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Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

We survived! Yay for us! With Baby Holly turning 6 weeks old as of yesterday, my wife and I have apparently made it through what I hear is the toughest part of the postpartum days: the first 6 weeks.

That first month or so is when you as the parent must figure out the details on what works best for your baby regarding sleeping schedules, formulas, and diapers. It’s a culture shock as a parent, even after already having one child. I knew it would be challenging going into it.

However, I must have kept my expectations lower than I needed to because, honestly, it hasn’t been that bad!

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

Despite us managing our newborn’s infant acid reflux, for the post part, things have been fairly predictable. There have really been just 10 simple steps to caring for our newborn during the first 6 weeks:

1)      Feed her an ounce, burp her. Repeat until each ounce is gone.

2)      Change her diaper.

3)      Play with her by talking to her and helping her do exercises.

4)      Take a cute picture of her.

5)      While you teach yourself newborn photography, by the default of taking so many pictures, Instagram your work to show it off to friends and family.

6)      Change her diaper.

7)      Wrap her up in a blanket and rock her to sleep with the pacifier in her mouth,

then place her in the crib.

8)      Change her diaper, now that she finally fell asleep but wet herself again.

9)      Rock her back to sleep and place her in the crib again.

10)  Repeat two and a half hours later when she wakes up again.

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

Those are my 10 simple steps. This has been my life for the past 6 weeks.

Granted, these 10 steps have been my wife’s reality more than mine, since she’s on maternity leave, but I still work during the day. A lot of the time my main responsibility is to take care of our 5 and a half year-old son Jack while my wife Jill takes care of the baby.

This past weekend I celebrated the end of those first 6 weeks by shaving off my postpartum beard, as well as getting a hair trim. As you can see though, I was unable to overcome the temptation of shaving (and Instagramming) in stages.

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

And if my eyes look bloodshot and cross-eyed, and I look like I need some ginseng because of lack of sleep, it’s probably true.

As for Baby Holly, she doesn’t have that problem so much…

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

Fare thee well.

Postpartum: My 10 Steps of Caring for a Newborn during the First 6 Weeks

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Dear Jack: We’ll Definitely Be Dangerous… We Just Won’t Get Hurt

5 years, 4 months.

Dear Jack:

Dear Jack,

I suppose it’s safe to say a new weekly ritual is in full swing. This makes the 3rd weekend in a row where you and I have gone exploring in the surrounding neighborhoods, using a creek that begins in our backyard
as our road.

Dear Jack:

Before Mommy left the house to get her “pre-going into labor haircut” and then to Kroger to buy groceries, she smiled and told me, “Be safe. Don’t be dangerous out there.”

I smiled back and promised her,

“Oh, we’ll definitely be dangerous- we just won’t get hurt.”

About 20 minutes later as you and I were about to turn out of our neighborhood in my Honda Element, I asked you, “Jack, where you want to explore today?”

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

We decided to pick up where we left off last week, this time following the creek in the opposite direction. You quickly found the wooden plank you discovered and left behind on Sunday, deciding to take it with us for today’s entire journey.

The plank served three purposes:

#1. A shovel to help you make “chocolate milk” in the creek.

https://familyfriendlydaddyblog.com/2016/03/24/dear-jack-our-new-canon-powershot-g7-x-camera/

#2. A portable table to help you see your instantly growing rock collection.

Dear Jack:

#3. A bridge to help you get across the creek when you didn’t feel like jumping.

https://familyfriendlydaddyblog.com/2016/03/24/dear-jack-our-new-canon-powershot-g7-x-camera/

The further down the creek we trekked, the more exciting and potentially dangerous things became.

You had to make your way across the rocks and the water of the creek by depending on half-rotted boards that were already placed there by other adventurers.

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

And then when we finally came across a more legitimate bridge, even it was crooked; like something from a cartoon movie.

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

Even as I’m telling you this now, it sounds like some kind of weird dream we both experienced.

When we go exploring together, we never really know what surprises await us. Well, fate would have it that we just happened to be aligned with these two tunnels leading up to the bank of a pond…

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

So we crawled through one. Once on the other side, you found an old pumpkin there in the water. I’m not sure why, since this is March, not November.

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

After that, we clumsily journeyed back to the street and found my car; you were exhausted by that point. But we still had about 45 minutes before Mommy would be home, so I talked you to in to letting me take you on a drive.

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

You and I have wondered for over a year now, since we moved to Spring Hill, about that that big blue water tower we had been seeing in the distance.

So we checked it out.

Dear Jack: I Will Be Serving as Your Guide to Danger and the Unknown

We were high up enough where we could even see our own neighborhood and church.

I’m glad you like exploring as much as I do. I suppose it’s becoming a mutual hobby for us.

And though we were slightly dangerous the whole time, we came back home to Mommy without any injuries.

Love,

Daddy

 

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Dear Jack: Our New Canon PowerShot G7 X Camera

5 years, 4 months.

Dear Jack: Our New Canon PowerShot G7 X Camera

Dear Jack,

Last weekend you and I got to test out our brand-new camera: a Canon PowerShot G7 X.

We picked up right where we left off from the weekend before, when we followed that creek to the treehouse.

Whereas my new toy was the camera, your new toy was a gift card holder, which is a functioning toy tractor from Tractor Supply Company.

j1

You made it your mission to run that red tractor through the water and soot in the creek. I served as your camera man.

I love our new camera. The camera I’ve been using for the past 4 and a half years up until this point was the 2011 version of the Canon PowerShot, which was only 12 megapixels.

Dear Jack: Our New Canon PowerShot G7 X Camera

Apparently that’s my favorite brand. I find it very user friendly and absolutely durable. Mommy and I dropped the last one several times and it never damaged the camera at all.

With the upgraded version, we now have 20 megapixels, plus a 1 inch sensor which causes the background to blur; giving the images a more professional look.

Dear Jack: Our New Canon PowerShot G7 X Camera

(Thanks to Best Buy for their educated staff, who were able to enlighten me!)

With your sister Holly scheduled to be born in less than a month, and with you starting Kindergarten this fall, Mommy and I figured it was the right time for a new camera.

j4

As for our journey in the neighborhood walking park a few neighborhoods away from us, we trekked on far enough to discover a really cool school playground.

Dear Jack: Our New Canon PowerShot G7 X Camera

Now that we’ve been exploring the surrounding neighborhoods for the past couple of weekends, I have a feeling this will be the norm for us; that we will try to squeeze in an exploring journey whenever we can.

While Mommy’s taking care of the baby this summer, I’ll be there to guide you to excitement in the great outdoors.

Love,

Daddy

Dear Jack: Our New Canon PowerShot G7 X Camera

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Dear Holly: You’re Over Halfway Ready inside of Mommy’s Tummy

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25 weeks.

Dear Holly,

It was 4 months ago this week that Mommy and I started telling everybody about you. I first officially revealed the news about you in an episode of my 1st web series, Jack-Man.

With your due date on April 21st , the day after my 35th birthday, Mommy is now more than halfway through her pregnancy. As crazy as it sounds, you’ll be making your arrival in just a little more than 3 months from now!

I was telling Mommy this week how weird of a thought it is that when you turn 5 years-old, like your brother Jack is now, I’ll be 40 years-old.

But I would choose 35 or 40 any day over being 25 or 30. I like how settled life is these days. Life is good. It wasn’t that way when I was officially “young.”

With us living in our new house for a year now (we moved in January 29, 2015), our family has basically been on cruise control, in regards to any kind of major challenges.

We’ve survived debt, getting out of debt, car issues, and even job insecurities since your brother was born; in addition to adapting as a family raising a child for the first time.

It looks like you will be born into a stage of our family’s life when things are calm and stable.

Granted, one of my life quotes is this: “Life is either bad and about to get better, or it’s good and about to get worse.”

I believe it’s important to never take for granted when you are going through a smooth patch in life. I am just as aware of God’s grace now as I was when our family lived through those stormier years.

Hopefully, the upcoming challenges this year won’t dramatically alter our smooth sailing days.

Between 1) welcoming you into our family, along with 2) my New Year’s resolution of attempting to do what it takes to go full-time with my blog and YouTube channel, as well as 3) our family possibly replacing at least one of our vehicles, this year is will have its fair share of positive challenges.

I want those kinds of challenges.

Mommy and I have been cleansed by the fire; we have been forced to mature. Now we’re looking forward to keeping life on cruise control, just not staying on the same roads.

Love,

Daddy

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Dear Holly: I Don’t Believe that Anybody Feels the Way I Do about You Now

20 weeks.

Dear Holly: I Don’t Believe that Anybody Feels the Way I Do about You Now

Dear Holly,

It has now been a week since we found out you are our baby girl named Holly. Mommy and I have been so truly happy.

Mommy bought you some dresses and other clothes online already and we have been trying to figure out which baby blanket to buy you as well.

Like I mentioned last week, you really have been over 7 years in the making. We have hoped for you for a long time; it’s only now that the timing would be perfect.

Yesterday as I drove home from work, I was listening to what I believe is one of the best musical recordings of all time, released 20 years ago in 1995; Oasis’s (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?

While I was listening to “Wonderwall”, a song that never gets old to me, I thought about you, as certain lines from the song played over the speakers of my Honda Element:

“I don’t believe that anybody feels the way I do about you now…

There are many things that I would like to say to you but I don’t know how…

And after all, you’re my wonderwall”

Perhaps to some people, the term “wonderwall” never really made much sense in that now classic Oasis song.

But to me, it always made sense- and it especially makes sense in regards to how I perceive you:

I write to you as if you are a real, living person, here with me right here and right now.

But the thing is, you are.

There’s simply a technically in that you are still in Mommy’s tummy, where you’ll be until around April 21, 2015.

So until then, you are my wonderwall.

You are this mysterious wall I can’t climb or get over to the other side; yet you are right there in front of me.

While I can’t yet look you in the eyes, you are just as real and familiar as if you are already here with me in the outside world.

You are my daughter. Man, that seems weird to say.

But seriously, how can anybody else in this entire world feel the way I do about you now?

Love,

Daddy