Is it time?

Every women who has had a baby will relate to the anticipation over the arrival of a newborn. I have gone crazy reading stuff on the Internet and in books about whether or not we are really in labor yet. But we had some interesting developments this week. At our appt. we found out that we were 3 cm and 50% and with the onset of light contractions, we believed we might be having a baby sooner rather than later. Last night I was having very small, but regular contractions and they continued this morning. My instincts said that we aren't ready, but my husband encouraged me to call and just talk to the doctor. They wanted us to come in this morning and I am so glad we did. In the past two days, this baby has decided that he would rather snuggle in mommy than come out(I must make a cozy home!). He flipped his way to a transverse lie(sideways) which is impossible to have a vaginal deliver from. Breach would be OK, but transverse is more complicated and carries with it some more potential complications. We did an ultrasound and at 37 weeks we are probably already 8lbs at least. BIG BOY!! Our next step is to meet with the doctor tomorrow and most likely go to L&D for a procedure to try and flip him back down. This can be a painful process and can bring distress to the baby, so we will be hooked up the ultrasound and monitors. There is no guarantee he will stay flipped if they are able to do it. Most likely we will either flip and engage in labor(they think I would be 4-5cm already if the head was down and helping in the labor process) or have a planned c-section next week.
We would love your prayers since this is more complicated than we had previously hoped.
But we realize it was truly a blessing that I went in today. If anything, it made them aware of the situation before I go into active labor. After active labor, it would be more complicated to discover this and have to have an unplanned c-section. My family votes for flipping this baby and inducing asap, since we know he is big and we are already full term. But we want to do what is best for this little guy!
Another blessing is that my parents are headed to Richmond right now and will be here in an hour. I didn't want to keep asking our neighbors to babysit and it will help us relax and make the best decision for our son tomorrow. I feel a little guilty if they come and nothing happens, but they felt like it was best to come also! I love it when they are here....and so does Danny! It is like having a nanny!! They are wonderful with their grandson and always helpful around the house! So, I am off to put my feet up and watch the newest episode of The Office and Scrubs!

update: There is no baby yet, but what a blessing today. The newest Gaskill decide to flip himself around into the correct position when we got to the doctor. No need for a painful procedure or a c-section. Our doctor will do elective induction at 39 weeks, so if labor doesn't start back up(labor had possibly started) then we will have a baby in two weeks.
What a blessing! Thank you for your prayers!
But thank you for continued prayers since we are still an "unstable lie" and could have more complications when labor starts.
I had some Eggplant Parmesan tonight and even walked to and from the restaurant(it is less than a mile from our house and there are sidewalks!), so we will see if that gets things going again!
We will keep you posted!

Danny Playing Baseball

Video we took today of Danny playing baseball in the kitchen:

The Evolution of Picture Taking

As an aspiring photographer, I am often on the computer editing, organizing, and evaluating photos that I have taken. I see so much room for improvement and I desire to become better that this skill. But last night I was made very aware of the fact that there is an evolving process to the dynamics of a casual photographer. Of course, there is the area of my portfolio that I would hope would change for the better, but I am talking about something different. This about the subject of my photos changing through out the years. Let me explain.
Back in college, my parents gave me a wonderful present of a nice SLR Canon camera. I had never had more than just a point and click camera and I would say that this is the point when my love for picture taking really took off. Prior to my Canon, I had done some artsy pictures, but this opened up a whole new world for me. I am so thankful that my parents saw my potential and bought me a gift that represented what I could become. My early picture taking involved lots of nature shots and experimenting with the world around me on film. I also remember taking pictures when my friends would get together and I always tried to get as many with different people as I could. I wanted to be able to document the memory and have a collage of friends represented in my scrapbook. My friends were a special part of who I was and it was nice to have them forever represented in my memory books. My college scrapbooks are very full! Then came the dating and engagement stage of life. This point of my picture documentation was not too different from college, except that the group of friends spread out around the country and now I was more limited in who was in my photos. But this was also a great time to once again focus on natural shots and things in the world around me. The purchase of a new lense somewhere along the way also opened the door again to new possibilities.
After marriage, we were probably less active with friends and more comfortable staying at home together and enjoying our new stage of life. The subject of most of these photos became one of three things....places we visited, each other, or the dog. I even had an entire album develop at this time for our puppy. We love our doggies and it showed through our love for taking their pictures.
Then came human children. And here is where the biggest change happened. I guess it was a gradual evolution, but I laugh as I think about what I used to have in my albums. Friends, nature photos, cool shots of buildings and animals, our dog....but now we have multiple albums dedicated to our child. For almost a year, the albums on my computer were labeled based on Danny's stages of development. I have since started labeling based on seasons and places we visit, but would you believe that every photo is still of our son? I am not saying this with anything but joy over being able to capture the cute things that Danny does, but for goodness sakes, he monopolizes the album. On our smugmug website, the Spring 2008 http://gaskills.smugmug.com/gallery/4533119_gwrEp#272596802 album currently contains 66 photos of Danny. Scott is in a few, but I am sure it was by accident. He just "happened" to be in the cute shot of Danny I was taking. Pollack made an appearance in a few photos and there are a couple of some ducks we were watching. Pictures of mommy....zero. I don't want this to sound like complaining, because it is a general rule that I choose to be behind the camera, not in front of it. I don't really like most pictures of myself, but it would probably be a good idea to be in a few photos. I don't want to look back years from now and have to try and remember if I was even there. So, a new goal of mine is to make sure I get in a few shots. Maybe when this new baby is born, I will "accidentally" be in the picture, since I will be giving birth to the little munchkin. I think we are due for a family photo shoot after baby #2 is born.
So, parents, I am sure you have all experienced this evolution of photos in your life. And it is with complete joy and excitement that we take each photo of our child. Years from now, I will be so glad to have these pictures of Danny eating cookies and hitting golf balls. But things sure have changed. Aren't we blessed?

btw: The Puppy album on my computer hasn't been updated in a few years....poor Pollack. It is hard to become second in line behind the children. But he isn't complaining, because as mentioned in an earlier post, he loves the dropped food and new friend to throw the ball.

Just like Daddy

I am so blessed to be the mommy of a sweet little boy! And I am convinced that I have the greatest husband. I am so proud of him and he is the kind of man I want our children to become. So, I guess you can say that I was a happy momma to be taking pictures in the back yard this Easter Sunday. Scott decided to mow the grass real quick(therapy after 9 hours in a car) and Danny was his little helper.
I just love this photo and how it captures a little boy following in his Daddy's footsteps....
So sweet!
We had a great time in Atlanta for the Easter weekend. I know 9 hours may seem like a lot of travel, but there are so many cities along the way that it is not that bad of a drive. Of course, we had to stop more than Scott usually does when he has made this trip, but it was managable. And we all got giddy in the last hour of the ride with much giggling and talking about going home to "Short Pump"(with a pssht and a arm crank motion included....our way of saying short pump for the watering hole that this area was named after) We loved seeing family and it was fun to be an overnight guest, versus the usual rush in and rush out that happens when we live in the same city. I am working on editing our photos, but look for them in our smug mug site....http://gaskills.smugmug.com I will probably label them something like Easter in Atlanta. This is it for trips to ATL for Danny and I(until after #2 is born), but Scott will be headed there one more time for a friend's wedding.
Now we are just counting down the days until we meet our second son! He needs a name though! Please feel free to comment and leave suggestions after this post. We at least need a short list...Can't call him #2 forever!
Until next time...Happy Spring!

Long time no see...

It has been a long time since I last wrote on our blog. I have been so busy with lots of fun things. We had our first"dinner" party at our new house. I couldn't think of what else to call it, but it was so fun having our friends and their daughter over for dinner and dessert. It was a special dessert for Scott, since it involved his new torch and creme brulee. Yummy....and it is always fun to play with fire at the dinner table. Then, we had our first overnight guests with my parents in town for a few days. We put them to work....of course we had time to celebrate my dad's birthday and a trip to Maymont park....but most of the week was spent doing "odd" jobs. This is a family tradition. I remember my grandpa coming for a visit and many hours being spent doing projects that my dad had on his to do list. So, we happily carry this tradition on....great for us, since they ended up checking many things off our weekend list. And good for them to get to see our new house and know it well. In a few weeks, they will have to know their way around our house when they come to take care of Danny when baby #2 decides to come into world. We would love to have more guests....this house is a good house for having people stay over. So, friends and family, make plans to visit!
I had lots more to say and pictures to share, but the fact that we are stealing wireless means that our computer is horrendously slow....so no pics today(they were good ones of Danny too!) But more to come later.

Waffles and Syrup

I need to start my entry with a little information I feel is important. As I am finding out that more people read this than I thought(except you never leave comments...boo!) and that people may not be familiar with the world of blogging yet, I want to reassure you that I do try my best to be a good mommy. I really don't sit at the computer all day. In fact, it is so easy to blog that I am surprised at how many people are impressed with it. I just feel I need to make sure you know that I do play with my child, fix dinner, keep my house moderately clean, and all the other duties of being a stay-at-home mom(plus unpacking a house!). In fact, I am writing this entry after an hour long romp in the yard with Danny and Pollack and Danny is happily eating his snack. I think Pollack might be enjoying the "etzel" snack as well, since I just heard a pretzel drop, Pollack munching, and Danny giggling.

Now for the story. Some of you know I went on a women's retreat this weekend with our new church and had a fabulous time making new friends. It was my special treat after doing the single mom thing in Atlanta for two months and gave Danny and Daddy some much needed bonding time. They had a great weekend and even though Danny was excited to see his mommy Sunday afternoon, he wasn't ready to give up the full time attention from Daddy. In fact, he has started equally calling our names in the morning from his crib, which is really nice when I can legitimately lean over and tell Scott "He is calling for you, so I guess you have to get him!"

But like I said, they had a great weekend, except for one little mishap. We have these crazy locks on our doors that feel unlocked when you turn them from the inside, but are really locked on the outside. I have locked my self out a few times, but decided to hide a key. Sunday morning the key was not in it's place since we had let our babysitter use it and Scott had not had a chance to re-hide it. Just after putting Danny in his highchair with a plate of waffles and syrup, Scott headed out our laundry room door that goes into the garage to let Pollack in through the side garage door. As he closed the door, he knew he had made a mistake. Thirty minutes later, Scott was able to reenter our house with the help of a kind neighbor, his crowbar, and one very broken door. Fortunately we don't close our blinds in front of the breakfast table, so Scott was able to periodically check on Danny in his chair. Danny just waved at his Daddy and proceeded to make a sticky messy.

I am including a photo of the door after it's date with a crowbar and one anxious daddy.

So, as you can guess, we just bought a new door and new locks for the entire house. No boys weekend is completely without at least one chance to use a crow bar, tear down a door, and make a mess at a meal. And don't worry...there will be many more boys weekends! Scott and Danny had a blast together despite their crazy morning.

Where does he get it from?

So, we have a little talker on our hands. Anyone who has spent time with Danny knows that fact. Danny has always been a very verbal child and has amazed us with his skills. I used to laugh when the nurse at Danny's doctor would start the long list of developmental questions and ask us how many words Danny would say. She would give me some options such as 5 words or 10 words, because I believe she thought my pause meant I misunderstood the question. But the actual truth was I was trying to count words in my head really fast and realizing that it was way beyond being able to count. I think I just said "At least twenty?" with question in my voice, because I felt like I hadn't given the answer she expected.

Well, yesterday he amazed us again in the word of language development by READING! No really...I'm not kidding. At least that is what we thought had happened. And I am not talking about the kind of reading that he currently does at home when we read a book. I will start a sentence and he "remembers" the word from one of our previous fifty times reading that book and will finish the sentence for me. That is also impressive for an 18 month old, but not quite like our experience yesterday.

Here is what happened:

Danny and I were out doing our usual Monday grocery shopping and were blessed to have Scott be able to join us for lunch(one of the many perks of our new place...Scott is about 10 minutes away from our house!) So, being the frugal shopper that I am, Danny and I had already decided we wanted to take advantage of the $1.50 deals at Sam's Club for lunch. Mmmmm, I can taste the yummy hot dog now. We were in line debating what to get for lunch for Danny. Should we go for the pizza? No, pizza had been on the "boy's weekend" menu, so we continued to chat about the options. I was having the hot dog, as was Scott, but we are always worried about giving a hot dog to a small child. But after realizing that I could use a knife to cut it up into itty bitty portions, we opted for the hot dog special times three. I guess while Scott and I were conversing, Danny was working on his new reading skills, because all of a sudden he yelled out "ICEE". It took me a second to figure out what he was talking about(we call the teethers in the freezer icees also, but there weren't any in sight) Then I gazed past the cashier and noticed the large Icee machine behind the counter. OK, you are saying to yourself that I must have bought one on a previous visit, but I haven't. I have never bought him an Icee at Sams and his only similar experience might have been when we had a Costco membership and I used to get a fruit smoothie to share. Different machine, different name, and it has been at least 6-8 months since he has had a Costco fruit smoothie. I can assume that he read the words, right? How else would he know? I am still trying to figure that one out.

So, therefore, we can only conclude that he is a genius. Of course all parents say that about their kid, but this one is actually legit. He is reading at 18 months...Any Mensa members that happen upon this blog, please take note. You have a future member named Daniel.

He takes after his Daddy...


(No,we didn't get an Icee, but we got really excited about it though!)

Admendment to yesterday's blog

So, I was thinking this morning as I got ready to go out and run errands that I wasn't completely honest about our situation here in Richmond. I said that we don't have any "real" friends and that is not completely true. It is true that I don't really know anybody at our church yet(but the women's retreat this weekend should change that) and that we haven't really found a group of "friends" that we socialize with on a regular basis....but we do have some wonderful new friends. We have a couple at Scott's work that have a little girl around Danny's age that have already had us over for dinner twice(we can't wait to welcome them over to our home!) We are already brainstorming some fun summer activities to do together since she is a teacher and will have the summer off. Scott has great work friends that help make his day enjoyable. And I have felt a kindred connection to a few neighbors who are already helping me plan a backyard bible club for our community. It is nice to be able to speak the same language(and celebrate the same beliefs about God in many cases) as the people who live around you.....that was a disadvantage to our previous home. Not that our old home didn't produce many ministry opportunities, but my Romanian, Bosnian, Spanish, and Pakistani language skills are lacking to say the least.....English is about it for me, unfortunately. So, all that to say, God has blessed us in so many ways and I am going to be thankful despite circumstances.

Hello, hello, hello....is anybody in there?

I am stealing a line from Comfortably Numb/Pink Floyd for my title today in order to reinforce Scott's recent point that you shouldn't blog if you don't have anything to say. As a reader of multiple hilarious blogs on politics/sports/and sometimes the two together, Scott thinks that a pregnant stay at home mom can't have much to say, much less very many people reading her blog. I know this isn't a stab at my chosen proffession, b/c we are in complete agreement that my being at home is best for our children, but he knows that my experiences are limited to pretty much what happens in our home and what I read on the internet during the day.

So, there lies my intro to today's words.....it is amazing what you learn reading with your 18 month old.

Let me introduce you to one of our favorite books....Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson. For those of you who have not had the pleasure to read this wonderful book, let me tell you that it is pretty great as far as children's books go....it has a wonderful rhythm and a lesson that I took as my own teaching for the day today. Did you know that God can use children's books to speak to us? Of course, why would he be limited? He is amazing.....The story starts with telling us about a bear in the deep sleep stages of hibernation. Other wild animals find their way into his lair and start a party of sorts with a warm fire and many yummy goodies, including my dad's favorite line "so they pop white corn and they brew black tea" while "the bear snores on". This book has been a favorite of my parent's and Danny since I gave them a few of my "bear" books to read. One of the blessings of having a mommy that is a former Kindergarten teacher is the wealth of books as Danny's disposal. He even has his own library and reading couch in our upstairs landing of our new house....but I digress. So this bear sleeps as everyone parties until a "small pepper fleck" makes him wake up and give a huge "raaaaa-choooooo!!!!" At this point in the story the whole crowd(mouse, hare, badger, gopher, mole, wren, and raven) "freezes" and awaits the punishment of being caught in a bear's home uninvited. After much gnarling, snarling, roars, rumbles, and other such angry emotions, the bear begins to whimper and moan about there being a party and he slept through it....what a whiner! But the animals reassure him that they can still have fun and proceed to "pop more corn" and "brew more tea" as they "spin tall tales through the blustery night".

I have read this story at least 50 times and have never seen it quite like I did today. How many times am I like that bear? I whine about something that seems ridiculous when you see the big story. Not only is the bear failing to get prospective here, but it seems as if he is unaware of the fact that his ability to dwarf the other animals in size gives him the power to call the shots here. Do I have God's power at my fingertips and fail to see the blessing because I am caught up in the "little" circumstances? And how many times have I looked at my circumstances and only seen the negative and not the the blessing that lie within, such as having friends around you when you wake up. All he saw was the fact that he missed out....it took the little mouse's wise words to bring him back to reality and then be able to enjoy himself with the wealth of food and friends that surrounded him. In light of this revelation, I am determined to begin thanking God for my blessings more than I currently am doing....Danny and I started by thanking Him for our wonderful house(despite the circumstances of work to be done) and the wealth of great neighbors(despite the fact that we officially have no "real" friends yet). I want to see the positive in even the situations that seems difficult. And remembering that God is worthy of my praise even when the things around me are REALLY bad, which of course is not the case right now. In fact, other than those two mentioned negatives, life is pretty great for us here in Richmond. We know this is where God has called us to be for this stage in our life!
So, I go back to the beginning and say to Scott that I hope this post has qualified me as having "something to say". And for the five of you who read this blog, I hope this has been a blessing to you. And go check out Bear Snores On or another good children's book and look for the message that lies within. I wonder if Ms. Wilson ever intended this message when she penned this great classic!

Moved in and loving Richmond!

We are moved into our new house and are so excited to be in Richmond. We have been amazed by the kindness of our neighbors....we were only here two days and we already had two cakes, cupcakes, and cookies to enjoy. Fattening us up for sure! Danny seems to have adjusted well and as you can see he is ready for Mommy and Daddy to put together his big boy bed. He loves his train table and new Christmas gifts that Mommy put away after Christmas. Pollack loves his yard and is pretty much wiped out 90% of the time when he is in the house due to squirrel chasing and barking at the birds. He has a new friend behind us....our backyard backs up to a house with a yellow lab and they like to run along the fences and play together. We worked hard unpacking and are down to the organizing stage now. We had Nana here for a few days, which was a tremendous blessing. I think Danny thought Nana lived with us now and was a little confused after she left. He still comes home and hollers upstairs for her, but we just remind him that Max needs someone to take care of him. Well, time to go sort through some more stuff(we have too much stuff!) and play "hit ball"(golf) with Danny. More to come later!