Week by week 4

John-Luke had a good week. Mostly sleeping, eating and being loved on by his brother, mommy, daddy and grandma. It was super fun. Here are a few highlights from the week.
Tuesday: Sleeping at the pateaugoire (free wading pool for little kids) while Bimmy played.Wednesday: Eating induced sleep coma.
Saturday morning: Sleeping at the park while Bimmy played in the water, sand and on the slide.
Saturday mid-day: Sleeping in his crib while Bimmy took a 3.5 hour nap. (We play big and we sleep big around here).
Saturday evening: At the pateaugoire again. This time looking concerned that what he is sucking on is NOT what he was hoping it would be. He was a good sport and we got all the way home without any crying. What a great baby!
That is about it. John-Luke's life really does consist of mostly sleeping and occasional quiet wakefulness and a few feeding frenzies before more sleeping. Loving it! Perhaps I could have more than 2 kids if they are all this easy. Well, ask me about it again when my help (mom) is gone. Stay tuned for some 1 month stats after CapN's 1 month appointment this week. Any guesses on how much he has gained/grown?
Don't forget to check out the all Bimmy post below. He really isn't a forgotten first-born. We still love him more than ever!

18 months & counting

I am officially the worlds biggest slacker. James turned 20 months on the 15th and here I am finally posting about him turning 18 months old. I feel like I pretty much ignored the last 6 months of his life on this blog except for posting about trips that we have taken as a family. A lot of it has to do with the fact that I was overloaded with school but that isn't really a good excuse. All I can say is that I swear to be better in the future. Now, about the last 6 (really 8) months...
James has gone from this... (taken the day after he turned 1). to this in 6 short months. (taken the day after he turned 18 months).Basically he turned from a crawling baby into a running little boy!
Some of his major accomplishments are...
1. Walking at 14 months and running shortly thereafter.
2. Going to a "big boy" bed at 17 months. (Yes, he does sleep with his little bum up in the air).3. Talking up a storm. His favorite things to say are body parts and animal sounds. And he loves to talk about bugs and outside things like dirt and trees too.
4. Climbing everything.
5. Being generally a happy, lovable little guy. He loves giving out kisses and saying "hello" to everyone he meets. He also loves having his picture taken so that he can see himself.
6. He still thinks that daddy is the coolest person in the whole wide world as you can tell from the following videos.

On the bright side of things, I did have a photo shoot done of James which was taken "on location" in downtown Geneva by my friend Harmony who happens to be a great photographer as well. Here is a SMALL sampling of what she took. (Please excuse the 8 month pregnant belly).
Didn't they turn out great? Thanks, Harmony!

Week by week 3

This week I had a hard time taking a lot of pictures of John-Luke. Mostly because James really likes to have pictures taken of him. He smiles right on cue every time the camera comes out as is evidenced by this picture of him. He then insists on seeing the picture and announcing to everyone that it is a picture of "Bubba" as he calls himself. Despite the camera hogging that happens around here I was able to take a few pictures of John-Luke. This week while Bimmy was watching bugs crawl on the ground behind our apartment, John-Luke was... yawning. And while Bimmy was playing at the park, John-Luke was... sleeping in his Sleepy Wrap. He actually quite likes it and is generally content to fall asleep when we go out. Lucky for me. And last but not least, while Bimmy was smiling for the camera, John-Luke was being "hugged." So now y'all know what we all do during the day. I take pictures while James smiles and plays and while John-Luke naps.
And this week John-Luke officially rolled over again (last Sunday) and grew out of his newborn clothes overnight. Literally. I put him in a sleeper one night and by the next morning it was just too small. Overall, John-Luke has been great this week. He is still a great sleeper (a habit that I hope continues forever) and just really doesn't cry. Talk about ideal. Now if only I could have my house magically clean itself life would be perfect! Oh, and if the pregnancy belly would disappear overnight that would help too!

Week by Week 2

Week 2 pics of John-Luke include: Big brother, Bimmy, watching him have some tummy time. James is quite fascinated with the baby at this time. Hopefully the charm doesn't wear off anytime soon.Sleeping at his first BBQ in the park. He did really well and we all had a lot of fun.Wide awake during some tummy time. John-Luke (aka. Captain) doesn't really prefer tummy time and has already rolled over to escape it. He officially rolled from his tummy to his back when he was 8 days old. Brian, his 2 grandmas and I, all witnessed it but I think it was a fluke as he has not done it again. Captain is still sleeping really well. He really only wakes up once at night. He has been about as easy as I could have ever hoped for. Easier in fact. I didn't know babies got any easier than Bubba has been but I guess they do. Either that or I am just that much more capable.
James is still liking the baby pretty well and gets very concerned about the baby when he isn't right there with us. He also thinks that the baby is going to be too hot in his bed and is always trying to take his blanket off. He likes to give him little kisses but he also likes to "meep" his nose. Meeping is pinching someone's nose while saying "meep" really loudly and Daddy taught James how to do this. It has been hard to teach James that the baby can't be "meeped." Otherwise, things are going great. I'm feeling pretty darn good too since I've been able to sleep some at night.

Week by Week 1

I have decided to post a couple of pictures of John-Luke each week to document his first year of life. This idea comes from my friend Harmony who is doing the same thing. It also comes from the fact that I am an "undocumented second child." There are almost no pictures of me when I was a baby or even a small child. And there are pretty much no pictures of me alone as a small child/baby.
So here I am starting. Here are a couple of pictures of John-Luke from his first week of life. Here he is in his first photo with his monkey that I will be using each month to document his growth. And here he is with his Grandma Shelley (Brian's mom). She has the magic touch. John-Luke really likes to snuggle up for a nap.
The first week actually went really well. John-Luke slept about 20 hours a day which really made things easy. James has been pretty good with him so far and we had lots of help with Brian's mom here. So far going from 1-2 kids has been easier than going from 0-1 kid. I wish I would have known that before as it would have saved me a lot of stressing. Stay tuned for more weekly posts.

A Birth Story

Before: June 26, 2009. 7 am Friday morning. Just about to leave to the hospital.After: July 1, 2009. 6:06 pm, Wednesday. John-Luke Fila Gillespie sleeping like an angel.In between: Friday.
Well, we were all scheduled for a lovely induction on Friday beginning at 8 am. Got to the hospital. All went well. Got checked in. Got to the delivery room and got "hooked up" with the IV. I even got one of the two rooms with a huge Jacuzzi tub to chill in while waiting. Because of my prior c-section the doctor/hospital started the drugs off really slowly. I mean really slowly. And nothing happened....and still nothing happened....and still nothing happened. Basically, nothing is all that happened on Friday. We sat and waited and although I had some contractions they weren't really that painful and I didn't even get an epidural that day. Later in the afternoon the doctor came by to dicsuss my options. We decided to stop the medication for the night and to start it up at 6 am the next day. I was shown to my lovely recovery room and finally given a great steak dinner to eat. Oh, and the dessert was to die for. A lovely mango/passion fruit mousse. It was heavenly. Got a nice hot shower too. Didn't get too much sleep that night. Who sleeps good in a hospital? Even a really posh private one?
Saturday. Got woke up bright and early by a really nice nurse and they took me back to a different delivery room (still got a Jacuzzi tub) and got hooked up all over again. I did get to eat a yogurt and some chamomile tea so that was nice that I wasn't totally starved. And as the doctor recommended I jumped in the Jacuzzi to help things get started up. (I guess it can help get things loosened up or something or perhaps it just keeps the moms relaxed). Well, this time things started working. By about 12 I asked for an epidural and it was promptly given by a super nice guy. Unfortunately, I waited too long to avoid vomiting so I was lucky enough to continue the day with vomit breath. Lucky me! I even tried to ask for gum but that was not allowed. Well, as it happened with James the epidural was spotty but was good enough to make it all quite bearable but not good enough to really get any good sleep. I wish. And then I just sat there and waited for things to progress. Well, I also tried various different positions to get John-Luke to move down and get into a good position. Things started slowly but by about 5 pm it looked like we were really getting somewhere. At about 8:30 pm I started pushing and that was even going well until John-Luke stopped coming. He was so close (the doctor could see his head) but just wasn't budging. She tried using the little suction thingy (don't know what it is called) and that did nothing. The doctor wasn't comfortable with using forceps (and frankly neither was I) for fear of hurting John-Luke so by 9:00 it was decided that a c-section would be done.
I was all prepared and ready to go and was quickly wheeled down to the operating room. The doctor gave me the good stuff so I wouldn't feel a thing and off they went to cutting. It is kinda surreal to have your belly cut open while you are laying there wide awake. Surreal in the sense that I could feel everything they were doing (not pain). I could feel them make the first cut and then start going deeper and pulling things to the side and going deeper. Apparently, a second c-section takes a bit longer than the first as they cut exactly on the old wound. Another surreal part of this experience is having the doctor ooh and aah over how beautiful my old scar and wound had healed. To me scar and beautiful are kinda oxymorons and don't really go together at all but all the doctors I've seen have told me how "beautiful" my scar is. Whatever. In fact, the doctor was so excited she told me that I could easily at "at least 5 c-sections" if I heal that well. Again, Whatever!!
So after what seemed like 10-15 minutes of digging in my belly they finally pulled John-Luke out at exactly 10 pm and he went crying away with Brian. Now any woman who has ever given birth (naturally or via c-section) can relate to that wonderful release of pressure when the baby is finally out! It is the best feeling. Like you have your own body back to yourself. I love that feeling.
Back to the story...After about 3 minutes Brian and John-Luke were back and I was able to give him a few kisses and whisper to him for a few moments (see pic below) and then him and Brian were off to the nursery to be properly looked over and such. Meanwhile, I was just getting all sown up and put back together. All the while the doctor is still oohing and aahing over my lovely healing and scars. They got me all patched back up as quickly as can be expected and wheeled me back up to my lovely recovery room where I was quickly met by John-Luke and Brian.
Everything was great with John-Luke. No problems at all and I was able to nurse him immediately. After which he promptly fell asleep and that is when the real horror started for me.
The epidural wore off. The baby had just nursed. I was on IV medication to make my have more contractions (to stop blood loss). The nurses were pretty much jumping on my belly to get it to contract AND to add insult to injury they were putting heavy bags on my belly to accomplish the same thing. Needless to say, they all worked to get me to have non-stop, worse than anything I have ever felt, pain!!! I was totally crying. They gave me a shot of morphine and said it would be better in 5 minutes. Nope. Morphine does not work on me. Not at all. In fact, the pain just kept getting worse and worse. By this time I was in so much pain that I was pouring sweat and about to vomit (even though I had nothing in my stomach to vomit). Well, after about 20 minutes of waiting for the Morphine to work they decided to give me some IV painkiller (not sure what it was as I was pretty delirious at the time). Again. Nothing. Of course, pain relief was shortly promised and did not arrive. By this time I was totally crying and I finally just asked them to give me more epidural meds straight to the source. Of course, they had to call the doctor who had gone home but he was an angel and said yes. Finally, after writhing in pain for what seemed like hours and was probably at least 2 hours the epidural meds helped enough that I was able to handle the pain. It wasn't completely gone but it was at least bearable again. That first night was truly horrible. John-Luke was an angel and slept about 8 hours through the whole thing.
Sunday was also quite unbearable but at least they were satisfied that I wasn't going to bleed to death and so they stopped pounding on my stomach and putting weight bags on it too. I was still having bad after birth contractions but I was on pain meds so it was mostly bearable (except when nursing). Really, after 2 days of labor and a c-section I was just sore everywhere. Especially on my tailbone where John-Luke had been pounding for 2 days. Every day since then has been better and better.
Oh, and they did figure out why John-Luke suddenly stopped just short of coming out. He had turned so that his head was sideways. Totally different problem than with James but the same conclusion anyway. All things said, I'm just thankful that John-Luke is here and that the only damage he had was a big bruise on his head from pounding into my tailbone. It could have been lots worse if we had tried forceps to get him out. Thankfully we didn't.
He really is a good baby. Sleeps well (so far) and nurses great. He did have to have his frenulum clipped like James but luckily they just did that here in the hospital instead of sending me to a ENT later. It makes nursing so much easier/less painful.
Today, John-luke was circumcised and he is required to stay overnight for monitoring but we will go home tomorrow and rejoin the rest of our family. The doctor who performed the circumcision officially pronounced John-Luke a true American afterwards. It is very uncommon here ti curcumcise unless it is for religious reasons. And that is the better part of the story. At least all the details that I haven't blocked out. Next time, no labor for me. Not with my beautifully healing uterus!