This is the photo I mentioned the other day. Elias is one week old this day and Zion is just in love. She is a sweet and caring big sister and seems to have forgotten that she was hoping for a little sister instead. Yesterday in the car Elias started to cry. Zion told him "Don't worry, baby, we're almost home." Then when we got home he stopped crying and she said "See, I told you it would be OK." Her words are so tender and sweet.
Rob gave me a pedicure for Mother's Day. I've never had one before and I was SO excited. I planned it for a weekend when I thought it would still leave me with pretty toes while I was in the hospital. I chose a bright purple called "Let's Grove". I think this may just start an obsession with pedicures. It was really amazing, so relaxing and of course the gal who did them did a way more amazing job than I could have done even if I could have reached me toes (bear in mind that this photo was taken weeks after they were done so they don't look as nice as they did at first).
We have been blessed with a number of our friends bringing us meals since we came home from the hospital. Nora, Matthew and the kids were the first and brought some super yummy pork stew and blessed us more with their company at dinner too. Matthew really loves babies so we let him get a fix while they were over. Seems like a super good deal to me. 
One of my most favorite things is a baby in what we call the "little bean" position. You know, with their knees all tucked up and cuddly they look like little kidney beans. This was the day we came home. Boy, his hair looks red! Sometimes it looks brown, sometimes a darker blond. He'll need more hair before we will be able to tell what color it will stay.
We purchased in advance a little gifts from the new baby to each of the kids. Gabe got a small Lego kit that makes a fire engine, Zion got a new My Little Pony and Gideon got a Lightning McQueen play mat. Later Rob took the kids out and they each got to pick out something little for their new sibling to welcome him to the family.
Grandpa Jim (my dad) getting to meet his fourth grandson for the first time.
Zion getting to meet her new little brother for the first time.
Gideon is meeting Elias for the first time too but seems to be afraid of him. No worries, he's since gotten over it. He's not super in to his little bro but he's not afraid. One time since we have all been home together Elias was crying really hard and Gideon started to cry too. He kept saying over and over "I don't want it!" Poor little guy. We asked "do you not want the baby to cry?" and he said, so pitifully "yeah." Aw, poor little guy, he was just so sad to hear the baby cry. We are thankful that Elias doesn't cry very often and Gideon seems to now understand that it's OK. Ever since we added Zion to our family and Gabe was concerned with the crying we've told our kids that babies cry because they don't know any words yet and that it's OK when it happens and they aren't bothered nearly as much.______________________________________
Elias and I had a bit of a rough weekend. His ability to nurse kept getting worse and worse until finally over Friday night he quit nursing entirely. He was clearly hungry but just wouldn't latch on. So Saturday morning he and I went to see a Lactation Consultant. She helped us figure out that Elias only wanted to latch while in a vertical position. Imagine me perched on the edge of a chair holding him as he dangles between my legs and letting him find me to latch on all by himself. Yeah. If you are picturing this correctly you can imagine how uncomfortable this is for one of us. She gave me some other helpful tips about getting Elias' latch to improve. As it was, it didn't matter how long he nursed, he just wasn't moving milk. So after getting to the point on Friday where I thought we'd have to give up entirely we are doing much better now. He is latching better and that has enabled me to gradually get to the point where we can nurse in other positions and get rid of the darn plastic shield we were using. Now I just have to get my supply up so we can ditch the occasional formula bottle we are having to give. Today he had a weight check and was only up an ounce since Friday. It's not as much as we'd hoped but at least he isn't losing any more. We'll have him at the doctor again on Thursday so let's hope for a big jump by then!
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