Baby steps.....

Ok. So I am a bad blogger. Most of my friends can tell you that I am a horrible pen pal as well.

So baby steps.... I'll upload some photos of our wee lad and our girl wonder. Then perhaps a little text later.

Gote meets Bean.

This was big sister's visit to the hospital.  We had a little pizza party and introduced the new siblings.  Grae has been waiting and waiting for Bean to arrive and now that he arrived she was a little confused about who was still mommy's tummy.  It took a little while to get her comfortable around the squirmy squeaky baby, but when it was time to head home for bed she wanted to just spend time with him and hold him.  

I don't think she fully understood the whole relationship between the Bean in the belly, and the Bean in the bassinet.  She even seemed a little surprised when I told her Mommy and Bean would come home from the hospital the next day.   

Keyser Söze! Keyser Söze!

He has a name! (No, not really Keyser Söze.)

His name is

Kai D'aurian

We had to settle on a name prior to leaving the hospital-- in fact it was the last thing preventing us from leaving-- (oh, and his bilirubin levels, but more on that later...) Kai means 'Ocean' in Japanese, 'willow tree' in Navajo, and 'and' in Greek. It has many other meaning in Dutch, German, Welsh, and other languages.

D'aurian is a family name (D'auria, actually) on Alana's Mom's side. Doris is also an area of Greece, thus Dorian is someone or thing from that area (i.e. Doric columns)

Grae insists his name is Bean, and corrects me every time I refer to him as Kai. We are discussing how my name is really Anthony, but everyone calls me Tony. She can call him Bean (or beaner or silly bean) for the rest of his life-- that's one of the benefits of being born first. (The lesson on not taunting your sibling will come later.)

More in a few minutes...

Bean has arrived!

Here are the vitals: 8 lbs 9 oz, 20.5 inches long, and a -- boy. Mommy and baby are doing well. No name yet- that will follow soon. We had to meet him first!

Alana poked me about midnight and said she was feeling labor pains and stronger contractions had begun. We got up about 1 a.m. and got things ready to roll to the hospital when the time came. We called the midwife and had everything ready by about 3 a.m. and both tried to rest a little until labor progressed. (Let's be clear-- I laid down and fell asleep for a little over an hour, Alana was busy having contractions)

At about 4:30 things kicked in a bit more. Mark, our neighbor came over for a short time until Suzanne and Kirk (Alana's mum and da) could make it to the house to stay with Grae. Alana was feeling some strong contractions and really wanted to be enroute-- so we took off. The trip to North Memorial is a bit longer than the trip to Fairview where Grae was born, but the heated seats are a HUGE hit with the 'labor' party.

Once at the hospital, things progressed very smoothly. We made it into a room by about 5:45-6 a.m. With Grae, things stalled out mid morning-- not so this time. That baby was a comin'. He was here by 9:10 after 33 minutes of pushing. Alana said it was more pain than the first time around, but the labor was MUCH shorter.

Grae will be coming to visit her new little brother this afternoon. Baby and Momma are both asleep, and I will publish some more after a brief nap....zzz...

The Emergency Bean-cast System.

This is a test. It is only a test. In the event of a real birth, this test would be followed by news and photos.