new crib

Elijah has been sleeping in a bassinet since we brought him home. However, it's been increasingly difficult to get him out of it lately since he's been growing like a weed and putting on a lot of weight. I also felt like the bassinet didn't give him enought space. Every time we'd lay him down in the middle he'd end up by the side of the bassinet banging his head on it. We figured he must arch his back while sleeping and then fall over on his side, which put him next to the side of the bassinet since it was so small.

To address both of these issues we brought up the crib. Ryan assembled it in the kitchen only to find out that it was too big to go through the tight bedroom entrance corner. After moving most of the furniture out of the way, we still had to partially disassemble the crib to get it into the bedroom.

Elijah was fast asleep when we laid him down in his new crib. When he woke up in his new surroundings, I think it really scared him. He looked more pitiful than I have seen yet. But he adjusted pretty quickly. The next time we laid him down in the crib he was just fine.

We laid Elijah down in the middle of the crib for the night, thinking that he would now have plenty of space. When we got up at 5 am to change him and feed him, there he was, at the edge of the crib, banging his head on the side. We have no clue how he got there, but that must be his favorite place to sleep. It's a good thing we have a bumper.

the first bottle

I am going back to work tomorrow. I'll be in the office for only a couple of hours, but it will be long enough for me to miss a feeding. A few days ago we decided it was time to give Elijah a bottle to get him used to it. He'll have to do it a lot when I am back at work full time. I was concerned that he wouldn't take it, as I heard many babies refuse the bottle and prefer the breast. But he took it without any problems. I even felt slightly offended that he didn't care if it was the bottle as long as milk came out of it :) We've been giving him one bottle a day since then.

sleeping through the night

A few days ago Elijah slept through the night for the first time. We put him down at 11 pm and woke him up at 7 am. He would have slept longer if we didn't wake him up. At first Ryan didn't even realize what happened. We've been up every night since we brought Elijah home, so Ryan just assumed we must have been up that night as well. Needless to say, Elijah was our hero that day!

new beginnings

Blogging has been popular for a while, but I never saw a reason to start my own until now. With Elijah's arrival so many new things are happening every day and I thought it would be nice to record certain events so that we can look back on them later. Otherwise we'll forget. I also thought that family and friends scattered across the world may find it entertaining to drop by once in a while and spend a minute or two reading about the small and big events of Elijah's life.

We entered the country of parenthood on December 11th, 2005, and what a ride it has been since then! Elijah weighed 7.5 lb and measured 20 inches. He is now 7 weeks old and close to 12 lb (or so it seems when we pick him up). We spent the first 5-6 weeks learning his "language" and mastering breastfeeding. We are still not experts in either. I am sure we have misinterpreted many of his cues and continue to do so. He was probably fed when he needed a nap and put to bed when he was hungry more than once.

We made it to church for the first time when he was 4 weeks old. We've been back twice since then. But we are still struggling in reclaiming some other spiritual disciplines we used to practice prior to delivery.

The first post of a blog about Elijah should probably have his picture. So here's one of my favorites.