It has been another busy week for us! Brad has had the whole weekend off so it's been nice! Friday night we headed to Paullina to Mike and Anne's to hang out with them for the night! It was nice to get together with them since we haven't seen them much since Maeci has been born. Saturday we got up early because the kids had there pictures taken. They did pretty good with pictures except for the fact that Maeci really didn't really want to wake up at first. I am excited to see them once she gets them done. Saturday late afternoon we headed down to Paullina for there fun days parade and they had fun games and bouncy things in the park for kids. Camden had fun running around with his friends, Trevor and Mikayla. After the fun in the park we went back to our friends Brooke and Aaron's house for pizza and to let the kids play some more. It was a busy weekend for us and seemed like we were on the go constantly but we had a good time! The weather was perfect all weekend and it was not as humid like the weather we had last week. I have been wanting to go to some more of the boy's baseball games but it's hard to take Maeci when it's so hot and humid out. Hopefully we will make it to a few more before the season is over. Today we are going to hang out and relax. I am going to take Cam swimming this afternoon...he is becoming a little fish. He has private swimming lessons the end of July so it will be interesting to see how he does with. We are also excited for next weekend. We are taking a small family vacation to the cities. We are going to the Mega Mall to shop and go to Camp Snoopy(i think thats what it's still called) and let him go to Lego Land. He absolutley loves legos so he will have fun there. We are also going to the Zoo, a Twin's game, and going to make a stop at the outlet mall. I am excited to get away!!! Well that's about all that is going on around here for now!

Busy last week

Our last week has been pretty busy. Last week Brandi came home from Aurora to visit. I didn't tell Camden she was coming and he was sure excited to see her when we picked him up from daycare. He kind of just looked at her like what are you doing here and then ran to her and gave her lots of hugs! We just hung out around the house while she was here. She kept Camden entertained outside while I took care of Maeci, which was very helpful! They had fun playing soccer, having water fights, and just hanging outside! Last Thurday night we packed up the kids and went to the Oz and Brett's baseball game at Milford. I didn't know how Maeci would do during the game but she did well and pretty much slept the whole game. It was my first game I had been to this season. It was great to be able to go and they came away with a win! Friday Brandi headed back to Swea to spend the rest of the weekend up there. I was going to go back on Friday but decided not to leave until Saturday morning. This weekend was Brad's first weekend back to work since I had Maeci so it's been just the kids and I most of the weekend. Friday night we headed to our friend's for a BBQ since I did not go back home. It was fun to get together with everyone that night and Camden enjoyed playing with all his friends. Our friends have a little girl also that is almost 2 weeks older than Maeci. Saturday morning I packed the kids up and headed to Bancroft for the baseball tourney. They won there first game and ended up winning the tourney that day! Again it was nice to be able to see another game. After the first game we headed to Gma and Gpa Beadle's to visit with them and the Roman's who were home from Wisconsin. After spending the afternoon visiting I packed up the kids and headed back to Primghar. It seemed like a long day but it was nice to visit family and watch baseball. Thank goodness Camden and Maeci do well in the car especially since I was by myself. Today we are just lounging around at home while Brad sleeps. After he gets up we will do the whole father's day thing! Happy Father's Day to all you dads!!!!
I will post some pics later otherwise I usually post all the pics on facebook!

Doc appointment

Maeci had her week check-up yesterday. Everything went well and doc said everything looked fine. She came home from the hospital weighing 9 lbs 9 ozs and yesterday she weighed 10lb 8ozs. I was happy to see she gained weight instead of losing it. Doctor said she is a very content baby because she just layed on the table and slept for the most part during her check-up. So we were happy to hear that everything looked good. I was just saying yesterday how good she was and her sleeping was good during the night. Well last night she decided to she wanted to be up for 3 hours during the night and she is fussy today. Boy I sure hope it was just last night and today because I am already used to her being such a good baby and can't imagine her starting to be fussy all the time. She gets so gassy and gets tummy aches easily so I think that has been some of her problem today.I guess everyday won't be the same with her. We also have been trying to keep her awake today and that is not easy!! Anyways that's about all that is going on right now.....Oh yeah my sister is coming here tomorrow from Chicago. We are excited to see her! Camden does not know she is coming and he is going to be so excited to see her!!

Well Maeci is now a week old and everything is going pretty good. She is a very content baby and sleeps all the time. She sleeps all day but she still does pretty well sleeping at night. Most nights she will sleep for 5 hours at a time. She is hard to get back to sleep after she wakes up but she will eventually go back to sleep. I guess I can't complain considering she is only a week old.
I am still breastfeeding her and I am thinking I am about ready to give that up. The past couple days I am just pumping but I feel that is all I am doing! I guess people were right when they said how demanding and time consuming nursing is! So we will see how this week goes with it and I will go from there!
Yesterday we headed back home to visit all the grandparents, aunts, and uncles! It was a long day but it was nice to see everyone. Camden enjoyed playing with Cassie and the boys and was worn out by the end of the day. Maeci literally slept all day. I think everyone maybe got a peak at her eyes but for the most part she was sound a sleep. I will post some pictures from the last week either on here or facebook!

Our first day/night at home with Maeci....

Well I wrote this post once but for some reason it didn't post....
Our first day home with Maeci went pretty good. We are all just trying to get settled in and get a routine started. Brad has been busy doing alot around the house and getting stuff putt away...he is such a great husband and dad! Oh yeah and he is taking care of me since I am a little layed up from the surgery!Camden is starting to adjust a litte better. He does not like it when she cries really loud...like during her bath last night! He got very upset because he didn't understand why she was crying!He held her for the first time last night and fed her a bottle...boy did he love that!! He has been giving her lots of kisses and hugs:) Maeci slept alot during the day yesterday and I wasn't sure how last night would go. She went to sleep around 7:30 and I finally woke her up around 11:00 to nurse her before I headed to bed. She went right back to sleep so I went to bed thinking this could be a long night since she had slept ALL day. She woke up at 1:00 and she took a couple oz. of formula and went right back to sleep and slept until 6:00 this morning! I about died that she slept that long! I figured she would be up for the day after I fed her. Nope she ate and went back to sleep and is still sleeping and it's 9:00! I know it's the first night but I hope she continues to be a good sleeper! I will probably have to maybe wake her up one more time in the night to nurse since 5 hours is a long time to go without me nursing or pumping. And she really needs to really eat every 4 hours since she was losing some weight in the hospital and newborns just need to eat more often! Well the rest of the household is getting up so I better get going!

Our first day/night at home with Maeci....

Daddy went home :(

Brad just left a little while ago to go home for the night to pick up Camden. Camden was pretty excited because daddy and him were going to the movie today in Spencer and were going to go buy some toys for Maeci! He had a hard time leaving but we thought it was a good idea for him to spend some time with Camden before we get to come home tomorrow. I hated to see him leave too because it's alot easier with him here to help me since I am having some pain still, I guess I will just rely on the nurses...which I hate asking for help all the time!
Maeci is doing pretty good. Dr.Caldwell, the peds doc, came and checked her out this morning. She is a little concerned because yesterday she was down to 10lbs and today she was down to 9lbs 9ozs. All baby's usually lose some weight but she has almost lost a lb. So we are going to see what she weighs tomorrow before we go home and we may have to take her to the clinic back home and get her weighed for a couple days to make sure she is starting to gain and not continuing to lose the weight! She seems to be eating good though so we will just have to watch her. She is a pretty good baby so far, obviously likes to sleep alot. Her dad and her love to nap in the hospital chair already. Her color is really good and everything else seems to be going pretty good. This is something new I have never heard before but on her eyelids and right between her eyes she has a couple "stork bites" I have seen them on lots of baby's before just never hear of them called that until the nurse told me yesterday. I guess they are a type of birthmark and something with the stretching of blood vessels in the area where they are located. They are flat and not raised. I guess it's common in baby's and most commonly go away completely or at least fade by the time they are 18 months old. It's nothing serious at all but I guess I just learned something new yesterday! Well she is ready to eat so I better get going! YAY we hopefully still get to go home tomorrow!

Day 2.....

The night went pretty well last night. I had her in here one time to nurse her and the rest of the night I was able to sleep because she was in the nursery and they bottle fed her. This morning she did good nursing and throughout the day has not been so good. She is having trouble latching on or if she does she falls asleep about 3 minutes into the nursing and it's hard to keep her awake. My milk has not come in yet but the colostrum(spelling?) is there so she is getting a little of that. It is frustrating at times but I guess if it don't work out at least I can say I tried it with her. The nurse thinks we will be fine because it does take awhile to get used to it!
I am also having alot more pain today than I had yesterday. I am trying to keep ahead of that with pain meds but they make you so loopy and tired and I hate feeling like that but I guess that's what I have to do. I am also having that neck pain again that I had after I had my spinal before surgery yesterday. So hopefully tomorrow will be a better day with the pain control. Other than that we are just hanging out and enjoying our visitors! I will probably put some new pics of her up on Facebook later tonight or tomorrow. She looks different today than yesterday because some of her swelling has gone down. She looks alot like Camden did when he was a baby. The nurses look at her and can't believe she is over 10 lbs, they say they think she looks smaller than that! Brad and I think Camden looked bigger at birth than she does! She is still a little chunk though!Hopefully everyone is enjoying there weekend:)

Maeci Esta Stevens

Well she is here and doing great. Maeci was born at 7:38 this morning weighing in at 10 lbs 6 oz and is 22 inches long. She is a little chunk! She is already daddy's little princess! This morning on the way down here I started having contractions and when I got here they hooked me up to monitors and sure enough I was having contractions. So even if I wouldn't of been coming down for the c-section today I would of probably had her this weekend somtime..Crazy how that happened! The morning started of kind of shakey with not being able to get an IV in me. I was poked 3 times and finally they got it in....they sure DO NOT feel the best when you have to get poked that many times. I went into OR around 7:00 am and they gave me my spinal to numb me and I instantly got nausea and really bad pain in my neck and upper back...they gave me some medicine to take care of that so I was feeling pretty good when doc came in to start the surgery. He came in and started at 7:25 and I had her ata 7:38...it went pretty fast!! Once I got back to my room I started the neck and back pain again but it's under control now and I am hardley having any pain at all. I am on a liguid diet right now until I can keep stuff down. Everytime I eat Jello or drink somthing I have been vomitting it back up so I am a little dehydrated. If this continues they will have to put another IV back in to get me some fluids through that. THey took it out a little while ago because it was bothering me so bad when they put the IV and my machine would constantly beep. So I am hoping I can keep all this water down that I have been drinking so I DO NOt have to go through another IV attempt! Well that is about all for now. I posted some pics on facebook so check them out! Oh yeah bare with me as some of this might not sound right or spelling might be a little off, I am still a little doped up from some of the medicine!

Quick update on BB game tonight....

Tonight NSK traveled to Buffalo Center to take on undefeated North Iowa. Brett was the starting pitcher. We got an update at the end of the 4th inning and the score was 0-0. I thought maybe we could get the last inning on the radio here and we could hear bits and pieces of it on 98.1 but we had to keep driving back and forth in the drive-way. Dad and I were very nervous not sure what was going on in the last inning with Brett pitching. We ended up winning 6-2 and Brett got the win. From what we could hear on the radio both boys also had some hits and I guess it was a heck of a game!! Way to go boys!!:)

The Big Day...

Well tomorrow is the big day for the arrival of Baby Stevens'. I am SOOO ready to be done. This past week I have been very uncomfortable..I swear the baby has double in size in the past week. I have been battling headaches and backaches the past couple days! But tomorrow that will all be over with..thank goodness. We have to leave for Sioux City a little after 4 in the morning tomorrow...it's going to be an early morning and I probably won't sleep tonight! My dad is coming down this afternoon to stay with Camden in the morning and bring him down to the hospital after the baby is born. He can't wait til his Papa gets here! So tomorrow we will be letting everyone know once the baby arrives!

Weekend

Like usual our weekend seemed to be pretty busy......
Friday-We headed down to Paullina to Mike and Anne's for a BBQ. We had lots of good food, fun, and the weather was perfect. It's always a goodtime getting together with them and there kids!
Saturday-We went to Spencer to do some shopping, got groceries, and to get a few last things for the baby. After we got home we relaxed for awhile because I was exhausted and with it being hot all weekend I was swelling up alot! That night Camden and I were supose to go with Mike and Anne to the rodeo in Cherokee but Camden decided he wanted to go to the races. It was probably a good thing we didn't go because I would of had a hard time sitting through the whole thing! So after relaxing for awhile we headed to the races here in Primghar. The Jaycees group here in Primghar sponsor and put on the races. We are members so Brad was working there that night. Last year Camden didn't like them so much because it was so loud and his ears are sensitive to loud noise but this year it didn't seem to bother him as much and he really enjoyed them!
Sunday-It was such a nice afternoon so we spent alot of time outside and were able to get some yardwork done!
That pretty much sums up our weekend....I will post a few pics later!