Stay at Home Mommy

Being a stay at home mom is so much more fun than I thought it was going to be. I was so afraid I would be bored and not know what to do all day, but I actually have been keeping myself busy. Between Netflix, books, chores, errands, feeding the baby, and just playing him, my day fills up very fast! The two of us have the best time ever. His first month just flew by. I was so lucky to have my mom stay as long as she did. She took such good care of me. I had another surgery when Ezra was three weeks old. I had a parathyroidectomy. I didn't see my baby boy for 26 hours. It was so hard to be away from him but I knew he was in good hands with both of his grandmas taking turns watching him. When grandma left, things became real. Just me and the baby, all day everyday! But we have really just come to love spending time together! I am terribly sad that in 6 weeks I have to go back to work and leave Ezra with someone else. But thats life I guess….

Billy Rueben

Okay, its actually spelled Bilirubin, but up until now I had never heard of it, so how was I supposed to know how it was spelled. We checked out of the hospital on Friday and they asked us to bring Ezra to the lab to get some blood work done that Saturday. Later that Saturday we got a call saying that his bilirubin levels were too high, and that he was going to need light therapy. These levels showed that he was jaundice, and he was going to have to stay on the lights and eat a lot to bring the levels down.

The hospital took care of everything, they called the home health people, and they delivered the little light bed and lamp to our house that afternoon. Ezra needed to be undressed to be on the lights, so for that first week of his life he didn't wear any of the cute clothes we had for him. But he has a cute little naked body so I didn't mind too much. He really liked the light bed, he would sleep well on it and was really happy to just lay there.

This lasted for about a week. We took him in every day to get his blood work done. They had to poke his heel and get blood that way. He was so chill he hardly flinched when they took the blood. But as the week went on he started to notice more and more, which was a sign that he was getting better. Before we knew it his levels were great and we didn't need the lights anymore.

Hospital Stay

Since I had a c-section, I got a longer recovery in the hospital than I expected to have. And to be honest, I kind of loved it. Yes by the end I was ready to go home and sleep in my own bed… but I really enjoyed my hospital stay. I had my baby right there next to me, and I had food being brought up to me all the time. I seriously ate so much of their macaroni and cheese!

Each of Joseph's siblings came to visit, and it was fun to see them all meet their newest nephew. My mom came up that last day and helped me check out and then stayed with us after for a few weeks.

We had a couple of scares that first few days. He stopped breathing a couple times and was rushed off once because of it. We had a nurse tell us he wasn't eating and losing a lot of weight when he wasn't. And he had a really hard time eating from me so we were struggling with that for a long time.

Here are some pictures of him that first few days.

Ezra Joseph Van Zant

So there's this boy... and I have fallen in love with him!

On October 11th, Joseph and I went to my 8:30am OBGYN check up. It should have been a normal visit like the week before, but I was feeling very off that morning. And the night before I had a hard night, so when the midwife told me she wanted me to go to Labor and Delivery, I wasn't too surprised.

Joseph and I checked into the hospital around 9am. I texted my boss saying that I might be late/not coming in that day. At the time I didn't feel like I was going to have a baby that day, so I thought we would just have some blood work done and head home later. But apparently the doctor had other plans. He wanted me to stay there for 6 hours, getting my blood pressure checked every 15 minutes. If my blood pressure continued to stay high, they informed me that my baby would be coming that day. However, my baby had this funny habit of making lots of flips and turns inside if me, and this day he had flipped the wrong way and was breached. Knowing that we might have to deliver the baby with him being breached was a little nerve racking. The doctor suggested a c-section and honestly I felt good about it.

By the time 6 hours had come and gone, it was obvious that we would become parents. Around 3:00 the doctor was telling Joseph and I about our options. We asked when the c-section would happen and the doctor said immediately. We moved to another room where I signed consent forms and was prepped for surgery.

As I laid on the operating table, I just watched my husband. He was watching the whole surgery, and I was watching him. What felt like a minute after we started I heard the best noise of my life, my son's voice. He didn't bawl like I thought my newborn would, but he made some noise. Just like that Joseph left my side to go be with him. Then Joseph came and laid him next to me.

Words cannot describe the feelings I had in this moment. It was love at first sight. Welcome to the world my little Ezra.

True Charity

So uh... its been a while since I blogged. But Joseph did something so incredibly sweet to me the other day I just feel the need to scream it to the world!

So to catch up on our life.... We are expecting a baby! I've had a hard pregnancy though... At the beginning of my pregnancy I was sick... like sick sick sick. And we had just started a budget, but I was too sick to go to the ATM to pull out money for our cash budget. I was too sick to pack a lunch. I was too sick to care about anything... So I just survived... day after day after day. But sadly our savings account did not. At the end of the month when the credit card was due, I would pull money from savings to make it happen (which I knew I shouldn't have, but did anyway). Joseph would remind me all the time we needed to budget and be good and I just couldn't because... well I felt like I couldn't do anything....

A few weeks ago we went on vacation to Lake Tahoe, and we had a vacation savings account, but on the drive home after spending all our money on vacation.... we knew we needed to start being better with our money, like right away. So we got back and with the little cash we had after our vacation we put together a cash budget, and have been living off of a cash budget for two weeks now.

Tuesday night my friends wanted to go to dinner with me, and of course I wanted to go with them. The place we went had burgers and shakes, and I spent $11 on dinner. But the dinner made me really sick, that night I was so sick and the next morning I was throwing it all up... So the next morning when he asked me how I was I told him I was more sad than anything. I have $20 a week to eat food on, and that is sadly really hard for me. I spend way too much money eating out, and I'm trying so hard to stick to that budget. So when he asked me why I was sad, I told him its because I spent $11 on food that I didn't really love and ended up throwing up.

The next thing he did was the sweetest. We originally decided we would spend $30 on eating out, 15 each. But he told me it was a lot easier for him to not eat out, so we split it 20/10. And when I told him how sad I was about spending $11 on one meal, he gave me $5.00. Now I know that it doesn't seem like a lot, but he gave up half of his spending money so that I could avoid a day of packing a lunch and buy food one day.

Joseph has done his very best being there for me. I have been a miserable pregnant wife who doesn't help out with much and complains/cries most of the time. But he has just been amazing. Marriage is the best, we help each other out, and sometimes one helps the other out more. Joseph is the best and he has just been so amazing to me. I am feel more and more grateful each day I am with him.

Also its Thursday night and I haven't and don't plan on spending his $5.00. I need to prove to myself that I don't need more than $20 a week for food. And then maybe on Saturday him and I can go get ice cream with the $5.00!!! Oh the exciting dates we go on these days! :)