Easy Like Sunday Morning

There was only one baby born in Covenant Medical Center on Sunday morning, March 4, 2012.

And he belonged to us.

Kelli was scheduled to be induced on Monday morning, March 6. This was 7 days past her due date. She went 8 days past when she gave birth to Charly, who also came via induction. Suffice it to say, we were fully prepared to go in on Monday morning.

 

On Saturday, Kelli felt, what she thought to be, a contraction. It came while she was shopping inside a crafty boutique while Charly and I waited in the car. We thought we better start timing them. However 70-some minutes later, we let down our guard and again, began expecting Monday.

Later in the afternoon, her contractions started coming again, this time, every 30 minutes. By 7:30, they were coming every 20 minutes. By 9:30, every 10. We called the doctor. She told Kelli to come in when the contractions were 5-7 minutes apart and she also told her to take a bath to stop the contractions. Why in the world would we want to stop the contractions? If this baby was ready to enter the world, we wanted to be ready. Comfortably in a hospital! Kelli called her parents because we didn't want to have to go in in the middle of the night.

After Denny and Carol showed up around 10:30, we continued timing contractions. We had three or four in a row, separated by only 7-8 minutes. So despite what the nurse told Kelli over the phone, we headed out for the hospital.

We sat in the triage room for roughly an hour, contractions stopped, and the nurse left us alone as she called the on-call doctor. She warned us that one couple had already been sent home that night. Kelli was only dilated to 4 cm (she had been 3 the preceding Wednesday). That bit of info and the fact that the contractions had stopped, made us feel as if we were about to be the second couple sent home that night.

Instead, Dr. Lipinski was on her way in! Her policy was to never send home a couple past due. With an induction scheduled for Monday morning, Lipinski's plan was to admit us, get us settled in a room, get Kelli an epidural so we could sleep and rest for the night, then start the pitocin first thing at 7 am the following morning. Kelli got her epidural around 3 in the morning and I made the couch into a bed. At 5:30, our nurse Carryn (the same delivery nurse we had for most of the day when Charly was born), told me to wake up. Things had progressed through the night naturally, and baby was coming soon!

Carryn got things ready and Dr. Lipinski showed up around 6:30 am, just as Kelli began to push. At 6:49, 19 minutes later, our son, Hayes Warren Henrichs, was born.

Proud Patriots

 So what? The Patriots lost the Super Bowl. Who cares?

We do (insert frowny face).

 

But Tom Brady is still the best and we are still proud. And because of Mr. Brady, there's a good chance they'll be back next year!

One Month To Go

Exactly one month from today is Baby #2's official due date, February 28, 2012. Things are feeling very real all of the sudden. We have sort of settled on two boy names but are worlds apart when it comes to girl names. We're moving Charly to a different room, a bigger room, so the baby can have Charly's old, smaller room, yet we haven't begun to move a single piece of furniture or paint a single swatch on any wall. We have some newborn diapers and a few neutral newborn outfits but suffice it to say, one could argue whether or not we're as ready as we could be.

We often wonder about Charly, and the inability to keep her in the loop regarding how much her life is going to change. She is kind of the Queen of the Castle right now, strutting from room to room, bossing Elliot ("Eta") around, bossing us around, jabbering up a storm, getting out whatever books, or coloring books, or puzzles, or building blocks she feels like and leaving them strewn about the house. There are days, when we're being bossed around by her, that we think this baby couldn't come soon enough! Somedays Charly needs a wake up call! But then we feel sorry for her, thinking about how much of her world is going to change and she doesn't have the slightest clue.

We talk about the baby all the time with her and we both know that she knows that there is a baby inside her mom. She likes it when it kicks and moves. She acts excited and talks about "Baby" things all the time. She practices feeding her baby Mel gave her at Christmas and she's interested in the bottles that Kelli recently dusted off and replaced in our kitchen cupboards. She shakes her head at the mention of a "Girl" but repeatedly tells people she wants a "Boy". We're asking for her help in deciding upon names, but she's not much help.

A few weekends ago, I took some pictures of Kelli's bump. We had fun, but Charly wanted nothing to do with any pictures. She didn't make it into even one. Well, sort of one, but not really. It was more by accident. And once she realized I had a camera she was done. She doesn't like being photographed anymore, which I suppose is silver lining for our hard drive.

Speaking 'Charly'

Charly talks all the time. We don't always understand her, but she talks all the time. At home. She's pretty reserved in public. Some words she says loud and clear. Like:

boy, baby, snow, moon, sun, cold, burr, Papa, Grandma, remote, George (for Curious George), purple, blue, pink, cup, cake, please, thanks, excuse me, 'What doin'?, off, on, book, read, touch, watch, sheep, cow, toot, poop, pee pee, shower, hi, dump (in reference to her building blocks, not something else), truck, Beau, bow, cat, ear, eyes, nose, honk, hair, ouch, mine, sad, crying, couch, chair, sleep, come, monster (usually in reference to The Monster at the End of This Book iPad app), game, Hawkeye, hot, heart, marker, Mama, Dada, stop, away, home, eat, don't, bite

Then there are others. Words that she says quite frequently, that took Kelli and I awhile to decipher. Words like:

• "Eta" - Elliot (our cat)
• "Popeye" - her pacifier
• "Binka" - her blanket
• "Ca-cai" - color (in her coloring books)
• "Heta" - heavy
• "Mutta" - muffin
• "Cackle" - tickle
• "Hooj" - huge (usually in reference to a full moon, which she's obsessed with, or her mom's belly)
• "Mimi's" - M&M's
• "Waawaa" - water
• "Coi" - car
• "Pod" - iPod (or if she's lucky, iPad, which she gets really excited about)
• "Tay-tay" - her Uncle Taylor
• "Bane" - her Uncle Blaine
• "Shrooz" - her cousin Cruz

There are more. Plenty more. But that's all we could think of off the top of our head. Today is a snow day, school was cancelled, and tonight we're supposed to go to Rock of Ages with Beau and Ashley. We just hope the snow stops long enough to get a babysitter to our house.

Santa Came!

Charly may have wanted nothing to do with the jolly guy in red this year, but she sure accepted all the gifts he brought her with a big ole' smile!

 

She loved her building blocks.

 

And her Elephant and Piggie book.

 

But Mom had to read it because it was too early and "bite".

 

Her Curious George DVDs were a hit, even if she couldn't take her eyes off A Very Monkey Christmas, which she insisted play while she opened presents. We tried deleting it off our DVR but I think it's burned in permanently from the thousands of times it was played this December.

 

Little People are very cool. As is her Little People dollhouse. It has sound effects for the doorbell and the washing machine (both harmless), and the toilet and the shower (both kind of odd choices)! Thankfully the makers of Little People keep their minds out of the gutter, unlike me apparently. Charly thinks it's cool and has to get it out at least once a day, even though at the time she would have rather played with the screwdriver I used to take the box apart, to "fix" everything in the house.

 

And the biggest gift Santa and Mrs. Claus (plus 1) carried up the stairs from Santa's Basement Workshop . . . (drum roll please)

 

A kitchen!

 

She's a master chef and always remembers to wash her hands.

 

Her stocking was filled with "mimi's" (M&M's) and colors. The girl could color for hours on end. And read. Toys are not necessarily her thing. But give her a pack of Crayolas and an Elephant and Piggie book, and the girl is occupied and content. 

We had a lot of fun on Christmas morning and can't wait to see how Charly shares the spotlight next year!

Christmas Was Good

Christmas was good this year. (When isn't Christmas good?) With Charly, we swear it just keeps getting better and better. Part of the reason is that magic you felt around Christmastime as a kid, returns to you as an adult when you see your child begin to experience it first hand. It's an interesting perspective. With her 2-year celebration just around the corner, Charly was old enough this year to begin understanding some of the traditions we're trying to establish for her sake:

Like celebrating on Main Street the day after Thanksgiving with family and friends, and speculating as to how Santa will be 'coming to town' this year (helicopter!). Even though she fell asleep on my shoulder and missed the whole darn thing . . .

And decorating the Christmas tree! Kelli had a new scheme this year including ribbon and even more ornaments. She was so excited because Charly loves to help Kelli around the house. Come to find out, Charly would have rather wrapped Elliot up in lights than use them to decorate the tree . . .

And gathering in Des Moines at Blaine and Jodi's to make Christmas cookies with the entire Henning clan! Even though she would have rather just played with her cousin Brooks' hockey jerseys and watch football than decorate any Christmas cookies . . .

Okay, so she was kind of unpredictable. But simple moments like these, (and more that we'll share later):

. . . reassured us that we were creating something special to her. And hopefully by documenting it all, we can share it with her someday!