Moose started smiling in response to silly faces, high pitched voices, and cooing a week or so ago. At first it was almost exclusively Daddy who was the recipient of his happy grins, but everyday he seems to get a little more generous with them, smiling more often and at more people and things. Here are a couple of short videos we've caught!
So we just gave Evander his first bath...he was sooooo stinky! Ok, not really, I'm just way way way behind on my posting. Since I'm starting to really get behind and since I have several other topics waiting in the wings I'm going to try and combine several posts here that I might've otherwise posted separately if our month had not been such a giant roller coaster. Hang on!!!
We gave Evander his first "real" (i.e. not sponge) bath on August 19th. He loved relaxing in the warm water until I started to wash him up. He wasn't so sure he liked that at all and it all went downhill from there. For the record he now LOVES every minute of his bath time, although he's still not too keen on that whole getting dressed thing that happens afterwards!
As you can tell Sofie was absolutely delighted by the whole bath time event, and she has spent many hours since then playing with Evander's bathtub.
Immediately after Evander's bath we dressed him in this special outfit that you may remember seeing Sofie in way back when (you can revisit here). Recall that this bunting has been worn by Aunt Janna, Ben, Uncle Kyle, cousins Lillian and Clayton, and big sister Sofie and we had a very special reason for choosing the 19th to snap some pictures of Evander in it. About four hours after these photos were taken the newest member of the extended family, cousin William Alexander, was welcomed into the world!
The bunting has been passed down to baby Will, who will surely be one of Evander's best buds! (Incidentally, you'll notice that I've added a new link on my blog list where you can read all about Will's adventures!)
They weren't especially impressed, but I'm sure that will change with time :)
I just love this picture (stolen from Aunt DeAnna!) What proud grandparents! Will is practicing his dirtbike racing...it's totally in the blood :) 
Evander took his first bottle today while I went out ALONE! for the first time since he was born to get myself a haircut. Nana reported that he vehemently denied that weird plastic nipple thing for some time before he figured out that the stuff inside of the bottle tasted very familiar and maybe he was more interested than he gulp gulp gulp thought!
The last ounce was still resting in the bottle when I got home, since expressed breast milk is pretty much liquid gold and we exercise an extreme reluctance to discard it, and after I spent a minute or two checking out my new hairdo in the bathroom I returned to find Sofie, little mama that she is, doing this...
Little big man you turned one month old last Sunday and oh what a cyclone of a month it was. After your rapid fire birth we brought you home to a very very affectionate big sister who hugged and kissed the whole family into a pretty solid summer cold. And, as if stuffy nosed 2 AM feedings greeted by a mommy who sounded like Darth Vader weren't fun enough, your poor little body decided a UTI would be the perfect topper. You landed yourself a four day stay at the children's hospital complete with eighteen puncture wounds and three catheterizations. It was enough to throw this mommy into a bit of a tailspin which she is just now starting to catch her bearings from. Through it all you've been a little fighting trooper, surely living up to your name, a good, strong man (child!)
You are enormous. I look at you and wonder how on earth you ever fit inside my belly, how you ever could have made your way out in one piece. Your body is completely different than Sofie's with your lanky arms and long, thin fingers and toes. You inherited my hands and feet and I love them on you. Your fuzzy little noggin is covered with the softest coating of downy hair. I love to rub it while you nurse. You love to eat and you are growing so fast, already in your 3-6 month clothes. I tease that you're a boob man. When you're hungry you shake your little head and then dive in like a fish going after a worm. When you're sleepy you nurse comfortably, sighing and making little crooked half asleep smiles, and when you finally pull away you nuzzle in as if you had a pillow.
When you are calm you are incredibly focused and your body relaxes as you stare contentedly off at the object of your choice as if you are analyzing its complexities. When you are active you grumble and grunt, waggling all your appendages in quick, jerky movements with a frustrated air. You are intense.
Evander, I have a feeling I'll always remember this month as one of the most challenging months of my life and I may never reminisce fondly about the circumstances surrounding it and how they made me feel, but meeting you has filled me with awe. It's hard for me to believe that just one month ago I had never smelled your little head, a scent so uniquely your own even fresh from a bath, or felt your little hands gripping tightly to my shirt, or heard you softly breathing, sighing softly in your sleep. I will always remember this month as the month I met you, and that's more than enough to make it one of the most incredible months of my life.
Happy Yesterday Was Labor Day!
Evander's labor story is FINALLY posted. Scroll down and check it out :)
Anyone wondering how on earth Grey turned into Evander? I sure would be if I were you! Well...after yet another conversation with Ben in which he recounted the reasons he wasn't 100% thrilled with the name Grey (1. It's more of a nickname than a full name. 2. It's meaning isn't particularly meaningful.) I thought maybe I'd acquaint myself with some other options. After sticking my nose into some baby names websites for awhile I came across the name Evander and immediately felt attached to it. Not really that surprising when you consider that we were considering the names Evelyn, Evany, and Evangeline (just me...Ben hates that one) for a girl before we knew we were having a boy. Also, I think Evander is reminiscent of the names Oliver and Xavier which I'm fond of. I was really excited to run it by Ben because I was pretty confident he was going to like it too. Especially since it reminds me of the names Vance (which we both think is a great name that we might have considered if it wasn't Aunt Janna's married name) and Vaughn (another name that Ben is attached to but it belongs to both his uncle and his cousin already...Ben used to tease me and say he wanted to name his son Otto Vaughn Otto!) Evander also carries a solid meaning: good man or strong man, and some decent history too. In Roman mythology Evander was a Grecian hero, deified after his death, who brought the Greek pantheon, laws, and alphabet to Italy. He was said to have wisdom beyond that of all the Arcadians. So I wasn't too surprised when Ben jumped on the Evander bandwagon. We spent a couple of weeks trying it on for size and the rest is history.
Now the only question is...what should we call him?!
Nicknames I'm currently using include: Mister, Boss (because he is), Moose (because he's enormous), Pteradactyl (because he sounds like one when he gets mad), and Grey (we're all using this one accidentally from time to time!)
Nicknames associated with the name Evander include: Van, Vander, Andy, Vandy, and Evan. We're leaning towards Van at the moment, but I'm not completely sold on it. Ben has also suggested just plain E. Sofie's pronounciation, "Vanner" makes me grin :)
Here's Daddy checking out his little boy for the first time...
...and Sofie checking out her baby brother for the first time :)
Footprints!
First bath!
This one reminds me an awful lot of the first picture of Sofie that I posted on the blog. You can see it here. You can definitely tell they are siblings!
This was Day 2 at the hospital, August 7th. It was the first time Sofie got to hold her brother.
Me with my snuggle bug. I wish they never grew too big for this!
Here we are on the 8th all ready to go home and waiting for transport. He'll never wear that outfit again :( Sofie never wore her homecoming outfit again either. I guess I make giant children!
Being wheeled out...
...and on our way home. We had to move the carseat straps up already!
Sweet sleepy profile.
Hanging out with Nana awake...
...and asleep.
Sofie's babies are really enjoying all of Evander's stuff. There always seems to be a baby in his carseat, swing, and bouncy seat!
Case in point. She instructed me to lay him down with the rest of her babies, and I coaxed her into laying down too :)
Our little Oompa Loompa. Aunt Barbie gave him these shoes and Sofie insists that he wears them when we leave the house!
A nursing mama's view.
Picture crazy mama took about twenty pictures of one week old Evander hanging out in his swing. This first one looks so much like some of Ben's baby pictures it's almost scary!
I think that'll about do for an update from our new family of four. We are busy working on adjusting to this new normal, trying to get as much rest as possible, and falling in love with this big little guy, but I'll do my best to post another update soon!I've been working on the labor story for the past couple of nights, but it looks like it's going to be one or two more before it's finished. I also have about a million pictures to sort through and post...who knows when I'll get around to that! In the meantime here's a little video clip to hold you over:
Sofie's actually doing awesome with the baby and most of the time she's very fond of him and interested in everything he's doing. It just figures that this is what I would get when I pulled out the camera for posterity's sake!
So...you know how they say that there's a sort of labor amnesia that occurs the moment a squawking newborn is placed wriggling in your arms? I'm sort of suffering from that combined with a case of mommy brain these days, so I won't claim that all the details of this story are entirely on the mark, but the over-riding themes, I'm sure, will certainly shine through.
I think it's safe to say that we all know by now that I've had a desire to have a completely natural labor since before Sofie was born. We spent the time leading up to her birth taking Bradley classes, practicing labor positions, and reading lots of birth stories. I had definite ideas about my desires for her birth, wrote up a pretty detailed labor plan, and then things pretty much went the opposite of what I had planned for. And then a strange thing happened. Even though I didn't ultimately end up with the birth that I had hoped for I had an amazing experience anyway, and more importantly I had this perfect tiny creature who was, in effect, changing everything I thought I knew about anything and making me love the ride in the mean time. I suppose Sofie's birth and her influence on my life in these past two years had a profound effect on how I formulated my labor expectations with Evander. This time around, while I still harbored desires for a natural birth, I was much more cautious about my expectations. I told everyone who asked that I was trying to keep an open mind about labor and we'd just have to wait and see how it went. I didn't write a birth plan, reasoning with myself that if I didn't set myself up with any ideals I wouldn't feel disappointed if they weren't met. What I did do was, mostly very quietly, read a lot of very motivational and empowering books and birth stories. I was also pretty diligent with my red raspberry leaf tea (for uterine toning) and evening primrose oil (for the prostoglandins) as well as continuing to nurse Sofie (for nipple stimulation) and staying very active right up until the end (we went to the fair on Monday, splash pad on Tuesday, had a day of appointments on Wednesday, and then delivered Thursday morning).
The one thing that I did have my little heart set on was going into labor on my own this time, since that was something I didn't get to experience when Sofie was born, and I was trying my darndest to maintain a patient and positive attitude, though I was getting more antsy as we were drawing nearer and nearer to that magical two weeks past the due date marker. I had felt that my body was revving up to go into labor most of the evenings in the week or two leading up to the real deal, with cramps, hot flashes, and Braxton Hicks contractions, but every morning I'd wake up feeling just fine once again. I mentioned it to my midwife at an appointment and she said that hormones spike during the hours of about 5 PM and 2 AM and that was why I was feeling so many pre-labor symptoms at night. So, when I was extra crampy on the evening following my non-stress test and ultrasound I felt hopeful but not overly so, and when I started having whimpy little contractions around midnight, just slightly different from the Braxton Hicks I'd been having for months, I decided to try timing them on a whim but already knew I wasn't taking anything seriously until after 2 AM...and I certainly wasn't going to stay up until 2 AM timing whimpy little contractions when I could be resting my body in preparation either for the hard parts of labor ahead of me, or for another morning of waking up feeling just fine and trying to keep up with a two year old! It turned out that the "contractions" were coming pretty consistently at about nine and a half minutes apart and I headed to bed once again thinking that maybe tonight would be the big night.
I woke up several times to go to the bathroom during the night, which was pretty typical at that point, and around 5:30 AM I decided maybe I'd stay up a bit and see if I was still having contractions. So I headed out to the living room and pulled up a really cool website called "Contraction Master" and spent some time logging contractions while I surfed the net. As the time neared 6 AM it was clear that my contractions, which were a bit stronger at this point but still not all that painful, were coming consistently at around five and a half minutes apart. I made a call to Nana to tell her that I was FINALLY in labor and it was FINALLY time to head over to keep on eye on Sofie while we traveled to the hospital to meet our new little guy. After I got off the phone with her I went and took a shower and then flipped on the bedroom light to finish packing my hospital bag. Ben, still completely unaware of what was happening at this point, groggily protested, "Sam! What are you doing?" I told him I was packing my hospital bag and he responded, "Do you need the light on for that?!" I snapped back, "I'm in labor!" He wasn't quite convinced as I explained that Nana was on her way and that he should probably consider getting up and getting himself ready because we would be leaving for the hospital soon. I walked back into the bathroom to finish up my morning routine and he appeared a few minutes later, a little more awake this time, and asked me how sure I was that I was really in labor. By this time my contractions were strong enough that they were requiring me to take little breaks to lean against the wall or flop on the bed and I told him I was 100% sure. His response was, "So I can email work?" and I said, "Yes!" I went back out into the living room and resumed timing my contractions. They were mostly coming about five minutes apart, but sporadically I was having some at just three and four minutes apart. I decided I should probably call the midwives and let them know that we would soon be heading in. It was almost 7 AM. I called the answering service, told them I was in labor, and they let me know that they'd relay the message to the midwife on call (Nadia) and that I should hear from her within fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes ticked by...I started seeping myself some really potent red raspberry leaf tea with all the tea bags I had left and continued to track my contractions. I called the answering service back and let them know that I had not received a call. Again I was told that someone would call within fifteen minutes. This time I had barely hung up when I received a call back from Nadia. She asked me some basic questions...How long have you been in labor? How far apart are your contractions? How long was your first labor? Which hospital are you delivering at? I don't think she was quite convinced that I was really in labor because she told me to go ahead and head in to the hospital, but she kept saying things like, "If you're in labor they'll admit you." She also told me that Cathy Mihalic was actually the midwife on call. Cathy...who I hadn't had a single appointment with during my entire pregnancy. Oh well!
It wasn't long after I'd hung up with Nadia that Nana and Grandma arrived. Ben was still putzing around getting himself ready at this point and I was resting on the couch. I asked Nana to make me some peanut butter toast, anticipating that I would be needing some fuel for a full day of laboring. She did, but when she brought it to me I took one bite and was so uninterested in eating that I could barely swallow it. Looking back, I suppose that should have been a sign to me that I was further along in the process than I thought I was. Sofie woke up around 7:30 and I went in to cuddle her a bit and spent a few minutes nursing her, as is our morning routine. I really wanted to spend that special time with her...the last little bit of time that it would be just her and I, but it was cut quite short because I was pretty uncomfortable and having a hard time trying to mask that discomfort so she wouldn't be frightened. I did get to explain to her that today was going to be the day that Mommy and Daddy went to the hospital to have the baby and that Nana and Grandma were there and they were going to look after her while we were gone. Then we headed out to the living room and I told her to eat my peanut butter toast :) At this point I was pretty ready to get going and Ben still hadn't emerged from his putzing. I remember shouting, "Ben? What are you doing?!! Let's go!" Before we headed out I took a (very uncomfortable) trip to the bathroom and had lots of bloody show. I grabbed a beach towel on my way out, just in case! Ben pulled the van up to the door and Nana and Sofie walked me down to it. Sofie was upset. She could tell that something wasn't quite right and had a hard time letting us go.
Our forty minute ride to the hospital was mostly uneventful. I asked Ben to drive very carefully and smoothly because I was really trying to concentrate on relaxing my body through each contraction and I was very sensitive to the slightest bit of tension. I sat and sipped my tea between contractions. It was during the ride that I decided I was totally getting an epidural. I was still managing my contractions very well, but they were so uncomfortable, and heck if I was going to go through that for another six hours (which for some reason was the amount of time I had decided I had left to labor). I was likely in transition, but I had no idea at the time. I kept myself together until we were within sight of the hospital and Ben was trying to decide where to park. Then I finally snapped, "Just park!" We should have used the valet, but we parked in the garage instead. As Ben parked I was finishing up a contraction and I informed him that I wasn't going to wait around while he gathered our things. Instead I took off towards the hospital, hoping to use the time between contractions to my advantage.
I made it into the building before the next contraction hit, and Ben came following behind me with a wheelchair that I gladly sat down in. He wheeled me towards labor and delivery, following the hospital signs, until we stopped at a door and it was then that we realized that we still had to walk across the street to the main hospital and we couldn't take the wheelchair with us. I got up and high-tailed it across that street before the next contraction hit, right as we made it to the building. I leaned against the cement wall outside the hospital and breathed through it completely aware of, yet oblivious to, the other patients milling around me. The doorman asked Ben if we needed a wheelchair, then went to retrieve one for us, which I again gratefully sat down in. Ben wheeled me in and we went up to labor and delivery where we were kindly greeted by...No One! Just a sign that said something to the effect of, "If you need the receptionist, call this number." So Ben called. And then we waited. And waited. And I had a couple more uncomfortable contractions. And finally, after what seemed like forever but was probably no more than five minutes, the receptionist came out to check us in. I had a couple more contractions during the process and I would sort of just zone out during them, close my eyes and get very quiet. She seemed used to it and kept saying things like, "When this one is over I need you to sign this." and "Go ahead and breathe through your contraction and then I need your insurance card."
When she was finally done, a nurse came and wheeled us into triage. She asked if I needed to use the restroom before I changed into one of those lovely hospital gowns and I said yes. What a mistake! I had a pretty rotten contraction while in the bathroom by myself, and lots more blood. Somehow I made it into the triage room, into the hospital gown, and onto the bed where the midwife on duty, Cathy, came in to check me out. The first thing I said to her was, "I'm pretty uncomfortable. I'd like an epidural please." She responded with, "Ok. Well, let's see how far along you are. What are you hoping for? Seven?" I sort of snort-laughed and said, "That would be nice!" She then proceded to check my dilation and said, "Well...how about eight to nine?" And then my jaw hit the floor! It was such exciting news for me. While I had been planning on an epidural for most of our ride to the hospital the whole time I was secretly thinking to myself..."Unless I'm really far along. Then I think maybe I can do this." Cathy said, "I'll gladly get you an epidural if you want it, but I think you're just going to have this baby." I asked her if there was a birthing tub available, remembering how much relief that had provided me when I was in labor with Sofie. She wasn't quite sure, but restated that she didn't think I'd have time for it anyway because this baby was pretty much ready to be born. So I decided...Ok!...let's go for it. This was what I had wanted and hoped for all along, and here was this midwife making it sound like I could do it. So I got in a wheelchair and they wheeled me down to a delivery room, all the while chirping things like..."She's nine centimeters! She was just sitting out there at check in as calmly as can be!"
We got to our room and I transferred to the bed where I insisted on sitting bolt upright, because it was the only position remotely comfortable to me. From this point on there were about 4-6 women fluttering around me. (The midwife, a midwife in training, a nurse, a nursing student, and who knows who else!) They were such an incredible source of encouragement. From the time I sat down in that bed they never stopped praising me. It was an endless stream of things like, "You are doing so well." directed towards me and "You can barely tell she's having a contraction by looking at her!" muttered softly to one another. And here is where I will take a little public service break to say that if you are ever blessed to be present while a woman is laboring the most amazing thing you can do for her is to tell her how freaking awesome she is doing. It is the craziest thing because she will believe you and it will give her the confidence to do even more awesome. Those women were like a choir of angels to me. They fluttered around getting things ready, starting an IV ( I was group B strep positive again), and asking me more questions.
Evander Benjamin Otto
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