Head Up, Eyes Open

Just a quick post today. Wes must have been pretty exhausted by the birth, because he has hardly opened his eyes to look at the world. But Kim was able to snap one photo when Wes was having a brief post-nursing burp. We also were able to get a shot of Luke getting ready to walk baby brother out of the hospital and to the car for the trip home.

Wes in the World, Day 1

We had a quiet day in the hospital, at least as far as regular doctor and nurse visits and cold diaper changes would allow. Kim, fueled by fairly decent hospital fare, started breatfeeding in earnest and Wes, much like his older brother, seems most content when firmly cuddling with Mom. Dad, on the other hand, was thankful to merely scavenge the free generic ice cream from the nurse's station and was able to venture homeward for a few hours to prepare for Wes' arrival, which is planned for Sunday. Our pediatrician pronounced the little guy's health to be good and Wes passed his hearing and eye tests. He was also admitted to the Circle of Circumcision, regarding which he voiced substantial protests. However, I think we can all agree that his protests would be even louder had we attempted to do a circ a few years or more from now! We also had visits from Pastor Michael, Scott and Courtney Raecker, and another visit from Grandma, who no doubt enjoyed the break from her full-time babysitting of Luke while the rest of us are camped in the hospital! We have no pictures uploaded from today, but will add other posts as we can in the days ahead.

Welcome to the World, Wes!

To the surprise of many, including himself, Wesley Dean Belitz came into the world today at 3:05 PM. While he wasn't due until early June, Kim felt like she had started leaking amniotic fluid late Thursday afternoon and, after a brief trip to the hospital that night, came in for further testing Friday morning and ended up being induced. The doctor broke her water at about 1:30 Friday afternoon and serious contractions started less than one hour later. After about 1.5 hours of labor, Kim went from being 5 cm dialated to a full 10 cm and crowning! That wasn't enough time to get the epidural in, so quite by accident Wes was born without the benefit of pain relievers for his mother (or his father, for that matter, who REALLY thinks there should be something more relaxing than popsicle sticks available for the dads in the delivery ward). So, after a brief but eventful labor, little Wes arrived at 6 lbs, 6 oz and 20 inches long. As this is being written, Nick is preparing for a night at the hospital with Kim in the comfortable bed, baby Wes swaddled in blankets, and himself left to ponder how to sleep at all on a cough originally designed for Pygmies.
Also, earlier this evening, Luke was able to meet his baby brother for the first time and, after some initial gawking, was happy to climb up on the bed with his Mommy for a few pictures. He even tried tickling Wes with his toy train, which didn't work very well, but it was a nice gesure...
More updates as time and energy allow...

A beautiful shower

Joanne and Jill



Yesterday, my mother-in-law Joanne and Aunt Jill threw me a beautiful shower at Glenmoor Country Club. We all had a great time and laughed so much that I joked I just might have the baby there! The food was delicious and so was the cake. I truly felt showered by all, even my Californa relatives who sent presents early for me to open at the shower!

New Playhouse!

So I realize that I have been neglecting my blog as of late. The truth is that I have been busy doing other things like wrapping up the school year, washing baby clothes, scrapbooking and most of all trying to go to bed early. With that said lots has been going on in the Belitz household this past month. One fun thing for Luke is that he got his new little tykes playhouse as a Christmas/birthday gift from Grammy and Poppa. He loves it and I love it too! It is great for lots of imaginative play as it has 4 sides - a school house, sports center, market and ATM and a side for tools/repair shop/gas station. I am hoping that this will provide many hours of entertainment for Luke while our second addition is here and the weather is nice.
Luke has been preparing for his baby brothers arrival by signing "happy birthday baby brother." He also gives his baby brother kisses on my belly and says hi to him. This does not happen often but it is cute when it does.
Nick was offically offered a full time contract with Encana, the natural gas company that he has been working for since the end of January. Before he was a contractor so this means that he gets benefits including 5 weeks of vacation off a year! What great timing for us. Everyone he works with seems great and he is enjoying his job.
Finally, this past week you could call me clumsy because I have fallen twice in 5 days. I guess with this big belly my balance is off, however, this has caused me to get monitored twice this week. On Monday, I fell on some ice outside my classroom and had to go to my doctors office for 30 minutes of monitoring. Thank goodness Luke was good because I was strapped in to the monitor and could not move. We came prepared with snacks and books so the time went by fast. This past Friday, I caught my two feet together and fell down the last step while dropping Luke off at preschool. Because my knee hit my belly (not hard at all) my doctor said that I had to go to Labor and Delivery to be monitored for 4 hours! This meant that I had to take the entire day off of work. Baby was doing great the entire time but they did not let me eat and only let me drink water so besides being bored and realizing that daytime TV was not good, I was starving and did not eat lunch until 2:30. I guess this means that I need to slow down and take it easy. Only 4 more weeks to go....

Dyeing Easter Eggs!

Nick and I bravely attempted to have Luke dye Easter Eggs for the first time. He did a great job thanks to having some practice yesterday at Ms. Lori's. Luke was very proud of the job he did and would barely let us have the eggs back to put into the fridge!

 

Today we went to the mall to visit the Easter bunny. Luke actually like the bunny and I was surprised because he is terrified of Santa! We are excited to celebrate Easter tomorrow and are planning on dyeing Easter eggs later today.