Birth to 1 Month

My sweet baby Lakelyn-

Bringing you home was the best birthday gift I could have ever asked for.  My birthday was the day after we came home.  I loved being at home with you and daddy, it was a very relaxed day and you were the best birthday gift ever!  Bringing you home was both very exciting and nervous for your daddy and I.  We didn’t know what we were going to do when we got you home.  Who was going to be there to tell us everything right and wrong, or when you cried who was going to help make you stop!  Fortunately it all came very natural for us both.  Plus you were such an easy baby that really the only time you cried is when you were hungry.  You were so tiny, daddy would carry you around with one arm.

Eating:  Breast feeding was not as easy as I thought it would be. I had imagined that I would just pop you on the boob and you would start eating. You would do really good one feeding and then not the next. You were getting frustrated and so was I.   You were hungry and I felt like I was starving my baby. So I finally decided until my milk came in I was going to feed you formula, this was really hard because I wanted to breast feed and I was afraid after you had the formula you wouldn’t want to go back to the boob. However the lactation consultant at the hospital assured me you would prefer my boob over the formula. After being home for a few days and pumping, my milk came in, we went back to the lactation consultant who helped me with breast feeding again, she decided I should try a nipple shield and this helped some but still was very difficult for you to get as much milk as you wanted. I continued to work with you at home with the nipple shield but after a week or so I decided I would pump and feed you with a bottle. I came to this conclusion because 1) I would never be a person who breast feed in public 2) You would take 20-30 min on each boob to eat and still not be satisfied 3) I was paranoid you weren’t getting enough to eat. So after a few weeks I began pumping exclusively and giving you my milk in a bottle. You ate 2-3 oz every 2 hours. We went to the breast feeding clinic every 3 days for 3weeks until you were back up to your birth weight and to make sure your jaundice levels were normal.

Sleeping:  We woke you up every 2 hours during the day and 3 hours at night until you were back to your birth weight. After that we were lucky to get a 4 hour stretch at night without you waking up. The first few weeks of life you seemed to have your nights and days mixed up. You would wake up at 3am sometimes with Daddy and stay up for several hours, just wanting to look around. Daddy went back to work after a week of being home so I stayed up with you most nights. There was no reason to have Daddy being tired at work when I could sleep during the day when you slept. Daddy did a great job of getting up though when he knew I was really tired. Getting 4-5 hours of straight through sleep made me feel like a refreshed person. The first few weeks everything was so new and getting up in the middle of the night several times didn’t really bother me. At this time you slept in the bassinet in the pack in play in our room. You were such a noisy sleeper, I didn’t mind but Daddy had a hard time sleeping though your grunts.

Clothes:  You wore a newborn size but 1 month was just a tab to big. 

Diaper:  You wore a new born pampers swaddler diaper.

You love bath time!  I was very surprised but even your first bath you didn’t really cry.  You loved having your hair washed!  The first few times we washed you in our bathroom sink but then after your umbilical cord fell off we put in the baby bath tub.  I loved giving you baths because you enjoyed them so much!

Lakelyn’s first road trip was November 23^rd, only 5 days old! I wanted to have Lakelyn early so that we could go back to my hometown for Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and I wanted to be sure I could be with my family for the holiday. Holidays just aren’t the same when you can’t spend it with your family. Lakelyn did so good. She slept the whole car ride down, slept her normal at night, so she got up every 3 hours, and then slept most of Thanksgiving while she got passed around and then slept the whole car ride back. She was such a good baby!