3/28/09  -  posted by Hogers at 9:05 PM  -  5 Comments

Eat, Pooh, Sleep. That pretty much sums up the first week at home for Allie. I guess it should be no surprise since that is what babies do. Allie will sleep like a rock for a few hours. Then she'll wake up, I'll change her diapers, Judy will feed her and then she'll stare around at the ceiling for awhile before falling back asleep again.


I have to admit that I feel a bit guilty because this first week has gone by so smoothly. I'm sleeping 7-8 hours at night since I'm a heavy sleeper and don't wake when Judy wakes up to feed the baby.

Last night, Judy went to bed early...but she tells me to wake her up at 2am so that she can feed the baby. I'm sitting on the couch watching TV, and I'm like "ok, no problem". I have the baby monitor next to me so that I can keep an eye out on Allie. I eventually fall asleep on the couch. Next thing I know, Judy's waking me up saying, "what are you doing?!?" As I slowly wake up, I hear this loud crying coming from the baby monitor..."WAHHHHHH!!!!!". Hahahaha...I guess I sleep so heavily, that I can't even hear the baby monitor when it's next to my ear. I felt so bad...


Being the pessimist that I am, I'm thinking that I'm going to get it bad later since things are going so well right now. Either Allie will turn into the worst colicky baby of all time, or else she'll be this rebellious meechuhn kid when she grows up later. Please Lord...let her be an angel!

3/25/09  -  posted by Hogers at 9:47 AM  -  5 Comments

Allie and Judy were finally discharged from the hospital yesterday after being there for almost six days. It was good to leave the hospital after being there for so long.


The first day home proved to be pretty smooth. Hogan welcomed Allie with his usual curious sniffing, and they were able to sleep together under the sun in the baby room.


The first night turned out to be not as difficult as I had expected. I went to bed around 1:30am, Judy got up to feed the baby once around 2:30am, and then Allie slept all the way until 7am. I'm keeping my fingers crossed and hope that every night turns out to be this easy.


My parents have been here all week, and they had a fun time being able to spend time with their first granddaughter.

3/21/09  -  posted by Hogers at 6:11 PM  -  9 Comments

Allie has had her first visitors in her short 36-hour life up to this point. Allie's family on her mother's side (Judy's brother/wife, mom and dad) stopped by yesterday and friends (Sue, Janet, Steve/Jen, Dan/Caroline, Albert, Song/Jerry) trickled in today.


My parents will be flying in from Chicago tomorrow. I've been trying to shuttle back and forth from home and the hospital so that I can walk Hogan, clean up around the house, and download pictures.

I'm getting worried because I like to play with Allie all the time...even when she's sleeping. I learned this trick from my mom where she would spread open the eye lids of my nephew when he was sleeping...my sister would get so mad when she did that.


I'm also getting worried because Allie isn't as quiet today as she was yesterday. Yesterday, she sounded like a little chicken when she cried. It was so cute. Today she sounds like a freaking hawk. Oh well...I guess we should be happy that she has a healthy cry.

3/20/09  -  posted by Hogers at 12:04 PM  -  5 Comments

Allie Jinju Chang arrived early this morning at 3:10am, coming in at 7lb 15oz and 22 inches. Late last night/early morning, we had a feeling that the baby would not be induced into a natural labor and we finally had to go for a c-section. Mom is recovering well and the baby is now healthy.


I wasn't that worried going into the c-section operating room. Judy was a bit anxious and the anesthesiologist knocked her out with some gas. Everything seemed to be going well until I heard a gasp from the doctors and everybody started to scramble around.

Two doctors and a nurse rushed the baby out of Judy to the baby stand and were furiously working over her. I watched the timer and saw that three and a half minutes went by before hearing a sound from the baby. Finally, the baby let out a healthy cry. Apparently, the baby's thick fecal matter had gotten into its mouth and there was a danger of the baby inhaling and swallowing the fecal matter. But they were able to suction everything out and the baby is now fine.


I've already had five nurses comment how long the baby is (over 22 inches). I have to admit that the only thought going through my head was how the height was going to help her generate clubhead speed for her golf swing (Michelle Wie)...hahaha.

3/19/09  -  posted by Hogers at 9:06 PM  -  11 Comments

It's 9:07pm PST, Judy is sleeping, and there's no baby yet. This is the first time Judy's been able to sleep since Tuesday night. I'm proud of Judy since she's been doing such a good job these past 24 hours and 9 months.


The above shot is the baby monitor hooked up to Judy's belly. The upper line is the baby's heart rate (around 150 bpm) and the lower line is her contractions (around once every two minutes).

I took the risk of slipping out of the hospital to go home and walk Hogan. I was tearing down the side streets between my house and the hospital, yelling at every slow driver that I crossed paths with.

On a more sad note, I'm not sure if Illinois is going to be able to pull out their game with Western Kentucky. Ugh...

 -  posted by Hogers at 6:18 PM  -  3 Comments

So the afternoon is just about over and the labor is progressing slowly but surely. Judy has made some nice progress in dialating from 2cm (in the morning) to 8cm (now). There are some concerns that the baby's head may not be in the *perfect* position...so the nurses just came in to do some "tossing" of judy to help jar the baby into the best position.


I talked to my Dad on the phone today and he asked how I was doing. He said that sometimes labor can be "laborious for the dad" as well. Well, I've been handling the stress pretty well by watching TV and eating italian ice popsicles.

Quote of the day comes from Adam Chae: "There's no return policy on the baby".

 -  posted by Hogers at 5:50 PM  -  5 Comments

So I wake up around 9:30am this morning, even though there have been nurses and doctors coming in and out of the room since 5am. Judy seems to be OK at this point...cervix slowly dialating. I decide to run back home to check on Hogan and grab some more stuff.

When I get home, I pack my soccer bag with a bunch of stuff that I didn't bring 10 hours ago: laptop computer, change of clothes, tooth brush, coffee. My bag feels like it weighs a ton as I go out the door.


I was reminded of that scene in Black Hawk Down where Eric Bana tells the younger guys that they don't need their night vision goggles and other equipment the first time they go out. But the second time they gear up, you see him packing his bag full of stuff. That's what I felt like...with the exception that I was packing my bag with toothpaste instead of night vision goggles.

 -  posted by Hogers at 3:42 PM  -  6 Comments

So after being one week overdue, Judy and I have finally made our way over to the hospital. I went to soccer practice last night and when I got home, Judy was having contractions every five minutes. She told me that we should go to the hospital, so I took my time and took a nice warm shower, took out the trash, fed and walked Hogan, and packed some more stuff into our overnight bag. After that, we did the following:

Day 1
11:00pm - Go to hospital
12:00am - Judy checked in and being monitored
1:30am - Judy in lots of pain due to contractions 3 minutes apart
2:00am - Judy dialated only 2cm
2:30am - Walk around the hospital to encourage baby to move down
4:00am - Eugene falls asleep
5:00am - Judy given medicine to induce labor


Stay tuned as I'll be giving updates here as more stuff goes on. The hospital room here at Cedars Sinai is pretty nice. Nice view of the Hollywood Hills, wireless internet, big room. I pretty much feel like I'm at home...surfing the internet and watching NCAA games. Judy said that all we need is to have Hogan here...hahaha.


Judy's swollen hands. She said that they look like Big Ed Lee's hands...HAHAHA.


View from our hospital room towards the Hollywood hills. Jerry's Deli is at the bottom left hand corner. Judy makes comments every half hour about how she wants to eat Jerry's Deli.

3/17/09  -  posted by Hogers at 5:36 PM  -  2 Comments

That's how I would describe my latest home repair project where I had to use foam insulation to fill in some gaps behind my exterior face boards. In my previous post for building my side porch, we had to take down the gutters in order to build the trellis.


I finally got around to putting the gutters back up. But before doing that, I had to use this aerosol self-expanding insulation foam to fill in the cracks. It was hard to determine how much to use and the pictures pretty much speak for themselves.

3/10/09  -  posted by Hogers at 7:17 PM  -  1 Comments

The question of the day for us has obviously been whether the baby has arrived yet. Well, we're just about at Judy's due date, but the baby has not yet come. In the meantime, here are some pictures of Hogan in the baby's crib:



More Hogan pics here