Caution: May Contain Nuts

Olivia, at 6 weeks old, sleeps 'well' at night and is generally a cheerful little monkey

I know this post is looooooooooooong overdue. As you probably have guessed, I haven’t had any free time lately because I’ve been enjoying extra-long naps and leisurely baths…. haha. NOT.

Olivia made her early arrival on Saturday, January 21st at 615am, weighing 7lbs. I later commented to Timothy that her birth was much less dramatic than Frederick’s. He responded with a resounding, “Maybe for YOU!” and took another much deserved nap. You see, Olivia’s early arrival- two weeks early- made for a rather LONG day for her dear Daddy.

Throughout January Tim tried to pull together a supply trip to South Africa. Because of circumstances beyond our control, his trip was pushed to what we felt was the last possible opportunity before he needed to be close to home for the arrival of Baby. After a stressful but successful trip to South Africa, Timothy returned to Zambia on January 20th. His plane arrived at noon, he spent the afternoon at the immigration office in Lusaka, and made the two hour high-stress drive home to Kabwe, arriving around 5pm.

I’d had a fairly pleasant day (all things considered). I took the kids to play with some friends earlier in the day. On the way home I was going a leeeeeeeeetle too fast down our VERY bumpy, be-potholed road. I hit one of the ruts pretty hard (don’t tell Tim) and then felt that oh so familiar twinge… ok more like a kick from a mule, in my lower back. I slammed on the brakes, pulled to the side of the road, and thought to myself, “That was totally a fluke.” (Tim is convinced that labor hormones take away my ability to think reasonably.) Eventually I got the kids down to nap and after an unsuccessful pilates attempt to stop the contractions I decided to take a nap. No luck there. The contractions woke me up every time (that’s supposed to be a sign, right? Well remember Tim’s theory about my brain and labor!) I decided starting dinner would distract my mind enough to make the “false labor” disappear. Tim’s birthday had been a few days before, while he was in South Africa, and I had a few finishing touches for his cake.

Tim walked in the door around 5. I had been tracking my contractions since 4 and was starting to believe ‘this might be it’ as I saw that the contractions were not only regular, but less than 7 minutes apart. Not wanting to distract from Tim’s birthday, I let the kids give him his presents and welcome him home. Once he had settled down I put on my best optimistic-face and announced, “Well, now that you’re home, I should probably tell you that I don’t think it’s false labor.” His face could have cracked concrete, maybe even warped titanium. After a long, hard stare he just turned around and walked outside. He returned half a minute later and demanded, “you’re kidding, right?!” The fact that I had the far-off look of pain-denial was enough to make him realize I was contracting right then and there. His words were not of the uplifting sort.

He began pacing our 4 foot living room (that’s about 1 1/3 steps each way for a guy his size) wavering between throwing me in the back of the truck and flooring it to the hospital or setting up our bedroom for delivery. However, still unconvinced that I could actually be lucky enough to get out of 2-4 more weeks of being pregnant, I told him no way was I leaving before his birthday party! He tried to convince me that time was of the essence, even enlisted the help of all the friends who were arriving for our neighbor’s weekly cook out. I was immovable. The thought of making that two hour drive and not coming home with a baby was too embarrassing to contemplate. Besides, we had birthday steaks and a cake!

to be continued… (Olivia’s hungry!)

Monica and Frederick LOVE their new baby sister