The Coming of Baby Eric

Life has been very much, lately.  I don't know if that came across like I mean it to, but its hard to put into words.  So much.  But I would like to share some of the sweet and sad things that have been happening in our lives over the last few months.  I'll try to keep the catching up short and sweet.  But it's hard to keep long ordeals short, so bear with me.

So to kick things off, the coming of our newest little family member...

When my water broke 8 weeks early (on Aug. 13th), I was pretty scared. We had planned to have this baby "all natural" at a birthing center with midwives.  Well once again our hopes for that flew out the window.  I spent a week in the hospital (Sacred Heart Medical Center, Spokane WA.) that was very anxious and though confined to a bed, very busy.  While on bed rest in the hospital I tried to get a lot of things taken care of.  There's no pause button for life's demands.  I also frantically tired to get as much preparation as I could done that I hadn't done yet, since I was planning on having several more weeks more of cooking baby #2.  Hardest of all was not seeing and caring for my little Gus.  He spent many days and even nights with his wonderful grandparents and wonderful aunts and uncles though.  Thank goodness for them.    

With Gus I had had myself very psyched up for the labor and deliver.  But I hadn't done that yet with this pregnancy, so the first few days in the hospital were spent desperately trying to get myself there mentally.  To the point where I had myself once again convinced that I could have this baby and was strong and didn't need the hospital interventions like an epidural.  I did get there thankfully before I went into labor a week later.

A last photo of me Pregnant.

  Gus enjoying himself while visiting me

 Loving on Gus in the Hospital

Besides the fact that it was 7 weeks early, and in a hospital with poking and prodding nurses and doctors instead of at the birthing center with calm, experienced midwives- the labor and delivery went great!  It was very fast and I got the V-Back delivery with out an epidural that I wanted.  My midwife actually came and was my coach/duala. And Dan of course was once again my rock and support threw every moment.  After having him I felt amazing and couldn't believe I had just had a baby!  SOOO much better than coming off of having a C-Section!  I wanted to get right up and run around, but they wouldn't let me of course :)

We hadn't found out previously what our baby was.  So we also had the joy of finding out our new little baby was a BOY for the first time just moments after he was born.  It was as wonderful as I imagined it would be to wait.  I got to hold him moments after he was born and his sweet personality was very evident already.  He looked all around and was so very quiet and calm.  I was so surprised by this since he had just gone thru being born and was in "a whole new world" for the first time!  But that's our little boy.  Quiet, calm and strong.  

He came out beautiful at 5 lb. 12 oz., 18.5 inches long at 6:24 pm on August 20th after about 12 hours labor.  He had precious little round cheeks.  All the NICU nurses loved his cheeks because they don't usually get chubby cheeked preemies :)  He was strong and breathing, and just needed some help with eating at first.

Poor little boy the evening he was born. So glad when he finally came home and got rid of all those monitoring wires!

Holding Daddy's finger so tight!

Eric had to be under the lights for a few days, but he had a faithful penguin friend that endured it along with  him. 

Sleeping

My first morning back home after having Eric.  So glad to be home again with Gus, but so sad Eric couldn't come too.

It took a couple days, but we finally found and settled on a name for our little boy.  

Eric Murland Bell
He's our little Eric and my husband got his long awaited wish to name a son after his profound father Murland.  The first person we told was Dan's dad and he was very touched and honored.  And now it means more to us than ever that our son bears the same name as his Grandpa.

Me snuggling with Eric for the first time, so wonderful!

Gus' first Glimpse of his baby brother.

First Family Photo, Gus is upset cause he can't get to his baby brother.

Eric is the snuggliest baby ever!

We couldn't get enough sleepy snuggles with this little chunk muffin :)

He remained in the NICU for 33 very very VERY long days.   The last couple weeks he was there seemed simply due to the hospitals stringent standards of what and where they thought Eric needed to be eating wise, before he could come home.  He nursed great with me but bottle fed very poorly.  The doctors felt since he was premature that he should have a  bottle each day supplemented with formula to get extra calories.  But since he couldn't eat from a bottle well they kept him there.  It broke my heart a little each time I had to leave our little boy,  to go home to Gus, and again when I had to leave Gus to go back to see Eric.  I constantly felt like I couldn't be enough to either of my sons as I desperately tried to be there for each of them as much as possible each day, driving back and forth to Spokane twice a day for 33 days.  Finally we jumped threw the hoops and the doctors were satisfied and we got to bring Eric home and our family was for the first time together and complete!

Finally Coming Home!!!