Dear baby Matthew,

Today you are one month old. I wanted to write you a letter today to express just how amazing you are to me & your dad. We love you more than words can describe.

This past month has been filled with adventure. I will never forget seeing you for the first time & your first diaper change when we brought you home. Everything was so new to us and your first diaper change involved both me & your dad working together and it took longer than it really should have. I took the business end while daddy made up an awesome song about having a dirty bum & that it is ok to cry but it gets better once your clean again. It was a really catchy tune.

When you were changed for the first time by daddy without the assistance of mom you gave him a pee shower. The reaction he had was priceless. The first time mommy changed you, you almost got me but I was prepared and you just hit the wall.

Another great moment this past month was visiting your great grandma. She loves you do much. As well as your first sleep over at auntie Kelly & uncle Jamie’s house. You partied to hard at grandpa Rob’s 60th birthday where everyone loved meeting you and mommy & daddy were afraid to drive home in fear of waking you up so we stayed the night I stead. You slept alright.

As you continue to get older always remember that we love you to pieces. Just don’t grow up to fast & please start sleeping through the night as mommy will really like to have uninterrupted sleep just once. We are on your schedule right now, asleep by 9pm, a quick feed. Sleep until 11pm, feed, sleep until 2am, feed, and then finally sleep until around 6am… Thank you.

Love always,

Mommy.

Matthew is now just over two weeks old, he sure is getting big. We do not have another appointment until next Tuesday to find out just how much he has actually grown since birth. His umbilical cord stump finally fell off yesterday. I was starting to think it wasn’t going to fall off, which of course is perfectly alright by me as it just means he gets to stay my itty bitty baby a little longer. The stump started to fall off in the tub the other day as it got bumped just a little bit, and in turn had a drop of blood appear around his belly button. It was only that one one time so we were not overly concerned first time parents. I was going to bring it up at our next check up appointment, but of course it fell off now and he has an adorable innie belly button.

When Matthew was 5 days old, Bryan and I finally decided enough was enough and we took Matthew outside the house. We just went for a drive around town as well as did a little grocery shopping, where I got to use my babyhawk mei tai carrier for the first time. Matthew was so well behaved that he slept the whole time being in the carrier. As well as slept whenever the truck was moving. It was a successful first outing, that we went out the next day for a check up at the Midwife office and he got weighed, and he had gained almost 7oz since birth! He is just an eating machine.

We visited my grandma (Matthew’s great grandma!) last Sunday, and it was so much fun. It was great having him meet my grandma, and of course my grandma was over the moon in love with him. We gave her a bunch of pictures of him and she went on about how she was going to do the standard grandma thing and show everyone she met his picture.

I dont think the past two weeks would have gone as smooth if Bryan was not off from work. It is great having him be home with us. He has taken such an active role in everything, from getting up with him in the middle of the night, changing his diaper, as well as making sure I am keeping up with eating and drinking my water. He is such a proud daddy. Of course none of this surprises me as he has always been so proud of the idea of being a father when I was pregnant, and even before that loved being around our friends children. He really is a kid at heart. I love him. Bryan will head back to work in the first week or two in February, even then I am sure he will want to stay home longer. We will just be out of money by then.

A random fun tid bit of information, my engagement rings finally fit again!

Below is some highlights of the past two weeks.
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Have you taken a moment to look at that baby ticker on the menu area? Does that say I have less than four weeks left until I become a member of the parenting awesome children society? Where has these past 35+ weeks gone? I swear I was just breaking the news on my blog that I was pregnant.

My pregnancy has been pretty rock solid, besides the small bump in the road that I talked about previously. That bump has not even been spoken of nor thought of since that week in time. Why should it bother us? Our baby does not going to have a tail! As well as the fact that all other tests and visual inspections in ultrasound point to a baby who is developing “normally” as it’s legs are in the 60%ile so “average height” (I would think, or on the shorter side?) and the only downer is that little baby bumble bee’s head is in the 80%ile (It has a big smart brain!) Though these numbers were from my 19 week ultrasound so who knows somebody might have had a crazy growth spurt and have even longer legs, and hopefully not a larger head.

I have been having lots of people ask me what I like most about being pregnant, well I would have to say I like the fact that I am able to grow and develop a living thing. Just that thought of how it all goes down, the egg, the sperm the magic between mommma & dadda results 40 weeks later with an amazing new human being. I often “forget” that I am 35+ weeks pregnant, as I just feel so good, it is not until I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror or see my own shadow that I realize just how pregnant I really am, or perhaps I am reminded that I am actually pregnant with the fact I have a very active bladder jumper and I feel like I have to use the bathroom all the time (I actually always seem to be in there). I love the feeling of every bump, jump, kick, flip, hiccup, punch, stretch etc. It is truly an amazing feeling that I will never grow tired of feeling (& I’ll miss it once it is all over with) I even enjoy the “big” kicks, the foot under my right rib cage, the little baby bum that rises on my upper left of my stomach. I swear it likes doing that when people are talking about the baby.

What I have not been enjoying? That would be simple, the multiple midnight bladder emergencies, the lack of ability to sleep peacefully and the fact I cannot roll over without feeling like a whale, late night heartburn. As well as the recent swelling I have been getting in my legs and ankles. Though I guess that is all apart of being pregnant now isnt it?

Last Sunday was my family & close friends baby shower. I had all my aunts from my dad & mom’s side of the family as well as all the aunties on Bryan’s side of the family getting together to celebrate my ability to grow a baby. There were even a few other random and great people there, from my sister in law’s mother in law, my female cousins, a few of my best friends… It was a really great time had by everyone. Not to mention the little baby bumble bee got some pretty wicked toys and well needed items. I’m in the middle of hand writing out all my thank you cards. If you got me something for the little one, your card is in the mail very soon.

Bryan and I finally got the babies room all set up, and ready to go. I just need to buy a few mattress covers as I don’t want leaky diapers to soak through to the nice mattress (icky!) as well as pick up crib sheets as well as a few odds and ends and the babies room will be ready for its arrival. I also planning on picking up a bassinet so we can have baby close to us in our bedroom until it gets the routine of life and can sleep the night.

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This past Thursday I had the day off due to a later afternoon midwife appointment, why I had the whole day off is beyond me, I’ll just blame my supervisor as he thinks these baby things are cheap and taking a whole day off without pay is beneficial to my financial gain. Oh well, I still enjoyed myself none the less running around town doing various errands and then meeting up with my belly buddy Lisa at the mall for some baby related shopping.

We walked around the mall for a while just window shopping and talking babies and what super power our babies might have. As Lisa had already finished her pre-wedding related shopping she was wanting to get some childrens books so her and her pre-husband could read books to their growing baby “Sprocket” as it can hear them right now and has been responding to their voices. I thought that this was an excellent idea for my own developing human to pick up a few new child related books that it can call its own, as some of you may or may not know my personal collection of children’s books are for my hands only! I don’t think I talk enough to my belly enough, but I do talk telepathically to it all the time so off to the book store we went.

I think I spent more time picking up random children’s books and reciting the first few pages, or giving a personal review and summary of just how awesome or awful the book actually is. I hope Lisa did not think I was to children’s literature crazy. I ended up picking up three great books. “Alligator Pie – Poems: Dennis Lee” “Good Night Vancouver – David J. Adams & Anne Rosen” and “Baby Beluga – Raffi”

I had to leave our shopping adventures earlier than I had wanted as I had to get to a midwife appointment and battle traffic which is never a fun thing to do on a beautiful hot summer day in Vancouver. My appointment went well, just general chit chat and getting to hear the Belly Bumble Bee’s heart beat again (it sounds like a train – chuga-chuga-chuga… I cant remember what my midwife said the bpm were, I was to busy listening to my little one), I go for yet another ultrasound next week (more on the previous ones at another time)

I had also bought a few baby clothes from Old Navy, I could not resist myself, as baby jeans are just to adorable to resist buying. Also do you realize how hard it is to find gender neutral baby clothing? It either has frills & lace, or has sports related rugged masculine theme to them. I do think these outfits can easily be worn by a little girl or little boy. Rock star Baby! Oh yeah!

Just wanting to test out the wordpress app for the iPhone. I got myself an iPhone 4 last week, it is my cool new toy! I need app suggestions