More pictures!

The man of the hour

'nuf said. (thanks, Seth and Noelle!)

Momma and baby

Dr. Evil Dex

Frankie helps Daddy fix his bike

Frankie, Dex, and Nonnie in the play room (and why yes, that is an enormous Incredible Hulk cut out poster that Chris could not leave behind when they were giving them away free the other day at the 7-11. and why yes, it does freak me out every time I notice it out of the corner of my eye, lurking there behind the day bed.)

Frankie loves having Nonnie and Daddy to play with all day!

Family Resemblance?

Videos!

Here we are at the hospital, Dexter is one day old, and Frankie meets him for the first time.


This is from earlier today, Frankie sweetly helps her brother get comfortable. Until the end, when it's obvious we're still working on the meaning of "gentle".

A hard day's night

Thursday night Dexter got overheated and spiked a temp of 102.4 around 1 am. The admitting temp for a newborn his age is 100.4. Yikes! We cooled him down as best we could, I fed him, and we took him to the hospital. By the time we got to the ER his temp was at 99.9. By the time we left it was 98.6. After examining him they decided to let us go home without any further testing since we had an appointment in the morning with our pediatrician, and he seemed completely fine otherwise.

Our peditrician was horrified that they had let him go without any testing, and we had to endure watching our 4-day old baby get a cathader for a urine sample, and a needle in his arm for a blood sample, and yet another heel prick for more blood. She did not issue the spinal tap, much to our relief, because he did seem fine, but didn't feel that she would be doing her job if she didn't at least do the other testing. Fortunately, his testing revealed no infection, and no signs of jaundice, so we're in the clear. She agreed with us that he was probably over-heated and dehydrated. We're going to supplement with formula, and she wants me to start pumping to get my supply up. I think my supply has already started to catch up though, because he's only taken the formula three times since yesterday after a feeding, and has thrown most of it back up twice. He's had some reassuringly soaking wet diapers that started last night, and several dirty diapers, so I'm hoping we're back on track.

Poor exhausted baby after a morning at the doctor's office.


We're enjoying getting to know the newest member of our family. He's a sweet boy - he rarely cries, and so far when he has, it's been clearly a result of gas. I've been learning to hear the difference in his "I'm hungry now, momma" cry, and his more painful sounding "I have gas now momma and don't want to try and eat right now" cry. He's sleeping well for now, but I'm not going to declare him a good sleeper until he gets back these first few weeks of normal newborn drowsiness.


Frankie has accepted her baby brother like a champ. I am immensely grateful for my mom being here and spending so much time with her, and it's wonderful to have Chris here at home too. I will tell you that as soon as I had Dexter, she seemed HUGE to me. Physically, but more developmentally. She's at such a fun age right now. She's continuing to add to her vocabulary, and shockingly, without further prompting or dilligence on our part, has started to use her signs. They aren't consistent, but this morning she clearly asked me for "more" nutrigrain bar.

She is enjoying the new house - it's wonderful for her to have so much space to roam in now. Here she is on the deck playing with her pool and in the grass in our backyard.



Videos to come later today!

Dexer Wallace McFadden I is Here

The people have been demanding pictures, so here's the best of what we have so far. I'm not sure any of the photos do justice to his enormous hands so you'll have to come see those in person! Pictures first, then the details:
















Labor and delivery was as different this time around as night is from day; much quicker and fewer complications - we arrived at the hospital at 1:00 pm and Dex was born at 9:07 pm! Jenny had been laboring already earlier that morning, and on our way to the hospital so that we when we arrived she was already at 4 cm of dilation (for those that like to know that sort of thing). She opted for the epidural again, and was also put on pitosin. She actively pushed for 15 minutes, or 7 sets of 3 pushes and then baby Dex was here! He weighed 8 pounds 14 ounces and was 21.5 inches long.

The best part has been how easy the post-delivery has been on her (us) this time. Dex immediately started breast feeding, has had no problems with jaundice, and is sleeping/eating/crying pretty much on cue. He's been very well behaved.

Frankie, who is 16 months this week, has been playing the role of older sister like she was born to it. She learned the word 'bay-bee' last week and when asked where the baby is, she points to D.W. She's a little clingier than normal, but that's to be expected! Jenny's mom Chris has been a rock star, helping us through the home buying process, the big move on Saturday and watching Frankie while we have been in the hospital the last few days - all while suffering through the Boston scorcha'; 95 degree temperatures!

More to come once Jenny's back on line, but wanted to get some of the details posted so that you could know what's going on. Thank you for your prayers and all the offers of help!

Dexter's Coming!

Good news - we're at the hospital and baby Dex is on his way! Jenny is doing well, and we're hoping Dex will be born late tonight or early tomorrow morning. Right now Jenny is 4cm, her water has broken, and she is enjoying the magic of the epidural. Her contractions are strong but still only semi-regular.

Fortunately we were able to successfully move into our new house on Saturday; thanks to the efforts of many of our stalwart friends. The 96 degree day was a scorcha' for Boston, but we're just happy it didn't rain. Actually we're just happy that the cops helped us find a parking space for our 25 foot truck by calling the owners of the cars in front of our condo and asking them to move. Lucky us. A bunch of our guyfriends showed up in muscle t's jockeying to see who could move the heaviest items - which I think we all agree was the IKEA armoire. Special thanks to Jeff Derrick who prevented me from hitting about 4 different parked cars when maneuvering narrow Cambridge streets!

The move took most of the day, and was complicated by the fact that Jenny and Sarah were busy buying more furniture around the corner while we loaded up the truck. Turns out the senator next door was having a garage sale, and so we loaded up on his cast-offs, including a sweet oversized leather couch that's perfect for the new place.

Thanks again to all of you who helped with the move! Sometime down the road we'll have the official house-warming BBQ - but first things first; we're waiting for Baby Dex!

* ghostwritten by cdmcfad

Lambie and Ring around the Rosie

We are still waiting to have this baby, which is fine with me, since we close tomorrow at noon on the house, and are moving on Saturday. I would love for him to be a gentleman and wait until we're done moving to the new house. Fortunately I'm fairly comfortable all things considered. My contractions have all but stopped, and it seems that Dexter is content to hang out for a little while longer in the comfort of my womb.

To pass the time, I will leave you with these two videos:

I love the worried look on her face in this video, and the way she's not sure what to do with lambie to console him. I realized after I shot this that I don't think lambie's batteries are low, I'm pretty sure I washed him. Whoops!


Hannah and Frankie have learned "Ring around the Rosie" from Sarah, and we were thrilled the other night when they played themselves without Mrs. Murry's assistance. So sweet!