All Better!

I had my 6 week post partum check up yesterday and the doctor said all is healed and I can resume normal activities.... now I have no excuse to not exercise.

JD is doing well.... not as fussy as he has been the past 3 weeks but still eating all the time! Hopefully he'll become faster at nursing as right now it takes him about 45 minutes every time. Just a little bit ago he fell asleep on the Boppy pillow as he was eating... he's now laying on the Boppy in bed with Daddy, who is feeling a bit under the weather today.

And I had to include this picture just because I LOVE these jammies! They were given to him by our very good friends, Marc and Gina while we were up in PA.....

Pitiful!

Poor Little Buddy has his first cold! Yesterday he was excessively fussy and wouldn't eat very well. Then I noticed a rattling sound as he breathed through his nose. It wasn't running and I couldn't see anything in the nostril but I decided to use the nasal aspirator and suck it anyway. What I got was a whole lot of yellow mucous! Poor little guy couldn't breathe while he was trying to eat! That would make me fussy too!

So I called the pediatrician's office and the nurse said to use the saline drops, have him sleep upright in his car seat or bouncy seat and suck his nose before feeding him. She said if it wasn't better in the morning to go in to the office and see the doctor. Later that evening I could see that he wasn't feeling good.... he just looked kind of pitiful!

Well, he slept very well last night and it was a little better this morning.... but being a paranoid new mom I still took him to see the doctor. His ears are fine and his chest is clear. Looks like it's just a stuffy nose but I feel better knowing it hasn't spread. The doctor said it will take 7 - 10 days to clear up but if he runs a fever I should bring him back in.

Oh! He now weighs 10 pounds, 11 ounces... little piggy is getting big!

6 weeks.. WOW!

I can't believe he's 6 weeks today! I also can't believe that I would have to leave him on Monday if I were going back to work. It solidifies our decision for me to stay at home for a while with him. I really don't think I could leave him this early! Thank God we have the option!

Here is his 6 week photo with the bear in the chair. In my current sleep deprived state I put the wrong date on the sign...but he's sleeping now so I'm not going to redo the picture (the date should read 7-24-08). Anyway, he's getting so big! Just last week he started smiling at us (and not because of gas) and cooing. It's so cool that he "talks" to us now! He doesn't do it very often but I get very excited when he does!

He's still not sleeping at night very much. He's generally up about every 2 hours wanting to eat but the past couple of nights he's had one 3.5 hour stretch each night. Now, if only I would learn and go to bed when he does I might be able to take advantage of that.... I just can't bring myself to go to bed at 7:00 PM when there's laundry and dishes to be done!

Random Pics

Here are some random pics that I just wanted to post.... I love taking pictures of bath time!!

JD's first Road Trip and Mike's Wedding

Life has been so hectic I just haven't had time to post much lately! So, this will be a long one, I'm sure, as a lot has happened over the past several days!

JD got to meet the rest of his aunts and uncles (Dave's sister and brothers) over the weekend, JD took his first road trip to PA, Mike and Deanna got married (and now JD has a new aunt), etc...

First, the road trip! Usually it takes us 9-10 hours to drive to PA, depending on the traffic around Washington DC. Traveling with JD, I was expecting it to take MUCH longer. Dave came home from work on Wednesday and decided that he wanted to drive through the night. So I finished the packing and we hit the road at 8:00 PM Wednesday. We drove through the night and arrived at Dave's parents house on Thursday morning at 7:00. Only 11 hours... not bad! JD did great! He slept the whole way. We only had to stop to burp and change him. I brought my breast pump, which has a car adapter, pumped bottles and fed the little guy while we drove. I think it saved us a lot of time! When we arrived in PA, Dave's mom was more than happy to entertain JD while we got a few hours of sleep. We both needed it after driving all night long!

Friday morning we all got up and had breakfast together. Mike and Jeff joined us and then we all headed to Wood's Golf Center for a Harbaugh Family Outing. Everyone played a round of golf and JD and I enjoyed driving around on the golf cart and just relaxing. JD pretty much slept the whole time and I couldn't resist taking this picture....he had a hold on his binkie and wasn't letting go! Later that day we all drove to Allentown, PA for Mike and Deanna's rehearsal dinner.

Saturday was the big day. The whole reason we drove to PA. Mike and Deanna got married.

The wedding was beautiful and the reception was a ton of fun! Sunday Dave drove me to see his college (East Stroudsburg University) since we were already pretty close to it. It's in the Poconos and the area is very pretty. While driving back to his parents house he decided that he wanted to leave that evening and drive all night again. So, Dave went to bed as soon as we got back to his parents house while I washed clothes and bottles and got everything packed up again! We left PA at 8:00 PM on Sunday and arrived home at 8:30 AM on Monday. We hit some traffic and a very big storm in Delaware so it took us a little longer to get home. We were all exhausted and our cat, Samantha, was VERY happy to see us! This is probably the worst picture ever taken of me but it shows just how tired we were and just how clingy the cat was the day we got back!

While in PA, JD got to meet his Uncle Mike, Aunt Deb, Uncle Jeff and Aunt Deanna. Here are pics of him with Uncle Mike and Uncle Jeff.

I didn't have my camera around when Aunt Deb and Aunt Deanna were holding him but I'm sure somebody got a picture. If they're ever emailed to me I'll be sure to post them... speaking of Aunts and Uncles, here is also a picture of Uncle Kent holding him... I finally got a chance to get a picture!

Not only did he meet the rest of his aunts and uncles, he also got to meet most of his extended family (Dave's aunts, uncles and cousins) as well as a lot of close family friends!

So the trip was exhausting but a lot of fun. It was great to see everyone and I'm very glad we went while JD is so young!

We Survived!

No pics for this post because I don't exactly know where our camera is right now.

We survived our first 11 hour car trip with JD. Dave and I left our house last night at 8:00 PM and drove all night, arriving at his parents house in PA at 7:00 this morning. JD did great! He slept the entire car ride and barely made a sound! I'm wondering if he would have slept so much if we had made the trip during the day??

Today he met Uncle Mike, who is getting married on Saturday, and in just a little while Aunt Deb will arrive to meet him. And I think Uncle Jeff is coming over for breakfast in the morning! I'll be sure to post pics of him with all of his Harbaugh aunts and uncles as soon as I find our camera in our bags!

1 Month Old

I can't believe he's already one month old! We went to the doctor a couple of days ago and he now weighs 10 pounds, 2 ounces. He's gained almost an entire pound (just 1 ounce short) in a week and a half...this kid must be getting plenty to eat! As far as my post partum weight goes, I've lost all but 15 of the 58 pounds I gained while pregnant. I'll be cleared for exercise in a couple of weeks and I plan to work very hard to get rid of those last 15 pounds (and then some, hopefully).

So much has gone on I just haven't had time to get online to write about it with all the fussiness. I finally hit my breaking point on Thursday after a solid week of eating and crying constantly. The poor kid has such bad gas that the only time he wasn't crying is when he was nursing! So bad that it would wake him about every hour during the night (thus waking me) and nobody was getting any sleep at all! I finally called the doctor to see what we could do and they had me bring him in because I told them that the gassiness was affecting his eating (he would arch his back and scream while trying to eat). The doctor told me to give him Children's Benadryl and Gripe Water every 6 hours for about 5 days. Yesterday was our first day on the medicine and it does seem to be helping. I'm thinking that the lack of sleep was contributing to the crankiness and the Benadryl calms him down enough to allow him to sleep. Now we wake up every 2 hours to eat, burp and fart. It's not much but it's better than every hour!

Yesterday was my 31st birthday. As far as birthdays go, this was the most uneventful birthday I've ever had. But as my little guy fell asleep while holding on tightly to my finger I realized that this will always be my favorite birthday! Dave and I went out to dinner. It was JD's first outing to a restaurant and he did pretty well! Tonight we will go to dinner with my brother Kent and my parents. Kent's birthday is on Monday (he'll be 32...yes, we're very close in age) and we always choose a night in between the 2 birthdays for everyone to go to dinner. Hopefully JD will be just as great tonight as he was last night!

OK... here is JD's one month old picture in the chair with the bear. I also couldn't resist posting a few more I took during "tummy time" today. A couple of them show off his beautiful blue eyes!

I don't know when the next post will be. Hopefully the fussiness will subside soon so I'll be able to put him down occasionally and do some dishes or laundry or something! Also on the agenda for this week is JD's first road trip to PA. Uncle Mike is getting married one week from today and I'm sure trying to pack one-handed while holding a baby will be quite interesting!

Getting big!

Sorry I haven't posted in a few days. JD is going through some kind of growth spurt and I can't get anything done! He's fussy and clingy and hungry all the time. All we do is sit on the couch and nurse... it's exhausting! He's even fighting sleep this week and I really have to work to get him to nap during the day.

Anyway, all this eating is making him grow... we've put away the newborn diapers and are now in size 1. And today we're wearing a 0-6 month onesie instead of a newborn onesie. I'm going to be so sad the day I pack away his newborn clothes.... I think I'll put that off for a while!

On top of bigger clothes and diapers, we've started putting him in his crib to sleep at night. The first 2 nights were horrible. He woke up pretty much every hour and I spent the entire night walking back and forth from our bedroom to his. Last night was better. He slept for 4 hours (from 9:00 PM to 1:00 AM), ate and then slept for another 2. Even though he was pretty much up for the day at 4:30 AM I still got a total of 5 hours of sleep last night so I feel pretty good! Right now JD is napping with Daddy in the bed before Daddy has to get up and go to work.

I'll post more this weekend.... Saturday he'll be one month already! That means a new picture in the chair with the bear!... and just because I hate to post without a picture, here's another one from July 4th that my mom sent me... he's such a cutie!

3 Weeks, 2 Days

After we got home from the festivities yesterday I put JD in his bouncy chair and attached the toy bar. Usually he just looks at the little toys hanging from the toy bar but I noticed last night that he was actually trying to reach out and touch the toys!

So this morning I got his activity mat out for the first time. I thought he would scream after just a minute (which is what he does when we lay him in his crib) but he didn't. He lay there for about 15 minutes just looking at everything. I know he's a little young to actually be "interactive" but I felt like I gave him something new and exciting to look at.... and I'm happy to see that he is starting to notice his surroundings a little more!

Happy 4th of July!!!

What a day we had! Ever since I could remember, I've attended the Pawleys Island 4th of July Parade. It's a very fond memory from my childhood so I thought I would get JD started early. Dave and I drove down to my grandparents house on Pawleys Island (which is nicknamed the "Log Inn") and claimed a shady spot by the side of the road to watch the parade. JD slept through it, of course but I really loved having him there!

After the parade we walked down the dock at my grandparents house to the creek for JD's first swim. I spent a lot of time as a child in the creek behind the Log Inn so we stripped him down and spent just a couple of minutes in the water. He screamed at first (the water was a little chilly) but then calmed down and just kind of looked at me.

After that we went to my parents house (JD's first trip to Grandma and Grandpa's house) for lunch and then headed home as we were all exhausted!

I thought it would be easiest to put together a slide show of the day, as there are several pictures.... enjoy!!

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

3 Weeks!

I'm finally finding the time to post his 3 week pictures with the bear. Dave has been installing a new wireless router and it seems to have one issue after another so it has taken a while (and is still not complete!)....

I have learned that getting a 3 week old to sit still for a picture is nearly impossible! He was looking at the little stuffed animals on the shelves above the chair...he was looking at the sign taped to the chair...he was trying to eat the bear...basically doing anything but looking at the camera! Here are my efforts:

A first for the whole family!

Last night we had our first "family first"! We were invited to go for a train ride with some friends and had an absolute ball. Neither Dave nor I had ever ridden on a train so it was a first for everybody! Here are a couple of pictures and a short video that Dave took with our camera...

Little Piggy!

No pictures this time... just a quick update on our doctor's appointment this morning!

JD now weighs 9 pounds, 3 ounces. He's gained 19 ounces in the past 14 days. The nurse said that the average weight gain for this age is about an ounce per day so our little guy is gaining like a champ! At least now I have reassurance that the breastfeeding is going well!

The doctor also looked in his eyes and ears and down his throat and said everything looks perfect. The jaundice is now gone and the results from his "heel prick" test that they did at the hospital all came back normal!

We have a healthy, growing boy and it's almost time to switch to the next size diapers... he's growing too fast already!

First Bath!!

Now that JD's umbilical cord has fallen off and his cute little belly button has healed we could give him his first actual bath!

I thought he would scream his head off... but he didn't! He actually enjoyed it and almost fell asleep at one point. Here are a couple of pictures.... he held Daddy's hands almost the entire time we were bathing him and promptly found his thumb once we wrapped him up in his cozy towel.