Carter Turns One!

Carter is now officially one year old. I cannot believe how fast the time flies. Our little boy is getting so big. Actually, he is pretty tiny for a one year old, but I think he is just perfect! We had two birthday parties for Carter - one with family, and one with his play group friends. Unfortunately, Carter was teething really bad at his family birthday party. He was really grumpy! His playgroup party was a much better success. Below are pictures of Carter and his friends (except for Ryan - we missed you Ryan) enjoying their cupcakes.

Also, I guess I should address the fact the I haven't posted a blog for about eight months now. I promise I will try to do better!! I guess anything is an improvement from eight months between blogs though. : ) I am planning on posting a "Year in Review" blog next to catch everyone up on all the fun missed events, but right now I have a one year old demanding my undivided attention.

Yummy!


Hunter


Elley


Cohen

Just Being a Baby . . .And Growing Fast

Doesn't this look comfy? : ) It's amazing the positions that Carter can fall asleep in. As you can tell in these pictures, Carter's hair is starting to fall out. Poor little guy. He was born with a perfectly cute fuzzy head which quickly turned to a perfectly cute bald head. The funny thing is that it all fell out on top first. So, for a little while, he looked like he had male pattern baldness. : ) Now, his hair is just barely starting to grow back in.



One of the gifts that we received was a baby carrier. Here is one of Carter's outings in the carrier. I walked him around the yard with the dogs. He wasn't quite old enough to notice the dogs yet though. Since he was too young to put sunscreen on, we pulled out the giant golf umbrella. That actually worked quite well.




Here's Carter just being cute . . .









With a new baby you have to get creative when trying to get house work done. I decided to put the carrier to good use again. I would just carry Carter around in his carrier while I did house work. Well, one time he got a bit tuckered out and just crashed in the carrier. I thought it was too cute.


Carter loves his Daddy.




He loves Grandma Chris too. Here are a couple of pictures from when Grandma Chris visited when Cousin Jordyn was born.

Naptime

Ryan and I have definitely learned how to take advantage of naptime. We are lucky to have a cuddly little guy!

One Month Old

Carter is just over one month old in these pictures. We were finally able to give him baths in water (not just sponge baths). He hated getting sponge baths because he would get so cold, but he absolutely loves baths in his little tub. I think that we enjoy watching him as much as he enjoys the bath! - Doesn't it look like he is waving hello?



Here are some pictures that I took just because. I think he looks at me like I'm crazy for putting him in all different positions and then snapping away. Oh well, he's bound to learn he has a crazy mom sooner or later. Carter definitely liked being on his back much better than his tummy. At one month he had already learned to turn over from his tummy to his back. He hated being on his tummy that much! I was trying to be a diligent Mommy by making sure that he got enough tummy time. He had other ideas. I think that the first time he rolled over it was an accident, but that was enough to teach him that it could be done again. From that point on, anytime I would put him on his tummy, he would just struggle until he would roll onto his back. Oh well, at least he was getting good exercise!







Here's how Carter had to sleep at night. The poor little guy had acid reflux and it wouldn't let him stay asleep. He slept much better when upright in his carrier. He slept in this carrier until he was a little over three months old.

Carter at Home

In these pictures Carter is about three weeks old. Carter has been home for about one week. Ryan and I are getting things figured out as new parents . . . like not sleeping. And the new parent concern that your baby isn't breathing during the night was that much more heightened for us. So, Carter slept in our room so that we could easily observe him at night! However, our biggest concern was making sure that Carter would gain enough weight. As you can see, he is a little guy. Our worries went away with a little time. Carter started putting on the weight quickly.

Carter Comes Home!

After eleven days in the NICU, Carter finally got to come home. That was the best day ever! We dressed him up in his blue puppy outfit from Grandma Bourland, loaded him into the then oversized carseat, and headed home. Ryan and I were so ready to have the "wireless" version of Carter. We gladly welcomed the sleepless nights, diaper changes, feedings, etc. We finally got to be Mommy and Daddy. Aunt Shannon, Cousin Jackson, and Cousin Blake were the first to visit. Both Blake and Jackson were very excited to get to hold their new cousin. Grandma and Grandpa Bourland were in Ashton, Idaho at the time. They literally drove through a blizzard to come and hold Carter. In fact, I don't think he was put down for the next two days while Grandma and Grandpa Bourland were here. Good thing Carter is a snuggler because we were all making up for the lost cuddle time.

Finally . . . we get to hold our baby!

Carter was in the NICU for nearly a week before we actually got to hold him. It was so hard to wait that long but of course we didn't want to risk his health. Initially, the doctors were worried that he had an infection in his lungs. It turns out that he didn't. His lungs were just premature. Once he received the second sufactant dose things started to make a turn for the better right away. It was such a joy to finally hold our baby in our arms. We take full advantage of the fact that we can do that as much as we want now. Carter was in the NICU for a total of 11 days, which felt like forever to us. After Carter's breathing was doing well we had to wait to make sure that he was eating OK. Since he had so much stress just trying to breathe, the doctors waited to feed him so that his system wouldn't get over stressed. Once he was getting food, it was through a feeding tube. Eventually, he started getting a bottle and then we started to mix in breastfeeding as well. At some feedings he was breast, bottle, and tube fed just to make sure that he was getting enough. Before we could take him home he had to be able to get enough to eat without the feeding tube. To make sure that he could eat enough without the tube Ryan and I actually stayed overnight with Carter in one of the rooms in the NICU. It is kind of like a test night before you get to take your baby home. You are completely on your own but Carter was still hooked up to all the monitors so that his oxygen levels and breathing rate could still be watched before he was officially released. The day after our test night, we got to take Carter home. We passed . . . Yeah!