Three Weeks

Tanner 

We have made it to the three week mark. Actually, time has gone by really fast and I am sure it will only continue to do so. I have found that my desire to blog lately just doesn't exist, perhaps I have better things to do. I mean I do have three kids now and all :-) Speaking of which, the transition from 2-3 has been pretty easy, the lack of sleep has been difficult, but the actual balancing of the three kids hasn't been that hard. I am pretty sure that this transition has been easy, because the girls are at the same stage/same age. If they were not the same age, forget about it. I honestly do not know how or why people would have more than two kids if they did not have a set of twins in there somewhere. I think it would be a lot more difficult to balance and adjust if the girls were different ages, so I consider myself lucky. I also do not know why anyone would ever want to be pregnant more than twice! Thankfully, this is something I don't have to think about or worry about anymore since we are done. As for Tanner, he is an angel baby. I was always told I was so lucky with the girls, that they hardly cried, I could put them down and do other things and again, I have been blessed to have another little one who is just like that. He only gets really angry if he is hungry and that is when he turns into "angry Kitty." He gets so upset and yells so loud he sounds just like my crazy cat when she is freaking out, so we all call him angry kitty when he acts like that. Some of his other nicknames, are bean and monkey toes, both given to him by Maddie. I think bean is my favorite just because it is cute. He continues to grow and at the end of his first month I think he will be bigger and weigh more than the girls did at 2-3 months. Yesterday he weighed 9 pounds 5 ounces, he is an eating machine, but that is what he is supposed to do, so that is a good thing. After a few rough nights of him sleeping on me I solicited advice from my facebook friends and the resulting advice was to start swaddling him at night. This has worked like a charm and he is now sleeping 3-5 hour intervals give or take in his swing, one step at a time, but at least it isn't on my chest where I have restless sleep thinking I am going to drop him!

Maddie, Tanner and Natalie

The girls continue to go to school, which has been a good thing since this winter is lasting forever and has been so cold. They get to get out of the house and have a break from our every day lack of activity. I am looking forward to nicer weather when they can play on the swing set and we can go on walks and they can ride their bikes. I also look forward to summer swimming and picnics at the park....summer please hurry! So for now that is what is going on here. Look for a one month update in a little over a week after we have visited the doctor, official stats will be provided then :-)

Introducing Tanner William Stahl

Tanner

Here is the post you all have been waiting for...just kidding, but really here is the story of Tanner's arrival. Last week was a crazy week of final preparations and waiting. On Monday January 3 I started going into labor around 4:00 at 6:00 I had met my 6 contractions per hour limit and called the doctor. Even though I had an appointment at 8:00 they told me to go to labor and delivery. Tom and I both thought for sure that was it and we would be having a baby that day. My doctor had told me that she wouldn't stop labor once I had reached 37 weeks. Once we were at the hospital they gave me fluids and then a shot to stop the labor. I was a little upset, but at the same time I understood, he was still not "full" term 40 weeks or whatever, but still. So the labor stopped and I was sent home to rest. Wednesday I had an appointment with my doctor for my usual weekly visit. I hadn't been feeling very well for a couple of days and had a headache. Well my blood pressure, at the office was really high for me 158/104 or something crazy like that so they sent me over to labor and delivery again to monitor the baby and to do some initial tests to see if I had pre-eclmapsia. All of my tests started coming back normal and my blood pressure at the hospital was completely normal and level, not elevated at all. Very weird I thought, how is this possible? We began making arrangements to have someone come stay with the girls, because they decided they wanted to monitor me over night...THANK YOU Krissi for helping us out, you were a life saver! Well, shortly after Tom got back to the hospital I started having regular contractions again, I had been having a few, but they were getting more painful. Finally I asked for something to ease the pain because while they were irregular they were painful. At that point the nurse called my doctor and the next thing I know there are 4 nurses and the anesthesiologist  standing over me prepping me for the c-section. It all happened very quickly, and since it wasn't an emergency I thought this was odd, but my mom thinks that they probably use non-emergencies as practice for emergencies, which makes since. So we were all prepped and taken back and at 11:17 pm on January 5, 2011 Little Tanner William Stahl entered the world 8 pounds, 20 1/4 inches, pissed off screaming and urinating on all the nurses and doctors. He has a full head of hair and very healthy lungs! The rest of the procedure was over by midnight and we were wheeled back to my room to recover, always a pleasure! We spent three days in the hospital and were released on Saturday to go home. We are making the adjustment, the not sleeping is of course painful and Tanner does not like to lay on his back at night, he does during the day though go figure. The girls have been wonderful big sisters. They do not like to hold him, but they sit with me while we are feeding and they cover him up and bring him is pacifier and other things big sisters do. So for now that is the report and story and while he wasn't set to come for another week, I am sure glad he is here and healthy and we can move onto the next stage!