Baby Xander

Okay here's the update of Xander or as Ammon calls him Baby Xannar. He's a good baby he loves to eat and if he had his way he'd be permanently attached to me. At his one week Dr's visit he'd already gained some weight (only an ounce and a half but still). Unlike his brothers his hair doesn't seem to be falling out and changing color. Instead it's growing in and staying dark (like mine was when I was a baby). He definitely was born with the most hair.

His brother's love him and are always asking to hold him. Ammon doesn't seem to be jealous of him at all. He just wants to be helpful and loving. I think this is a very good thing. I haven't been pushing the potty training with him because I thought he might regress like Ethan did when he was born, but he's actually taken himself to the bathroom a few times (not consistently, but hey I'll take what I can get). I'm hoping once we get Xander use to life on the outside I can start working on the potty training with Ammon.

Ethan has been getting to be a very big boy and likes that he gets to do things that he hasn't been allowed to before. He's gotten to get things for Ammon as well and help him down out of his high chair. He's discovered that Mommy doesn't have to get everything for him and I'm happy (though sometimes worry about what he's getting into) about that.

This is an obvious before picture. After losing my lap Ammon developed this way of snuggling with me instead. He just sort of wrapped himself around my belly and used Xander for a pillow. Here he is obviously asleep.

Okay here's some labor pictures. We've gotten some interesting reactions from people when we've told them we were planning on a home birth and so I wanted to include some pictures to show what it was like. Here we see me in the birthing pool resting between contractions. Eric's my main support, next to him starting from the left is Cathy my midwife and on the other side Camille she is another midwife. Midwives usually work in pairs. Some people think that we were going back to the dark ages by using a midwife, but this just isn't so. Every 15 min or so a midwife would put the Doppler on my belly and check Xander's heartbeat. They use all sorts of medical things and have oxygen at the ready just in case. They bring today's technology to yesterday's way of birthing.

Here's Eric helping me through a contraction and next to him is Briana. She another midwife and the main one who works with Cathy.

Afterwards...here's the thank goodness he's out. As painful as it was without any drugs. It's so much more full filling...for me...and for Eric. Eric felt like he was useful like he was apart of it. With Ammon it was just sitting around and waiting because I was numb and couldn't feel anything I didn't need his help getting trough it, but this time I don't think I could've done it without him.

The continued high of "WE DID" Ethan's not amused though. Ethan by the way was there at the end. He wanted to be and I promised he could. I know he's only 5 and all that, but we feel that it's important to begin young with our kids so we can shape their attitude about the whole process instead of letting friends and school do it. He now knows how babies get out of the mommy's tummy, but not completely how the baby gets in there (he hasn't asked). We waited until Xander's head was crowning and then I sent Eric to go and get Ethan. Eric said that was the fasted Ethan has ever woken up.

One major difference with delivering at home is that the cord isn't cut immediately. I delivered the afterbirth and then it was put in a Ziploc bag and we just sort of carried it around with him until it was done pulsing. There's a lot of baby's blood in the cord and we wait until the blood has gone into him and he's "done using it" as they put it before cutting it. Notice how pink he is. He's less than an hour old.

Here's my team of supporters: Vanessa my Doula, JoAnn a midwife student, Cathy my midwife, Briana my other midwife, and Camille my third midwife. It was suppose to be just Cathy and Briana, but Cathy was getting ready to go on a well deserved vacation (she left later that day) and she didn't want to leave me without a group of great people to help me while she was gone. As it turned out she got to be there and she was really relived too she wouldn't have been able to enjoy herself if she'd left me still prego.

At about 8am the boys crawled in be with me and had some lovely snuggle time with Xander to welcome him to the family.

Proud Daddy gets to snuggle his newest boy.

Close up of Xander Morgan Clive Romney, not even 24 hours old.