1. Hazel
2. Chicken Wings
3. Me

I’ve tried to move up in the rankings (since I used to be number two before Hazel was born) but it’s really a lost cause.  At the top of Yenari’s list for chicken wings are Korean chicken wings.  While there are good Korean wing joints near us in Santa Clara, and other places Yenari has chowed down on in LA and New York, for the real deal you’ve got to get your Korean chicken wings in Korea.  So Yenari was pretty pumped about eating some chicken wings on our trip.

After a dinner one night with some family friends, Yenari asked her brother to pickup some chicken wings for her at one of the top spots in Seoul, Kyochon Chicken.  Despite having eaten a full dinner already, Yenari ate almost the whole box of chicken wings but couldn’t quite finish them off.  Fully satisfied with her midnight snack of chicken wings Yenari passed out for the night.

The next morning she spotted the left over chicken on the table.  Normally Yenari is very conscious of germs and proper food handling, but unfortunately her love of chicken wings blinded her and she ate the remaining chicken wings.  Before doing this she asked her mom if it was ok, and she said yes.  I caught her midway through the feast and asked her if it was a good idea to eat chicken that had been sitting out all night and she said ‘my mom said its ok’.  Not one to get in the way of Yenari’s love of chicken (kind of like stealing food from a hungry dog) I let it go and she finished off the food.

She was doing ok for a while, but had a bit of a stomach ache around lunch time….not enough to prevent her from eating beef soup at lunch, but enough to slow her down a bit.  We took a big family nap (me, Yenari, and Hazel) for a couple hours after lunch and upon waking up Yenari felt fairly awful.  After a bit she threw up and was definitely not feeling great.  Yenari’s mom wanted her to go to the hospital/doctor, but Yenari was refusing to go, saying that it was a stomach thing and there isn’t really anything the doctors can do about it – only time and fluids really help.

It was approaching dinner time, and we already had plans to have dinner with the whole family – Yenari’s dad was leaving work early and her brother was driving the hour from where he lives to meet us at a bulgogi restaurant.  Yenari’s parents decided that we should go without her, but right as we were leaving Yenari threw up again and Yenari’s mom decided to stay at home with Yenari and Hazel.  I offered to stay at home instead, but they insisted that I go out to dinner with Yenari’s father and brother.

So we went to eat and were enjoying our meal while Yenari was at home with her mom and Hazel.  About halfway through the meal Yenari’s dad got a call from Yenari’s mom and then said he was going home because they were bringing Yenari to the hospital and they needed help with Hazel, but that I should finish eating with Yenari’s brother and that everything was fine.  I assumed, from what Yenari’s father said, that Yenari’s mom had convinced her to go to the doctor, but the real story was somewhat different…

At home, Yenari started feeling worse and worse.  She had puked a number of times and she had been breastfeeding Hazel all day, so she was very dehydrated.  Yenari’s mom was playing with Hazel in her room so Yenari went to be with them in her mothers room.  She was lying there, zoned out, sipping on water…when she had to make another trip to the bathroom and basically was in a passed out / delusional state….she was sweating, having palpitations, was feeling lightheaded,  had numbness and tingling in her arms and legs, and blurred vision.  She asked her mom for water, but she didn’t want to let her drink it in the bathroom because that isn’t sanitary (but eating unrefrigerated chicken is?).

Finally Yenari asked her mom to call the Korean equivalent of 911 (which is 119 in Korea) – Yenari’s mom called Yenari’s dad first (the call I heard but couldn’t understand due to a slight issue of not understanding Korean) who said yes, call 911.  An ambulance came, the paramedics came into the apartment and brought her out on a gurney (after asking whether she was just drunk), and Yenari, her mom, and Hazel were driven away in the back of an ambulance, sirens ablast.

When Yenari’s brother and I finally finished the multi-course meal that Yenari’s father had ordered (and commanded us to finish) we started over to the hospital, but a few minutes away from getting there Yenari’s dad called and asked us to go back to the apartment and pickup Yenari’s glasses which she had left at home – it seemed odd that Yenari would have left them, but I didn’t think too much of it.  We drove the 10 minutes back home and another 15 back to the hospital….which was a real hospital, something I totally wasn’t expecting.  I was expecting something like urgent care, but this was a major hospital and we were heading into the emergency room.

Yenari’s father saw us coming in and directed us over to Yenari, lying in bed with an IV in her arm.  I was shocked as I had no idea she was actually that sick and that no one had told me!  She was obviously pissed off that I was coming so much later and asked very sarcastically if I had enjoyed my dinner!  She was actually feeling a lot better by then since she had been given some fluids.  The dangerous part was over, but they still attached an EKG and tested her heart – since Yenari is a nurse in a cardiac unit she was more than interested in interrogating all of the doctors and nurses on the results.  Here’s the happy chicken wing victim in the hospital:

Yenari in the hospital after the chicken wing incident

Yenari’s mom wouldn’t admit that the chicken wings were the cause and was looking for other potential causes, but we all knew that the chicken wings were to blame.  After her final tests were over we all headed home and Yenari finished off the evening drinking Powerade, Pocari Sweat (a Korean drink like Powerade), and water.  The next day Yenari was feeling much better and by dinner time was eating kimchi and pickled crab.

As a result of this two things happened:

1. Yenari’s mom started putting everything in the fridge – even cookies made it in there, and soon the fridge was just about overflowing
2. Yenari doesn’t like chicken wings anymore

So, on the positive side of things I’m back to #2 on Yenari’s list.  With chicken wings out of the way I’m right behind Hazel on the things Yenari loves.  I’m sure chicken wings will make their return on the list, but for now I’m enjoying my spot on the list!

We had to keep a close watch on her since her idea of fun was to attempt leaping out of the bassinet to play with us. Most of the time she spent on our laps while we tried to entertain her while watching movies. Yenari plopped Hazel in front of the TV and put the headset on her to see how she would react and she was transfixed – we’d never seen her act that way in front of the TV. It was a Korean cartoon and Hazel shrieked out in excitement whenever the shark came on the screen.

Once we made our way to Seoul and then through immigration, baggage claim, and customs we were greeted by Yenari’s very excited parents. Yenari’s mom was with us in California for the first four weeks of Hazel’s life, but hadn’t seen her since…and Yenari’s father had met her yet. Yenari’s father was a little worried because Hazel is very fearful of strangers (and particularly men), but she only gave him a healthy level of caution and didn’t freak out too much. Here’s their first meeting in the airport:

Since it was about dinner time, we went straight to a restaurant and met up for dinner with Yenari’s brother who was also meeting Hazel for the first time. Yenari’s dad continued his courtship of Hazel – trying to feed her and carry her around the restaurant…this courtship was successful at times and cry-inducing at others, but it was a start. Yenari’s father is a very energetic guy and this energy scared Hazel off for the first day or so, but Yenari gave him some advice to start slow and build up to his full energy level over time as she begins to trust him. Now, after a couple days, Hazel seems to be quite comfortable with him and sits happily on his lap and lets him carry her around. Here’s her father feeding Hazel at that first dinner:

After dinner we headed back to Yenari’s parents house and Yenari’s brother picked up Yenari’s grandmother to meet Hazel. Here she was kind of assaulted by love and affection…something that was a bit overwhelming for Hazel and resulting in a bit of a meltdown. We went to bed soon after and slept well, though Hazel woke up at an early 5am and turned the scenario around for Yenari’s parents by showing them what it feels like to try to play when you’re tired!

A little later in the morning we went with Yenari’s mom to bring Yenari to the salon – Yenari likes getting her hair cut a lot more in Korea than the US because they understand Korean hair better here. Yenari had recently trimmed Hazel’s bangs very unsuccessfully and Yenari’s hair dresser saw it and couldn’t resist giving Hazel a bit more of a trim to straighten things out. Here she is with Yenari’s friend Eulji who joined us at the salon:

While this was happening Yenari was busy being attacked by a ceiling-dwelling-robotic-octopus…or at least that’s what it appeared to be:

Later that afternoon we went over to Yenari’s Doyoung house – Doyoung is Yenari’s friend from middle school and high school and she and her husband have an almost 2 year old boy who we were meeting for the first time:

By this time I was somewhat zonked from the jet lag, but everyone happily chatted while I passed out on the couch. I’m pretty much caught up now, but the first two days were a bit rough.

Yenari’s mom and brother picked us up from Doyoung’s house and we went to pick up her father who had been on a day trip for business to Sunchun. While in Sunchun, Yenari’s father called to a restaurant called to a restaurant to get the famous Gwanyang Bulgogi – he didn’t have enough time to go to the restaurant, so he asked the owner to bring a cooler full of bulgogi (an order for 15 people!) to the bus station. Yenari’s dad didn’t want to cook it at home, so he called a BBQ restaurant where you cook at the table and asked if we could bring our own beef to cook – kind of bizarre, but they were okay with it. The bulgogi was incredible, nothing like the bulgogi we get in Santa Clara, LA, or anywhere else in the US. We also order some beef sashimi – raw beef marinated in pear, garlic, onions, sesame oil, and green onions. Here’s the family:

and here’s Hazel passed out – I wasn’t alone is suffering from jet lag:

Eventually we made it through almost all of the food…so the 5 of us ate about 13 servings of the bulgogi plus 2 orders of the beef sashimi. This was definitely some serious eating…the rest of the evening is a blur due to the beef intoxication!

The big event for Sunday was Yenari’s cousin Youngjoon’s wedding. We lucked out in having a family wedding while we were here – it gave us a chance to see lots of extended family without having to drive all of Seoul and the surrounding area to meet people. The wedding was also a new experience for most of us because it was a Korean traditional wedding – something that is very rare – both Yenari and her mother had never been to one in person. Yenari’s grandmother came over before the wedding and played with Hazel – she was in a much better mood this time and had a blast with her great grandmother:

The wedding was at Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul and was held outdoors. Here are some photos of the ceremony:

Hazel was well behaved during the ceremony and didn’t scream out or anything like that. After the wedding she was mobbed by extended family members who wanted to meet her, hold her, and snap pictures of her. We saw Yenari’s grandfather (who we had seen recently in California) and I met Yenari’s aunt Jihae and her uncle Sungtae – both of whom I hadn’t met – now I’ve met all of Yenari’s mother’s siblings. The reception was very different from that of an American wedding – it was a no nonsense eat your food and get out of there situation – no dancing, music, or anything like that. We enjoyed our meal and then headed home.

We finished off the eating for the day by treating Yenari’s parents, brother, and grandmother to a dinner at a Chinese restaurant. I lost count after a while, but Yenari just counted out at least 7 courses. So, this was definitely a continuation of the massive food quantities we seen at just about every meal. I bet I’ll gain around 10 pounds if this eating style continues. Aside from the food, my favorite thing about this restaurant was that the brick wall was painted with a series of greater that life size paintings of Bruce Lee! No Bruce Lee photo here, but one of Yenari and her mom kissing Hazel instead:

When we got home to Yenari’s parents house they brought out Hazel’s early first birthday present, a beautiful wooden block house from Soopsori, a Korean company that makes toys entirely out of wood…and entirely out of wood it is – even the screws and screw driver used to assemble the house are made of wood. Everyone was busy playing with the the little animals, appliances, and the house:

A great present that we can’t wait to get home with us!

We’ve had a great time so far in Korea and are really looking forward to the rest of our time here. This post is way too long already so I’ll hold off on covering today’s events, but will do my best to keep this up to date….

I’m a couple days late, but Hazel is now 7 months old.  Its hard to pinpoint individual things, but it seems like Hazel has made some major transformations in the last month.  Physically the smallest little changes are two teeth that are making their way up in the bottom middle of her mouth.  She’s seems to be somewhat annoyed by it, but it doesn’t seem to be bothering her too much – just a little extra drooling and gnawing on anything she can get her hands on.

She hasn’t started crawling yet, but she can spin around, roll, and scoot backwards.  She can also sit up now without support…though we keeping our hands close by to catch her from falling when she sees something interesting that she wants to lean out for.  She has a lot more fun playing now – studying all the little gadgets on her exersaucer, throwing toys onto the ground and waiting for us to pick them up, and playing peek-a-boo.  More noises and laughing and baby gibberish has come as well and is pretty fun to listen to – Yenari responds to just about any noise Hazel makes with the response ‘did she just say mommy?’.  No mommy yet, but I’m sure its on the way sometime soon.

She’s been doing a better job eating both solids and from the bottle…though she’s still a far way from eating full meals while I’m watching her.  Her favorite solids are carrots, squash, and prunes.  mmmm.  Luckily her digestive system has somewhat caught on to the solid foods, though she’s not quite regular yet.  The other funny thing is that she’s become obsessed with trying to drink water from a cup – she doesn’t quite know what the goal is, but she starts chewing at the edge of the cup and tilting it back.  When the water actually makes it to her mouth it surprises her and either rolls down her chin, causes her to cough, or miraculously gets swallowed properly.  We’ll have to get a video of it, it’s pretty funny.  Here is a photo of her messily eating some food, totally zoned out (she doesn’t normally look this ridiculous while eating):

We had a good and relaxed Christmas.  Yenari had to work Christmas Eve but had a remarkable 4 days off in a row starting on Christmas.  Here’s Hazel with some of her Christmas stash:

We think she enjoyed playing with the wrapping paper and ribbons more than the actual toys, but she’s grown to like them too.  She’s very entertained by her ‘Pal Violet’ (no not that Violet)…the first baby toy that has a USB jack to plug into a computer.  We got to pick her name, favorite food, color, and animal….we are endlessly entertained by doggie Violet mispronouncing bibimbap as her favorite food.  She liked the other presents we got too – here she is trying to eat a bacon wallet my mom got for me:

I think we’ll end it on that note, because what can really top eating a wallet made of (fake) bacon.  Well, maybe a couple more photos:

Wowzers, a half year goes fast.  The Shins sing that “the years have seemed short but the days go slowly by” – for my last half year I’d say that the minutes have gone slowly but the days are just flying by.  The days have gone fast enough that I’ve neglected to write anything here since the 5 month milestone and I’m even a few days late on the 6 month mark which Hazel hit either Monday or Tuesday….since she was born on the 31st I’m not sure whether she should get credit for 6 months on 11/30 or 12/1.

Hazel has changed a lot in the last month, but it is hard to point to any single thing.  She hasn’t learned too many new tricks, but she’s improved quite a bit in the old ones.  She’s a lot more focused, she’s able to entertain herself with her toys, and she’s gotten a lot stronger.  Her eating habits have changed quite a bit as well as she’s caught on to eating the solid foods.  The solid foods have been great for me because it means she actually eats when I’m taking care of her while Yenari is working.

The solids have had a downside though…the switch from breastmilk only to rice cereal, oatmeal cereal, veggies, and fruits has brought her digestive system to a screeching halt, going from many dirty diapers a day to none for many days.  It got bad enough that we even brought her into the doctor because she hadn’t gone in about 5 days!  Her doctor checked her out and said that she didn’t seem to backed up, but that we she start her on some prune juice or prune solid food and proceed on to child suppositories if that didn’t work.  She actually seemed to like the prune baby food (gross!) but it didn’t quite ‘clear the road’, so the suppositories were the answer after she hit the 8 day mark…and once we went for it the action started up in seconds!  She still hasn’t quite figured out pooping with solid food, so hopefully we’ll be seeing more stinky diapers soon.

In the last few weeks we’ve been busy taking Hazel on many social engagements.  Hazel and I had a great time and Jeff and Sarah’s place for Thanksgiving – Yenari was working, but everyone there was really helpful in playing with Hazel.  Luckily I’ve gotten quite good at eating while holding Hazel, so I was able to enjoy an incredibly tasty meal! Here’s the little lady all dressed up in her Thanksgiving outfit before we headed to Jeff and Sarah’s house:

That same weekend we stopped by to see Rebecca, Troy, and Ewan at there house.  Rebecca took some great photos of Hazel and Ewan playing together – this was definitely the most interaction Hazel has had with another baby.  Hazel was busy grabbing Ewans hand, checking him out, and wondering how a 4 month old could be bigger than her!  Ewan was playing hard to get, or maybe just a little preoccupied with trying to jam his whole hand into his mouth! Here are the two lovebirds:

This Monday we took Hazel to the doctor for her checkup.  She is moving right along in the growth department, measuring in at the 90th percentile for height and head circumference and the 75th percentile for weight.  She was only at the 50th percentile for head circumference at her four month checkup, so her head has done some serious expanding!  Though they’ve made mistakes in measuring her head many times, so maybe her head didn’t get so much bigger.  She got a bunch of shots which she really didn’t like, but otherwise survived the visit without too much trouble.

And to finish it off, a couple more photos from the last month:

Saturday was also, of course, Halloween.  Here’s the babe in her bunny costume:

Doesn’t she look so big?!?! Hazel did remarkably well with her costume and never got pissy or angry about it.  She laughed big time when she first saw herself in the mirror wearing it.  She was in and out of the costume so many times: we had a couple Skype sessions with both the grandmas, Yenari brought her into my office wearing the costume, trick or treating at Yenari’s former landlady’s house, Halloween dinner with Yenari’s aunt and uncle, and a birthday party for one of Yenari’s coworkers’ kid.

On the eating front, she still hasn’t fully caught on to bottle feeding.  She doesn’t scream when she sees the bottle, but she seems to prefer to hold out until Yenari gets home or at least until she’s really hungry.  We did start the slow path down the solid food front – we’re still on rice cereal…she seems to enjoy it but isn’t eating too much of it yet.  Maybe we should try carrots next – she couldn’t keep the toy carrot that came with her Halloween costume.

She’s moving around a lot more though hasn’t fully caught on to rolling yet.  She did roll over from her tummy to her back once on the floor, but just once.  She’s done it on the bed several times, but that’s a bit easier.  She’s gotten strong enough that she can sit really well, prop herself up, and is able to hang out in her highchair now – here she is:

In sad news, it seems that her mohawk has subsided and no longer stands on end…her hair is still heavily focused right down the middle so she’s got a mohawk vibe, but its not the same thing.  We’ll have to break out the hair gel and hair spray soon to keep the mohawk alive.

And lastly, some photos of my girls playing together…these are from about two weeks ago…

Here she is holding one of her favorite toys:

She’s still giving us (at least me and the nanny) trouble in the bottle feeding department, but she does cave in and eat from the bottle when she’s really hungry, but still not nearly as much as she should be eating.  We’ve also caved in a few times by bringing Hazel to the hospital to meet Yenari on her dinner break for a quick feed, though we’re trying not to make these emergency feeding sessions a regular affair.

Today Hazel had her 4 month checkup.  We were especially eager to see how she was doing on the growth front since she obviously hasn’t been eating as well this past months due to her battle with the bottle.  The growth charts and the doctor’s comments comforted us – she’s growing just fine: she’s still at the 75th percentile for weight (14 lbs, 14 ounces), around the 97th percentile for height (26 inches), and the 50th percentile for head circumference.  On this visit to the doctor Hazel wasn’t the only one facing down the needle – the whole family got shots…Hazel got her next round of vaccinations and Yenari and I got flu shots…so while we don’t have matching clothes we were wearing matching band-aids today.

Here’s another shot of her from almost 2 weeks ago:

Lastly, congratulations to new parents Joe and Sophia, who welcomed their beautiful baby girl Vera Elizabeth Lampe about a week ago – welcome to the club!

So…I went from spending just about no time home alone with Hazel a few weeks ago to spending about 50 hours alone with her over the past week and a half!  It has been an…interesting transition and is definitely taking some getting used to for all of us.

For the most part things have been going really well in my alone time with Hazel.  I’ve been going on long walks with her through the neighborhood – checking out all the parks, exploring the small streets I’ve never been on before, and seeing things I never noticed in the neighborhood when life moved at a faster pace.  I’m not looking forward to the end of daylight savings time and the shortening of the daylight hours – soon enough it will be dark by the time I get home, so the walks will probably be shorter and less entertaining.

My favorite thing though is making her laugh.  Over the past few weeks she’s transitioned from occasional little smiles, to big smiles, to the occasional laugh, and now to all out cracking up.  I just about gave myself whiplash today shaking my head around while she watched me in the mirror, laughing her chubby cheeks off!

It’s not all laughs though.  Hazel still hasn’t caught on to eating from a bottle – she’s eating only a few ounces a day while Yenari is at work and those ounces are painful painful attempts filled with crying and frustration.  She definitely knows how to eat from the bottle – she’s done it for short periods of time successfully – it just seems that she doesn’t want to do it!  So, for now I’m keeping up on trying to feed her, but I’m not trying to push it much – if she fights it I give it a break and try twenty minutes later.  As long as I don’t fight with her on eating she seems perfectly happy and well behaved.  When Yenari finally gets home Hazel goes into eating overdrive and catches up on 10 hours of eating.  Apparently lots of breastfed babies take a few weeks to adjusting to eating from a bottle in daycare, so hopefully we’ll have a better story to tell in a few weeks.

One area she has been very cooperative in is sleep – she’s been able to get to sleep around 9 or 9:30 each night, letting me wind down after a long day of work and then baby herding.  I’ve even led a number of calls for work while she’s been sleeping – though I have warned my colleagues that I may have to abruptly end the calls to soothe the crying babe.

So…things haven’t been perfect by any means, but at the same time they haven’t been a complete disaster.  Hazel and I have been able to spend a lot of time together and as a result I’m getting to know her and to understand her better.  Now if we can just take care of this ‘not eating anything’ issue, all we’ll have left is the fun and games!

Yenari did, however, dress Hazel up in her fanciest princess dress:

In addition to this being a celebration of her age, today also marked the last day of Yenari’s time off of work.  Tomorrow Yenari heads back to work at her full schedule of 4 days a week at the hospital.  She works the evening shift from around 2:30-11:30pm, so her going back to work will also mean some big changes for me!  On the weekdays we’re going to have a nanny taking care of Hazel until six and then I’ll take over until around midnight when Yenari gets home – scary!

The major part of the preparation over the past several days has been trying to get Hazel used to eating from a bottle.  Shouldn’t be too hard right?  How hard could it be for a baby to eat from a bottle?  Ummm….apparently quite hard!  This has been one of the most difficult times we’ve had in the last…100 days.  As soon as a bottle comes near Hazel the screaming and crying begins.  She’s gotten a hold of it a few times and eaten a few ounces, but she doesn’t seem to remember or want to eat the next time around.

On Saturday we fed her only with the bottle until 9pm…she probably drank a couple ounces of milk over the course of the day – a tiny amount compared to how much she normally eats.  On Sunday we tried to follow the schedule that she’ll have once Yenari goes back to work – breastfeeding until 2pm and then the bottle until midnight.  We all survived it, but there was lots of crying and Hazel only ate a few ounces.  It’s really difficult as a parent to watch your baby cry because she’s hungry and to not give in and let her breast feed.

Over the last week we’ve done our part in supporting the economy by purchasing just about every bottle and nipple on the market…from the local Babys R Us to the local Japanese market…we’ve seen them all.  None of them have provided the miraculous breakthrough we were hoping for, and I’m guessing that we won’t find one that will provide that miracle.  Hazel seems to be able to eat from a bottle when she needs to, she just doesn’t seem to want to do it too often.  My hope is that with more practice and with the reality of no mommy in site, Hazel will resign herself to eating from the bottle and overcome this challenge for all of us!

So, here’s to Hazel’s hundred days, a good return to work for Yenari, productive eating for Hazel, and me surviving with Hazel at night 4 days a week!

So we made the not so long, but long for lunch trip down to Santa Cruz for our late lunch and Yenari ate like a champ, taking down all of the sushi that she couldn’t eat when she was pregnant (still staying away from the high mercury stuff).  Lunch was excellent and Hazel slept the whole time, allowing us to devour the food without having to keep her happy.

After eating, we drove up to Felton to visit Rebecca, Troy, and their 4 week old baby boy Ewan.  We hadn’t met Ewan and they hadn’t met Hazel, so it was a big baby fest!  Ewan’s a big boy – despite her 7 week head start, Hazel is just about the same weight as Ewan and his feet are even bigger than hers!  Here they are together with their mommies followed by the foot comparison shot!

Yenari thinks that in this picture Hazel is checking her watch to see if it’s time to wake up Ewan!

In the foot comparison Hazel’s on the left and Ewan’s on right.  Though they’re about the same size, it’s amazing what a difference 7 weeks makes – Hazel feels a lot more ‘solid’ and obviously has much better control over her head.  On holding Hazel, Rebecca said that Ewan is a lot more ‘floppy’.  Amazing how much they change over the course of a few weeks.  We had a great time visiting with Rebecca, Troy, and Ewan…trading baby stories and just catching up.

Normally when we go to Pink Godzilla we stop at the nearby A&W to pickup some root beer floats.  We hadn’t done that earlier, and Yenari was eager to fulfill our eating destiny, so we decided to stop in Campbell to pickup our root beer floats (and a bacon cheeseburger for me!) before heading home.  Tastey tastey.

We topped the evening off with a visit from my mom and Duncan who had just gotten back from their weekend excursion in Monterey.  Here they are, playing with Hazel on the couch:

And lastly, here are a couple nice smiley photos I took today:

So, it was a very fun-filled day for us today…we’ve finally realized that we can actually go places and do things and she doesn’t go wild and crazy, so here’s to more fun-filled and exciting days to come!

We left for the restaurant around 6:30pm and Yenari almost immediately started having some light contractions.  She had similar contractions the previous night and the previous Monday and thought that like those, these weren’t the real thing.  We got to the restaurant and ordered – a jerk burger for me and a hearty jerk chicken and oxtail combo for Yenari.

Oxtail and Jerk Chicken (picture from Yelp)

As we waited for our food the contractions got stronger.  Our food was delivered and we started chowing down.  We had the stopwatch on my phone tracking the contractions and Yenari was tapping it closer and closer together.  She had to get up from the table to walk around outside – for those of you who have seen Yenari eat, it is certainly a rare circumstance to see her leave a plate of food she likes still full – this seemed like a big sign!

Yenari came back inside, had a couple more bites of food, and then said that she was going outside again and that I should get the check and have her food packed up.  I got everything settled, Yenari went to the bathroom, and as we left the restaurant the manager said (innocently) ‘Hope you have a great night’!  I slowly led Yenari back to the car, and we drove back home, tapping the stopwatch every 5 minutes or so.

Once home, Yenari asked me to give her the leftover jerk chicken from the restaurant and began eating it between contractions.  Once done, we decided to take a short walk as we’d heard that if it is false labor then walking will reduce the pain/duration of the contraction.  We made it about 100 yards before we had to turn back because of the pain.

Yenari paged the doctor and got a call back a few minutes later.  Our medical group has a bunch of different offices and they share the OB on call duty across the doctors.  We had seen the 3 OBs in the Los Altos office, but that night a doctor from Portola Valley was on call.  Yenari explained to her how she was feeling and the length / duration of the contractions.  At this point they were coming every 4 to 5 minutes, but they weren’t exactly regular.  The doctor thought that Yenari was in early labor and suggested that we head to the hospital within the next hour.

Because we live about 20 minutes from the hospital (Stanford’s Lucille Packard Children’s Hospital), we started packing the remaining things into our hospital bag – toothbrushes, cameras, etc.  Yenari was still unsure whether this was the real thing and kept telling me that I didn’t need to really pack everything up because we’d probably be turned back at the hospital.  Yenari hopped in the shower for a few minutes, we packed up the car, and we head out to the hospital at 9:21pm.

On the way to the hospital Yenari started feeling much better, the contractions seemed to slow down and were lighter, so she was sure that this was a false labor and that she’d be embarrassed at the hospital when she (a nurse) would be sent home.  We made it to the hospital by 9:42 and found our way to the labor and delivery unit by 9:50.  At the nurses’ station they asked her ‘And you’re here for?  Ultrasound? Did your baby stop moving?’.  When Yenari said she thought she was in labor the woman behind the desk almost rolled her eyes, as Yenari looked happy as can be, still joking around, and definitely not like she was in labor.  They asked if this was her first baby, she said yes, everyone seemed sure that this wasn’t the real thing, but they wanted to check her out anyway.

Our nurse, Rose (who was super nice throughout the whole night), brought us into the examination room, attached a fetal heart monitor and a monitor to measure the contractions and started them up.  She confirmed that the contractions were about 5 minutes apart, regular, and of the appropriate intensity then she did an internal exam which showed she was still 4cm dilated.  She left for a minute to call the doctor and came back to tell us that the doctor wanted her to stay – this was the real thing.

After a while we were led down the hall to the delivery room, a big room with the delivery bed, lots of monitors, all sorts of gizmos for taking care of babies with problems, a flat screen TV, and a nice window seat for me to sit and rest on.  After getting settled Rose explained how everything would work and asked if Yenari wanted an epidural – she had decided earlier that she did, so they had the anesthesiologist come in for a consultation. Rose also hooked up an IV for Yenari so that they could pump her full of fluid (she was slightly dehydrated) and Pitocin (a drug to make the labor move along faster, almost a requirement if you’re getting an epidural).

Yenari in the delivery room

Once Yenari was all plugged in, we decided it was time to call our parents to let them know they’d be grandparents soon – I called my mom and dad and Yenari called her parents in Korea.  The next hour or two flew by without us really noticing.  Yenari was talking with Rose about when to get the epidural and she wouldn’t make an outright recommendation, but did say that people who get it early in labor are often able to sleep or at least save up energy so that they can be in better shape for the pushing.  Yenari thought that saving energy was a good plan and ordered the epidural.  At 1am the anesthesiologists came in, prepped her, and poked her with the big needle to insert the epidural.  Within minutes, the contractions that were causing a pain level of 5 out of 10 had dropped down to a 1.  She was still able to feel the contractions, but she was feeling the pressure of the contractions and not the pain.

Yenari awaiting the epidural needle

For the next 2 hours, we both tried to sleep – I was mostly successful, but Yenari wasn’t – she got rest but wasn’t able to sleep at all.  At 3am, when Rose came to check on her she said that the contractions were progressing really and she turned off the Pitocin drip.  The doctor had asked Rose to do another internal exam at 5am, but since she saw a different type of contraction that indicated ‘active labor’ she decided to do it at 3:25.  She found that Yenari was 7cm dilated, fully effaced, and the head at station 0 (see diagram below).

Baby head station diagram

During the exam Yenari’s ‘bag of waters’ ruptured.  Since her water broke and since things were moving fast, Rose paged the doctor to let her know that is was going to be sooner than originally thought.  She also prepped the room for the delivery, preparing the sterile field with the sterile equipment, verifying the baby warmer / scale were working, and generally getting everything in place.

The doctor showed up at 4:25 and did another internal exam – this time Yenari was 9.5cm dilated (10cm is desired for pushing) and that the head was at station +2.  She said that she would be back in an hour, but that Yenari should call the nurse if she felt a really strong urge to push.  For the next half hour, the urge to push grew, and Yenari told Rose that she felt ready at around 4:45am.  Rose did a quick look and said that she could see the baby’s hair!  And she guessed that the baby would be out at 5:30am.  She called the doctor, who arrived around 5am.

When the doctor arrived she also took a quick look inside and asked if I wanted to see the baby’s head – I took a look and Yenari got jealous and asked if they could bring in a mirror.  They wheeled in a massive mirror and set it up so that she could see.  They tried taking it away after this brief exam, but Yenari said that she wanted to keep it there for the rest of the delivery so that she could see her baby coming out!  The doctor gave a refresher course on pushing and said that first time mothers typically push between 2 and 3 hours.  She said that for many first time mothers the first half hour of pushing is when the mother figures out how to push.  Yenari was shocked that it would take 2 to 3 hours and glad that she got rest.

As the next contraction was coming the doctor said it was time to push.  I was on Yenari’s right side holding her feet up, keeping her head down to her chest, and encouraging her as best as I could.  Rose was on the other side holding her left leg and the doctor was front and center.  She gave the 3 pushes the first contraction and the doctor said that she was doing great…Yenari thought that was just her way of encouraging her to keep it up.  The next contraction came one minute later and Yenari pushed 3 times again.  From the mirror we could both see the head almost all of the way out!

The doctor seemed shocked that things were moving so quickly and asked Yenari to slow down so that she could get prepared to catch the baby.  She wasn’t expecting the pushing to be done in just a few minutes!  Slowing down wasn’t really an option for Yenari – this isn’t something where you can decide to really take a break.  The 3rd contraction of pushing came.  After one push the head was out (with one of her eyes open!), and after the second push the baby was out! All the way! In 5 minutes of pushing!  I think all of us were in shock that it was done so fast.    The doctor asked if I wanted to cut the umbilical cord, handed me the scissors, and I cut it.  The baby started crying and looked to be in great shape.  The clock read 5:11am, the baby was born, and Yenari beat Rose’s guess of 5:30am.

Within a couple seconds, the doctor put the baby on Yenari’s chest while she delivered the placenta – she asked Yenari not to push as hard, but still she managed to get it out in one push.  After the placenta was delivered, Rose brought the baby over to the scale and baby heater and got her stats: 7 pounds 10 ounces, 20 inches long.

Yenari and the baby, just after birth

Heating up the baby!

7 pounds, 10 ounces

The doctor kept on saying that Yenari didn’t know how lucky she was, and that she had pushed for 3 hours in her own pregnancy.  Both the doctor and the nurse said that Yenari was made for having babies and that they’d see her next year!  The whole thing was a pretty remarkable experience and also a lot more civilized than I expected – she didn’t cry, scream, curse, or insult me.  I feel lucky that everything went so well and so fast, I know that it isn’t this easy for everyone.  The epidural certainly made a big difference, but that is not to discount the amazing job Yenari did with keeping a positive attitude and pushing like a champ!

We were already pretty much set with a name for her (thank goodness she was a she and not a surprise he), but wanted to see her face before we made the final decision.  After seeing her we decided to go with it: Hazel Yoojin Neustaetter.  Yenari had basically chosen the name Hazel before she even met me (I guess I was just a means to an end?) and I also really liked it.  We wanted a Korean middle name so that Yenari’s family in Korea could call her by that name and so that she would have a stronger connection to Korean culture.

A lot more happened that morning, but we needn’t bore you with more details – you deserve a prize if you’ve read this far anyway!  We’d like to thank everyone who supported us throughout the whole pregnancy and birth experience.  An extra thanks to Rose, the doctor, and everyone at the hospital who helped us.

The happy family, at least two of us