Stella comes home

The day before Jack was born, we dropped Stella off with Jaime and Joe (Stella's breeders) for a week and a half. We're grateful to Jaime and Joe for taking care of Stella and the love they give her. With Stella having a good time with them and their young family, we were able to focus on the hospital stay and acclimate to the first days with Jack once we returned home.

We picked Stella up this past weekend and introduced her to Jack for the first time. English Bulldogs as a breed are very good with children and Stella was indeed very curious to sniff and smell Jack. She showed a healthy curiosity about the baby but never seemed scared, threatened, or overly jealous by him. We were especially concerned that she would feel distressed if the baby started crying, but she seems to handle it all very well.

As our friend, Renea, explained - we want to make sure that Stella continues to feel part of "the pack". We continued to crate Stella in our room at bedtime and she doesn't seem disturbed by the baby crying and all the commotion at feeding time.

Now both of our babies are home and the family is complete - we're off to a great start!

Here's a short video of Stella meeting Jack (if the video doesn't play and you are at work then try playing it at home, your company may block video):



CLICK HERE for some pictures of Stella meeting Jack.

New Baby Essentials for iPhone-toting Parents

Here's a few products that we've found to be essential during the first 10 days as new (iPhone-toting) parents:

PIXELPIPE http://pixelpipe.com/

You always have your iPhone with you, but you probably don't always have that fancy digital SLR with you (or the time later to download the pics from your camera and then upload them again separately to your blog, Facebook, KodakGallery, etc.) And you're finding that every moment is a Kodak moment.

Pixelpipe is a great iPhone app that allows you to take pics with your iPhone and instantly and SIMULTANEOUSLY upload them (with captions and bylines) to your blog, your email, and/or 60+ different social networks and photo sharing sites.

Instant gratification.

Download from the App store on your iPhone.

BREASTFEEDING/NURSING LOG http://www.andesigned.net/

This iPhone app is an invaluable tool for Mom and worth the 8 bucks to download. With just a click to Start and a click to End, this app resultingly tracks the length of each of your nursing sessions, the start/end time, which side you nursed on, and logs the total number of times and hours/minutes per day, and more. You can add and edit entries manually. The app keeps track of formula and ounces as well. And the info can be exported to an Excel spread too for sharing with your doctor or lactation consultant.

They also make a similar app (for 2 bucks) to track Diaper changes.

Download from the App store on your iPhone.

ETRE TOUCHY GLOVES http://www.etretouchy.com/

Best invention ever for iPhone users in cooler climates like Northern CA and the Pacific NW. These gloves look like regular knitted gloves - for 3 fingers. But they are fingerless on the iPhone-critical thumb and index fingertips so they give you the freedom to touch, tap, stroke, slide and pinch.

Great for those Kodak moments when you're out and about. No fumbling to get gloves on and off at the risk of losing that perfect shot.

Eyes wide open

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Blissed out

Typical Jack after a feeding

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Week 1 Recap

It has been 1 week since Jack was born - and what a week it has been! Here's a quick recap of what's gone down over the last week:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY FESTIVITIES ON HOLD - TWICE

• The c-section was scheduled for Thursday 02-19-09 @ 10am. Mindy almost had her confidence up and ready for an 8am arrival at the hospital, but then we received a call notifying us that an emergency c-section was ahead of us and to plan to come in at 11am. We arrived at 11am, were shown to our room, but were again bumped by other emergencies. This time, it was undetermined when the surgery would begin. Mindy and Tom were joined by Mary, a first year medical student that Mindy was paired with several weeks ago in a voluntary UCSF teaching program that pairs medical students with patients. After several hours, it was finally our turn and the time had arrived when the O.R. was free and prepped for us, so Mindy was setup with an IV, downed some medication to quell stomach acids, and walked to the O.R. where the spinal block (that would numb her from the chest down) was placed in her lower back and other final preparations were made for surgery. Tom was allowed to join her at this time. (PICTURE AT LEFT: Tom and Mindy just before Mindy is walked to the O.R.)

SURGERY AND THE SHINING

The surgery lasted just under an hour and Mindy was awake throughout. The surgery was frightening, but the staff was comforting and Tom stayed next to Mindy for support. There was no pain, but there was uncomfortable and intense pulling, tugging, pressure, and waves of nausea. At one point well after the surgery, Tom and Mary commented that there was blood and fluid creeping its way along the floor and past the nurses hole-y Crocs a la the old horror movie "The Shining", and squirted onto and past the staff onto the ceiling. Mindy didn't notice a thing. Ask Tom for more gory details if you dare. (PICTURE AT LEFT: Tom and Mindy just before surgery)

THE MOMENT JACK IS BORN

Mindy heard Jack cry and quickly looked up to Tom who was looking at her and simultaneously choked up at the joy of that moment. It was 5:07pm.


CLICK HERE for more pictures in the O.R., of Tom cutting the umbilical cord, and Jack's first moments on the outside. Thanks to Mary for taking these amazing pictures!



JACK'S VITALS

Jackson Bradford Blossom
Thursday 02-19-09
5:07pm PT
7 lbs 13 oz
19 1/4 inches

Jack was slightly jaundiced at birth which was monitored but does not need to be treated. It will regress with regular feeding.

Full head of hair, the softest baby fuzz ever on body.

Jack lost 10.2% of his body weight over the course of his first 3 days while Mindy's breast milk came in. This was slightly more than they would like to see, so Jack was fed some formula overnight to help boost his weight and then Mindy was instructed to pump extra milk reserves for a couple of days to supplement his current feedings.

JACK'S FIRST VISITORS

Tom's cousins in Sacramento were the first to visit Jack.

CLICK HERE for more pictures of Jack with his cousins Alie (pictured at left), Riley, Kerrie, and Kevin.







(ALMOST NOT) GOING HOME

Tom stayed with Mindy in the hospital for the 4 night stay until she was released on Monday afternoon, 02-23-09. By law, you cannot bring your baby home unless you have a carseat. No problem. Of course, being responsible and prepared pre-parents, we bought the seat several weeks beforehand and installed it in the car as soon as we drove it off the lot. Carseat - done, check it off the list. However, what we neglected to do is a trial run with the seat itself and all those damn straps that hold baby in tightly to the seat itself. We spent a half hour in the hospital room, with the instruction booklet and Jack between us, trying to figure out how to adjust all those straps and clips so we could actually get Jack in the thing and leave the hospital. We finally gave in and asked one of the many nurses who dropped by the room to help us out. Yippee, NOW we can go home!


HOMECOMING

MONDAY. ONE WORD - DOULA. When we arrived home that late afternoon, we had some uninterrupted time to enjoy Jack away from the constant barrage of nurses and doctors and admin staff at the hospital. That night, our postpartum doula, Julia, joined us for the first night of her 2 week stay with us. Julia is proving to be invaluable for the lactation expertise/advice she has given us and the comfort she has provided Tom, Mindy, and Jack during the transition period before relatives come for the next month. She arrives around 10pm and leaves at 6am, every other night. During that time, she oversees breastfeeding and ensures Mindy is comfortable (with a c-section, this is invaluable itself!), makes sure Mindy has adequate water and food as wanted, brings Mindy her pain medication in the middle of the night, helps with the pumping schedule by managing the pump and sterilizing the equipment, changes Jack's diapers, and performs light housekeeping. These simple acts allow us to actually get some deep sleep for an hour or two vs. the light sleep you have when you have one ear open for every burp and movement of the baby.

CLICK HERE to find out more about what postpartum doulas do.

WEDNESDAY. FIRST PEDIATRICIAN'S APPOINTMENT. Jack had his first pediatrician's appointment on Wednesday 02-25-09. We love our new baby doc and ours is the first "Jackson" in his practice. Jack gained 2 oz since Monday which is great and everything else checked out happily and healthily.

LOOKING FORWARD TO THE WEEKEND:

• STELLA COMES HOME. Stella's breeders graciously took Stella home with them for a week and a half while we get acclimated. Stella loves it with Jaime and Joe because she gets to go "home" to her Mom and play with their other bulldog pups and young family. There is no better place for Stella to be if she cannot be with us. We miss our other baby terribly and cannot wait for Stella to meet her new baby brother on Saturday.

• OPEN HOUSE TO MEET JACK. We are holding an open house this Sunday from 12-3 for friends to drop by and meet Jack. Hope we don't have to breastfeed him for 2 of those hours ;)

Jack's first walk

In front of the Mission

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Jack's first walk

He likes to be snuggly

Posted via Pixelpipe.

sleepy time

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Jack's First Movie

baby security tag

Posted via Pixelpipe.

Jackson Bradford Blossom

As you can see from the photos Jackson Bradford Blossom (Jack) entered the world Feb. 19th. The exact time of delivery was 5:07pm PT. Jack weighed in at 7 lbs 13 oz.

Mindy, Jack and Tom are doing great. More photos to come.

Other patient emergencies

We are prepped and ready to go but other patient emergencies are taking up the ORs.

Looks like it will be a few more hours.

Slight delay

The hospital called this morning and re-scheduled Mindy for 1pm PT (instead of 10am PT). We'll have to wait a couple of extra hours to meet baby Blossom.

It is a beautiful day in San Francisco.

Suburbia meets Dolores St.

Dolores St., please meet your new neighbor, the 2005 Volvo V70 2.5 Turbo wagon.

If we were having an identity crisis over the transition from being young(ish) urban professional Mission (pseudo) hipsters to Mommy-and-Me, then getting a Volvo station wagon would have been a tipping point.

But thankfully, we know what we are. We're young(ish) urban professional Mission (pseudo) hipsters with a heaping helping of practicality and unapologetic conformism when it makes sense. So, we have proudly embraced bringing a little bit of surburbia to Dolores St. with the addition of our Volvo wagon.

It's quite an upgrade from our former utilitarian (albeit beloved, easy to zip around, and park) Toyota Tercel with its automatic transmission (yippee, especially after 8 years with a standard on those SF hills!), 4 vs. 2 doors, the usual Volvo safety and luxury appointments, and a big back that comfortably seats both Stella and stuff.

Viva la Volvo!