One Week

We've survived the first week. It hasn't been too bad. Of course, Christoph had three days off work and my mom is here, so the hardest part is just the lack of sleep. Micah has his days and nights mixed up. During the day he sleeps like the dead, barely waking up to eat. Then at about 11:00pm he wakes up. He is happy awake, but wants to be held and nurse non-stop. When he does fall asleep he wants to be held, if you lay him in his bed he wakes up right away and fusses. I try not to do the whole co-sleeping thing because we have a waterbed and it's not considered safe, but if he's asleep on my chest and I don't roll over, I figure it's ok, just not very restful. Last night he actually slept in his bassinet for part of the night, so we're making progress. He's a sweet little guy. He only cries when he's hungry and getting his diaper changed. He manages his big sisters' lop-sided strangle holds pretty well. He gets the hiccups all the time. Without fail, if he falls asleep and I lay him down, he'll start hiccuping about two minutes later. We haven't had much success in getting pictures with his eyes open, they haven't been open very often. When he does have his eyes open he always gets this worried little old man look. I think it's because he sees these loud yelling blurs flashing by and he's afraid he might get sat on. Diaper changing a boy has come with a bit of a leaning curve. This kid has gone through more clothes in the first week then either of his sisters. He keeps catching me off guard and suddenly everything's wet! I just have to throw in here, that Christoph has only changed two diapers so far, scaredy cat.

I have been spending a lot of my day sitting on the sofa holding him. I can't get enough of all his little parts, fingers, toes, ears, skinny little legs, rosebud lips. Part of me feels like I need to be doing something more productive, then Katrina runs by and I know if I blink it will be him. These sweet halcyon days of cuddling are so short and I can't make myself put him down. I stare into his face and he is so innocent and undemanding. I'm not saying infants aren't work, it's hard not to sleep, but the work is so elementary. You feed them and change them and love them and that's all. There are no power struggles, no figuring out how to train without breaking their spirit, no back talking, no emotional drama, no making messes, no tantrums. I'm not saying there aren't many wonderful things about older kids, but for me the parenting they need is so much more involved and so much more exhausting then just losing sleep. So, I'm sitting, soaking in this baby and cherishing every second the best that I can, in-between giving the older ones the attention they need. Thank you again to Grandma for facilitating many more moments of Micah gazing and cuddling then I would have on my own.

The ring is from Christoph. He's given me one for each baby. :)


Some pictures of Emily at the hospital just before we went home. we just have video of her meeting him the first time.