One month old

Today Jude is one month old! Our survival and sanity despite sleepyness and big baby care learning cure is a big credit to our parents for all their help, our friends for all their meals, and God...for giving us a content baby who sleeps well.

Moments after Jude arrived May 27th

Today was baby's one month checkup. Jude now weighs 10lbs, 13 ounces and is 21 7/8 long. A friend teases us that I actually delivered a 2 month old baby.

Years later Jude will ask "Why does my hair look orange in this photo?"

Jude celebrated his one month day with lots of spit up and listening to some Bach in his bassinet. He also got another visit from Grandma Carole. We joked that its amazing my brother and I somehow thrived and grew, even though we never listened to Mozart as infants. Greg adds that with the Mozart I might have skipped 3 grades instead of just one. :-)

Once more, with gusto (and mulch!)

So, the third and final installment of grandparent help arrived last week with Greg's parents Henry and Nancy. Due to distance (they live in Baltimore) they were not able to be there for the birth, so this was also their first time to meet the little guy!

Unique among the grandparents, Jude is the not the first grandchild for the Millers. They have two other grandchildren, Meredith and Andrea, who have been with us for a few years. Experience counts in the world of grandparenting, of course, particularly helping to make a number of things like diapers and bottles and soothing fussy babies seem downright routine... which is very encouraging from new-parents-on-the edge.

There was one other feature of the Miller grandparent visit that was huge: gardening. Yes, that is what I meant to type. If you know Kara and I well, you'll know that we take great pride in our yard and we find it to be a relaxing haven for us in the summer months. Kara has done a great job planning and planting and maintaining it, but this year the garden has seen no love... whether Kara was unable to bend over during pregnancy in spring or neither of us having any time to pull weeds with a new baby, the garden has been in OK shape but not nearly how we like it.

Enter Henry and Nancy.

They are very good in the garden, and were gracious enough to answer our call for help. You'll see some pictures from our adventure out to Planter's Palette near Wheaton, where we picked up so many plants we could barely fit the stroller in the Blazer! The helped us plant everything, and mulched all the beds (we have a lot). Truly a ton of work. I'm not sure what the appropriate gardener cheer is... "boy, you really turned that one over"? Well, whatever it is, Henry and Nancy get it. Basically, they saved summer for us... and now for Jude, too!

It's sad that they live further away and it will be months instead of weeks that we see them again--and we've promised they don't have to work so hard next time.

One bit of closing. We received a good piece of advice from Henry that we should pass on, in case you haven't heard it: Never try to make a happy baby happier. Sage advice as we try to figure this little guy out.

Shortly after arrival

Out on a plant-buying adventure
Hangin' with Grandma Nancy

a bedtime story

Jude is only about a month old but he already has a mini routine around bedtime. Every few days he gets a bath before bed. We usually wrap him in a hooded towel. The cuteness character heads on these are more for mom and dad at this point than Jude, who is still trying to discover that he has hands.

Jude chillin in alligator towel

Next Greg checks and changes Jude's diaper. Actually if you haven't heard, Greg changed every baby diaper for the first several days of Jude's life. It was his daddy task. And it was awesome for mom who was recovering. Finally on day 3 or 4 he showed Grandma Carole and Kara his diaper changing routine and they began to help.

Dad on diaper duty

After a diaper change Jude heads to the crib to get swaddled. If you don't know, it begins in the hospital where they wrap babies tightly in blankets like little caterpillars. Some experts say it makes baby more secure by recreating a 'womb' environment. Not having seen the womb environment, we're not sure, but we do know he sleeps much better when he isn't flailing his arms around and knocking himself awake on accident.

Prepare to swaddle

We don't use blankets to swaddle Jude. Instead we have these great swaddlers that you tuck and velcro. Thanks Tori for the great suggestion.

Caterpillar baby

After the swaddle Jude gets one more meal before bed. Both mommy and Jude found it best not to include a photo of this part. After that its off to sleep for baby Jude, usually around 9:30pm.

Jude "Dines" Out

Now that Jude is three weeks old we have successfully attempted the stressful First Bottle Feedings Away From Home. Jude dined out at the lovely Planter's Palate Garden Store in Wheaton, and less successfully dined out in the Costco parking lot.

Dad feeds Jude while Grandma supervises

Jude and his BPA free bottle

We decided to go for BPA free bottles. Its a chemical in hard clear plastics which some studies say might be dangerous. We haven't tried other bottles with him but he does fine with the Born Free line we have (Thanks Annisia & James for the bottle gift set!)

Week 3 bottle feedings are still a bit messy. Jude dribbles out a bunch while trying to eat. But its much, much better than the bottle he got at the end of Week 1. Afterwards he seemed to forget how to eat when mommy fed him later. So she banned the bottle until late in Week 2.

Jude's first bottle ever