Saturday, September 17, 2011

Lessons Learned

I have been a parent for nearly ten years... I can hardly believe ten years ago I was anxiously (and I was a bit terrified) awaiting the birth of my daughter.  During each pregnancy, The Lord has drawn me nearer to Him, and taught me incredible, life-changing lessons.

With Kristyn I learned about consequences, unconditional love, and forgiveness. With Branden I was taught to trust and rely on Him and putting my trust wholly in Him and not in worldly possessions or other people. I LOVE how God can continue to teach me, mold me, and ultimately humble me!

I have always heard about how "prayer is powerful."  I believed it, but didn't always practice it.  I have prayed daily, as a family, as a couple, as an individual. But I feel as though I usually pray "safe" prayers, "bless our family" "bless our food" "keep us safe"... I admit I did not pray boldly. However, the night of August 31 that changed.

I knew that for me to deliver our new child by a VBAC I needed to go into labor soon, because I had 2 previous C-sections the Dr was hesitant to let me go to my due date.  I had evaluated my motives, and was confident I was not desiring this delivery because of my pride, but because I knew this was better for my child and for me. After coming home from my Dr's appointment, I began boldly praying. Taking my requests to the throne, I also asked many friends and family members to pray that I would go into labor soon. We had friends praying for us across the country, and around the world!  Zach and I prayed before we went to sleep that I would go into labor and deliver our son as soon as possible.  We were detailed in our request... That was about 9pm.... 1:30am I was awakened by contractions. At 2:45am the contractions were getting stronger and coming every 12 minutes.  We called our Dr and headed to the hospital... Within hours God had answered our prayers.

At 2:40pm Jaxon Wade Fulton was born.  Within minutes they whisked my newborn away to the nursery, later we learned he he had transient tachypnea. This is when the fluid in the lungs from being in the womb is not completely extracted from the lungs.  Essentially Jaxon had "wet lungs" causing him to have labored breathing.  He was taken to the NICU.  Zach and I listened to the Dr as she told us the specifics Jaxon needed to overcome to be taken off the oxygen, eat from a bottle, what his bilirubin level had to be before he could be released.  Zach, Jaxon and I spent 5 days in the hospital, and Zach and I had never prayed harder, more boldly, or more specifically.  By the end of our stay we were literally praying for poop!  (Moms of kids who had jaundice understand)

The beauty of it all was Zach and I were in constant conversation with our Heavenly Father. Yes, he answered our prayers, but more importantly He taught us how much we needed Him. We needed to lean on Him when in the middle of the night in the hospital room I was awakened to pump milk instead of the cry of my son wanting to eat... A sad feeling that would bring me to tears, but instead of wallowing I fell into the arms of God and let Him console me and give me strength.  Zach and I were humbled as we were taught how to pray: continuously, without ceasing, boldly, with the absolute trust that God's will is perfect.

In his first few days of life, God used our son Jaxon to teach us lifelong lessons that Zach and I will carry with us and teach our children. 

Thank you, Lord for you unconditional love, and for humbling us and teaching us!

Cloth Diapers: Week 1& 2

We started cloth diapering last week after being home from the hospital a couple days.  We have been using our cloth diapers in combination with disposable ones for two main reasons:
  1. We only ordered 7 newborn sized All-in-one (AIO) diapers because I wasn't sure how big Cub was going to be. Branden had to be squeezed into newborn size diapers and after a week couldn't fit in them anymore; however, Kristyn was in newborn size for over a month.  Since I wasn't sure which way the pendulum would swing with Cub, I decided not to buy too many.  Plus my sister had given me a few of the newborn sized "gdiapers" that she uses on her daughter. These are hybrid diapers and with the right insert you can reuse these a few times before they have to be washed.  (We don't have a the right insert)
  2. All of the suave diaper changing moves I may have acquired 7 years ago have vanished... On more than one occasion since Cub's birth, I have been peed on, pooped on, put a new diaper under him only to immediately change it because he pooped more in the brand new diaper. We have had to change multiple onsies in a single changing, and changed sheets on the bed because the changing pad doesn't take into account the arch fountain that is my son's pee stream.
So with these factors, we have been cloth diapering in combo with some disposables.  My only complaint has been I didn't purchase enough so I am doing diaper laundry every day, but that will be over soon because he is just about ready to be in the One-size AIOs we bought. The cloth diapers are the only diapers that have not leaked on Cub regularly.  I can say definitely is that Huggies are my least favorite diapers of all time. They have been leaking on my kids for 10 years! LOL. 

So for our first two weeks of cloth diapering I can say I LOVE my bum genius newborn, AIOs. They are absorbent, have a great fit, and are just adorable on Cub's little bum.  Not to mention the laundering of the diapers is much easier than I anticipated. I was concerned that since I cannot dry them in a dryer they would take forever to dry, but that is simply not true. They have dried quicker than I expected.

I am pretty excited about this cloth diapering business, and pleasantly surprised at how much easier it is than I was anticipating! :-)