Cutest Baby?

How do you know if you have the cutest baby in the world? It's easy. You don't, because I do.

This picture was taken today during a class photoshoot where Dylan was one of the models. The guy to the right with a lens bigger than my arm was a little disconcerting. Might have been zooming in to see the cuteness of Dylan's atomic structure. Dylan did a great job! In one of the poses with him in my arms, looking blissfully up into my eyes I felt like I was really connecting with my son. He seemed to know that I was thinking and really could really look forward to who he would become. Then pooped on my shirt. Twice. I have photo evidence of this assault. But how do you punish a baby that just eats sleeps and poops? I took his binky out. We're even.

Dylan's First Baby Bath

Yesterday, Dylan had his first real Baby Bath! All we had to do is wait for his circumcision to heal (which amazingly only took about a week) and for his "raisin" to fall off. We waited a little longer, because of all the horror stories we heard that even baby soap dries out a newborn's skin.

Dylan's "raisin" (a.k.a. umbilical cord stump) fell off last week. It was during a 4am diaper change on the morning of Friday, April 17th. My mom gave it to me, which I thought was very interesting to look at, but gross, nonetheless. Apparently some people keep it in their baby record book. Ew. Later in the day, I showed it to Dan. If something grosses me out, I know it gets to Dan even more, and that's really funny to me. It was interesting because you could see the clamp mark on one side, and the inverted shape of Dylan's new belly button on the other. We now know why the nurses in the Childbirth Classes kept calling it a "raisin." It looked just like one. I saved it until Sunday, when my dad came to visit. I thought, as a doctor, he would find it interesting, too. And he did. But he also thought it was gross. Anything that grosses out my dad must be really, really gross, so Dan and I agreed that it should be thrown away after Show and Tell with my dad. But I took pictures first, so Dylan can have be grossed out when he reads his baby book when he's older.

On Friday, April 24th, Dylan experienced his first baby bath. He had his Newborn Photo Shoot scheduled for the next day, so I thought we would get a head start in preparing Dylan for it. Also, he was having a particularly fussy day, so I thought I'd give him something to be fussy about. During one of his naps, I made all the preparations. I dressed in grubby clothes that I could change out of if I got soaked. I put out all the items I would need for getting Dylan into the bath, wash him, dry him, diaper change him, dress him, and get him settled for a nap. After Dylan woke up, Dan was making some phone calls. I held and rocked Dylan to keep him quiet, and waited for Dan to finish his phone conversations, because I was certain that Dylan would start to yell when he was wet.

One of the nurses at the hospital had given me a tip for Dylan's first bath. I was prepping for the worst, so I figured I'd take all the advice I could think of into account for the bath. The nurse had said to take an extra baby towel, drench it in very warm water, squeeze it out, and lay it on the baby. Then you take out one limb at a time, clean it, then put it back under the warm towel. Occasionally you dump more warm water on top of the towel to keep the towel and the baby warm.

I undressed Dylan and put him into the bathtub and buckled him in his little baby mesh bath seat. The baby books say to actually undress him in the tub, but I figured if he messed it would be no big deal since he was already in the tub. No screams yet. I started the water at the tub faucet, but Dylan was far enough away from the faucet to not even get wet. I was worried that even the sound of the rushing water would scare him. It didn't. I waited for the water to get warm, and drenched the baby towel in it. I gently squeezed out the towel, but not enough to get all the warm water out of it. It was the moment of truth. I quickly draped the towel over Dylan's body and waited for a reaction. Dylan let out a contented sigh and looked at me. I remained tense, thinking that he was just working himself up. I filled a small plastic bowl with warm water and gently poured it on the already wet towel. I waited for Dylan's reaction. He stared at me for several seconds, then closed his eyes.

Relieved, I went ahead and gave Dylan the rest of the bath with no incident. Dylan actually fell asleep in his bath chair because he loved the warmth. It just made my job easier. Dan came in and checked on us. He was worried about both of us because it was so quiet and I had been repeatedly warning him that the bath would likely be a very loud event. Dan went to get the video camera.

All in all, the First Bath went well. Dylan was clean and wasn't traumatized by the water or the baby wash soap in the hair. My grubby clothes didn't even get very wet! We are probably just lucky, and Dylan's probably just storing up his resentment for the Second Bath. But as First Bath experiences go, I think this was a success! All clean!

Tiny Little Baby Parts

In the afternoon of Delivery Day at the hospital, we started to make our phone calls announcing the arrival of Baby Dylan. My mom called my cell phone, and Dan answered.

She asked, "Does he look like you?"

Dan answered, "Nope, not even a little bit."

When Baby Dylan arrived, he reminded me exactly of a baby picture of my dad. I share many of the same features as my dad, so I guess Dylan looked a lot like me. As the days progress, though, I'm noticing changes and details that don't look like me at all. It's been fun to try to figure out which baby parts look like which parent.

Initially, many of Dylan's features appear to be Asian, and there is a definite resemblance to my side, and particularly my dad's side of the family. But as Dylan is growing in to himself, and as we look more closely, we are noticing more and more features that don't look Asian at all.

When Dylan was born, his hair was jet black. As the days progress, I see brown highlights that remind me of Dan's color hair. My dad says that the shape of Dylan's ears is not Asian. I don't know anything about ears, but I trust my dad. It's his profession to know about the shapes of ears. Dylan's eyes are big and wide, not little "rainbows" like mine, that tend to disappear when I smile. He has points at the corners of his mouth and his mouth turns up when he's happy and down when he's upset. My mouth is what I call a "Wallace and Grommit" mouth that is rounded and has no corners. Those "chipmunk cheeks" are just like mine, though.

Dylan has relatively long feet, and long fingers and toes. He also has beautiful long and strong limbs. We are hoping that means he will take after Dan and be thin and tall. Dylan didn't have eyelashes when he was born. I was hoping he would have Dan's long eyelashes, and I was worried when it seemed he was born without them. But after about a week, they have been starting to slowly unfurl and lengthen, and it seems that he will have nice eyelashes after all.

And then there are the features that are uniquely Dylan's. Dylan has a beautiful brown skin tone that doesn't come from either parent. I can get a deep tan pretty easily, but I definitely wasn't born brown. Dan thinks that Dylan's eyes look like mine, and I think they look like Dan's. We'll have to see how Dylan develops as time progresses.

Dan and I both agree that we have a beautiful, healthy baby boy. We both have that parent bias that we think he is just so cute, as is evident through Dan's deluge of emails and blog entries, all entitled with some version of "Isn't my kid the cutest thing you ever saw?" We are both definitely having fun our new parenthood, despite the sleepless nights.

Let the Sleeplessness Begin!

My mom has been an amazing source of help during the past couple of weeks. She came down to stay with us and help out as soon as Dylan came home. She helped with the grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning. Best of all, she gave advice when we were at those "What do we do now" moments. It was helpful and reassuring, when, at particularly frustrating times, she didn't know the answer, either. She's helped us deal with the first couple of weeks of this drastic change in our lives with a decent amount of sleep and lots of good humor. Dan, my mom and I have been tag-teaming the sleep schedule, hoping to fend of the sleeplessness nights that exhaust many new parents. However, there were several times when all three of us were standing together with droopy eyelids watching over the crib, while little Dylan slept peacefully. I swear that, at those times, I saw a little smirk on Dylan's face, as if he already knew that he had all of us wrapped around his tiny little pinky.

My mom left yesterday. As she was doing some last minute shopping and cleaning, we warned her that now our house would explode in to the mess it was before she came. The dishes are already piling up next to the kitchen sink, and the only laundry that we've done are the loads my mom lined up before she left. Dylan has taken to suddenly changing his sleep habits to much shorter cycles, and we've given in to just waking up, giving him a diaper change and feeding him every couple of hours or whenever he wants. After all, they say you can't spoil a newborn...

I need a nap.

Sweeter Than Pepsi and Pixie Sticks

Welcome, Dylan Kimura Burnett!!!

Sunday, April 5, 2009

My last day at work was Friday, and I had already planned to be off for Spring Break and the rest of the school year. On Sunday, Dan and I decided to take another belly picture in front of the house, in a similar pose as the first belly pictures we took.

Monday, April 6, 2009

Dan and I attended the Childbirth Tour Night at the hospital. As we were going through the Childbirth Classes throughout this past month, Dan noted that he had never seen a warming table or a birthing bar, and he was very curious to know what the birthing suites at the hospital would be like. I had seen warming tables and baby nurseries in hospitals, so it had not occured to me that it might be a novel idea to Dan. We spent the evening with many, many other couples learning about and viewing the various amenities available to birthing mothers and "coaches" at the hospital.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

I had a routine doctor's checkup, where it was determined I was 2cm dilated. Apparently pregnant women can walk around and be fine for weeks when they are "only" 2cm dilated. 4cm, on the other hand, would be a different story. So, the doctor calmly sent me home with a clean bill of health and said that if he were to guess, he'd guess the baby would be born within the week. But he couldn't be sure.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

12:00am - I couldn't sleep at all at night. I was restless and didn't feel right. I just couldn't get to sleep. I wasn't experiencing anything that I would call pain.

4:00am - I couldn't stand it anymore. I just couldn't stay in bed without making too much noise for Dan to sleep. He had a big meeting scheduled in San Diego that day. I told my sleepy husband that I was going to go out to the front room and read our childbirth literature we had gathered. I didn't think it was any big deal, because all the reading materials from our classes all said if it was contractions, then I wouldn't be able to walk or talk during the uncomfortable phase of the contractions. I obviously could talk to Dan and walk to the front room, and I had no problem reading through the childbirth education material.

5:00am - I had already made too much of a commotion for Dan to sleep. He came out to check on me. I told him that I was uncomfortable, but the intervals did not seem to be consistent. I continued to sit and read and be uncomfortable. I could still talk to Dan and walk around the house. We both decided to add to our hospital packing pile, just in case we might be leaving later that day or the next. So I was wandering around the house, picking up things and putting them in the pile. I didn't want to call the doctor, because I could still walk and talk and I physically, I felt the same as I did the day before. I did not want to have to go to the hospital, just to be sent home again.

6:00am - I decided that maybe the intervals of discomfort might be somewhat consistent. I went and found the stopwatch, got a notebook and pen from the office, sat down and started timing my own contractions. At the start of the uncomfortableness, I would jot down the time. Then I would wait for the discomfort to subside. I would check the stopwatch and write down how long the discomfort had lasted. I waited for the next round. Actually, Dan has video of me timing my own contractions. We all find this video to be very amusing, after the fact.

6:40am - I reviewed my times with Dan, and we both thought the times were pretty consistent, and that the uncomfortable times were lasting longer and getting stronger. Dan called the doctor, who casually asked us to go to the hospital and get it checked out, but he didn't seem certain that it was the Real Thing. Dan and I didn't really think it was, either. I kept telling Dan that I didn't want to get all the way over to the hospital, just to be sent home again. But I was feeling worse and worse, so we went to the hospital. I hated the car ride. That would be the time when I think I would consider what I felt as "pain." The movement of the car made the contractions feel worse.

7:00am - We arrived at the hospital. They brought me to the Labor Evaluation Room. They determined that I was still at 2cm, so they couldn't figure out why I was in such pain. I definitely was feeling pain with the contractions at that point, and I was very unhappy at the thought that they might send me home. The nurse said that she would monitor me for about a half hour, and then she would determine what we were going to do. At that point, I was certain I was going home.

about 7:30am - My water broke. I grabbed Dan's hand and told him happily, "They can't send me home now!" I was right. They admitted me and wheeled me to a birthing suite. They checked my dilation again, and were surprised that I was already at 7cm! That got everyone hopping. I still hadn't had any medication for the pain. The pain was getting worse and worse, but I could still communicate with Dan and the nurses. I was just really, really unhappy about it.

a fairly short time later - About now, my sense of time is all fuzzy, understandably. I finally got an epidural, and the pain slowly subsided. Dan watched the monitors in alarm and watched the lines move up and up as my body experienced the contractions. Fortunately at this point, I was medicated and therefore feeling less and screaming less. Then, the beeps from the baby heart monitor on my stomach strated to fade every time my body had a contraction. The nurse panicked, which of course did not help Dan, who was doing his best to stay calm to help me relax. She took out the internal fetal monitor probe that Dan and I had seen in one of our childbirth classes. It's essentially a small wire coil that is attached to a wire cable that goes to the computer. The wire coil is literally screwed into the top of the baby's head. Dan, understandably, asked if that was really necessary. The nurse tried to explain, but then she realized that I had already dilated to 10cm, and that the baby was in the birth canal and that was why she couldn't detect the heartbeat from my stomach. Now that I was at 10cm, everyone was hopping even faster! The nurse called the doctor to come up right away because the baby was coming. A short time later, the nurse called the doctor again.

9:36am - Baby Dylan was born. Yep, that's a 2 and a half hour labor and delivery. The people at the hospital said each subsequent child you have comes out more and more quickly. So, if we were to have another baby, if I sneeze or have a slight headache, Dan should get me to the hospital right away.

Dylan Kimura Burnett

Born April 8, 2009

at 9:36am

7 lbs. 6 oz.

20 inches long

First Family Picture

Happy Grandparents!

Going Home!!!

April 10, 2009

First Car Ride!!!

Welcome Home!!!

Check out Dan in the background! (I didn't know he was there.)

Look at that head of hair!!!

Dan's pretty sure something's wrong with me...

Baby Crib and Dresser

With the addition of the crib and the dresser, we have deemed the baby room to be complete! We inherited the crib by way of a generous donation from Dan's brother and family. It's one of those convertible cribs that has an adjustible height mattress support, and can eventually be used as a toddler bed. Our nephew just recently graduated from the toddler bed to a big kid bed, so we are fortunate enough to be able to use this crib for Baby.

Dan has been playing with his new camera he got for Christmas, and he envisioned a time lapse movie that made it look like the crib was entering the room by itself and assembling itself. Here is a little movie with the pictures that we took as Dan moved the crib into the room and finished assembling it.

... and then we built the dresser...


Even though I'm the only one in the pictures, I just want to point out that, NO, Dan did not make the pregnant lady build and move the dresser by herself...

All done!