6 Weeks Later

Look how much more he fills out the same outfit!

(sorry for the bad lighting and redness)

5am Sleep Smiles

Snapped these with my phone last night as Drew drifted back into a slumber on my lap. How much cuter could you get than some sleep smiles?

Cat Nap

Derek snapped this the other day when we both passed out after he ate.

I think it's funny seeing as how the remote and my phone are never out of reach when I nurse the munchkin.

Mother's Thoughts

It's a bit too early to tell if you are going to be a momma's boy or not, but I like to pretend that you already are. Nothing melts my heart more than to see you stop crying when you hear my voice, or fall asleep in my arms. You completely trust me with your life already and I want nothing more than the protect you from everything bad in this world. It's amazing how much I already feel 'motherly' toward you, but yet realize that I have so much to learn. Although I will never be a perfect mother, I will strive to provide you with the best life possible and surround you with endless love. You will always have an ear to listen and a shoulder to cry on with your mother. These things I promise.

Love you tons little man... smelly toots and all.

P90X

Yep. We got it. And starting on Wednesday when I'm released to do physical activity again, we're starting it. I can't WAIT to start running, but we're going to do this in conjunction with our other workouts in order to help speed up the process to getting back in shape! And I'll use the term 'we' lightly here as Derek worked out regularly during the pregnancy and only put on 4 pounds. I put on more than 10 times that, so it's more for my benefit in the end. Doing it together, however, will help in the motivation to follow through.

Stay tuned for results updates!

The Many Faces of Drew

Below you will see examples of "The Drunk", "The Pooper", "The Thinker", and a few others!

Preconceived Notions

"Preconceived Notion - a belief or opinion that a person forms, before actually encountering someone or something, or before learning of any evidence about them/it."

I had quite a few of these. And guess what? Most have already been tossed aggressively thrown out the window with this baby.

Sex - Get your mind out of the gutter! I'm talking about finding out the sex of our baby! Up until I was about 26 years old, I NEVER wanted to find out the sex. Partly because my mother said it was the best gift in the world, and partly because I would LOVE a surprise like that! I guess that being a 'planner' and 'organizer' type-A personality changed that as I'm not sure how I would have dealt with that big of an unknown.

Epidurals - Not sure why I even attempted to go natural. Where did I even get the idea that these might be 'bad' for the birth? Why reject something that makes you feel 100% better? The epidural was amazing and helped me completely relax (even sleep a bit). I'll probably opt to just get one as soon as I can next time around!

Showers - I was fully prepared to shower like once a week with a newborn. Thankfully, having family in town for 80% of the first 4 weeks of his life helped me to accomplish this small, yet wonderful task almost daily. Thank GOODNESS!

Breastfeeding - Why did I think he would latch on, suck for a bit and everything would be peachy? Breastfeeding, while definitely important to me, is a daily frustration with still some pain from time to time. I've seen three lactation consultants, had phone calls with more and it's still not something that is coming natural. We have to work daily at it! The priority is getting him my milk, right? So who cares if I need to give myself a break every now and then and pump/bottle feed him? He's still getting the 'good' stuff, right!

Cloth Diapers - We have several small sizes, but the fear of not wanting to squeeze his legs or tummy off, we're still learning the best ways to put them on to prevent leakage. My idea that it would be something we'd do from about week 2 or 3 has gone out the window as we're still using some disposables in week 6. We'll get there though.... soon enough. At least every cloth diaper we use now eliminates one disposable in the dumps!

Pacifiers - People are VERY opinionated on this. Some people say NEVER, some people say to start using them right away and some people say after a few weeks. I had this notion that I would never 'pacify' my baby... instead just let them express themselves. After reading on the American Academy of Pediatrics website that they recommend them as a way to prevent SIDS, we have decided to introduce them to Andrew. He does VERY well with them and we are now fans.

Emotions - Crying is for wussies, right? I'm generally not a huge crier. Sure, the occasional movie or book will bring me to tears, but everyday life just doesn't cause that. Well not now. I cried so much the first few weeks, with a 4-hour stretch one day that I just could not stop. I know that my body is full of hormones and it's "normal" for new moms, but I'm not a big fan of the uncontrollable crying at the drop of a dime. It's lessened quite a bit now, but those first two weeks were ROUGH!



I'm sure you have your own ideas as you read this, but please just know that these are my personal opinions and thoughts. As my best friends say almost daily - "every mom and every baby is different"... THAT'S the key!

A Gift from Machu Pichu

Uncle Matt (Derek's brother) was in Buenos Aires a few months back for a semester abroad and picked up this cute, wool outfit from the city of Machu Pichu. We think he looked adorable in it!

       

First non-sponge bath

Now that all cord pieces were finally off,  we decided to test out the bathtub with Drew and see how he would do. You can see the progression below viewing from left to right as to how he did. At first he screamed bloody murder, but with the warm water running down his body, he soon began to just look around with enjoyment.

The best part was snuggling my little, happy froggy afterward!



One Month Pictures

Happy 1 Month Little Bumblebee!

Wow. It's already been a month? Where did time go!

Stats: (We don't see the pediatrician again for another month, but 8 days ago at a lactation consultation he weighed 9 lbs 13 oz. I'd say it's safe to say that he's well over 10 pounds and longer than 22 inches)

Changes:

- He looks towards sounds, lights and motion

- His alert time is quite a bit more now

- He has allowed us to actually sleep 6 hours at a time a few nights in the past week

These professional pictures were taken when he was 10 days old -

And I'll have some non-professional pictures up later from today.

LOVE YOU TONS LITTLE MAN!

Happy Birthday Bean!

 Happy Birthday to my brother!

Love you tons and can't wait to see you in a few months!!

Full Freezer

Thanks to both grandma's and their 'extra' cooking they did while visiting, we have a completely full freezer to eat from now that all family has come and gone.

See all that foil?

There looks to be enough meals to last us at least a few weeks and we couldn't appreciate that more. It's probably the best gift we could have received during this time as I'm really not in the mood to cook big meals and Derek would probably get sick of pizza delivery!

First Crib Nap

Derek's mom, "Mimi", got Andrew down for his first nap in the crib on Monday and has since then taken a couple more naps in there! He looks SO tiny in his crib, but really enjoys his elephant mobile when he wakes up.

1 Week vs. 4 Weeks

Can you tell a difference? We sure can! Besides the yellow jaundice color being completely gone, he looks more like a 'baby' now rather than a 'newborn'.

Crazy how time flies.

Happy 4 weeks to our little munchkin!

Changing Table Time

As mentioned before, Andrew has really started to like his changing table (once you get the dirty diaper off him!). He likes to just lay there naked and look around.

We love nothing more than when he's awake and content and it's so fun seeing him recognize our voices and 'listen' to what we're saying. His dark blue eyes will just melt your heart when they look at you  and who doesn't love kissing the cheeks of something so soft and sweet?

Biased Mom

Nope, not of my beautiful son this time, but of my beautiful chocolate lab.

I think she's perfect and she LOVES hanging out in her baby's nursery.

Tummy Time

Our pediatrician and the nurses in the hospital recommended tummy time from birth in order to avoid flat spots on the head as well as develop more muscles in his upper body.

We've been trying to do tummy time 3-5 minutes a day.... or at least until he begins to scream. He does a great job already with lifting his head up and looking around, especially when he hears noises.

Grandmotherly Love

Isn't this such a sweet picture of Andrew holding my mother's hand?

My dad snapped it while they were here.

(I told you I was behind on some pictures!)

Lots of Love

Andrew has had lots of family visitors come to Cleveland to meet him. Derek's two siblings and both sets of our parents have now made the trip to meet the little guy.

His fan club is steadily growing by the day!

Faux Hawk

 

So I realize that this blog has become mostly just pictures of Andrew. Let's face it though.... who really wants to see anything else at this point?!

He seems to change everyday and we have loved getting to know our little man. Even his toots, burps and cries are cute sounds!

As far as changes, he has learned to like his bath time more and has also been crying less on the changing table. He likes to just sit in his bouncy chair and just look around. He LOVES snuggling up on his mom and dad and generally falls right asleep when doing so.

Anyhoo - this is a cute picture my mom caught when she was here of his faux hawk after bath time!

Sunny Sunday

This past Sunday we actually had some sunlight come into the house. I put Drew near the window he loves to look out and his doggies decided to join the party and pose for a picture!