me very often because they wanted me to finish at least 3 rounds of antibiotics before delivering. My mom and aunt kept checking the monitor to see what my contractions looked like and they kept comenting on how big they were, and were surprised when I said I felt nothing.. not even pressure.

I think about 1:30pm I was way past ready for SOMETHING, anything to happen. I was literally BORED. I asked my mom, "what's going on, what are we waiting for?"

Finally around 2:55pm the nurse came in and my mom comented on how long it had been since my progress had been checked. Nurse looked at my contractions, and finally decided to check me.

My nurse was training a student on this day, and I allowed the student to be there and a part of everything... but unfortunatley for her, when the nurse reached between my legs with her fist and discovered that I was 100% effaced, 10cm dilated, and a plus 2, and was asked to do a 'practice push' and babys head came poking out, she was pushed to the side and no longer allowed to help, only watch, because my baby was coming and the nurse had 5min to take apart my bed, and set up the room and trays for the doc. to come in and deliver.

At 3pm I started pushing. At 3:25pm Adalyn entered the world.

I had Ricky, mom, Elma, and my big boy 3yr old Hyrum counting with me and encouraging my pushing.

I think I summed it up best when I got on Facebook for the first time after arriving home and posted this status-----

"3yr old son holding my arm helping count to 10, mom forcing nurses to do their job in a timely manner, aunt Elma helping keep peace and control, Husband making fun of student and hospital staff to make their job harder/more fun, and ONLY 25min of pushing a sunny side up baby girl =most awesome--priceless delivery experience ever... ---Ricky Leiser--Denise Brock Milligan--Elma Hernandez Milligan. Baby Adalyn Denise Leiser arrived 4/25 @ 3:25pm. 7lbs 9oz. 18in."

Rock N Roll

Hyrum is obsessed with Rock n Roll music lately.

Well, I haven't quite figured out what type of music he considers Rock n Roll just yet, but if you ask him, he will tell you how much he loves it.

He has lots of shirts with guitars and stars on them. They have all been deemed his 'Rock N Roll' shirts.

He has a Paper Jamz Guitar, as well as Paper Jamz drums. He loves them, and plays with them at some point every day... I think that the songs that are played on these 'instruments' he considers his Rock n Roll songs.

One of his best friends also has a little first act drum set, so I'm sure he plays with it while he is over there.

Any way... He Loves music. You can find many posts throughout my blogging history about Hyrum and his love for music.

I just went back and looked at them all :)  so I really shouldn't be surprised about his new found 'Rock N Roll' phase(?) that is going on right now. Maybe it's not a phase. I will let you decide when you get done checking out this blog post. :)

He loves to sing.. There are some car commercials on TV with catchy tunes that he has memorized and will sing around the house... he also made his own little rap/song and has been singing it every day for maybe two weeks. Maybe someone helped him come up with it.. I don't know.. I am finding myself surprised a LOT these days with Hyrum and the new things I hear come out of his mouth. I sometimes feel like a bad mother for not knowing where he is doing his learning.

Any way, there isn't much to his 'song' but it's really catchy and I will start singing it with him at times.. it goes like this

"Who loves rock n roll, who loves rock n rolll? ME. I love rock n roll, I love rock n roll"

I will have to video it some day soon.

Before I leave you to look at all of the pictures and videos of my life long music man, I must say how much he is growing up. Kind of makes me a little sad.

Being a big brother is really changing him. For about two weeks now I have been talking to him about getting his hair cut. He would always say "no thanks, I don't need a hair cut... daddy needs hair cut."

Tonight we went out to eat. While eating I decided that it would be a good night to get his hair cut so after dinner we headed to the salon to chop his hair off.

When we first pulled up, him and I got out of the car alone and went inside while Ricky finished up a phone call. When we went in there was only one person inside who's hair cut was being finished up so we didn't have a wait.

I gave Hyrums name and the lady looked at Hyrum and asked him if he was ready. Hyrum jumped up and ran as fast as he could back to one of the stations with much excitment. The lady placed a booster down for him to sit on and he climbed into the seat and excitedly told the lady "I love Rock n roll, this is my rock n roll shirt."

Ricky came in and told the lady how to cut Hyrum's hair, then we were sent to sit down and wait because Hyrum didn't need us. :(

He smiled the entire time. Every few minutes he would look over to Rick and I and call out to us. Once we would look up at him, he'd flash us a huge, forced, happy smile because he was a big boy, getting a big boy hair cut all on his own and NOT crying. He didn't make a peep. First hair cut in 3yrs that he hasn't cried or fussed or complained..

His hair cut was topped off with some extra special red colored hair gel. Because he was such a big boy, we purchased a tube of red spiking gel just for him and his big-boy-ness. He's really proud of it and can't wait to wear it in his hair again tomorrow.

Any way, here is evidence and proof of Hyrum's long time love for music. I hope you all enjoy and much as much fun as I have! maybe he will be famous some day.

(his haircut and his 'rock n roll' shirt)

 (he loved this piano. I actually really liked the tunes it played as well)

 (pot drummin)

 (drums at EMP)

 (playin with mom-mom's sticks)

 (his first live performance!)

(this band was taking a break and Hyrum made his way on stage to play the drums)

(!rock star!)

Soooo... should we start with drum, piano, or guitar lessons first..? or a hip hop dance class for tots??

 

!!I LOVE MY ROCKER!!