It's been noticed by a couple of people that I have seriously neglected posting...! That's what happens when you have a screaming infant in the background (as I do right now!) I have been busy trying to get him on a schedule and sleep training. My days consist of one feeding to the next, diaper changes, and wearing a lot of spit up. Who knew a little guy could be so much work?! It's also one of the most wonderful experiences I've ever had!

The past couple of days have been (dare I say it?) a little easier and I pray that it will only continue to go more smoothly. here we are attempting to get a family pic...

Graham wasn't that excited about it!

you know you have a new baby when...

you have crazy, delirious moments like this!

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The other morning Andrew woke up to a patting sound around 4 or 5 am. He realized it was me patting something, so he nudged me and asked what I was doing. I said I'm burping Graham. (I also was buried deep under a mound of covers). So he's like, "what???" and starts franctically digging under the covers trying to find our son who I was probably suffocating. Well, then I woke up for real and wasn't sure what was going on.

our conversation...
Andrew kept saying "where's Graham?"
me: he's in his bed.
A: where's graham?
me: he's in his bed!
A: well why did you tell me you were burping him?
me: I don't know.
A: what were you doing?
me: I don't know.
A (still looking under the covers): are you sure he's not in here?
me: go look in his bed. I promise he's there.
A: why did you tell me he was in bed?
me: I'm delusional, I don't know. stop giving me the 3rd degree!!! I don't know, I'm asleep, I don't know what's going on. go look in his bed if you don't believe me.
A: what's the 3rd degree? what's going on?
me: if you don't settle down & let me go back to sleep, I'm going to....

so, anyways, Graham was safely in his bed and I hadn't suffocated him.

We had a good laugh about it in the morning!! He had his 2 week appt. this week and is now 10 lbs. 8 oz! He has outgrown newborn diapers & almost his newborn clothes!

He also rolls over about halfway already. He is so big & strong!

valentine's day with my boys

This parenting thing is certainly tricky business! I am trying my best to get my little guy on a schedule and he is determined to follow his own schedule!

We weren't sure how to plan for V-day, but we decided to stay at home rather than risk a melt-down in public.

We did get to go out to lunch with our friends/landlords, the Joyce's, who were in town and Graham slept through like an angel. oh, how thankful I am for those angelic moments. He actually has done better so far in public than he does at home!
hanging out with our little man

So we made a nice dinner at home.
Steak, baked potatoes, & corn

looks nice enough... HOWEVER, what you don't see in the pictures is our background noise.

ahhhhhhh! yes, he did decide to scream through our entire meal. at this point we could only laugh. (because we are sleep-deprived & delirious :)
but we're still enjoying the moments. and hey, it can ONLY get better, right?!!

I do believe that's a smile!!

Graham's 1st weekend

It's hard to believe Graham will be one week tomorrow! Boy, has life changed!

Every day is a learning process. It is a wonderful, frustrating, thrilling, pull-your-hair-out-please-stop-crying, beautiful learning process. I love it. Graham is so snuggly and those moments of holding him close make all others become a blur.

here's some pics from the weekend:

Our friend Alison brought us a delicious dinner - thank you so much!!
She got a few snuggle moments with Graham as well.

This was how he was sleeping on her!

I love how he is always propping himself up. no, he's not screaming :), but a biiggg yawn! ok, mom, enough with the papparazzi!
After Graham would NOT go back to sleep at 5 am, I finally brought him to our bed where he immediately settled right in. I know you're not supposed to do this, but desperate times call for desperate measures sometimes...this was how Andrew found us - both sleeping in the same position. on Sunday he slept like this on me for about 2 hours. These are the BEST moments where I could snuggle him forever! he seems to be sleeping in all these pics... :)
we don't see his baby blues a whole lot yet!

we did make it out to our first church service yesterday.

Graham beautifully slept through it all!My mom made this little green beret.

He's sporting the french baby look.

We are finally home and so glad! We could not wait to get home and it has been wonderful. Of course, if my mom wouldn't have been here to help it would have been 10x more difficult! She has been such a big help as well as having meals from friends from church. We are very blessed! Our first night was rough as they tend to be...no sleep for mom & dad! But we're getting settled and just loving our little man! For those not on facebook, you can view more pics of our sweet boy here.

our baby boy

Facebook is blocked at the hospital, so right now we are relying on updating our blog which imports to FB. Thank goodness for that little feature or nobody would have any info until Thursday!!

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so on Tuesday we went to my regular appt. at 11 am. I was dialated 5-6 cm and my dr. said enough already! we are having this baby! She sent me over to the hospital (essentially through the hallway which was awesome!)

we were so thankful that my mom was here because we didn't have any of our stuff, most importantly our camera! it was so great that she was able to bring everything to us.

The dr. said I only needed a bit of Pitocin to get things going. That started at 1 pm. By 3 pm I was starting to ask about that epidural! The strange thing is the contractions were all in my hip bones, which I wasn't expecting! I didn't even have them in my stomach area. The epidural kicked in by about 4 which was wonderful. Then things slowed down a little as they tend to.

The hardest thing at this point was that I was so hungry! Since I didn't expect this to happen today, I had only eaten 2 muffins at 8:30 am. I was so famished by late that night that I didn't feel like I had much strength.

Fast forward to 7:00, I was fully dialated, but the baby was not low enough for me to start pushing. So they adjusted my position and let me sit a while longer. About 8 pm they decided I should try pushing. After an hour and a half we weren't making a whole lot of progress which was somewhat discouraging. I felt the dr. was getting frustrated with me for not doing it "right". (She later apologized when she realized why :)

So at 9:30 pm they decided to turn my epidural way down unfortunately!! Then after another hour and a half of pushing, Graham FINALLY made his grand appearance (11:05 pm)! It was pretty rough there at the end especially, quite painful, but we are just so thankful that it's over and that he is a healthy little boy.

So the big surprise was that the little guy turned out to be a massive 10 pounds!! My dr. had estimated him to be around 7 lbs! So that is when everyone realized why it was so hard to get him out! But the blessing is this - my dr. told me that if she would have known he was 10 lbs. she probably would not have let me try to push him and would have taken me right to c-section. So I am SO thankful that I was able to avoid that and it was possible to have him on my own.

finally holding my little boy

not so happy!
snuggling with daddydaddy changing his 1st diaper!

he also put on Graham's shirt upside down which was hilarious!love our sweet little man!

take two. at the hospital again!

we went to the dr. this morning and I was dialated between 5-6 cm, so she sent me directly over to labor & delivery! I am having contractions (wow, not fun!) and am looking forward to getting that epidural in the not too far future. :)

It doesn't feel quite real...quite unexpected for our day today!! However, that is probably the best way to go! I am still cautiously optimistic that our baby boy is coming today!! But we are certainly hoping so!

ok, these are getting bad...I gotta go. :)

yep, still preggers

So my due date has come and gone...and no baby. Not a big surprise. I have been told countless times that first babies are always late. And that's what I have tried to put my mind to this whole pregnancy. I guess the thing that threw me off was that 10 days ago my dr. & nurses all assured me I was about to give birth any second! So, naturally, I began to think that was true. (big mistake :)

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This weekend, God definitely gave me a peace about the timing of this baby. I know it's in His hands. I feel absolutely assured that Graham will come when he comes and making myself feel pressure to accommodate certain people's schedules is not going to help anything.

The ony thing that is somewhat discouraging is knowing that I still may have to be induced after the whole emotional upheaval we went through last week! But, again, God is in control of this situation and I rest in Him.

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I do have a few small suggestions to anyone who may interact with anyone who is pregnant...

I have been shocked at the words that people will say to some who is pregnant. It's like all tact flys right out of the window and does not apply to someone who is pregnant. Some of these have been said to me, some of my friends have recently told me they've been said to them.

They are meant to be funny...but seriously...think about it. :)

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1. do not ask a woman if she is having any twins

(do you want her to be any more sensitive about this?!)

2. do not tell her that she seems to be too small

(do you want to make her worry? are you her dr?!)

3. do not ask if she has stretch marks

(now, mercifully, I do not, but I think if I did, I would have been very tempted to LIE!)

4. do not tell her how swollen she is

(yes, someone did tell me yesterday how swollen my face was. ummm, thank you?)

5. do not tell her if she just does "this", it will induce labor.

(yes, I have tried them all, and no, they do not work if baby is not ready to come!)

6. do not tell her the last month or 2 flys by.

(are you kidding me? it's the longest month of my life!)

7. do not criticize the name choice

(we have lots of positive comments about our name, but if you don't like it, it's ok to pretend you do!)

8. do not badger those who choose to keep gender or name a secret.

(this wasn't us, but I know it can be hard for those who go this route!)

9. do not be critical of childbirth classes or birthing methods that a couple chooses.

(wow, I didn't know what a big deal it was between going "natural" or using medication or using a midwife vs. dr. or to circumsize or not to, to vaccinate or not to...people have very strong opinions on both sides of all these issues!)

10. Just be supportive and love. Only give advice when asked.

(we appreciate the many words of wisdom that people have shared with us. I think it's just that by month 9 we heard the same things so many times, that it gets a little overwhelming!)

11. It's ok to talk to a pregnant woman about something other than her pregnancy.

(I love conversation that has nothing to do with it at this point!)

12. How much weight have you gained?

what?? how much do YOU weigh?

13. let's remove this comment from our vocab - "still pregnant, huh?"

(why, yes, I am. thank you for the reminder :)

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> does anyone else have crazy things that people have said to them?? <