Jack: Month Four

A little late posting this - the photos were taken on time though hehe. Jack turned four months on the 3rd. He is a big, little man. Loves his hands in his mouth, and becoming more and more aware of his surroundings.

He loves standing. This month, we've introduced him to his exersaucer - 10-15 minutes a day. The look on his face when he realizes he's "standing" without you is amazing - he is just so happy.  We got the exersaucer on loan, but he received a jumper for Christmas from some amazing friends - so I will have to put that together for him.  He has great head and neck control, so now he gets these toys hehe. 

We have also started going to a "Mommy and Me" workout class at a local gym. The babies all lie on the mat in the middle and we do circuit training around them. Jack just babbles away the whole time, just so much to see, and other little ones to babble to. 

We have also taken Jack out for rides in his little sled in the snow, and have gone snowshoeing in his carrier. While he is heavy, he is a little furnace, so we keep each other especially toasty while we are mucking about in the snow.  It's a lot of fun, but I am looking forward to warmer days, and spending mornings in the garden and afternoons at our beaches with him :)

This month we are going to look into swimming lessons. They do have to be 6 months in this area to participate, but I want to get him signed up, and then go to the local pool a few times before just to get him used to it... and have Mommy time with some of my other mommy friends :)

Jack: Month Three

A little late, but Jack turned 3 months on January 3rd.  Over the past month, Jack has consistently been giving this Mommy a full nights sleep. Waking up in the middle of the night is a rare occurrence now - less than once a week. He gets up between 6-730, and will go right back down for another 2-3 hours sleep after eating. I use this time to get him 'back on schedule', or to work the feedings around what we have going on that day - if there are appointments. I'm also going to guess he is around 15-17lbs now (based on our combined weight on our crummy at home scale). He's starting to get some baby rolls, but he is just so long that the weight doesn't make him very pudgy at all.

Our little Lumber'Jack'  :)

Jack is really starting to grab and grip items a lot better this month. He has started to consistently bring them to his mouth to 'eat' them...I know he's not hungry because he does this all the time, regardless. I joke that his cousin Adley, who he met at Christmas, showed him this neat skill.

Jack is really good at supporting his head now, he doesn't need very much help at all anymore. It still wobbles here and there, but for the most part he prefers to be sitting upright and looking around at his little world. He also loves to 'stand' - he will be in the bouncer before we know it! He also really loves to kick.

His favourite thing to do this month: flying in the air - complete with flying sounds.  No matter how grumpy he is, if you 'fly him' and make the noises, by the time you land, he is all giggles and has forgotten to be grumpy. :)

Jack: Month One!

Our little moose, Jack, is a month old! The time just flew! We cannot believe how much he has already changed - in his looks, personality and developing mannerisms.

He's found his thumb this month - something we are trying to keep on top of, he does get a pacifier for our sanity :) He is working on his smiles, and he's starting making some new noises. He loves being held in the upright position where he can look around - from day one, he has been lifting up his head. He's also got his hand grip down pat - lacking coordination still, and of course does not have the 'release' figured out... my hair has been caught in those tricky hands a couple times.

We also celebrated his first halloween, we dressed Jack as a Lion with a crochet lion hat that I made for him. He wasn't as cooperative for that photoshoot as he was for his one-month photos:

Our friends and family really enjoyed this... expressive.. photo of dear Jack. I'm still pretty grateful we got a smile for his one month photo hehe. :)

I must say, Jack has given me plenty of opportunity to play with my DSLR camera, and with Photoshop - I've been learning so much! :) 

We Have A Baby!!

Jack at almost 2 weeks of age.

Our baby bear finally decided to grace us with his presence :) Baby Jack was born on October 3rd at 4:00pm. Measuring in at 8.95lbs and 23 inches! He was 5 days overdue.

We went into labour late in the evening on the 2nd - it started off with just what felt like Braxton Hicks, but they became regular at 5 minutes for over an hour, so I called L&D as I wasn't sure and they recommended I come in and get checked out. They confirmed that they were indeed contractions, so I got to stay. By morning when my doctor came in,  I was dilated a good 4-5cm, so they broke my water - which made the contractions worse, but I was able to hop in the shower and clean up and the hot water was soothing. I was happy that we did the 20 minute drive while I was not having any pain - I couldn't imagine the drive with full contractions. 

Things just progressed more and more through the afternoon - it was uncomfortable, but manageable with the resources they had available : birthing ball, tub, nitrous gas ect. We gave birth at birthing center, and the nursing care and support was just amazing.  I think that really made a difference - I had always thought that I would be demanding an epidural right away, but we did it without one... and I will 100% attribute that to the support from the nurses and my husband, as well as my very calm and confident doctor. Although, I'll admit the last half hour I was really wondering if it was a good idea. But we did it! I had back labour, so I was most comfortable standing and leaning forward - two things I would not have been able to do if I had an epidural: lying on my back and sitting were the worse when I was labouring. My husband was a tremendous help, applying counter pressure when needed to help through the harder contractions and just amazing overall support.

It got real around 1 in the afternoon, and by 2 we were in hard labour - pushing hard for about 2 hours. Finally Jack, stubborn as he was, came into the world at a very precise 4:00pm with the help of some vacuum assistance after 18 hours of labour. He did not make it easy, that is for sure - but he was completely worth it :)

Because it was a birthing center, we had a huge room to ourselves, with our own bathroom facilities, microwave and everything. I got to stay in the same room where I labored and gave birth to Jack - so it was nice that we could settle into a room and not worry about being moved around all over.

Day One

By the way - those wondering about 'old wives tales' while I was pregnant (we didn't know the sex of our baby during the pregnancy):  majority of the 'tests' said we would be having a girl - James actually almost didn't believe it when he announced that it was a boy - he 100% thought it was a girl. Also, I had zero heart-burn / stomach issues, ect - despite how much hair Jack has. And for those super concerned about pregnancy weight - I was all baby. I gained 20lbs during this pregnancy, and when I left the hospital, we carried almost 9 lbs of that home (baby Jack), and the rest we left there, I came home to pre-pregnancy weight. So moms - do not fret about your weight :)

Jack at one week - I know he's crying, but I love how this photo caught so much expression.

Jack has been doing well, Oreo (cat) and Chewie (dog) are still adjusting, but coming around. He's feeding like a champ, so we have been able to breastfeed exclusively so far. We've introduced one bottle at night, so dad can do a feeding, I can sleep a bit more, and to prep Jack for if there's a reason I can't breastfeed him. We introduced the soothie the second night for our sanity, and it has been a blessing, and there has been zero nipple confusion - our nurse pretty much told us to 'do us', and not to worry about the whole nipple confusion 'ridiculousness' as she refereed to it hehe. We have also started introducing some cloth diapering this week, started yesterday, now that I can move a bit better and have a better handle on the feeding and such. So far I've just done some prefolds and covers - and no leaks or problems (yet). I have some other diapers to try in the smaller sizes - he's not far away from the one-size diapers though with his big birth weight.