1 down, 18 to go!

Isaiah met the first of his 18 cousins this week. My little sister came down with her youngest, Clara. Clara is five months old but I must say Isaiah showed her up as far as behavior goes. He slept much better and cried much less. In her defense she was cutting her first tooth. Theresa took me to run lots of errands and I think someday I may actually be able to leave the house on my own with the little guy in tow. As of now I'm still not allowed to carry him in his carseat so Theresa had to lug both of them around. She gave me some tips on taking care of him while I'm out and about so that was good. Isaiah and Clara got on very well together . . . perhaps because they were completely oblivious of each other. When Theresa and Clara first got here I made sure Clara knew that only one of them was allowed to cry at a time and for the most part they both obeyed the rule. Anyway, Theresa left this evening so I guess tomorrow I'll officially be home alone all day with my boy--wish me luck!

First Real Bath

I am too scared to give Isaiah a bath. We were just sponge bathing him but since his belly button came off we had no excuse for not giving him a proper bath. Luckily Aunt Theresa came to visit so she took care of giving him his first real bath. He screamed the whole time, which is what he does anytime you try to take care of him--baths, diaper changes, clothing changes, etc. all cause screaming fits.

Isaiah's Church Debut

Isaiah woke us up early Sunday morning and since we were all awake we decided we'd try out taking him to church. He actually did fairly well. He lasted 2 1/2 of the 3 hours, which is more than I can say for myself! Some days I feel like I'm all better, but then when I try to do anything I realize how tired I really am. Of course everyone oohed and aahed over him since he was so handsome! Since I teach the little kids Jerel takes the baby for the second two hours so I guess if you want an accurate account of how Isaiah did at church you should really check with him.

Some more pictures

 

Here's Isaiah at 2 weeks.

How did THAT happen?!

 So I just checked it out and Jerel is in roughly the 10th percentile for height and I am in about the 5th percentile. At Isaiah's 2-week appointment yesterday we found out he has grown a full inch since birth and is now in the 90th percentile for height. I am not sure how that works . . . is there some kind of tall gene that's like super recessive or something? My family is particularly short--I think the tallest guy for generations is like 5'7" or something, so it didn't come from me! But Jerel does have some taller people in his family. Anyway, we hope Isaiah is enjoying his time as a tall kid since it probably won't last long!

He weighed 8lbs 8oz at birth and by the 2-week appointment they like babies to be back up to their birth weight...Isaiah is an over-achiever and is up to 9lbs 9oz already! That makes his weight in the 75th percentile. His head, FYI, is in the 61st percentile. Ha, look at me throwing out all these baby stats--I am definitely turning into one of those annoying first-time moms that think everything about their baby is soooo fascinating...

Grandma Atkinson

 Here's Isaiah with Jerel's mom. She's been a laundry-washing, baby-holding, diaper-changing fool the last few days! I told Isaiah he's going to have to start going naked once she's gone. He didn't seem too bothered by that. She's heading back to Utah this afternoon. Jerel's making his yummy chocolate chip cookies for her today--hopefully she'll share with me!

Isaiah slept lots and lots last night so we love him extra today! After his second feeding we let him stay in our bed and no matter how we laid him down he'd wiggle himself around until his feet were lined up perfectly to kick my incision...silly little guy!

Anyway, we've sure appreciated having both grandmas come to help with the baby!

A few more pictures

 Isaiah wasn't particularly cooperative during yesterday's photo shoot, but here are a few more pics anyway. Isaiah is doing pretty well. He usually only wakes up to eat twice during the night and that is fairly tolerable. I am getting a little stronger every day so that is encouraging. Anyway, time to feed the baby again...

2 Hours

 I can remember my last semester of grad school wondering what life would be like if it wasn't measured in semesters. Public accounting took care of that by dividing my life according to busy seasons. And then for a couple of years I had this weird life where time wasn't really measured by anything and I was actually aware of the changing seasons and other natural markers of the passage of time. That has now come to an abrupt end as my life is now measured in the 2-hour increments between feedings. Two hours might seem like a fair chunk of time, but really it takes about an hour to feed him, which only leaves one hour to actually do anything. Fortunately I don't feel like doing anything anyway. He does usually give us a 4 or 5 hour stretch at night so that is fabulous.

Not a whole lot of exciting news to share here I guess. Bambi is coming by later today for a photo shoot so for those of you who want to see 10,000 pictures of Isaiah I should have those posted in the next couple of days.

Isaiah and Grandma Joe

 Here's our cute boy with my mom.

Super Dad

This is Jerel and Isaiah just as we were getting ready to leave the hospital Tuesday afternoon. The delivery wasn't as smooth as we were hoping for and after almost being able to deliver him I ended up needing a C-section, then I had some hemorrhaging and needed a blood transfusion. This all, of course, left me exhausted but Jerel stepped right up and did all the baby care. He did the feedings, the diapers, the late-night crying spells, etc.

I have been slowly getting back into the swing of things. Yesterday I had a rough go of it and ended up back in the hospital briefly to get some fluids and pain medication and such and this afternoon I am starting to feel better. Isaiah was very cooperative at the hospital and Jerel had lots of fun trying to find a men's restroom that had a baby-changing table in it. Today Jerel read Isaiah his first book--a cookbook which Jerel read like it was a story. He also sings to him, although we've discovered his repertoire of nursery songs to be a little lacking. He makes up for it by singing things like the Chiquita Banana ditty and the theme song from Gilligan's Island.

My mom got here yesterday while we were still at the ER so she met us there. Today she cleaned the living room for us, watched Isaiah so we could take naps, and helped keep me stocked with fluids close at hand so I can try to get back up to normal strength. Next week Jerel's mom comes to help since Jerel will be going back to work, so we are well taken care of!

Isaiah Charles Bernard Atkinson

Born: July 10, 2009, 6:57 PM PT
Height: 21 inches
Weight: 8 lbs. 8 oz.

All my bags are packed...

...I'm ready to go. Unfortunately last night the hospital filled up with women already in labor so we got bumped from the list to be induced. Now we're scheduled to go in at midnight Thursday night, which means baby will probably arrive sometime on Friday. I find the whole thing rather annoying, and Jerel finds me rather annoying I'm sure. It's just that in my head the baby is growing by at least 2 pounds a day at this point and every delay will just make labor that much harder. We'll keep you posted.

Brief Update

Just got back from the doctor--still no changes. Jerel thinks it's because the baby doesn't want to come out if he is going to end up named Charlie. So I get to go in at midnight Tuesday night to get things started and then get induced sometime Wednesday. The only good thing about waiting alllllllll the way until Wednesday is that it will make Charlie's birthday 07-08-09 and the accountant in me really likes that.

Talk About Overstaying Your Welcome!

You know those annoying people at work who stop by your cubicle just to say hello and then end up telling pointless annoying stories for the next 3 hours? Or the friend who drops by to return something she borrowed and then makes herself at home and you think she'll never leave? (I'm not denying ever being one of those people!) Anyway, a while back I decided to let someone stay in my tummy, but I made it clear it was only a 9-month lease, and now he seems to have decided to make it his permanent home. I'm not really sure how to get him to leave. He doesn't seem to have any intention of leaving on his own, I have no real way to force him out, and the doctor doesn't seem to be in favor of eviction yet.

Today's visit to the doctor showed (not surprisingly) no physical changes or any indicators that labor might ever start. Well, I guess there was one change, my stomach grew another 3 cm this week, I'm up to 41cm for those of you who are keeping track. This, of course, doesn't indicate labor, it just indicates that the baby is getting even more enormous and will thus make labor even more horrible. The no-changes news wasn't a shock to me. I figured since starting tomorrow we are having a severe heat wave it would only make sense that I would remain pregnant through the whole thing. But at least I'm not being pessimistic...

So we are scheduled to visit the doc again on Monday. If there are any changes at that point he will have me induced on Tuesday. If there are not any changes at that point he will have me stay at the hospital Monday night and they'll do some procedures or medicines that I've never heard of to try to get things going by Tuesday. At least there is a light at the end of the tunnel, even though the tunnel still seems reeeeaaaalllly long to me!