Catching up

I'm trying to keep this blog timely, so at this point I need to get caught up-to-date with a few stories. I'm finding that I only can work on it in small chunks of time so far, at least in these early weeks with him home. Nonetheless, I have successfully completed my 3-part series on our first week home with him. I still promise to record the story of his birth (while it's somewhat fresh in my mind) and some details about our hospital stay, but for now I wanted to jump into the present and write about what's going on with Evan now.

First of all, today was a milestone for him...he lost his umbilical cord! Now he has a cute belly button and no more scratchy cord stump! John was changing him this morning after we'd woken up and noticed it first. The weird thing was that the stump itself seemed to have disappeared. We looked in his pants, in his sleepsack and under his onesie, but couldn't find it. Turns out it was indeed in his onesie but behind him (ouch, can't imagine how that would have felt to sleep on it!). Evan had another pediatrician check up yesterday and I had asked the doc if it was close to coming off yet, given he was 12 days old yesterday. She checked it and said it was close, and sure enough she was right! Also, during that check up we learned that he now weighs 7 lbs 12 oz! He's gaining weight at a great rate and growing longer too. He's now a full 20 inches long. He won't be able to fit into his newborn size clothes much longer! :( I'm gonna miss having him be such an itty bitty bundle snuggled up on my chest...so I definitely am continuing to soak that up as much as I can.

Evan got his first nail trim this week. For some reason his nails weren't *that* long at birth (maybe because he was pre-term, according to one of the nurses), so we were able to go over a week without getting out the baby nail clippers. But this week he scratched his face (amazing though how quickly the scratch went away, within about one day!), and he scratches me more often so John braved the nail trim. He did it while Evan was fast asleep in his bouncer seat, so it went pretty well. I snapped a few pictures as I thought it was just too cute seeing father and son have a manicure moment. :)

Evan's first nail trim. John even made sure to file the rough edges back after the trim. :)

Also, Evan got to meet one of his sets of grandparents this week. My mom and step-dad came by for a few days and so he got to meet Grandpa and Grandma Boyte. Nanna Hingst (John's mum) will be coming to visit in a few weeks, so he'll get to meet more of his grandparents soon too.

Grandpa and Grandma Boyte holding Evan (August 18, 2011).

A few other recent and memorable stories

The craziest diaper change I've had yet: So, a typical dirty diaper for Evan is a No 1 and a No 2. This one was no exception, except the blue line that indicates he'd pee'd wasn't that fully showing up. Thus, I was wary about his potential to pee during the change so I had the new diaper ready and every chance I could I had the top of the new diaper folded over his front. Sure enough, he did pee, but I felt good that I had contained it mostly in the new diaper (still, sadly that diaper was a short-lived one, and I had to get a new one out). Then as I was putting his diaper rash prevention ointment on his bottom I heard a noise...and it was coming very close to wear my finger was rubbing ointment. Yes, he was tooting, and it was a foamy, juicy one (I think all his little, and also the not-so-little, toots are juicy though!). Anyway, I had to quickly grab a wipe to clean his bottom and not get poo'd on! So, here I was, worried about a pee fountain and feeling good that I'd prevented that, and then in the end nearly got sprayed with No 2! It's always an adventure changing diapers I guess!

Parenting lesson learned this week: It's good to always have the spare crib sheet clean and ready to go over night. Two nights in a row this week Evan had huge spit ups, or really I should call them projectile throw ups, not long after bed time. The first one was really a projectile that nearly hit the side of the bassinet wall! We had the spare crib sheet handy though, and were able to get it cleaned up quick and get Evan into warm, dry, and clean clothes for the rest of the night. Then the second night it happened again. This time his poor head was laying in a pool of it, totally soaked through his hat and sleepsack. Luckily John had done his laundry that day and so the other crib sheet (we just have two) was cleaned again already so I was able to get it changed and get him in warm, dry, and clean clothes again. However, it started to dawn on me: what if he does this more than once per night? What if we hadn't done the laundry that day? How many crib sheets do we really need for instances like this? At this point, we still just have the two, but we'll definitely be making sure we keep the second one clean and ready for night time. That and we hope he doesn't keep this pattern up, as it can't be good for him. :( [Note: he hasn't done this the last few nights...and I hope it stays that way!]