Photos

Trevor is always looking for something to take photos of with our new camera, and lots of them turn out looking amazing now that he's spent many hours reading about photography and teaching himself how to use all the options on the camera - aperture, ISO, shutter speed, all that jazz.  So who would he rather take pictures of than me?  Especially on Valentine's Day - here a couple of my favorites.

February

The last few weeks have led me to ask myself... whose breasts are these anyway??? Mine?!?!?!?!  Apparently... since they're attached to my thoracic cavity.  Let me just say that it's pretty weird to use your boobs to feed your kid, to put it brashly.  Don't get me wrong - it's very satisfying, and nothing could possibly be more convenient, and it's so soothing and comforting for him - but still weird.  I'm still not sure how this thing even came out of me.

I have to use this method to say Thank You one more time to Jacinta for throwing my baby shower.  Jay and Jacinta have been so great to Trevor and me.  Now that we only have a couple months left in Vancouver, we think daily of how much we are going to miss them.  Our personalities have fit so well with theirs and they have been our closest friends here.  I have made a few other friends that I've spent limited amounts of time with, and Trevor has one friend that he knows from Camosun in Victoria, but he has only spent time with him doing school stuff - Jay is his only friend that he does fun stuff with.  And while we may or may not seem like it, Trevor and I are both still fairly shy.  It's also easier to be lazy, which is why we don't have people over more often.  I enjoy entertaining guests a lot, and Trevor does too - we just get lazy.  I digress.  The point is, we will miss Jay and Jacinta tremendously!!!  

I have another momentous occasion to announce.  Background first.  Grant has been getting up only once a night for nearly a week consistently, and the night before last, Tuesday night, he slept through the entire night - from 11:30pm til 7am!!! Woohoo!  Swaddling really works, if any of you haven't tried it.  Last night he was up once for a short, short nurse, which I expected, since he didn't nurse around 11 or 11:30pm, which is what we're trying for.  His schedule was funny yesterday evening due to the baby shower and the fact that for some reason he had a marathon nurse just as the shower was starting, that nerd.  He's supposed to save the marathon for 11pm so he can sleep all night.  

He continues to be an amazing baby.  Trevor's mom and sister, Susan and Michelle, have been here since Monday evening and leave on Friday evening, and he has continued to always be on his best behavior!  He is happy and content wherever we go and happy to be held by anybody - I hope it lasts!!!  

I'm off to delve into the laundry once again.  I dream of my own washer and dryer in a cozy laundry room where I will enjoy doing laundry like Kate Gosselin.  I enjoyed laundry before and I will again!!!  Except maybe for the folding.  Until next time.  

Smile

On Wednesday, Grant was nursing and smiled WHILE looking at me - his first real smile!  He hasn't done it since.  He will smile while nursing, but he'll be looking away, or he will smile in his sleep - very cute, but not as cute as smiling while looking at someone.  Just FYI, babies can see faces 10-14 inches away right away, which is the distance his face is from mine while nursing.  It was very cute and wonderful!  I love him so much.  Here is a picture I took of him smiling in his sleep a couple weeks ago.

Baby!

I'm definitely no good at blogging - look how long it's been since my last entry.  Happily the last few months of pregnancy are over now!  I had the baby on January 15 at 7:08pm, and it was a boy - hooray!  We named him Grant Michael Curtis.  My labor story goes like this:

I noticed that I was having lots of Braxton-Hicks contractions on the Sunday before, the 11th, as well as the Monday and Tuesday.  I went to see my doctor on Tuesday afternoon for my 39 weeks appointment, and she asked me if I'd like her to strip my membranes - there was no hesitation in my "yes please!" at all.  She did that, and told me that I was 1cm, so all the painless contractions had actually been doing something!  She also said that it takes most women 10 hours to get to 1cm, so I had already completed the first 10 hours of labor.  I left the doctor's office very excited.  My contractions were still almost entirely painless that evening and the next day, Wednesday.  Wednesday afternoon at 2:45pm, my water broke - actually, just began to leak a tiny bit.  The contractions began to be mildly painful from then on, and always less than 10 minutes apart.  I stayed up almost all night Wednesday since I didn't know if we would be going to the hospital or not, then I tried to get some sleep and got about two hours.  We went to the hospital at 6:30am and they admitted me since my doctor said she would be coming in to break my waters the rest of the way to get things going, which she did around noon.

After that I really started to have contractions.  At the end I only had to push for a few minutes and out he came.  I had to get a few stitches, but he's completely perfect and such a happy baby.  He was very alert right away and visited with us and wanted to nurse.  We left the hospital on Saturday, the 17th at noon.  It is such a relief - more than I can express - to have him out!  I feel so much better.  My nausea is gone, and the terrible headaches I was having are gone as well.  I still get headaches, but I had chronic headaches before getting pregnant.  

The baby hardly ever cries, and is very easy to soothe.  He's also very patient and agreeable.  He doesn't mind his crib, his carseat, his hats - I'm worried that I don't know when he IS happy since I can't tell when he's unhappy as he never complains!  He's taking a snooze with Dad right now, and it's amazing to us how, to quote a Brad Paisley song, "went from something's missing to a family".  I love him so very much.