Thank goodness Henry came early! It meant that Cristin and I got to keep our Labyrinth date at the Colony. Hoooray for popcorn and beer!!!
Cristin was super excited and blogged about her preparations here and here.
We had a terrific time, forgoing our usual dinner at The Bull and Bear for more face time with Henry.
Look how freaking cute we three are.
Cristin has lovingly documented our experience here. Read her post – it’s good stuff.
Here are a few of my fave scenes from the movie:
We finally gave Henry a real bath! He did a real good job and seemed to enjoy it. Isn’t he precious?
If you’re a long-time reader, you might know that we have bluebird house in our back yard, complete with a little video camera inside it. We can watch the video feed on the TV inside the house. Read more about our setup here.
Well, this year we set the nest box out in the yard in February because we noticed the blue birds milling about the feeders. They started laying eggs last week and as of today there are already four eggs in the nest! Here we go again!
Some pretty photos we took of Henry. I was trying to capture just how little he is, before he gets too big!
On the 20th, the kitties turned 10.
Happy Birthday Billy!
Happy Birthday Cayce!
Another first – Henry spent last night in his crib in his room!
Here’s Henry experiencing a little tummy time.
I can’t keep apologizing for not posting to the blog, but I do feel bad about being so sparse with content. I’ll try to absolve myself of all sins and use this post as a catch-up. Here’s what’s new over the past two weeks.
Regarding Henry’s health, we have good news. As of Wednesday, his weight was 7 pounds, 6 ounces, up from both his birth weight of 7 pounds, 1 ounce and the nadir of 6 pounds, 3 ounces. So hooray for our little boy. He’s eating like a champ and gaining weight and we’re so proud of him.
Oh, and the other night he slept nearly through the night, waking only at 3 AM and then again at 6 AM. It was like a miracle. It didn’t last, though. The next night he had us up every 2 hours again. Oh well, it’s a sign of things to come, I imagine.
A week ago Cristin and Matt came over for dinner and brought a huge lasagna. We had a nice meal that night and enough leftovers for two more meals – and it was some yummy lasagna! Cristin has blogged about it here and posted her really great pictures on Flickr here.
Here’s a cute picture of them that I took:
Tyra has come by several times to visit and brought the girls by once to deliver homemade chocolate chip cookies. She loves looking at that little teeny baby and the girls love chasing the cats around the house. Tyra also provided us with some tasty prepared dinners that will definitely come in handy.
Lots of people have sent gifts, adorable onensies and checks and other good things – thank you all! If you haven’t gotten your thank you card yet, please be patient. It’s coming!
My great aunt and uncle also came to meet the baby and gave him a full set of onesies bedecked with froggies – too cute. Granma, they can’t wait to see you next time you visit.
Lessee, Henry and I took our first ever stroller walk last week. Here he is getting ready to be pushed.
Dave and I went to dinner at El Rodeo and Waraji with Henry and he was quite well behaved at both restaurants. We also went to breakfast at Camille’s and spent an hour or so walking through the flea market with Kerri last weekend.
And Neil was in from Dallas so he got to visit as well.
Mom got to feeling better so she spent some time visiting, too.
Well, the baby’s crying so I have to go feed him. I’ll post more when I have time!
I used to scoff at the fact that maternity leave was treated as short-term disability. I mean, you’re getting the six weeks to feed, bond with, and otherwise take care of the baby, not because it’s a medical condition, right?
After having been through the birth, however, I think that kind of “pelvic floor trauma” definitely counts as a major medical procedure and weeks of recovery are indeed warranted.
Today we celebrate Henry’s due date! Of course, he arrived two weeks early.
I know I said that he might come early, but honestly, I was not mentally prepared for his early arrival. When my water broke, I was aware that the doctor would want to have the baby delivered within about 12 hours. So as soon as we’d figured out that my water broke, I knew that we would be having the baby by Sunday. It was disturbing to me to know that there was a definite end time to the pregnancy, it was rapidly approaching, and I had no control over any of it.
Ele talks about wishing she had savored the experience of the delivery more. I really felt like I understood what she meant, and had every intention of making a conscious effort to inventory, document and appreciate the birth experience. However, the whole experience went so quickly! I dilated so much quicker than any of us anticipated. It was also much more painful than I’d anticipated, even though I had an epidural. To add to that, the strain of physically pushing the baby out combined with the loathsome pain of reflux that occurred every minute I was pushing nearly put me out of my mind. In the middle of the height of pushing, my only thought was “get this baby out of me NOW and I don’t care what it takes.” So much for savoring the experience.
I went into labor on Saturday, and on Sunday Cristin and I had scheduled a photo shoot to do belly pictures. Once labor started, I was so disappointed when I realized we weren’t going to get to do the photo shoot. On Sunday, I still had a pretty big belly and for a moment, I considered whether we could fake it. I realized that anything else I wanted to do while pregnant was no longer an option. The last pictures we took of me pregnant are just that, the last pictures we took when I was pregnant. I am kind of reeling from the whole loss of pregnancy.
Now that Henry is two weeks old (golly!!), I am still trying to adjust to the fact that I’m not pregnant any more. It took a lot of time to get adjusted to the idea of being pregnant, and it turns out that it’s really nice to be pregnant (assuming you’re not having a difficult pregnancy). Being pregnant is like carrying around a secret. A little secret you share with this unborn person. A little secret that only you and the little person know about. You talk to the little person pretty constantly. He’s is your constant companion. He might annoy you occasionally but won’t wake you in the middle of the night. Once he’s born, your secret is out and he is suddenly so much less manageable.
There is a tangible loss with even the happiest of births.
As a side note, I’m going to take down my Pregnancy page, but you can still get to it from here.
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