Two weeks

Well it's been two weeks now since the arrival of our little girl, and things have settled into a routine now. Our friends and family have been a tremendous help, mostly by bringing dinner. Everyone has also been great about helping us keep G aware that he is still important and making sure he gets plenty of attention. I will also give a special thank you to Tammy's parents, for watching Gideon when we were in the hospital, and to her mom, who has been over to help out most days since I've gone back to work.

The baby has a wonderful temperament. She's very calm most of the time, unless she's hungry or being changed. On that topic, I'd like to state that we can't seem to change her without her peeing while we're doing so. Everyone always says to watch out for boys peeing on you when you are changing them, but with G he went mid-change maybe 3 or 4 times. S has peed about 3/4 of the times we change her. I suppose the warning then may really be that boys can hit you with it... :)
Anyway, we've found our basic sleeping routine now, which is the same routine we used when we had G, which is basically that I take watch until about 1am and she has 1 to 6. I suspect this will vary over time with my part increasing, but since she is nursing, that middle shift still requires Tammy's involvement.
Tammy is looking great and up and about quite a bit. Her main limitation now is for lifting things. I think we're doing really well with all of the changes this time. It certainly helps to have some idea of what to expect, and experience to guide how we handle it.
Since I expect this blog will someday become a book that both kids will read, I'll add some advice here: when you do have children, share the load. It can be very tough waking up in the night and doing your turn at feeding/burping/changing/rocking,and you may think, maybe if I let them cry, my partner will get up and do it... Never do this. If you are very exhausted or sick, ask for a night off, or swap shifts. Maybe offer to watch them so the other can nap during the next day or something. Just be sure you plan it out. Sleep loss is a heavy hitter, and if one of you falls too far behind on it, you both will suffer frustration, anxiety, and irritation.
So, we're doing well, getting as much sleep as we can. Now here are some pictures of our first weeks as a family of four.

Just as she arrived:



We got this of G being a big brother at the hospital:



Here's Daddy's favorite pic of her at the hospital:




Here's Mommy ready to go home:




A little face she made:



And here's my happy family all cuddled together:



Anyway, I'd say we're off to a great start.

Here at last

Meet Sylvia Barbara Dalton born September 2. She weighed 8lbs 3oz and is 20 inches long.

Almost time....

We are right at the 12 hour mark before baby Sylvie graces us with her presence. I decided to spend as much time with G today as possible and to finish up a couple of last minute things and at this point everything is almost done. I decided to go ahead and work tonight to keep busy and hoping that would help time fly and truthfully it has.

Thank you everyone for all the calls and text messages, I feel extremely loved and it has helped calm my nerves.

We have been talking about baby Sylvie for the past couple of months with G and I think yesterday he had enough of the talk, when we got up in the morning he said "lets go to the hospital and get Sylvie" I think someone else is ready to see this girl too.

So as of tomorrow we will be a family of four.

I like how that sounds.