First impressions

I'll post pictures backwards here - Kari took all the labor/delivery pictures on her phone so she had those, while I had her take our photo shoot pictures on my camera so I posted the pretty stuff before the nitty-gritty stuff, accidentally giving some people the impression that I endured this labor thing gracefully.  Here's what I really looked like during labor:

AWFUL.  I was being very sarcastic to that nurse putting that shunt in my arm.  Turns out, I needed it for pitocin in the end and she's actually a nice person, so I apologised after it was all over.

My 1st impression when they handed sweet baby Ethan to me was "eeeew, get him back off of me!"

They told me they'd put him on my chest immediately after delivery and they did not lie, I felt like they didn't so much catch him as rebound him from his prior slimy abode onto my stomach.  He was covered in goop! Totally gross.  And he had just given me such terrible grief of a delivery I said "it's going to take me a few minutes to love him." Yep, said that out loud.

My 2nd impression was that he has got some lungs on him!  I didn't know a newborn could scream so loudly and clearly. And persistently!  Even after swaddeling him all up he didn't calm down.  It was a bit of a relief when they took him to the nursery to get his bath, finally I had some peace and quiet! It seemed my fears for a colicky baby were confirmed, if he wasn't asleep he was crying (scream crying), but now he has begun taking a pacifier and is content for seconds at a time after he nurses and before the paci gets popped in. Yep, seconds, we'll try to stretch that to minutes as the weeks go by :)

My 3rd impression was that I was so glad Kari had been there with me.  Sure, she left when I started throwing up, but she muscled through it and came back and kept rubbing my back and getting on Joe when he'd quit rubbing my tailbone and she'd remind me to keep breathing and told me it was good to make lots of noise and it just felt good to have some support that I knew and loved when all the nurses seemed *so mean,* they just wanted me to be in pain pushing. I knew Kari was there wanting to not push right along with me! We could be wussy about this delivery thing together.

Sure enough, she says she's terrified of delivering her next baby, but I'll be right by her commiserating and not wanting to push, too. Thanks, Kari!

My 4th impression was how much easier the hospital visits were than with Caroline's delivery.  When Eli and Patrick came to visit with her they were craaaaazy, it felt like a wrestling match on my hospital bed, there was lots of baby stealing and jostling and pushing.  This time everyone was happy to see the baby but they were calm and sweet.  I expected Caroline to be crazy but she's a little mom, she likes to hold him and sweetly pat his head but when she's done she doesn't push him on the floor, she just let's me know, "all done!" And when he cries she informs me, "crying!" Thanks, sister :)  Eli uses his sweetest falsetto voice and talks to him, and Patrick is very protective and tells me how much he loves him.  It was actually a pleasure to have them visit!  Amelia and Addilyn were great, too, I actually looked forward to the kids stopping by rather than dreading the hour.

My 5th impression is that this is going to be the most fun I've had taking a baby home.  We have a great home to settle into, he has loving older siblings who won't kill him, I have my sister nearby, and for the first time I have loads of time with my wonderful husband.  This will be such a different experience, in such a great way!