What once was two. Is now three!

Yesterday at 11:47 AM I became a father. The birthday was a bit of a surprise. The due date wasn't until next week. We thought that we had at least a week until the baby came. To be honest we thought it would be even longer. Especially with first baby's labor usually starts after the due date and sometimes even requires being induced. So the labor caught us by surprise.

Wendy has been having Braxton-Hicks contractions almost constantly for the past couple of weeks. Thursday night Wendy started to have some contractions. I thought that they were just her normal nightly contractions that keep her awake all night then disappear. Yea, I was so wrong on that count. Wendy knew the difference however. She told me, "If you have anything to do before the baby comes you might want to do it now." I thought she was joking; facts have shown that she definitely wasn't.

That does explain a little bit about my next reaction though. Wendy got up to try to relax and deal with the contractions. I thinking that it was the normal "practice" contractions went to bed and slept. Four hours later Wendy woke me up saying, "Ben I need you!" It became immediately obvious to this trained nurses eye, and any other random person's eye, that Wendy's contractions were not practice. I still didn't quite understand the situation because I thought that Wendy had just started having the contractions. Nope, she'd been dealing with the contractions since midnight. I felt so terrible. Felt like I had abandoned her. She stated she wanted to let me rest so at least one of us would be awake the following day. Makes sense but I still felt bad.

Once I realized that contractions were real, and coming fairly quickly I downloaded a quick iPhone app to time her contractions. After six or so iterations we found that she had contractions lasting 1:07 and they were coming 2:47 apart. Because I was fuddled and hadn't quite realized how long Wendy had been going alone it took me a while to realize that it was time to go. I had to look it up on the internet just to make sure that it was OK to go to the hospital. When I finally had the realization we hurriedly packed up the bags and drove to the hospital.

Arriving at the hospital

I was going to park at the front entrance of the hospital but Wendy insisted on walking to the entrance herself. I later caught flak from the nursing staff because I allowed her to do so. Wendy claims however that it was better because it allowed her to walk a little more and that it helped. I'll take her word for it.  On the way in though she told me, "I hope they don't send us home!"  She was worried about not being dilated enough to be admitted to the hospital.

That was a needless worry. Once we got in the labor and delivery room they checked her dilation. She was at a seven. We had mentioned to the nurses the possibility of doing the labor naturally. The nurses statement as she got up from checking Wendy, "Oh yea, you got this. You can do this easily unmedicated." We decided then that since Wendy was already so progressed it didn't make sense to do an epidural. So Wendy delivered completely natural.

Not to say that even with her being dilated so much before coming to the hospital that it was easy. The labor still lasted eight hours from the point. I hate to admit it but I was really glad that we went to the birthing class. It was painful to go to but we were able to use so much of what was taught. A lot of the things that helped the labor go a little better we learned there; and almost all of them I never would have even thought about trying out on my own. The position changes, the way to support Wendy, they way to encourage her, worked well. We were especially grateful that we were able to get a jacuzzi tub with jets. It worked great for Wendy. The hardest part for me was to continue coming up with superlatives to encourage Wendy. After saying "you're doing great," "You're doing awesome!" for four hours I had to find other things to say. I had to dig deep. At a certain point I'm pretty sure I was so desperate that I told Wendy that she was doing "gnarly." It was at time like these that I was grateful there was a nurse in the room with us almost the entire time. She was able to help encourage Wendy when I was faltering.

Helping Wendy Labor

The last part after the head crowned was the hardest. Andrew's head was too big, and Wendy's channel too small so it took a long time to get him out. Wendy had to actively push for an hour and half before the birth occurred. Again, the birthing class was helpful for this. We were able to get a squat bar for Wendy to lean on so that gravity was helping her and it was more comfortable to push. We had to switch from the squat bar near the end because her legs were tired.

It sounds bad but I'm actually somewhat glad that Wendy's legs got tired. The position that we moved to allowed me to be behind Wendy, supporting her. It made me feel more like a participant in the process in addition to being the cheerleader. It made the process feel a lot more intimate and personal to me.

After nearly twelve hours of labor and a lot of pushing Andrew Dylan Stuart was born. 7 lb 10 oz and 19.5 inches in length.

Ironically we had decided on the name at 11:15 the night before. Yes, that would be about 45 minutes before labor started. It appears Andrew was just waiting for us to name him so he could come.

Andrew Dylan Stuart immediately after being born

I cannot express how proud I am of my wife. Going natural with no pain medication was not easy and she did it with no complaints, no swearing, no hitting, no biting, no screaming, and never even complained about her pain. The closest she ever got was to say, "I want this baby out." "Come out baby!" and only at the very end, "Ow" spoken softly. In fact she did so well that the midwife told us that he had to keep reminding himself that she did not have an epidural.

Happy Family

Footprinting

Digging out Stumps

My parents are having their entire backyard dug out and then landscaped. My father took the week off to make sure that everything is done as he wants and also to resolve any problems that may rise up. This has left my father in a conundrum. What is a workaholic supposed to do with a week off and a ton of people working on the backyard? That answer is simple...work on the front yard!

So, for the past couple of days Dad and I have been doing our best professional landscaper impressions. We brought out all of the typical tools of the trade: axes, shovels, rakes, picks, and even a chainsaw. Between the might of our sinew and the sharp edges of our tools we vanquished both stumps. There was much rejoicing. At least until Dad finds his next project.

Digging out the stump

Axing the roots

The Stump

The dirt pile

Dad in the stump hole

Ben in the stump hole

Filling in the hole

Ladies Night to Cook

Sundays are reserved for family dinners. Our two families have been great about arranging things so rotating weeks work well. A couple of weeks ago the Stuart family dinner ran into a couple small issues for Sunday dinner.

1. The patriarch and matriarch of the family were out of town.
2. The oven at the family home was out of commission; making it slightly more difficult to cook meals.

Fortunately Wendy and I have an oven that works (the stove is a bit finicky but usually works).  With the reduced size of the family dinner we had our Sunday dinner at mine and Wendy's home.

There is a slight problem with having home-made meals made here; the kitchen is tiny. The meal was fairly complicated so multiple people needed to help prepare. It got a bit crowded in the kitchen so I channeled my inner masculine slacker and hid in the family room while the ladies cooked dinner. Despite small twinges of guilt I enjoyed the meal the ladies prepared.

Ladies cooking

Time to eat

Photography Class

We've bought a membership at the local community fitness centers. Several weeks ago when walking in to go swimming we saw a photography class being advertised. We both have intentions of becoming decent photographers so we thought we'd sign up. We learned a fair bit about the use of ISO, shutter speed, and aperture. I learned enough that I've started shooting in manual mode. Wendy is still figuring out the various settings.

One of the more interesting techniques the teacher demonstrated was the use of reflectors. I've seen white and gray reflectors used before. This teacher actually recommended using patterned reflective fabrics that include purples and reds because they give more color to the portrait subject.

Teacher demonstrating how to set up a reflector

Wendy while having light reflected onto her

The Leonardo Museum

I'm married to a museum enthusiast. Not only does she work at a museum she loves to go to museums. This past Friday for our weekly date she chose to go to a museum called The Leonardo.  She was excited; I was less so. Just the name gave me worries. I like museums; but artsy modern art museums not so much. Wendy however had a hook, the museum was hosting a NASA moon rock. I agreed that if there was a moonwalk it couldn't be all too terrible. Remember the moon rock..I'll get to it later.

The museum ended up being a lot of fun. It resembled a science museum more than an art museum in its activities. One of the first things that we did upon entering was to play Dance, Dance, Google maps. Yep. They had Google maps projected through the floor and you controlled where the map scrolled and zoomed by jumping on arrows. It was surprisingly fun. Unfortunately it didn't transfer very well to either pictures or video.

Wendy Dance Dance Googling

Close to the Dance Dance Google display were several touch screens with a large display of Utah in front. You controlled the large screens with the touch panels. This display was capable of showing vital statistics for most of the cities in the state including: crimes, single-mothers, population and other things. The most important thing I learned? For all you West Valley City haters; Ogden was far worse than West Valley City in every crime category that was tracked.

Ben reviewing crime statistics for Utah

I'm assuming because the name of the museum was patterned after the inventor/artist there was a small area dedicated to Leonardo Da Vinci including a display describing his habit of writing all of his notes in mirror image. The display then challenged its readers to attempt to write something in mirror image as well. I failed miserably. I couldn't even write the simple three letter word that is my name. Wendy had slightly more success than I did. I just took her ten minutes to do it.

Wendy writing backwards

Another one of the displays focused on "Who am I?" The displays talked about genetics and so forth. It also talked about the importance of knowing who you are and accepting that. To help achieve this goal the museum provided a station in which you could draw a self portrait. Here's the process and results.

Ben drawing his portrait

Ben's Self-portrait

Wendy's portrait. She gave up.

The museum has a rotating display/art show. The rotating display and art show for this point in time spotlighted a group of highly talented, dedicated, and motivated women: Rollerderby girls. Wendy was so inspired by the display that she went out and became one. She liked this portrait more than the last.

Don't Mess with Madame Museum

We also found a motion capture studio where a animated character would imitate your movements. We did run into a small problem with Wendy's first try. The motion capture got confused with her maternity shirt flapping around. The animated character was doing some pretty impressive hip contortions as a result. Tucking in the shirt did result in a better copy of movements; but not nearly as entertaining. As my life was threatened if I posted a video of a pregnant woman dancing I'll post a video of myself.

Wendy and I had a profession change. For one day only we became weather forecasters. I can only tell you this. Watch out for the heat on Friday; it's going to get hot.

Our final activity involved little animated characters and moving them incrementally across a sheet of paper to tell a story. We also took pictures of this characters moving incrementally across the sheet of paper.

Stop motion animation

Results:

With that, our evening at the museum ended. We had only spent three hours inside the building reading, watching, and playing with the displays. We didn't realized that we had forgotten something until we walked outside and saw the NASA staff cleaning up. Remember that moon rock Wendy got me excited about? Yea, completely forgot about it and completely missed it.

Katie's Wedding

My cousin got married this past weekend. I'm afraid that I wasn't able to get any pictures of the actual wedding ceremony. Mainly because I didn't think that cameras would be allowed during the ceremony.  All of the weddings that I've attended in the past have all been LDS temple ceremonies; I haven't seen an LDS civil marriage ceremony before.  I assumed that cameras wouldn't be allowed. It wasn't until the wedding party started their stately march in and everyone's cameras started flashing that I discovered my error. Because of this the only pictures I managed to get are of the reception afterwards.

Beautiful Bride

The important women in my life: my wife and mother

Mom, Debbie, and Tammy

What would a reception be without dancing? Well, to me it isn't nearly as exciting. My father and cousin managed to get the music going and for rest of the night I danced with everyone who was willing to dance. Unfortunately that only included my wife once. For some reason she didn't want to dance fast while pregnant. Something about balance being different. Fortunately there were plenty of other willing victims for me.

Dancing with my wife

Dancing with Tammy

Dancing with Debbie

Dancing with the bride

Dancing with my mother

Dancing with Tammy's
 daughter

Cleaning out the shed

At the beginning of this year we moved into the basement of Wendy's Aunt's house. While the rent has been perfect the amount of storage has been slightly non-existent. We received permission to clean out an unused storage shed. When I say unused it means that I don't think the place has been used in over a decade. I think there was at least a 1/2 inch of dust on the shelves and floors. We spent a couple of evenings cleaning everything out for storage. Let's just say the dust was flying.

Ben using a shop vacuum

Wendy cleaning the shed

Wendy sweeping all the dust off of one of the shelves.