A Day In Incirlik Village 2009

Since Karen and I have been feeling a little better, we decided to venture into the Village today. Our firt stop was by the furniture store to see how the jewelry box Karen is having made is coming along.  This is where we bought Katie's bedroom furniture.  Katie says to Sunny, "That stuff is really nice."

Then Karen and I went by The Turkish Turtle to have spicey chicken sandwiches and Efes beer.
The village is actually in the process of removing their above-ground-wiring.  It's been funny to watch the process.  First, they just dug a two-foot deep trench in front of all the stores all the way down the street.  They didn't put any caution tape up or any warning signs.  The merchants just layed down pieces of wood across the trench and that's how people were expected to get across if they wanted to get into a store.  After the wiring was laid they didn't repave the street, they just covered the trench with rock.  You can sort of see this in the bottom left of the above picture.  The underground-wiring is not yet active and they haven't actually wired to the stores.  So what does a merchant do to get ready for the new underground wiring?  How can you access the new wiring if it doesn't come into your store?  Well you just drill a trench up to your front door!

But what if your electrical cords don't reach the sidewalk?  How can you power your jack hammer? No problem.  Just climb up to the still active, above-ground-wiring and plug directly in!
We also saw the bakery cart come by with baklava and other pastries.

I negotiate a shrewd business deal for some baklava.

A nice day back out in the village.  

Pack Me Up And Ship Me Home

"Just mail me home," says Slinky!  Even the Little Ghost is ready to go.  Just a quick note to let everyone know that things have been a little better lately.  Karen is doing well with traction therapy and loosing weight, all of which helps alleviate pressure on the spine.  Patrick is feeling better after a two week battle with some form of stomach virus.  We finally managed to both get back on the healthy track and are looking forward to a few adventures as we prepare for what may be our final Air Force PCS.

6 Months And Counting

I wanted to thank everyone for their concerns about how we are doing.  I haven't been on line much as we have really been focused on Karen and just getting through each day.  The good news is we have about six months left and should be watching the sun set and rise in America by September at the latest.  Hopefully, closer to early August.

Karen is doing much better but it still is difficult. She has returned back to work.  We found out she has one herniated disc in her lower back and one bulging disc (not quite herniated).  As the herniated disc protrudes out it touches and irritates the sciatic nerve causing extreme pain, numbness, and even muscle spasms down the entire length of her right leg.  The first time the spasms hit we ended up at the Medical group and they literally had to give her morphine to calm the spasms down.  The second time was almost as bad but we didn't go to the medical clinic.  So the plan is six months of good diet and light exercising with stretching.  We are hoping that can help alleviate the pressure on the nerve and Karen can avoid surgery.  Karen has definitley improved and can get through the day by being careful and moderating pain with medication. But walking long distances or standing is out.  As is lifting Katie or holding her while standing.

So it has been very hard on both of us I think.  Hard on me because I do almost everything around the house or with Katie, but even harder on Karen because she has to endure the pain and wants to carry Katie around very much.  

The Air Force certainly isn't making things any easier.  I have once again found myself in the position of working for a Medical Group that thinks nine hours days are not long enough.  So it's mandatory ten hour days right now. Except, I actually have to get up between 0400-0430 in order to get Katie up dressed, fed, changed, and to daycare.  So as far as I'm concerned they are 12 hour days.  And the drug testing job is the worse job I have ever had in my 27 years of working.  I'd rather be washing dishes back at Pantera's Pizza.  The job itself isn't too bad - it's the status and support of the program that are the big problems.  Karen has been able to start helping out with folding clothes and a little cooking while sitting on a stool.  But I would be lying if I didn't say it's been hard.  Katie is really the only thing that makes the day worth it for us right now.  We really need to be home and near friends and family at a time like this.

Which brings us to our friends and family.  Thank everyone so much for all the stuff everyone has been sending.  It has been just astounding how much stuff people have been sending us.  So thanks for everyone's concerns.  We are making the best of the situation and will continue to post as able.  

Patrick & Karen Dwyer Blogging Hiatus

I will be limiting posts on this site for the near future.  As many of you may know, Karen has been experiencing some extreme sciatic nerve pain.  This has progressed rather severely since last Friday and we really need to look at how we spend our time and money.  At this point we are not sure what the future holds as far as Karen working, medical treatment, our ability to afford daycare, and many other "Incirlik" complications.  I think it best if we focus on being ready to get out of here so when the time comes we have everything in order.  Karen is having a tough time and all I can say is she is my hero for ever more. 

2009: The Year of The Dwyer's Escape From Midnight Express

The Dwyer's spent New Year's Eve at a Turkish carpet store in The Alley in Incirlik Village.   One of the local carpet guys often throws parties.  We didn't have anywhere to go on New Year's Eve so Karen did a little talking and found a party to crash.  I had told Karen I didn't want to spend New Year's Eve being pressured to buy carpets.  But it wasn't like that at all.  The owner, Nuri, had food catered and served beer.  He was very nice and never even discussed his carpets unless you asked him a question about them.  For some reason it's difficult for many of the Turk's to understand that Americans don't like pressured sales.  Nuri seems to have picked up on this long ago and it seems to pay off well for him.  I heard he sold $10,000 in carpets on New Year's Eve. 

Below: Katie models the hand made sweater Major Alicia Edward's bought her. Notice the buttons are actually Turkish "evil eyes."
Katie has removed her sweater to reveal the beautiful party dress made by her Zia Enrica Malone:

The carpets come out and people start looking:

Katie only made until about 9PM and really started to fuss.  She fell asleep on the cold walk home.  We stopped by our neighbors with the intention of seeing midnight with Katie but she woke up there and fussed util we took her home.  I think I fell asleep about 12:15 while Karen was talking to her Dad on the phone.

Dwyer's Christmas 2008

My concept of Octonodecembuary is that once you decorate for Halloween every day becomes a blur that can make Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's Eve, and Valentine's Day just seem like one quick month. Plus, I have my birthday in December, Karen has hers in January, and we have five close friends and family birthdays in there as well. So the most important thing of all is to make sure you don't let anyone rush you through it because time flies when you're having fun.

This Christmas was no exception. Katie Marie Dwyer's first Christmas ! ! ! It was hard getting prepared. We had "the incident" at the mosque in Adana that set back our decorating one entire week. And work...work has been very busy in December. With Karen having sciatic nerve problems, me not getting any time off due to base drug testing needs, and not having seen our friends and family in over 16 months - it has been tough. But it has also been one of the best Christmases ever just because of Katie. She can light up your day like....well, like a Christmas tree.

Karen and I want to thank all of our friends and family for everything they have done for us. Especially during the Christmas holidays. It was amazing how much stuff everyone sent us. I could go on for days and not have said enough about that.

I am going to just let the pictures tell our story. The first one above is Katie's first "face-to-face" with Santa Claus on Christmas eve day at the CDC. She had seen him at the tree lighting ceremony. But here she gets to really check him out and tug on his beard.

The Christmas season started with the tree lighting ceremony. The gradeschoolers put on a great performance. The video is very dark but it sounds great and you get the idea:

Below is 3am Christmas eve after Karen and I finally finshed getting the house just right:

Below: ELMO! ! ! ! Elmo does abso-frig-lutely everything. And I mean everything. He even farts and tells two minute stories. I am not kidding. Sometimes he will say, "Elmo has something to tell you. Squeeze Elmo's nose." And when you do he farts and says, "Excuse Elmo."

Below: Karen and Katie opening presents:

Below: the Grinch rears his head:

Below: A young girl after a very tiring first Christmas:

Starbucks At Incirlik Air Base

Starbucks has opened at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey!  And this is not a "We Proudly Serve..." but a full-blown Starbucks with mugs, desserts, and wifi.  In fact, I believe this is the first full-sized Starbucks in all of USAFE.  The base had been trying to get Starbucks to come in on a smaller scale but once Starbucks Turkey saw the base and the captured market, Starbucks offered to put in a full store.  I heard they paid for 100% of the construction in exchange for being able to keep all profits for the first year.  Sounds fair to me.  Thank you Starbucks!  

Karen and I love our Starbucks.  I don't care how commercialized people claim it is.  The ambiance and smell offer a comfort feeling that reminds us of home.  I'm a pop culture junkie anyway.  We spent four years at the intersection of Black Mountain and Mira Mesa in San Diego, where they literally had afour Starbucks - we miss our coffee!  We bought Starbucks thermoses that say "Turkey" on them.  They are the yellow ones onb the shelf in the photo above.  We also bought a little bear wearing a Starbucks 2008 jacket and waving a Turkiye (Turkey)  banner. We are hoping they will bring in mugs that say "Starbucks Incirlik" but we will see.  Starbucks may not want their name going on mugs with the name of a military base on it.  Incirlik is also the name of the village outside the base so it still could happen.

Below Katie is held by one of the Turkish workers on opening day:

Whirling Dervishes In Konya

NOTE: BE SURE TO CHECK OUT THE VIDEO OF THE DERVISHES AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST.

Karen and I went to Konya on December 14th to see the "real" Whirling Dervishes. It was a long five hour trip up into the mountains and a sort of high desert area that looked a lot like the Antelope Valley near Edwards Air Force Base.   I took the above picture myself.

A quick Wikipedia explanation: "The Mevlevi Order or the Mevleviye are a Sufi order founded by the followers of Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Balkhi-Rumi, a 13th century Persian poet, Islamic jurist, and theologian, in Konya(in present-day Turkey). They are also known as the Whirling Dervishes due to their famous practice of whirling as a form of dhikr (remembrance of Allah).  The Mevleviye, one of the most well known of the Sufi orders, was founded in 1273 by Rumi's followers after his death, particularly by his successor Hüsamettin Çelebi who decided to build a mausoleum for Mevlâna, and then Mevlâna's son, Sultan Veled Celebi (or Çelebi, Chelebi, meaning "fully initiated"). He was an accomplished Sufi mystic with great organizing talents. His personal efforts were continued by his successor Ulu Arif Çelebi. The Mevlevi, or "The Whirling Dervishes", believe in performing their dhikr in the form of a "dance" and music ceremony called the sema.

The Sema represents a mystical journey of man's spiritual ascent through mind and love to "Perfect." Turning towards the truth, the follower grows through love, deserts his ego, finds the truth and arrives at the "Perfect." He then returns from this spiritual journey as a man who has reached maturity and a greater perfection, so as to love and to be of service to the whole of creation.

The sema was practised in the semahane (ritual hall) according to a precisely prescribed symbolic ritual with the dervished whirling in a circle around their sheikh, who is the only one circling around his axis. The dervishes wear a white gown (symbol of death), a wide black cloak (hirka) (symbol of the grave) and a high brown cap (kûlah), symbol of the tombstone.

The Mevlevi Order was outlawed in Turkey at the dawn of the secular revolution and the dervish lodge was converted to Mevlana Museum in Konya by Kemal Atatürk. In the 1950s, the Turkish government legalized the Mevlevi order as an association and began allowing the Whirling Dervishes, who are chosen among the members of this authentic Mevlevi sect, to perform annually in Konya on the Urs of Mevlana, December 17, the anniversary of Rumi's death.^[1] In 1971, they performed in London with Kani Karaca as lead singer. In 1972, they toured North America for the first time with Kani Karaca, Ulvi Erguner, and Akagündüz Kutbay among the musicians. They performed in France, for Pope Paul VI, and at the Brooklyn Academy of Musicand other venues in the United States and Canada - under the direction of the late Mevlevi Shaikh Suleyman Hayati Dede. In April 2007 the order initiated another tour of the U.S. where they performed to sold-out crowds, in places such as Denver and San Francisco.

The order is still active in Turkey, currently led by the 20th great-grandson (22nd generation descendant) of Rumî, Faruk Hemdem Çelebi."

So I guess Rumî, Faruk Hemdem Çeleb is the guy in the picture in the black robe on the right side of the floor.  We were glad we went to see such a unique event but ten hours on a mini-bus is a long time.

This was also the longest time we left Katie alone. We left at 0600 in the morning and did not get home until around 1100 PM. Thanks to Larissa and Chris Cook for watching Katie on her first "long day" away from Mom and Dad.

OK. There are some errors on here I just can't fix. For example "Katie" text above being wrapped around so the "e" drops to the next line. The software literally won't let me correct it. Just part of living in Turkey I guess.

Our Turkish Christmas Birds

Two birds have been sleeping in our vine outside our front door every night.  I have never seen anything like it.  I didn't know that birds actually get close together and snuggle.  It has been cold here - in the 30s most nights.  And our vine is just about bare at this point.  But these two birds get up there every night just after sunset and snuggle together until the morning sunrise.  When they are puffed up like in this photo they seem to be asleep or almost hibernating.  there eyes are closed and I can actually walk up to about a foot away to take a photo like this.  While we are going in and out the front door in the evening, we walk within three feet of them and they never move.

I'm not sure what type of bird they are.  Our Turkish shoeshine guy at the Medical Group, Jaf, tells me they are Nightingales.  They don't look like the Nightingales I see when I google them.  But perhaps they are some Turkish variation.  

Merry Christmas From Patrick, Karen, Katie, and Slinky Dwyer!

Meeeeerrrrrry Christmas everyone! I have one minute to post this! they now have a time limit set on the computers and they automatically log you off. In fact I am going to log off right.....NOW!

And now I'm logged back on and have 55 more minutes but the library closes in five so let me get in what I can. Octonodecembuary is blowing by and time is literally flying. I posted as many pictures as I could of Katie on her site. She is wonderful and talking (or she thinks she is at least)...a lot! They have made it even harder to do stuff on government computers including at the libarary. Flash drives and active x controls are disabled to some extent. I found a way arounfd loading the pics though. Karen had a hell of a time accessing e-mail and Facebooks.

I'm still collecting pee at work. I can only begin to tell whay an absolute thrill that is. I don't actually have to collect it but I have to manage the program. We are trying to get cards and stuff out to everyone but please expect delays. We appreciate everything everyone has done for us or sent us. We miss everyone! Oh, the pedal car. I drove that thing around the entire base perimter - 8 miles. It absolutely killed my legs! It was to raise money for the Combined federal Campiagn.

Our holiday greeting videos ran in St. Louis missouri on KSDK and some station in San Diego. If anyone has a way of capturing that in file format, please send to me. We miss you all. Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night....

The Fence Is Down

I know we posted before that we are enjoying the fence being down. Just wanted to post a few more photos. Below Slinky is amazed to see there is a whole other world on the other side of the fence. This is the first time he was ever able to see past the fence much less walk out the back gate. Remember, we had a five foot tarp around the whole fence.

Another shot of our banana tree. Actually, it's our neighbor's banana tree but this year it has grown so much we have one stalk that has sprouted up on our side of the fence. We have a smaller one on the other side of the yard as well. This tree below is over two stories tall:

Now that Karen's back to work and things have fallen into a routine, we have found time to venture back in the alley. Below is Katie's first trip to a bar. We went to The Turkish Turtle to have their famous chicken sandwich. They were excellent! Below is a shot of Karen and I over by the grafitti wall.

There is a good shot of Katie in the bar that I will post on her site at adayinthelifeofkatiedwyer.blogspot.com

Dwyer's Update

Life is great with Katie. We need 72 hour days but life is great. Just a few updates. We sadly said goodbye to The Matriarch of Incirlik Mental Health, Major Alicia Edwards. She is headed to Misawa, Japan. We received an opening at The CDC (Incirlik Day Care) for Katie, so Karen will be going back to work in early September. We are tentatively planning to get internet services in the coming weeks so hopefully some of our friends and family will hear from us more often. I'm trying to accumulate 15-30 CEUs online in two weeks. It's really tough with trying to work, teach guitar, and have time for Katie but my CADAC expires in September so I'm up against the wall. Can't wait to get the CEUs out of the way. And the strike by Turkish local nationals was averted on base so we will still be able to buy groceries and baby supplies- that's always a good thing. See you soon.

The Return From Germany

I know everyone knows we have made it back to Turkey with Katie, but I haven't had a chance to describe the flight yet. I really try to avoid sounding negative out here. Hopefully, this will only sound funny now that it is over. Here is the story of the the Dwyer's flight from Ramstein to Incirlik.

Let me start by saying I to fly. I used to love to fly. But since 911, it is such a hassle and the airlines provide such crappy service, it's not worth the money any more. And it's such a long ordeal. I don't think it's fair for an airline to say a flight is, for example, 3 hours if you have to arrive at the airport 3 hours early and it takes a minimum of an hour to get your luggage and depart the airport. Well, with Karen and I, our flight adventure started several days before the flight. We flew The Patriot Express or The Rotator, as some people call it. This is a fairly regular flight from USA to Incirlik with a layover at Ramstein or sometimes Ireland. The DoD contracts the entire plane and staff with Orion. We flew what is known as Space Required. This means we have a lower priority than someone moving from one assignment to another but a higher priority than people who are trying to fly Space Available. Space A is essentially catching a free government flight for personal travel. Now, one of the requirements to fly Space R is having official orders saying someone is paying for the flight. Well Karen was on roundtrip orders and I was on roundtrip orders. But Katie had no orders. Incirlik's aerovac office was required to "amend" Karen' orders to show we had a new dependant requiring flight. We were ble to get Katie's emergency passport back from Frankfurt on Friday, 18 July. So I started calling Incirlik's aerovac office to get Katie's orders so we could fly back to Turkey on Wednesday, the 23rd. Incirlik kept telling me there was one guy that could amend the orders and he would be back later...which turned into by 4 o'clock...which turned into "call back Monday." So on Monday I called. This time later turned into "after lunch" which then became "...he's actually not going to be in today. Try back Tuesday." In the meantime, I have Ramstein's passenger terminal telling me I had to have the orders in by the day prior to the flight. So when i got up on Tuesday, we had eight hours left for Incirlik to get me the orders. Adn the I still had to GET them to Ramstein. Remember, we were not at Ramstein but at Landstuhl about 5 miles away. I start to call back every hour and I finally reqch the guy and he says, "Sgt Dwyer, don't worry about it. I do this all the time. Sometimes I even get the orders to the terminal five minutes before the flight." Now, the guy cutting me the orders is a great guy. I know him. But I find myself saying, "Well, yeah, maybe you have gotten them there five minutes before the flight before - but Ramstein is telling me that won't work." And Ramstein has the plane! So I was leaning towards their point-of-view. I finally got the orders around 1PM, just 2 and a half hours before the Incirlik guy went home.

So now we rush over to Ramstein to turn in the orders around 6PM the night before the flight. You would think sigh-of-relief and good-to-go right? Nope. They looked at my paperwork as if they had never seen anything like it on our planet before. But after a half an hour they said we were checked in and all we had to do was, the next day, go to a specific counter they pointed out to me and get our seats. The flight would be around 1:50 PM and we were to show at...ready for this...9PM! Almost five hours before the flight.

The 23rd rolls around and Karen and I are out of bed before 5am so we can pack, clean the room, check out, and get to Ramstein. All is well. I go up to the counter and they say, "No you have to go to that counter over there." "Are you sure? We went to that counter last night." So I go to that counter and they say there is no record of us having ever checked in and again looked at our paperwork as if they were written in another language. They finally figure it out and simply say they have redone what must have fallen out of the system. Whatever. At least I can now check my luggae over at the last counter. Until I hear, "There is no record of you having checked into the system." I explain that this would be the third time we have tried to check in the system. This time it takes even longer but when I leave the counter we all have boarding passes so I didn't care what the system thought after that.

So then we cram onto the flight with a bunch of people Incirlik bound and so more that will be continuing on to the Kyrgyz Republic. Finally get situated. We get a row of five seats for the three of us. Plenty of room and katie is being perfect. We ate our meal and were about one half hour into the movie when we hear the pilot say, "Attention. We need to announce that we are turning around and heading back to Ramstein. We have a hdraulic leak that is causing the landing gear not to move automatically. We will lower the landing gear manually so you will hear some noise. Unfortunately, this warrants attention back at Ramstein." Well crap. We were finally three hours from home and now we have no idea when we will get home. Then a second announcement, "We will not be heading to Ramstein. Instead, the US military has requested we land at the former Hahn Air Base." hahn is near Ramstein by the village of Lautzenhausen. When we landed, I heard an officer behind me say he could see a line of hydraulic fluid on the runway as we were towed back to the other end of the runway after landing. This was probably true as a fire truck and two safety vehicles seemed to follow our path scrubbing the runway where we had been.

Once we arrived to the spot where they were going to attempt to repair the aircraft, they had us disembark with our carry-on luggage. We were bused about five minutes away to a VERY SMALL terminal and told we could not leave the area. The plan was to fix the plane before 11PM as the flight crew could not take off after midnight due to flying restrictions. This part was . Some people did very well. A lot of the active guys moving on to deployment just played cards and drank beer. But we had an 8-day old baby! Katie did well but got fussy after a few hours. We went through several feeding and diaper cycles. We started to get worried because there was no place for Karen to pump or breast feed and we were down to only three bottles of formula. And Katie was really starting to fuss. We couldn't get her to sleep because all the other kids on the flight where running around screaming, but we couldn't take her to the quiet area where the soldiers where sleeping because we didn't want to wake them up. I was completely convinved they were going to send us to a hotel when they announced the plane was fixed about 10:45PM. So we made it in the air by midnight and landed at Incirlik after 4 am, 24 hours after we got up to head to the airport for our "four-hour flight."

One other funny note about the flight. At one point, Karen was trying to sleep with her head on a card table in the corner of the room. We had also just gotten Katie to sleep. Well a lady three tables over was playing cards and continuously shuffleing the cards very loudly. No big deal. But I guess her husband and teenage son were getting irritated beccause they couln't sleep due to her shuffleing. So what did she do? She moved over next to us and started shuffleing! Her famil asked her to move because she was too loud so she came nect to karen and an 8-day old baby to keep them awake. We just moved (we moved several times due to other similar incidents). So the funny part is the women turns out to be the wife of a very high ranking Medical Group leadership member. They were on their way to Incirlik! It's going to be interesting when I say, "Yes, I have met your wife. We were on that flight together."

I wanted to document this here. It's not that I'm furious about the whole thing. I mean, it was a pain, but now it's just a good story. I just want Katie to someday be able to read about the ordeal she went through to get back home...or at least back to Turkey. Home will come later.

Two Quick Videos of Katie Dwyer

Video of Katie at Landstuhl NICU a few hours after birth. Watch for the bubble:

"Finally at home in my crib at Incirlik in Turkey! Turkey....where the hell is Turkey? Why am I in Turkey? Listen and you can hear my pacifier click."

Dwyer's Are Back in Turkey

I'll tell the story later. A few pics for now:

Just an hour or so after birth. NICU has placed a bow in Katie's hair and tried to make her comfortable as possible:

First day out of hospital...and first smile! Great to see - gas or not:

First pediatric appointment. "I am really bored and don't want to be here." Just prior to this shot Katie had tried to lift her head and look at Karen. This caused her to look like she was rolling her eyes and then she fell into her favorite contemplative position:

Our flight home from Germany was diverted in mid-air due to an in-flight emergency. They landed at the former Hahn Air Base and we had to sit in a SMALL terminal for 6-8 hours. Karen and Kattie trying to get some sleep on the floor:

"Finally, back home and in my brand new crib!"

Kitty and Katie get along just fine. We never leave them alone and always supervise interactions just to be sure:

Taken today:

Katie Marie Dwyer - Director's Cut

To start with, we want to make sure everyone knows Katie is just fine. She has been released from the Landstuhl hospital and has been staying with us in lodging since Thursday night. I have a ton of pictures but will again have to wait for posting as I can not load from this computer at the Landstuhl library. So here is the story of Katie Marie's birth...

Karen and I checked in to Labor and Delivery around 5:30 PM on Sunday, 13 July 2008. Karen was scheduled to be induced. Now, I want to say before I start that EVERYONE we dealt with concerning the birth was fantastic. but there were some interesting moments that we can laugh about now. To begin with, when we checked in, we still weren't sure if they were going to induce with a gel or a a "fully bulb" or "fully bowl" - I'm not sure how you pronounce it, but basically it's a little balloon they stick up a pregnant women's hoo-ha and slowly inflate to induce labor. Karen was reluctant to go the hoo-ha route. So we get settled in the room and we hear this guy outside our door say, "OK I'm going in - wish me luck." Then this 18-year old kid walks in and says "I'll be getting you started." So we are thinking he's going to insert the balloon. Karen says, "Have you ever done this before?" The kid answers back "Well, I did one earlier today." Fortunately, we learned he was only talking about starting the IV - but his experience wasn't much better with the IV. He stuck Karen two or three time and could not find a vein. Then the nurse came in and tried - same results. Turns out Karen has small veins up by the wrist and they had to call the anesthesiologist and have them find the vein. During this time they also checked Karen's dilation and told us they preferred to use the gel and not the balloon. Karen was agreeable to that. So they got the gel in, started the IV, and also started Karen on Patosum (spelling?), a medication that also helps increase contractions. This is when it got interesting.

Karen wanted to wait as long as she could for the epidural. When you get the epidural you loose all leg movement. So for quite a while we continued without the epidural. The only problem was we expected to get some sleep. However, they would come in and do a check on Karen every hour or so, and when they did the internal checks it made her have to go to the bathroom. So neither of us slept more than 10 minutes the first night. As daylight rose on the 14th, Karen's contractions became more intense and she finally reached around 4-5 centimeters dilation. Around this time Karen asked for the epidural. I think they tried 2-3 times at this point. But the first insertion didn't seem to go where they wanted and when they finished they were still uncertain if they had a good spot. The epidural is somewhat of a chance procedure if I understand it correctly. Once they get through the cartilage, it's kind of a roll of the dice that the wire will go the direction they want and evenly distribute the medication. Karen's hit her left side perfectly, but she still felt everything in her right side. As the contractions became stronger, they tried different thing like rolling her to one side to get the pain meds to shift. Nothing seemed to work and it got to a point in the afternoon where she was feeling every contraction intensely. They offered to readminister the epidural but Karen was reluctant to go through all that a second time. She settled for having some form of alternative narcotic administered through the epidural. That also had no effect. I don't remember exact time but I remember thinking Karen went through four hours of intense contractions every sixty seconds without the epidural working. Finally, she said she didn't think she could take much more and asked for the epidural to be reattempted. It was much more difficult to go through the procedure because Karen had lost feeling in one leg and was much more exhausted at this point. But she had to sit up straight on the side of the bed for the epidural to be administered. But we managed to pull it off and this time she was feeling nothing in about a half an hour. We were actually able to snooze for 10-20- minutes at a time for about two hours now. They told us Karen would deliver "...sometime tonight."

Well, she almost made it. Doctor Sewell said Katie didn't want to be born on Bastille Day. The labor started getting more intense and Karen was up in the straps pushing. Very exhausting but no pain. I saw her head about five minutes before she came out all the way, and I remember thinking, "Well she is smaller than I thought." But that was because of the head compression. After, Katie went back up inside, Karen continued to push without getting results. That's when the dod said he might have to consider the vacuum after another 10-20 minutes. It only took karen a few pushes after that comment. When she came out the second time, she kept coming and coming and then I though, "Oh she's actually bigger than I imagined." In reality Katie was quite small at 6.5 pounds but it sure is a lot to come out down there. She has very long legs and big feet. She was born on 15 July 2008, at 4 minutes after midnight.

Earlier we asked what would happen when Katie came out. Would they just hand her to mom and then clean her, or clean her and hand her to mom? The nurse told us they would clean her a little and hand her to mom unless there was a need to address something first, which sometimes happens. We knew something was up when we started seeing two to three other people show up and set up at the side. Then we heard Dr Sewell say, "The chord is around the baby's neck. I had to cut the chord but be sure to make note of that." She was literally white when she came out and didn't cry although I could see arm and leg movement. Then I heard little cries as they took her to the warming table and began to work with a manual oxygen pump and clean her up. The table was only about ten feet from Karen so she could see everything. They seemed to be trying to clear her lungs and getting her to breathe OK. It all happened so fast it was hard to have time to really think. Then they asked me to cut the umbilical chord, which I did. But that made me think everything must be going OK. Then the NICU doc walked over to Karen and said, "I'm going to make this fast. You can kiss her and then I'm going to be gone." And Karen did. And the doc was - gone. In the 5 seconds it took me to decide whether to stay with Karen or go with the baby, they literally had her down the hall and hooked up to tubes and were working on an IV.

It was all very scary but I was able to watch and stay with Katie. About two hours later Karen was able to clean up and make her way down by wheel chair. It was very hard for Karen. They had Katie on breathing assistance, warming, and an IV. Then they had Karen move to the Mother/Baby unit around 4 in the morning. At this point we had been up for almost 48 hours without ever sleeping more than a half hour. I went to back to our hotel room which is less than a quarter mile from the Mother/Baby unit.

I got 4 hours sleep and went back over 9am. Karen had already gotten up and had the nurse wheel her over to NICU. She was able to hold Katie. When I got there we went up again and this time I was able to hold her as well - that's the picture in the previous post. Things were looking much better for Katie. All the tubes had been removed from her nose and she was maintaining her own body temperature. I don't remember a lot of details from this day except that in our mind this was the day after Katie was born, but in reality it was the same day. This really made us loose track of getting sleep. I do remember that we again slept apart on Tuesday night, meeting up again on Wednesday morning.

On Wednesday, they moved Karen and to her own room where I could spend the night with her in a chair. And in the afternoon the moved Katie down to the unit with us! There where and are still things to watch for but we were very happy to have Katie with us. They explained to us that babies are very adaptable during birth. When a chord gets wrapped around a babies neck, they instinctively know to let there lower body organs (liver, kidneys) take a hit so they can protect the brain. They think this is what Katie did. They believe her liver experienced a bit of shock but that the brain was just fine. When she came out she had a hard time breathing but was able to recover from that and they don't see any current problems with the liver - but that will continued to be monitored. Hearing and vision test are just fine. She is a little low on iron right now and receives an extra .3ml per day.

Wednesday night we again got almost no sleep. We were finally all together but in a 15ft x 15 ft room with a bed, a lounge chair, a bassinet, a sink, and a computer stand. It was crowded. I finally left Karen and went across the hall to family lounge and watched TV all night. Luckily, on Thursday morning they said they would release Mom and baby in the afternoon. Good thing. Thursday became really frustrating. I don't blame anyone. Everyone was just so concerned and trying to make sure we were OK. What happened was we would get seen back the lactation nurse, the attending nurse, the Labory and Delivery unit, New Parent Support Program, the technicians for vitals. And they were all so adamant, "You have to feed her every two hours!" But we couldn't because they kept coming in. Finally, I had to say, "Look you all have to stop bothering us - you keep telling us to feed her every two hours but it's now been four because we can't get any privacy." I think that was the trigger that made them rush getting us released, since all tests on Katie were good. So we all ended up free together for the first time around 5PM on Thursday back at the hotel room.

Katie's first visitor outside the hospital was Karen's boss from Edward's Air Force Base, Tom Burkett and his wife Karin. They gave us a card and Katie a pink blanket that Karin calls a "snuggle blanket - because it is cold in Germany." It says, "A star is born."

Katie's first trip was to the Landstuhl dining hall on Friday for lunch. On Sunday she also went to Ramstein's Chili's, the Ramstein BX, and the Vogelway Commissary. We received Katie's emergency passport and Birth Abroad certificate on Friday. Hopefully, Katie will be flying to her new home at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey this coming Wednesday. Pictures to come.

Katie's Arrival Approaches

I was joking to Karen that if you look at our blog, it looks like we are on a giant vacation. Let me assure everyone there is a lot of other stuff going on. Our storknesting sponsor, Robin, has gone exceptionally above and beyond in getting us out of lodging and showing us the area. But we also are spending a lot of time taking care of the things that need to get done.

So today, I'm including just some of the things we are working on a daily basis on, such as...documents. Document, documents, documents! We have to apply for an emergency passport for Katie, a birth certificate for Katie, and a social security card for Katie. Plus, we also have to file a notice of birth abroad and get all of this expedited for through the American consulate and returned as quickly as possible after the birth. The American consulate gladly charges us $150 for that privilege - seems like it should be free for service members on a government directed move overseas. Then, once we get Katie back to Turkey we have to give Turkey $85 to allow Katie to be in Turkey. We have to pay close attention to all these document dates because Turkey is known for giving out one year residency permits that expire just before families are scheduled to leave Turkey forcing the families to purchase a second residency permit they only need for a matter of days to weeks.

Karen is also continuing with regular fetal monitoring at NST. They check the baby's heartbeat and movement along with Karen's blood pressure. All have been fine including Karen's blood pressure which has actually been excellent lately.

We also work on things such as preparing the labor bag, reading up on parenting, and taking care of other necessities. For example, last night Robin and Andy had us over for dinner but we also took the time for Robin to show Karen how the breast pump works and answer any questions Karen had.

On days we stay at Landstuhl, we sleep late, go to NST, each lunch, do our laundry, and try to keep in touch with those we can. Today we see the doctor at 1500 and will ask some last minute questions we have thought of. Then Karen has an NST on Friday. On Sunday, we are back in the evening for Karen to be induced. We don't expect anything to happen until Monday though. Karen and Katie will stay in the hospital a minimum of 48 hours. If all goes well, we would hope Karen and Katie could be released by Wednesday and that we receive our documentation back by Thursday. This would allow us to take the rotator flight back to Turkey a week from this Friday - however, more than likely we will have to wait on some paperwork and would be looking at the following week. We are hoping we can catch a rotator back because this allows to land at Incirlik and not have to catch a civilian flight into Adana.

If we are on base we can chose between three of Landstuhl top 5 dining choices: the Chow Hall, the Community Club, Burger King, Sub Way/Anthony's Pizza, or The Cappuccino Shop...actually those are ALL the dining choices. But we make do and the Chow Hall is quite good for my taste buds.

Tomorrow, the tentative plan is for our Storknesting sponsor to take us to Trier after Karen's NST appointment. Trier is the oldest city in Germany and is located close by near Luxembourg. It was established by the Romans over two thousand years ago.

This gives you a little "behind-the scenes-look" at how we spend a lot of our time. The hospital has fixed some of the computers in the cyber-lounge. Now there are 6 working computers instead of 2. So, hopefully, I'll have a few more posts before Katie arrives.

Karen is in Germany

Karen arrived in Germany Friday night. It was a little confusing getting out but she made it. They are never actually able to give you the exact time until just before the flight, because of security issues. But we knew it was on Friday. But we also knew it was going to be late. They let you check your bags in a day early if you are actually flying on a boarding pass. When we checked in at 9 on Thursday the plane hadn't even left Baltimore yet and they seemed to know it would be pretty late. They told us not to check in on Friday until 1230 when it was originally 7AM. Then it got confusing. AFN (Air Force News - our TV) was saying check in at 1300, the phone said something else, but they said 1145 on the phone. So we went at 1145 and they said come back at 2. But she was able to get on and depart around 3-4PM. Karen said the flight was fine. We managed to talk the Turkish counter agent into giving her an aisle seat. Sounds like he even did one better as Karen said she had mega foot room and it almost seemed like first class. They did have to stay on the flight line for about an hour in Germany because of rain and lightning. She said they almost actually diverted the flight. Thank goodness that didn't happen. I will let Karen tell you the rest:

"Yes I am now in Germany and oh my gosh it is so beautiful here! Everything is so green and I am surrounded by lush green trees and grass. I love it here! I just wish Patrick were here with me, I know he will love it too. It is kind of like St Louis without the humidity. My flight was wonderful. They gave me a great seat at the front of the plane. I was surrounded by guys coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan. They had all been away for a year and were headed home. They were such great guys, asking me all kinds of questions about having a baby in Turkey. They thought I made the right decision to come here to Germany instead of Ankara. My boss from Edwards meet me at the Terminal and one of the other ladies that I worked with was there too visiting her daughter who is stationed here so we all went to dinner. It was so yummy to have good ol American food that tasted good. I was in heaven! I had a huge BBQ pulled pork sandwich. Today I am at the hospital and had my first subway sandwich in a about a year and they have a cyber-cafe with plenty of computers so I can keep in touch with you all. I am getting so excited to see my little Katie. She will be here soon. I am so weepy all the time too. I am feeling great. My back is hurting today as my bed is kind of hard. We have a feather bed on top of our mattress at home so I didn't sleep too great. She is sitting on my bladder a lot too so it makes it hard to walk very far. I am hoping I will be able to sightsee anyway. There are so many things here to do and see. My old boss is taking me to brunch at the officers club tomorrow morning. He said they have these awesome crab legs and shrimp. YUM! Do you see a theme running here. FOOD!! My room here is really nice too. I can tell that they just remodelled them recently. I even have a flattop stove and lots of windows looking out at the woods. I sure am not going to want to go back to Turkey! The air is so clean too. I went outside this morning and took a big breath of fresh air. It smelled so good with all the trees around and it had been raining. You just can't believe how bad the air is where we are in Turkey. Well, that's about it for now. I am just wandering around my little area here. I have a dr appointment Monday afternoon and a bunch of paperwork to fill out. I will keep you updated on my adventures here."

It's amazing how many people we know seems to be in or heading to Germany. Karen's old boss Tom Burkett is there. Alice, another lady Karen worked with for a while at NAF Human Resources Edwards AFB is also there. She also came along to pick Karen up. And Dr. Soto, my supervisor from Edwards is arriving for an assignment at Ramstein in August. Well I still have to grocery shop and clean today - it's harder to get by with just one! Oh, almost forgot that I do have Karen's number to her hotel and room. If you want it shoot me an e-mail or call. Karen and I can talk for free via Government DSN line, She said they advertise about 40 cents a minute for commercial lines. I'm not sure what it would cost someone dialing in though. See that's one other thing they don't tell people who are choosing to have the baby in Ankara. You have to pay for every phone call there. Expensive! Bye Karen. Love you and see you in Germany.

Katie's Nursery at Incirlik

Welcome to Katie's Nursery. Remember to let these load fully. Sometimes you have to click on the play button twice but make sure you have given it plenty of time to load before trying a second time. The video will start off sideways but quickly adjust.

And everyone keeps asking to see Karen's Buddha-belly. So here she is:

Our Turkish Bassinet

We finally brought home our Turkish bassinet! We think it turned out perfect. Now remember, this was our third trip. And when we go to the store, the guy that's there speaks not a word of English. Since we only know the most basic of greetings and thank yous in Turkish, communication can be funny. To recap, the first time we were there the guy called his brother-in-law who spoke "a little English." He said come back in one week. We did, but it still was not ready. The guy called his brother-in-law again and he was trying to get us to come back on Monday. We were having a hard time getting him to understand we had to wait until Saturday. With all the communication problems, we were only able to get across that we wanted the white and blue bassinet they had but that we wanted it done in white and pink. But we had no specifics on design other than that. As you can see, it came complete with white and pink, as we asked, but with a sleeping kitty cat design that Karen just loves. We all were lauging when we picked it up. We had to ask my boss, Major Alicia Edwards, to go over with us in her SUV because the bassinet wouldn't fit into our car. I followed them in our Toyota but we became separated at the light. By the way, we went right by the stork on the way over - saw her again - and yesterday we sat two storks in the nest! So Karen and Alicia got there first. I guess the guy came up and was just speaking Turkish as fast as he could as if they understood. Karen said Alicia got the funniest look on her face like the guy was crazy because he was talking like they understood Turkish and of course they did not. But the workers pointed to the crib and when Karen realized it was hers and ready - she was very happy. The workers were smiling and very proud of themselves. But Alicia said, "I don't understand. If they don't understand anything you said how did they know to put cats on there?" We tried to explain it was a coincidence but Alicia kept saying, "That doesn't make any sense to me - I mean how would they know to put the cats on there? Did Slinky make a call?"

In the first shot you are looking from above. The heart pillow and pink pillow under the cats are removable. the cats are actually own a removable blanket. In the second shot you can see the sleeping kitty on the front.

The third shot shows the woodwork. It is a very nice bamboo-type wood except much darker and stronger. Everything was made by hand. So we are hoping the furniture will arrive on Wednesday. We have two dressers for Katie, the Camel bar, and a homemade Turkish rocking horse on the way. We bought a lot of stuff at The Praktiker store (kind of a Turkish Lowes) over the weekend for Katie's room. Curtain rod, bamboo shade, storage. May not post for a little bit as next weekend is all about Katie's room. Also, we have received so many nice things from everyone! Thanks everybody. The help has been much appreciated.