History of the J Man

Nana and Papa got Jonah goggles a few weeks ago for his big boy swimming class and he loves them! Here are some photos Dena took when she was over one night of Jonah in his pj’s and goggles.

A goggles and “swimming” video to go with the photos above…

Couch Swimming from Julie Diehl on Vimeo.

A quick post to share a couple cute photos from the last few days.  The first is one Chris took of Elliott on the couch, I think it turned out well so I’m posting it. We have a very similar one of Jonah when he was this age on our red couch too.

The next is from this morning.  It’s a photo of both boys in our bed.  It’s become the tradition this week for Jonah to jump in bed with Elliott and I when we wakes up.  That gives me some extra time to nurse and even get a shower in hopefully while Elliott goes back to sleep and Jonah watches a movie, this week it’s been Princess and the Frog.

This last one is also from today.  From the walk Elliott and I took to order Jonah’s birthday cake.  It was a hard angle for me to get since E was in the Moby wrap on my chest but he looked so cute in that new hat.

Here we are at the end of Day 2 in the life of E.C. Diehl, and things are still going quite well.  We decided to take Little E out to Nana and Papa’s house, as well as a trip to Babies R Us and Jimmy Johns for lunch.  We concluded things with a stop at Starbucks.  A few people recognized that we were carrying around a newborn, and a couple even asked how old he was.  It was a little odd to respond, “One day.”  Had we delivered at Prentice, we would have probably still been at the hospital.  Score one for homebirth, I guess.

Elliott did a good job with being in the car, though he didn’t really like being strapped into his carseat.  The one we have right now seems a bit too big for him, so we might end up switching it out for our other, smaller seat that we used with Jonah.  We’ll see. 

He also had his first bath today, and predictably hated it.  Jonah did a nice job with helping out, but Elliott definitely wasn’t having any of bath time.  Once he got out and dry, he was OK though. 

Grandma and Grandpa Diehl came by pretty much as soon as he was out of his bath.  He was mostly asleep or half-asleep the whole time, so my Mom didn’t really get a chance to see his eyes, which she wanted to see.  There will be time enough for that, I suppose.

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Just got back from giving him 2 oz. of formula, changing a poopy diaper (still meconium) and changing his outfit because he peed all over me.  Good times.

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A few words about Jonah: He seems to be adapting OK, though he is definitely a little more manic when people come to visit.  Not sure if this is a call for attention or what, but he seems to slip into a higher gear for sheer entertainment purposes in order for people to notice him too.  Maybe it’s just my imagination.  Anyway, everyone who comes to visit pays a lot of attention to him, so I assume he’s not feeling too neglected.  Plus he’s cleaned up on big-brother gifts, so he’s pretty pleased with that.  My parents gave him a big milk truck that he’s now enamored with. 

One other note on Jonah — for a while he would say, “I not like you!” to me.  When I asked why not, he would say, “Me not know,” or “I don’t know.”  Sometimes it would be accompanied by him hitting me.  He also bit me last month.  Not sure where that came from or why he thought that, but fortunately it seems to have been a phase that he has now grown out of.  I think I also encouraged it by asking, “Do you love me?” to which he would respond, “No.”  For a little while, I would show people and they would sort of laugh, which probably encouraged the response.  I’ve avoided doing that lately and we seem to get along pretty good now.  Needless to say, I won’t be testing him there any time soon.

Julie: 

Looks like it’s time to officially change the name of this blog.  I’m thinking something like “History of the J Man and Little E”…

Jonah’s little brother was born early Monday morning, May 10, 2010 at 2:42 a.m.   I started feeling contractions around 10 p.m., after celebrating Mother’s Day with the family in Morton Grove then getting a crabby Jonah to bed once we got home.  Chris and I went to bed hoping to sleep through much of the beginning stages of labor.  Chris snored away without any trouble while I slept on and off for a bit, trying to relax through contractions and not wake up enough to even time them. 

Around 12:15 a.m., I woke Chris and asked him to get the phone so we could call our doula to ask her to come.  I thought contractions were about 8 minutes apart at that point.  I had plans to wait a little longer before calling the midwife but ended up calling her too around 12:45 a.m. or so.  The midwife got to our house around 1:40 a.m. and her assistant arrived a few minutes later.  At that point I had gotten up to soak in the bathtub while Chris started to set up the house for our homebirth.  There wasn’t a ton to set up but he had to put plastic down on the bed and on the floor and pull out some other things like towels for the delivery.

The midwife came and took my blood pressure while I sat in the tub and then left to get set up herself.  By the time she was ready I was also ready to get out of the tub.  It was sort of tricky getting out of the tub and walking back the length of the house to our bedroom but I made it. I crawled into bed, and Hillary checked me.  She said I was 9.5 centimeters and fully effaced so I could start to push any time I was ready.  That was much better news than when I got to triage with Jonah at the hospital and was barely at 5 centimeters.

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Chris:

From my position at the head of the bed, I didn’t have such a great view of what was going on, though I held Julie’s hand and massaged her head during the more intense periods.  As the contractions started to come more forcefully, I could tell Julie was in a lot of pain, but fortunately they didn’t seem to last very long (at least to me; I’m sure to Julie they felt interminably long). 

At some point I did happen to look down and see his head poking through down there, and I heard the midwife say, “He’s in the call” or something like that.  I wasn’t sure what she said, as another wave of pain coursed through Julie’s body.  It was only a few more pushes and the baby was out!  Julie had only pushed for about 15 minutes, which is a far cry from the two hours from when Jonah was born.  In fact, from the time I woke up (12:18 a.m.) to when he was born (2:52 a.m.), only about 2.5 hours had gone by.  When Jonah was born, it had been a 30 hour odyssey.  From when Julie had started to feel the first contractions to time of the birth, it had been just under five hours, or about the length of a Red Sox/Yankees playoff game.

Once the baby was born, Julie got him on her chest and after a couple of fitful false starts, he latched on and started chowing down.  He didn’t cry out right at first, but once Hillary moved him over to the bed to run through the standard battery of tests, he was really able to test out his lungs, and they were in fine working order.  We debated over whether he looked like Jonah and after consulting Jonah’s baby book, decided that he didn’t really look anything like his older brother. 

I also found out that what the midwife had said was that our new baby had been born “in the caul,” which simply means he was born without the amniotic sac having been broken:

To be “born in the caul” simply means a child is born with the amniotic sac or membrane still intact around the body. When a baby is born in the caul, the sac balloons out at birth, covering the baby’s face and body as it emerges from the mother. The baby is in no danger of drowning, as it is still being fed nutrients and oxygen through the umbilical cord, and will not take its first breath until the face emerges from the fluid contained in the caul. The caul is harmless and is easily removed by the doctor or midwife. (From Wikipedia)

According to the article, only about 1 birth in 1,000 result in a baby born in the caul, and most of those are premature births.  It explained why Julie’s water had never broken.  Apparently being born this way is quite auspicious, according to our midwife.  She told us how European cultures believed the caul, or baby membrane, was said to have powers to save people from drowning, and how they were richly prized by sailors. 

The baby’s vitals all checked out and as the midwives were starting to pack up, my cell phone rang: Our doula had arrived!  Of course, she had missed the birth, which was too bad, but in some ways, it was great that labor was so smooth (relatively speaking) that we were able to manage things on our own.  She was coming in from Bolingbrook and had taken her time because she didn’t want to get there too early, but never in my wildest imaginations did I think the whole affair would take under five hours.  I remember distinctly hoping that we would be done by noon the following day as I rolled out bed just after midnight.  As it turned out, we were all tucked into bed as the sun was coming up. 

Around 6:45 a.m. or so, Jonah wandered out of his room, and much to his surprise, he had a baby brother!  I still can’t believe that he slept through the whole thing, and Bianca also didn’t make a peep.  I don’t know if her instincts told her what was going on and to lay low, or she was just tired, but neither Jonah nor Bianca disturbed us at all.  We were all set to call Julie’s parents to take them back to Evanston and get them out of the way, but it was never necessary.

Before she left, our doula was nice enough to make us some pancakes which we thankfully ate together.  Jonah was very excited to hold his new brother and had fun touching his fingers, toes and hair.  It was nice to see him ask permission to touch the baby; hopefully his respectfulness will last!

It’s about 5 p.m. now and it’s still hard to believe what we’ve all experienced.  Our home now has four people in it (five, if we count the dog!).  It’s going to take some adjustments and definitely won’t be easy, but I think we’re all ready for the adventure.  We’d better be, because it’s coming at us whether we want it to or not.

Finally, we did decide on a name, only an hour ago or so: Elliott Cameron Diehl. 

Jonah had his first drop off play date this weekend.  He went next door to his friend Luca’s house for a few hours.  I was a little worried about how the drop off would go since in the past either Chris or I have always stayed with him at play dates but I shouldn’t have worried.  He literally walked into Luca’s house, took off his shoes and dove into the box of cars.  When I said, “bye” he was like, “yeah, bye” without even looking up. 

They had a great time playing at Luca’s house and then riding in the wagon to the park.  Here’s a photo of the two of them at the newly redone park in our neighborhood.  It was wonderful of Luca’s parents to take both boys out so Chris and I could get some other things accomplished child-free, at least for now (less than 1 week away from my due date!).

Below is a photo of Jonah and Luca at the park.

I have some unrelated photos from this month that are cute so I wanted to get them posted before Jonah’s little brother arrives.  Less than 2 weeks until my due date now.  My last day of work is May 7th so I’m hoping he doesn’t come early, I’d like to get that one last pay check in. 

This first photos is of Jonah and Chris decorating Easter eggs at our house.  I think Jonah’s fingers got almost as colorful as the eggs.

A post-bath photo of him in his new Ikea bath towel with a hood that actually fits over his head. He’s outgrown the other ones we have…

And this last photo is from the other night. He fell asleep with his baby doll and I thought it was really cute. He used to sleep with Elmo like this but lately he’d rather have cars or trains in bed with him. He keeps talking about his baby brother sleeping in his bed with him too. I told him in his room yes, but they will each have their own beds.

I also found him one night with a bunny rabbit toy stuffed into the belly of his shirt, he fell asleep that way. Maybe imitating how I look? I’m not sure what that one was about and didn’t take a photo.

Jonah is into singing lately. Here are short videos of him singing his current favorite songs.

Just in time for the Cub’s home opener next week it’s Take Me Out to the Ballgame:

Take Me Out to the Ballgame from Julie Diehl on Vimeo.

And his other favorite to sing is Itsy Bitsy Spider:

Itsy Bitsy Spider Song from Julie Diehl on Vimeo.

About 2 weeks ago Jonah started a big boy swim class.  He’s not 3 yet but he and Kate have been going to the baby swim class at the park district since he was about 6 months old and by last session the instructors thought he had gotten about all he could out of that class.  He suggested Jonah sign up for the next level even before his birthday.

This class is different in that Kate is NOT in the water with him.  He’s there with other big kids and a few instructors.  The kids take turns sitting on the wall or getting into the water with the teachers.  We weren’t sure how Jonah would like it but he did great.  No crying or anything.  He did most of what the instructors asked him to do and waved at Kate in the window as he swam by. 

Here are photos from today’s class, before getting into the water. 

This weekend Jonah gets to go swimming with mommy and daddy at the hotel.  We’re going back to the hotel where we got married to spend the night for our anniversary.  Jonah will come swimming with us that afternoon then Grandma and Grandpa are going to pick him up and take him for the night.  Should be fun for everyone.

A friend of mine was looking for new books for her 10 month old son so I created this list for her.  Her son is into animals and trucks so that was my theme here.  Those also happen many of our favorites too.  We’re getting more into longer stories and Dr. Seuss books these days but I thought I’d capture a list of what we’ve really liked up until 2.5 years old.  There are some obvious favorites missing like Good Night Moon, Bear Snores On and Runaway Bunny but most of the moms I know already have those. 

Perfect Pets – Bright Baby Touch and Feel

          There are others of these but this is my favorite.

Big Red Barn – Margaret Wise Brown

          Also one of my favorite bedtime books. 

Sheep in a Jeep – Nancy Shaw

The Going to Bed Book– Sandra Boynton

          Love the Sandra Boynton books but this and Horns to Toes are my favorites.

Tails – Matthew Van Fleet (also like Dogs by the same author)

          We’ve already done through 2 Dog books but these are both fun.

Little Blue Truck– Alice Schertle

          One of my favorites!  A fun story, Jonah can make the sounds and it has a good message.

Roadwork – Sally Sutton

          This is a clever truck book that I don’t mind reading.

How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night– Jane Yolan & Mark Teague

I like this series of Dinosaur books we have a few in the series. 

Move it! Builders– Mike Brownlow

(I’m feeling like we need to post some new photos here but first we have to take some!  With Passover and Easter coming up that shouldn’t be a problem, stay tuned.)

For now I want to post a quick potty traing update.  As of this morning Jonah has spent 2 dry nights, in a row, in underpants.  It was his idea the first night and the 2nd night I didn’t really give him the option.  I thought this would be a tricky transition becuase he’s always gotten so wet at night.  For about 2 years now we’ve been buying the super absorbent Huggies Overnights because regular day-time diapers would leak before he woke up.  Those were the only ones that worked.  Hopefully now they are no longer needed!  We’ll see, I know it’s early to proclaim success but he gets it during the day and during nap time so maybe this is just the 2nd step.  We cut out his drink before bed and I think that helps too.  Keep your fingers crossed….

Now - if anyone has ideas on how to get him to poop on the potty I’m all ears.  So far he still asks for a diaper when he has to do that.  We’ve tried promising him stickers or other rewards for sitting there or even for trying sometimes but so far those don’t seem to work.  He likes to do it in his diaper after our nanny leaves.  He asks for one, we put it on, he tells us to leave the room then comes walking out, legs spread when he’s done and says, “You change it,” pointing to Chris or I, whomever he deems worthy at that moment, usually me, lucky me.  I’m anxious to give up that duty and only have to buy one size of diapers at a time once his baby brother arrives.  If you have ideas, send them our way!