Not sure how much he weighs or how long he is since he doesn't have a check-up until two months, but he sure is growing. He's filling out his 0-3 month size clothing pretty well, with just a little room left to grow, and seems to fill up a couch cushion pretty well too.
We don't normally dress him like a convict.
He hasn't settled into a predictable routine yet, but most nights he goes right back to sleep after feedings, so we are getting okay sleep. Most nights.
Ellie is still pretty delighted with him, excited just to be in the same room with him most of the time, though she often insists on holding him and will try to pull him right onto her lap with or without our help. She also likes to give him high-fives when his hand is poking out and "pat-pat" his back (we have to burp her to occasionally too lately).
Sometimes it's hard to tell who babies look like. Charlie seems to be a pretty good mix. If anything, he reminds us of Ellie as a baby. But most of the time he just looks like Charlie. I have discovered my contribution, though. Charlie's hair frizzes after we wash it.
This is what he thought of me setting him down after his bath to try and get a picture of this.
Here is a close-up after he calmed down. You can see the frizz a little bit, though the lighting is pretty bad.
Ellie's hair does this after we wash it.
So there is a bit of me in these kids.
And here is Ellie dancing with Daddy to Nat King Cole's "A Christmas Song" before bed. We're all getting excited for Christmas around here!
Since having kids I have decided that grandparents are the best idea ever. Ellie heartily agrees with me. And Charlie hasn't come right out and said as much, but I think he likes the idea too. He has gotten some good grandparent time in his short life so far.
My mom could put Mary Poppins to shame with all her babying skills and help.
My dad can't resist a turn to hold Charlie. One night before dinner he was holding Charlie and kind of bouncing him, trying to get him to stop fussing a bit. Ellie, who was playing under the kitchen table at the time, was watching and said, "Grandpa's dancing!" She hurried out from under the table to join in, spinning and goose-stepping. She's quite the little tag-along to her grandparents.
Brady's parents surprised us with a visit during Thanksgiving weekend. They were in the neighborhood, if you consider only a six-hour drive to be "in the neighborhood." I may be partial, but I think that a new baby Charlie is pretty hard for any grandparent to resist. It was really nice of them to make the sacrifice to come all that way to see us (well, let's be honest, Ellie and Charlie) for such a short visit.
Before they left, they gave us a fun bag of gifts to open, starting on Dec. 1. Each day for the first 12 days of the month was a fun gift to get us into the holiday spirit. The first day was a couple of advent calendars with a chocolate for each day. Ellie never fails to remind us about the "chocolate calendars."
Some of the other days included:
Some Christmas crafts to decorate. Ellie was really excited about the "pon-pons" and started ordering the sequins around like they were people ("guys, you go over here . . . c'mon guys, over here . . . on this one, guys . . .")
Cookie cutters and play dough. For some reason Ellie is convinced that the candy cane is a letter 'r.'
A Santa decoration. When Ellie first saw this, she kept introducing herself to it ("Name is Ellie, name is Ellie . . ."). Meanwhile, when we went to take her to actually sit on Santa's lap, she played mute the whole time. Go figure.
And a Santa Pez dispenser. This quickly became one of her "guys." She spent a good hour showing him the Christmas tree, making him climb the tree, ride the rocking horse ornament, etc. She was pretty excited later when we showed her that there was candy involved.
There were also ornaments, books (which Ellie loves reading at bedtime now), a plate for leaving out Santa's cookies (Ellie pretends to eat and feed me cookies from this regularly), and other fun things. We have had a lot of fun looking forward to the presents every day. Plus, there's still Ellie's favorite, the chocolate calendar. Today Ellie and I made a thank you card for all the fun presents. Just in case it doesn't arrive as the artist intended it (some of the sequins have already been pulled off by a toddler who will remain nameless--we didn't even try for pom-poms), here is a picture of it. Thanks again for all the fun!
I'm a little late on a Thanksgiving post here, but we've had a lot going on. We've had a lot to be thankful for this year, most especially family. We had a great holiday visiting with family, and lots of help from aunts, uncles, cousins, and especially grandparents with our two little ones. Here are some pictures my sister took of both kids on Thanksgiving day.
Charlie is nine days old here.
He sleeps for what seems like 90% of the time. It's a rather restless sleep during the day, so he wants to be held a lot, but it's still sleep. Probably just so much work for how fast he's growing.
And he has been growing so fast. You can almost just sit and watch him grow. At his two-week check-up last week, all his measurements were in the 75th percentile. The doctor explained that means that out of 100 babies, he would be bigger than 75 of them. What surprised me was that there would be 25 babies out of 100 bigger than him. He is getting so big!
I guess that means I better get on the ball and take more pictures before he completely outgrows his newborn phase.
This is his funny old man look.
Ellie basked in all the extra attention of extended family. On Thanksgiving my family was so nice to take her to the Festival of Trees. She has been pretty excited about Christmas trees ever since she got to help Grandma put one up and then decorate it. She learned from They Might Be Giants that they are conifer trees and often requests to go look at the conifer tree and turn on the lights. So a whole conference center full of conifer trees was pretty exciting.
This picture is blurry, but it really captures her excitement.
A more thoughtful analysis of the Sesame Street trees.
Working on some crafts in Santa's workshop.
Sticker art.
A treat from Santa (which apparently Ellie stopped in her tracks to eat on the spot). (Incidentally, Ellie picked out her own clothes that day. It's the outfit I'd like to think she'd wear if she ever got to be a guest star on "The Cosby Show.")
Meeting Santa's reindeer.
And, of course, climbing Santa's workshop.
All in all, a pretty good trip. Thanks to all our family for the help and support and making it a great holiday, even while I was out of commission.
Introducing young Charles Bradford. He's "Charlie" to us. (Otherwise it kind of sounds like we should say "Sir" before his name and he should start talking with a British accent.) Note the chubby cheeks already. That was one of the first things I noticed about him when they held him up to me.
He was born at 8:09 a.m. on Nov. 15 (Daddy's birthday). As you can see, tipping the scales at a whopping 9 pounds, 4 ounces. He was 20.5 inches long, head 14.75 inches around. Turns out the C-section was wise for many reasons. For comparison, Ellie was 7 pounds, 10 ounces and 18.25 inches. So he's starting at Ellie's 6-week weight.
Getting acquainted with Charlie after the surgery. Things went really well with the C-section and I am having a slow-but-steady recovery. Even though things were very different than Ellie's birth, being in a hospital instead of a birth center, having surgery instead of delivering naturally, we still had a really good experience. We went in calm, knowing what to expect, prepared for him to come, and yet still had that laughing/crying-at-the-same-time euphoric moment when we heard his first cry, as if it were a total surprise that there was a baby at the end of all this.
Still in recovery. Brady said I was a bit loopy. And, as you can see, still quite swollen all over in my hands, arms, and face. It's slowly going down and I got to comfortably wear socks over my swollen feet for the first time today.
We got lots of visits from Ellie in the hospital. Here is a video of her meeting Charlie for the first time:
I wasn't sure how she would take it. For so long "Baby Charlie" was this growing mound in Mommy's tummy. She would come up and press her mouth into my stomach and say a muffled "Hi, Baby Charlie!" We thought she might be getting the concept until one day she did the same thing into Brady's shoulder. She seems to have overcome the transition from abstract to reality pretty well.
She's pretty enamored with him. (She's also finally learning to pose for the camera and say, "Cheese!" which has led to some pretty cheesy smiles.)
Here Ellie is introducing Charlie to her beloved "Schnappie" cartoon, among others.
She loves getting to hold him. Every time she does lately, she has this sort of nervous giggle the whole time, especially when he wiggles.
All dressed up to go home. We were actually grateful for the time in the hospital to recover and adjust to this new little guy. He is pretty mellow most of the time and eats like a champ. It has been such a different experience than all the struggles we had getting Ellie to eat, and then all the difficulties she had once she did start eating. It's one of the best things in the world to watch him eat and eat and swallow like it's no big deal. And then he burps and eats some more and it's so easy. And then we can just set him down after. No big deal. And we wonder, is this what it's like for other people when they have babies, or are we just playing house here? I felt bad always comparing him to Ellie that way, but Brady pointed out that Charlie was difficult on the inside, Ellie was difficult on the outside, so I guess they both have had their easy and difficult moments.
Charlie with Father of the Year. I realize there are a lot of good dads out there, but I think this past week Brady has taken the cake. He has done more than his fair share of taking care of this kid, sending me off to sleep more so I can hopefully recover faster. And he manages to take Ellie out now and then too.
Ellie is still adjusting to her new life with Charlie. She absolutely adores him and is great with him. It's the rest of us she doesn't always have patience with. Grandma and Grandpa have been saints, putting up with some pretty good tantrums that come with the age, the adjustment, and the budding two-year molars, and putting up with her non-stop chatter the rest of the time. If she is awake, she is talking.
The first day we got home with Charlie, we got him all bundled up and settled into his little bed. Ellie came in the room and peered over the side. She kept patting him tummy while he slept, saying, "Baby Charlie sleepin'. Night-night, Charlie. Sleep tight . . . bed-bugs bite . . . love you . . ." Whenever she sees him, whether he's crying or not, she will try to pat him and say, "It's okay, Baby Charlie, it's okay." And several times a day she wants to, "Go hi to Charlie," (go say hi to Charlie). So she is becoming a good little mother hen. The question is if Charlie will be able to keep up with her, or ever get a word in edgewise.
Stretching out and yawning after a bath, which he didn't love. Ellie wanted to get him some boats to play with, but I told her I didn't think that would help yet.
Now a quick story about his name. After giving Ellie a name that had so much significance to us, we wanted to give this baby a name that would be meaningful to him and us as well. So we decided we would also give him a family name. Technically, he is named after Brady's grandpa, John, who went by Jack, whose nickname was Charlie. It was a few years after we were married before I knew that these were all the same person. The story, as I heard it, is that years ago someone left a mug (or something) with the name "Charlie" on it at Brady's grandpa's house. When his kids were young and would ask him for something, he would tease them and say, "Oh, I'm not your dad. I'm your Uncle Charlie." (Some of you might recognize the beginnings of Brady's teasing humor.) The name stuck as kind of a joke, I guess. Brady grew up knowing him as "Grandpa Charlie." So Charlie is named after his Great-Grandpa Charlie (or John, or Jack). Technically we could have had three sons named after him, but we're pretty happy with the boy we have now!
T minus 12 hours and counting. I've been counting in hours since yesterday around 4:00 p.m. I swear Saturday had about 40 hours in it. This has been the longest week. Ever.
Lately Ellie loves to help Grandpa stretch after a workout. She will sometimes drag me or Brady over by the treadmill and insist we get down on the floor with her to stretch. As I am facing the final hours of pregnancy, I am allowing myself to indulge in thinking of all the things that I can look forward to once I am no longer pregnant. Being able to get down on the floor to play with Ellie again is one of them. Seeing my ankle bones again after all the swelling goes away is another. And maybe eventually doing a little exercise and stretching.
Several weeks ago the doctor determined that I was going to need a C-section to deliver this baby. When it came to scheduling we found that hospital policy would not allow us to schedule any earlier than Nov. 15--Brady's birthday. We had hoped to go for a nice 11-11-11, but I wouldn't have been 39 weeks along yet, so it was a no go. At the time I had asked Brady if he wanted me to wait until the 16th, since we couldn't go earlier, but he said it would be just as well to share a birthday as to have them back to back. A couple months ago, one extra day didn't seem that big of a deal. (Eight months ago I would have paid someone to put me into a coma until this week, but that wasn't an option.) This afternoon as I dosed out another round of nausea and headache medicine, I thought of grateful I am that he is willing to share his birthday and not make me go through an extra day of this difficult pregnancy. Nov. 16th seems a million years away.
Saturday we had what will likely be Brady's last solo birthday party for a while. (This picture is actually one my sister took at Ellie's family party, but I couldn't resist stealing it and I forgot to take any that night and this is about what it looked like.) He spent most of the party making amazing pizza for everyone else. He's been a pretty good trooper through this pregnancy, taking on more than his share of parenting duties, keeping me supplied in whatever comfort food seemed to help at the time, and putting up with my general misery. The end of this pregnancy will likely be the best present he could get this year. Hopefully in the midst of all the exciting events tomorrow he will get a nice break too and maybe even a little birthday nap. Happy birthday, Brady! Just 11 hours and 45 minutes to go!
As I have been trying to get organized and all nested for this new baby, I have noticed a trend in the baby paraphernalia we have collected for this kid. I started it by selected the fabric for his baby quilt and the ball I made for him, but there is definitely a lot of monkey-themed baby boy clothes out there. You'd think this kid was going to be born with a tail.
I remember when Brady's brother Sam was about five years old he confided in me that he wished he could have a monkey tail. His reasoning: "'Cause then I could go pewm!"( he made a sort of high-pitched, laser-like sound as he swung his hips back and to the right) "and pick that up over there, and then--pewm!" (he made the same motion to the left) "and pick that up over there . . ." He continued to demonstrate the longed-for tail's abilities, swinging his hips back and forth up the length of the kitchen, and I had to agree that a monkey tail might have its advantages.
One night while we were living in Knoxville I heard a song that brought the utility of monkeys into question, though. We had stopped at a store to pick up just a couple of items. Being very pregnant with Ellie at the time, I opted to wait in the car while Brady ran into the store real quick. The radio was on a station that we had really liked; they played a lot of local bands and live music. I was only sort of half-listening when I became aware of this chorus repeating:
One monkey don't stop no show, yeah, one monkey don't stop no show, mmm-hmm, one monkey don't stop no show . . . So get on board!
[Sidenote: I have no idea who was singing this song at the time. I looked online later and found the song has been sung and recorded by a number of famous singers, Dolly Parton among them. If you ever go to or live in East Tennessee, you will learn that Dolly Parton is the embodiment of all things good and right in the world, and therefore lends credence to anything she touches.]
By the time Brady got back, the song had ended, so I had to reenact the lively chorus for him. As we laughed over the song, the question arose in my mind that if one monkey doesn't stop the show, just exactly how many monkeys does it take to stop the show? At what point do you put your foot down and say, "No. No. That is too many monkeys. I will not get on board"? I have a sneaking suspicion we are going to find the answer to that question in the next week or so . . .
Brady ran another half marathon yesterday, along with my brother and one of my sisters. Working on my own slow-but-steady race, I was not quite the cheerleader I was last time. We only had about six or so days of Autumn this year, so by yesterday at the start of race time, it was only 25 degrees outside. Instead of going to wait for him at the finish line and take pictures, I wished him luck and went back to bed. I'm pretty sure this is what he looked like at the finish line, though:
He finished with roughly the same time as his last race, but the course and weather were much tougher this time, so actually that means his performance improved quite a bit. Way to go Brady!
