3 months

If you remember when Hunter was a couple of days old, he had to be readmitted to the NICU so they could treat his high bilirubin levels that were causing his jaundice. When we were there, AJ told my mom "When I find this Billy Rubin guy, I'm going to kick his ass!". Hunter had a 3 month check-up last week. This isn't a regularly scheduled visit, but at his 2 month visit Dr. Terwelp checked his bilirubin levels again and wanted to have us come back in at 3 months because it was still a little higher than he would have liked. We hate this because they have to prick his little heel and squeeze out a vial of blood and it is so sad. They weighed him (12 lbs, 7 oz!) and measured him (22.5 inches) and after the exam thought that due to how well he is growing and how his color looked that it wasn't necessary to check his bilirubin. Looks like we finally got that Billy! He is officially double his birthweight and has grown 2 1/2 inches. This puts him in the 10th percentile for length and the 48th percentile for weight! He's got the cutest little chubby cheeks ever and he is smiling all of the time. I love it!

As far as sleeping through the night goes, we're pretty hit and miss. He had a REALLY good night earlier this week and slept for 7 (SEVEN!) hours from 8pm-3am. Ever since that night though, it has been back to every 2-3 hours, maybe one 4 hour chunk of time. I've decided that anyone who says that their baby has been sleeping through the night since they were 4 weeks old is just plain lying. There just isn't any other explanation for it. :)

First plane ride!

We need to get this boy a frequent flier number! Hunter had his first plane ride when we went to Indy over the 4th of July. My birthday is July 5th so we usually like to take a long weekend with the Independence Day holiday being so close and a corporate holiday for Dell.

It wouldn't be a trip that I took without any travel stories and this time did not disappoint...

We had an early morning flight on July 1st - 7:10 am. We started off a little late but not too bad....it just takes us so much longer to get out of the house these days! We got to the airport and it was PACKED. When we were checking in at the kiosk I was not able to check in electronically and had to wait to speak to an agent. Ugh...now I was starting to get a little nervous. We stood in line for quite a while and thankfully a gentleman in front of us let us go ahead of him. We were at the check-in counter for at least 20 minutes as the agent tried to get me cleared - apparently this was some security precaution that we got caught up in. By this time we had less than 10 minutes before our plane took off. This agent actually left her position at the counter and walked us through security to make sure we got on the plane. She was by far the nicest American Airlines employee that I have EVER encountered. Sooo, along with the baby we have all sorts of extra stuff that we are traveling with now...a carry-on (with a change of clothes for all 3 of us...I have learned my lesson...), the diaper bag, a stroller, and a big car seat travel bag. We're rushing along, trying to get our laptops out, shoes off, bags pushed through the x-ray machine and then comes the car seat bag....the openings on these x-ray machines are deceivingly small. :) I seriously looked like Greg Focker trying to push this thing through the x-ray machine. It did go through but they had to call someone to help get it out of the other side. AJ thinks we broke it because he looked back and all of the people in line behind us were stopped and shooting daggers through the back of our heads with their eyes. Oh well, we got through okay and finally made the flight. We were the last two on and got separted but we were only flying to DFW so it was okay.

Here is a pic on our layover -



Hunter was a sweet little angel on all of our flights. I was really worried about the air pressure changes hurting his little ears but we didn't have any problems with that at all. I tried to nurse him whenever we were going up or down but a couple of times he was sleeping hard so I put the pacifier in his mouth and that seemed to work.

Mom picked us up at the airport and of course was super excited to see Hunter. I suppose she was excited to see us also. :) The last time she saw him was when he was two weeks old. When we were waiting for our bags the man who was next to us came up to me and said "I don't think you are going to get your baby back, ma'am".


We had a great few days in Indy. We got to see Grandma and Grandpa Hunter who came up with my uncles Bill and Steve to visit us on Friday. Here is a cute pic of the 3 of them -


Whitney and Brian threw a very nice "Meet the Baby" party for him on Sunday. We had a house full of family and friends who stopped by to meet Hunter. It was so nice to see everyone and it was a great party. Here he is all partied out -



I love the pic of Mom and Brad holding him because we have a similar pic from when they were here and he weighed, what, 5.5 lbs and now look at him! He is just getting so big so fast!

We had a very nice trip and it was nice to get out of the 105 degree heat for a few days. We laid over in Dallas again on the way home and when we got off of the plane in Austin we were waiting outside of the plane for our stroller and carseat that we gate checked and they never showed up. I was not a happy camper...this was a brand new stroller that I just bought right before our trip and a carseat that we need to have to get the baby home from the airport...on top of that, how do you lose something that was put right by the plane as we were getting on??? So, down we go to the lost luggage counter, where we have had the pleasure of spending time before, and we walk in and the super nice lady from our first flight that walked us through security was working at the counter! They gave us a loaner car seat to use and they delivered both the carseat and stroller around 2am that morning so all is well. I am writing a letter to American about this lady. It isn't very often that you encounter someone so helpful in the airline industry these days...and she was nice to boot!

Hunter has finally getting back into his sleep pattern. It has taken a few days to get readjusted but it looks like we're back on track. We have a big week this week including 3 month pictures tomorrow!

Big changes!

Hunter is now 12 weeks old which means that my maternity leave has come to an end. After much discussion and consideration, AJ and I have decided that I will be a stay-at-home mom and I have officially resigned from Dell. We are both very excited that I will be staying home. I'm very happy to be able to be here with him every day and am looking forward to all of the fun we will have together! This means my Dell email address is not a good way to contact me anymore. You can reach me at my Yahoo or MSN address - kjwinship@yahoo.com or kristin_winship@msn.com.

Hunter is getting bigger every day and our days go by so fast. We are establishing a nice little schedule. He usually goes down by about 7:30 or 8:00 at night and is up at about 8:00 in the morning. We go on a walk as soon as we get up and get changed so we can try to beat the heat. (We've had 21 days of triple digit temperatures so far this year!) By the time we get home from our walk, Hunter eats, I eat, he goes down for a nap and I shower it is noon before I know it. He is starting to play with toys and is very interested in everything that is going on around him. It's so amazing how fast they develop! I was downloading some video they other day and found some of him at about 2 weeks old and I can't believe how big he is now.

I will blog later about our trip to Indiana over the 4th - Hunter's first time on a plane!

Ahh, sleep!

Now here is a milestone that deserves documentation! Hunter "slept throught the night" last night for the very first time! I put "slept through the night" in quotes because technically sleeping through the night is 5 (or 6, I can't remember) hours at a time and this was from 7:30pm-1:30am. Still, I'll take what I can get! Hunter is still sleeping in our room but last night I tried something different. I put him down in his crib in his room when he went down at 7:30 because I thought it might be quieter for him. We have his monitor in his room and when we put him down in our room we leave the door cracked. I stayed up until about 11:00, sure that he would wake up at any time to eat, but finally decided to lay down and then woke up in a panic at 1:00 when I realized that he hadn't woken up yet. I went to his room to check on him and he was still sound asleep. :) I've tried this trick again tonight and he is sleeping as I type so we'll see what happens!

2 months!

Hunter had his 2 month checkup today with Dr. Terwelp. I was not looking forward to this one because he had to get his first shots today. They give them 5 sticks and I didn't know what to expect but it went really fast and he did very, very well. It was much better than I expected. They also checked his bilirubin so his poor little heel got stuck AGAIN. He actually cried more for that than he did for his shots. One of the levels is still a little higher than they would like for it to be so we have to go back when he is 3 months old just so they can monitor it. After that he will go back at 4 months for more shots. :(

He is growing like a weed. His first scheduled appointment (that was unrelated to his jaundice issues in the beginning) was at 2 weeks old and he was in the 4th percentile for weight and length. Today he is in the 5th for length - 21.5 inches - and the...ahem...20th percentile for weight! He is up to 10.3 lbs. I guess we don't need to worry about him getting enough to eat!

Last Prego Pic

Ok, so this is a little outdated, but I love it so much I wanted to upload it anyway. On Saturday, April 11th, our friend Piper came over to take some pregnancy pictures of me. Turns out it was great timing because my water broke at 11:50pm that night so the pictures that she took are the last ones we have of me pregnant which I think it pretty cool. When they came over to drop off the disk a few weeks later they brought this one blown up and framed for us and it is now hanging in Hunter's room. :)

Chunky Monkey!

We had a follow-up appointment to Hunter's weight check from a couple of weeks ago and he is up to 8 lbs, 15 oz! He has gained a pound and a half in the past two weeks. Little chunk! He is still in size newborn in clothes and diapers but I imagine it won't be long before we are in 0-3 months (which will make mommy sad!).

Hunter had his first "playdate" with his friend Harrison last week. Harrison's mommy, Allison, and I went out to lunch and it was a perfect day outside. We sat outside and talked and ate and had a great time. Harrison is 2 months older than Hunter and they were both good little boys and slept almost the entire time. I'm sure these two will have many, many fun times together in the future!