The Zaeby is almost 2 months old...

And she continues to be perfect.  Smiling more and more, tracking people and toys with her eyes, and getting chubbier and stronger all the time!  Her checkup is next week so I'll update her stats then.

Of all the gifts she's given us, one that I'm very grateful for is her incredible sleeping skills.  Last night she set a record, sleeping from about 10:30 pm until 6:30 am in her co-sleeper next to our bed.  While that was an especially long stretch, she's been doing 5-6 hours pretty consistently every night, and then she wakes up and nurses and goes right back to sleep until we all get up in the morning.  As a third time Mama I'm very aware that these things can change at any time, so for now I'm just grateful to be an unusually well rested mother of a 2 month old!

Smile!

Just like her sisters, Zae started to smile right around her one month birthday.  She's still sleeping most of the day (and continues to sleep great at night, too), but has gotten more interactive during her awake periods.  Definitely a dream baby.

Family of Five

Time flies... it's already been nearly 4 weeks since Zae arrived and made us into a family of five!  She has spent most of her first four weeks sleeping, but in the past week or so she has started spending a little more time awake.  Here's a video from last night.  Third time around, and I'm still surprised at how captivating it is to watch a baby do basically nothing... stretching, yawning, sleeping, moving arms and legs, making funny faces.  Endlessly entertaining.

Zae has been an incredibly easy baby so far.  Breastfeeding was a little painful for the first week or so, but since then it's gotten better and she's eating well.  At her two week check-up, she was up to 7 lbs 14.5 oz, so 10 oz above birthweight.  She's also been sleeping really well.  She was up a lot her very first night, but pretty much every night since then she's slept for 3-4 hours at a time, meaning that I've had to wake up once or twice during the night to feed her, leaving me surprisingly well rested for a mother of a newborn.  I started pumping milk and introducing a bottle this week -- Zae has had no problem with this new way of eating, and her big sisters have enjoyed being the ones to feed her.

Zae's big sisters adore her and give her lots of love.  Athena's love takes the form of lots of grabbing and holding and kissing -- she hasn't really grasped the concept of personal space, or of leaving the baby alone while she's sleeping.  In general, Athena's 3 year old big feelings and strong opinions about how things should be have been a little challenging recently, and we're trying to figure out how to give our middle child the attention and support she needs.

Meanwhile, Mazie is more restrained this time around and also more able to help with changing diapers and even carrying the baby around a little.  In other Mazie news, she lost her first tooth this week!  She was the second to last kid in her first grade class to reach this milestone, so she was VERY excited.  She wrote the tooth fairy a note asking what she did with all the teeth... the tooth fairy responded that she couldn't reveal that secret, but if Mazie writes another note with some guesses the next time she loses a tooth, the tooth fairy might let her know if any of her guesses are close to the mark.

Zae is Here!

On January 26, 2015, we welcomed Alexandra "Zae" Katherine Dickinson into our family.

Unlike her big sisters, who were both born a few days before their due dates, Zae made us wait for her arrival.  Baby Tres was due on January 21.  Though I was trying hard to be patient, by Sunday the 25th I was definitely more than ready to meet my baby.  Waiting is not easy!  Nanny and Papa were staying with us, and that evening we stayed up until about 10:30 playing Qwerkle, and then went to bed.

I woke up at 12:10 to what seemed like it could be a different kind of contraction than the Braxton-Hicks painless ones I'd been having for weeks.  After a couple more, Caleb and I decided we should head to the hospital.  Since Athena had come so quickly, we didn't want to risk an unplanned homebirth!  So we called our team -- Lisa (our doula), Ahya, Nana, and Jen -- and woke up Nanny and Papa, and drove to the hospital.  At about 1:30 am, we got to the delivery room and the nurse checked my dilation: 4 cm, same as I had been 5 days earlier at my last doctor's appointment.  I was still having contractions, but was definitely wondering if this was a false alarm.  The nurse and on-call doctor decided to do a labor check, meaning that we'd hang out for a couple of hours and then they'd check me again.

On her way to the hospital, Jen had dropped Mia off at our house to be with Mazie and Athena so that Nanny and Papa could come to the hospital.  But since it looked like it could be a while before things actually started happening, we told them to stay home a little longer and try to rest.

We spent the next couple of hours walking around the hospital floor and trying to keep my contractions coming.  With both Mazie and Athena, I hadn't gotten to the hospital until I was in very active labor (7+ cm) so it was strange and kind of fun to have this relaxed, early labor experience, but also a little stressful trying to make sure things were moving along so they wouldn't send us home.  We really, really wanted to meet this baby!

At 3:45, I was put on the monitor to check my contractions and baby's heartbeat.  My contractions were about 2-3 min apart and were strong enough that I had to breathe through them.  I was feeling hopeful -- it definitely felt like I was in labor by now!  A little after 4 am, the nurse checked my dilation again and delivered the verdict: "Well, you've made some progress.  You're at 4 and a half centimeters."  Oof.  Lisa reassured me that this was good news: early labor gets you up to 5 cm, so I was almost done with that and things would probably move more quickly from that point.  I was a little discouraged but tried to stay positive.

The nurse and doctor decided to extend my labor check -- rather than admitting me at that point and putting me "on the clock" with hourly checks, they would leave me alone for another two hours and see where we were at that point.  It was 4:30 am, and the nurse said she'd be back at 6:15.  Since we'd been up since midnight or so, we decided to all lie down and rest for a while.  Lisa said she thought it would be great if I could sleep through another centimeter or so.  I doubted I'd actually sleep, but lying down to rest sounded like a good idea.  So I got in bed, Caleb put a cushion down on the floor next to me, Nana rested next to him, Ahya took the couch, and Lisa and Jen went out into the hallway.

After about 20 or 30 minutes, my contractions started getting a lot stronger and I wasn't comfortable in bed anymore.  I got up and went to the bathroom, and started having even stronger contractions.  The rest of the team got up.  I came out of the bathroom and felt like I had to throw up, so I went back into the bathroom and stood by the toilet.  I remember thinking that this was REALLY intense for only being 4 cm dilated -- how on earth was I going to make it through another several hours of this?  Then with another strong contraction, my water broke at about 5:07 am.  Jen texted Nanny and Papa and told them things were picking up and they should get ready to come to the hospital.  My next contractions were really strong and I was feeling a lot of pressure.  Lisa had me look up and blow out during the contractions.

We came out of the bathroom, had another contraction, and then Caleb suggested I get onto the bed.  I got on the bed on my knees and put my arms around Caleb's neck.  The nurse had just come into the room and had a glove on to check my dilation.  With the next contraction I felt a lot of pressure and Lisa continued to coach me to look up and blow out in puffs.  The pressure kept getting stronger... and then it was gone.  I reached down and announced "The head's out!"  Much scrambling ensued... the doctor wasn't in the room, the nurse just had one glove on, and Caleb was trying to get someone to put gloves on him so he could help catch the baby.  I believe his exact words were something like, "Gloves!  Can someone get me gloves?  THE F*CKING GLOVES!!"  Meanwhile, I was feeling great... such relief.  It's amazing how comfortable it can be to have a human halfway in you once that hard head is out.  Lisa and the doula had to remind me that my work wasn't quite done and that I still had to push (my first actual push) to get the rest of the baby out.  So I did, and the baby was out, and I flopped back onto the bed and looked down: a baby girl!  I heard them announce the time: "Baby girl at 5:17 am."  They brought her up to my chest.  Pure bliss.

Nanny and Papa got to the room just a few minutes after Zae was born, and probably just a minute or two after the doctor.  We called Mia and she woke up the big sisters and they were able to see their baby via FaceTime.  We even put the camera between Zae's legs so they could see if they had a little brother or sister!  (Mazie made the correct diagnosis, but apparently Athena was a little deceived by the umbilical cord.)  Mazie had big happy tears running down her face.  We had been planning to have her at the birth, but unfortunately due to flu precautions the hospital was not allowing any children under 18.

For this reason, we were determined to get home as quickly as we could.  In the end the hospital staff was great and understanding, and at about 2 pm Nanny and Papa and Ahya brought Mazie and Athena to the hospital, and we checked out and met them downstairs and went home!

Baby Zae is now 9 days old and has been a dream baby.  She started nursing immediately after she was born and has been eating well ever since.  She mostly sleeps and eats... she's on my chest now as I type this.  Her big sisters both adore her and seem to be handling the transition very well overall... Athena's had a little trouble adjusting to a new nighttime routine, but Zae's been cooperative enough that I've been able to snuggle with Thenes at bedtime almost every night so that's really helped.  I'm loving being on leave and haven't left the house much in the past week.

We're so grateful for another perfect baby, and are so excited to see who she becomes!  Welcome, our little Zae-by.  We love you so much already!

Thanks to Lisa Waldo, our doula, for many of these lovely pictures!  More Zae pics here.

Baby Tres Survey Results

Back in November I fielded a survey to collect predictions / guesses on various facts and figures related to the upcoming birth of Baby Dickinson #3, aka Baby Tres.  As background information to assist respondents in calibrating their responses, I provided the following information:

Baby Tres has two big sisters.

• Mazie James was born on May 23, 2008, three (3) days ahead of her due date.  Labor started at about 4:30 am and she was born at 10:32 pm.  She weighed 7 lbs, 5 oz., and was 19 5/8 in long.

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• ​Athena Lee was born on August 12, 2011, five (5) days before her due date.  Labor started at 5 am, and she was born at 8:19 am.  She weighed 6 lbs, 14 oz., and was 20 3/4 in long.

And this visual aid (taken on Nov 18... we are quite a bit bigger now):

Results from the survey have been compiled... it is now 11 days before B3's due date, so the truth will be revealed soon!

My Athena

It's been ages since I've just taken a minute to write about the kids... what they're doing, who they're becoming.  Some musings:

I'll do Athena first since in typical second child fashion she's gotten much less blog coverage than her big sister.  Athena is... entertaining and goofy.  When I think of her I picture her wide smile with its big teeth, purposefully silly and sweet at the same time.  Like Mazie, Athena loves to perform.  Over the past couple of months our house (like many across the country) has been filled with a cappella renderings of the Frozen soundtrack.  Athena's renditions are surprisingly good -- she stays on key very well and even adds in some vibrato as she belts out, "Do you want to build a snowman" or "Let it go!!!!"  Facial expressions and hand gestures add to the drama.  And of course, there is much prompting to clap if our attention strays for a moment.  She also likes to give "mastics" (gymnastics) performances, which mostly involves sommersaults and some spins.

Athena continues to be quite the talker as well.  Some phrases she's recently been trying out include, "Seriously?!?" and "Why do I ALWAYS HAVE to do that?"  We've been toying with potty training for several months now but haven't really committed to it... she's not resistant, but also doesn't usually object to wearing a diaper, so it's mostly just been our own laziness holding her back.  This weekend I was home with the girls and decided to step up the commitment a bit, so we went with the approach of setting a timer and having her try to go to the bathroom every 45 minutes or so.  By Saturday afternoon when the timer would go off she would slump over and complain, "Why do I ALWAYS HAVE to go to the potty?"  So put upon.  A little coaxing and a reminder that she can choose between going potty or putting a diaper back on usually got her back on track.  And then at bedtime it was, "Why do I ALWAYS HAVE to go to bed?"  Another gem: "But Daddy told me I HAD to!"  As in, "Mom, can I have candy?  No?  But Daddy told me I HAD to!"

Athena is still loving her preschool.  She goes Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9-3:30 or 4 (depending on my work schedule), and gets very excited whenever we tell her its a school day.  (It doesn't hurt that Caleb has established a routine of taking her to Bittersweet Cafe for hot chocolate pretty much every school morning.)  She comes home singing songs she learned at school and talking about her teachers and friends.

This year, we were incredibly fortunate in having our dear friends Alli and Bryon move here from Durham.  Their daughter Hazel is 6 months younger than Athena.  On Mondays, Caleb stays home with Athena and Hazel, and on Wednesdays Alli has both girls.  So in addition to her time at Patchwork, Athena has also gotten to spend a lot of time with Hazel and it's been really fun / funny to watch their relationship through its different phases.  We made it through a biting / hairpulling / hitting phase and recently they've been getting along really well.  The other night they managed to find a box of Nerds candy together, and (perhaps realizing that any conflict might result in losing the whole thing) proceeded to be models of good sharing behavior.  They took turns holding the box, and the holder let the non-holder take candy out of the box.  Athena was even hand-feeding Hazel at one point, which, given the biting history, demonstrated some real trust.  They're quite the pair... we're a little concerned about what their teenage years together are going to look like.

In general, Athena is a very happy, adaptable, and social kid who has no problem saying goodbye to us at the beginning of the day, whether she's going to school, going to Alli and Hazel's house, or hanging out with Ahya... but she also gives the sweetest hugs and enthusiastic greetings when we get home.  As a working mama, I feel incredibly lucky to know she's in such good hands (and having a great time to boot) while we're apart.  And even though she's transitioning into such a KID these days, she still lets me tuggle (an Athena-ism that I'm pretty sure we'll keep using long after she gives it up) her and love her up.  I just adore my little goddess.

Here's a recent chat:

The Great Buzz Cut of 2014

Last Thursday night I went in to check on Mazie as she was going to bed.  She sleepily told me that she wanted to get a buzz cut.  I told her I thought that was an interesting idea and that we would discuss it in the morning.  When I came in to check on her a few minutes later, she asked me to write it down so that we wouldn't forget to discuss it.  The next morning, we talked it over and she explained some of her reasons (tired of tangles and bangs in her face, wanted to look different).   We had her think about the pros and cons (including being cold, not liking it/having to wait a long time for it to grow back, and other people's reactions), and told her to think about it for a week or so.  Nanny and Papa were coming to visit on Tuesday.  If she was still set on it when they got here, we told her we'd do it.

Today is Wednesday and Nanny and Papa got in last night.  Mazie has remained firm in her resolve, and the stage is set for the great buzz cut of 2014.  Live photos and videos will be posted here starting at 15:00 MST, January 29.

 Getting ready...

Before...

Trimming first with scissors...

On to the clippers...

Here she is!

And she LOVES it!

Pretty gorgeous...

Lots more photos here...

The Great Buzz Cut