Grandma and Daddy Time

Clark's Arrival Home

We got to come home today! Hurray!!! Clark fit into his car seat with out a problem, rode home in style, didn't fuss one bit and was welcomed by grandparents and our animals with out a problem. Reiner is a little worried about upsetting things, but all of the animals are being respectful. They are keeping their distance, but look interested. It's nice that no one has hissed or barked at him. Wes has been a little loud, but that's just because he missed us. Clark has been very alert and taking in his new surrondings.

Clark's First Visitors

Due to the hospital's new rule that no one can visit, Clark's grandparents had to come see him from the room's window and talk to us via cell phone. It was nice to have the opportunity to show them Clark, but frustrating that I was trapped in the hopsital and couldn't have them come in the room.

First Day of Life

Here are some pictures of Clark and Daddy.

Clark David Wayland

We arrived at the hospital at 11:30 am after being told not to come in at 7 am because there wasn't any rooms available. After a few hours of contractions I finally decided to get an epidural. Throwing up is where I draw the line! The epidural was WONDERFUL! Then about 9:30 I started to push. After 2 hours of difficult work, the doctor came back in and said, he's not moving down, so you can either keep trying to we can do a c-section. This of course terrified me because it was not what I wanted. So I tried some more for another hour even more determined. Unfortunatly, nothing changed. So at around 12:30 we went into the operating room and I was cut open. Clark arrived at 12:48 am on November 1st. 8lbs 7 oz, 21 inches long with a head cercumference of 12cm. No wonder he didn't fit! Anyways, enjoy the pictures. We'll be in the hospital for a while longer as I recover. We'll keep pictures coming in the coming weeks.

More Belly Pictures

I'll be 38 weeks on Monday and since today was picture day at school, I was dressed nicely and put some effort into curling my hair even! I thought I would take some pictures since I felt "pretty." Pretty gigantic!!! HA! Don't think my stomach has gotten that much bigger since about a week and a half ago, but my students were commenting on how "big" I was looking.
I have even had a couple of days I thought we were going to be lucky enough to meet this little one.
Last Thursday I was having contractions all day. Not painful, but pretty regularly, like every 5 minutes. Many people at school said I should call my doc. So I did. They told me to lay down, drink water until I feel like I'm drowning and call back in a hour. Nothing changed so they told me to get checked out at the hospital. As you can see, they ended up sending me home. Oh well, it was nice because I was nervous about dealing with preregistration and where the maternity ward even was.
The next day I had much more sever contractions that were taking my breath away, causing a ton of pain and were about every 2 minutes apart. I paged Clint and demanded he come home. He found me laying on the couch, one had on a pillow and the other on the coffee table "looking more in labor" as he put it. He suggested I walk around a little, so I did and after about 1 hour the contractions stopped and I was fine, but exhausted.
So a week later and my biggest complaint is the stabbing pains I get in my back at the end of the day. Nothing seems to help except a massage. Too bad the hubby is being the slave at the hospital. As much as we would like to meet this little bundle of joy this week isn't good because our doctor isn't in town. Maybe he'll be a good birthday present on Monday.
Enjoy the pics and we'll keep you posted.

Buffalo Excursion

Last weekend we went on a Buffalo excursion. There is a guy in Westmoreland (town about a half an hour east of Manhattan) that raises Buffalo and Morgan horses. Every year SOKS (Significant Others of Kansas State, which is a program the wife of the dean of the vet school put together) has us go out to feed buffalo at this guys ranch. The first two times we went it was a blast. The buffalo came right up and everyone had a good chance to feed them. This year, the buffalo were a little more shy and we didn't get as much hand feeding as we would have liked. We mostly were just throwing alfalfa pellets on the ground, hitting a few in the process, merely by accident.
I think we picked the coldest day of this "Fall" to do this activity. It was a whopping 35 degrees that day. Do we look cold? After we fed the buffalo we went back and had VERY dry buffalo burgers and shivered some more in a dusty barn on the property.
The people who run the ranch are extremely friendly and welcome visitors any time. One of those perks of living in Kansas!