The first week

Well, as of 7:26am tomorrow morning, Jay will be 1 week old.

To be honest, this whole first week has been a bit of a blur!

Leaving off from my last post, Sunday night was our first night home with Jay and boy did it NOT go well.

Jay did not want to sleep in his bassinet AT ALL. It was a loooooong night as he was crying throughout most of the night and hubby and I would take turns holding him with hubby waking me up when Jay wanted fed. He's fine when he's held but he doesn't like be put down it seems. I think I ended up falling asleep with Jay curled up on my chest for a few hours.

Tummy Time with daddy

Monday my mom stopped by, having run out in the morning and early afternoon to find us some more newborn size clothes on sale, as we were originally expecting Jay to be on the bigger side rather than the smaller side and well... aside from the newborn sized stuff we were given at the baby shower, most of the clothes we have for Jay are 0-3months. She also bought us a box of newborn sized Pampers. She stuck around for a few hours in the afternoon until hubby got home from work around 7pm so I could get some stuff down around the apartment - with Jay being early, we didn't quite get all his stuff put together, not to mention we were so tired and exhausted Sunday that we didn't get a chance to put any of the stuff we took with us to the hospital away.

Also, my milk came in Monday evening... gotta say, Tuesday morning was another horrible morning as Jay cluster fed for a good 2 hours straight, meaning he was nursing non-stop, only stopping for a few minutes in between to poop, as it seemed my milk was going straight through him! Needless to say, my poor boobs were in pain!

Tuesday my mom stopped by again to drop off a D-battery so we could give Jay's bouncey seat a try. His activity mat also arrived and hubby and I tried a little tummy time with him too, although he got a bit frustrated.

Wednesday night we gave Jay his first spongebath since the hospital... and well, he christened mommy AND the kitchen floor! Doh!

Today we made an amazing discovery - put Jay in his bouncey seat with a binky and he's golden!

I was getting a bit frustrated with the fact that 1) putting him in his bassinet didn't last long so I couldn't really get much done while he slept and 2) it seemed like he was CONSTANTLY eating. I get that he's little and needs to eat every 2-3 hours but there's no reason for him to eat for a good 20-30 minutes, go down for 20 minutes or less and wake up hungry again! A friend of mine that stopped by today suggested letting him try a pacifier as it might just be he likes the sucking motion. I was a bit hesitant at first, as I've read if you're breastfeeding not to give them a bottle or a binky for a few weeks to avoid nipple confusion, but my friend, who has 2 kids and breastfeed them both, said she only heard that about a bottle and it worked fine with her kids. I gave in and tried and OMG - it worked!

Morning snuggle-time with mommy

I think tonight for sleep we're going to try putting him in his bouncey seat with the binky and see if he sleeps longer than he does in the bassinet. The hospital strongly stated NOT to co-sleep with baby, however lately I've been finding that letting him sleep on my chest while I lay on my back slightly propped up is the only way that myself and Jay can get any sleep during the night. Hopefully the bouncy seat and binky will workout in our favor tonight!

As it is, we seem to be getting a nighttime/morning routine going on - daddy leaves for work around 10pm, mommy feeds Jay and puts him down for a little bit to take a shower and do anything else before Jay wakes up again. Jay gets fed again and then snuggles with mommy on the couch until it's time to take a nap watching TV. Then shortly before daddy gets home at 330am, we move to the bedroom, feed Jay again, put him down for a bit and try to get some sleep before he wakes up howling in the bassinet. Daddy tries to stay up a bit with him so mommy can get some sleep in bed but mommy ends up getting woken up for another feeding. By the time daddy gets up to go to work in the morning Jay gets fed again and then snuggles with mommy for a few more hours before it's time to get up for the day.

Jay seems to be pretty bright though, considering he rarely ever opens his eyes yet... the few times we've done Tummy Time this week he's started doing the crawling motion with his legs, like he's trying to go crawl! Also, early Monday morning while he was snuggling with me, he started lifting his head up! I Googled just to see if that was normal - they say the average baby doesn't lift their head up on their own until about a month old - Jay was barely 4 days! He can't hold it for long - just a few seconds, but I still think that's quite impressive!

So, as far as house hunting goes, since we've been pre-approved and just have paperwork to finish gathering for the bank before we make an offer, we have a meeting with our realtor Saturday morning to look at some houses - including this one down the street that I have a really strong feeling about - it has A LOT of what we want and is finally in our price range too (I've been watching it for awhile and the price has dropped a lot). It's also just down the street which is nice as I really like the walking path nearby not to mention we're in a nice area. We're looking at several others on Saturday as well, but this one seems to be one of the better deals given the condition and price.

My mom is going to be babysitting and while I am trying to pump some milk daily, considering how often Jay eats, I'm a little concerned that I won't be able to get enough pumped and he'll run out and my mom will be stuck (since I started Wednesday, I've been able to get about 2-3oz pumped a day since my supply is still so new), so hubby and I agreed to keep a little formula on hand for such occasions. Mom is also going to be watching Jay Monday night too so hubby and I can go out for Valentine's Day, since my dad's out of town and she's on her own.

Jay's first doctor's appointment is on Monday too - we'll see if he's gained anymore weight now that my milk is in or see if the doctor thinks we should start supplementing formula (something he mentioned before discharging us last Sunday as Jay's so small). We'll also find out what his kidney ultrasound says too, although I'm assuming it's nothing too major as if it were, then why would they let us go home from the hospital?

Can't believe it's already been a week though!