happy birthday adeline!

So after much anticipation (can I get a drum roll please)...Adeline is here! To everyone's surprise and delight, she arrived 11 days early on April 23, 2010 at 9:25am, weighing a whopping 6 lbs even and was 19 3/4 inches long. She is now 5 days old, and we're all home and doing absolutely wonderful.

Now I bet you thought you'd get away without hearing the whole intriguing birth story. HA! Wrong! I'll try to leave out the unpleasant details and make it as short as possible though. And mind you, this is written from the point of view of a woman going though labor and delivery for the first time. So those you who have "been there, done that," can simply smile knowingly, and those of you soon to be 1st timers...well, I'll try not to ruin all the fun surprises.

I had already had 2 sleepless nights of cramping/contractions before I went to work on Thursday morning, April 22nd. I figured they were bound to go away - I was still almost 2 weeks out from my due date. But the contractions that morning went from every 20 min to every 8-10 min by around noon. At that point I was getting anxious and not able to concentrate very well (and besides, I had a meeting coming up that I didn't feel like wincing every 10 minutes through), so I decided to go home and just rest.

By around 8:30 pm the contractions were much more intense and I was at the point where I had to stop what I was doing and concentrate through each one, and by 10:00pm I was beginning to be in a considerable amount of pain. Brian was getting quite anxious, so we decided to go to the hospital, against my sister's warnings that it was still probably "too early." And sure enough, we showed up and I was only 1 cm dilated.

1 cm dilated people. Are you kidding me?!

Needless to say, I was frustrated pretty pissed. Usually they won't admit you to the hospital until you're at least 4 cm, when they consider you in active labor. After walking around for an hour, I still had only progressed to 1.5 cm, and at that point, I was hurting. I certainly must be a huge wuss, but running for 24 hours straight, at 14,000 ft, up a 10 percent incline, would have been more pleasant than the pain I was experiencing. They told me I could stay and see if I progressed, but that this was considered early labor and could go on for days. But the nurse on staff did say she thought I would have the baby by...Monday.

Gee. Thanks for the vote of confidence.

So I decided to go home and take their advice and draw up my warm Zen-like bath, turn out the lights, and meditate. Oh and take a Tylenol PM, because that would dull the pain for sure (where's the sarcasm font when you need it?) So I went home and learned to relax as much as possible and and let go of my frustration, which made things more tolerable. About 3 hours later around 2am when I decided Zen could take a hike as I couldn't stand it any longer, we went back to the hospital, and I was 4 cm.

Thank you JESUS! (I was every religion that night.) I immediately demanded pain killers.

They put me on an IV, and although things were tolerable at that point, I had already had 2 sleepless nights and was done with it.  I asked for the epidural and it was the best decision I ever made. Seriously, an epidural must be what taking crack cocaine feels like - high as a kite and floating on a cloud. If I didn't have a needle in my back, I might have thought I'd died and gone to Heaven.

Unsolicited Advice: Get the Epidural!

I didn't feel an ounce of pain for the remainder of labor and delivery at that point - it was smooth sailing from there on out. And to think, trying to get to 4 cm to be admitted to the dang hospital was the hardest part! Brian was cool as a cucumber throughout the whole process - I knew he'd be great. Besides, he slept the entire night after I got the epidural, so I think he got off pretty easy, although he may disagree. So yeah, after resting for a mere 8 hours on my epidural crack-like high with only about 20 minutes of pushing, Adeline Jocelee Bishop was born.

And she is perfect and absolutely precious. And all worth it, of course!

We stayed at the hospital for the 24 hour minimum and then high-tailed it home. My mom jumped on a plane early Thursday morning after we called her on Thursday night to let her know I was in labor, but obviously at that point Adeline was coming without her! My mom was a big help to us for the few days she stayed, and then left for home on Tuesday.

Adeline is now 5 days old and we're adjusting well to our "new life." She is a very good baby - she's a good sleeper, and most of the time we have to wake her up for feedings so she can gain weight properly, but when we do wake her up she's a very good eater.

Trying to heal from my "2nd degree laceration and a moderate tear" as the Doctor called it (err, ouch) and taking care of the baby has been challenging. But Brian has been quite eager and wonderful with helping out with the little one - I think I've only changed one diaper myself so far, and he volunteered to give her her first bath. Adeline certainly lucked out on such a dedicated Dad. Thankfully, today was the first day I could finally walk regularly without doing a weird modified duck walk and sit without looking like I'm 90 years old, so we successfully went for our first stroll around the neighborhood as a family - wife pushing the baby stroller, with husband and dog in tow.

Make room, suburbanites!

We also ventured out to Old Navy and Marshall's, and Adeline was just great. She really likes the stroller and swing - I think all the movement makes her feel like we're going on our daily run when she was in the womb.

So that brings me to now. Brian escaped off to soccer practice for a couple hours, and Adeline is asleep on the couch next to me. Brian and I both couldn't be more thankful and excited for such a sweet, happy, healthy baby girl and look forward to watching her change and grow over the coming days, weeks, and years (but not too fast).

Welcome to our new life. Cheers to new chapters and 6 lb beginnings!

Arches and Canyonlands

For one last ho-rah before Adeline gets here, Sarah and I decided to take a mini-vacation over the Easter weekend to Utah.  Right out of the gate we had some issues though because as we got closer to Copper Mountain, we found out that I-70 was closed near Vail for a 30-car pileup.  The only way around this accident was to take a 1 hour detour through a winding mountain road to Leadville and then back up to Minturn.  Ugg.  That sucked. [Read: It was horrendous.] The entire detour the snow was coming down like crazy, it's only a 2-lane road, and it was filled with idiots. [It was the idiot drivers who can't drive in the snow that made it a nightmare. I was trying all kinds of crazy maneuvers to get around retard drivers, and Brian was not very happy with me.]  Eventually we make it back up to I-70 and continued on our way to Moab, UT.

On the way to Moab, I was thinking that this was the first time I've ever been to Utah for a vacation, and then it hit me.  I actually know someone who lives in Utah now, and I think he's my brother! [Hey, we may be engineers, but we never claimed smart] I gave Kevin a call at work and told him we were on our way to Utah and he had to take the rest of the week off and join us. [Read: come camping and hiking with us again - we'll try not to make you vomit this time!] Luckily, his supervisor was cool with it and Kevin decided to join us on Friday night.

Our first day of hiking was in Arches National Park.  Arches is an extremely awesome park and is very family friendly.  Most of the hikes in the park are less than a 1/2 mile long, with only a few of them being multiple miles long. [Um, except somehow we managed to hike 17 MILES in the park that day.] The arches themselves are very cool, and each of them you can walk right up to, stand under, climb on... [so awesome!!] 

The highlight of the day was the very last hike that we did in the park.  The loop is called the Devil's Garden Trail, and it takes you to seven different arches over the course of 5.5 miles.  The first half of the hike is on a well established trail with tons of other folks.  After you get to the end of the trial at Double-O Arch, there is another trail called "The Primitive Trail" that you can take to get back.  The Primitive Trail is not marked with anything other than some cairns, and weaves it's way through the Devils Garden.  The Devils Garden is an area of these very tall sandstone fins that jut out of the desert like a bunch of dinner plates set up to dry.  The trail weaved its way between and over them and provided some of the coolest views in the park. [Ahem, there may or may not have also been some mumblings about being tired and something about "a slave driver," but the only thing I heard for sure was how awesome the trail was when we were done!]

Friday night, Bones finally rolled into town and met us at our campsite.  The next day the three of us headed out to Canyonlands National Park, specifically the Needles section of the park.  Our destination for the day was Druid Arch.  Sarah did a bunch of reading before hand and a ton of folks said it was the most impressive thing in the park, so of course we had to go see it. [I read one random person's blog about how he enjoyed the hike, and decided that sounded good enough to me.]  The hike to Druid Arch is now on my list of all-time great hikes.  You start out hiking on a solid sandstone trail at the top of a valley.  Eventually you make your way down to the valley floor and wind your way through this large drainage.  

As you get closer to Druid Arch you slowly climb back on top of the valley, and after performing a bit of dodgy scrambling at the end, you come over the lip of the valley and see Druid Arch standing there.

Of all the arches we saw at both national parks, this one is by far the coolest, most awe inspiring, and of course, hardest to get to. [It was cool as hell. You can't even fathom the size from this picture, but it must have been 20 times larger and taller than anything we saw at Arches.]  Due to the mileage and scrambling, not many people attempt to make it back to the Druid, which makes it that much nicer since you can sit and enjoy it by yourself.

Eventually we make our way back to the car, sore, tired, and ready for some food and sleep. [I had a brilliant detour idea that would add either 5 miles or 2 miles to the hike. Brian and Kevin made it clear before the hike that they outnumbered me with veto power on any of my "great ideas" - but I quickly corrected them that I, with child, most definitely tied them. Either way, the 2 mile detour compromise had me totally dragging major ass the last hour - it was quite a long day!]  
On Sunday we again got up early and headed to Canyonlands, but this time we went to the north side of the park, which they call "Island in the sky."  Much like Arches, this part of the park is mostly overlooks and trails that are less than a mile long. [Thank goodness, I was so beat.]

The views from the overlooks were totally impressive and you could see for miles.  Canyonlands kind of reminds me of those nesting russian dolls, where inside every doll is another doll. [What?] As you look out from the overlook, you see a canyon.  Inside that canyon is another canyon, and that canyon has another canyon inside it.

All in all it was a great vacation.  We did two of the coolest hikes I've done in a long time, got to hang out with Kevin, and get one last outdoorsy adventure before the fatherhood adventure begins. [AGREED! WAHOO!]

P.S. We almost ran out of gas on the way home! I noticed I had maybe a quarter to a third of a tank left when I saw a sign for Grand Junction, 89 miles. I made up my mind right there I was going make it - because who doesn't like a bit of game on a 6 hour drive home, right? Anyway, Brian woke up and reminded me we needed gas...the car started stalling 1 mile from the exit and Brian was so pissed, he told me if we ran out he was going to make me walk to the gas station, AHAHAHA. I coasted in with flying colors!