The Times They Are A-Changin'

The Caffrey's are moving back to Iowa in June!

There, instead of dragging it out, I figured I would get the major announcement out of the way before y'all had it in your heads that the change was a family expansion (don't even think about that for another 2-3 years). 

Yes, the rumors are true. Our exile to Florida is coming to an end, and we're coming home. Matt put in his formal resignation yesterday, so now I can openly talk about it.  Just so you are all aware, this has been in the plans since October. We just felt with the passing of Matt's dad, we really needed to be up north with his mom.

No, Matt doesn't have a job yet, and if you know of anything, would you point it in our direction? He's applied to 20 teaching jobs so far, but if you know of something he would be good at (like something with computers) that will 1) support a family of 3 and 2) keep us in the Des Moines/Ankeny/Ames area, we would love you forever if you helped us out!

Matt's last day of work down here is June 10. Right now we get free HBO with our rent, so we'll be sticking out the Game of Thrones season, and will probably be moving up around the 20th. My aunt has been very generous to offer us a place to stay until we figure things out. Hopefully we'll be moving up with a plan because Matt got a job. Cross your fingers and say a prayer for us!

Guess I'll have to rename my blog....

2013 in Review

2013 was a year of highs and lows for us Caffreys.

We started the year off with the news that the baby we were expecting was a boy!  Talk about starting the year off on a high note!

Arthur's profile

The rest of the winter/spring was spent gearing up for our little bundle of joy. We had baby showers, we had to look for a new apartment to live in, and we just had to set up room for the baby.

May brought the surprise of Arthur arriving! We thought for sure we would have to wait until June, but unforseen circumstances saw Arthur coming three weeks early. And on May 22, we welcomed little Arthur Phineas, the highlight of our year, into our lives!

37 Weeks Pregnant, 4 days before Arthur was born

Arthur Phineas Caffrey, 2 days old

The summer is a blur of learning how to take care of a baby, moving to our new apartment and visiting family. It really flew by.

The fall found Matt starting his third year teaching, and me starting my new career of being a stay at home mom.  Soon, I found myself finding myself apart of an amazing group of women, who all had babies around the same time as I did, and we try to get together at least once a week so that we can have a grown up conversation, and so our babies can grow up to be friends.

Arthur and his friends on one of our walks

The year did have some low points in the fall, with the loss of Matt's father. It was really hard, and still continues to be hard for Matt, but having Arthur around has really helped him with the grieving process.

The holidays were really special this year, being Arthur's first. My family came in from California for Thanksgiving, and we traveled to Iowa for Christmas.  Arthur loved being around his extended family.

Exploring Mommy's face on Turkey Day

Beautiful picture taken by his Aunt Katie

Our little family

Matt and I are looking forward to see what 2014 brings to us. we know that it will bring amazing adventures with our goofy little boy. We look forward to seeing how he grows and seeing how our family will continue to change.

The Story of Arthur Phineas

I'm terrible at this blogging thing, the last time I blogged was when I was 12 weeks pregnant, and now I have a 2 week old.  But since a lot of people don't know the birth story of Arthur, I thought I would share it here.

On Tuesday, May 21, I went to the doctor for a normal pre-natal appointment. It was my 37 week appointment, and I was 37 weeks 3 days along in my pregnancy.  During the appointment my blood pressure was pretty high, 140/92, and there was protein in my urine.  These factors, along with my insane swelling, were indicators that I had pre-eclampsia.  My doctor sent me across the street to the hospital to be observed in Labor and Delivery.  I called Matt, and told him what was going on, of course, he heard the words "labor and delivery" and tuned everything else out, thinking it was "go time."

I got into Labor and Delivery and they made me give another urine sample, and then hooked me up to some machines. They were monitoring my blood pressure every 10 minutes and they were monitoring the baby's heartbeat and any contractions that I may have been having.  Matt got to the hospital in record time, after leaving impromptu sub plans for the next day.  After a couple hours, and yet ANOTHER urine sample and a blood sample, it was determined that I did in fact have pre-eclampsia and it was decided I would be induced the next morning at 4 am.

It was a sleepless night, since I was a little scared about being induced. This was not the birth I had planned for or expected. I wanted to go into labor on my own, labor at home for as long as possible and show up at the hospital and labor in a tub.  Instead I was woken up at 4 and allowed to take a shower, and then hooked up to pitocin and had my labor started that way. 

I was determined to have this baby without pain meds. I figured if I couldn't control anything else, then I could at least have the natural birth I wanted.  At noon the doctor came in and broke my water. The contractions that didn't seem that bad, painful, but manageable, intesified, and within the hour, about 8 hours into my labor, I decided I wanted the epidural.  I got the epidural around 1 in the afternoon, and then I promptly fell asleep.   I woke up and enjoyed Jeopardy, but I was getting really tired of being in labor.

Finally around 8 pm, it was time to start pushing. Matt, the amazing husband that he is, stood and held my left leg and helped encourage me.  After such a long labor, and seeing scary numbers on the blood pressure monitor all day (at some point the bottom number was over 100), I was exhausted.  Finally at 9:03 pm, I pushed Arthur into the world.  For being almost 3 weeks early, he was a hefty 9lbs 4oz.  And since he was so early, the NICU people were in the room, and he was immediately swept away from me as soon as he was out.  Matt couldn't even cut the cord until later he symbolically cut the cord.

I was a mess after the delivery. I had a 4th degree tear, and as they stitched me up, they gave me morphine and told me for the next kid, if it's as big as Arthur, it would be an automatic c-section.  By the time I was able to hold Arthur for the first time, I was so weak, I only held him for a second.  The rest of the night is kinda blurry, and I know I pretty much passed out and slept until about 3 am.  During the time I was sleeping, however, the lactation consultant helped Arthur nurse for the first time, and he nursed for about an hour while I slept.  And I was able to get the skin-to-skin bonding I so wanted, I was just asleep for it.

The next day I was on strict bed rest, because of my blood pressure and the fact they had me on magnesium all day for it.  We stayed in the hospital until late Friday night, and we were finally able to come home.

Right now, I have no desire to have any more kids, but I'm hoping that that feeling will go away, because I would love for Arthur to have a sibling some day.  Matt and I are very thankful for modern medicine right now, because as Matt has pointed out, if I had this baby 100 years ago, there could have been a completely different outcome.  My blood pressure was not pretty.

I'm doing better now, my blood pressure is back to normal, and all my swelling is gone. Arthur is an amazing baby, and I love spending all my time with him.

Is this a baby bump, or am I just awkwardly fat?

Me at about 5 weeks pregnant (right after we found out)

Me at 12 weeks pregnant

Well, we made it to the coveted 12 week mark! Just about ready to cruise right into the second trimester.  I would like to think that I've started to show, but it's hard for me to tell.  What do you think?  Is that a hint of a baby bump, or do I still just look like I've only gotten fatter?  Because that's how I feel.  I can't wait for more milestones to start popping up.  I can't wait to feel the baby for the first time, and I can't wait until we find out the sex of the baby.

I am totally over the morning sickness part of the pregnancy, so that's awesome!  However, I am still at the super exhausted stage.  I would be perfectly happy spending all day sleeping or laying in bed all day long.  I'm hoping this passes and I start feeling energetic again.

Becoming a Family of Three

Well, it's safe to say, I'll probably be updating this blog A LOT more than before.  

Matt and I are currently 10 weeks pregnant with our first child.  We're super excited/nervous/terrified.

We just went to our second appointment with the midwife the past Friday, and what an amazing experience that was!  Because our first appointment was really early (5 weeks 6 days) the midwife wanted us to do a second ultrasound, and I'm so glad we did.  The baby (whom we're calling Falcon right now) looked AMAZING!  Falcon is already VERY active, and gave us quite the show while we were looking. He/She wiggled around and punched his/her little arms like crazy.  Looks like we're in for a very active little one.

Words can't describe how we're feeling right now.  We're feeling very relieved that everything looks really well, and that Falcon is on track for a June 8 due date.  

I'll try and update at least monthly on the progress of Falcon, and maybe after Christmas I'll start posting belly shots, who knows.

Right now, I just keep staring at my ultrasound picture of Falcon, trying to comprehend that I have a PERSON growing inside of me.  That just blows my mind.

Our Excellent Adventure

So, Matt and I went on an amazing adventure for the month of July.   A lot of fun stuff happened, and everyone always wants to know the stories that went on during the trip.  The problem is, most of our friends and family live far away from us, so a lot of them wouldn't get to hear our stories, so I came up with the solution of making a blog post about the trip.

Day 1: Panama City to San Antonio, TX

First day of the trip, first day of non-stop driving.  We drove straight through, and hit 5 states.  The most interesting things that occurred during this 13 hour drive: we ran into a biker gang (The Bandidos) in Louisiana, and rain and traffic in Austin.  We set up camp in Boerne, TX at Cascade Caverns.  The place was super deserted, and Matt kept saying it felt like a murder movie.

Day 2: San Antonio to Carlsbad, NM

When we woke up the next day, we packed up everything but our tent and drove into San Antonio and viewed The Alamo. We didn't take a tour or anything, we just looked at the outside, just so we could say we had been there.  We then drove back to the caverns just in time to pack up our tent and go on the tour of the cave.  The cave was very wet and cold, giving us the first day in our trip with wet feet.  An interesting story about the cave.   There is a ledge in the original entrance where a man lived out his life.  He and a friend got in an argument, and he shot the friend.  Thinking he had killed the friend, he ran and hid on this ledge for the rest of his life.  When they "discovered" the cave, they found his remains and a journal he kept while living there. They turned that journal into a book, and moved his remains into a museum.  However, it turns out he didn't have to hide there after all: his friend didn't die, and he didn't press charges.

After touring the caves, we drove 6 hours up to Carlsbad, NM.  We set up camp at Brantley Lake State Park and then drove to the Carlsbad Caverns where we watched the bats fly out at dusk.

Day 3: Carlsbad to Riverside, CA

We woke up the next day, packed up camp, and then descended into Carlsbad Caverns.  The walk down was difficult, it was very steep and long. But the end result was worth it.  The cave was absolutely BEAUTIFUL! The cave structures were VERY beautiful.  The massive stalagmites and stalactites, that took millions of years to form were just beautiful to look at.

After the caverns, we drove out of the way to drive through Roswell, just so Matt could say we were there.

Then we embarked on the 900 mile drive to Riverside.  We left Roswell at Noon and arrived at my parents at 2 am.  Nothing really exciting happened, but we got really excited that we got to eat supper at In N Out in Tucson, and we got to see saguaro cacti in the Arizona desert.  Oh and dust devils, we got really excited about dust devils.

Days 4-10: Riverside, CA

We spent the next week hanging out with my family in Riverside.  We saw my grandma, had a family barbeque for 4th of July, visited the Cleopatra exhibit in the California Science Center in LA, saw the USS Iowa, celebrated my grandma and sister's birthdays, and went to a midnight showing of Rocky Horror Picture Show.  It was a fun visit that went by too fast.

Day 11: Riverside to Zion, UT

Leaving Riverside early, we made a pit stop in Las Vegas to have brunch/lunch with my cousin.  It was totally awesome and  a lot of fun seeing my cousin who I see way too infrequently.  

After lunch, we drove to the Hoover Dam.  We didn't go on the tour, but we drove across it, twice, and then walked half way across the bridge to take some really wicked pictures.  

After the dam, we drove to Zion, UT, where we set up camp and then took the tram tour of the canyon.  Matt took a lot of great pictures.  It was very beautiful, and we especially loved seeing it at sunset. It was also the hottest place we camped.  And then of course it was the one place that didn't have a shower so we could shower in the morning.

Day 12: Zion to Yellowstone

Probably one of our most stressful days.  We woke up early, just so we could drive through the mile long tunnel through one of the mountains.  It was a cool morning, so we were driving with the windows down.  We drove up the switchbacks and then drove through the tunnel, turned around and drove through the tunnel again.  As we were driving slowly back down the switchbacks, Matt started to panic: he was pushing all the way down on the brake pedal, but he wasn't stopping.  The steering wasn't working as well.  We came around a bend and there was a "slow vehicle" pull off, and we pulled off there and brought the car to a stop to discover the engine wasn't running.  The car had died.  Matt turned the car off and on and it started back up.  And then proceeded to die twice more before we reached the bottom of the mountain.  After leaving the park, I immediately got on the phone with Hertz and after several different calls, we were told to drive to the Salt Lake City airport and exchange cars.  So we get there, I convince the lady at the counter, that yes, the people on the phone said to exchange our car, and we're given a new car.  A Fiat.  Yes, you read that right, we got a FIAT. We had to move THREE WEEKS of camping gear and luggage from our kinda roomy Chevy Aveo into a FIAT.  I will admit, I cried a little, but Matt, that wonderful man, got everything to fit into the car.

After fitting everything in the Fiat, we were able to continue on our journey. We drove up to Wyoming. We drove into the Grand Tetons, where we got some beautiful pictures of the mountains and we saw hundreds of buffalo just chilling in an open area, including two males fighting by the road.  We didn't stick around to see how that turned out, they were larger than our Fiat.  We got into Yellowstone, and it was dark and rainy.  But after we checked in and got to our site, the rain had stopped for us to pitch our tent and make supper.  All in the dark.

Day 13: Yellowstone to Ankeny, IA (technically to Sioux City, IA)

So, we woke up and had this grand plan: drive all 1100 miles to Ankeny in one day!  Then we decided we didn't want to rush Yellowstone. We leisurely drove through the park, ate right next to the lake for breakfast, visited a visitor's center and just generally enjoyed the park.  Then we drove through the Big Horn Mountains, and enjoyed the BEAUTIFUL pastures and meadows at that top.  About halfway through the Big Horn Mountains, when the GPS was telling us our ETA was 6 am, we decided to kick it in a rest area and sleep.  So we made it to 2 am and a rest area just south of Sioux City.  We curled up in the Fiat and slept...for 5 hours. :)

Day 14-18: Iowa

We spent the next 5 days hanging out in Iowa. We hung out with family and friends.  And we got to eat at a lot of the places that we miss eating at and hanging out at.

Day 19: Ankeny to Fort Wayne, IN

We left Iowa and drove to Wisconsin to visit The House on the Rock.  The only way to describe this place is weird and creepy.  The house is HUGE, and full of what can only be described as "crap."  There are hundreds of creepy dolls, figurines, an "ocean" room and the world's largest carousel.  There is no air conditioning, so we moved through REALLY quickly.

We left there, and then ended up sitting 2 hours in traffic in Chicago.  Got to our campsite in Ft. Wayne at nearly dark, set up camp, made supper and then went to sleep.

Day 20: Fort Wayne to Philadelphia

We woke up early and beat the thunderstorm packing up our camping stuff quickly.  We didn't know that the day before would be the last time we saw the sun for a while.  We ended up saying "screw it" and decided to drive on Toll Roads to Philadelphia. Biggest. Mistake. Ever.  $40 is what we paid in tolls from Fort Wayne to our exit to go to Gettysburg.  Also, we got rained on, no, POURED on through the entire state of Ohio.  It was raining so bad, that the road was turning into a river, I was really nervous driving the Fiat.

We toured Gettysburg, which was as awesome as I remembered it.  We didn't get to explore that much, because we were trying to get to our campsite before it got dark. But we toured the whole battle field, we just couldn't get out of the car and read all the signs we would have liked.

In the end, we got to the site after dark. Our mission had failed.

Day 21: Philadelphia to The Eastern Shore, VA

We woke up early and got to Indepenence Square 2 hours before our tour of Independence Hall.  We decided to walk around and explore historic Philadelphia.  We saw Franklin's Grave and the Second Bank of the United States. Then it started raining, so we had breakfast in a bagel shop.  Finally it was our tour time, so we went to Independence Hall, and I was very overwhelmed to be standing in a spot that was SO important in American History.  The thing that got to me the most was that the actual chair that Washington sat in during the writing of the Constitution was sitting, feet away from me.  It was definitely a highlight of the whole trip for me to be there.  Then we walked across the street to The Liberty Bell.  It was much smaller than we thought it would be.

After our excursion in Independence Square we drove toward Edgar Allen Poe's house.  Which when listening to our GPS, we drove first back over the Toll Bridge we crossed that morning from Jersey BACK into Jersey, so we had to pat another $5 to cross back into Philadelphia. *sigh* And then we ended up at Poe's house only to find out 1) he only lived there for like a year and 2) they had none of his stuff, so it was an empty house. *double sigh* 

After that, we drove to the Eastern Shore of Virginia and met up with my friends who I met through writing fan fiction.  The three of us have been friends for years over the internet, so it was really cool to get to meet them in person.  That night we went to a local production of Rocky Horror Picture show whose casting was interesting to say the least.  It was still fun to hang out and get to know each other in person.

Day 22: Eastern Shore of Virginia

 Day 2 of hanging out with my friends from Twitter! We started the day off with breakfast and seeing wild ponies and continued onto a nine hour mini-golf marathon!  The day was AMAZING! The 5 of us (counting husbands) got on REALLY well, and you couldn't tell that we had met in person for the first time.  We've already begun planning our next get togethers and Matt is seriously thinking about applying to teach on the Eastern Shore, since their school system seems to be doing better than a lot of other places.  I love these girls to bits, and I can't wait to hang out with them again.  Until we get together again in person, there's always Twitter. :)

Day 23: Eastern Shore to Savannah, GA

Sadly we left the Eastern Shore and began our journey home.  We drove across a HUGE bridge over Chesapeake Bay, that included TUNNELS under the Bay. It was both  awesome and terrifying.  Drove through the Carolinas and ended up at Ft. McAllister outside of Savannah.  We got to our campsite and it was full of mosquitos, so we drove to Publix and got bugspray.  Nothing too exciting, happened: we had our only campfire, we roasted marshmallows, we played cards.

Day 24: Savannah to HOME

 We woke up and toured Ft. McAllister, and let me tell you, this fort is awesome! They built the fort out of earthworks, by just re-manipulating the geography of the area to make defenses.  Just on some guys land.  Then, a Union Ironclad came and attacked the fort, and it ended in a STALEMATE! The fort finally fell when Sherman ended his march to the sea there.  Talk about the most awesome place in history! And when we talked to the ranger, he said they only get thousands of visitors a YEAR!  If you are ever in the Savannah area, you should check it out, it was awesome and totally worth a visit.

After we toured the fort, we drove HOME.  It was so nice to finally be home.  We really enjoyed our vacation, but nothing is better than being at home.  

This is going to be a vacation that we will remember for a very long time.

 If you would like to see more pictures from our vacation, check out this video I made!

I'm Terrible At Blogging

So, almost a year using this blog, we have learned that I'm TERRIBLE at updating this sucker. 

Matt has successfully completed his first year of teaching.  It was a year of ups and downs and many frustrations.  But he did it!!  He had MANY trials, but one of his students told him how much Latin means to him, so Matt feels the year was successful.  In the beginning of May, we did face a very stressful situation when it came to the job.  Matt got the dreaded, "I'm sorry, but you have not been chosen to come back," letters.  When he was handed the letter, his principal reassured him that it wasn't permanent, and that he would be coming back.  And he is!  He'll be teaching AP World History in addition to his Latin classes, but he'll be coming back!  At the end of this month, he'll be attending an AP conference in Orlando, so that will be fun for him to be able to learn and see what he wants to do with that class.

I have successfully ended my year.  It was a VERY stressful spring, where-in my kid really tried my patience.  But when all is said and done, I really loved my kids this year, all eight of them, and I'm really going to miss them once the year is over.  I'm going to be starting a new path next year.  I'm going to be staying home, and focusing on things that need done around here.  I felt the cleaning and cooking really fell to the weigh side with us both working, and in reality we can live off of Matt's salary, so I'm going to focus on taking care of him and our home.  I'm also going to focus on my writing, but that idea is still in the process of being thought out, so stay tuned.

In the spring, my family came and visited.  We gave them the tourist treatment, and then we became tourists ourselves and traveled to Orlando and did the Universal theme parks.  It was a lot of fun and it was great to see everyone.

We're planning an epic road trip this summer, where we're literally going to hit both coasts and a bunch in between.  We're going to see my family in California, Matt's family in Iowa, and then hit Virginia to visit some friends.  And in between we're going to see caves, aliens, buffalo, a crazy house, a cracked bell and a mountain with faces in it.  It's all going to be very exciting and fun.

Now that I'm going to be home full time, I promise to be better at updating this thing!!  Until then, DFTBA!