{Watch Me Grow} - 1 Month Old

1 Month old already! How can this be? I must admit that this is not my most favorite age. I enjoy the stage where there is more interaction - smiling, talking, etc AND sleeping!!! I'm so excited that we have a boy in our family! It just seems complete. And whoever said that shopping for a little boy isn't fun?? There are so many cute things for little guys!

Not too many exciting developments the first month. Just eat, sleep, poop and repeat!

Birthday Picture! February 24, 2012

1 Week - March 2, 2012

2 Weeks - March 9, 2012

3 Weeks - March 16, 2012

4 Weeks - March 23, 2012

Footprint time after his first bath at the hospital

He hasn't even left the hospital and he's already watching NASCAR with Daddy!

One of the things he's done most this month!

Sleeping:

• He started out sleeping pretty well for a newborn - about 3 hours per stretch, but toward the end of his first week that changed.The last couple of weeks have been terrible! He will sleep decent for the first stretch (2.5-3 hours) and then after that it's all down hill. Maybe he'll go back down right away or maybe he'll eat and stay up for a couple hours and then when he does go back down he is noisy and doesn't sleep longer than an hour. This has made for one tired Momma!
• Has been sleeping in the swing not moving because he seems to have some reflux issues and isn't a big fan of sleeping flat. The bassinet we bought for him hasn't gotten much use. We don't have these issues diagnosed yet, but it seems to me that it's reflux. If it continues we'll be heading to the doc this week. I'm not going to wait until his 2 month appointment.
• He is the NOISEST sleeper. He makes all kinds of grunts and squeeks and I am blaming the reflux for that. He seems to be the noisest when he has something that he can't get worked whether it be gas or a burp. These noises keep Mommy up but Daddy is able to sleep right through them all. Must be nice!
• Last night was the best night we've had so far so I'm hoping that maybe he is turning a corner!

Eating:

• Nursing has been going MUCH better. Guess I just had to power through the pain. 
• He will take a bottle just fine so I've been doing some pumping. 
• He seems to be a little snacker. He's hard to keep awake to eat a full "meal" and then when he wakes up an hour later he wants to eat again!

Misc:

• He has smiled for me a couple of times and I know they weren't gas smiles!!! I can't wait for more and more of these. It certainly makes the sleepless nights a little more bearable!

 

 The first bath at home and he hated every second of it! His cord finally came off when he was 2 weeks old so bathing could take place in the tub and it has been MUCH better!

Birth announcement picture

 He has started to like laying in his play gym. The colorful singing star has started to grab his attention. His eyesight must be getting better because he is starting to focus on things and really look at people.  Grammie was here last week with us and when she first picked him up he gave her the one over! I hope the attachment to Mommy isn't quite as bad as it was with his sister!

Brother/ Sister love! When I'm taking Will's weekly picture, Katelyn always wants to get her picture taken too. Each week we have one with both kids. This will be fun to look back at over the year and see how much Katelyn has changed as well!

Stats:

  Weight: ~11 pounds (at home weight estimation)

  Height: ??

  Diapers: Size1

  Clothes: 3 Month

Happy 1 month birthday little buddy! I'm so happy that you were chosen to be a part of our family! We just love you so much!!!

Happy St. Patrick's Day

 St. Patrick's Day 2012

The weather has been hit or miss today so we didn't go to any of the parades. Katelyn had a breakfast date with Daddy this morning and went to Cracker Barrel for pancakes. She loves her daddy-daughter dates and I'm so glad that Jack takes the time to give her that special one on one attention. And Will and I stayed home and snoozed! A perfect Saturday so far!

My 2 Lucky Charms! :)

Daddy was tickling him and we got a smile!

Big boy bath

 Will's cord finally fell off last weekend so he was able to get in his big boy bath for the first time. He wasn't much of a fan of the sink sponge bathes and I can't say I would blame him. He much preferred his bath in the tub; I'm sure him being much warmer was the key!

 Katelyn was very excited to help give him a bath and was so gentle and careful with pouring the water. She really impressed me with how careful she was to not get it in his eyes. He was so calm when she was pouring the water on him. I now have a new helper at bath time! I can't wait until he can sit up and we can put them both in the tub together!

Sorry - I can't get this picture to rotate, not sure why

Nice and clean after his bath

2 weeks old and a check up

Will is already 2 weeks old - wow where has the time gone? We managed this week as Jack headed back to work. His first day back to work and my first day to care for 2 kiddos on my own started off with Jack being gone overnight. Nothing like getting thrown in with full force! But, we managed just fine and we were all alive when he came home haha!

Will has been sleeping pretty well at night. He'll sleep for 3+ hours and then at and usually go back down without too much of a fight. He was doing much better in the sleep department when compared to Katelyn at this age, that was until last night. I guess he didn't want us to get too used to him sleeping well. He just fought sleep ALL.NIGHT.LONG! He would fall asleep on me and then when I would put him down he'd stay asleep for a few minutes before going into a full out scream fest. I'm not sure if he had gas or was just being stubborn but it made for a long night. Finally to get some sleep, we turned the swing on and he swung for a while allowing me to get about 3 hours. Thank you Will - can we please do better tonight?!?

He has still been nursing great and definitely prefers the real thing over a bottle. 

He had his 2 week appointment this morning. The doctor said he's perfect :) Imagine that - well we already knew that! 

 

2 Week Stats:
Weight - 9 pounds 8 ounces

Length - 21.25 inches

Head circumference- 15.5 inches

Proud big sister!

Big Sister, Lil Brother

I made these shirts for the kiddos to wear at the hospital. Unfortunately, we didn't get Will changed into his shirt before Katelyn showed up so the pictures just had to wait until we got home. 

What cute kiddos!!It still hasn't quite sunk in that I'm the Momma to these 2 adorable kids!!! And  that we have a little boy in our family now!!

1 Week...already!!

Wow! It doesn't seem like it's possible that a week has already passed and we're all still alive haha! I'm slowly getting used to the lack of sleep although he is doing pretty well. He doesn't like to lay flat so the bassinet is not a big hit right now, but the swing in a stationary position is working well. He'll go down around 10:30-11ish every night and sleep for 2.5-3 hours, eat and go back down for another 2.5-3 hours and repeat. We have had a few nights where he eats and then struggles to get back to sleep so we have some Mommy/Will bonding time. I'd much rather spend this bonding time during the day but oh well. So far he seems like he is going to be a laid back baby.  I hope I'm not eating my words later!

We had a check up appt when he was 3 days old and he was at his birth weight but had lost a bit of length because his cone shape head went down. He currently fits best in newborn clothes and newborn diapers. The 0-3 month clothes are a bit big right now. He'll probably be too long for the newborn one piece outfits soon but the 2 pieces will be good for a while.

When we left the hospital to come home, they informed us that he hadn't passed his hearing test. WHAT?!?! I was completely caught off guard. That was definitely not what I was expecting to hear and I worried all.weekend.long. They told us to go the ENT clinic and they would retest him and not to worry too much about it because about 50% of the babies don't pass their test on the L&D floor. Why even do the test if that many fail it?!? So we made our visit to the ENT clinic and he passed the test. Praise the Lord!

He figured out the breastfeeding thing pretty quickly but he has such a hard latch that he has me torn up! We will be trying to find a lactation consultant this week to see if there is anything we can do to fix this issue. He doesn't seem to care how he gets his milk so that has been nice. I've been pumping some to try to get some relief and heal. Hopefully we can solve this problem and then all will be well.

1 Week - March 2, 2012

Meeting Baby Brother for the first time

Katelyn has been so ready for Baby Brother to get here, asking everyday if he was here or not. (Guess the size of my belly wasn't enough to give her the answer haha.) She has been the best big sister so far. She has asked to hold him a few times and is ok when we help her hold, she likes to help feed him a bottle and all in all has just continued to do her thing as if nothing has even happened. We have had lots of grandparents around to spoil her so the real test will be this week when everything returns to normal and its just the 3 of us home during the day. I'm sure we'll have our moments when she gets jealous but so far, Will couldn't ask for a better big sister!!

Such a proud big sister!

First family of 4 picture!

Here's the real story

On Wednesday (February 22, 2012), I went to the Dr. I was 40 weeks and 3 days and getting more and more ready by the second. The nurse took my blood pressure immediately upon being called back and it was slightly elevated (I'd just walked into the hospital and sat down right before being called) and she asked if I had any other concerns. Well I did have a slight concern - it seemed like it took me a little longer every day to get baby to wake up in the morning. I know he was just flat running out of room in there. The Dr. checked me and I was at 2-3 cm. Woohoo!! I was only 1 the last 2 weeks before. After the doctor left the room, the nurse mentioned to me that doc was thinking of inducing me sooner rather than later. (The original induction date was February 28).  I was stoked!!! The Dr. wanted to do an NST first to make sure everything was alright and of course it was. My blood pressure was perfect, as it had been the entire pregnancy, and baby was moving appropriately. Even with a good NST the doctor still thought we should induce soon and that there was no reason to wait any longer. He happened to be on duty the following day so he scheduled me in!

Last night as a family of 3!

 We got to the hospital at 9 AM on Thursday, February 23, 2012. L&D was ready for me and things got rolling right away. I was still only 2-3 cm but they got the pitocin rolling and were hopeful that things wouldn't take too long and baby boy would be here soon. I'm not sure why the doctor felt things would go fast for me - I had told him my first delivery was nothing fast and he just kept saying it's your second it won't take that long. 

So 1:00 PM rolled around and he broke my water.

2:00 PM I got an epidural and then baby boy decided that he wasn't going to tolerate the pitocin and his heart rate would decelerate after each contraction. So began the turning back and forth to try to find a position that he would tolerate. 

7:00 PM I thought for sure I'd have a little guy by now but still no sign of him. I was dilated to 6 cm but still so far from delivery. My contractions had slowed down because the pitocin had to be decreased so much. 

12:00 AM Still no sign. I was completely dilated and the doctor put me in a sitting position to try to have gravity pull baby down. I pushed for 1 hour and he didn't drop hardly at all. So back to the sitting position. For the next hour I was in extreme pain. The epidural did not seem to do anything! I can't imagine doing the entire labor and delivery without pain meds! Wowzers!! 

3:00 AM I started pushing again with the nurse and Jack and he seemed to come down a little with each contraction and push but I never remember pushing so hard with Katelyn. Finally the doctor came back to my room after delivering 4 babies in the last 4 hours. I was getting so tired and told him I didn't care what we had to do he had to get this baby out!!! I asked if he could use the vacuum and he said yes if that didn't work it would time for a c-section. At this point, I didn't care. I was in so much pain and so tired I just wanted to be DONE!!! So after 3-4 attempts with the vacuum at...

3:42 AM William John was born at a whooping 8 pounds 14 ounces and 22 inches long! 

What a delivery this had been!! I never imagined he would be quite that big and obviously his size was the reason he didn't want to come out. I was all the  more thankful that the doctor didn't make me wait another week to have him. He would have been 10 pounds!!! AND he would have been a leap year baby - both I did not want!!! It's amazing how much love you can have for someone so fast!!!

Look at all that hair!!