2 Months

According to that pretty little ticker at the top of the blog my son is 2 months old today. I refuse to believe that. I am just going to pretend that he is not growing so fast and that he is going to stay my little baby boy forever.

*sigh*

Ok denial over. (Sort of)

So what does two months mean for Jake?

• He is starting to get on somewhat of a schedule. Wake up, eat, smile and play with mommy for about 1-2  hours, nap in the bouncy seat for 30 minutes to an hour. Wake up and play some more. Have picture taken many times. Eat. Take another short nap. Workout with mommy. Hang out in bouncy seat some more. Play under the play gym. Eat. Take longer nap.  Eat. Daddy gets home. Play with daddy. Catnap for a little while. Sit in the bouncy while mommy and daddy eat dinner. Eat. Relax or get a bath. Get in pajamas and hang out for a little while. Eat. Fall asleep. This is his general schedule although the times depend on when he wakes up in the morning.
• He is not a happy waker upper. He is grumpy when he first wakes up and takes some time to be fully awake. He gets that from mommy.
• When he is hungry, he wants his food NOW.
• When he is wet, he wants a diaper change quick! (More so in a disposible diaper than the cloth diapers)
• He pees A LOT!
• He loves the play gym and bouncy.
• He likes looking at himself in the mirror, especially the mirror above the swing.
• He is generally a happy baby and gets some huge smiles and giggles.
• He will watch mommy or daddy as they leave a room.
• When he is mad he sticks his bottom lip way out. (Still trying to get a picture of this)
• He is consistently sleeping 5-6 hours at night (and went 7 hours without eating last night but it took him an hour to go to sleep after that)

He has a doctors appointment on Wednesday. I can't wait to find out how big he is (we have attempted to measure and weigh him but I want the "official" measurements) and to see how much he has grown. He will also be getting his first set of shots which I am not looking forward to. Hopefully those will go smoothly and he won't have any reaction to the shots and the doctor will tell us everything is great.

I am sad that my baby is growing up so quickly, but I am definitely looking forward to all the new things he will learn in the next few months.

Playdate!

Jake had his first playdate last Wednesday with Austin (who is two weeks older than Jake). Kathleen came over to our house with Austin and then we took the boys to the mall. The boys took turns crying and we walked around the mall for a while, ate some lunch, and walked around some more. It was nice to get out of the house during the week and have someone to talk to instead of just hanging out by myself! And it was nice to have Kathleen to talk to and share all of the stuff the boys are doing. We are planning on having lots more playdates. I can't wait until the boys are old enough to actually play with each other.

The boys were worn out!

Jake finally really enjoys his baths and just stares at himself in the mirror the whole time he is getting a bath. He really seems to like the water and he has taken a few baths with me when he got really fussy a few times. He stops crying as soon as he gets in the water. I think part of it is he likes being naked! He always starts smiling when we take his clothes off to take a bath. I hope he likes the pool as much as he likes the bath. I can't wait for Memorial Day for the pool to open, we will be headed there as soon as it is open!

In the big bath

Getting a bath with daddy

After asking constantly when she was going to get to babysit Jake we finally gave Grams the chance to watch him for a few hours on Saturday. Josh and I took Cosmo out to the dog park and went and grabbed some lunch. Nothing big but it was nice to take Cosmo out (no babies allowed in the dog park). Although I can't say it wasn't weird to not have him with us. It is easier to leave him with Josh while I go to the gym. I guess I feel like one of us should have him so when we are together without him it is odd. I know that soon I am going to have to leave him during the week with someone else so I guess I need to get used to it. Although I wouldn't be surprised if I cry when I do have to do that.

Hanging out with Grams

This is his pooping face, he decided he needed to poop as soon as Grams started holding him

SMILEY BABY!

Smiles while mommy works out with him

We finally caught some good smiles on camera so we took a lot!

Play Gym Fun

We have been putting Jake under his play gym for about a month now and just recently he has really started hitting the toys and enjoying laying under there for a while playing. He loves looking at the lights on the top and gets so excited and has his arms and legs going all at once. It is super cute!

First Mini Road Trip

We headed to Austin this weekend to go visit the Ridenhours for Gabrielle and Emmylou's birthdays (not really until April but their party is the same weekend as Jake's baptism). We also stopped at grandpa and grandma's on the way home.

We went this weekend because it was the last weekend of Josh's spring break and we would be able to leave earlier on Friday so we could take our time getting down their. Unfortunately for us it was also the weekend of SXSW,  a big music festival, and the rodeo in Austin, along with the last weekend of spring break for all the colleges in Texas. A normally 3.5-4hr drive took us almost 6.5 hrs. Traffic was absolutely horrible, stop and go most of the way down. Which also meant we had to stop more times than we had planned to change and feed Jake. Poor baby was just ready to be out of his carseat! We are really hoping that by this summer he will be entertained by some toys so he doesn't get so antsy when we drive to Michigan! Right now the things that entertain him would require him to be out of his carseat.

We had a great visit with Teresa, Brad, Gabrielle, and Emmylou. It was great to spend time with them and I hate that we don't get to see them more often. I am a bad mommy and didn't get a ton of pictures though.

Miss Gabrielle posing

Trying to get Emmylou to stand next to Jake (she didn't know what to think of him)

You can see how petite Miss Emmylou is! She is 11 months and Jake is only 6-7 inches shorter than her!

I tried to get a picture with all three of the kids, Emmylou was not interested anymore and walked off!

We stopped to see grandpa and grandma on the way home Sunday. We hung out at their house for a while then went to meet Uncle Joey and have lunch. Jake decided that lunch was the perfect time to poop, twice. The first requiring an outfit change. Good thing Josh is great at diaper changing! After lunch we headed home, hoping that the drive home was not nearly as long as the drive down!

We had a great time this weekend and were really glad we weren't home for the lovely 6 inches of snow that fell today! I am not sure about this whole global warming thing when we have seen something like 17 inches of snow this winter! Josh and I have contemplated moving to Hawaii so we can avoid the snow!

Josh heads back to work tomorrow and I start week 7 of maternity leave, only 5 weeks left and that makes me really sad. It will be beyond hard to leave him during the day. I am glad I love my job, I am hoping that will make it a little easier.

More pictures from the last week or so!

Hanging out under the play gym, he likes it!

He figured out how to hit the haning toys

Bath time with daddy! He loves bath time usually, but of course the day I get the camera out he decides he is not happy about it

The end of a laugh while hanging out in the bouncy seat, he (and we) loves the bouncy seat!

6 Weeks

I cannot believe my baby is 6 weeks old already! He has grown so much already, I tell him everyday to slow down. He is awake much more now and likes to know exactly what is going on at all times. Nosey little boy.

He has had a lot more too look at lately too. We have been getting out of the house a lot more (although it takes about 5 times as long to actually get out of the house). We try to go on a walk everyday, well when it is nice out. Hopefully those days will be more frequent now and we will be able to go everyday, I like getting out of the house everday without having to pack up and get into the car!

Jake is smiling a lot more now, mostly in the mornings. He is really happy when we wake up in the mornings and will lay there and smile and laugh at me (and Josh on the weekends). He is starting to be more interested in toys and will lay under his play gym for 15-20 minutes at a time. Today he figured out how to hit the rattle on there and did that for a while. Yesterday we were at Grams house and he hung out outside with us for a while. He seems to like being outside, other than the bright sunlight. We need to get him some sunglasses!

We also visited my work this week. Everyone thought he was cute and wanted to hold him, which he slept right through! (Until he was hungry!) We are headed to Austin next weekend for his first road trip. We are hoping he sleeps most of the way down there and are going to do our best to time the driving out so we don't have to stop too much but I think no mater how much we plan it is kind of up to Jake how it goes!

Here are some more pictures that I haven't shared yet!

Closest thing to a smile I have gotten on camera

He fell asleep in our bed while eating and I just let him sleep there

My two babies sleeping in our bed

Holding the paci in himself at Presley's party (you can see some of Presley's loot in the background)

Newborn Pictures and an Update

Not too much new stuff going on around here. Jake is growing big, he is up to 11lbs and 21.5 inches. He sleeps great, usually we get a 5-6 hour stretch of sleep at night. Although he still has a few nights here and there that he doesn't sleep great, but I will take just a few as opposed to all of them.

We have made lots of trips out of the house now. And Jake went to his first birthday party, Miss Presley turned 2. We went back to church this week and made it out alive. He slept through mass which was perfect. We had attempted to go to church the week before, but it worked out so that he would have needed to eat right as mass started so we decided to wait another week. This week we took a bottle for him but he never needed it. We also had our first trip to the mall. Other than spitting up on grams, he did great. He slept most of the time, ate once and had a diaper change. We also ate out at a resturant that same day (we got everything in all in one weekend!). I was able to fed him and everything went great. So now we have done most of our firsts as far as going out. Those first times weren't as scary as we were thinking they would be!

We are starting to get much more settled into a daily routine. Jake is starting to nap around the same time, but I am still feeding him on demand so that is always changing. We have started to see a lot more smiles from him too! Although we haven't managed to catch any on camera. He stops and gives us a pouty face the second we get the camera out. Stubborn little boy!

So we had his newborn pictures taken on Feb 20 and it took a couple of weeks to get the disc with all the pictures and get the annoucements ordered. So now that all of that is done I can share some more pictures. (The one at the top of the page is from that session)

Birth Story

This is more for me to remember everything, but I figured I would share.

Short version:
I woke up to my water breaking at 1:45am on the 29th. We were at the hospital by 4am and I got an epidural around 5:45am. By 7am I was at 10cm and ready to push but the nurse had to get everything ready. I did a few practice pushes around 7:45 and at 8 started pushing. About 5 sets of pushes later Jake was born!

Long Version:

I had a dr's appointment on Thursday and when she checked she said I was 75-80% effaced and still about 1 cm dilated. But she also said he was really low and she could feel the top of his head through the amniotic sac. Thursday evening I was having some stomach cramps but by 9pm they had gone away and we went to bed. I woke  up at 1:45am feeling like I had peed on myself. I jumped out of bed and there was a lot more fluid that came out. I assumed it was my water but didn't want to wake Josh up until I was sure. So I waited until about 2:15 when I started to have contractions to get him up. We figured we would wait a little bit to call the doctor because I had had so many contractions before. About 15-20 minutes later the contractions were pretty regular and getting more intense so we called the doctor. She told us to come on in so we got up and Josh got dressed quickly and started getting all of the last minute things together while I attempted to get up and get dressed. I called my mom and told her that we were going to be headed to her house with Cosmo. It took my a lot longer to get dressed than I had anticipated, I had to stop what I was doing every time I had a contraction, which at this point was about every 3 minutes. We finally got out the door around 2:50.

The drive to my mom's was hard because my contractions were coming two at a time. I would have one that lasted about a minute, then about 30 seconds of rest, then another one about a minute long, then about a 3 minute break. After we dropped Cosmo off we headed to the hospital with my mom right behind us. I was trying to drink water on the way because I knew I wouldn't get a lot to drink once I got to the hospital. So during that 3 minute break I was getting I was drinking. Every bump we went over made the contractions worse so Josh was trying to avoid them and drive quickly, oh and it was raining. When we got to the hospital we pulled into the parking garage and Josh asked if I could walk in and of course I said yes. About 20 seconds later I threw the car door open (while we were still moving) so I could throw up all the water I just drank and I quickly changed my mind about being able to walk. After Josh parked he ran in to get a wheelchair and the admissions desk people said they would get a nurse. Josh saw a wheelchair in the corner and asked if he could take that one, so he did. We were almost in the hospital when the nurse came out with a wheelchair. Once we got in I had to sign (or scribble randomly) all the consent forms (not sure why they think this is neccessary when you are in labor). My mom got there as I was signing, and was talking very loudly trying to find us.

Apparently they thought I was really in labor because we bypassed l&d triage (normally where they would take you to see if you are dilated and make sure you are really in labor) and headed straight to a room. I asked about getting in the tub (figuring I couldn't because my water broke) and they confirmed that I couldn't. That was my best coping skill for dealing with contractions. I asked if I could shower and they were checking with the on call doctor but I still had to get in a gown and checked, which took about 30 minutes because again I was stopping every time I had a contraction. When I was checked the first time, about 4:30am, I was 2-3cm dilated. By the time we got to the point that I could get into the shower I had already decided I wasn't going to make it without an epidural so they got the fluids started. I had to have an entire bag of fluids before they could do the epidural but the nice nurse (I had fabulous nurses in l&d) turned it all the way up so I could get it more quickly. While we were waiting for the fluids to get in the contractions were horribly painful and seemed to be getting worse. I couldn't get comfortable during one and couldn't move very much during them either.

About 5:20 my new best friend (anesthesiologist) was on his way so Josh and my mom had to leave the room, I was not happy about that because I was using Josh's had to squeeze everytime I had a contraction and I knew that I was going to somehow have to sit very still during the epidural. The nice nurse promised she would help me and told me just to let her know when I was having a contraction. After we got me sitting up and in position the nurse would come over and let me squeeze the crap out of her hands everytime I had a contraction then when it was over she would go work on getting stuff ready then I would tell her when I was having another one and we repeated this until the dr was ready to put the epi in. Then she stood and held my hands while I got the numbing shot (that hurt) and made sure I was staying still during contractions (of course I was having one right when he went to put the epi in.)

After the epi was in they said it would be about 5-10 minutes for it to fully kick in, but about 3 minutes after it was in Jake's heart rate started to drop, so the nurse had me flip to my side and his heart rate went back to normal for a little while, then dropped again, so we flipped to the other side. By this time the epi has kicked in so the nurse is having to help me turn over. After we did this for about 5 minutes she called in another nurse to help and see if they could figure out why his heart rate kept dropping. They were also having a hard time getting him to stay on the monitor, which after the fact they figured out he was so low and that was part of the problem. They put an internal monitor on him and checked me at about 6am and I was 5-6cm. Once the internal monitor was on his heart rate was better so they let Josh and my mom come back in.

I was feeling much better at this point and we were guessing what time he was going to be born. A little while later I realized that I was feeling the contractions a little bit in one spot on the left side, but it wasn't anything bad so the nurse had me (well told me to, she, Josh and my mom had to move me) lay on my left side to see if that would spread the epi medicine out. It worked for a little while then I could feel it again. This was right before 7am and there was a shift change so my new nurse came in. I let her know that I was still feeling some pain and she said that it could be because he was so low but she gave my epi a boost and said to give it a few minutes and she would check me. About 7:15 she checked me and said I was at a 10 and would be pushing soon. So she started getting everything ready in the room and I took the time to put some make up on. (I knew there were going to be pictures afterwards!)

Around 7:45 the nurse had me push with a few contractions. The monitor wasn't picking up the contractions up well so she was relying on me to tell her when I was having them, but I wanted to wait to start really pushing so I would tell her for every other one. I figured if I couldn't feel the contractions I might as well let them do as much of the work as possible instead of me doing all the work! A little after 8am I started really pushing. 3 pushes for each contraction then I would rest. The nurse pulled out the mirror so I could watch (it helped since I couldn't feel the left side of my body, that epi boost did its job a little too well!). Around 8:15 the doctor came in. I pushed through about 5 contractions with him. Once Jake's head was out he had me stop pushing, he sucked out his mouth and nose then told me to give him one small push and the rest of him was out.

The doctor and nurse put him right up on my chest where Josh cut his cord, they cleaned him off and tucked him into my gown. I got to hold him for about an hour before giving him to Josh to hold. Then they took him and weighed him and checked him over.

In the end it was definitely not what I expected, I was planning on being in labor much longer than that and it being more difficult than it was. But I am glad it went quickly and smoothly. I am hoping that my next labor and delivery are just as quick and easy and maybe I will be able to make it without an epidural next time.