Catching up

I'll cut right to the chase.

How come no one ever told me how hard this newborn phase would be???  Maybe no one wanted to be the Debbie Downer, but jeez... Steven and I have had a big wake up call in the "we're now parents" department.  Even though we thought we had it all figured out (who were we kidding?!?!), we naively thought it would be an easy transition into newborn land filled with only cuddles, smiles and happy times.

And while we love our new life, it hasn't come easy.

Breast feeding hurts.  (Why do all the breast feeding books have a well-rested, pretty woman smiling with a perfect baby lying in her lap?  False advertising! I gritted my teeth and curled my toes in pain every time William ate for the first 2 weeks.)

I've been an emotional wreck.  (I cried almost every day in the beginning.  And when Steven would ask me what was wrong, sometimes I didn't even know!  I'm tired?  I'm in love with our baby?  I don't know what I'm doing?  Take your pick.)

My confidence has been shot.  (I've never doubted myself more than I have since becoming a mother.  I've spent countless hours skimming through as many baby books as I can get my hands on hoping they could tell me how to be a good mommy.  Turns out every one has a different opinion on everything, which just stressed me out more.  Insert more crying here.)

A night's sleep has turned into many cat naps throughout the day.  (It's a good thing I can sleep anywhere at anytime!)

My type A personality is hating the chaos, like big time.  (Who knew that babies were so unpredictable and that I wouldn't be able to control everything?!?  Ha!  The more I want or try to manipulate William to follow my schedule, the more it doesn't work.  Obviously.)

If I change out of my pajamas, shower and eat breakfast/lunch/dinner, it's been a successful day.  (Productivity?  What's that?)

Sigh :)

Now with the ugly truth out of the way, I will say that it has gotten easier.  Phew!  With William being 5 weeks tomorrow, I look back with pride at all the progress we've made in such a short time.  We're getting to know our little guy much better and he's starting to adjust to this big world too.  All in all, we're taking it one day at a time while trying to laugh at ourselves through the ups and downs.  What a crazy hard, but oh so good adventure we're on!

In attempt to catch up on the past 5 weeks... here's some of our favorite photos of our William T.  Enjoy!

 Ok, so not the most flattering pic of William (can you say frog??), but I wanted to make sure and document just how little and skinny he started out!  By the way this kid eats, he'll be chunky in no time!

 "Ama's" first time seeing and holding William!!!  A blessing that came out of William's pre-delivery complications is that my mom decided to fly out and help us.  SOOOOO thankful she was here with us for two weeks!  I seriously don't know what we would've done without her!

 4 days old and ready to eat some thanksgiving goodness! :)

 I woke up to this one morning... melts my heart.

Woke up to this the next morning. ha!  (And NO, Steven's not breast feeding!)

William used to have a hard time going back to sleep after his early morning feeding, so my mom or Steven used to take him so I could get some rest.  When I would wake up, I usually found one of them asleep with William.  So cute.

See?  :)

 1 week old!

 Power to the people!

 Snug as a bug :)

Such long limbs... just like his daddy!

 

 What happens when you're born overseas?  You have to take passport pictures at 2 weeks old!

 

William loves his swing!  One night William wouldn't stop crying, so out of desperation we decided to take him downstairs and put him in his swing.  As soon as he started rocking, he was silent and went right to sleep.  So as any new, sleep-deprived parent would do, we set up camp on the couch. And as we drifted off to sleep Steven murmured, "God bless the swing."  :)

 

All strapped in and ready to go for his first stroller ride!

Happy dreaming in never never land!

 

Lookin all cute by the Christmas tree

 Well, it was Stevens birthday a couple of days ago and since I didn't have time to go out and get him something, I asked Pawn to come over to babysit William so we could go to dinner!  I love that his first babysitter was Pawn.  She loves him so much and takes such good care of him!

 

 We even took our moped.  Something we haven't done since I entered my 3rd trimester!

 Enjoying our couple of hours of freedom! (Even though I was checking my phone every 10 minutes!)

 Daddy has started giving William a bottle for his late night feeding.  And boy, he sucks it down fast... which usually results in a projectile vomit all over daddy.  It's a good bonding time for them :)
We love this picture.  It's like he's chanting, "MORE! MORE! MOOOORE!"
 

 Havin a drink while watching the ILLINI with daddy.  Does it get any better??

 Just enjoying some tummy time :)