Cute as a bug

We managed to get out of the house today for a little while. We met Jessica and Brooke at Nagasaki for Wyatt's first Japanese Hibatchi lunch. He slept right through all the banging and clanging. Then we went by the office so I could drop off a few things and of course I had to show him off while we were there. I meant to make it out to Babies R Us after leaving work, but I soon realized that I had forgotten the things I needed to return so we may have to attempt that trip again tomorrow.

Mimi and Pop must be having fun in Hawaii, Wyatt can't wait to get his authentic Hawaiian shirt!

Here are some pics to hold them over while they are away.

Two days in the house

We really didn't do much of anything today. We got up and dressed after his 9am feeding and just sat around watching tv and staring at each other. Daddy just got home and fed him dinner and I'm about to start on another batch of thank you notes.
Nothing exciting to report, but I get yelled at if I miss a day of blogging- so there!

Rainy Tuesday

Today we sat around the house in our comfy clothes and listened to the rain. Wyatt slept solid after his 8am feeding until noon. I stayed up late working on his room so I took advantage and stayed in bed until noon as well. I got up and took a shower while he sat in his swing and then we both got our sweats on and laid around the house some more.

When daddy got home we had happy baby time on the blanket while I made dinner. I know what you are thinking and of course I took some pictures!

Out and About

This morning we got up early, well early for us (9am) and headed over to check out a daycare that was recommended to us by our neighbors. It's on my way to work and not totally out of the way for Michael so he may be able to drop Wyatt off for me once in awhile. I loved the place and I think that is where he will end up going. I finally looked at the calendar yesterday and counted up my weeks to find out what day I go back to work...March 3rd.
We also went to Macy's for a little shopping and then headed back home just in time to feed a hungry baby! I've been pretty productive today. I wrote a huge batch of thank you notes and even managed to cook dinner. Now I need to give daddy and baby some boy bonding time while I go work on organizing Wyatt's closet.

1 MONTH OLD

Wow how time flies! And look how smart he is...he already knows how old he is! (He's holding up one finger on his right hand) And look at his cool new manly Superman Boppy cover made by Julie.

We ventured out to Target today to load up on some more baby supplies and then went to Outback Steakhouse for dinner to celebrate daddy's birthday.

We had a photo shoot to commemorate the one month mark for Wyatt and this was my favorite pic that turned out. Love this huge teddy bear from Theresa! Check the photobucket link for more pictures taken today.

We also gave Wyatt another bath which did not go over so well. He was not a fan!

Whew!

What a day! We had our 3rd shower today and I am just overwhelmed by all of our amazing friends and family. My sister Rachel had probably 40 people coming in and out of her house today and they all came to see my baby boy. He was great and just went with the flow. I think just about everyone got to hold him at some point. I can't wait to get my camera out and check out all of the pictures that were taken today. Hopefully I will get around to posting pictures of his room after I get a chance to sort through all of the bags and boxes and load up his closet.

Tomorrow Wyatt will be 1 month old and his daddy will be 432 months old (or 36 for the mathematically impaired). It's so hard to believe that after such a long wait, we are finally so blessed to have this beautiful baby boy in our lives. Now I can look back and see that all those years of waiting really have melted away. All of the tears and heartache have been replaced with great joy and love. This little boy is our dream come true.

Too busy to blog??? Who me???

Ok so I skipped a day, but I have a good reason!
Tuesday evening Mimi came back to visit and then we went to a shower for Wyatt thrown by my co-workers. Now I know these ladies have been rooting for us and supporting me for a long time, but that was above and beyond (Thanks girls!) Wyatt has so much great stuff, he is a lucky little boy.
I spent all of Wednesday morning running errands with my mom and then when I got back home and she needed to leave, I put Wyatt in his swing and started organizing his room. My friend Julie and her daughter Katie came over and entertained him while I kept sorting and putting things away. I now have his crib set up and most of everything else in its place...well except for the clothes. I needed more time to figure out where and how to put all his clothes away. By the time Michael got home, I was absolutely exhausted...welcome to motherhood, right? I handed off the little man and went back to tackle more of the mess in Wyatt's room.
Here it is Thursday morning and Wyatt is finally asleep on my chest and now I must follow the golden rule of motherhood...SLEEP WHEN HE SLEEPS! Night, night!

Ouch! That's going to leave a mark...

Wyatt went back to our fabulous ped this morning for a follow up. He has gained another 12oz this past week so he is now 8lbs 12oz. He's gaining well and eating great so doc says we can try and space out his feeding to every 5 hours which may help mommy and daddy get a bit more rest. And they had to take some blood to test his ionized calcium. Did you know they can take blood from the head?!?! It was a little freaky, but the nurse got the vein right away and they are going to call as soon as they get the results. It did leave a nice sized little knot on his head that the nurses promise will go away by the end of the day.
We are very excited for yet another work shower tonight, this time with my co-workers. I know they are excited to get to hold him and pass him around tonight. I just hope he cooperates and doesn't get too fussy. Now that we are spacing out his feedings a bit more, that puts his next bottle at 6pm, about an hour into the party. I'm pretty sure I can get some volunteers to feed him when he does get hungry!

More Visitors

Today my aunt Mary Kaye and her daughter Nina Xu came to visit Wyatt. Mom rode up with them too because Mimi can't resist a reason to come visit our handsome little man. We went to lunch at Applebees and Nina Xu held Wyatt and gave him lots of kisses.

Are you ready for some FOOTBALL???

We spent the entire day in our sweats watching football. Pop drove up from Louisville to visit and made his famous pizza (mmmm!) Aunt Hope came over too and fed Wyatt for us. Wyatt wore his "future quarterback" onesie and football sleep sack so he was ready for both big games today.

Shopping at the Mall

We got out of the house again today and hit the mall. We shopped all of the sidewalk sales and managed to get out of there with only a couple of new outfits for Wyatt. Completely necessary of course! Wyatt was a bit fussy this evening but I think that was our fault for getting him a little off schedule this afternoon. Now he's asleep on my chest as I type. I just don't think there's a better feeling than this. All of that soft baby skin and sweet baby smell filling up my lungs.

I couldn't decide which picture to post of him today, so I'm putting both up.

Uneventful

We had a pretty boring, uneventful day today. Wyatt and I had a part replaced on my car, then stopped by Hallmark to purchase his baby book. All of Hallmark's 3 ring binder baby books have a few pages for adopting parents to switch out for the pregnancy pages. This is a very cool minor detail that means alot to adopting parents. I hope to start working on it this weekend while Daddy is home to help with Wyatt.

Uncle Javi did come to visit and meet Wyatt for the first time today.

Mimis and Mommies and Babies, oh my!

Today Wyatt met his first girlfriend, Ella. My friend Laura, who I have known since we were about 5 years old, had her baby girl on Dec 28th, approximately 14 hours after Wyatt was born. It's funny now to think that when I was visiting her in the hospital on the 29th, my baby boy was already born and I just didn't know about him yet. Laura, her mom Martha, and my mom all drove up from Louisville with Ella to meet Wyatt. We sat around and compared notes and baby toes and of course blinded the babies with camera flashes.

Big Day

Today we had our first baby shower at Michael's office at Tenmast Software. They set up games and an adorable diaper cake centerpiece and loaded us up with tons of the essentials. We played bingo with words about Wyatt, a word scramble and name that baby animal. The cake and lunch was so much fun! We are really blessed for Michael to have found such a great group of people to work with. I dressed Wyatt in his "My Dad Rules" t-shirt for the occasion.

I came home and set up his brand new Rainforest travel swing and he spent some time in it while I unrolled all the diapers from the diaper cake decoration, I think I counted 87 diapers in all. Hmmm that should last me a week or so!

We also gave Wyatt his first bath tonight. I unpacked the bath center that Aunt Hope bought for him and we lathered him up with the sweet smelling Johnsons baby wash. Unfortunately we could not get pictures of this first bath because in case you've never bathed a 3 week old baby- they are slippery little suckers! But I did make Michael stand next to the bath with Wyatt afterwards.

Ohhs and Ahhs

We made it in to visit my co-workers at Ball Homes today. I know they were all disappointed that I didn't even get Wyatt out of his carseat, but we will play "pass the baby" next Tuesday at the baby shower. It was great getting to show off my little man to all my friends that have been rooting for us for so long. Finally the long wait has paid off.

So far Wyatt loves his bouncy seat. I have managed to shower and put on makeup two days in a row now! Ok so this was at 2pm, but still...

Wyatt is regularly finishing 4oz at each feeding, every 4 hours. Tonight he took 2oz a little early because I messed up his feeding schedule with our little outing, but then I went ahead and gave daddy a 4oz bottle for him, thinking he would only finish half of it. I did a load of laundry and washed some bottles and came back to check on my boys and Wyatt had finished that other bottle too! I think we might have a linebacker on our hands. Good thing daddy went to Sams Club after work to get the bulk can of Similac!

I made spaghetti for dinner tonight which I think was the first meal I've cooked in weeks.

Mission Accomplished

Pediatrician...check!
Wonderful amazing terrific smart answer to our prayers pediatrician...CHECK!

I called the recommended ped this morning and not only did she spend 15mins on the phone with me this morning, she got me in 1 1/2 hours later and then spent another 45mins with us at her office. She knew of the other place's bad repuatation and confirmed my suspicion of that place.

First thing was weighing him, naked! I knew this was going to be the first of many times I would be peed on and sure enough, he sprung a fountain right there in the exam room. Luckily I missed the direct line of fire and remembered to pack an extra outfit in the diaper bag. Oh and did I mention that my not so teeny baby boy weighed 8lbs this morning. He only weighed 6lbs, 15oz last Thursday. He gained 1lb, 1oz in 4 days!! And the doc said his calcium burns look bad, but should heal themselves eventually. In other words, he's a happy healthy little boy and we go back next Tuesday for some bloodwork.

I also called a couple of daycares to get him lined up for when I have to drag my butt back to work. I am already dreading it, but I have 49 more days before I have to worry about that.

our first weekend home

Friday night we had friends and family over to meet our little man. We ate pizza and passed the baby and he seemed to love every minute of it. Ok he slept through most of it, but I could tell he loved it.

We spent the weekend running around trying to get all the things we need to get us through until the baby showers begin. Wyatt has already been to Babies R Us, Applebees, Best Buy and Target, you know, all the important places. He is sleeping very soundly during these outings and as long as we get everything we need done between the hours of noon and 4pm, we're golden.

We bought a video camera today so look forward to more youtube videos soon. Of course, all Wyatt does right now is eat, sleep and pee/poop so I can't promise any groundbreaking cinematography.

Jack is doing great with Wyatt. He curls up next to us and occasionally sniffs at Wyatt but he realizes that he is supposed to leave him alone.

Ohhh that first night is a doozy!

Well we are home safe and sound and Wyatt enjoyed his first restaurant meal at the Outback Steakhouse in Ashland. (Pictures to follow, grandpa insisted) We finally got home around 8pm, just in time for grandpa to feed him before he had to head back to Louisville. My mom is staying for a few days to help out and that sure came in handy about 8am this morning when I was dog tired and trying to get dressed for his first doctor's appointment.
We made it there, albeit 15 minutes late only to find that I simply despise that facilty. We are working very hard to get the legal paperwork to prove to our insurance company that we are responsible for Wyatt's medical care and need him to be covered. It's very frustrating to know that we want him to find the best doctor possible and we simply can't get insurance coverage because of legal barriers.
We were referred to a pediatrician in Nicholasville that I have heard good things about so hopefully she'll be able to take us on and help us work around the insurance company.
We got alot accomplished today and I hope tonight will be a little smoother!

It's only been 4 days???

It feels like I've known this little boy forever, he snuggles me and smiles at me (I know it's gas but I don't care). He was a bit fussy today and got a little out of routine but by his 8pm feeding he was back on track.
I sat with one of the nurses tonight and did a bit of the discharge paperwork. I have started packing up my room here at the Hospitality House. Unfortunately Michael is still stuck at work but they are going to let him off at noon tomorrow so he can meet up with my parents and they will drive him up here. This way they can meet Wyatt, and Michael can drive our car back home while I sit in the back with Wyatt.
The doctor still hasn't shown up for his circumcision but he better be there in the morning. One of the social workers is coming up for discharge and so tomorrow should be a very busy... but very exciting day.

Mommy Monday

This brings me to today...or what's left of today since it's 11:28pm. I set my alarm so that I could grab breakfast and make it for Wyatt's 8am feeding, but I was running a little late so skipped breakfast and walked over to the hospital. It was 70 degrees today on the 7th of January. Crazy!
I spent alot of time with him today. I took some pictures this morning and then came back to upload the new pics for daddy to see.
I think he's going to be circumcized tomorrow so I'm not looking forward to that. The nurses don't act like this is any big deal and he should heal quickly from it so hopefully it will all go smoothly. It's looking pretty good for coming home on Wednesday. We hope Michael will be able to get away for half a day on Wednesday to come up here and help me pack up all of our stuff and get Wyatt home where he belongs!

Sunday...day 2 in Wyatt World

Oh I almost forgot to tell you all where we are staying. The hospital here in Ashland has a Hospitality House a block from the hospital that is such a blessing. We were planning on finding a hotel and looking at $70 a night for an indeterminate length of time. As soon as we got in the NICU, before we even finished scrubbing in, the nurses were already calling to get us a room. We came over on Saturday evening and they gave us a tour and showed us to our room. There is a full kitchen for long term stays and everything you could ever ask for. They only ask for a very small "suggested donation" and this is nicer than any hotel we could have found. We are really close by so we've been able to make just about every feeding, every 4 hours since we met the little man. I do get to sleep through the midnight and 4am feedings for now, but to be honest I am kinda looking forward to doing those at home.
Michael found out on Sunday afternoon that he had to report back to work on Monday so he fed Wyatt at 4pm and then we took off for I-64 West to meet Michael's sister Hope who graciously offered to meet us halfway and bring Michael the rest of the way home. I had no brains on Saturday morning and only packed for two days so Hope brought me a bag of stuff to get me through the next couple of days and a cute stuffed Tigger for Wyatt.
I made it back in time for his 8pm feeding and then stayed until 10:15pm snuggling my baby boy. There is a curfew at the Hospitality House so I have to be in by 10:30 every night. I came back here to the room and uploaded pictures and finally fell asleep around midnight.

Sweet Saturday

This day, January 5th 2008 will go down in the history books as one of the pinnacle moments in my life. This is the day my world was changed, screw the sun...my universe revolves around Wyatt Maxwell.
We got to the hospital around 10:20am and we were too dang early. Yes you read that right...we were EARLY! Michael made me wait until 11am to call the social worker to find out where she was. At 11am on the dot I ran outside to call her and she was in the parking lot coming toward the building. We had a few minutes of hugs and hellos and the obligatory paperwork and then we were on our way up to the nursery.
We walked in just in time for his noon feeding. The nurses and Dr. Knight (pediatrician) welcomed us warmly and introduced us to our baby boy. I held him and Michael pulled out his camera and started taking video of our first moments together. I looked at Michael and asked him if this was a Riley Owen or Wyatt Maxwell and we immediately agreed he was Wyatt Maxwell.
Dr. Knight gave us a thorough run down of Wyatt's medical status and we found that everyone there had been taking such good care of him in his first week. He was and still is well loved by all of those amazing NICU nurses who have watched over him since the minute he was born. He eats like a champ and keeps everything down, he burps easily and goes back to sleep...everything the smartest and cutest baby in the world is supposed to do!
Now I know you are all wondering why he's still here and in the NICU. There are a few issues medically and legally that just needed time to work out. He is wonderfully healthy and happy so be assured that there is nothing to worry about with him.

Frantic Friday

So the decision was made, but HOLY CRAP NOW WHAT??!?!?!?
I still don't have a clue how I held it together to actually work on Friday, but I tried my best to clear everything outstanding so as not to leave everyone in too big of a bind. I started out the day by bringing in a blue and white cake with "It's a Boy" written on it. Only a handful of people at the office knew what was happening on Thursday so it was fun to surprise everyone like that on Friday.
Since we've been anticipating the wonderful day for so long, we happened to have most of the basics on hand. Michael was able to take off a half day on Friday to go home and clean up the Christmas decorations still scattered all over the baby's room and put everything up in the attic. When I was finished with work we met out at Babies R Us to purchase the car seat/travel system I've had my eye on and a few other quick necessities. Michael had previously made plans to have a guy movie night with some former co-workers so our friends Steve and Jessica and baby Jayca came out to Hamburg to meet us for dinner. The boys headed off to their movie and us girls went shopping! We found the coming home outfit and bought a few blankets and bibs.
Michael's sister Hope had come down to watch Jack (our dog) for the weekend so she was there waiting for us. And Michael's friend Javi had met the guys at the movies so he helped us put together the stroller and install the car seat. Hope helped me get everything ready to throw in the laundry and we all went to bed, anxious for the next sunrise.

From the Beginning...

Oh geez, where do I begin?
Thursday January 3rd I got a call from the social workers at CSSB (catholic social services) and they started giving me details about a little boy to see if we wanted to be considered for his case. Well I was calm and cool at first because I had just emailed them the day before and I figured they were just calling me up to give me an update about if we'd been shown lately and so on. So very quickly I realize this might be the real thing so I start shaking. I had to call Michael but he was slammed at work and could barely get a free moment to talk to me. We ended up deciding to order pizza for dinner and have a serious discussion. By the time we were both home, before that Pizza Hut box was set down on the counter, we both knew we wanted to go for it. We called the social worker at home and she gave us the specifics of where he was and how we could get to him. We decided to meet her up here in Ashland on Saturday morning.