Month 1 Essentials

Someone (an expectant Mom a couple months behind me) suggested I do this and I actually thought it was a good idea.  Here are the things I couldn't live without for the first month:

Boppy Pillow:  This is probably the number one thing I've needed, especially in the first couple of weeks when there was no way I deal with the weight of Waylon on my body.  The Boppy not only made feeding him way easier, but it was also good to prop him up on when we were just hanging out.  Make sure to buy a couple extra covers though because it WILL get stained.
Aden + Anais swaddle blankets:  We have a lot of blankets but these are my favorite.  They're a little bigger and stretchier than other swaddle blankets which makes wrapping your baby a lot easier, they wash really well, and I love the cute little prints.  They also make burpy bibs that I highly recommend.
Lansinoh Disposable Breast Pads:  Look, it's as simple as this:  if you're breastfeeding and you don't want big wet stains all over your clothes, get yourself some of these.
Lansinoh Lanolin Cream:  This goes along with the breast pads.  If you don't want to be sore and chapped, get some of this stuff.
Scout:  This little Leap Pad friend is just about the cutest toy ever.  It takes about 5 minutes to plug in your baby's name, favorite color, food, and animal on the computer and then you have this awesome pal who chats about baby's favorite things, sings songs, makes animal noises and even plays bedtime music.  Waylon loves to listen to him, especially during diaper changes, and even Scott loves playing with Scout!  Plus when he's older, Scout can help Waylon learn his colors, how to spell his name, and some nursery rhymes.  Scout is awesone!
Netflix:  I've made no secret about the fact that I am not crazy about breastfeeding.  But those little 20-30 minute stretches of just hanging out while your baby feasts can make you feel a little less like an on call dairy cow if you keep your laptop or ipad close by and stream some half hour long TV episodes.  For the record, I don't do this for all feeding sessions, but sometimes I get a little bored.  Don't judge.

Waylon: One Month

I really meant to write Thanksgiving week but with the family in town I just ran out of time.  We had a lovely holiday and it was nice to have my parents and brother, sister-in-law and nephew here to celebrate and meet little Waylon.  Some pics...

He was a little crankypants for this photo but still super cute.

Here is Grandma hanging out with Gino and Waylon:

And here is Waylon meeting his sister for the first time:

It was a really nice week.

Anyhoo, Monday was Waylon's 1 month birthday!  I took him to the doctor in the morning for his 1-month check up.  He's 23 inches tall (92nd percentile) and weighs 9 lb. 8 oz. (40th percentile).  Basically, he's a tall and skinny lad but he's gaining weight at the right pace (I'm constantly worried about this) so the doctor said everything is fine.

The doctor also said he's sleeping pretty well; he usually eats around 10 at night then sleeps until about 3 when he wakes up to eat.  After that, he's right back to sleep until around 7:30 or 8.  He literally has been doing this since we brought him home and everyone keeps telling me how lucky I am to have such a good sleeper.

He's definitely getting more alert by the day and has even started smiling a little bit.  He holds his head and chest up like a little champ during tummy time.  He's not really a fan of the swing (which is great, since we have two of them!)  I'm kind of concerned that he seems to want to be held a lot. At night, he can put himself to sleep after the 3 a.m. feeding no problem, but during the day sometimes the only thing that will soothe him is being held.  I don't want that to become a habit but Scott says it's fine when babies are this young.  I'm thinking about getting Happiest Baby on the Block to make myself feel better about it.  Any thoughts/suggestions on that?

Supposedly, my nursery bedding should be here this week (I'm so done ordering off Etsy) so I can finally post some pics of Waylon's room.  Stay tuned!

Here is Little Man on his 1 month birthday:

Sprouting Sprout

It's been over a week since I updated the blog, and without getting too specific, let me just say that it's because I've been having some health problems.  It's crappy and I've been tired and in pain and lacking energy to do much of anything.  Luckily, my mom was here all last week and was a big help taking care of Waylon, making dinner and cleaning up around the house.  And of course Scott is super helpful as well which is good because it's been taking most of my strength lately just to feed Waylon.

Anyway, Little Man is doing great.  We went to the doctor on Monday and he grew 1 inch and gained 5.5 ounces in a week.  I think he might be having a growth spurt because he eats constantly it seems!  He is tall and skinny and still super handsome, don't you think?

Here's another of my fave pics.  Scott, Waylon and Josie just chilling listening to some records.

That's all for today.  Time to rest.

Real Talk

So, we've been home from the hospital for a little over a week now and baby Waylon is doing pretty great.  We had a doctor's appointment on Monday and she said everything looks great.  He gained about 4 ounces in 5 days which is right on target, and grew half an inch! He already looks older to me when I look at pictures of him we took in the hospital which is crazy to me.  I like my tiny little Sprout and it makes me a little sad he is already getting bigger.

Waylon is still a mostly peaceful happy baby.  He is starting to focus more when he looks at you and his eyes look a little lighter to me than when he was born.  Might they stay blueish-gray?  That would be so cute.  He really only cries when he's hungry or has a tummy ache and it's either the most overdramatic screaming fit you've ever heard (which makes me laugh) or this sad little baby bird noise (which also makes me laugh).  Yes, I laugh when my child cries.  Bad Mom!

Without jinxing myself, I have to say that Waylon has been sleeping pretty well.  He wakes up only once or twice a night, eats and goes right back to sleep.  Last night he slept from 1:30 to 7:00 which was amazing.  Keep it up little Sprout.

Okay, breastfeeding.  Obviously, he is eating well based on his weight gain and everything, but I have to be honest:  I hate breastfeeding.  It's not as painful as it was in the beginning but it's just not the romanticized lovely bonding experience that everyone leads you to believe that it is.  You're basically tethered to your child all the time, especially because pumping is not working for me, and I find myself watching the clock whenever he eats and counting down to when this particular round will be over.  Is that harsh and blunt and unloving?  Yes, but that's the truth and whether I enjoy it or not doesn't really matter.  I'm committed to doing it because I know it's best for both of us but I'm telling you, I can't wait for him to start eating food that doesn't come from my body.  Judge away.

How handsome is my little boy?

One Week of Waylon

Well that sure went by quickly.  I can't believe little Waylon is already a week old!  I think I've done a pretty good job adjusting to everything.  Breastfeeding by far has been the most challenging part of it all, but it is finally starting to get better.  Honestly, for the first couple of days I would just pray he didn't get hungry because it was so painful.  I tried pumping but it just doesn't produce that much for me and I felt like I spent all day either feeding him, pumping, or washing pump parts and bottles.  I think I will try pumping again in a couple of weeks just to give myself some freedom but for right now, it looks like the little Sprout is stuck on me.

I pray I don't jinx myself, but I think he is sleeping pretty well.  The doctor told me that I can't let him go for more than three hours without eating, even if this means that I have to wake him up in the middle of the night from a sound sleep.  That's about as counterintuitive as anything I've ever heard and I contemplated telling the doctor she was crazy.  If Waylon wants to sleep for 4 hours at a time at night, I'm not messing with that good fortune.

Other than that, he is a pretty happy and peaceful baby.  He only really gets upset when he's hungry or needs to be changed and I feel really lucky.  His face is expressive and hilarious.  I love how straight his nose is and his cleft chin. Basically, he's pretty much the most awesome little creature ever!

Waylon Scott's Birth Story Part #2

Okay, so I'm in the OR, shaking like crazy and crying because I'm freaking out about the impending C-section.  The nurses were all really nice as I was getting the spinal tap (or whatever the one that's not an epidural is called) but the anesthesiologist was like "listen, you need to pull it together."  Someone else might have thought that was pretty mean, but I actually found it quite calming.  People do this every day, these doctors and nurses probably do this every day, and it's going to be fine.

After I was numb and laying down on the table with the curtain up around my mid-section, they finally let Scott in the room.  Go time!  Even though nothing they did was painful, I could still feel the entire procedure take place.  It was weird, the zipping feeling, the moving around of my organs, the moment they pulled Sprout's little head off my rib cage (what a relief after months of burrowing!).  After a very short time the doctor said it's a boy and held up a slimy purple mass over the curtain for a split second, not even enough time to identify it as a human baby!  How annoying!

Scott could see much better than me and he was able to go over to where they were cleaning him off and told me that he was beautiful and perfect...and he is, don't you think?  Long and lean and handsome.

Scott got to see him first while they were still sewing me up.  How cute are these two?

Finally I got to see little Waylon Scott.  I think in the first moments the overwhelming emotion for me was relief.  My little Bean Sprout is more than fine, he's awesome!  I didn't die from surgery!  Everything is going to be okay!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from that we took in the hospital of little Waylon.  Somehow we missed having a picture taken of the three of us!  I should probably remedy that soon.  Anyway, look at this fat little Sprout.  Can you see his cleft chin in this picture?

This was one of the first pics I could get with his eyes open.  He is really alert!  I hope his eyes stay the color they are now, but I think they might turn brown.

Here is my favorite one, of us finally leaving the hospital and heading for home (trying to beat the hurricane!).  He looks so pensive, staring out the window and it's the cutest thing ever.

I have lots more to talk about (people have been particularly curious about his name) but I think that's enough for the day.  Thanks to everyone who has been so supportive through the unknowns during my pregnancy.  It was scary at times but mostly exciting.  I'm so glad it's all over and I just get to enjoy my little Waylon now!

Waylon Scott's Birth Story Part #1

Sorry I'm a little behind with this but we're still getting used to being at home with the little man.

Anyway, Friday morning Scott and I got word that the offer we put on a house had been accepted! I will discuss this more in another post, let's stay on topic today.  It was a great start to the day and I went to my chiropractor appointment to try to turn the little Bean Sprout feeling good about the possibility.  Even though the version hadn't worked, I just still wanted to try everything that I could and you just never know.  After that, I went to meet Scott in Hartford for a delicious Mexican lunch around noon.  As we were driving, almost as we pulled into the parking lot of the restaurant, a black cat crossed in front of our car.  I'm not even kidding.  It narrowly avoided being hit on the other side of the street by a truck and ran right in front of it.  I did a double take and sure enough, all black.

I am a fairly superstitious person.  Okay, really superstitious!  So all during lunch, I just went over in my head what kind of bad luck a black cat crossing your path in the week of Halloween might mean.  Was something going to be wrong with the house?  Was the hurricane that was approaching the East Coast going to obliterate us all?  Was everything going to go okay in 6 days when Sprout was scheduled to come out?  I was so stressed out, I ended up overeating at lunch, but at least it was food I really loved.  Afterwards, I drove home at 5 miles below the speed limit in the right lane the whole time, just trying to make it home without incident.  I implored Scott to please do the same when he came home from work in a few hours.  It was a little after 1 and I settled down on the couch with my computer to catch up on election news and celebrity gossip.

As I was enjoying the amazing irony of Justin Timberlake having to share cover space of his ridiculous wedding photo with Britney Spears, I felt a little pop and then a huge whoosh.  Water broken!  I was a little caught off guard, partly because I had no other signs of impending labor and partly because my doctor had warned me that because of the position of the little Sprout, I was going to have to come to the hospital right away if my water did break.  So, I called Scott and waited in the bathtub for him to come while Niagara Falls continued to spill out of my body (seriously, totally unprepared for the sheer volume of water.  Sorry if that's gross, but it's true.)  My stomach actually got noticeably smaller as I sat there.

Scott didn't take to long to get home and luckily I was able to pass the time calling my parents, brother, and a couple of friends to keep me distracted.  We got to the hospital around 2:30 and they immediately did an ultrasound of Sprout and started monitoring his heart rate.  Still head up and a strong steady heartbeat.  It seemed we weren't in any danger but I was definitely going to have a C-Section, I thought within an hour or so.  Except when you eat two enchiladas, a tamale, rice, beans, and chips and salsa, you cannot undergo surgery right away.  So I was going to have to wait until 6 before I could be prepped for surgery.  Here's a photo of me chilling and waiting for the hours to pass.

It didn't seem very long at all before the nurses were coming to bring me to the OR.  It was very bright and cold in there, there were about 6 people all scrubbed up and a table full of medieval tools  in the corner, Scott couldn't come in while they prepped me, and I started to panic.  I've never had anesthesia, surgery, stitches, anything.  And that stupid black cat from earlier....