Morning hike with friends

Alder and I went out to a friend's house this morning to go for a hike. I met Janet in a breastfeeding class and her daughter, Sylvia, was born exactly one week before Alder, and with the same mid-wife! We are having fun as first-time moms seeing how are babies are the same and different.

We went for a long and very enjoyable hike, and we made it back just before the heat and humidity became unbearable. While we were cooling off, we decided to take some photos of our babes together.

Alder is a bit of a bully....sorry Sylvia!

If you notice, Sylvia is not wearing a diaper...she does wear diapers, but not all the time b/c Janet and her husband are using "elimination communication" with Sylvia in an attempt to be 'diaper free' at a much earlier age than is typical in our society. (see these links to learn more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elimination_communication, http://www.diaperfreebaby.org/, http://www.natural-wisdom.com/) Very cool!

a wednesday

(dad here)
Well, Tsuga was to make the entry today but, obviously, he was sulking too hard to sit up at the keyboard straight like a smart dog. It couldn't have been that we were so enamored with how straight up Alder wanted to be on the couch. Of course these are perfect-second shots, but he really is holding that gigantic noggin up for extended seconds of time these days. We wonder if he's sore from it all - the tummy time. For instance,...


OK, so Mom was in front of him pumping, but...

What else? Oh, check out how long he is...

What else?
Guess just some more photos on the couch, some not so good, like...And thats about it. A Wednesday. Invitingly normal and brand new too. One of hopefully many.

Five weeks old

Our great friend Tiffany from Knoxville came to visit this weekend. We had a great time going to the park and out to eat - the weather was perfect! Alder actually had his first restaurant experience on Friday night...he slept the entire time...

On Saturday we went to a friend's house in the country where we hiked down to the river and let our dogs run wild. It was great to be outside, naturalize a bit, and watch the dogs do what they do best. It will be fun when Alder is old enough to enjoy these outings and not sleep through them! HOWEVER, I am not wishing him older by any means...he is already growing up faster than we imagined...five weeks old already!! We actually noticed today that he is about two thirds the length of his pack-n-play!!

Dad and Alder pooped and snoozing on the back porch. Too bad he cant sleep this way on his own (no belly sleeping allowed these days) b/c he really likes this position.

serious baby

Not much to say today, but wanted to post some pictures anyway. Alder is doing well. He smiled for Jason and I yesterday, but has not been so cooperative with our silly antics today. Hopefully they will get more frequent. He is a very serious baby as you can see from these photos...

One month old

Just for comparison, here is Alder in his car seat on May 21, when we brought him home from the hospital and on June 18. I think he has grown into the cheeks a bit!

I smell like maple syrup...

Yup, that's right, maple syrup. I am taking some herbs (Fenugreek and Blessed thistle) to increase my milk supply and they make me smell strongly as if I am kin to Aunt Jemima. The pediatrician told us that Alder was not gaining weight when we went in for his pre-surgery visit and that we needed to start supplementing him with formula and/or pumped breastmilk. So I am doing everything I can to increase my supply so that we have to supplement with formula as little as possible. The herbs and extra pumping appear to be working (thank goodness), and Alder seams to be much happier now that he is getting full at each meal. He is still cranky from gas a good bit throughout the day, but at least now I know that he is no longer hungry.

We are so lucky that he is sleeping almost fully through the night already!! Last night he slept from 10:30 to 5:30! Pretty rare for a new baby, but I am not complaining. He sleeps alot during the day also, but I suppose he will start having more and more awake time each day.

When Travis and Ana were here this past weekend we had fun decorating Alder's casts. Notice his flexibility (destined to be a yogi) and poop stains on the casts...two more weeks to go...hopefully we will have no more.

Yes, that's a four for his fourth cast..isn't it great that he already knows how to hold up the number four with his fingers!

post surgery update

Alder has been doing very well since his surgery on Tuesday. In fact he seems to have adjusted to his new casts better than the previous ones! He is starting to focus on our faces and turn his head to our voices, which is so great to see. Hopefully he will grace us with his smile soon. He gives us a prelude to his smile when he is falling asleep - his eyes dart around under his eyelids and he smiles and sometimes chuckles...it is kinda weird, but cute nonetheless. Jason thinks that he must be dreaming about things in his past life.

Here are some recent photos - it is tough for me to see that he has changed much, but maybe you guys can see it more than me b/c I see his every day.

Chillin on the couch:

bathtime:

yawn:

dad likes to tease me:

Looking up at the trees:

Mom and Alder:

Aunt Ana and Uncle Travis:

surgery and final casts!!

Alder is sleeping off his anesthesia from his surgery this morning and is really doing well. He underwent a procedure called a tenotomy, where incisions are made in the achilles tendon. Former manipulations and castings turned the feet out for proper orientation respective of leg position. The tenotomy drops the heel so that the feet become 'flatter' relative to the ground and gives him normal heel flexibility. This final step in the manipulations is often done with the subject awake and with a local anesthetic. However, our doctor prefers use of general anesthesia because the local anesthesia can sometimes inflame the tissues around the achilles tendon, making it difficult to find the tendon. While again, this surgery was a tough reality to swallow, we trusted our doctor with years of experience and success with this approach.

We arrived at the hospital at 6am and they took him from us at 7:30 just as he woke up from his typical long night's sleep (we are so lucky...)., and I was feeding him in recovery by 9am. He was very hungry and alert enough to get a good feeding in...what a relief. His cries and movements are a bit weak today, but they are getting stronger and more normal as the day goes on. It was a much easier process than I had anticipated and we are very grateful for this. The hardest part is behind us.

This last cast is constructed to be more durable than the previous three, with an extra layer of fiberglass wrapping, similar to casts typical of broken limbs. Despite us asking them to make them lower to make cloth diapering easier, these casts are still very high and will likely limit this for another 3 weeks. Here is Alder sleeping soundly today:

Alder will wear these casts for three weeks, rather than only one. When we return to see the doc in 3 weeks, he will get these last casts off and he will start wearing a Mitchell AFO brace (see this link for a photo:
http://www.c-prodirect.co.uk/shop.htm#brace) for 23 hours a day for 3 months. This will likely be another tough transition for him to get accustomed to, but it should not take more than a couple of days.

Grammy and Paw Paw have been here for the weekend and have been a big help. I feel like I am constantly feeding or pumping these days so the extra hands are very nice to have around, whether they be holding Alder, hanging clothes on the line, or cooking dinner! On Sunday they were an enormous help by hanging ceiling fans in two of our bedrooms as well as a new light fixture in our dining room (to replace an ugly brass one). The fans are super because it is starting to get hot! This picture does not really show how pretty the new light is:

third casting

We received some good and bad news at the doctor yesterday when we went in to get Alder's third round of casts. The doctor was able to achieve nearly full corrected rotation on his feet already (the good news). He actually purposefully overcorrected his feet (~70 degrees turned out)...but this is normal and they will be in line like ours eventually.

Here we are in the waiting room before the second casts were removed:

Here are some photos of his feet after the second casts were removed - the progress is amazing:

The bad news is that he will have to be under anesthesia to have his heel cord release (tenotomy) this coming Tuesday. We knew about this procedure and expected it, but we were suprized to find out that he would have to be put under. We thought it would be done under local anesthetic. We trust our doctor and just dread the night before the procedure when he will not be able to eat anything after midnight. He will have a new set of casts (his final set) for three weeks and then he will be fitted for a brace that he will wear full time for a few months. More to come regarding all of this...

Here are some pics of the new casts so you can see the amount of external rotation. He was pretty fussy last night and woke up more than usual; probably sore from the new position. Today he is doing great:

His new casts are also quite a bit higher than the last ones making the cloth diapers impossible to use this week...bummer. But it is only a week.

We also went to the pediatrician today and found out that he is up to 9 lbs - something I have been wondering about and hoping that my breastfeeding was doing the trick...and it is! He is healthy overall and the doc says that he has a very strong personality...and that we should watch out.

some happy photos

Jason had fun taking some close-up pictures of Alder this evening when he got home from work. He was not fussy...amazing....so it was really nice to enjoy him awake and happy. He has been fussy lately in the afternoons and I am trying to figure out what, if anything in my diet may be causing it. Beer and chocolate cake is all I ate today and he was happy, so hey!!

Ellen and Arianna made Alder some great outfits that he always picks out first....