We Skyped with our parents + Uncle Justin and had Poppy dressed in the shirt. When a good moment arose, we held Poppy up to the camera so they could read her announcement!  We also did the same for Aunty Hannah in England. Needless to say there were some gasps and some yelps and some yippees.  It was hard to tell all our siblings face to face. So from there we made a few phone calls and had an instant chat with Uncle Simon.  My sister Sally is working in Zambia for a year so I phoned her cell phone on Skype and caught her going to sleep for the night.  She sounded soooo sleepy and I was worried she wouldn’t remember our conversation in the morning but I’m sure she did.

So we are excited to let everyone know that we’re having another baby!!  My due date is September 1st which makes me 11 weeks today.  When the baby is born, Poppy will be two years and two months old. We’re hoping that she is going to love being Mummy’s little helper with the new baby.

I took some photos of Poppy in the shirt I got for her and our good friend Rhea Hickok designed an announcement for us!

Unlike the Wright Brothers, however, Poppy only flies in style. She’s not subject to the normal baggage limits with her “assistance devices” (diaper bag, stroller, car seat, etc). Very sneaky, Pops! She doesn’t have to run to her terminal or gate. Instead she has a dedicated servant (Mummy) who pushes her briskly in her own personal carriage (stroller). She can bring as much food and drink on board as she likes. She boards first. She rides free (until age two). And when she needs the toilet, she doesn’t actually need a toilet, especially not the small, cramped ones people often wait for on a plane. She just goes whenever and wherever she wants and her above-mentioned servant cleans everything up. And she still gets the “complimentary” peanuts (which of course she’s not allowed to eat but that doesn’t matter because she’s content staring at the red packet). How about that action, Wright Brothers?! Boo yah.

Poppy’s personal photographer (Mummy again) snapped nearly 500 pictures, 285 of which have made the final cut and found a home in our photo gallery to document Miss Poppy’s journey to Pennsylvania and Ohio. After meeting her second cousins, great aunties and uncles, great grandma and great grandpa, and numerous passersby at Atlanta, RDU, and Pittsburgh airports, Poppy’s already asking when she can jet set again, possibly to England, Africa or Hawaii. Next year, darling!

Sorry for the long delay in finishing this story! Starting back at Nursing school has been my number one priority for the last 3 weeks, but I have a couple of days off this week so I’m getting stuff done!!

Poppy was 7 weeks old yesterday so my memory of the events that took place that day are a bit faded but I will hit on the main points and you can use your imagination for the rest, haha. Oh, and be sure to read parts one and two first if you haven’t read them already.

So back to the story…

We just hung out for most of the morning, napping, channel surfing and anticipating what was to come.  Drew ventured out to find the cafeteria and ended up having a slap-up breakfast of sausage and biscuits and gravy: lucky thing!  I can’t remember what time of day it was but at some point the news of Michael Jackson’s cardiac arrest hit the news and that kept us busy for a while.  My contractions were getting worse and worse as they kept increasing the Pitocin.  At various points the nurse would come in and reduce the pitocin and then come back later and increase it again.  I was trying so hard to put off the epidural but it came to the point where I was just exhausted from the pain and felt like I couldn’t keep breathing through them anymore.  So I told the nurse “it was time”.  Everything happened fairly quick.  The anesthesiologist was called, the nurse came in to prep me, they elevated the bed, I sat on the side of the bed and Drew sat in front of me so I could put my feet up on his knees.  He was told to brace me as I tried hard not to pull away from the needle going into my spine!  I don’t know whether it was just because I was already in a lot of pain or whether it was because I was just exhausted but this procedure was horrible!!!  Drew really had to brace me hard.  I lay back down and they put a Foley catheter in.  I started getting numb from the waist down and it was sooooo weird. I hated the way it made my legs feel like rubber.  It was freaky touching them and not feeling a thing.

At around 1-2is in the afternoon Drew’s parents and little brother arrived.  We chatted for a while before they went out to find some lunch.  The afternoon went quickly but I wasn’t progressing and I was getting more and more nervous that they were going to come in and say that they’d done everything they could but it was time to just take the baby out!  I’m unsure exactly what time it was but the doctor came in and said “lets break your waters”.  WATERS!!  That’s right I still have that card to play!  I had totally forgotten about the waters!  I was so relieved that we had something else to try.  So after the doctor broke my waters we waited some more. (I was still at 3cm, oh and probably by now it was confirmed that Michael Jackson had died).

Here is where the story gets amazing for me.  It turned 7pm and guess who walks through the door, nurse Mary, the nurse who I first saw in the morning when I first arrived.  She had been on call that night and seeing as the day had turned out to be really busy they had phoned her in!!  She said her husband wasn’t very happy about it but we were super super happy!  She came in so determined to get Poppy out naturally that I felt like she was my hero, like God had sent her in to rescue me.  She then did more for me in the space of a couple of hours than any of the 3 nurses who I had during that whole day had done for me.  She put me in to various positions with my legs up on the stirrups, 30 mins on my left side, then 30 mins on my right side.  Then the doctor came in and checked me again….9cm and roughly 90% effaced!!  We could not believe it, I had gone from 3-9, praise the Lord!!  The doctor said in about an hour I could start pushing. He told me what to do and how to count and I felt really ready to get this show on the road!  So after a bit Mary got the bed in the right position and we started!  Drew was at my left side and my mother in law was sitting back eagerly waiting to meet her first grandchild.

I really enjoyed this part of my labour.  I felt like everything was really organised and under control.  Mary would tell me when a contraction was imminent and then she’d tell me when to start pushing because obviously I couldn’t feel them although I did slightly feel some nearer the end.  Mary did most of the work for the doctor, she got Poppy’s head right to the point where if I pushed anymore Poppy might pop out.  I would be pushing and Mary would say “ok stop stop lets wait for the doctor!” lol.  So we paged the doctor and obviously seeing as it was so busy he took a little while to come.  Eventually he came in and we started again.  I pushed and pushed while Drew was encouraging me and doing what supportive husbands do best.  At one point I had to tell him to stop talking because he was distracting me!  Then we came to a bump in the road.

Skip this paragraph if you don’t want to be a bit grossed out! There was a piece of skin that was stopping Poppy from coming any further.  Every time I pushed she would come up against this piece of skin and then when I relaxed she would bounce back.  So the doctor had to snip a little bit to allow Poppy to pass through.

Once this was done Poppy was on her way!  I think it was at this point where everyone was going crazy at the sight of Poppy’s hair and so much of it!!  The doctor asked if I wanted to reach down and feel her head, I wasn’t sure at first but I did in the end.  This was where I lost it!  I could feel my baby!  She was finally here!  A few more pushes now and she was out.  Drew was in tears. My mother in law at this point had come to stand next to Drew and she was sobbing too, but the room was so peaceful. It was a beautiful atmosphere.  The umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck and she came out blue, but Drew said the doctor went swoop swoop swoop and she was free.  She was put on my tummy and we were all crying and overwhelmed with joy. Then she got carried over to the warmer where another nurse was waiting to clean her off a bit and wrap her up.  This was the time that we phoned Africa and got my Mum on the phone.

Drew held the phone up to Poppy so Mum could hear her crying, a very special moment for my Mum.   While Poppy was under the warmer the doctor was fixing me up.  I was bleeding a lot and he was vigorously massaging my uterus and getting the nurse to take over while he gave me stitches and gave me a medication to contract my uterus to stop the bleeding.  I later found out that my EBL (estimated blood loss) was 750ml which the doc said was more than they usually see.  Thankfully they got the bleeding under control and nothing else came of it.

Poppy was then put it my arms and I met my little girl for the first time.  I was exhausted and in a daze but the moment was magical.  Drew’s Dad and brother came in and Poppy met everyone.  Lots of photos were taken and it was a special time for everyone.  Then a nurse came in and we watched Poppy get her first bath.  A little while after that I got into a wheel chair and we went down to the post-partum unit.

Here ends my labour story.   As I write this I can’t help but want to cry because it was such an amazing day, from the moment I realised I was bleeding in the beginning to the moment she was put in my arms all bundled up.  I look back at it fondly and love remembering how our angel came into the world. – I love you, Poppy.

You may remember me mentioning that my parents were in the process of moving to Greensburg, Pennsylvania. Well, last week the movers came and packed ‘em up and they made the move. Everything was going smoothly until the wee hours of their first night in their new house. My mom emailed the story:

There was just one minor glitch the first night we slept here–two state troopers showed up and banged on the front door at 2:30 am. A neighbor, not knowing the house had been sold, saw a light on, got concerned and called them.  My first thought was that the tractor trailer containing all our worldly possessions had crashed and burned on the interstate!! But alas, everything was fine–the truck showed up bright and early that morning and by 6 pm everything was unloaded. The movers even unpacked quite a bit and took the boxes with them. It was great!

That’s what I love about my mom: she can go from nearly being arrested to being tickled that the movers took the empty boxes with them! Luckily, they were not arrested nor did they have a bunch of empty boxes to trip over when coming down the stairs at 2:30am. But that was only the first night so who knows what kinds of mischief they’ve been up to since then!

(Just to clarify: no Mausts were actually arrested…that my mom told me of.)

The Mausts to Pennsylvania

It’s an odd thing to have both our parents moving at the same time and both farther from us. My parents are migrating north to Pennsylvania where my dad has taken a new and exciting job as a land agent for a gas company. I think they’re really looking forward to the move; well, maybe not the actual move, but the being in a new locale will be a refreshing change. They’re hoping to move over Thanksgiving or Christmas.

The Hayes’s to Namibia

Emily’s parents are also moving as of today, September 5th. They’re migrating south to Namibia where Georgina will serve with Voluntary Service Overseas as a volunteer and will be working with visually and hearing impaired children in Rundu in the north of Namibia. See Georgina’s Got No Hair for more info. Once they’re on the ground, we can expect to find regular updates on Nigel and Georgina’s blog at Hayestack.co.uk.

Pictures and Videos

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As I mentioned above, I have added two new videos to the videos page. Further, I have added a bunch of new pictures, some from our weekend with my parents in Beckley and some from our lovely friend Fontaine’s fiesta mexicana which she kindly hosted at her house. Here’s a foretaste, but as always, the money’s in the photo gallery.

I guess now that our family’s have abandoned us in both northerly and southerly directions, we’ll need people to come visit us in Wake Forest. You might have to entertain yourselves because school’s in full force right now, but, hey, come on down and we’ll work something out. Maybe you can cook and clean for us, eh?

Furthermore, there are new videos to be watched. Favorite amongst the many? Mine is definitely the one entitled “Punch Farsh.” Tomorrow, filming will start of the highly requested Tour of McDowell. It’s not a military campaign. It’s the tentative name of our forthcoming video release featuring never before seen footage of our new residence, 69 McDowell Drive. Stay tuned.

• June 2nd – Sir Nigel D. Hayes (emily’s dad) celebrates his 56th birthday!
• June 4th – Justin (drew’s little brother) turns 12!
• June 4th – We celebrate our first anniversary!
• June 14th – Simon A. Hayes turns a young-looking 31!
• June 19th – Duane W. Maust (drew’s dad) celebrates his 49th birthday!
• June 39th – International Celebrate Hannah Polly, Polly Hannah Day

If you see any of these mirthful birthful people around, be sure to wish them a happy day!