A Little More on the New Addition

So there's a little more to Pearl's arrival than I explained before in the previous post. This post is designed to clear up at least three issues:

1. We want more pictures of Pearl! We know you have more. Give us more pictures of Pearl or we're going to storm the house, tie you up, stick you on a pig pole, and rummage through your camera until we find what we're looking for, now post those pics! And a little more detail on the whole birth story—that would go a long way to calm the ranks.
   
   
2. Seriously, dude, what's up with the beard? You've been sporting than Wang Fu mess on your face for like months now. Are you going to shave than Mongolian caterpillar off your face or what?
   
   
3. Did the girls get to see Pearl? We've heard rumors that there may be some rivalry between Daisy and Pearl. How's that all shake out? Do you have to keep them separated so Daisy won't pull out Pearl's eye lashes or is she cool?

If you've asked any other questions above (or apparitions thereof), sit back and relax because you're about to get your answers. There are a TON of pictures in this post, which I'm more than happy to allow to tell the tale. Some would like to call it photo-journalism. However, I prefer to call this photo commentary, since I'm not documenting the facts—I'm documenting my point of view. On second thought, since my point of view is basically the world's reality...I guess we can call it photo journalism after all.

More pictures of Pearl, and we mean it!


Here's a good one of Dad holding Pearl. Yes, Pearl is winking at you. She's a quick study.


And those are her feet. I'm not sure why the hospital collects footprints from babies. I'm inclined to think they're actually collecting information for a secret government program to train children to perform mind control on small ally cats. I haven't quite placed where the footprints come in, but it's a developing story. Nevertheless, before they could make off with the prints, I snatched a photo. Not only will I be able to foil their wicked government plot, but it's also pretty cute.



You may have been able to discern that wee Pearl was a pretty full head of hair. This photo was taken after she was finally cleaned up. The professional baby bather person (yeah - that's her official title, and ALL she does is bath the babies) was trying to get Pearl's hair to make a decision as to whether it would lie to the left or right. A close examination of the photograph will show that Pearl chose not to choose. Interesting fact: I learned that UVRMC is the most-birthed hospital in the nation at 4800 births per year!



Here's the final product for the hair do. There is a hint of curl in Pearl's hair, which proved too difficult a task for the baby bather. She finally settled for the "sticking up" look and slapped a bow on her head. I, of course, chose the purpley bow for its amazing complement skin color.

And there's Mom when she got to hold Pearl again. It takes a while to clean up a baby! Maleen had already been transported to Mother / Baby.




And, yes, this is the weather outside. Look closer. When we went in to the hospital at 9:30ish it was a clear blue sky. In fact, the window was open when we walked into the room. This is the scene outside when Maleen and I made it to Mother / Baby a few hours later.


Here's the basic story of how Pearl got here, so that everyone's on the same page:

Maleen was scheduled to be induced on the 4th. That means you have to be ready for the 6:00 a.m. phone call asking if you're ready to be induced. (I'm not sure any woman has ever said, "No, I'll just wait a little longer." Nevertheless, the always ask if Maleen's ready. Hmmm. Well, being that we scheduled the day, I think we're about there.)

Anyway, 6:00 a.m. came and went without a phone call. Maleen was ready to drop everything and cruise to the hospital at any moment, but that wears off as the day wears on. By the way, thanks to Camille and Eric who were going to come over as early as necessary to make sure our kids woke up to somebody familiar

Things weren't looking good as we packed the kids up and sent them to school. I told Maleen to lie down and get some rest—she'd be needing it. She dutifully went in and removed her makeup to lie down for some extra shut eye. No sooner had she lain upon the bed, the hospital called and asked if Maleen was ready.

Note: I'd like to start my own old-wives tale. If you're being induced and they haven't called, just take off your makeup! It's a sure-fire way to put you into the situation that's going to put you into labor.

Anyway, we dropped the kids off at the Moses' and bolted for the hospital. Thank you Moses' for help us out again. You were an excellent help today. Thank you, thank you.

I like to think that I get to speed on the way to the hospital: I mean, my wife's about to be in labor, man! But Maleen thought maybe we'd be able to wait. I told her that if we got pulled over, she'd have to put on one heck of an act and she better sell the whole, "I'm in painful labor bit," and maybe that would actually put her in labor. Yeah, we drove a very conservative pace to the hospital.

Note: I'd like to start another old-wives tale that if you are speeding to the hospital, even though you may not be in labor when you start, by the time you finish the act for the cops, you will be in labor!

They checked us in, and Maleen and I proceed to make the wagers discussed in the last post. We met Brooke, our delivery nurse who was exceedingly nice to work with. And she got everything squared away for the labor-inducing stuff. She also reported that Maleen was at a three and a half.

Status report in hand, and knowing I had a little time before things got interesting, I of course, left and went to lunch. Now before you start huffing at your computer screen, this was a good decision—it enabled me to be there for when everything interesting started to happen. I skipped all the boring stuff, that and I had errands to run.

Meanwhile, back in the hospital room, Maleen remained stoic, right up until the contractions started being more than these talk-though-them-okay contractions. See, when they start becoming the grit-your-teeth-until-it's-over-and-sweat-starts-beading-up-on-your-head contractions, it's decision time: do I go for the trophy and go natural, or do I go for the epidural? My hats off to all those amazing women who have "gone natural," but we believe that God let us discover epidurals for a reason. So while I was chowing down on Five Guys, Maleen was getting an epidural.

Turns out she shouldn't have. It didn't work very well: it made her legs numb, but kept plenty of sensation right around where the contractions are. So, what was the point again? We're debating whether we should ask for a discount because it didn't work. Seems rational. After all, if you take your car into the shop and ask them to fix something and they don't fix it, well you don't pay.So it is in every service field in every industry in the world, except medicine. You see, they're still practicing. Anyway, most of you already know my aversion to doctors, but I digress.

I came back from all my errands and Maleen had made it to a six. We braced for what we know starts to happen now: baby starts having heart rate problems with every contraction. Doctors start showing up out of nowhere. People get more and more anxious, but nobody really wants to say anything for fear of how you'll take it. More monitors, more people, more stress, more drama.

Well, none of that happened. Maleen started to complain of more contraction pain, and they decided to check to see how far out the baby was. Maleen was a 10, fully complete. We called in the doc, and he asked Maleen to push. So she did. After the solo push Pearl was born and the pictures tell the rest of the story. Man, she's cute.

If I've left anything out, please ask me in the comments and I'll try to respond in another post so we get all the information out there. Also special thank to the Rice's who took our kids for the afternoon. Thank you, thank you. Life would have been much more difficult without your help. We really, really appreciate it.

 
Alright, we've seen more of Pearl. You live to see another day. On to hairy matters. Did a woolly mammoth actually die on your face or is there some excuse for that bush under your nose? By the way, Cheech and Chong called and asked for their mustache back. There are some PETA representatives at the door and they're demanding you stop mistreating the poor animal whose pelt now adorns your jaw. Is the wind blowing in the room, why is your bear always "blowing" sideways? And finally, how does filtered food taste?

Yes, yes. The answers to these questions and more in the next exciting segment:

To Beard or Not to Beard...















Many of you have seen my mustache and beard, and most of you are probably in possession of some portion of the truth. Well whatever you've heard, or however much you've heard, that's what you're going to have to live with, 'cause I'm not telling it now.

This mustache and beard of mine have raised more questions that I was prepared to answer. I'm not kidding when I say that I've fielded at least a few questions or comments EVERY day for the last five weeks.

The heart of the matter was whether I could grow a mustache by the time Pearl arrived. Ok, now scroll up so you can see the picture above. You see that 'stache? 'Nuff said.

So now I can admit that it's been a long road to have a beard. I had no idea I'd be filtering all my food like a whale filters plankton. And how do one actually train a beard to grow the right way? I had no luck at it, despite multiple Googlings of the subject. This much I can tell you: gel doesn't help. Shampoo doesn't help. Neither does conditioner. Forget about combing it—it doesn't care. Don't try your wife's hair straightening iron, either—those things make absolutely no difference at the length of a beard, but you're guaranteed to have a few burns after the fact. But hey, your beard will cover than mistake long enough for it to heal.

Anyway, I made my deadline. Pearl is here. I have photographic proof that the beard was in place at the time of delivery, and I wasted absolutely NO time in removing it:



















Take a little closer look at the left side of my chin. Each of my girls decided which section they were going to trim. June got the first shot, and she that side of my chin.













Robyn got the same side of my mustache. 


















 Ivory got the other side of the beard.













And Daisy got the last part of my mustache.


















This is what they left on my face. It was nice not to be breathing through the jungle anymore.
















I trimmed it up the rest of the way, as you see here. The only part I left was a well-trimmed soul patch—I just couldn't make it all go away!
 











Here are my helpers. Most of them enjoyed it.


Ok. We now know you are completely insane. We can only hope you didn't wear off too much on your girls. Speaking of which, have they even seen Pearl? Is Daisy really going to beat the tar our Pearl as soon as Mom is sleeping?

The Kids in the Hall (of the Hospital)


















June got to hold Pearl first. She was SUPER excited to finally meet Pearl. The only slight complication to this is that June had a cold recently, and we didn't want her contaminating Pearl. So, she very carefully sanitized hands before the event, and she meticulously exhaled away from Pearl—taking care to hold her breath while gazing at Pearl.

Robyn was next to hold little Pearl. She loved holding her and was extremely gentle. She showed Pearl how she would hold her if she was at home. Ivory also held Pearl, but is not photographed her because Dad was helping make sure Pearl's head was okay. (Ivory's not really ready to understand the implications of not supporting a newborn's head.)

















Finally Daisy got to hold Pearl. She was thrilled with the idea of holding Pearl, right up to the moment we put Pearl in her lap. Then we got this face. It seemed to say to me: "What do you mean she's coming home with us?"













Our time in the hospital as a family was...interesting.

 Mommy always gets a special gift on birthdays. Being the extreme lady man (more similar to "ladies man" than say, "girly man") that I am, I have made sure Mommy gets something to remember the day by (as if a baby weren't enough!).


















The look on her face when she opens her jewelry is something I've been trying to capture on film for four pregnancies before this one. I wasn't going to miss the photo op, so I watched the scene unfold through the Nikon D90 viewport. I finally got my reaction shot. It was worth it, and here's what she saw:


















Go ahead, blow it up. You'll want to take a look at these. Those are not big diamonds, but their diamonds all the same. There are five of stones—I'll let you work out the significance there. The primary stone is a crimson sapphire (or more commonly known as a "pink sapphire"). I've got alotta pink around me—it's fitting Maleen where a little on her neckline.

On a side note, yes, that exquisite ring on her left hand is also my handiwork—but that's anniversary-grade stuff.














It was a long day for everyone.



















There are lot of tags on this arm.




















Yeah, and those arms go all the way up...to this beautiful face. Well, I couldn't have done it without you, babe. Ok, ok, you couldn't have done it without me. No? Fine, you did really well today, and I'm glad you let me be a part of it. Love you.