Tag: family

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News

An update on Max

It figures that within an hour of sending the writing last night that we’d get some bummer news, here’s an update. As I mentioned in the previous post, Mighty Max was having some minor breathing troubles since he was born, and the precautionary x-ray that was taken turned up what’s called a diaphragmatic hernia. Basically some of his intestines have formed/squeezed through the diaphragm (which separates your lungs and heart from your stomach and intestines) and are interfering with his left lung. This news surprised everyone since his vitals are so strong and he’s otherwise perfectly healthy.

This resulted in us all being transferred to Legacy Emanuel last night around 8pm and Max is in the Neonatal Infant Care Unit (NICU). He’s doing fine (hooked up to tubes and wires), but he will likely go into surgery within a few days (there are some ultrasounds scheduled for later today). Afterward he’ll end up staying here at the hospital for 3 – 4 weeks before he can come home with us. This will depend on how well he does after surgery and how well he eats/process food afterward.

This shit sucks (especially after the already unplanned c-section), however he’s in the right place (this hospital performs many of these surgeries, and newborns have even been flown down from Alaska for the surgery here), and while it means a delay before he can come home with us, his chances of a full recovery are good.

We’ll be in the hospital through Thursday and then Kelly will be released. After that we’ll be here visiting every day until we can take the little man home with us.

Thanks for all your thoughts and support.  I’ll keep you updated.

Categories
News

Baby Max is here!

This morning, December 26th at 8:12am, Kelly and I welcomed our son

Max!

to the world. The stats for those who like that stuff: 21.5″ long, and weighed in at 7 lbs 10 oz. Both Kelly and the baby are doing well despite an unplanned (but entirely warranted) cesarean after 9 hours of rough labor. Kelly is resting comfortably, and the little man is chilling out (when he’s not being prodded and poked by the hospital staff over a concern of a chest infection or something).

Full story:

After getting up early Saturday for Christmas, going out to my folks, and then visiting some of Kelly’s family who are staying in Oregon City, we got home around 9pm last night. Around 10pm Kelly started feeling some early labor pains, by midnight had suddenly and intensely progressed, and by 2am we were in the hospital room and Kelly was in some seriously intense active labor.

Within two hours she had progressed from 3cm to 7cm dilated, all w/o any pain meds (Kelly is made of steel and lava and diamonds). Then the progress stopped, and for another couple hours of incredibly rough and painful labor w/o any progression Kelly decided to get an epidural (which was a relief for me to see her agony vanish). The doctor did some checking and realized that the reason the progression halted was that the little man was coming out a bit cockeyed (chin wasn’t to chest and was going through slightly turned) and Kelly’s pelvis was likely not going to be large enough anyway. Combined with some distress on the child (reduced heartbeat) when Kelly was going through a contraction and it was decided the best (and probably only) choice for the boy was to go under the knife.

I’d never been put in scrubs and walked into an operating room with my wife on the table before (and I really hope I don’t have to again) but the procedure was quick, and before we knew it there was a new little person in the world.

For the next couple hours we waited in the recovery room, and then around 11:30 were moved back to our birthing suite. Max has had some blood drawn and an x-ray of his chest taken (not sure the results yet) but his breathing has improved so it seems he’ll be fine (fingers crossed). I guess some respiratory issues are common in cesarean births, but the staff here at Good Sam aren’t taking any chances (and I really appreciate it).

After being up for 31 hours I finally dozed off for a nap on the sofa for a couple hours, and now Max is dozing happily on Kelly’s chest while we watch Trading Places on cable.

Anyway, I’m sure there will be more posts, but I’m going to try and avoid smothering my blog with stuff about my boy (for the same reason I’ll not be posting his every move on Facebook). I hope to give him a sense of privacy as he grows older. He’ll probably be considered ‘off the grid’ by the time he’s a teen if his every moment isn’t published publicly on the interwebs. Good. 🙂

Categories
Technology Travel Work

Tahoe, and server surgery

Last week I was sent to South Lake Tahoe for a work ‘summit’, where several peeps from SuperSweetCo were sent to plan the next release (and beyond) of the app. It was quite the adventure, and an exhausting few days that taxed both my ability to focus on 12+ hour work sessions, and to deal with the elevation (I suffered from symptoms similar to altitude sickness, the headaches were pretty nasty). Despite the cold nighttime temperatures, it was beautiful up there.

I arrived back in Portland Thursday afternoon, and spent Friday working until ~3am trying get caught up and fix bugs in my queue that had built up over the week.

Over the weekend, after doing some yard work, I had to perform some emergency Linux server surgery (for circusgeek.com). The server had been acting up over the past few months, but nothing specific had gone wrong. Over the weekend I rebooted a few times and every few cycles it wouldn’t boot up. After taking the case apart, I heard a ‘hissing’ whiny sound. After some part replacement (including the power supply) I discovered it was the motherboard that must have had a faulty capacitor. Fortunately I had a ‘spare parts’ machine in the garage I wasn’t using so I was able to replace the innards and boot it back up with everything intact. Linux has come a long way; I remember when I couldn’t swap out much hardware w/o a kernel rebuild. Long story short, the server was back up in a couple hours (with a slightly faster processor) and all is well. Crisis averted. And, it means I can continue to serve up this little-read blog. Hooray!

Also this weekend Kelly cooked up a delicious dinner out at my folks place for Mother’s Day. I also got to help my dad cut up some wood for an upcoming hunting trip of his, and play with my nephews (even the wee one, who’s just old enough now to play with in between pooping and crying sessions).

Categories
General Work

Family weekends done & an afternoon at the Zoo

Last weekend was a relatively relaxed weekend, sandwiched between some very busy weeks of work, and we continue to plan for our upcoming trip to Hawaii. I even picked up a waterproof camera (the Canon PowerShot D10, waterproof to 33 ft! Pretty happy with the test shots so far).

This past weekend (starting Thursday) we had some of Kelly’s family in town (her Father and his new ladyfriend who stayed at a nearby hotel, and an Aunt and Cousin who stayed with us). As a result, it was a hectic few days, not only disrupting our usual routines, but also trying to keep them all entertained while here.

Today, after the family left, we went to the Oregon Zoo for my work’s summer (or end of summer) picnic. I hadn’t been to the zoo in many years, and had a pretty fun time wandering around seeing all the animals. The highlights for me were seeing Samudra (the baby elephant),  and the big cats (lions and cheetahs) at the Predators of the Sarengeti exhibit. Also, the company picnic was good fun, had a nice late-lunch/early dinner, a beer, and a chat with coworkers before Kelly and I continued our tour of the Zoo.

See the photos from the Zoo here.

Categories
Travel Work

August recap & we’re going to Hawaii

Yup, another month, and despite all my hopes to write more frequently, I keep using Twitter to spout my nonsense, rather than writing to my blog.

To keep it quick:

  • Early August Kelly and I joined our friends in Eagle Crest (photos)
  • Worked a ton (late nights and weekends)
  • The weather has gone from stupid hot to cold to hot again
  • Had the mother-in-law in town from Arizona
  • Continued yardwork action, trying to keep the place in order
  • Planned a trip to Hawaii

The last bullet is the important one. Kelly and I are going to Hawaii at the end of the month, and I’m really excited about it. We’re renting an oceanfront house south of Kona on the big island for 6 nights. Since 2001, all our travels have been to Europe, which I love, but that means a lot of cathedrals, museums, pubs, and big cities. I’m looking forward to spending a few days swimming in the ocean, and doing (hopefully) not too much in a tropical environment.

The house we’re renting has WiFi, so I expect to be blogging and posting photos while there. Doubt I’ll write too much more between now and then since we have have more family visiting next weekend, and I have even more work to do. So for the 2 of you who follow my blog (I assume it’s down to two, since my posts have been so infrequent), expect more at the end of the month.