Boyness Birthday!

Boyness had a great birthday!

Making treat bags:


LOTS of balloons:


When asked what he wanted for his birthday, Boyness said "Fruit! and Friends!"


"And SMOOTHIES!"








We had a treasure hunt (that we were too busy running after kids to take pictures of after this):


Cake:


Mmmmmm, cake:



Pinata!


The pinata mob:

Basking

In the lovely warm glow of a Boyness Birthday Party that went very well. Aunty B and Uncle O, Boyness was so excited that he got a present from you, since he wasn't expecting one :).

And basking in the lovely warm glow of the car needing not a new transmission, but a new thing-that-joins-transmission-to-wheels. $160 vs $2000. Thank you universe.

Out with a whimper. Kind of.

Last hours of call and waters-broken primip is finally in active labor. Francesco is about to get off of work, so I drive with the kids to meet him there. We switch vehicles. I head on my way, am next to the mall in the left turn lane as MW calls and tells me she's started pushing, am I less than a half hour away? Yes. And then...

The transmission on the car goes out. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck. Francesco is luckily not too far away yet, and less than 10 minutes passes before he comes and we coordinate pushing the car (with the van...I was headed slightly uphill) into the parking lot.

Needless to say, I missed that birth. The last with this preceptor.

"Are you going to be OK?" asked Francesco...he almost never asks this kind of thing, I guess he usually assumes that I've got it handled or he can't do anything for me anyway or something, but he asked me then, so I must have looked like the shit I felt like. "Can we, I don't know, all get in the van now so you can go help out?" Pointless. Arriving after the birth when there is another student there already.

This was supposed to be my last one, though, and I feel like eversomuch shit. The nearly overwhelming feeling of that competed with the nearly overwhelming thought of how much this is going to cost to fix, and then I just couldn't think about any of it anymore. The kids and I went to the bookstore and Francesco called towing companies. The car is safely transported to the mechanic, now, who assures us that if it is complete transmission replacement that we require, he is now equiped to do it. This is someone we trust to do this monster repair right and cheap, and that is no small thing. It's still money we don't have, which will make an already lean holiday season even leaner.

I have no idea how we're going to do this coming week. Today, Francesco is off so I can take the van and strand him at home with the kids; tomorrow we are both off for Boyness' birthday. The remainder of the week we have wildly diverging schedules in hugely different places, and there is no way to do it with one vehicle. There just isn't. Mass transit? OMG we've never even been on the busses in this state.

At least I'm not on call this week.

Ah, the Weekend

I am in my waning days of on-call time with one practice. Last day, actually. I've liked working with them very, very much.

So anyway, on Friday, again sitting happily in the last bits of my on-call time for this practice, with nobody really looking like they were going to go into labor (three primips due two weeks from then), I thought it would be safe to invite ~L~s daughter G to sleep over.

Because we are batting 1000, ~L~ and I, with me having to call her to get her kids every time I babysit, my suspicion was pretty high, but I thought we'd make it this time. Fuck, the sleepover was even my idea.

So of course one of our primips goes into labor and another's water breaks.

Our trend of primips with speedy labors continues. This woman went from 0 - literally couldn't get a finger into her cervix - to baby in four hours. 9lb 4oz babe, intact perineum (I am proud of both of us for that one). It was a great birth, postpartum hemorrhage notwithstanding. She was completely asymptomatic - practically skipped off to the bathroom - after at least 1200cc blood loss (we couldn't estimate well, it wasn't contained on the blue pads and bedding and floor in a way we could get a number out of). The new student, who will be taking call after I leave mostly but was at this birth while the other student took time off call, was excited and clueless. I remember not quite knowing what to do like that. It seems so far in the past, now, and while at the time I just told her what to do ("[otherstudent], draw up pit please" "get a blood pressure please" "I need you to come assist me over here") it feels weird on reflection to be so far from where I was just over a year ago. And it feels weird to know that in a short few months, she'll be where I am.

Morning came, and I went and traded cars - my sedan for a van full of kids, mine plus G - at Francesco's work. We stopped at Trader Joes and forgot several important grocery items. Came home and let the kids have crazy/fun time. Enjoyed a visit from ~L~. Got to bed around 8:30, and true to form, a MW called the second I turned out the light. "Just an update," she said; apparently client-with-water-broken was contracting in a halfhearted kind of way. I went to bed fully expecting a call last night, but no, here we are at 9am and I have a full night of sleep behind me. That's the way to do it, eh? I'm hoping for an afternoon birth today. In the meantime, as much schoolwork and house organizing as I can cram into the morning without exhausting myself.