Update

I have been a bad blogger lately.  I've been busy enjoying my son, and time with family that has been (and is still) coming in and out of town.  Please be patient with me.  I'm still trying to figure out what it looks like to connect with others via blogs, facebook, and email now that I stay at home with my son, as opposed to sitting at a desk in front of a computer 45 hours a week.  I am definitely not going to spend the same amount of time surfing the web now as before, and I am finding that I would much rather connect with friends in person, cook rather than read new recipes, and just live life, than spending so much time living it virtually, through the internet.  But I'm looking for a balance, a way to still enjoy connecting with far off friends through the technology available to me, a way to continue to be encouraged and inspired by the amazing women and blogs that I've come to love.  So I'm still working out the kinks and looking for balance.

The last two and a half weeks have been a whirlwind, and they have been amazing.  I love being a Mom... Jeremy and I love being parents, and we love this little man that the Lord has entrusted to us.  Jeremy has said things like "why didn't we do this sooner", and "we should have a baby this age at all times".  Basically we are just loving parenthood and everything that it entails, but we still really value the three and a half years of marriage that we had with just the two of us. 

This has been a much smoother transition than I expected, although I'm quite scared to say that for fear that things will start getting more and more hard as Noah gets older.  I love this age/ stage so much and think it's the best, I don't want him to change or grow a bit.  I hope that each stage is like this, and that I enjoy each season that we go through as parents for what it is, thinking that those are the best moments.  As of now we are convinced that we have a pretty easy/ good baby.  For the first two weeks all he did was eat and sleep and was awake maybe 1-2 additional hours per day.  Over the past few days he's been starting to be awake more during the day (fortunately he hasn't had his days and nights mixed up).  He doesn't cry much, and only does so when we has gas/ an upset tummy that he just needs to work out.  I get up with him 2-3 times a night, for about an hour each, to feed him and change his diaper, but other than that he sleeps great at night.  I've been surprised to find that getting up in the middle of the night doesn't even bother me.  I will say that this is largely due to knowing that I get to stay home with Noah during the day though, that I know that we can sleep in if I need to, or that I can squeeze an afternoon nap into our schedule when needed.  Because of this I haven't felt overly tired or exhausted and feel like I'm getting as much sleep as I need most days.

Nursing is going well (so far), I have a little pain and soreness, but nothing nearly as bad as some horror stories that I've heard.  Noah eats every 2-3 hours and is gaining weight at the rate that our doctor expects him to... although he still is a very skinny guy and we want to fatten him up a good bit.  (He weighed 7 lbs 8 oz at birth, got down to 6 lbs 14 oz by the time we left the hospital, was up to 7 lbs 1 oz at 1 week, and was up to 7 lbs 5 oz at 2 weeks).

I'm doing well recovering from my c-section (birth story still to come soon).  No matter how you have a baby there's going to be some pain and recovery to go along with it, and although a c-section wasn't my plan, or what I would have chosen, it worked out just fine... both me and Noah and healthy and happy and I'm healing up nicely with a little minor soreness on my incision.

I've been surprised to find that although other people's kids spit up/ pee etc. has always disgusted me, that my own child's bodily excretions don't repulse me at all.  Not a day goes by that me or some piece of our furniture don't get peed or puked on, but it doesn't bother me, and I just clean it up without cringing at all.  Before I had Noah other parents always told me that I would just know my baby, his needs and his cries... I thought they were crazy, that that was for people who had lots of baby experience and were just made to be parents.  Fortunately those people were right, and within two days of being home from the hospital Jeremy and I already felt like we knew Noah, what his cries were for, and how we needed to respond.  It's amazing how the Lord just works all of this out for us.

Surprisingly for me, the biggest adjustment in parenting hasn't been anything relating to caring for Noah, but it has all been in how Jeremy and I relate to each other and how much time we have for each other.  We've been spoiled for the last few years, by getting to spend such large amounts of time together.  Especially over the last year and a half where we commuted together 2 hours a day.  We got very used to being together almost all of the time, and to mostly being the center or each other's attention.  Now we have this whole new member of the family to care for, and spend time with.  It is such a joy to do this together, to become even more of a team than we have been before, to really work together for the good of our family, but it has had its challenges also.  We both spend so much time giving attention to our new family member that we just aren't giving each other as much attention as we were before Noah's arrival.  In fact, most days the first chance that we really get to snuggle up alone together is when we put Noah in bed at night, which is a huge contrast to the way we used to spend our Sundays snuggling on the couch and watching movies.  Or how we used to go for long walks every weekend holding hands.  We've still been doing some walking together, but now Jeremy's hands are generally occupied by the stroller.  It's just a different season, and will take some adjusting.  We'll have to learn to be more intentional in connecting with each other, and having time alone together.  I will say that I'm proud of us though, we already left Noah with Jeremy's parents one evening (in between feedings) for us to go out on a double date with Jeremy's brother and his wife while they were in town.  We may not have the chance (or the budget) to go on weekly dinner dates like we used to, but we can still find ways to enlist some Grandparent time so that we can have a gym, walk, or coffee date alone together.

This week my Mom will be visiting us from Thursday through next Friday, and following that I'm hoping to get more settled into a schedule/ routine... to start being more intentional about connecting with friends, returning emails, blogging, and maybe even getting back into the swing of some crafting and cooking again.

Shannon