about Graeme's first Easter

Graeme celebrated his first Easter this past weekend. Well, we probably had more fun celebrating it with him. He figured it was like any other day I suppose.

We started the celebrations on Saturday with the Bauer family. Graeme wore his Easter onesie that I bought him before he was born.

Cute, right?!


We went to his GiGi and Pop's house where he proceeded to take a long nap with Pop.

We all ate dinner while he continued to sleep. He was pretty sleepy that day.

Aaron and I took on the responsibility of opening his Easter basket goodies. He got way more loot than we did, as it should be I suppose.



Sunday, we spent the whole morning at Journey. I resumed my preschool worship leader duties that I've missed for the past few weeks. We had a great day and saw 100 people go public in baptism.

Graeme was looking pretty sharp in his Easter outfit. My friend Jessica made him some adorable bow ties and he wore one of those.

We got home from church and took a brief nap before it was time to head to Outback to celebrate Easter with my family.

Graeme was a sleepyhead through dinner again. Afterwards, we were all given our Easter baskets. The four big kids (me, Aaron, Tyler, and Sarah) got little baskets filled with candy and my mom's amazing homemade chocolate peanut butter eggs. Graeme got the biggest Easter basket known to man. Here's a size comparison:

He definitely made out pretty well for a four-week-old who was clueless to the Easter experience.

We got him an Easter basket too. It was not nearly as stuffed as the ones from his grandparents. Also, the chocolate bunny was in his basket from GiGi, but I think we will eat it for him. :)

We had so much fun celebrating our risen Savior with Graeme and can't wait to share many Easters with him. Also, we can't believe he turned four weeks old yesterday!

while Graeme (hopefully) naps...and about old chewing gum

*Sigh*

I'm not saying that this is proven fact, but I think that because both sets of Graeme's grandparents were here for the majority of yesterday and held him for most of his naps, today he is not at all happy that mommy will not hold him all the day long. Hey, if it takes a day to get back in our groove, it's fine. Grandparent snuggles are worth it for sure. 

We've had three naps since we woke up this morning. Two lasted all of thirty minutes each. The third attempt we made it about an hour and 15 minutes. Now we will see what this nap holds. Seriously, the kid has got to be exhausted by this point! Here's hoping for a wonderful, long nap.



Yesterday, there was a meeting at work in the morning that lasted until lunch. My parents came up and watched Graeme so I could go. It was the first time I had done anything work-related since before Graeme was born. I definitely missed him a lot, but it was nice to be back at work for a morning. Next week I will be going to work with Graeme for a couple mornings, and once May hits, we will figure out my new schedule. My mom will be keeping Graeme and instead of working four short days like I did before he was here, I am planning to work two longer days. 

Anyway, after the meeting, I used my time without a baby in tow to stop by David's Bridal and try on and order the bridesmaid dress for my brother's wedding. I had been waiting until I wasn't pregnant to go get the dress. And I figured if I tried to go when I had Graeme with me it would be a little tricky in the dressing room. It didn't take long at all, and my dress should arrive in plenty of time before the wedding.




I relieved my parents yesterday for a couple of hours, but then we passed Graeme off again to Aaron's parents so we could go out on a date. It all happened to fall on the same day, and even though there was a short break in between the two times, it was the longest we had left Graeme. Eight hours total!

It was so nice to get out with just Aaron though. We went to Downtown Raleigh to eat dinner. We took our time and got to sit and talk for over an hour in a restaurant basically to ourselves because it was so early and the place was empty. After dinner, we opted out of a movie (our original plan) and walked around downtown instead. 

It was a little chilly! We wanted to find somewhere inside, but we were still too full to go to a coffee shop. And Raleigh is lame so all of the downtown shops were closed. I had the idea to go check on our gum. I can't remember if I've explained our gum on the blog before, but I'll do it again anyway...

December 31, 2008

On our first New Year's Eve as a "couple" (we still weren't Facebook official soo...) we spent the evening downtown with some friends. It was freezing, so while we waited for the acorn drop at midnight, we did our best to find places to stay warm. There is a Marriott hotel right next to all of the New Year's Eve festivities, so we meandered in there. We stumbled upon their parking garage underground that was basically deserted. It was here that the four of us planned the ultimate empty parking garage roller blading laser tag game. And it was here that Aaron became sick of chewing his gum.

He found this pillar:

December 31, 2008

...and he stuck his gum behind it.

We used to go check on our gum pretty frequently. It was even part of my engagement day scavenger hunt.

August 8, 2009

So, last night, I happened to think of it, and we decided to go check. The parking garage is still pretty empty. Although, they use Level P1 to house cop cars now. I got a little nervous that a police officer was going to jump out and think we were up to no good. I'm not sure "Oh! Sorry! We are going to check if a five-year-old wad of chewed gum is on this certain pillar down here!" would fly as a good excuse.

We made it to our pillar safely, however, and sure enough, there was our gum.

April 16, 2014

We left the parking garage in disbelief that the gum has been there for over five years.

On New Year's Eve of 2008 we had just begun a relationship. We had only been dating for less than two months. I didn't even refer to Aaron as my boyfriend. Heck, I was still completely tongue-tied when I talked to him!

Now, our gum is still there, but we've come so very far. Five years later, we're almost four years into marriage, in a house, with a dog, and we have a baby!

I really hope the Marriott Convention Center parking garage Level P1 never undergoes a major cleaning. I hope in 50 years we can hobble down the steps (or maybe use the elevator at that point) and still be able to find our gum on that random pillar.




I suppose I shouldn't press my time any longer and go do some things that aren't as fun (aka fold laundry) while the little one is still asleep. 


Happy Easter weekend!

about Graeme's third week of life (and here are some newborn pictures!)

Graeme is three weeks old today!

He brings so much joy to our life. It's been our greatest adventure yet figuring out this parenting thing one day at a time. (If you think about more than just the day you're in, it's too much to think about!)

Graeme woke up for his middle of the night feeding at 2:15 this morning. I was holding him and glanced at the clock around 2:28. I told him how only three weeks ago we were just two minutes away from meeting him for the first time. It was pretty cool to be awake  with him at exactly 2:30am when he officially turned three weeks old. 





We took him on his first big outing on Friday. We swung by the Caribou Coffee drive-thru (he'll be pretty familiar with Caribou) and then went to Crabtree Valley Mall. The real reason for our trip to this particular mall was so that we could take Graeme for his very first visit to The Disney Store. We tried to plan our visit so that he would be awake for The Disney Store, but despite our great efforts, he slept the entire time.

Aaron was pretty excited, if you can imagine.

But Graeme, in his mouse ears, was dead to the world. Even the Disney world.

There was a SUPER nice cast member (store employee) that was so happy that we brought him and thought he was just adorable. She took our picture with a giant stuffed Mickey and gave Graeme a certificate to commemorate his visit (since the sleepyhead won't remember it otherwise!).

We might have been a little more excited than Graeme for this whole experience.

And we couldn't leave without buying Graeme his very first Mickey Mouse.

Oh, and before we left the mall, we of course had to buy him a couple of cute outfits from Baby Gap and make a stop at one of our other favorite stores that he must also love one day. No Androids or PCs around here.

We had a great week. Graeme is doing very well at night. He wakes every 3-4 hours to eat, but he goes right back to sleep afterwards. We have made the transition to the crib, and he has slept in there every night since Tuesday night. I leave the video monitor on next to my bedside so I can still see him anytime. In the morning, he typically wakes (or I wake him) to start the day between 7:15-7:45. From then on, we eat, have awake time, and take a nap in cycles throughout the day. He's a pretty easy going kid. We get along just fine.

Penny has made this transition pretty smoothly. Every once in awhile she will try to choose a very inopportune time to play (like when I'm home alone and trying to change a dirty diaper she goes and finds the squeakiest toy and paws at my legs relentlessly). She is very patient mostly though, and I think she accepts her demotion in the family well. We still love her to pieces and try to lavish attention on her when Graeme is sleeping or when we do have a free hand. She loves Graeme and the hardest thing for her is the fact that we will not let her attack his face with kisses (she's managed to sneak a few in though!).

I will leave you with a few of Graeme's newborn pictures that they took in the hospital. They send a photographer to your room to take pictures (you can decline if you want). There is no obligation to buy any of them, so we let the lady take them. When she brought back the slideshow later, there were a few that I really liked. Some were not that great. She told us we had two weeks to go online and buy them before they were unavailable. When we saw the prices, we had no intention of buying any of them!

However, when Graeme's two week birthday rolled around and we knew the pictures were to be gone by the end of the day, we went back on the site to at least watch the slideshow one last time. I think we both should have known that was a mistake...

I was holding my two-week-old son and watching this slideshow of adorable pictures from the day he was born. And of course the background music is this perfect song that made me start sobbing. Aaron just shook his head and pulled out his wallet.

He said, "They know what they're doing! They know the dads and moms will watch this again when the pictures are about to expire. They picked that song so that the moms will cry and the dads will have to buy all of these pictures! They are so smart!"

I'm embarrassed to say how much we dropped for the digital prints, but it's our first kid and he's adorable. Oh well.

while someone else takes care of the baby

Hello, everyone.

My awesome dad-in-law had a free afternoon today. He came over, took Graeme from me, and sent me upstairs to do whatever I wanted for a couple of hours. I'm pretty excited about it.

I just painted my nails for my first act of "me time." I had been scared to attempt that during nap time because I just knew Graeme would wake up when I had two hands full of wet nails. The struggle.

Anyway, here I am now sitting on my bed with Penny (who is also enjoying time sans baby, I believe). I figure a blog post was in order since writing is fun and relaxes me.




Graeme is 17 days old now. He had his two-week appointment on Monday. He is now 9 pounds, 2 ounces and 22 inches long. Somehow, he is in the 97% for height...I'm not sure how he is so "tall." The doctor says he looks great and encouraged us that we are doing a good job. That's very reassuring to hear from a doctor. We figure we aren't totally screwing this whole thing up, but it's nice to get it affirmed by someone else that has a degree in kid's health.

Oh, also at the doctor appointment, we heard a new pronunciation of Graeme's name that takes the cake to anything else we've heard. The nurse came to the waiting room and asked for "Gray-ah-may." We couldn't help but laugh. That's just the worst non-name ever. She felt bad about it, but we told her she wasn't the first to say his name wrong. She made a pronunciation note for future reference.




I mentioned in my last post that we were going to make the transition to the pack-n-play from the "taco bed." It's gone pretty well. According to the doctor, Graeme is in the middle of or about to hit a growth spurt. So that may attribute a bit to his waking more frequently the past two nights. He does act awful hungry! Or it could be from the new sleeping arrangement. We press on though. It's not so bad. He is just waking every two-three hours instead of sleeping until we wake him up, which had been our norm. It also takes him a bit longer to drift off in the middle of the night, but we let him fuss it out for a few minutes and then he puts himself to sleep.




Now that I am basically here by myself during the day, Graeme and I are figuring out our routine better. I am determined to teach him to put himself to sleep in his crib or wherever else he needs to sleep. He typically does great and falls asleep pretty fast. A couple naps a day I have to let him cry it out a little. I of course make sure he's not in misery with a dirty diaper or a burp that needs to be burped. But if he's dry, full, and just wants to be held, it's time for him to cry it out for a bit. It's tough, but when I actually watch the clock he only cries for less than ten minutes. I know it will be worth it.




Monday I made it my goal to do laundry (not necessarily fold and put it away though) and clean our bedroom and bathroom. I figured that was pretty attainable on my first day home alone. Graeme cooperated and I completed my tasks. That felt good.

It's pretty easy for me to start thinking about all of the things that need to be done or that I want to get done and spiral my brain into stress. I want the house clean, there's laundry to be done (always), my blog is neglected, the baby book needs to be filled out, I want to order some prints of Graeme's pictures, I should call my grandmas, and oh the list goes on. I quickly stop myself and remind myself that there is time for everything but not all in one day anymore. By making small goals each day of the week, I can still get things done and feel accomplished. And I don't tire myself out either.

It's also true that I would much rather have servants that did everything for me and just stare at Graeme all day. Again, the struggle. (Although he still takes precedence over anything around the house!)

It's definitely going to take some time to figure out how everything works now that there's a little one to care for in the midst of it. Aaron has been amazing at helping with so many things. It's been more of a struggle for me to let things go and let him help. Before Graeme came, it wasn't that he wouldn't help me do things, but I liked to do them myself. I liked taking care of anything and everything to do with cooking, cleaning, and housework so that he wouldn't have to worry about any of it. At most, I might ask him to take the trash to the dumpster on his way out the door or carry the vacuum downstairs for me. I didn't even let him help me much when I was pregnant.

Now, I realize that it's ridiculous for me to try to do everything. I would go crazy. I need Aaron's help! And he of course is very happy to oblige. We are having fun being a team and taking care of things together. I can't imagine doing this without him.




Well, I think that's about all for now. I will be back for another post as soon as I can! There are two boys and a dog that are a lot higher up on my list right now. :)

two weeks into this thing

Two weeks ago at this time I was sitting in a hospital bed holding my brand new baby boy that was born just that morning. I can't believe he's two weeks old!

Me and Graeme before we moved out of the delivery room.

Before we were parents, we heard countless times, "They grow up so fast!" or "Time speeds by!" or "They'll be grown in the blink of an eye!"

Yeah.

That's all totally true. We get it now.

I have cried about four times in the past 24 hours just thinking of how much he's already grown.

His going home from the hospital outfit (pictured) is about to be too small already! :(

Anyway.

I am not sure the goal of this blog post other than a random assortment of catching up. Here goes...



Graeme was born very early on a Sunday morning (figures he would come on the busiest day of the week for the majority of his close family and friends...even his own father). We could have stayed in the hospital until Tuesday, but the thought of another night in the hospital bed with the constant interruptions was not appealing to me at all. I just can't sleep well at the hospital. It was the same when I had my thyroid removed.

Despite hardly any sleep while we were at the hospital, I was on an adrenaline high or something. The fact that I had gotten about eight hours of sleep in 48 hours didn't hit me until we did get home on Monday night. I wasn't sure what kind of sleep we would be in for that night with a newborn and no nurses to whisk him off to the nursery. To my delight, we have an angel baby who SLEEPS SO WELL AT NIGHT.

We are two weeks in now, and Graeme has yet to have a bad night of sleep. I am just waiting for that all-nighter to come. Of course, I don't want it to, but I am waiting.

We feed him one last time before we go to bed between 11:00-11:30pm. We lay him down still awake and he puts himself to sleep. Then I have to wake him up for the next feeding. Last night, I totally slept through my alarm to wake him up in the middle of the night. (Our pediatrician doesn't want him to go longer than four hours at night for now.) I accidentally slept an hour past when I had meant to wake him up. When I did wake up out of the blue, Graeme was still sound asleep. I felt a little bad, but I know if he was really hungry he would let us know!

Anyway, after he eats and gets his diaper changed in the middle of the night, he goes right back to sleep in his little Rock-n-Play all by himself. Then, he sleeps until between 6:30-7:30am. I am okay with that wake up time.

Tonight, we are going to try to make the transition from the Rock-n-Play to the Pack-n-Play. (That all-nighter I'm waiting for might be fast approaching...) I am hoping he's not too attached to his little "taco bed" as I like to call it, after just two weeks. We don't want him to get so used to sleeping in it that it comes back to bite us later. A flat sleeping surface is headed his way in just a couple hours. We'll see how it goes. And then before too long we will promote him all the way to his crib.

This is where he's been sleeping at night. It's pretty cozy.

So that's how night sleeping is going.



The daytime is just as fun. We implemented the eat-wake-sleep routine as soon as we could. He took to it like a champ. I sure do love him. The routine is good for all of us.

When he's awake, (which isn't ever for terribly long, although in the past week he's been much more alert) he likes to listen to music, listen to books, look in the mirror, watch his swing mobile, have tummy time, or just listen to someone talk to him. He sure is easy to entertain right now. He and Aaron are reading Peter Pan together. At night, we are all reading The Jesus Storybook Bible.

Things Graeme does not like include diaper changes, clothes changes, sponge baths (he's had one full bath since his cord came off...he wasn't as angry about it as a sponge bath, but didn't love it either), having his face wiped, getting the straps put on him in his carseat (once it's buckled, he's fine), and when his food is not quite ready at his demand.

He really hated his first sponge bath at home...

That's how the daytime goes.




What else?

Well, my mom was a HUGE help for the first two weeks. We didn't do laundry, cleaning, or anything really. Aaron helped occasionally, but he was usually sent away to sit down and rest too. She took care of our house, made our bed every time we took a nap, and even got us groceries. It was awesome. She's the best.

We have also been completely spoiled by our wonderful church family. We have had dinner brought to us almost every night. It has been amazing. Meals are still coming this week. I'm pretty sure I'm not going to remember how to cook or ever want to again. We feel so loved and appreciate everyone that has helped us so much.



I guess I'll end with a sentimental paragraph now...


I have always wanted to be a mom. I can't believe I finally am! It has made me love Jesus more. It brings His love for me into a brand new light. It has made me love my husband more. Watching Aaron be a dad and tackling this new adventure with him has been the funnest part of our marriage so far. I love Graeme so unconditionally and feel like he fits right in to our family perfectly. One of our wise friends told us this about becoming parents:

"Your kid is the only person you love before you ever get to know them. You love them right away. Anyone else in your life, you get to know them before you love them. They have to earn your love. Not your child. The moment you see them, you love them unconditionally."

the story of Graeme's arrival (part 3)

If you missed part 1 or part 2, make sure to read them first!


Note:  I tried to keep this post PG! I hope it's not too much information. :)


We last ended where Dr. Anderson had broken my water (it was quite stubborn and never did break itself). Our families came back in to say hi for a few minutes, but then Megan ushered everyone out so that Aaron and I could get some rest.

Since I was finally able to relax due to my epidural, I could get semi-comfortable. Aaron cozied up in the stiff, leather recliner by the window, and I cozied up in my inclined hospital bed with monitors and needles. You know, the best night of sleep ever, basically.

I am pretty sure I only "slept" for about 30 minutes, when my contractions started to bother me again.

Megan did an ice test thing where I would tell her when I could feel cold. One of my legs felt no cold (that's a good thing). The other leg still felt cold near the top. She had me roll over to try to spread some medicine to that leg. 

I tried to rest some more, but the contractions were not as "pleasant" feeling as right after my epidural.

Around 1:00am, Megan checked my progress. I was now dilated six centimeters (woo hoo!), but the contractions were not getting better no matter what position I was in. Megan gave me another dose of medicine to try to kick start some good feelings. She said if that didn't help, we would need to call the anesthesiologist back in to check and make sure nothing had shifted. That was not news I liked to hear. I was pretty sure I did not want to have to get my epidural "fixed" if it entailed doing it all over again!

But, at this point, I figured we were progressing about a centimeter every 1-2 hours, so we would probably not see our baby until breakfast time. 5-6 more hours with no epidural sounded just as unpleasant.

I prayed that the new medicine would work, but the contractions were getting to be almost as worse as before the epidural. Aaron had woken up from his nap at this point and was helping me breathe again.

Finally, after 20 minutes with no improvement, Megan was about to make the call for the anesthesiologist. Then she said, "You know what, just to make sure, let me check you one more time." 

To our surprise she looked up and said, "Oh. You know why you're in so much pain? You're complete. It's time to have a baby!"

I just laid there for a few seconds in shock. "What? Really?"

"Yep! Ten centimeters! I need to get things ready and we can start pushing!"

She started bustling in and out of the room gathering blankets and carts and things and who knows what.

I looked at Aaron and we were both thrown off a little bit. Our baby was coming. Like now. Just 20 minutes earlier we were at six centimeters. Now, Graeme was ready to bust out of there.

Aaron hurriedly texted our parents that "It's time! We're at 10!"

Then, he started getting a little panicked again. Actually, this time, I panicked a bit too! Megan started to explain how Aaron needed to hold one of my legs but not to push it certain ways. I had rules too. Push like this, not like this, and so on. I was glad for Megan because I felt so not ready for this part yet.

She explained that another nurse would come in to help, and when Graeme was about to fall out (at least that's how I took it), that's when we would call in Dr. Anderson.

Once we were all set up and I was "comfortable," we started pushing. This was around 1:50am.

I was feeling pretty good during the pushing. It didn't actually hurt, but it was hard work! Aaron was a little squeamish at first, but eventually, he got over it. To my surprise, he actually peeked every so often!

After only a few pushes, Megan informed us that she could see a head with hair on it. (By the way, I'm sorry again if this is ever too graphic). "Yay!" I said smiling at Aaron. I have prayed this whole pregnancy that he would have hair.

I was also surprised that she could see anything yet, because I didn't feel like I was doing much. The numbness was throwing me off and it was really hard to tell if things were moving or happening.

Megan reassured me that "You're doing amazing! Most women push for hours to get this far!" (Sorry, to "most women." Don't hate me.)

We kept pushing, and besides extreme concentration which required some strange faces on my part, I never screamed or cried or made any noises. 

Aaron joked, "I thought for sure the one time I would hear you scream would be while you're in labor. And here you are smiling after each set of pushes."

I laughed. I knew I was not far at all from meeting this little boy that had been growing inside me for what seemed like forever. This labor thing was easy.

After 25 minutes of pushing with Megan and Aaron, who kept updating me on "what they could see" down there (I declined a mirror. No thank you. My imagination and updates from the two of them were good enough.), Megan called for Dr. Anderson.

Now it really wouldn't be long. I glanced at the clock and remember that it was close to 2:15am.

When Dr. Anderson came in, Megan reminded Aaron that if Graeme's shoulders happened to get stuck, he would need to move and let the other nurse take over. And I would need to do exactly what she said no matter what.

This was definitely getting real.

Dr. Anderson got all ready and set up (we had pushed a few more times since he arrived in the room).

When he got down there he said, "Woah! We are almost done here!"

That was crazy, and exciting, and surreal.

Dr. Anderson took over the coaching. After one set of the normal three pushes, on the next set, he said, "Do you have one more in you?"

"Sure," I replied. So we pushed a fourth time. Aaron yelled "Woah!!" I knew that we were getting close.

We took a little break until I felt ready again. Then we started another set of pushes.


One push.


Two push.


I was on the third push, when all of a sudden, there was a warm, crying, (slimy) baby on my chest.

"Oh!"

It took me a second to realize I was even done. He was here. I glanced. He was definitely a boy. Graeme was here. My little baby boy.

I heard Megan say, "If you were aiming for 2:30 exactly, you did it!"

I stared at Graeme. And I stared at Aaron. And there were definitely smiles and happy tears.

Aaron was smiling like crazy. "You're amazing. You did it. He's here."

We held Graeme as he calmed down. He was perfect. All of the drama of the day and the waiting for nine months and the heartburn and the nausea and the waiting and the waiting and did I mention waiting...all of that was over and totally, completely worth it.

I begrudgingly gave him to the other nurse who took him to get his weight and his APGAR and all of that other stuff. Megan stayed with me while Dr. Anderson finished up with everything down there. What Dr. Anderson was doing after the fact was actually more painful than labor. What's the deal with pushing on your stomach like they want to push through to the other side? 

Aaron was the lucky one and got to go help the nurse with Graeme. I could see what they were doing over there at least.

We didn't want to be the parents that posted a picture of the kid fresh out of all of the goop because they usually look more "scary alien-like" than "cute, cuddly baby." But Graeme was pretty cute despite all of the slime. Plus, this picture is hilarious and telling of what we're in for. He had already mastered the pouty face right off the start. 

It was hard to believe that it had only been 22.5 hours since I woke up at 4am on Saturday. Little did I know that I would deliver our little guy in less than 24 hours!

Overall, labor and delivery was great. The whole "come to the hospital, leave the hospital, come to the hospital, maybe to leave the hospital" was the worst thing. And the mean, "Debbie Downer" nurse was a low point, of course. 

I went in to the whole labor thing with no expectations. No "plan." I wasn't really nervous or scared. I wanted to go with the flow and do what was best for Graeme. I guess I might have had it "easy"...unless I have an uncanny tolerance for pain...not sure. I am glad I got an epidural towards the end. I am sure the whole pushing thing would have been a lot more painful without it. For sure, I'm not deterred from trying this whole baby thing again. But let's give it a couple years at least!



And that is the story of Graeme's arrival.