Happy Birthday, Teensy!

Today is my Teensy's fourth birthday. She truly has left toddler-hood behind and is a preschooler. She is a hilarious, happy, spunky, bright spit-fire of a girl. I love her to death; she cracks me up!

Teensy's Birth Story:
I went to bed as usual on the night of September 26 and was awoken by a single strong contraction at about 1:15 a.m. Although it was solitary, I knew it was strong enough that it might mean something was coming. I decided to get up, take a bath, and see what happened. The second contraction didn't come for another fifteen minutes. The third was just five minutes later. I got out of the tub and got dressed into fresh pj's. Each contraction was coming faster than the last so I thought I'd better wake up Michael. I wanted to put clean sheets on the bed for our friend, Jessica, who would be coming to stay with Maia and Mason when we went to the hospital. (Looking back this was not the best use of time, but hind sight is 20/20.) By the time I'd changed the sheets and called the doctor's office the contractions were like 45 seconds apart. Michael was a little nervous about us sticking around the house waiting for the doctor to return our call (go figure) so we were out to door before Jessica was even in it. (Of course, we didn't leave Maia and Mason alone--we crossed paths with Jessica on the front steps.)


The drive to the hospital seemed eternal. I tried to do my breathing but was basically overcome by horrendous pain. I had Michael drop me at the curb because I didn't think I could walk from the parking lot. When I walked through the ER door and told the triage nurse that I was in labor she wanted to know where Michael was. I told her that he was parking the car. She replied, "Well, I am the only one here. I can't take you down to Labor and Delivery." I said, "Okay" and asked for directions to L&D. She asked, "You're going to walk there?" I shrugged, "I guess so." And off I went.

It was slow going. I kept having to stop the put my hands on the wall while I bowed my head and tried to breathe through the contractions. Michael caught up with me at some point in my journey through the labyrinth that is HCGH. We walked up to the nurses' station and I introduced myself. They were expecting me because my doctor had called my house, talked to Jessica and then called the hospital. Two nurses took me into a room and gave me a gown. I remember changing in to it and having to stop to breathe through contractions. I was relieved to get on that bed.

The nurses performed the usual stuff to get me situated and when the one nurse went to check my cervix she made a "huh?" noise. Immediately, I thought of a breech baby. "Did you feel a crack?" I asked. "No," she replied, "but I can't feel your cervix." The other nurse said, "She might be complete." I said, "I probably am. Okay, I'm ready to push." They wouldn't let me. Imagine that. Something about them getting into trouble if a doctor isn't present. I got a little whiny. I remember telling them, "It's just mean. I am ready to push. I want to push!" At one point I said to the one nurse, "Look, I don't care who catches. You look good to me." She just laughed.

Finally (or so it felt), the on-call doctor came in. The nurses told her I was ready to push. She saw my bulging bag of waters and replied, "I can see that. Go ahead!" And I did. The bag broke and that poor doctor was wet from head to toe! She laughed as she wiped off her glasses and said that it was her fault for telling me to go ahead when she could see my bag of waters was about to pop. I pushed a second time and Marlee's head was out. She was delivered eight minutes after I arrived at the hospital (Christie, tell Brent I have witnesses if he needs them:).


When they put her on me I said, "Oh, she's an angel!" I could see all the vernix on her and knew she was a wrinkly mess, but I knew she was heaven-sent. My own doctor arrived in time to deliver the placenta. He was very funny about the whole thing. He told me that I had "tongues wagging at the nurses' station" because they get women in there who have called 911 and are carried in on a gurney but when they are checked they are only 1 cm dilated. He said, "Then there's you, who walks in here on your own two feet and calmly tells the desk who you are, who your doctor is, etc and when they check you, you are completely dilated." He was like a proud father. It was kind of cute. Oh--and I did apologize to my nurses for getting whiny and they laughed. Apparently, begging to be allowed to push out your baby when you are fully dilated is not bad behavior. Go figure.


Marlee was my biggest baby girl at birth: 8 pounds 0.4 ounces (so, basically, 8 pounds). As a baby, she didn't grow. Okay, she grew, but not a lot. That's why we started calling her "Teensy" and it stuck. After she turned a year, she got taller, but she's never been a little chunk like my other kids.


Teensy, at four years old,

* You claim to resemble Sleeping Beauty, Hannah Montana and Ashley Tisdale
* You are learning to perform a cartwheel
* You love to ride your bike
* You like your hair "long" (all down) or "half up half down" with "curlies"
* You are curious about letters and sounds
* You insist on wearing skirts most days
* You love your "blue eyes and yellow hair"
* Your favorite foods are corn and cookie dough
* You are insanely entertained by Hannah Montana and High School Musical
* You suck your thumb when you are tired
* You get up before the other kids and eat breakfast with your daddy
* You "make" Maia read to you in your room at night
* You are afraid of people in animal costumes (Chuck E. Cheese, etc.)
* You are fearless about most things and try new things before your older siblings
* You learned how to swim by yourself this summer
* You love to play dress-up
* You make me laugh every day!


This is Teensy in her Halloween costume last year: Sharpay from High School Musical.