Saturday, December 29, 2007
Thursday, December 27, 2007
He's here!
Brennan James Downer was born at 7:02pm today, December 27, 2007. He was 7 lbs. 15.5 oz. and 19 inches long – a big boy! Mother and baby are resting now – Mom in the recovery room and Brennan in the nursery where he’s being treated for a slight fever. We got to the hospital at 7:45am and were officially in labor from 10:30 until he came. Not bad, all things considered. There were a few bumps along the way, but it all turned out well in the end.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Skip to the end of this one if you're not into "bathroom" humor
You've been warned...
So I'm in the bathroom this morning getting ready to do my, uh, business, and I notice when I lift the toilet lid that there's a "floater" in there. (Eww! I hate it when the flush doesn't take!) No matter though, I'm sure it'll go down when I flush. So I sit down, do my thing, get up and suddenly see that it wasn't a "floater" in there at all but rather the biggest tree frog I've ever seen (about as big as my hand)! I shout out "oh my gosh!" (seriously... I didn't swear) but no one hears my exclamation. I drop the lid of the toilet right away while the options for "next course of action" start to scroll through my mind. I quickly find my options boiling down to: a) try to rescue the poor creature (somehow) or b) flush the frog back from whence he came. Option "b" seems slightly mean to me, but is far simpler, quicker and, well, less messy. So convenience trumps animal altruism and I push the lever down. I spend the next few moments contemplating the recent proximity of my backside to the amphibious invader and count my blessings that he didn't try to escape the bowl while I was over top of it. As the sound of whooshing water subsides and the tank above refills I decide to verify the success of Operation Froggie Flush. I only manage to get the lid up about four inches when I see that Froggie escaped his watery exit by jumping up onto the front inside edge of the seat, mere inches from where I'm holding the lid. Mercifully, he did not notice his opportune chance for total toilet exit and I dropped the lid with a bang once again. I made a quick assessment of the space between lid and seat and seat and bowl rim to determine (to my relief) that the fat frog wouldn't be getting out of his porcelain prison with the lid down. After that I decided to distract myself from the problem at hand by carrying on with the morning rituals ... putting in contacts, taming the hair, etc. ... in preparation for going out for morning errands with Naomi. Then I did what any self-respecting adult male/head of the house would do: I got my Dad (visiting for Christmas with my Mom) to take care of the frog while Naomi and I went to a doctor's appointment and then out for some day-after-Christmas shopping. Being less freaked out by slimy/jumpy creatures than I am, he had little trouble relocating the frog to the front yard (if by little trouble you mean he escaped several times, explored a good portion of the bathroom but eventually did get carried outside in my dad's cupped hands ... which he washed thoroughly afterward).
So thus ends the saga of the tree frog who took a wrong turn in the plumbing ... and thus begins a careful inspection of all toilets in the Downer household prior to each and every use.
...
Oh, by the way ... no baby yet. But we're on call for when a bed opens up at the hospital. As soon as the call comes we're off to get induced. So maybe tomorrow...
As we look ahead to a new life entering the world we are deeply saddened by another one exiting. Our friend Wendy Vallee (wife of Brent)'s father passed away early this morning in Savannah, GA. Even if you don't know them, would you please say a quick prayer for Brent and Wendy and her whole family as they grieve. Thanks.
Merry Christmas to all my readers, whoever/wherever you are. I hope you had a wonderful day celebrating with friends and family.
So I'm in the bathroom this morning getting ready to do my, uh, business, and I notice when I lift the toilet lid that there's a "floater" in there. (Eww! I hate it when the flush doesn't take!) No matter though, I'm sure it'll go down when I flush. So I sit down, do my thing, get up and suddenly see that it wasn't a "floater" in there at all but rather the biggest tree frog I've ever seen (about as big as my hand)! I shout out "oh my gosh!" (seriously... I didn't swear) but no one hears my exclamation. I drop the lid of the toilet right away while the options for "next course of action" start to scroll through my mind. I quickly find my options boiling down to: a) try to rescue the poor creature (somehow) or b) flush the frog back from whence he came. Option "b" seems slightly mean to me, but is far simpler, quicker and, well, less messy. So convenience trumps animal altruism and I push the lever down. I spend the next few moments contemplating the recent proximity of my backside to the amphibious invader and count my blessings that he didn't try to escape the bowl while I was over top of it. As the sound of whooshing water subsides and the tank above refills I decide to verify the success of Operation Froggie Flush. I only manage to get the lid up about four inches when I see that Froggie escaped his watery exit by jumping up onto the front inside edge of the seat, mere inches from where I'm holding the lid. Mercifully, he did not notice his opportune chance for total toilet exit and I dropped the lid with a bang once again. I made a quick assessment of the space between lid and seat and seat and bowl rim to determine (to my relief) that the fat frog wouldn't be getting out of his porcelain prison with the lid down. After that I decided to distract myself from the problem at hand by carrying on with the morning rituals ... putting in contacts, taming the hair, etc. ... in preparation for going out for morning errands with Naomi. Then I did what any self-respecting adult male/head of the house would do: I got my Dad (visiting for Christmas with my Mom) to take care of the frog while Naomi and I went to a doctor's appointment and then out for some day-after-Christmas shopping. Being less freaked out by slimy/jumpy creatures than I am, he had little trouble relocating the frog to the front yard (if by little trouble you mean he escaped several times, explored a good portion of the bathroom but eventually did get carried outside in my dad's cupped hands ... which he washed thoroughly afterward).
So thus ends the saga of the tree frog who took a wrong turn in the plumbing ... and thus begins a careful inspection of all toilets in the Downer household prior to each and every use.
...
Oh, by the way ... no baby yet. But we're on call for when a bed opens up at the hospital. As soon as the call comes we're off to get induced. So maybe tomorrow...
As we look ahead to a new life entering the world we are deeply saddened by another one exiting. Our friend Wendy Vallee (wife of Brent)'s father passed away early this morning in Savannah, GA. Even if you don't know them, would you please say a quick prayer for Brent and Wendy and her whole family as they grieve. Thanks.
Merry Christmas to all my readers, whoever/wherever you are. I hope you had a wonderful day celebrating with friends and family.
Monday, December 17, 2007
Any day now...
Baby D is nearly here ... and Momma is ready! The little alien is kicking and poking and squirming and the womb is just too small a space for all that movement. So we'd just as soon he come on out and get to know the world out here. Tomorrow we go in for our next doctor's appointment to see how things are progressing. Naomi had some contractions on Saturday, but virtually none yesterday. Today they've been sporadic, but starting to get longer. So he could come in the next day or two, or it could be several more days. Bottom line: you just never know. We're both done working ...for the immediate future (in my case) and several months (in Naomi's case), so we'll just hang out till he decides to grace us with his presence.
Here's one last pregnancy photo before we post baby pics...
After all these months I'm glad we've held onto his name and kept that a secret. Keeping gender a secret would've been hard and it's been fun to plan for a boy and not an "it", but it's nice to have something secret that people are really eager to find out about. The name really is important as it'll stay with him his whole life. We want it to mean something -- to both tell him something about where he comes from and cast a vision for where we hope he goes.
So here it is. You've waited long enough. His name is going to
Here's one last pregnancy photo before we post baby pics...
After all these months I'm glad we've held onto his name and kept that a secret. Keeping gender a secret would've been hard and it's been fun to plan for a boy and not an "it", but it's nice to have something secret that people are really eager to find out about. The name really is important as it'll stay with him his whole life. We want it to mean something -- to both tell him something about where he comes from and cast a vision for where we hope he goes.
So here it is. You've waited long enough. His name is going to
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