Baby Bash 2008

Ok, so we had a VERY full day of B A B I E S!!! So, Grant's brother and Sister-in-law (Chad & Becca) with Drew and Grant's parents came up this morning. Then Randy and Sara came over with Gracie, too. The guys went golfing (except Grandad Alan) and the rest of us got to hang out with all the babies for the day. It felt like our own Nelson daycare! This was the first time that Drew met both Olivia and Gracie. I think he's quite smitten with little Gracie!! See picture below:

Look at them almost holding hands!

So, at pretty much any given time you could find one baby sleeping, one eating and one screaming. They pretty much rotated this pattern between them all day long. It was quite an eventful day in the lives of the little ones. We all had a pretty good time hanging out. Here are some more pictures of the special day:

A nice mommy and baby shot!

Poor Olivia - she looks so little!

The first picture with all the Nelson crew since the arrival of the little ones.

Here's a short little video of the 3 of them interacting (i.e Gracie stealing Drew's toy as Olivia looks like a tiny lump next to them!)

2 Weeks Old

Hello everyone! Well, little Olivia will be 2 weeks old tomorrow. Wow! We cannot believe it has already been 2 whole weeks! Ok, so this was my first week since Grant had to go back to work - mind you that he's still not working full time, he had some time off here and there - none the less, it was a long week! The little princess can be quite a handful when she wants to be and does have quite an appetite - leaving me little to no time to do anything else! But she IS adorable and I wouldn't change a thing.

So, this past week we got our proofs back from her photo shoot at Lundies Photography. They came out really cute and we are really excited to get the pictures when they are ready. Here are some of the little pictures that we didn't choose to put into the "hands and feet" collage. We still thought these were really cute so we just bought prints of each.

We also had her 2-week doctor's appointment today and she has gained even more weight. She is up to 7 Lbs 15 oz (25th percentile - but growing rapidly), 20" long (50th percentile) and her head is in the 60th percentile.

I did ask the doctor about her new nighttime issues. So anyway, she has been getting really fussy, fidgety and completely inconsolable in the evenings where all she wants to do is eat constantly. Then if we let her eat as much as she wants, she'll overeat and wind up throwing up REALLY bad (I mean exorcist-like). Anyway, the doctor said that it may be too early to tell, but it sounds like early stages of colic to him. (Great!) So, if it is colic, it will get worse before it gets better. Apparently it will continually get worse until 6-8 weeks then get better gradually and can last up to 3-4 months.

Basically colic is when a baby is completely upset and inconsolable for no apparent reason while being otherwise healthy and gaining weight regularly. They usually have episodes 1-2 times a day. She has her 1 episode every evening, usually starting between 7 and 10 and lasting several hours. So . . even though she has been an angel baby up until this, and still sleeps through the night (only waking every 4 hours or so to eat), she does have some testy moments. So, he gave us some tips to try to calm her down, we'll see how they work.

This weekend Chad, Becca & Drew are coming up for the day on Saturday to hang out so that the little cousins can meet. Grant's parents are also coming up for a bit, too. Apparently Grandad is quite smitten with the little one and is dying to come see her again! awww, how sweet! I'll definitely get some pics of the babies together to show you all.

Well, that's about all for now. I'll post some more after the weekend.

First week alone!

Ok, so this is the first week that me and Olvia are on our own. Daddy had to go back to work! :( So far things have been going pretty well. However, Sunday night was the first night that Olivia decided not to sleep through the night. She was up and inconsolable from around 2 am until after 5 am. Just in time for Grant to have to go back to work! But, she's done good every other night since then. She's still going about 4 hours in between feedings at night and she just lets me know that she's hungry by sucking on her hands and cooing - no crying. She really is a wonderful baby and we don't really have any major complaints about her. We feel VERY lucky that she has been so good!

Anyway, we have our next doctor's appt. on Friday. I'll let you know how that one goes. We will also get to go look at our proofs from her photo shoot tomorrow. That should be fun. I am also still working on picking out the pictures for her birth annoucements to send out. I should get those picked out and ordered by the end of the week, and hopefully send them out next week.

Well, I have been getting lots of calls and emails wanting more pics of her on the blog. So here are some of the latest pics for you guys to check in on her:

Here's the little one taking a nap with Mommy

Here's the 2nd encounter with best buddy, Gracie. The way Olivia is eating, it won't take her long to catch up to her in size! :)

Passed out with Mommy . . . again!

Smiley!

Just being cute!

Here she is all dressed up in her cute green dress.

Her friend, Mr. Bear

More Olivia Pics

Hello again. Ok, so like we said, we are picture fanatics and we've got some more cute pictures for you.

Here's Olivia just hanging out with us looking around.

Here we gave her a sponge bath in the sink for the first time. Here's her little duckie bath towel. Isn't she cute?

Quack! Quack!

Doesn't she look so little and cute in her car seat!!

Here are some pictures we took during her "amateur" photo shoot with our friends, Rhoger and Diane. The pictures they took are much better and we'll post some of those when we get them.

Olivia loves her little lambie!

I'm 1 week old today!

Hello everyone! So, little Olivia is officially 1 week old today! Yeah! So we had another doctor's appointment yesterday and she is now up to 7 lbs 6 oz. So she is now *ONLY* gaining 1 oz a day instead of 2! The doctor was joking around that now she is just breaking into the high end of normal. (little piggy!). She definitely won't starve. All I can say is that if her wanting to eat all the time is our biggest issue, we are VERY lucky first time parents! Her next appointment is the 2-week appointment next Friday.

We also had our little photo shoot yesterday with her. This was just to do what they call a "hands and feet" collage. This is where they take all sorts of cute pictures (in black and white) of her face up close, her hands, feet, ear and other cute little baby parts and put them into a collage of 3 x 3 pictures (9 total) to make one big collage picture. They look really cute. This is so that we will have something to remember how little she is. The shoot went really well and we think the pictures are going to be adorable. They had her stripped down to her diaper and in a big pile of white blankets and tulle with the sunlight on her.

Today, our friends Rhoger and Diane are coming over to do a mini photo shoot with her so that we can do a birth announcement to send out. They should be here any minute!

Well that's about all for now. Let's see if I can't find some more cute pictures to post . . .

Here's a picture of her with her daddy

40 Week Belly Shots

And here are the LONG awaited 40 week belly shots! (he he)

Visit with Grandmom and Nana

Hello everyone! Well, Grandmom Susan and Nana came for a visit yesterday so that Nana could meet little Olivia. We had a nice time and even took her to Cracker Barrel for her first restaurant experience. She slept right on through the whole thing. Here are some cute pictures of their visit:

We also got some cute little family pictures of us and some other cute pics for your viewing pleasure:

Here's Daddy readying to Olivia for the first time!

Here's little Olivia in her favorite bib from Uncle Chad! :)

Today we have another doctor's appointment just to make sure she is still gaining weight well AND we have her first "real" photo session. (that's with a real photographer, not just mommy and daddy being picture crazy!). So, hopefully that will go well and she'll be in a good mood. I mean, there's no way she won't be cute, we just want her to be happy, too! :)

First Doctor's Appt.

Well, Olivia had her first doctor's appointment this afternoon and she is doing great! She had dropped from 7 lbs 8 oz to 7 lbs even when we left the hospital (2 days ago) and today, she is back up to 7 lbs 4 oz. WOW! The doctor said that babies usually gain about 1/2 oz a day and she is gaining 2 ounces a day!


We "were" worried about her weight with the whole breastfeeding thing - since you can't tell how much food they are getting. But after today, not so worried anymore. I thought that she seemed pretty demanding when it came to eating, but now I have confirmation. After describing her eating habits, the doc said that she is a very "voracious" eater and pretty impatient! So, now I've been calling her my little miss piggy! But she's adorable and I wouldn't trade her for anything!


Not much else going on around here for the moment. Susan and Nana are coming for a visit tomorrow so that Nana can meet her. So, other than that, here are the obligatory baby pics for your viewing pleasure!

Here's Olivia this morning in her jammies! Isn't she cute??

Here's Olivia's outfit for the day. Got to look cute for the doctor's appointment!

4 Days Old

Hello again! Ok, so we survived our first couple nights home without incident. Olivia is doing really well and sleeps very well at night. No complaints so far. In fact, she really doesn't even cry that much - just occasionally gets a bit fussy when she is hungry!

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One of my wonderful neighbors, Amy, had volunteered to organize some of our friends and neighbors to bring us dinner every other night for the first couple weeks to help us out. What a wonderful gesture, we feel very fortunate to have her and all the wonderful friends that have already volunteered to help us out.

Randy and Sara volunteered to bring us dinner Monday night for our first night home. They also brought over Gracie to meet Olivia, her best friend, for the first time. (they couldn't meet in the hospital because Gracie is under 1 and they have strict rules about that). Anyway, here are some cute pics of the two of them on their first meeting:

Who are you???

We have also become quite addicted to taking pictures of our little one. We just think she is the most beautiful baby girl on the planet and can't help ourselves. So, here are some of our most recent favorites for your enjoyment.

Here's her first night home. She looks so little in her pack-n-play. She did so well!

Good morning, sunshine!

On a complete (but hilarious) side note, Grant has been changing her diaper while I am doing this blog entry and just as he got her all cleaned up with a new diaper on - she let out a rather loud "man-ish" toot with a lovely surprise. Yup, guess he'll be changing that diaper again! She looked so proud of herself, too! Grant said that it wasn't necessary for her to do that, but it was pretty hilarious! :)


Olivia also has her first doctor's appt. this afternoon. She had already lost 1/2 lb (down to 7 lbs even) when we checked out of the hospital - but otherwise, her pediatrician told us that she was perfect and had normal weight loss. We'll get to see how she's doing now that she's left the hospital. I'll keep you posted on that one.

Home at last!

Hello again! Well, we got to come home today. It was nice being waited on in the hospital and having a chance to get lots of advice from all of the wonderful nurses and docs at Rex hospital, but we were ready to come home and start enjoying our new family!

Thanks to everyone that came to visit us while we were there. We had lots of our closest friends and family come and see us. We were even surprised to see that my brother, Sean, got to come from the Charlotte area for a little while with Kayla and Shane (his first son from California). Sean even came in quite handy as Olivia was having one of her few moments when she was quite fussy - Sean calmed her right down.

Oh, and by the way, I have a lovely case of laryngitis, that developed while I was in the hospital. So I can hardly even talk! All I want to do is brag about our little angel and tell everyone how wonderful she is, and I can't! She slept all the way through the night - both nights! I know it may not last, but so far, she has been an excellent baby.

Anyway, my parents helped us to get home and settled. They brought me some beautiful daisies and when we got home, we saw that Alan and Susan had decorated our door and mailbox with bows and a balloon to announce our sweet new arrival.

Here are some pictures of us from our first little moments with our new little one at home. (Right now Grant is taking a little nap on the couch with Olivia on his chest - some sweet daddy-daughter time).

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Isn't she an angel!

Here she is passed out with a clean diaper and a full belly!

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Daddy and Olivia are getting some good bonding time together, too!

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We are so in love with this little girl! I never could have imagined how wonderful this could be - she is amazing and we are enamored by her. She is so adorable and has been so good for us that we are just tickled to death. Grant will be home all week and maybe some next week - so we will be spending some quality time as our new family!