Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Henrik Wade Smith is here!!!

At home. =) July 20, 2009 One day old!

Making faces for mommy.

Behold! His eyes do open!


Bringing Henrik home. What a delight for us all!!


Mommy's heart is going to burst.


Newborn Henrik - July 19, 2009


Proud Daddy!
Henrik Wade Smith
July 19th, 2009 @ 1:24am
20" long - 7lbs, 14oz.
Wow! What a weekend we had. =) Our little Henrik Wade arrived 2 weeks early and gave us quite the nice surprise. Joe and I crawled in bed Saturday night at midnight after a busy day working around the farm, and as I was lying there trying to muster some energy to write in my journal I felt the strangest *pop* inside my stomach, along with a pain that frightened me! Joe asked me what was wrong as I started to cry and I said I didn't know! He helped me out of bed and then I felt the trickle... Keep in mind I was induced with Magnus and didn't know anything about going into labor on my own! I informed him that "I think my water just broke", and we stood there looking at each other asking, "What do we do now?" We couldn't decide whether to rush around to get to the hospital, to take our time and make sure everything (and everybody) was taken care of, or what. Joe even asked if we had enough time to get a good night's sleep in and then just go in the morning (since I wasn't having steady contractions up to that point). That's when it hit me... the pain... I said, "We better go now!" The contractions were hitting me steadily then, and we rushed around grabbing things, calling Melvin and Tamela to come stay the night with our sleeping Magnus, and off we went. My groans made Joe speed a little, but he didn't want to get pulled over (and further delayed) which was good since we did pass one cop on the back road. Our 35 min. drive seemed to take forever, but we made it, they wheeled a desperate me up to labor/delivery and got me in a hospital bed. Joe announced immediately that I needed my epidural, like now. =) The nurses checked my progress & said they'd try to get me one but it would take at least 30 min's & they didn't know if there was enough time. I tried to wait, but ended up pushing (it felt slightly better than trying to breathe & relax through the pain, and before I knew it, Joe was rooting me on saying, "He's coming!" Before I knew it, there was Henrik... but he wasn't screaming his head off like Magnus did, and I kept asking, "Is he okay? He's not crying!" They assured me he was fine, and he ended up crying some just to make me feel better. =) 1 1/2 hours of labor and I had my little man. No epidural, and I'm not sure what pain meds they gave me but Joe said they squeezed a little something in my IV. (We'd only been at the hospital maybe 45 minutes, which is why I didn't have time for my epidural!) Poor Joe was as pale as can be from the scene he'd just witnessed, and I had to remind him to get the video camera rolling on the new baby. But if we thought that was bad, we had no idea what the next 2 hours would hold! The placenta was stubbornly hanging in there and 2 hours is how long it took the Dr. (a decent sized man, with big hands and arms... oh my, the pain!) to get it out. They kept giving me more and more morphine at that point, but all it seemed to do was make things blurry and my eyelids heavy. I'll spare you all the gory, horror-story parts of the story and hurry along here, but you get the picture. All in all, it finally emerged (after I went through "labor" pushing all over again, only worse!) and all was well. I recovered very quickly, and after having Henrik at 1:24am, I was up and taking a shower at 5am. They let us come home a day early (we nearly insisted, and they didn't seem to mind) and we are happily starting a family life as a foursome! Magnus has been so sweet to his new baby brother, but then... it's only been one day! =)







Sunday, July 12, 2009

New Kids on the Block

Meeting the new kids - Jake (middle) put on the best show, surprisingly, and he's still upset about their arrival today! We're not going to put them in with him for a while...


We named the little tiger (see his legs?) dun Dusty Doc - he is such a sweety and Joe has claimed him as his own!


This picture makes them look bigger than they actually are, but I like it anyway.


Dusty - 1 year old

The little palomino that I just "had to have"! He's also 1 year old and I'm trying to find a suitable name for him.


So, you only only thought we were crazy before. =) We saw an ad for these colts (well, they were selling their whole herd) and couldn't resist going to take a peek at them. Now look what we've done!! They are just what we wanted though, and Joe and I are both excited about having a couple more little project horses to train and love. They are already warming up to us, and we're giving them lots of TLC. We had only intended to buy one colt, but we just couldn't leave either of these boys behind! Our family is growing... and growing... and overflowing! =)



Thursday, July 2, 2009

Powder Room... Westernized




I get western and horsie catalogs much more often than my budget can afford, but Joe and I always enjoy looking through them and getting ideas for our "next house" that will be totally western/rustic in styling. After 4 years of living in our current home though, I decided to continue decorating it as if it were western and we were to live here forever - it's been so fun! Being on a budget requires me to get creative though, so I'm pulling out my paints and going to work! I saw an idea in one of my books for a neat wooden sign, and it inspired me to paint this one that is much like it, but was quite a LOT cheaper! Stay tuned for more home decor pictures to come!