Happy 2 Week Birthday!

Can't believe that 2 weeks ago today our little boy joined the outside world for us all to hold and cuddle! The time has truly flown by, I can't believe it has already been 2 weeks. I can only imagine how quickly time will pass in the future, so I am trying to take it all in and appreciate all of the little things. Every little smile (even if they are just caused by gas), watching him see new things for the first time, laughing at his super loud and frequent toots, the amazing feeling of being able to settle him during his few moments of fussiness, and so on!

Today we had his 2 weeks doctors appt. He now weighs 8 pounds and 8 1/2 ounces and is 20 inches long! The doctor said that he is obviously eating very well and is growing like a champ! She asked if he continued with having long stretches of sleep at night and actually last night he had slept for 7-7 1/2 hours straight! She said that is perfect and just not to tell my friends (oops :-p)! She said as long as he is eating and growing like he is there is no problems with letting him sleep as long as he wants to! Though she said during the he may "cluster feed" which means he may want to feed every 2 hours, but as long as he averages a minimum of 7 feedings a day then we are good to go! She said I may feel like a milk machine during the day, but at least I am getting good sleep at night! She also said it looks like he possibly has a blocked tear duct in his eye, causing it to get kinda gross and mucusy and also it looks like he has a little yeast infection that was starting to form on his bottom. So she gave us some eye drops and "Magic Butt Cream" and they are both starting to clear up already! But even with those minor things effecting him he is still quite the content lil guy! He is such a little blessing!

As I mentioned in my last post my mom has been staying with us to help us out and to spend time with Zeke. It has been so nice having her here, she has been doing the laundry, cleaning the house, and making dinner! Not sure what I am going to do starting next week when I have to do it all myself! :-) I am sure I will eventually figure it all out!

Last night we made our first trek out to the dog park as a family! Mike had Ezekiel in the Baby Bjorn and he loved it, both of them! :-) It was a lot of fun to get out the dog park again and the puppies had a blast as usual and were able to burn off some steam, which was def in need! It was so great!

Sorry for the lack of pictures on this post! Here are a couple of random ones!

Zeke and his stylish doo!

Jaxon Bear doing some tummy time!

Since Tuesday, June 14th, 2011 at 5:11 pm...

After everything settled down they gave us an hour or so to spend some time together as a family and then we moved to our room that we would be staying in for the next couple of days. Then Ezekiel had his first visitors!

Proud Uncle Darek & Aunt Steph

Then shortly after there was a knock at the door and it was...

Grandma Bear! She was so excited to see her little Ezekiel!

Grandma Bear seeing Ezekiel for the first time

Grandma Bear and Ezekiel

Then there was another knock at the door and it was Grandpa Bear!

Grandpa Bear and Ezekiel

Proud Grand Bears

Then our friends Marky Mark and Katie came to visit for a bit (we forgot to take pictures!) Then we called it a night and he slept for 4 hours! It was so nice to get some unexpected rest! On Wednesday we had a handful of visitors (which we forgot to take pictures of too), first was our friend Jodi and her kidos, Gabe and Addie, then another friend of ours Shawna, then Mike's Aunt Natalie and cousin Steph, and then my mom came later that night.

On Thursday all of the doctors came to see us and said we were all good to go home whenever we wanted to. We had one last set of visitors in the hospital, some awesome friends of ours Gary and Mary! We didn't know that they were coming and were so happy that they came to meet our little guy!

Gary and Mary and Ezekiel

Then we all got ready to head out!

Z-Man all ready to go home in his Bear outfii

On our way home we stopped by my work so the whole family could get adjusted (I work for a chiropractor), my midwife said that an adjustment would be the perfect remedy for my tailbone (which was still hurting to the point that I could barely sit). Once I got adjusted I was feeling 100% better, Mike got his adjustment, and then Ezekiel got his first adjustment! We were just a couple blocks from Mike's work so we swung by there quick to show off our little guy. When we got home Ezekiel got to meet his awesome big brother Jaxon Bear and his cousin Brodie!

Jaxon Bear and Ezekiel meeting for the first time

The pups are doing great with the Zeke on scene. We are making sure to still give them a lot of attention and include them in on stuff with the baby too. Later that night we had the Foss family come to visit, then Uncle Darek and Aunt Steph, and then Grandma Bear. That night our little guy slept great, we pretty much had to wake him every 3-4 hours to eat! Praise God!

On Friday, Mike worked a half day so my mom came up in the afternoon to hang out with us. Then that night we went out for our first big outting! We went to Pottery Barn Kids at the Galleria and then Target! He did so great and just slept the whole time!

On our way to Pottery Barn Kids

Looking so cute in his carseat!

On Saturday we had Annette, Andy, & Moby Wind over to visit! Jaxon was so excited to see Moby again and tell him all about having a brother! Then my parents came up to spend the night, we went for a walk, and hung out.

On Sunday my we gave Ezekiel his first bath!

Then later on my Uncle Mark (my dad's brother) came up to visit and Darek and Steph came over too to celebrate Father's day! We grilled out and then we all walked to downtown Chaska to the ice cream shop for a yummy treat! The perfect first fathers day for Mike!

Then on Monday we headed down to my hometown of Waseca to have some newborn photos take by the awesome Jennifer Nace. I have been following her work for a number of years and couldn't wait to be able to have her take some photos for us! She does such an a great job and has so much patience with these little ones! Especially our little guy, he was not cooperating for most of the time! But because she rocks so much we finally were able to get all the photos that she wanted to get! Here are a few sneek peak photos! I love them so much!

After our exhausting photo shoot, we headed to my parent's house where my grandma (my mom's mom) was waiting to meet her great grandson! We hung out for a bit and then my mom and I swung by the neighbors to say hi quick on our way out of town as my mom is coming up to stay with us for the next 2 weeks. Then that night Marky Mark and Katie and our friend Jamie came over to visit.

On Tuesday Ezekiel had his follow up pediatric appt. The doctor said he was doing beyond great and was a champion! They usually like to see newborns back to their birth weight by their TWO week appt and he was 8 pounds 1 ounce at his ONE week appt, which puts him 3 pounds over! So this means that without question he has the hang of the whole feeding thing! So the doctor said that since he is such a rockstar eater that we can just let him sleep as long as he wants and we don't have to wake him anymore to feed him. And more than likely what will happen is that he will sleep 5-6 hours at night and then during the day might go a couple stints where he wants to be fed every 2 hours. She said he will want to have between 7 & 12 feedings a day, but he will probably be closer to 7 or 8. So that night we did just that and he slept for 5 1/2 hours! It was wonderful! But before that we headed to church because there was a guest speaker there and Ezekiel did great he slept the whole time and then after he got to meet our good friends Dave and Carissa!

On Wednesday we layed low for the day and just hung out around the house! My mom and I put Ezekiel in the Moby wrap and took the puppies for a walk, he loved being in the Moby wrap! So glad that he liked it, it will be perfect to be able to take him places in, especially the dog park!

Then today we kind of just hung out around the house again. Though it was a big day for Ezekiel, he got his second bath and also his umbilical cord fell off! So we got to do tummy time on the boppy pillow for the first time!

Jaxon Bear joining in on tummy time!

(he has been doing tummy time on daddy's chest up until now)

He has been such a rockstar at tummy time and lifting his head! He is continuing to sleep great all the time, he sure is making the transition into parenthood pretty easy for us! We truly are loving our expanded family, he is the perfect addition! And so darn cute too, maybe I'm biased! We are truly thanking God for our little miracle!

The Details (but not too many!)

This post is really for dual purpose, so I have the details of the day in writing so I can share them with our little Z-man when he gets older (I would like to think I would remember, but I have a feeling its kind of like your wedding day, you start to forget the little details over time) and to share with our family and friends how it all went down! This may get lengthy and I apologize for that!

I actually thought that Monday the 13th was going to be the big day as the "contractions" that I was having were different then the braxton hicks that I had been having previously. I was at work and continued to work my full work day as the "contractions" weren't getting anymore intense or closer together. Then when I got home that night everything completely stopped! I was a bummed! The day before Mike and I had discussed that we really need to pack our hospital bags as we had not done that yet, so we agreed to make sure we got it done on Monday night (good thing!). I went to bed that night without any signs of anything going on, then I was suddenly awaken at 2:30 AM to some activity in my back & belly and it wasn't our little guy kicking around!

I got up to go to the bathroom and I thought that my water had broken, but I wasn't sure. I laid back down in bed and as they started to get closer together I started to time them. (I have this handy contraction tracker app on my phone!) They continued to get closer together, it was about 5:30 AM and I decided I should wake Mike up. So he started to track my contractions for me and after a bit they were to the point that we decided to call in and let them know where I was at. So I jumped in the shower and got ready and Mike said that they said that we could head in. So we did a couple things around the house and said good-bye to the puppies and headed for the hospital at about 7:30 AM.

It took us about 15 minutes to get to the hospital and got all checked in and everything. They did all their checks and monitoring and also did a test to see if my water had broke or not. The test came back that my water had not broken (if I would of known that I would of stayed home longer, but I was supposed to head to the hospital ASAP after my water broke, since I tested positive for the group b strep test and had to get started on the antibiotics. So if it had broken I already would of been pushing it by not going in right away.), I was dilated to 6 cm, my contractions were 30 seconds long and between 2 and 4 minutes apart, and baby was doing great! They admitted me, she asked if I was going to do an epidural and I said no, so we just headed over to our birthing suite and settled in.

They got the IV in me and started the antibiotics (which I think was one of the most painful parts of all, but I don't really like needles at all) and then I had to have it every 4 hours after that, so I had it at noon and then again at 4. We called my family to tell them we were at the hospital and my mom decided to leave work and come up to be with us. She got there around 10:30 and hung out in the birthing suite with us. During this time my contractions weren't that bad at all and only being 30 seconds long I knew I could just breathe through them and actually I walked around a lot and walked them off. At about noon they checked me again and I was dilated to 8 cm, so I decided after my next dose of antibiotics I would get into the birthing tub and labor and deliver there. So at 1:00 my mom stepped out the room, and then they broke my water (now I sure know what it feels like for your water to break! So gross!) and we discovered that there was meconium in the fluid. So then that changed my delivery plans as they do not let you have a water birth if there is meconium in the fluid, but I could still labor in the tub. So I got in the tub and that felt really good, but after about an hour I decided I wanted to go back to my "walking it off" method (so it was fine that I couldn't do a water birth anyways). After about 30 minutes I was dilated to 10 cm and was ready to start pushing. I pushed for about and hour and 45 minutes, his head was a little cocked to the side so he got a little stuck at the end and pushed on my tailbone and ended up popping it out of place.

He came out all safe and sound and as perfect as perfect can be! There was no problems with the meconium or the group b strep. He was 7 pounds 14 ounces and 19 inches long and that was after he peed and pooed a ton!

His lungs working great!

So overall things went great! I was in labor for a total of 15 hours but it wasn't really a big deal until they broke my water. Then the last 4 hours were a bit more intense but still not that bad at all. My mom asked me now going through the whole process what was the worst part. And I have to say the first several weeks of my pregnancy when I was so sick was the worst part. With labor I at least knew it was nearing the end, but with the morning (noon and night) sickness in the beginning I didn't know when it was going to end. But I have to say I'd do it all again to have the end product of our beyond perfect son! I am so glad that I decided to do it all without pain medication, there wasn't a time throughout the whole days events that I thought I should of gotten an epidural, well maybe until the last 2 contracts! :-P But then the light at the end of the tunnel was so bright I knew I could get through it! I truly praise God for such an awesome experience and for how great everything went!

THE END, or should I say the beginning!

He is here!!!!

Ezekiel James Bemis

Born June 14th, 2011

at 5:11 pm

Weight: 7 lbs 14oz

Height: 19 inches

He is beyond super healthy and mom is doing great too!
Praise God for this little miracle!

More pictures and info about his delivery to come!

Twins?!

Twins...what?

Not the baby kind, the Minnesota kind. Like the baseball kind! :-)
Mike could only wish that we are having twins and guess there is still a chance that a second little one is hiding somewhere in there. But the chances are minimal!

So back to the topic at hand, we had a fun baseball filled weekend! On Saturday morning the boys (Mike, my dad, and brother) decided that they wanted to take in some batting practice. So I decided to tag along figuring getting out into the fresh air and "shagging" some fly balls would be good for me! :-) We packed everything up, including the pups and headed to the ball field. We found a great ball park, which to me means one that can be closed off completely so we can let the pups off their leashes without having to keep a constant eye on them! We had a lot of fun, especially the boys and puppies! :-) They were all like kids in a candy store! Brodie wore out pretty fast and then found a nice shady spot under the bench in the dugout, Jaxon was running and shagging balls for us too. Though he kind of hand it backwards and would chase after the balls that we would throw back into whom ever was pitching and then bring them back to us. Though a couple of times he did bring balls back into the pitcher or from further in the outfield to us! In the end he was having a blast and making us laugh the whole time! Gotta love him!

All of the guys, of course, still have it and were hitting the ball hard! Have to brag on my babe as he jacked one over the fence! As Darek said, our little guy definitely won't have a problem when it comes to strength and power hitting! My dad kept reminding me that if I picked up a bat I had to do it left handed so the baby knew what it felt like! :-) I never ended up picking one up, which is good because I don't know if I would know how to do it left handed! I am excited for our little guy to play sports some day and if he chooses to play baseball (which I don't know if he will have a choice, that and football I have a feeling will be highly encouraged to him!) to have the strength to be a power hitter but also have baseball smarts, which will be instilled in him at a very young age!

Then on Sunday we went to the Twins game with my parents! It was a ton of fun! I kind of thought maybe with all the excitement our little guy would be curious enough about what was going on that he would want to come out and check this world out. But not so much! :-) It ended up being a bit of an overcasty couple of hours (the sun actually came out right as we were leaving) and a little chilly, but not too bad at all and probably better than 106 and humid! Now on to the important stuff, food! I had a super yummy chicken Walk-A-Taco (a taco salad in a cone shaped hard tortilla shell), Kettle corn, and a Killebrew rootbeer! So nummy yummy! Oh yeah, and to make the event complete, the Twins won! Yay! It was a really fun and exciting game to see too!

39 Weeks & 2 days

So here I am 39 weeks and 3 days and most definitely still pregnant! :-) I will keep you updated though!

Into single digits!

We are officially into single digits (of days!) and at the last week until my due date. I don't have too much to update babywise other than at my appt they said everything is continuing to look great! I am dilated to a 2-3 and 70% effaced. Thankfully the crazy hot weather did not effect me in a negative way at all, thank u Jesus! Other than that we just continue to play the waiting game, which I am still perfectly happy doing!

 Belly Pic taken 6/5

Though we don't have much to share on the baby front I do have some other fun things to share. As I have read to keep the last couple of weeks going by fast you should continue to schedule stuff to do, even if you end up having to cancel them. So we have pretty much been doing that, along with getting things checked off our list of things to do!

So we all got our hair done! Even Brodie!Well, Jaxon just got a paw-dicure, which I am also getting today (or a pedicure)! Yay!

Brodie and his summer look!

On Saturday we took the pups the the Minnehaha Dog Park (our first time venturing there)! It was such a blast! Tho the river was really high and it was pretty muddy we still had a blast! The pups just LOVED exploring the park and hiking through the trails. Brodie ran right into the water to cool off and then to our surprise Jaxon even joined him a couple of times! It was a beautiful day, so it felt SO good to get outside and get some sun shining on our faces! The pups totally crashed on the way home and slept all night, as I always say a tired pup is a happy pup!

Brodie swimming in the river

Sunday we met up with our friends, Andy & Annette Wind and their pup, and one of Jaxon's best friends, Moby, for brunch. They are also expecting (in Julyish) so it was fun to meet up and catch up and compare stories and let the pups see each other. It's so fun going through this journey with other friends, tho we will soon be doing it from the other side of the world from each other as they are moving to Sweden in August. We are all bummed (especially Jaxon) but we are excited for them too because we know this is best for their family! We will now just have a new place to go and visit!

Jaxon sulking at the thought of losing his buddy Moby!
(Just kidding he is just soaking up the sun!)

After that we went out for dinner to Burger Jones for my birthday (which was on Monday). Had a super yummy version of the White Trash Burger (a cheese burger with cheese curds on it)! YUM YUM! Just what a prego lady needs! LOL! Or maybe just wants! :-)

Steph & I waiting for our table at Burger Jones

Monday was my birthday, which was pretty low key during the day, as I just went to work. But after, we had a baby shower with some friends for my sister-in-law Steph, which was a ton of fun! It was great to shower her and my nephew with lots of love and gifts!

Then on Tuesday I had my midwife appt and an extra long day at work of training our new staff. But then Mike had surprised me with tickets to see the Cirque De Soleil show Ovo that is in town right now! I was totally surprised and had no idea that he had this up his sleeve! We got to the show and found our seats, well I end up with a guy to my left, Mike to my right, and then another guy on the other side of him (all about the size of Mike). So to say we were a bit cramped was an understatement, so Mike asked the usher if we could move somewhere with an extra seat next to me. We got the super blessing and got moved to the 5th row! I call it the prego upgrade! ;-P We had people from the show flying over our heads and running around behind us, it was SO fun! It was such a great and fun night! Probably one of our last real date nights before our little guy comes, so I'm glad it was such a fun night to remember!

Ready for a fun night under the big top (don't worry they had AC)

Then Wednesday night we just went for a walk, did some stuff around the house, and I rested! Last night unfortunately was not as fun as the week leading up to it has been. We headed down to my hometown, Waseca, for the visitation for a high school friend of mine. I found out on Monday that one of my friends that I was in colorguard with, Toni Huber, passed away in a motorcycle accident on Sunday. Though it has been a handful of years since I have seen her it is still really hitting me hard (maybe its the hormones) and last night at the visitation was no exception, I was a mess! Toni was such a wonderful friend and I loved her dearly though we definitely had our fair share of battles! :-) For those that have never experienced the life of a Waseca Marching Jay (I know a bit corny here) and more specifically the life of a colorguard member, we pretty much become a family by the end of the season! And as families do we loved each other through thick and thin and Toni and I definitely had a lot of both! Looking back on it now I just laugh, but we used to be able to push each others buttons all too well! But in the end we loved each other so much! It has been so neat to see my colorguard girls come together over the past week to provide love and support for the family. It totally brings me back to the days of high school when we were always there for each other and so nice to know that we haven't lost that! It just makes me so proud to be apart of such a wonderful group of ladies and even though a lot time has passed since we have spent that time together the love for each other has not changed. ***Super corny warning*** I guess that's why our song for marching band was "Friends are friends forever" by Michael W. Smith. Though it is unfortunate that it takes such not fun circumstance, but it was so nice to see a handful of the girls last night. This is just a reminder as always to live each day to its fullest because you never know when it is your last and hug your loved ones extra long!

I read a quote yesterday that said "What if you only woke up today with what you thanked God for yesterday?"

We love you all! Thank you for your love, support, and prayers for our little guy and our family during these exciting times! We know that because of people like you in his life he will grow up to be an amazing man that will do awesome things with his life!

The Count Down is ON!

We are down to the final 2 weeks (ish), obviously depending on when this little man decides to make his appearance! The crazy thing to me is that it could be tomorrow or it could be a month from now! I guess that's what makes moms to be crazy when it comes to the waiting game! But everything that I said in my previous post is still the case as far as comfort wise so I am perfectly content with him hanging out for a while longer!

I think we almost have everything ready to go to welcome him into our home! My dad is working on the changing table, so we should be able to add that to the room soon! My mom has some of her friends working on the curtains for us, so I would think those should be done soon as well! And once we have those final couple of pieces put together then the little guy's room will be mostly complete!

Some of the things that we have done over the past week or so:
Friday Mike and my dad set up the crib in the baby's room! So it is really fun to have that all set to go!

As I think I mentioned, my mom loves to do laundry so she blessed us a ton by doing all of the baby clothes and sheets and such! I have it organized out by size for the most part, some of it is just waiting to go in the drawers of the changing table once that is in.

We got the pack and play set up in our bedroom, which is what we are going to use for the first weeks or months (or however long you keep a baby in your room). It also has bassinet and changing table all in one, so it is perfect for our room!

We officially been welcomed into the world of parenthood via batteries! We bought our first 10 pack of D size batteries (I think this is the first time I have ever bought size D batteries!) and we already need to buy more! But the good news is that we have all of the lil guy's stuff ready for his enjoyment! 

We got our car seat & bases installed yesterday. That was way more involved than I ever thought it could be! We made an appt with the Chaska Police Dept rep that does this as a part of her job. She said that we picked out one of the best and safest carseats that is available, which I kind of knew, but is always good to hear! She took about 45 minutes with us showing us the 3 ways that the car seat can be installed into vehicles, the best ways for it to be installed, the importance of keeping a clean car (ahem, Michael), how to harness our little guy into the carseat properly, then she installed the one base into Mike's car and then had Mike install the other into my truck while she watched. Everything that she went through was really interesting and I am REALLY glad that we took the time to meet with her and have her show us everything and teach us everything! I know our carseat would not of been installed properly if we wouldn't of! What a great service to offer!

We even have already had our first toy fatality!

LOL! Needless to say I was not being a good mom and I was not keeping an eye on Jaxon and he found a toy in the baby's toy basket that looked like a good one! (In his defense, I saw a toy exactly like this at PetCo, except it had a squeaker in its head.) I couldn't even be mad at him because it was totally my fault and I knew this day would come and I am sure will continue to happen as both pups and babes learn the difference between each others toys. Fun fun!

14 days and counting! Here we go!