Mother's Day

Yesterday we celebrated my first Mother's Day. It was a very special day with my husband and son just spending time together relaxing. In the morning we got up and tried to have breakfast at a little cafe near our house. They serve an amazing Bananas Foster French Toast but were so busy the line was out the door. We decided against waiting since Pete is not very good at it. Instead we went to Panera and ate then went on a drive in the country looking at big houses and the pretty greenery Michigan has to offer at this time of year. The rest of the day we napped, worked on things around the house and did all the normal things we do every day like feed, burp, change diapers, and hang out and walk around until he gets tired again. It's a constant cycle. Pete gave me a beautiful card telling me I am doing a great job and that he loves me very much. I got a 12 pack of Dr Pepper and chocolate. Boy does he know me well already. :) Oh, and they planted a Gerber Daisy plant in a pot in our front yard for me. It is beautiful, one of my favorite flowers.

All in all it was a great day. I feel very blessed to have such a sweet boy and great husband. I still can't believe he is really here and I am really a mom. It's a crazy thing. It's a great thing. It's a huge responsibility and sometimes I feel the pressure. It's tiring but somehow your mom super powers kick in and you make it another day. Here are a couple pictures. One is of Pete and I at Panera for breakfast yesterday. The other is of him and I hanging out on the couch after a nap. Have a great week!

First Date Night

P. and I went on our first date tonight, alone! Pete is 5 weeks old today. It has been 5 weeks since we have been anywhere without our new baby. Boy has time flown. We have a wonderful friend who is very good with infants. She used to work in a day care and has been around Pete often since he was born. She is just amazing with him and he loves to be with her. We felt more than comfortable leaving him with her tonight and looked forward to our time together. P. and I caught a 4:10 movie, Baby Mama, then went for coffee afterwards. I have to say I did incredibly well for being away from my son for the first time. I didn't call home. During the movie I didn't worry and I checked my cell phone only once. Of course I talked about him constantly but we also had fun conversations about other things in our life. We read the paper at the coffee shop and finally I said, lets go home and see our son. When we got home he was just waking up from a nap in his Baby Bjorn on his sitters chest. I was so happy to see him, so refreshed from some alone time with my husband and ready to shower him with lots of love and kisses. I did miss him. I did worry a little about him. Not so much that he was safe but that he might be fussy for his babysitter and she wouldn't want to watch him again for us. But overall I am so happy we took some time for ourselves to just reconnect and have a quick break from the busyness of parenting. We have a great marriage that needs to be nurtured just as much as our son does. Here is Pete and his friend and sitter. Aren't they sweet? 5 weeks! Our son is 5 weeks old. He is growing up so fast. I wish time would slow down. Every day he looks more grown up, like a little man. A very handsome little man. See for yourself. I am so proud.

Smiley Boy

Our Happy Boy

Pete is a happy boy. His smile can light up my day. Usually after a good feeding and a full belly I can get some smiles and laughs out of him. I treasure the quiet moments after nursing where we just sit and talk, sing, tickle, bounce around and hang out together. He will start cooing and I know the smiles and giggles are coming. Here are a couple picture of the smiles/laughs I caught this morning. He had just nursed and I am sitting in a chair facing him eating my own breakfast.
Soon after breakfast he feel asleep in my arms. He loves to be swaddled and walked around. It can put him to sleep right away if he is tired. It took a few weeks to figure out how to comfort him but now I know what he likes and it feels so good when I can quickly calm his cries and make him happy and comfortable. Here is my silly boy this morning laughing in his sleep. As he starts to drift off his lips curl up in a sweet smile then he snickers a little bit. It makes me laugh out loud. I watch his face intently as he starts to fall asleep waiting for the smile and laugh that I love so much. Today I was prepared, I had my camera on him, focused and ready to shoot his adorable little laugh. It was hard and both my arms are tired from trying to get a picture but it was worth it. I love this little boy so much. How do you ever explain the love you feel for your child? You can't. It is overflowing. It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it and writing about it. I live to see him, hold him, take care of him, meet his needs and see him smile. I never want him to be sad or lonely or hurt. I had no idea how amazing this would feel. It is indescribable. He is such a sweet boy, my son. I am exhausted. Completely exhausted. But I am so full of love.

More pics.....

Katie Meets Pete

Katie came home Friday night. Here are some pictures of her visit so far. This is the first time she held Pete at the airport. She wore a pretty black and white dress to impress her little brother. He liked it.
She read him a book that night about Sparky the Dog. He listened intently.

Pete sleeping on his big sister.
Katie changing his diaper.
Reading to him again.
Pete passed out on the bed, one arm out to his side.
Pete and Dad at Katie's Birthday Pool Party.
Pete and his cousin Katelyn hanging out at the pool.
Katie and her dad at the pool.

Sweet Pete

My friend Kari came over today and took some pictures of Pete. Here are a few of my favorites.

My Boys

I took this picture this morning of Pete and his dad sleeping together. Have you ever seen such a sweet picture?

Still no time....

No time to write but here are some recent pics of Pete with some friends this week. And one of him sleeping this afternoon. Feeding time.....

No Time

Sorry I haven't blogged lately. Things changed when P. went back to work. Now I am happy to get a shower, eat anything and sleep at all. But this sweet face makes it all worth it and there is less laundry to do when I stay in the same clothes every day all day. I will blog this weekend when P. is home and can give me some relief. For now, hope this funny picture of his bath tonight carries you through, it's what keeps me going right now.....P. forgot to cover his pee pee during a diaper change so he needed a bath, bad...... :)

One week ago.....

One week ago at this time I was in labor. At 4:00 pm today I thought, this is when my water broke exactly 7 days ago. By 6pm we were at the hospital. I was admitted immediately and by 9:30pm desperately seeking an epidural. Labored until 5am then started to push. Pete was born at 7:44am with the help of a vacuum. And here we are.....

What a week this has been. It has been the hardest, most exhausting, most emotional, and best week of my life. I wish I had more time to record all that happened this week to look back on someday but that's ok. When I have time I will put down more about my labor, delivery and our first week as a family. Right now, it is time to sleep.

Joy

I have never felt so much joy as I did today when Pete finally breastfed from me. We have been working on it all week and today at the hospital Pete and I made it happen. I cried and he fed and afterwards we sat and cuddled together enjoying the moments we just shared as mom and son. I don't have time to talk but I just wanted to give you an update and share our wonderful news. Thank you for your prayers and encouragements. Here are some pictures....not of the breastfeeding of course.....

Pete had a doctors appointment yesterday to make sure he was gaining weight and healthy. He was in perfect health, almost back to his birth weight. Here is a picture of P. and Pete waiting to see the doctor. We gave him his first bath the other night. He didn't like it much, too cold I guess.

This bath picture is blurry but is so cute.
Pete hanging out with dad.

Pictures of Pete

Pete is a wonderful baby. He is sweet and handsome and I never want him out of my sight. He makes me smile and laugh. We call him One Eyed Pete because when he is just waking up or the light is too bright he keeps one eye closed. It is so funny. He loves his daddy so much. They are sweet together, talking, sleeping, walking around looking at things. My heart is full of so much love when I look at them together. Pete is healthy and now that we are getting him food he is sleeping better and not as fussy.We could use some prayers. Especially regarding breastfeeding. Pete has not been able to latch on properly resulting in a lot of pain for me and lack of food for him. A lactation consultant worked with us for hours yesterday but Pete insists upon biting and hasn't figured out how to use his tongue to suck. I am not to let him feed again until my breasts heal more and we work on his biting and sucking through some exercises we were taught. Please pray that this will work out for us. I want more than anything to breastfeed my son. Also please pray for continued healing for me.

Enjoy the pictures. I could have posted a hundred of them but here are a few of my favorites. Thank you for your calls and emails. I am not up for talking on the phone right now but appreciate the calls and emails and we will get back to you as soon as things calm down for us. Thanks for sharing in our pregnancy, birth and time now with our sweet Pete.

As of 4/5/08, the Selinski family is one member larger!

This is A.M.'s friend Rachel posting the important details of Peter Jacob's arrival. I just got back from the hospital, and Mommy and baby are doing well, though Mommy, of course, is tired and in shock at how different real life labor is from the labor described on A Baby Story.

Here are the stats. Peter Jacob entered the world this morning, April 5, 2008, at 7:44 AM after a 16 hour labor. He weighed 8 pounds, 1 ounce and was 20.5 inches long. He has brown hair and a nice lower lip, half of which he likes to suck into his mouth. See for yourself:



He's a keeper! He has long fingers with equally long, well-shaped fingernails. The doctor says he is as healthy as can be. It's a happy day for this family!


4/6/08: Here are a couple more photos, per A.M.'s request.

Nursery

The nursery is complete. See what you think.....

We made collages of all the baby cards we have received and put them into frames as our wall art.

We love our blue and green "patchwork" bedding and window covering. I ordered it online so hadn't seen it in person but love it even more than I thought I would.














The dresser/changing table is from a great friend who saw our need and had the perfect piece of furniture for our baby's room.

We have a shelf above the dresser with some special baby items we have received. Under the shelf are pictures of P., the dogs and I that we had taken last Oct.















We have a diaper genie, a recliner rocking chair, and monitor. The theme accidentally ended up monkeys and Boxer dogs. Sock monkey on the shelf is from my friend J. The monkey hanging on the crib is from my childhood friend J. and the Build A Bear monkey in the crib is from Katie who made him just for her little brother when she was home at Christmas. The pictures of us on the wall have our dogs in them and there is a small Nintendog Boxer on the nightstand.
















I am so happy with the nursery. I have sat in there many times over the past week just thinking and pondering. I can't wait to sit in the rocker with our son. Each part of the room has special meaning to me.

Now all we need is a baby.

39 Weeks!

The countdown is on! I had a doctor's appointment this morning and my first internal exam due to complaining of intense pain in my crotch. The pain started a couple days ago and has increased in intensity since. I told her it was getting really hard to walk or lift my legs due to the pain. She decided to check and see what was going on. My doctor found that I am 2-3 cm dilated and 60% effaced. She was able to feel his head and said he was right there ready to come out. I know this doesn't mean the baby is coming tonight or even this week but it is a good start. The most exciting thing about being dilated and effaced is that I am a good way through the first phase of labor already. My doctor said I can pretty much count on a shorter labor because of my progress already. She said some women come in to the hospital at just a finger tip dilated and in labor and have hours and hours to go before even reaching 2-3 cm. I am pretty excited now, things are starting to happen. Like I said, I do understand women can be 2-3 cm dilated for weeks and still not go into true labor but in my mind this is a wonderful start and I am thrilled to know things are working towards me having our son in the near future.

Oh, and I gained 3 lbs since last week. That wasn't great news but that's ok. Our boy's heart beat was 151 and my blood pressure was 122/80. At this point I am not doing anything to induce labor or bring him here any earlier than he has planned. They say you can walk, have sex, eat spicy foods, do squats on an exercise ball, and some other things but I haven't tried any methods yet mostly due to the fact that P. hurt his leg last Monday and is on crutches right now. I am hoping for a recuperated husband before our boy arrives. I need a husband that can walk and carry a baby safely at the same time and until that is possible I am ok if our little guy waits a little bit longer. Hopefully the timing will all work itself out.

That's all for now. I will keep you posted. Have a great week and keep us in your prayers!