In Memory of Harry Stewart Randall

Vicki and I made this little movie of Harry's life as a memory for Monti and Shannan



One Year ago our family was blessed with the privilege of having my sister Shannan's baby boy Harry born into our family. He only stayed with us for 6 days.

In honor of Harry's birthday I am reposting his story and a few thoughts that I have about him:

During the early morning hours of April 19th, 2009 Harry was born by emergency cesarean section at Mountain Vista Medical Center. Due to complications surrounding his birth he was born oxygen deprived and he was flown by air evac to Phoenix Children’s Hospital.

Harry spent the next 5 days struggling for life. After numerous tests which finally indicated that Harry would not be staying with us for long, the doctors made the decision that it would be best to turn down the ventilator and see how Harry reacted. There was really no reaction. It was evident that his little body was just not going to be big enough to hold his amazing and brilliant spirit.

The morning of April 24th the plan was to remove the breathing tube and to let Harry rest from this work he’d been doing. The tube was removed at 1:45 p.m. Shannan and Monti were able to hold him without all of the apparatus and to sit as a family and just love and comfort each other. Some of us were privileged to be in that room as the veil was parted and Harry seemed to linger somewhere between here and eternity for about five hours. Those hours felt like minutes to us they passed so quickly. In short time Harry’s struggling breaths slowed and his body seemed to be even more cuddled into his mother as he truly began to leave it behind. He returned to Heavenly Father at about 5:30 p.m. on April 24th.

Harry is an extraordinary spirit who was born to extraordinary people. I believe he was so good and so valiant that he did not need to be tested in this life. He needed a body and because of the extraordinary efforts that his mommy and daddy made to provide one he was able to obtain one and to fulfill his brief mission here.

It has been hard this last year as we have missed having Harry here with us but I have taken comfort in knowing that thanks to the atonement of Jesus Christ we will be with Harry again someday. This is not wishful thinking on my part or just words that we say to comfort each other.

I know it.

I know it with absolute certainty.

I have a testimony that Jesus Christ lived and that He died for us and that He was resurrected.

I know that He lives.

I know that because of his sacrifice we can be resurrected as well and that through His Gospel we can live with our families again someday...that this life is only a probation and that Eternal Life is possible in and through the atonement of the Savior. I am so grateful for a Father in Heaven who provided us with a way to return to Him and for a loving Brother Jesus Christ who chose to be the Way.

Harry's brief probation here gave us a gift. He reminded us of what is essential. He reminded us what is most precious to us above anything else. We were so blessed to have him with us for 6 days and we love him and will miss him.

Disneyland

The past couple of years we have not taken our annual Disneyland vacation but at tax time this year we decided to get our priorities straight and visit the Happiest Place on Earth. :)

All kidding aside, we did actually decide that building some memories with our kids IS in fact a priority...not that you have to go to Disneyland to do that but it is a big help.

We happen to be what I refer to as "avid Disneyers"...we love everything about Disneyland. Perhaps it is just nostalgia on mine and Rob's part since we both have some really great memories of Disneyland but whatever it is; apparently we have imparted it to our kids because they saved every penny they got this year to go and came up with about $400 on their own to contribute! What troopers!

This year we were lucky enough to have our Auntie Beth (my best friend from childhood) and her sister Hannah along. Hannah is a lovely 13 year old girl so it was just AWEFUL for our boys to have to decide who HAD to ride with her on some of the rides. ;) (There may or may not have been a little romantic sibling rivalry on their parts...I'm just sayin'.)

We were also fortunate to have planned our vacation at the same time as our good friends Pat and Kristine John and their awesome clan of kiddos so we were able to hang out with them at the Magic Kingdom as well. So fun!!

This slideshow is a small representation of the fun we had there this year and the memories that we will always cherish...it was a blast!

20 weeks

We are going into our 20th week. Our baby girl is about the length of a banana and is curled up like that most of the time. She weighs about 1/2 a pound now. Yay baby! Her head is now finally a little more proportional to her body and she looks more like a baby than a little alien from now on.

As for me, I have reached the point that the "bump" can't really be hidden anymore and I am feeling the effects of that in my low back by late evening. I am typically a back sleeper but I have had to start side sleeping since that low back pain is waking me at night. That and my persistently full bladder are the first real pregnancy signs that I have felt and as annoying as they should be I actually find them novel and reassuring.

Found out today that anemia is still a bit of an issue for me. I guess I am not that surprised since I am still cold all the time except for my belly which is apparently getting all the blood flow because it is always warm. A more sentimental explanation is that my little princess is just radiating warmth from the inside out. :) You are welcome to think that is cheezy...I just think she is sweet and all I know is that I do feel warm carrying her inside of me.

A day in the life...

We had our 20 week prenatal appointment today. I actually thought this might be a good opportunity to show what a typical Midwifery appointment is like. This is something that I get a lot of questions about. I used to think it was an odd question but I guess I have come to realize that the whole concept of homebirth is so foreign to most people that it naturally elicits a certain curiosity.

I have become aware in conversations that there are many people who imagine that Midwifery care means that I meet with a Wiccan who is dressed in a broomstick skirt and Birkenstocks so that she can burn sage around me and rub herbs on my belly to bless my baby. This kind of notion always just makes me laugh but in an effort to dispel this and other crazy ideas about prenatal care from a Midwife I am posting these pictures and a real description of a typical appointment.

For those who find this odd...keep in mind that I have a lot of clients and friends whose curiosity about---all things birth related---is borderline obsessive. We call ourselves 'birth junkies' and this kind of thing fascinates us so if you aren't a birth junkie feel free to pass on this post. :)


This is a shot of the exterior of Nurturing Hearts Birth Services or NHBS. In my previous pregnancies I was fortunate to have the luxury of 'home visits' wherein my Midwife came to my home for prenatals. The home visit is becoming increasingly less common as the "valley" has spread making the travel time for Midwives ridiculous. It does make sense for us to come to them whenever possible and if I have to have an appointment that isn't in my home then at least it gets to be in the lovely home-like atmosphere of Nurturing Hearts.


This is the waiting room outside the offices of NHBS. My kids love it here and they are always welcomed graciously by Stephanie and Kate since the Midwifery Model of care sees pregnancy and birth as a family affair.

When Stephanie steps out to get us from the waiting room we move into her office where there is a little couch for me and a toy area for the kids. The beginning of the appointment starts with a casual chat on the couch about how I have been feeling in the last few weeks; do I have any concerns or ailments bothering me; questions I might have for my Midwives or questions they have for me about my nutrition and general health.

Today we went over my ultrasound results which was nice because I found out from Kate that the report showed that my placenta is anterior (this means at the front of my uterus) which likely explains why I have yet to feel the baby's movement. It puts a little 'pillow' between me and the moving baby so it finally makes a little sense and puts me at ease about the fact that this is the longest I have ever gone before feeling the baby move.


After we chat for a bit I move over to this little cot where Kate checks my blood pressure (as seen here---Notice Hayden's fascination with the process) and measures my fundal height (how far up the uterus has grown in the last month) and in this particular appointment also drew some more blood for another panel to check out my anemia---which; unfortunately; I am still battling.

Notice anything missing from this "exam table"? That's right...stirrups. That's because V.E.s are rarely performed prenatally by midwives. There is really no medical benefit to V. examinations at this point and most pregnant women find them---and the narrow, cold exam tables to which they are attached---very uncomfortable. Even when/if a V.E. is necessary such as when a GBS (Group B Strep) culture is performed there is really no benefit to the use of stirrups---that archaic contraption (torture device?) which was invented by a man and does not account for the comfort of a pregnant woman in any way shape or form.


After all that "boring" clinical stuff we get to listen to the baby's heartbeat with the doppler. (This actually has clinical benefits too but the kids and I just like to hear her heartbeat! This is Nate's favorite part of the appointment---he is on the left in this picture.)



Finally we wrap up the appointment with more questions and conversation. I never feel rushed and always enjoy our chats since I feel like all of my concerns are addressed and we are also building a great rapport which helps a lot when you consider that at the end of this ride I am going to be spending hours with these ladies in my home waiting for the baby to make her appearance. Pictured here are Stephanie Soderblum, my Midwife (in brown) and Kate Cunningham, her student (in green).



All in all the appointment takes about an hour and I can honestly say it is one of the best hours of my month. I look forward to it which is such an enormous juxtaposition to the dread I used to feel when I went for my OB appointments in Caleb's pregnancy. And THAT is a day in the life.

Pinewood Derby

Whew! It's all over. Okay...so it wasn't THAT bad. :) I just wanted to post a couple of pictures of the boys cars and explain them.



Nater wanted to make a wii remote for his "car" and this was the design we came up with. And yes...there is actually a 3-D "B" button on the bottom. Sorry it doesn't show here.



The boys love the Percy Jackson and the Olympians book series in which Percy Jackson finds out that he is a demi-God: Poseidon's child. Out of his love for these books, Caleb chose the trident as the main design for his car. Percy's sword in the book is called Riptide---hence the name on the side of his car.



Caleb placed 3rd overall for the Webelos age group and Nate won 1 of his heats. This last picture is of his car winning. If you look close you will see the nose of the other car on the left of the picture.

Building Stuff With My Boys

Okay so every year when Pinewood Derby rolls around I am filled with dread. Rob isn't really into stuff like cutting out cars on the jigsaw so it kind of falls to me to help the boys with their cars.

The funny thing is, I dread it because it stresses me out that I will mess up the block and have to start over but then we get going with it and it ends up being really fun. I like working with them and we have a lot of fun watching the cars---literally---take shape.

Yesterday we cut out Nater's and sanded it and in the evening the whole family went ot Home Depot to get some paint and another bit for the Dremel so we could work on Caleb's today. Nate got a Home Depot gift card for Christmas that he's been chomping at the bit to spend so he was able to buy his own paint with it there and he even wanted to buy the Dremel bit with his card as well. There is a reason we call him Nate the Tool Man.

Today we cut out Caleb's car and sanded it and we got the base paint on both of theirs. That means tomorrow we will lacquer them and add the wheels on. Geez...did I say it was fun? It may be fun but it is a lot of work. My neck is totally jacked up from bending over the Dremel.

I guess ulitimately it isn't really about building the cars but about building the memories. We have some good ones from this year. Here are a few pictures Vicki took of us.





Hey...check back for pictures of the finished results! The boys had some really cool ideas this year. (If you click on the first picture of Caleb and I to enlarge it and then look really close at his block you will get a sneak peak at his design.)

I shall call her...

The kids have decided that since we are not telling anyone the baby's name and they are tired of rotating other names; the baby needs an official one that we can call her around other people.

They decided on the name Helvetica. Ha ha! They are so funny. Nate came up with it actually but there was a quick vote taken and the 'Ayes' had it.

I said she needs a middle name and ever since watching the movie Mrs. Doubtfire I have always loved the name Euphegenia...Mrs. Doubfire herself...Effie for short. That name cracks me up. I don't know why. I'm weird like that.

So her official moniker until she is born (or until someone accidentally lets the cat out of the bag) is: Helvetica Euphegenia Halliday. I love it.