Crack out Day

Hey it's Arnie.  Today was finally crack out day.  Grace Tate Robinson was born at 12:14 pm.  Weighing in at 8 pounds 1 ounce, we are looking at a whole new size of baby.  Last time, we thought that this was the proper size for a 3 month old.  Maggie is not sure what to call her, it keeps switching between Gracie, Potato and Tater.  We are hoping she decides to go with Gracie, but little sister better be ready to be Tater.  Maggie is loving being a big sister.  She helped with bottles and a bath today.  We are at Methodist Womens Hospital in Omaha, room 5211.  We should be here until sometime Saturday. 

Here are a few pictures.  Sorry about the quality, the photographer will be back on the job tomorrow.

Happy Birthday Gramma Lea...

Maggie is a lucky girl.  She has 3 wonderful great-grandma's and one quirky, slightly eccentric and amazing great-papa.  Yesterday we spent the day in Lincoln for Gramma Lea's Birthday.  You never know exactly what you're going to find when you go to Papa's house...it took Maggie about 5 seconds to get comfortable (it would have happened quicker, but the life-sized Buttons the Clown inside the front door sent her running back to the driveway upon our arrival.)  We had a great time and Maggie loves the attention and all the "stuff" to play with. 

"Gramma Lea, I can do the ice cream!"

"Aunt Lori, get the lighter upper thing"

"I'm making more shots then the Jayhawks!"



Maggie: "This is a BIG bathtub, who takes a bath here?"
Carly: "Papa does"
Maggie: "Is that because his belly is so big?"



"Ta Da" Doing a little show on Papa's Magic Stage.

"I'm afraid of clowns, but Gramma Lea likes them, so it's okay.
Why does Gramma Lea like clowns?"  Maggie made Gramma
Lea this clown picture for her birthday.

I think this picture was before we were even out of the
neighborhood.  She was exhausted! What a fun day!

MOOOOOOMMMMMMM........

....I don't think there is room for Tater in here!

This is more like it!  ("Don't worry mom, I'll hold Tater so she doesn't get lost in the bubbles.")

This could be a long weekend for Arnie.  I'm pretty sure I'm fairly miserable to be around at this point and Maggie's nose is running like a faucet....so taking care of the 2 of us could be a big job.  Thank goodness there is a little basketball on to take some of the stress off :)



We have a nursery....

...now if only we had a baby to sleep in it.  (and pictures of a baby to fill all of these picture frames).  The only thing missing is her initials, they will hang above her crib....but I couldn't put them in the picture, someone might guess her name then.

Thank goodness I have extremely talented parents.  My mom made all the beautiful bedding, pillows, basket liners, etc. (We were going to reuse the ones she made for Maggie, but she decided potato should have her own, and aren't they awesome!!)  and my dad made the perfect changing table!  I couldn't find anything I liked to match the furniture when Maggie was born so he took on the challenge.  It all looked great when it was Maggie's room, but now I LOVE IT!  I guess there is some benefit to living in a house before your baby is born.

not much to report...

but I know people are checking here for updates on little Miss Potato, so I thought I better say something.  So far, she's still staying put.  Yesterday I got a couple more bags of fluid, it's amazing how much a little saline can improve your outlook on life.  They also added a sleeping pill to my daily medical regiment, so last night I finally got a little shut-eye.  I'm feeling pretty good today.  There were a couple of numbers in my bloodwork yesterday that make it seem likely that she will make her appearance within the next couple of days....but we'll see, this little girl obviosuly has a mind of her own (so different from her big sister...or not!)

We're back in Norfolk today, so Maggie could go to preschool and start her new session of gymnastics.  She's still very excited about getting to go "by herself" like the big girls....we'll see what happens when she remembers mom has to drive her :) 

Tonight Maggie and I will head back to Omaha (that makes 38 hour of driving to and from Omaha so far this month, in case anyone is counting....)  With the possible lung complications we may have to deal with, delivering in Omaha is still definitly the right choice, but  the road time and logistics of it are getting a little old!  Poor Maggie, she's been such a trooper and she LOVES being in Omaha with me, but she needs this to be over, so she can have some kind of regular schedule back.  I'm so thankful that her preschool teachers are amazing and that they have been completly flexible through this entire situation! 

I'm sure life with a second child and a new baby will provide all kinds of new challenges but I'm ready to start figuring them out.  We're all tired of the constant driving, the inability to plan and the continual packing, unpacking and repacking of our suitcases.  We're almost there!

We thought...

...this was going to be our last picture as a family of 3.  On Thursday afternoon the doctor told us Friday was the day.  We didn't really make it public because this is about the 5th time we thought Potato was coming, and I was trying not to get my hopes up, but this time we felt pretty sure about the plan.

Arnie and I reported to the hospital at 7:15 for an Amnio of the baby, the Perinatologist and my doctor both told us they thought the results would be positive and we should go home for a few hours and report to pre-op at 1:30, we were scheduled in an operating room at 3pm.  At 11:30 the doctor called to tell me that the amnio results weren't what we were hoping for, actually they were devastatingly low (we need her score to be a minimum of 55 and she scored a 28).  This result actually leaves us to wonder if her lungs will be fully developed at delivery, no matter when the time comes. 

I was devastated.  I've been so sick and so uncomfortable that I was hanging all my hope on meeting my beautiful little girl on Friday and starting the recovery process.  BUT God knows what's best and he's doing everything he can to protect us both.  I know that he won't give me more then I can handle....I may not feel that way all the time, but I know he's in control of the situation.  It still seems unlikely that we'll make it more then a few more days but hopefully those days and lots of prayer will give her the time she needs to get ready for the BIG world. 

After a rough day on Friday, I spent a few hours Saturday in the hospital getting fluids and having some additional blood work.  The fluids really helped me feel human again and gave me a little more energy and spunk then I've had in a few days.  I have a doctors appointment tomorrow morning, so assuming there is still no sign of delivery, I'm at least hopefully for a couple more bags fluids/nutrition. 

This morning when I woke Maggie up for school, the first thing she said (it's usually "NOOOOOOO, I'm not ready to wake up!") was, "It's crack-out day!"  I said, "I don't think so" and she quickly responded with, "yes it is, me and God decided."  So we'll see...maybe she knows something we don't.

girl time and lady Gaga...

The last few days have been fairly uneventful....lots of doctors appointments and hangin' out waiting on Potato.  On Wednesday afternoon Maggie and I had a little girl time, we went and had our nails painted.  She was SO excited that she got to put her toes in the big tub of water and that they had purple sparkly (glitter) nail polish. 

We also went to try and find a couple of warmer outfits for when potato gets here, Maggie thought it was fun to pick out clothes for her sister, but she was disappointed by the lack of skirts available for colder weather newborn clothes and that most newborn clothes don't include much glitter.  She found some ruffles and something with butterflies on it, so that seemed to suffice......for now!



Maggie couldn't understand the manicurist and the woman couldn't understand Maggie, so the pretty much just laughed at each other :)





Just to prove we really were there...

 Last night Arnie and I went to Lady Gaga, it was even stranger then I imagined it would be, but we had a great time and it will make a good story for Potato some day.  She spent most of the concert dancing away in my belly, I'm pretty sure she was wondering what in the world was going on out there.  Arnie is a little worried, he says he has a fuddy-duddy reputation to maintain and if people know he was at Lady Gaga it might ruin it....I assured him that I would mention he spent plenty of time out in the hall watching basketball and he was fully confussed by both what was happening on stage and off.  We went as guests of our bank, so thankfully we were comfortable locked away in a suite with lots of other very out of place, slightly too old to be there, and definitly not appropriatly dressed (at least not for what seemed to be the dress code of the concert) bankers and attorneys.  I'm glad my husband humored me and agreed to go.