Wyatt is 1 month!

Is that crazy or what? Do all babies grow this fast? It's amazing that in just a couple of weeks, Wyatt has become a squishy baby with chubby legs and cheeks. At his well-baby check up last week, he was already 9 lbs, 5 ounces and 21 1/2 inches long! 

I am getting the hang of sleeping for a couple hours at a time at night, and Wyatt has definitely gotten the hang of nursing (if you couldn't tell).  I remember that laid-back Jack would sometimes take 45 minutes or more to fill up. Wyatt is usually done in 15 minutes.

Growing Wyatt

You know that I love month to month pictures...so I thought it would be fun to put together my bathroom mirror photos by month. I have to admit that I do miss being pregnant, but I wouldn't trade what I have in month 10 for anything.

Tiny Wyatt

I know that the tiny, wrinkly, scrunchy faced newborn stage is over in a flash, so I really want to try to capture Wyatt and all of his newborn cuteness before he's outgrown it and moved on to the equally as cute, chubby baby phase. (and based on the amount he's been nursing, I think this will happen very quickly!) These are a few of my favorites so far.

I am sharing these here:

  

First day of school

Jack started pre-school today! 

To ease the kids (well, mostly the parents) into the routine, class was only an hour long and the parents stuck around to see their kids in action. As soon as we got there, Jack was off...he kept busy playing at the water table...

 and getting to know one of his teachers over some coloring with markers.

He let his inner Picasso out and painted an awesome picture that will be hung up in our house.

Jack painted with both hands...I love how one side is yellow and the other is blue. 

(yes, that's Wyatt in the car seat. He slept the entire class.)

I know that on Thursday when we drop him off, he is not going to miss us one little bit.  I am so excited for him and can't wait to see what this first year of school brings him.

34 months and becoming a big brother

This was a big month for Jack...you don't become a big brother everyday. He's been used to having all of my attention and I was really worried that having to share this with a tiny baby needing to be fed and changed and held was going to rock his little world...For the most part he has been great. He's very attentive to Wyatt and always gets concerned when he's crying.  But for the first few days, he really had a hard time connecting with me, especially when I was holding Wyatt.  It was hard to see him like this, but he's getting better. Today, he wanted to share his peanut butter sandwich with Wyatt, and I explained that he was too little and mentioned that he didn't have any teeth. This was something that he just had to see, so I brought Wyatt over and showed Jack his gummy smile. He also asked me if Wyatt eats nipples, which I thought was hilarious, but really, that must be what it looks like.

I love this picture of Jack holding Wyatt for the first time.

My first son and me.

My boys.

My niece, Maia made this crown for Jack. He was very proud to have his picture taken wearing it.

Introducing Wyatt

Wyatt Duncan

Born on August 29th at 5:57 AM in Exeter, New Hampshire

7 lbs, 19 inches long.

When we decided to head to NH to get out of Irene's way, I never actually thought that Wyatt would be born there, but it turns out that things work out the way they are supposed to.  

My contractions woke me up at 2AM that night and I waited about 45 minutes to wake up Rob once I was sure that it wasn't just the Braxton hicks that I'd been having for weeks. They were about 4 to 5 minutes apart at that point and completely manageable but since they were regular, I knew they were the real deal. I took a shower and called my doctor who said we should get to the hospital so they could check me and let me know if there was time to drive back to RI. Kara heard us puttering around and was up when we left at 4:30. We were so lucky that she and Paul could take care of Jack once he woke up. We let her know where Jack's diapers were and what he should have for breakfast. I gave her a big hug and thanked her for everything.  I remember feeling a little pang of guilt at the realization that Jack wasn't going to be our only baby anymore. I wished that I had spent a little extra time and had given him extra cuddles at bedtime that night. We got in the car and drove the 5 minutes to the hospital...we parked and walked into the ER where they asked if we were pre-registered. We laughed and explained our situation to the nurses while we filled out all of the paperwork. They offered me a wheelchair, but I was feeling well enough to walk. We were in our room just before 5 AM and I was hooked up to the monitor...we could hear Wyatt's little heart pounding away.  The nurse checked me and I was shocked when she said that I was 4 cm and 90% effaced.  There was no way we were going to make the 2 hour drive back to RI that morning.


I remember looking out the window and seeing the sun coming up over the trees. It's funny how extra gorgeous a day can seem after a big, scary storm. 

The contractions got stronger and closer together FAST. I had one that just didn't seem to end and for some reason I had it in my head that I had to go to the bathroom. The nurse looked at me and said, whatever you do, don't push. She later told us she wasn't sure why she said that, and why she decided to stick around considering she just checked me and I was only 4 cm, but she did and because she did, Wyatt was NOT born in the toilet. I somehow made it back to the bed, and Wyatt was born about a minute later. As Rob told me, the nurse yelled, I need a cart! and then there was sterile packaging flying all around the room. The nurse delivered him and the doctor arrived a few minutes later. Wyatt was perfect, with a full head of dark hair (just like Jack) and a pink complexion that I could have stared at all day.

When Rob and I started to process what just happened, we realized that we were so glad we made the decision to stay in NH. If we were home, we would have waited a while to call Bonnie and Brandon to come over to be with Jack, since I didn't feel like I was even close to having a baby. By the time they would have gotten to our house and we could have left for the hospital, Rob would have delivered Wyatt on the side of the highway since it went so fast!

Irene

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Irene is one storm that Rob and I will never forget. We watched the weather reports constantly that week hoping that it would head out to sea. As the storm came closer, it was looking more and more like it was coming right for us...since I was 39 weeks pregnant, we were even more concerned about how it might impact us and we had visions of the worst case scenario which would be a high storm surge or downed trees that might prevent us from getting to the hospital in time or at all. We eventually got a call from the town recommending evacuation because of potential storm surge, so we played it safe and headed up to our very good friends, Kara and Paul's, house in New Hampshire. They live 5 minutes away from a hospital and we knew they could watch Jack if needed.

We had a very relaxing day while Irene rolled through...There was a ton of rain and lots of strong wind gusts, but Kara and Paul never lost power, it only flickered a few times. We debated driving home Sunday night, but decided not to since we'd be going home to no power and who knows what else. I am so glad we decided to stay...