Waiting for baby

Here it is, the day we've been anticipating for over nine months - our baby's due date! And surprise, surprise, we have no baby yet.

You may recall that Liam was born 11 days late. It seems that wasn't an isolated incident. I must be good at incubating babies.

Since I had a C-section the first time around, I could have opted for another one and this waiting would have been over a week ago. But I am stubbornly trying for a VBAC, which means now I have to go through the exhausting every-day-feels-like-a-year-post-due-date wait. And I'm really risking a Christmas baby or at least a hospital stay over Christmas.

What can I say, I take my chances (I'm a big dummy!??!).

The longer I keep this baby in, the bigger he gets and the more likely it is that labor will go the same way - baby is too big, not progressing, C-section. So it really is a little ridiculous that I didn't just opt for a planned birth. But I didn't enjoy the recovery last time, and I don't like the thought of being cut open again. And so, we wait.

Meanwhile, to answer the question I am getting a lot lately, I guess I'm ready as I will ever be. I have the clothes, the changing table, the co-sleeper, the diaper bag, the car seat. Everything is in it's place and ready to welcome the new addition. But the experience of being pregnant has nothing to do with the experience of being a parent. How can I possibly be ready?

I still think of Liam as my baby and have a hard time visualizing life with two kids. When I look back on this video of Liam I am shocked that this is the same child that lives in my house and runs and talks and feeds himself. And I am reminded that having a newborn is so different from having a toddler. I've basically forgotten everything about that stage and feel like I'll have to learn what to do all over again.

It is surreal, anticipating the huge change that is about to happen in our lives. When I think about how precious and fragile a newborn is, I get excited. When I think about how often they wake up at night and cry for unknown reasons, I get nervous. When I think about the torture of labor, well, I just hope that epidural is as good as they say. When I don't think about it, I forget that I'm pregnant at all.

I've been off of work for three weeks now. It feels so indulgent - I could have worked longer. There was no medical reason to leave when I did. But it has been a nice break.

And now our house is full of family - C.J.'s brother, his wife, their three kids and C.J.'s sister are all staying with us for the holidays. It sounds a little hectic, but it's fun having family here and it is a great distraction from the waiting game.


They will take care of Liam while I'm in the hospital, and Liam is having the time of his life playing with his cousins. Now I am just hoping we can enjoy Christmas together before we welcome our little one. I've waited this long, can I make it four more days?

Leaves

A last word on fall 2011 - one little boy loved the leaves this year. Better than any toy, he spent hours over the course of a few weeks picking up leaves, throwing leaves and/or jumping in piles of leaves in the park, in our yard or on walks around the neighborhood.

Big help with the raking too. Here are a some fun shots of an afternoon in the backyard a few weeks ago.

Fearless leaf diving

I could do this all day!

Nana, let me show you.

What do you mean this isn't a rake?

 No really, this is the funnest thing ever.

It's contagious - even Mommy wants to jump in.

That enormous pile of leaves finally made it to the curb (enter Daddy, exit Liam) where the monster leaf-collecting machine came by and scooped them all up. Now the trees are bare and the temperature is dropping. Goodbye fall. Until next year!

Bronx zoo

Fall is one of the best things about living in the Northeast. And this November was the sixth warmest on record, for which, I am of course grateful. The leaves weren't quite as brilliant or lasting this year, but we did enjoy some gorgeous foliage for a short time.

We had a great trip to the Bronx Zoo a few weeks ago to soak up the colors and enjoy the mild weather. I am a sucker for seeing all the animals, and it's even more fun to see them through Liam's eyes. The zoo is in a beautiful park-like setting and features some great exhibits including lions, tigers, bears and gorillas.

 Liam and Daddy watching the giraffe

The gorilla encounter - worth the extra few dollars admission!

Brilliant colors

Regal lions

Strolling along

 

Fun family outing

Love the colors

A perfect day for this little guy

Soon to be four!

Good things

Enough of the emotional rant. On to happier things. And there are things to be happy about. It is a month for thanksgiving, after all.

In August we moved into a house. It has improved our quality of life by what feels like 1000 percent. It is spacious and cozy, in a great neighborhood and next to a large park with a playground. The main floor alone is bigger than our apartment with an eat-in kitchen, living room, two bedrooms and a bathroom.

Then there is the basement. I could write an entire blog on my affection for this extra level of house. The South is really missing out on this architectural wonder.

It has a large laundry area, tons of storage space and a room perfect for toys which never have to be picked up. I've probably already saved myself days of work by not going around picking up toys every night. They can just lay scattered on the floor in the basement until we decide it's time to go downstairs again.

The house also has a second floor mother-in-law suite with a bedroom and bathroom. And it has a fenced in backyard and a driveway, which I also have affection for after hauling groceries from an apartment parking lot. It is worth every penny extra that we deliberated over before committing to the lease.

Apartment-dwelling makes sense for city folks but houses are for us suburbanites.

Our little piece of suburbia

 

After the Step 2 board exam in September C.J. rewarded himself with a smoker. C.J.'s not much of a cook but the idea of preparing meat with a blow torch and a pile of wood appealed to his manliness, not to mention he was a little home sick for some good barbecue.

His efforts paid off with some of the best brisket I've ever eaten. The neighbors were baffled by the smoke rising from our backyard at 7 a.m. on Sunday morning (who is this redneck neighbor?), but they didn't complain after they got a sample.

Bringing a piece of Texas to New Jersey

Thought we'd have to freeze some of this, but don't you know, we ate it up in a week

Another reward after Step 2, a trip to The City to see our favorite Austin, TX band, The Gourds. A fun date night for us and a great show featuring songs from their fantastic new album. We never get tired of listening to this band or seeing them play a live show.

No fall in the Northeast is complete without apple picking. I rank this outing right up there with the basement for top things to love about living here. I only have a few sad iPhone pictures to show for it, but it was a great way to enjoy the cool weather and the apple crisp that resulted wasn't bad either.

Liam and I with Penny and Sandy and Karen and Paul

Apple pickers (and tasters)

And there was a trip to the pumpkin patch, another great fall outing which included a hay ride. Being in the presence of a real tractor was the highlight of the trip for Liam, but he indulged us and picked his own pumpkin too.

There was this odd event the weekend before Halloween - a snowstorm that dumped a foot of snow in our area and knocked out power for days all around us. I am thankful we had no power outage here, it melted quickly and the weather has been mild since.

Fall snowliage

Liam loves Thomas the Train more than anything else right now. When I say "Mommy loves Liam," he says "Liam loves Thomas." He carries his trains everywhere and sleeps with them at night. It is only natural that he was a train conductor for Halloween (not to mention it's a pretty easy costume to pull together!).

Our street was decked out for the holiday, and it was so sweet to take Liam trick or treating for the first time. I'm pretty sure C.J. and I enjoyed it more than he did, we loved hearing him say "Happy Halloween!" although it had to be coaxed out of him in front of the neighbors.

Mommy also loved that he's not old enough to notice if I pick out the good stuff from his candy stash. I call that my special pregnancy privileges. 

That was weird when you took me around to the neighbors' houses, can we watch this Thomas video again?

Speaking of mother-in-law suite, ours is now being occupied by, well, my mother-in-law. A few of life's twists and turns brought her to New Jersey to take up residence with us, and we are pretty excited about the extra set of hands.

The ratio of three adults to one toddler has been a life saver for this set of tired parents. In between working her own job, she cooks, cleans and watches Liam. The timing couldn't be better for her arrival just before baby number two. We are grateful for her help.

Liam and Nana



Goodbye third year

If nothing else inspires me to blog these days, I should at least mention here that a big milestone passed in September - we finished (survived) another year of medical school.

I wonder if perhaps I am more negative than other wives about medical school. I see blogs from some of my med school friends and they seem cheery and don't mention much about what their husbands are going through. I know putting into words how I honestly feel on this topic will result in one very whiny, depressing and boring blog.

However, the mood has struck and against my better judgment I will now proceed to complain.

Medical. school. is. a. beat. down. I. hate. it.

It is a never ending list of things to complete, hoops to jump through and tests to study for. It costs a fortune. It is a huge time suck. It overshadows everything, even the fun moments. It is always looming, demanding, a monster needing to be fed constantly.

To say that I will be glad when it is over is a gross understatement.

So I am compelled and happy to report, there is less than one year left. All signs indicate C.J. will graduate in May.

Not that it will get any easier then. He will start a residency in July which will mean an additional three to four years of long hours and hard work. We will face a mound of debt that we are completely ignoring at the moment. But maybe (I can only hope) it will feel like less of a struggle. 

Just to recap what happened in the last few months of third year - there was an internal medicine rotation with a lengthy patient case study due every week. There was an application process that included busy work and more busy work and asking for letters of recommendation and writing a personal statement and researching programs and uploading information. There was a board exam that required weeks of non-stop studying followed by lots of anxiety while waiting for the test results.

It seemed there would be a break then. The hard part was over. The test was done, the application was in, the fourth year electives began and they are, after all, electives. No pressure.

But of course there was pressure. Anxiety and fear and disappointment as the rejection letters started showing up and far outnumbering the interview invitations. There is that hard, cold, bitter truth staring us in the face - there is a disadvantage to being a foreign medical student. There is a stigma. Yes, C.J. will be a doctor. Will he be the doctor he wants to be in a place he wants to live at the program of his choice? Likely not.

Then there are a few interview requests. They trickle in slowly. This is very good. But wait, it requires plane tickets and hotel rooms and researching and practicing and scheduling and planning and thank you notes. More time suck, more pressure, more endless "what if" conversations about places like Michigan and Newark and West Virginia.

Not to mention the sobering feeling that on one day in March, our fate will be decided by a computer algorithm. Not just the fate of the next few years, but the fate of the rest of our lives. Because we will make a commitment to one specialty that will dictate our life style and potentially where and how we live for a few more decades.

Assuming we match. There is always the chance of not matching, and that is a scary thought that I'm pretty sure keeps C.J. awake at night.

I am encouraged that we've made it this far. I like to think about three years behind us. It seems we can make it six more months. We have done some fun things lately, we don't have a bad life. I am not walking across a scorched earth in Somalia with a starving baby, I like to remind myself.

But if I said this experience wasn't hard, I would be lying. If I just posted pictures of apple picking and pumpkin patches and the latest adorable thing Liam is doing, I wouldn't be painting the whole picture.

There is something dominating our lives and consuming all our thoughts and expending all our emotions. It is the beast called med school. And we are now in our fourth year.

Boy or girl?

The doctor I saw this week for my ultrasound doesn't like to tell patients that she is 100% sure about gender.

But in this case, she felt pretty confident.

That is not a hand

Liam gets a little brother in December and that brings the Winckler grand kid count to 5 boys/0 girls. Of course we would have been delighted with a girl, but it's hard to image anything but boys in this family, and I am happy we will have same-sex siblings.

And thankfully the rest of baby's anatomy seems to be as healthy as his male parts. We're over the halfway mark and on the downhill to becoming a family of four.

Surprise!

Hey, what is this, I have a blog? Oh, yes, I remember. This is the place where I regularly, frequently and often update all my far-flung family and friends about my whereabouts. 

What, the last post is from April? Is that three months ago?? Oops.

Well let's just get the full disclosure out of the way, before I lose steam and another three months go by. I am 17 weeks pregnant. 

I asked C.J. why he's been pitching in with the cooking and cleaning so much lately, and he said, "because you are always asleep."

So that is the story. Liam + work + pregnant = totally worthless and void of energy. It's hard to blog when I am incapable of keeping my eyes open after 9 p.m. 

All those unreturned phone calls, the items lingering on my to-do list indefinitely, the sudden rash of frozen foods and fried egg sandwiches around our house, it's all making sense now. 

Although, I may make a blogging comeback in the second trimester. I am feeling so much better that I usually forget I am pregnant. Except for that problem I'm having with my jeans. How long can I use a hair tie to fasten them in lieu of buying maternity pants?

The great thing about pregnancy is, you find out the big news and perhaps you feel shocked and surprised because it was a bit sooner than you planned, and then, nothing happens for a long....long...time. When the baby finally arrives it will feel like perfect timing to have a second child while my husband's in med school in the winter in New Jersey. Perfect timing! 

So let's go ahead and forget about that pregnancy thing for a minute and  try to piece together what happened in these pictures that I uploaded six weeks ago but then never wrote about or posted.

Going back to April, there was a trip to Texas, the beloved home land. This involved a visit with my family and a weekend camping at Old Settler's Bluegrass Music Festival. Naturally, I forgot my camera, but there were a few special moments captured on my phone.

Liam having a nap on Grandma Sally's lap (priceless!)

 

Grandma Sally's homemade chicken and dumplings (also priceless!)

Onion Creek (before Texas turned into Scorched Earth)

The fantastic Bluebonnet Stage

Liam loving corn on the cob

The camp fire

Back in New Jersey, at the end of April, Liam turned two. This big milestone coincided with me noticing some fatigue, nausea and a heightened sense of smell. I would like to blame these symptoms for my complete failure as a mother in doing anything for this child's birthday besides making him some lame cupcakes and snapping this picture.

This was no mother-of-the-year moment, and I only forgive myself because thankfully, he didn't know the difference and will not remember. And, I did throw a pretty kick-butt party when he turned one. Remember the home-made pinata? Surely some credit carries forward from that all-out effort.

Looking very sweet and mommy is so proud, even if there's not much to show for this big day

In the first part of May we were again so happy to have visitors - Amber and Matt made a trip up from Texas to celebrate Matt's birthday. This ended up being such a fun weekend. We splurged and got a babysitter two nights in a row for some really special evenings out.

A walk across the Brooklyn Bridge

Hanging at the Brooklyn Bridge Park (hippie kid needs a haircut)

Daddy and Liam playing in the park

Railroad Earth at The Wellmont in Montclair, New Jersey

Holy steak for four at the unforgettable Peter Luger's Steakhouse in Brooklyn for Matt's birthday (and a Mother's Day treat for me!)

Sometime in May our friends Sandy and Penny came up from Staten Island, and we went to a little zoo that is only four miles from our house. The zoo has a train that goes around the perimeter. It's a great place for young kids.

Thinking this was a routine Sunday afternoon outing, I didn't take my camera, which I regret because the trip made a huge impression on Liam. I snapped this one photo with my phone and that's it (Haircut, finally! Look at this big boy!).

 

When we got home, unprompted, Liam said his first sentence: "Mommy, baby ride choo choo train."  

And then he said it about 200 more times over the following weeks. And then he added "Mommy, baby see goat." and "Mommy, baby see cow." and "Mommy, baby see lion." and so on with many other animals that we had seen that day.

And then, basically, my kid started talking. Nonstop. Repeating everything we say. Counting, colors, A,B,Cs, animals,  please, thank you, back hoe, limousine, race car, garbage truck (we read our Things that Go book A LOT). His verbal skills have just exploded. It's pretty awesome, especially since he didn't say a word for so long. 

He also says his own name, although he pronounces it "Ee-min-a." Hasn't quite mastered the "L" sound yet. It's so sweet.

And that brings us up to today. Except for a few other little details like C.J. bought a truck, we are moving in August, third year is wrapping up and he is now in a stressful and frantic period of finishing a personal statement and CV, asking for letters of recommendation, preparing an application for residency and studying for a major board exam in September. 

And summer is here finally, thankfully. Summer in New Jersey is a breeze. Literally. The high today was 80 degrees. I am scarred for life after what happened last winter, but this is sort of making up for it. Almost.

Hopefully there will be another blog before the announcement about baby number two in December. If not though, now you know why. I am too busy sleeping.

Signs of spring

Finally, it's here. Well, almost. It's still cold (mostly highs in the 50s), but things are coming to life. The bulb flowers and the blooming trees are stunning.

I don't remember if trees bloom like this in Texas. It's been three years since I've seen a spring. Or maybe it's just that winter was so long. Whichever, I am impressed. My eyes can't get enough.

May is just around the corner. I hear that's when the weather really warms up here. We are counting the days.

Riches

My fears of having no visitors since being relocated to New Jersey thankfully have not come true. We've been lucky to have a lot of friends and family drop in to see us.

I have been terrible about documenting all of our guests and have almost no photographs to show for our reunions. A big up to H and Kayla, my parents, Amber, Karen W., the Ford family, Jordan and Corey, sister Kaitlyn, H again, Paula and Marguerite for stopping by or staying a few days. We are so happy to see familiar faces.

Most recently we were honored with a visit from some of the Winckler family - C.J.'s brother Keith, sister-in-law Shantell, and nephews Tyler, Korbin and Ethan were her for their spring break. They were such troopers - they went into The City every day for sightseeing while C.J. and I worked. On the weekend we went to the Statue of Liberty, spent an afternoon in Central Park and walked around Midtown Manhattan.

We loved having them here. Our apartment was transformed into a non-stop fun house. Liam was so sweet playing with his cousins and they adore him.

I only have a few pictures, from the day we went to Liberty Island. I guess I was too caught up in enjoying all the action - kick ball, bubbles, Go Fish, cartoons, memory, laser tag, movies, meals together, lots of laughing, sweet voices saying "Aunt Julie," commiserating on New Jersey drivers, comparing favorite things about NYC, catching up on the news from back home and washing it down with a few cold beers.

Thank you for coming Wincklers, we miss you so much already! We are just a bit heartbroken that you live so far away.

We may not have a lot to show for ourselves in a material sense, but we are rich when it comes to friends and family. We are so grateful to everyone who has come to see us in NJ.