Well, that was an interesting six weeks!

Warning:  Wall of text ahead!

Just before Alex was born, blood tests showed that I had anti-C and anti-e antibodies in my blood. Nothing had happened to cause me to develop antibodies - no transfusions, no procedures during pregnancy (ECV, amnio etc) and no trauma to my belly during pregnancy.  Awesome.  Breech baby, low amniotic fluid and random appeared-for-no-reason antibodies.  When Alex arrived (via the sunroof) they took extra bloods from her because of the antibodies but she stayed nice and pink and we came home after 3 days.  

When I was pregnant with Hannah I had to have monthly blood tests to monitor the antibody levels.  These levels spiked in April, to a level just below "oh shit" but high enough to warrant me visiting the High Risk team once a week, along with weekly scans to make sure baby wasn't anaemic and blood tests to monitor antibody levels.  Luckily levels stabilised, and baby was fine.  I had the choice of being induced or another c-section.  I chose the latter.   

Miss Hannah arrived on Friday, 25th May.  3.52kg, 51cm long, and pink... for about a day.  They took some of her cord blood to test, and she had heel pricks done every few hours to monitor her bilirubin levels.  Over the weekend she tracked just under the level required for treatment, so after her Monday morning test they decided 12-hourly would be sufficient and told me we'd probably be allowed to go home on Tuesday morning.  But then her Monday evening blood test showed that levels had spiked and I was told I had to finish her feed then take her down to neonates.

Once we arrived they took more bloods from her, stuck a tube into her stomach via her nose, put heart, oxygen and respiration monitors on her, and an IV line into the back of her teeny tiny hand.  She was put in an incubator with 3 blue light lamps over her and a biliblanket under her.  I was told to express milk 4-hourly, and was welcome to come and see her when I dropped the milk off.  Um.  Right.  Argh!  The only positive thing about her being rushed to neonates was that they moved me into my own room and offered me ear plugs in case the sound of other babies crying might upset me..!

This is the graph they used to track her levels.  There are a few dots just under the treatment line, then three for Monday where she went from OK (just), to lights required to blood transfusion required (400) in seven or so hours.  Luckily the lights brought her levels down enough over Monday night for the transfusion to be avoided.

(Click to make bigger...if you want)

On Tuesday and Wednesday I was allowed to breast feed her (with expressed milk top-ups afterwards).  She was only allowed out from under the lamps for 30 minutes, and had to have her biliblanket wrapped around her.  But I got to feed and cuddle (as best you can with wires all over the place) and she got to have her sunnies off and stare at me for a bit.  They also "let" me change her nappy after each feed.  Thanks guys!

On Wednesday they started turning down and then removing lamps, and by lunch time on Thursday she even had her bill blanket turned off... and I was kicked out of postnatal.  I had to move into one of the parent rooms at NICU with no notice, and nothing to eat (yay for Wishbone downstairs).  Hannah came to my room that evening, and I had to call them after every feed to report on whether she woke herself up or not, how long she fed, her temperature and her "output".  Her haemoglobin levels were low due to all the red blood cells her body had been killing so I was told we'd probably be in for another couple of days.

But on Friday a miracle happened:  we were allowed to go home!  I had strict instructions to make sure she fed regularly etc and to rush back to hospital if she became lethargic and/or wouldn't eat.  They called Masterton Hospital and my midwife and filled them in.  I left with six copies of her discharge notes and graphs to distribute.   

Over the next couple of weeks we had blood tests twice weekly, then weekly, and her bilirubin levels continued to drop nicely.  Unfortunately her haemoglobin levels also dropped so we were given a prescription for folic acid.  Tuesday two weeks ago she hit a low of 76 (normal should be 110-150 ish according to Dr Google) and transfusion was mentioned again.  Feck.  We were given a prescription for iron to go with the folic acid and our local pharmacy now knows us by name.

The following week her haemoglobin was back up to 81, so we avoided a transfusion (again!).  Her next appointment with the paediatrician is Wednesday, and depending on the results of the blood tests that day, we may be allowed to go a whole month before having more.  I really hope she doesn't develop some kind of foot phobia from all these blood tests though.  She kicks like mad and grizzles if anyone even goes near her feet.  Makes putting socks on her a bit tricky.

Hannah's still pale, and it's more obvious as she loses her yellow-ness.  Throughout all of this she's never acted jaundiced, even when her levels went through the roof.  This was possibly helped by my epic milk production (the paediatrician was well impressed, and now I know why Alex packed on the weight so quickly, heh).  She's doing all the things she should now too -  vocalising, tracking us with her eyes, smiling and demanding milk and cuddles all damn evening long.  Hopefully we can now get on with enjoying her instead of worrying about her constantly.  I'd hate to have been doing this as a paranoid first time mum, and seeing as the antibody issue is meant to get worse with each pregnancy, I definitely don't plan on doing this again.

:D

Shaving Foam Paint

For some reason, my mother has made a pinterest page thingy full of Kids' Stuff.  And on it there are various bath paint recipes.  

We don't actually have a bath at the new house, so bath crayons and paints tend to just run down the wall as they get splashed by the shower.  Through trial and error we've concluded that the best recipe is shaving foam + food colouring. 

Picture stolen from pinterest

It's thick enough that unless you point the water directly at it it stays on the shower walls quite nicely.  It's also thick enough that you can paint yourself pretty colours if you want.  And it's gloopy enough that you can pick up lots on the brush and then splash pretty colours all over your parents and the bath mat (don't forget to insist that the shower door stays open)...

Nice hand placement, Alex!

On the down side the bathroom stinks of shaving foam after Alex has had her shower, and she's now started painting with anything she can find.  Last night she painted the dining table with her curry sauce.    

Cats make great pets! *shifty eyes*

So I was sorting out our filing cabinet stuff yesterday (yes, after we moved it all here) and found the note that came with our two darling felines.  I read it to Nev.  He laughed.  A lot.  Then suggested I go through and bold all of the FILTHY LIES it contains.  So here goes…

Hi there,
I am your new Ragdoll kitten.  If you feed me and if you look after me like my mum and dad have, I will give you lots of enjoyable moments. 
I like to eat cooked fish, minced meat, raw meat (not cut too small, I need something to chew on), cooked chicken and now and again chopped up potatoes and pumpkin placed on top of my tinned food.  I need only water.
I also like Chef tinned kitten food and Iam's kitten biscuits.  I could be started on Chef adult food but must only be given a little at a time mixed in with my kitten food, too much at once could give me the runs and we don't want that, do we?
Please also make sure that you leave the toilet seat lid down as I might like a swim and I am not a good swimmer.  Also, I would like you to make sure all stove elements are off when not in use or unattended as I could burn myself badly.
As I am a very clean kitten and well toilet trained I would like it if I could please have 2 litter trays at my disposal.
I come to you in the best of health.  My mum and dad guarantee this.  I have had my 2 injections, have been desexed, wormed and defleaed, but will still need further worming and deflating during the year.
Should you feel that at any time you can no longer love or care for me, would you please ring my mum and dad.  They will gladly take me back and find me another loving home to go to.  My mum and dad will refund you the full purchase price or replace me with another kitten should you find me to be defective in any way which is found to be not of your doing.  This is for a period of 6 months from possession day.  
P.S.  If you value your furniture it would be a good idea to buy me a scratcher.

There is an ongoing debate as to whether "I will give you lots of enjoyable moments" is a filthy lie or not. 

And to be fair, Zari will at least eat raw meat and cooked chicken quite happily.  But damn did she ever pretend like she had never eaten Chef kitten food - and how dare we insult her by dishing it up when we brought her home.  And vegetables?  HA!  Though she did grow out of making a mess of herself whenever she went to the toilet.  Basil did not…

Finally, Nev would also like to know if 6 years is too late to return Basil.  His brain is clearly defective.

So..disorganised...*twitch*

You know how builders tend to have half-finished projects all around their own houses?  The same applies to IT professionals.  Or my IT professional at least.

Half the desktop on his Windows PC is taken up by random (but very important) icons.  I mock him about it regularly, and he recently went through and had a bit of a clean out.  But half his desktop is still taken up by random icons - just with holes in the grid from the ones he's deleted.  "Gah, please sort those by name or something!"  ... "No, I'll get confused!"

Then there's the way he organises his documents.  At one point he had a series of folders titled "New", "Newer" and "Newest New" and if I wanted to find something I was expected to know under which category it fell.  HE knew where everything was.  Duh. 

At this point I feel the need to point out that the way Alex constantly reorganises the icons on her iPad makes him all twitchy because it's not logical.  HA.  Hahaha.  Pot.  Kettle.

We have Media Portal installed on the HTPC for the watching of TV/movies, and it has gradually been getting buggier and buggier over the last six months or so.  Then one of the external HDDs failed and he promised to copy the files on to the NAS and redirect something something*...but Nev hates Media Portal so hasn't bothered yet.  I think his plan is to just let it destroy itself completely before looking at fixing it.  Though he will at least clear the cat hair out of the CPU fan for me (with assistance) to stop it overheating...

I guess that's what you get when you spend your day looking after servers, ensuring everything is all neat and tidy and running properly.  Buggered if you're going to come home and do the same thing all evening!

*  The NAS is very neatly organised and maintained, and runs teh lunix, so I daren't touch it myself.  

The land of bird poo and feathers...

We went to Nga Manu on Sunday.  Technically for my birthday, also because Nev actually had the day afternoon off (he ended up working overnight/morning beforehand), but mostly because I thought Alex would have fun at the duck/pukeko/swan feeding areas.    It also provided the chance to play with my new zoooooomy lens.  

Alex did indeed have fun feeding the birds.  Though once she'd run out of pellets she started throwing gravel to them instead.  She must've been won over by all those hopeful little faces looking up at her.  She also insisted on doing a fair amount of walking, but you had to keep a very close eye on her so she didn't sit down in a pile of duck poo.  

Typically, the more interesting birds (Kea and Kaka) weren't posing nicely for the camera, but I still managed to take a few decent photos.  There's a whole set on Flickr and a few below.  You can click on them to make them bigger, or not, if you're lazy and really don't care that much.  Whatever.  

Rocking her new sunnies

Getting swarmed

Paradise Duck

Heron

Young Pukeko.  You can actually see its face on the bigger version of this photo.

Swan - liked to pluck ducks when being fed.  Dick.

Work That Camera!

Alex was in a pretty good mood after her nap, so I thought I'd take some pictures.  Things started off promisingly...

But when I plonked her down away from the messy background, well, this happened...

Hey, what's this? 

Grrr.  Cute hairdo be gone!

And that was the end of that.

Weather permitting, we're off to Nga Manu in a couple of weeks.  Alex will get to see all the ducks and duckens*, and I'll finally get to play with my shiny new zooooooomy lens.  w00t!



* Birds have been categorised into either ducks or duckens.  Ducks are birds that will eat her sandwich if she throws it away - ducks, seagulls, pigeons.  Duckens are any other bird.

Alex's Busy Afternoon

Yesterday this magically turned into a container full of salty salty dough.

(Water not pictured - it was still in the tap)

We showed it to Alex after it had cooled a bit and she poked at it once, screwed up her face, then grabbed Nev's hand and demanded he take her walking around the lounge.  FINE.  I only slaved over a (not-so) hot stove.  No biggy.  Hrmph.

We tried again today, and she had much the same reaction.  I documented it for everyone's amusement.

...Ew.

I made a snail.  It got smushed.

As did the next snail I made.

THEN we discovered you can THROW playdough! 

I don't even...

I'm pretty sure I used to make cooler stuff than this out of playdough.

After she determined that playdough was in fact NOT delicious and sufficient mess had been made all over the kitchen floor, we went to wash her hands.  When I put her down after drying them, something amazing happened:  she took a step!  So Nev (handily home sick today) grabbed the camera (handily still out after documenting playdough mess) and took some photos of a somewhat determined looking Alex as she teetered down the hallway all by herself.  

When Nev switched to video she clung to the wall and refused to let go, so, um, that'll have to wait...

18 Months..

Here is three-week-old Alex on her sheepskin:

Here is 18-month-old Alex (mostly) on her sheepskin:

She got big.  And long.

Over the last couple of weeks her vocabulary has expanded greatly, though she does have a couple of multi-purpose words.  Duck being one of them (duh) - it can mean ducks, any other bird she sees, and the colour yellow.  The other is aap'n - which can mean apple, any other round fruit (peaches, nectarines, pears etc), the colour purple AND iPad!  Ha!  All yesterday afternoon she kept pointing to the kitchen and saying "aap'n!!" - so I cut up a pear and offered it to her.  She refused to eat it so I assumed she was just practising her words.  Then this morning I gave her the iPad so I could have a shower in peace (yes, yes, terrible mother) and she pointed at it and said "this!  aap'n!"...  I wonder how frustrated she was getting at me yesterday?  The iPad was clearly sitting on the kitchen bench next to the fruit bowl while it charged..!

Oh, there's another multi-purpose word:  nanan.  It used to mean Nana, now it means banana.  Sorry Nana, you've been replaced!

BORED

Despite my newfound super awesome domestic goddessness, driving lessons (yes, finally) and multiple hospital appointments for either me or Alex (just routine/checkups) keeping me busy, I find myself wanting to do something crafty.  Or something.  

When we put the house on the market we cleared out the spare room and put what was worth keeping in storage, donated some bookcases to Nev's sister, then took a load of stuff to the dump.  The latter included my sewing desk.  It was about eight years old, and one of those super cheap mulched rainforest pieces from The House of Ware.  It wobbled terribly when the sewing machine was running so I decided it wasn't worth keeping.  Must say, Nev took GREAT delight in smashing it to pieces with a hammer - which wasn't hard.  Most of my fabric went to storage, as did all of my patterns, so it seems I'm not going to be sewing anything in the near future.  

Then there's photography, which observant readers of my blog will have noticed I've kind of... stopped.  I don't know why.  It could be that Nev showed Alex how the camera works so whenever she sees it she zooms over to demand that we show her the photos we've just taken.  It could be the lack of easy transport to new places put me off bothering.  It's probably mostly that I still haven't read my photography book properly and feel like I should before I try new things...

Anyway.  This week I am going to do something creative.  And then I shall blog about it.  And you shall be amazed.  Oh yes.

 

Selling a House is Not Fun

I bet you thought it was.  It really isn't.

It's taken over our entire lives.  All I think about is keeping the house tidy and how very very annoying daily  pregnancy-induced heartburn is.  I've learned some things so far, so thought I'd share...

Our house is super dusty, and as a result the shiny black glass entertainment unit was not a smart purchase.  Also, anti-dust surface cleaners are just spray bottles full of lies.  Dusty dusty lies.

Cats are horrible animals and will do anything they can to mess up your pristine house.  They were also not a smart purchase.  Special Cat managed to get his very own photo on our house listing, while Zari vomited all over the cat room floor the very morning the photographer was coming to take said photos.  I swear they're leaving cat hair clumps all over the place just to annoy me - usually within an hour of me vacuuming.  The cats now spend their nights locked in the bathroom so any further furball incidents are easily cleaned up.

Toddlers love gardening.  And by gardening I mean throwing bark around the courtyard, eating dirt, putting the weeds back into the garden and trying to destroy the actual plants.  Oh, they also enjoy digging paving sand (that you just spent hours re-doing) out from between the pavers.

Inside the house, toddlers continue to be great helpers.  Cupboards and bookshelves are emptied daily, just to make sure there's no dust lurking anywhere.  Alex seems to have some kind of sixth sense about when I've just polished the front of the dishwasher too - she'll zoom straight over there and check for handprints all over the front.  I always seem to miss them!  Similarly, she'll check the edges of our (glass) desktops for tiny finger prints..

Cats are (despite appearances) quite smart, so they get a second paragraph.  When there's an open home or viewing we have to hunt down the cats (who now realise exactly what is going on and have become very good at slithering out of our grip - even Basil!  ...Though he probably oozes more than slithers) and bundle them into the carrier.  Then we pack up the litter trays and various cat beds so as to not appear entirely crazy-cat-people to potential buyers, thus ending up with a car load of excess cat and baby clutter, valuables, two Very Sad Cats and a usually pretty cheerful baby.  

So there you go.  Just in case you have pets and a toddler and are thinking about selling your house, my recommendation is not to.  Cleaning and tidying gets undone almost as quickly as you do it.  And then once you've spent hours cleaning and re-cleaning the place for a 20 minute viewing, the buyer decides that since there's no second bathroom downstairs the house just isn't right for them.  How many 1970s townhouses have two bathrooms???  

*cough*

Anyway.  Tenders closed today and I was hopeful that someone had decided they loved the place so much we'd get some kind of crazy awesome offer.  We did not, so off to PBN we go...

Perhaps I could take away a silver lining here?  By the time we do sell I'll be so very used to keeping the house spotless that I'll just carry on being an awesome domestic goddess even after Baby 2.0 arrives.