I’m a Father!

YAY! This last Saturday (Cinco de Mayo) at 7:39 PM, I became a father to a beautiful, healthy little girl, Kaylee Madigan Folts. She was 7 lbs 4 oz. and 19.5 inches long. Contractions started during the Avenger’s movie on Friday night around 9:30, and got more and more frequent and intense. By 12:00 I had called the doctor, as they were getting closer and closer together. By 2:00, we were loading up the car to head to the hospital.

Once we got to the hospital, Christine’s contractions had died down, she felt we were going to be sent home, but boy was she wrong! We were admitted, and eventually they Dr. confirmed that her water had broken and that she was 3cm dilated! It turned out later, it was only leaking, but enough to relieve some of the pain, and they think that is what caused the contractions to die down. Anyway, we were brought to a delivery room at about 4:30, where Christine was prepped. By 6:30 she was in enough pain for an epidural. Christine’s mom and sister were on their way up from Connecticut at this point, and were expected by 7:30 AM.

Well, 7:30 AM rolls around, and we get a call from Alison (Christine’s sister), and she informs us that they were in a car accident literally at the very last stop light pulling into the hospital. This intersection happened to be on the city lines of Boston and Brookline, and be on a state road. So, after figuring out whose jurisdiction it was, they talked to the Police, and a tow truck came and took their car. Finally, at around 9 AM they made it to the room and which gave me the opportunity to relax a little, as I knew there was more people to help.

At around 10:30, Christine’s epidural stopped working, and the pain was even more intense than before, as they had given her medication to help with the contractions. Turns out, that the epidural was able to work its way 4 to 5cm further than it was originally intended. The reason for this seems to have been that during the first procedure, Christine got light headed so the Dr. let her lay down before applying enough tape to be sure it would not slip. Luckily, it slipped further in, as they could simply adjust it and reapply tape (more thoroughly this time). Then the pain went away.

The rest of the day was pretty much sit and wait. The Dr. checked her progress around 2:45, at which point she was only 4cm, so the Dr. investigated further and determined that the water was still (partially) intact. At 3:30ish, they properly broke the water, and again we waited.

Eventually, the Dr. decides that enough time had passed and went to check how things were progressing. “Hmmmm” she says with a big smile, followed by “You’re 10cm dilated.” This is when my adrenaline peaked higher than it has ever ever ever been before. To the point where I had to sit down. All I could think is “Wow, this is about to happen.”

While I was freaking out, I tried (pretty miserably) to play it cool and make Christine not worry. Christine’s mom was calling Alison, as she had left to get some dinner with her dad. Turns out, they had just sat down, and she was just served a large margarita (which was very appropriate for Cinco de Mayo). From her accounts, she downed the whole thing while she was standing up, and then she sprinted back to the hospital.

Luckily, the Dr. had kindly asked Christine to hold off on pushing, as 3 other people were in the process of delivering at that exact same time. That super moon seemed to put everyone in labor, to the point where nurses were working double shifts.

Finally, at around 5:45, we were told she could start pushing. I was taught the count, and away we went. I counted and counted and counted… to the point I was sick of my own hypnotic voice. “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 <with a downward stress>, 10 <with and upward stress>”. At one point, I felt like I was speeding up the count as to help out Christine, turns out the nurse agreed and helped me find my pace again.

The top of the head became visible about an hour into the battle, 15 minutes after that, Kaylee decided it was a good time to get the hiccups… right there in the birth canal. With ever hiccup, you could see her little head jump. It was hilarious!

Pushing continued, and so did my counting… until finally one last big push at 7:39 PM, and there she was. My daughter! I cut the umbilical cord (something I was unsure I could do without passing out, as I almost passed out when I saw Jesse cut Ashlyn’s during her delivery), and then Kaylee was placed onto Christine’s chest.

Welcome to the world Kaylee

Welcome to the world Kaylee! You have made me the happiest man ever! Can’t wait to see you grow up and to experience all these new things that we will get to share!

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New Gig

Man, that was a very hard decision, but in the end I am pretty sure it is the best one! I have picked my next gig and will be working for a company called iFactory. They seem to have an awesome culture. They are also a family oriented business with a good work/life balance. Very nervous, but very excited at the same time.

I think this will be a great next step for me, giving me the opportunity to work with a larger team, with a more back-end focused track. I’ll be working on their core platform that they have built for hosting websites for publishers/dictionaries. Having this experience will make me more well-rounded and I can get as familiar with back-end work as I am with front-end. Though I have done back-end work, my focus has been front-end as the companies I have been with have needed me there the most. Anyway, I can’t wait to get my hands dirty and dive-in.

So between my now and when I start I have to finish getting the house put together (which I had hoped to do while interviewing, but interviewing is harder than a full time job), get my wisdom teeth removed (which will take away from the time I have to get the house ready for the baby), and finally get my hip fixed.

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Decision Time

So, after having 2-3 phone or in-person interviews a day for nearly 3 straight weeks, it is finally time to make a decision as to what it is I want to do as a next step in my career. I have lots of things to consider, from some very different companies.

  1. Which company would allow me to have the best work/life balance? I need to know that I will have time to get to know my daughter, who is on the way in May.
  2. Where can I learn the most, and continue down a path of becoming a well-rounded developer? I really need a place where the people, technologies, and the overall atmosphere foster my personal growth as an engineer.
  3. What salary will support our lifestyle, especially with a baby on the way? While not too important to me, I do need to know that I will be able to afford having a newborn… especially with the cost of daycare in the Boston area.
  4. How do I fit in culturally with the companies? Will I mesh well both personally and professionally with the current processes, policies and people?
  5. How much stability do I need? The job market is hot, which permits more risk, but at the same time, I have a daughter on the way… so where is that sweet spot?
  6. How excited can I get about a company and their product? As anyone who knows me is well aware of, I think people should be excited to go to work everyday. Of course, I am excited about all the places I applied to, but regardless, this is a factor that I need to consider.
  7. Flexibility of hours and working at home? If I have a plumber, or some other sort of service person that needs to come to my house, can I work from home? Or, if I need to run errands in the evening, can I skip the commute so I can do just that.
  8. Location, location, location…. what will the commute be like? One train, two train, a train and a bus, 30 minutes each way, an hour each way? Places to eat, ease of getting to after work events, etc.

Those are all the key points, at least the ones that have enough weight for me to put on the list. I really need to pick a position without having any doubts. The worst situation I could put myself in is accepting something and then always wondering “what if I had gone with company X?”. Of course, nothing will match my awesome story of turning down the chance of millions of dollars by working for Facebook…. I love my wife and have never been more excited (other than the day Christine agreed to marry me, and the day I was married) about the upcoming events in my life. Baby Kaylee wouldn’t be on her way into this world if I had taken Facebook’s offer. B-)

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Allergy Testing

So, I’ve had major swelling in my nasal passage for the past few months and I’ve gone to both my primary care and an ears/nose/throat specialist. At the specialist, they told me that it looks like it is caused by a severe allergy of some sort… So, I scheduled a allergist appointment to get it checked out.

I had been to the allergist about 6-7 years ago and they told me that I am allergic to absolutely nothing… which I never really believed. I had got tested last time as I had broken out in hives across my entire body! Well, as I said, they told me I was allergic to nothing. Today, however, the new allergist at first said the same thing after the standard “prick” test, as I wasn’t showing a reaction. But then, about 10 minutes after the usual reaction time, I started to react to the cat test. Then, 30 minutes after it was suppose to react, I started reacting to beech wood and hickory. This makes me think that the testing I had 6-7 years ago was negative because I had a late reaction. I had 92 shots that time, this time I only had about 24, and 3 of them reacted. Due to the slow reactions, the doctor also took blood to test to see if we get better results. Anyway, it seems that my current symptoms are caused by the fact that my neighbor has 3 cats. We have a shared basement and she lets the cats roam down there, and we have an open trash can that we use for our drier lent, which I am sure is covered in cat dander.

Other than asking my neighbor to stop letting the cats down stairs, I also bought a HEPA filter for the bedroom. I’m hoping the combination of these two things will help me snore less so that my pregnant wife can get a good night sleep.

On related news (Nikk’s health) I also scheduled an appointment to discuss the removal of my wisdom teeth. I’d keep avoiding it if it wasn’t for my best friend and dentist Patti, who won’t stop pestering me about it. “You’re going to loose your back molars!” she says… “It’ll be worse the longer you wait!” she says… ha ha… well, the consultation appointment is in 3 weeks, so we’ll see how it goes. My older sister, Patrice, is getting her wisdom teeth removed next week… hopefully that goes over smoothly for her.

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The Nursery

We have had a super productive weekend! Christine’s mom came up Friday morning to help convert the spare bedroom into Kaylee’s nursery.

On Friday afternoon we headed over to the Home Depot (a place I frequent often) to buy the paint.  Christine and I had tried 5 different colors of green until we finally found the perfect feminine, baby green, that didn’t clash with any of the wall decals or other decorations we had picked out. The final shade we decided on was Martha Stewart’s “Lemongrass”. It is perfect!

We prepped the room on Friday night… moved out the last of the boxes, scrubbed the floors clean of Jäger’s hair, spackled all holes in the wall. Then,  first thing on Saturday morning we headed to Babies-r-us to buy the crib (Thanks Julie!). They were having a sale, and I had rented a U-haul to get the thing home (as the one we wanted has a tall headboard and it wouldn’t fit in either my hatchback, or Christine’s mom’s Jeep)…  when we got there, they didn’t have the one we had planned on getting in stock, but to take advantage of the sale and the U-haul we had to pick one. Luckily, we fell in love with another one…  it was even bigger than our intended crib, so big it barely fit in the U-haul van!

Anyways, we finally got the crib home and began painting the nursery.

Our friends Mike and Sam came to help, which was unbelievably awesome of them! Sam even got up early, and Mike came despite having midterms next week. Thanks to all these great people’s help, we were able to knock out the whole room in one day (trim and all).

Today we put together the crib, did a few more touch-ups, and began putting together the room. So far this is what we have:

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Crib

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Bookshelf

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Stuffed animals and monkey decals

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Other side of window, with decals

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Consulting

I just got off the phone with a guy who works for a tech consulting firm with a branch here in Boston. I was actually referred to it by a friend/co-worker from Gemvara. He thought (and I agreed) that a consulting firm would be ideal for me because I am always looking to learn/get exposure to new things. After talking to this guy, I’m even more sure of this being something I at least want to explore further. He’s trying to figure out where I’d fit for a short term project to test the waters… both to see if I would like the work, and to see if they like how I fit into their team. I’m excited to see how this works out.

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Techstars

Thanks to my former co-worker and design star, Lee Gentry, I got the opportunity to hang out with the people of Techstars last night in Kendall Square. While I usually don’t venture to that side of the river B-), I was very happy that in this case I did.

What they are doing for the start-up community is awesome! They help raise funding for start-ups and provide consultation from domain experts with all different skills. Its great to see the knowledge share happen, it helps validate people’s ideas and gives the ideas a chance to come to fruition. I hope to get to know this group of people better in the future.

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Kidney Power

So, yesterday we had a followup ultrasound with a kidney expert to make sure our future daughter’s (Kaylee Madigan Folts) fluid build-up has gotten better. The first ultrasound showed signs of kidney reflux. We were super excited when we found out that they are now “in the normal range” and that we have little to worry about! We will have to keep an eye on any infections she gets while she is growing up, as frequent bladder infections may indicate that there is a problem that needs to be addressed.

This has been a huge weight off of our shoulders, as there was a chance, had it gotten worse, that she would have had to have surgery before she turned 5. The surgery would have been minor, but I’d rather my baby not have to go through anything like that. My god-daughter actually had to get the surgery when she was about 5 as she had the same issue they noticed in Kaylee.

The due date is around the corner and there is so much to do! Can’t wait to meet her!

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Kaylee Madigan Folts

IT’S A GIRL! We found out the sex of the baby!

Kaylee Madigan Folts

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I’m Going to Be A Dad!

So, today we were lucky enough to have two pregancy tests say that we are going to be parents! I’m super flustered, but more importantly, SUPER excited! Christine told me by leaving the test out on the sink. When I got home I went to the restroom, noticed it and was bellowed “Hey, you left out your… wait, what does two lines mean? Does it mean yes?” to which she excitedly replied “Yes”, which I even more excitedly responded “Like, Yes Yes? Oh my God!”

We can’t wait to find out for sure, but the chances that two test are wrong are super slim!

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