Charlie was born on a Monday night at 9:16 PM. We did not get to go home until Wednesday afternoon. I was a little terrified about getting home of course, but I was looking forward to a freaking shower mostly. Now, I am sure you can shower in the hospital if you ask enough, but I just chose to sit in my own filth for two days.
When we were leaving the hospital, I remember sitting in the room with the door open and hearing other babies crying. I was smugly thinking "Oh well Charlie barely cried at all. Poor mothers." Then I had to put Charlie in the car seat. I need to note that before Charlie was born I never held a newborn baby in my life. So as you can imagine I also have never placed a newborn in car seat. Sooooo, yes he was screaming his head off. And I became those mothers I pitied. Awesome how that works.
Eventually he got over it and fell asleep on the short car ride to the pharmacy and then home. At the pharmacy they had my insurance screwed up so I had to stand around for far too long. Much longer than any woman who just pushed a baby out should have to stand around for. I thought I was going to pass out and I texted Erich since I was pissed. He texted back that Charlie took a dump and was having a conniption. This just caused me to be "that" woman crying in the pharmacy. Funny how when I was pregnant I found myself crying over a frozen pizza for absolutely no reason, to having the baby and crying because my baby took a doodie and I couldn't help him.
We got everything settled and headed home and experienced the first blowout of the dozens to come. Erich wanted to start a tradition where we take pictures of ourselves every time we got pissed or pooped on. We made it through two pictures and decided that was enough to get the point.
One of the most stressful things about bringing the baby home was how our dog would respond. He was our baby for three years so as you can guess he was totally freaked out by the tiny human. He used to think he was a toy in the beginning. Charlie would move in my arms and Seamus would jump up and try to get his moving limbs. Now, I love my dog a lot, so it would kill me when I would have to push him and yell at him. One time Seamus barked and jumped up my leg to nip Charlie and I literally had to kick him. Oh yeah this led to more tears (hormones are soooo weird). Seamus is a pretty smart dog if I do say so myself, so after some time he got used to Charlie being in his life and now he has accepted him as part of the pack and protective of him. It's too damn cute.
So before the baby comes you always hear about the nesting stage.I spent a good bit of time folding stuff, organizing, cleaning, etc. Baby came and everything went out the window. Everything I had set up just did not work once Charlie was in our lives. We had to change all of our stuff around, but whatever. Variety is the spice of life.
My sisters were dying to meet Charlie so they came up the weekend after we got home. My little sister is a photographer so we got some great newborn pictures of him taken. He was pretty cooperative and now I think he freaking owns the camera. Also, reminder, this is less than a week after he was born so I was still so completely out of it.
Because I had six weeks maternity leave and everyone was dying to see this little guy we took a road trip from Chicago to Louisiana and Texas to visit our family and friends. This is a pretty great time to do it since he sleeps most of the time anyhow, but you better bring tons of clothes. I think the angle they sit in their car seats just creates messes. It's like the carseat manufacturers and cleaning product distributors are in some sort of conspiracy. Also, why don't po-dunk gas stations have changing tables? We were forced to wing it. Which has basically become my parenting style ever since.
Speaking of winging it, I don't think I will be winning parent of the year award when I say that every time Charlie needed to eat, I would crawl into the backseat while on the road and just pop him on the boob. Yep I would take him out of the carseat and hold and feed him while going 70 mph down the highway. In hindsight I now see the total dangers in this, but at the time that's what made the most sense to me. Not so much anymore I can assure you.
First stop was Colfax, Louisiana for Great Grandma Marie.
Then we went to we alternated between Lafayette, Louisiana and Houston, Texas. Charlie was quite popular. Who would have thought? Erich and I took the approach of sleeping as much as Charlie would allow. I know they say to sleep when he is sleeping, like when he is napping. But we just chose to sleep until noon with him since he would get up 3 or 4 times in the night. It worked out and it was a nice refreshing trip. Although near the end of our three week trip I was so ready to go home.
I am not sure if it is like this with all new moms, but I could not stand to hear everyone's opinions about what I need to be doing with him. I know lots of people would just say things in passing, but I am new at this so I heard everything and would get upset. Erich is awesome and can just let things roll of his back, I am not like that so I would just fume about things after awhile. Now, this is really lightened up and I think there is some sort of silent understanding or something. Anyway, three weeks were ending and I had one more week before I had to return to work so Erich and I hit the road to get back.
LSU LSU LSU
Grandpaw
GGMa
TT (Tante Tiffany)
Aunt G
Uncle Sean
Papa
Uncle Greg and Uncle JP Thibodeaux
Tante Vicki
Uncle Bart
Tante Liz
Aunt Gabbie
Aunt Sherry
Oma
Told you he was popular. It was busy month, but we had to head back to the real world which included work and cold weather. Everyone bought Charlie winter clothes so we were ready!
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