Carter - 1 month

Carter James, you are one month old! 

Weight: 9 pounds, 3.2 ounces

Length: 21 and 3/4 inches 

Clothes size: Newborn size are getting tight length-wise but are still loose around your chest. 3 month size still looks a little big on you. You are just long and lean! 

Diaper size: Size 1, although it seems a little loose. Newborn size is too small though… is there a size 0?

Sleep: You sleep in anywhere from 10 minute to 4 hour stretches, and it's hard to predict which one it will be each time you fall asleep. I try to nap when you do during the day (which isn't often) but it's hard to know how long we'll get to rest! 

Eating: You love to eat! You eat every 2-3 hours during the day and every 2-4 hours at night and would eat for hours if I let you, but most of the time I cut you off after 20-30 minutes on each side unless you are totally awake and actively eating (per the advice of the lactation specialist). Most of the time you eat in a relaxed and partially sleepy state but I do my best to keep you awake. 

Likes: Eating, swinging in your swing, falling asleep on Mama's chest, having your diaper changed and watching the mobile in your crib. 

Dislikes: Being stopped from eating and tummy time. There are times when if you aren't eating or sleeping then you scream and the only thing that will calm you down is eating again. When you start a nothing-but-eating-and screaming-cycle it wears both of us down. Hopefully this will end soon! 

Milestones this month: First time coming home, first time meeting your puppy dog, first time meeting Grammy, Aunt Pat, Kendra and lots of church friends, first time in a car, first time going to a restaurant, really starting to study our faces... everything was a first this month! 

Memorable moments: Going anywhere with you because your daddy is so proud to show you off to anyone we know :-)

Life 2 weeks later

Two weeks ago we brought our sweet newborn home from the hospital. At times it seems like the last two weeks have flown by and I don’t know where time has gone and at other times it seems like he has been in our lives forever and can barely remember life before him. Time is funny that way.

I would  be lying if I said the last two weeks have been easy. When you are pregnant, people try to prepare you for what life with a newborn is like. As a parent-to-be you listen, smile, nod and accept that taking care of a little one is no walk in the park. But truly, it is so hard to really understand how your world is rocked until it is happening to you.

So, here’s what I’ve learned in the last two weeks . Before having a baby I never knew…

• How well I could function (or not) on 30 minute spurts of sleep. I can do the basics on this level of sleep (feed and change baby, feed myself pre-prepared food and use the restroom), but not much more. It’s more than I thought I would be able to do.
• How dead to the world I could feel. When I get overwhelmed I tend to keep to myself and retreat, and boy oh boy, have I been overwhelmed lately… and sleep deprived… and busy taking care of a newborn who eats every two hours. You get the idea. We’ve had an overwhelming amount of love and congratulations for the little guy’s arrival and I just haven’t been able to keep up with returning calls, emails, texts, etc. I don’t think I’ve been this behind before. Thanks to everyone who has sent their love and congrats to us, we really appreciate it! - I’m working on getting back to everyone, but it’s just a little slow going with everything else that is going on. Sorry!
• How clueless I could feel as a mother. I read the books, I’ve taken care of younger siblings, I’ve babysat, I’ve watched my supermom friends have kids and I figured that I had all of the tools available to me in my tool belt, ready for whatever challenge this little one threw at me. But you quickly realize you know nothing when it’s 3am and your newborn has been screaming at you for two hours and feeding, rocking, swinging, new diapers, different combinations of clothes and blankets, singing, talking and other baby-calming techniques are just not working. It’s quite the reality check.
• How much a meal could mean. I always understood how nice it was to bring a meal to a family who has a new baby, but being on the receiving end, I can say it means the world to us to not have to prepare, cook and clean up after a meal when you’re already exhausted and at the end of your sanity. Blessings to you sweet folks who bring meals to families with new babies. You are doing a greater service than you know.
• How difficult breastfeeding could be. You hear about how other people struggle to breastfeed and you ignorantly think to yourself, “Really? How hard can it be? Women have been doing this for ages…”. Well, I’ll be the first to tell you it IS hard and I can understand how people can give up. I guess I’m lucky that I’m super stubborn and refuse to give up. Perhaps my breastfeeding journey deserves its own post, so more on that later.
• How much poop could come from such a tiny person. My goodness! We’re averaging 11 poopy diapers a day and that doesn’t count the times he poops while we are changing another poopy diaper. Yikes!
• How far a stream of baby pee can shoot. Little guy has some power behind him!
• How much I could unconditionally love this little person. This little boy is everything to us and we are so glad he is a part of our family!

There you have it, all of the things I never knew that I never knew. But this is all worth it! We love our little guy more than anything and are so, so glad that he is now a part of our lives.

We’ll leave you with a little video we shot this morning of him moving and cooing as proof to our families that he does more than sleep (which is all he usually does when we try to Skype!). Feel free to ignore our comments in the background :-)  Enjoy!

We are proud to present…

Dave and I are proud to announce the birth of our son, Carter James!

Carter was born on Friday, March 29 at 7:03pm. He was 8lbs, 3oz and 20 inches long… and totally perfect to us! But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start at the beginning…

I went into the hospital to be induced on the evening of Thursday, March 28. They wanted me to stay overnight so that they could give me some drugs to help prepare my body for the induction of labor the following day. When they first started monitoring everything I was already contracting on my own (but not very strongly) and was 1cm dilated. It was a restless night since I was excited to get things going the next day and because the nurses came in every hour to check my vitals, take my blood sugar or adjust the fetal heart rate monitor that would inevitably slide down my belly every time I moved in my sleep (or restless tossing and turning).

Friday morning they got me up at 5:30 a.m., unhooked me from the fetal monitors and IV and let me shower and eat breakfast before starting the pitocin. Dave and I took the opportunity to take one last belly photo before the little guy came out. And yes, I did bring my own hospital gown :-) It was much more comfortable than the ones I knew had been worn by many women before me with goodness knows what washed off of it. Yuck! Bringing my own was just a much better option for me.

At 6:30 I was hooked up to the pitocin and was ready to get things really moving so I could meet the little guy who had been growing inside me for the last 9 months. Things were off to a slow start and I wasn’t even 2cm dilated until nearly 11:00 a.m. Luckily I had a great support team with me at the hospital to keep me company and entertained: Dave, my mom, my Aunt Pat and BFF Kendra.

At the 11:00 a.m. check I was in a decent amount of pain and was ready to talk about an epidural. Let me tell you, pitocin is no joke and even though I hadn’t been through labor before, I was pretty sure that the contractions were stronger that anything my body would have been able to produce. Unfortunately the nurse thought I wasn’t far enough along to get the epidural and told me I had to wait a while longer before I could have the drugs. Boo.

So there I was, hanging out in the bed while the contractions got even stronger and I was in much more pain. It was to the point where they were coming every 2 minutes and were lasting for a minute and the pain was so intense that I could hardly keep my eyes open and I was barely able to speak during a contraction. So at 1:00 p.m. I demanded again asked about the epidural because I was SO OVER the pain. The nurse checked me and I had only progressed to 3cm. Ugh. But this time she said she would call my doctor about the epidural because she could see how much pain I was in.

Luckily my doctor said I could have the epidural (I knew I liked my doctor!) and they called the anesthesiologist right away. I was all hooked up to the epidural by 1:45 and was happy as a clam. To me on that day, epidurals were the best invention ever. I was more relaxed, alert and talking again all while making progress in my labor. Good stuff.

At 3:00 I decided to take a nap, which I desperately needed. I was woken up at 4:00 by the nurse who needed to check me to see if I had made any progress since I had received the epidural. I was at 4cm and my water had broken on its own (and I didn't even feel it)! That sounded like progress to me! The nurse said I could expect to dilate another centimeter about every hour and that if all went well baby could be born before midnight. I said that I was hoping he’d come before then, and she laughed at me. Hmmm, challenge accepted!

By 4:30 I was feeling a lot of pressure and could now feel the rest of my bag of waters leaking. The pressure was so intense and such an unusual sensation that I had the nurse come back in at 4:55 to check me again. She said that she would check me if I wanted but didn't think that much would have happened in less than an hour. Well, she checked and I was at 10cm!

Because baby’s head was still pretty high up it was decided that I needed to labor for another hour to bring his head down so that I didn’t have to use too much energy bringing him down with my own pushing. Well, an hour passed and his head was at -2 station (if you don’t know, that just means it was still up there but lower than it was). With the nurse in charge and Dave and my mom holding my legs, I began to push. I pushed for about 30 minutes to bring the head down far enough to warrant the doctor coming in for delivery. Things paused while everyone got dressed in their protective gear and then the doctor said to me, “well, show me what you’ve got!” Again, challenge accepted. Two pushes later and Mr.. Carter James shot out into the world.

Even the doctor was surprised at how quickly baby came. That’ll teach her to challenge me to show her what I’ve got ;-)

After delivery I got to spend the first hour of Carter’s life holding him skin to skin so that we could bond. After the first hour Dave got to hold him before he was weighed, measured and bathed.

After all of that, we all gathered around the bed to sing happy birthday to Carter and celebrate with a piece of birthday cake… because there is no more appropriate time for birthday cake than on the day of the baby’s birth, right?

We are so happy to have this little guy in our lives now. He is so loved and we are so very grateful for a healthy, happy baby. Welcome to our family, Carter James!