Baby Boy Week 1

I'm so behind on logging in our new family happenings!  I decided that I would blog about each week of his life thus far.  I don't know if I will be able to keep up w/weekly blogs about specific changes, but things change so fast with him that I would really like to document it!

Here is Week 1:

I've blogged some about Dylan's first week of life.  We were all in the hospital due to his IV antibiotic treatment.  I can't believe how tiny and perfect he was!  He just slept and ate.  He only cried when he was hungry.  It was funny because he peed almost every time he was changed.  Ryan experienced a lot of "fountains."

 He came out with long fingernails and always kept his hands in his face...just like in the womb!  I was always telling people when I was pregnant that he had his fingers in his face down there and was scratching all the time and some people didn't believe me...well the proof is in the baby!  He always has his hands up around his face "voguing."  I just say that he is very "expressive with his hands."  His startle reflex was very sensitive and cute.  Especially with those expressive hands!

Dylan started breastfeeding well from the start.  I learned a lot from our childbirth classes b/c our instructor was also a lactation consultant, so I felt like I at least had some idea of where to start.  But then we had lactation consultants come in almost daily at the hospital, so we got even more tips from them.  I did have some engorgement and clogged ducts when my milk came in.  Owwie!  But with the lactation consultants' help, we worked them out pretty quickly.  One thing that was difficult our first night was that I had to feed him every two hours due to him barely being considered "large for gestational age" on some scale they have. They also had to check his blood sugar about every 2 hours for the same reason.  It was hard because he would fall asleep after about 5 minutes of nursing and they wanted him to feed for 20 minutes.  That was just for one night, but we had trouble keeping him awake during feedings for the first week or so.  It was important to us that he feed for longer so that he would sleep longer between feedings so that we could get some rest!

We had so many visitors and so many nurses that were so sweet to us...it made our one-week stay bearable.  We (especially me) definitely got stir crazy in that hospital.  Sometimes it made Ryan and me short with one another, but ultimately it was our patient support for one another and reliance on God's grace that got us through.  Ryan was so great the entire time.  I couldn't have asked for more from him.  Anywho.  I didn't go outside for days at a time.  Ryan would go do a half a day's work and my mom would come spend time with me.  Eventually we went out to get a pedicure down the street during one of Dylan's treatments and went for a walk around the hospital or to Starbucks other times.

Despite the extra help we got from the nurses for a week, it was still surreal taking him home with us.  I sat in the back with him and watched him the entire way to the house.  We got home and Betsey (Ryan's mom) had left a tiny birthday cake out on the counter for Dylan and Gary & Debra (Ryan's dad and step-mom) left a Charlie Brown Christmas tree on the counter and had bought a Santa toilet cover and decked out our master bathroom potty.  We were so tired because we didn't get home from the hospital until 11 or midnight because of his evening antibiotic treatment and then we stayed up to get things situated.  Dylan slept well in his little bassinet in our room.  Of course I woke up to check if he was breathing periodically...but overall I slept WAY better in our own bed than I did at the hospital...and so did Dylan!  He has slept 3+ hour stretches at a time pretty consistently at night from that night on.