Visit report

On Wednesday eventing Anki and F arrived and it was so nice to finally see them again. We've had a few busy and fun days together and now they have left us again :-(

On Thursday we went to see my cousin Therese where our aunt was visiting too (good timing!). It was so much fun and as a bonus our aunt had cooked Palt so me Anki and I were extra happy!

On Friday we went to see Anki's friend Hanna and her 3 children. It was fun and quite intense with all the children and I think F was in a bit of chock. Alice slept most of the time. I guess she is fairly used to chaos since she has a big brother, plus the fact she is very young still and most kids tend to sleep a lot then...

Yesterday we had some relatives visiting and we showed off our little gems.

Tomorrow I'm taking Alice for a checkup and I also need to prepare the house for the arrival of Grandma Joyce. We can't wait to see her!

Auntie Anki and Alice



Cute cousins!

Two peas in a pod

Can you tell who's who??

Cutie!

Poor big brother

On Wednesday night Elias coughed a lot and in the morning he was really snotty so we decided to keep him home from nursery on Thursday and it definitely turned out to be the right decision. He has gotten worse since then and this afternoon he even got a bit of a temperature. He is in pretty good spirit though. Unfortunately he wants to watch tv most of the time so it is a bit of a challenge to keep him occupied and happy.


I guess it is just a matter of time before Alice gets ill too since it is pretty hard to keep Elias off her. He just loves to hold her and cuddle her and I really don't want to tell him he can't.

Checkup

Today I took Alice for a checkup. I was a little bit nervous as they say babies should reach their birth weight again within 10-14 days. Not that I know what happens if you "fail"...

It turns out she now weighs 3450 grams and she is 52,7 cm long (3360 grams at birth and 50 cm long). Hooray, she passed!!!

This week has been my first on my own and so far it has gone pretty well. On Monday it went really bad picking Elias up from nursery, he had an awful tantrum, but the other days have been pretty good. Dropping him off has actually been easier than ever so far. Wonder why?

It is quite obvious that it will be very different to be on maternity leave this time. Last time around Elias and I could do pretty much what we wanted to do whenever we wanted to do it. Now we have a pretty strict schedule to stick to with the dropping off and picking up from nursery. Plus the fact that dinner has to be on the table every evening. When Elias was little we could eat whatever after he was in bed but now we have to feed him of course. Oh well, hopefully in a few weeks we will have found a routine that works...

12 days of Alice

Today Alice is 12 days old and it already seems like she's been with us forever (sort of anyway). We took her out in the pram for the first time today for a short walk. It has been so cold here most of the time since she arrived so we haven't really wanted to expose her too much to the outside.

Things are going well on the whole. On Tuesday the midwife was here and Alice had gained some weight which felt good. Next checkup is on Wednesday and by then she should have reached her birth weight (at least). They say that babies have 10-14 days to reach their birth weight again. I am very curious as to see what she weighs and how tall she has grown. It definitely feels like she has grown from how the clothes fit her.



Elias is still very sweet to Alice but usually calls her "the baby" or "little sister" and still calls her a him ;-)
When I feed her he quite often comes up to me and say he wants to hold her and he has a few times. It looks so sweet! He can sometimes get a bit jealous when I feed her and say "my mummy" but I think that is just normal and expected. As long as he stays sweet to her and takes out his frustration on us it is fine.



We are definitely experienceing the "terrible twos" at the moment and have one or more tantrums a day but it feels manageable. It is frustrating and annoying but in the end I usually just feel sorry for Elias having all these emotions and not knowing how to handle them. To be honest I do feel quite nervous about the coming week when I will be alone and need to get him to come to nursery in time and also to come home with me in the afternoon. That will probably be quite a challenge...

Name

Webber productions proudly presents:

Alice Elsa Maria Webber

Lightning Birth

Vickan woke me at 6.30. "David!!" she said, and rushed out of the bedroom. At first I thought that I must have been snoring and she was annoyed, but then she came back and told me that her waters had broken.

I got myself ready pretty quickly, in a bit of a panic, but not as much of a panic as last time. I thought we would have at least 2 hours before the actual birth so I had a shower and made myself some rice krispies. I then went out to brush the snow off the car while they got nice and soggy, but a couple of minutes later vickan came out with a piece of unbuttered toast for me and said it was time to go.

I managed to stay cool at the wheel on the way to Södertälje, although we had never driven this route before. I had a nervous moment near the end of the journey when the signs for the hospital just stopped but luckily we got there without a hitch. Vickan got taken up to the maternity unit and I went to park the car, paying for parking until 11.30 the next day.

When I found Vickan again in the maternity unit I realised that things had got worse for her really quickly and she was in serious pain. She had to be wheeled to the birthing room and I followed on behind.

I hardly had time to think before it was all happening. It was just like last time, but as though the film had been sped up. I felt a bit guilty because I couldn't help feeling relieved that it would all be over quickly.

Just 20 minutes after paying for the parking at a machine outside, our baby was born. It was at least 2 minutes before the midwife decided to pick the baby up from Vickan's tummy to see what kind it was. For some reason I was not surprised at all to see she was a girl. I was glad because I'd got it into my head that it might be easier for Elias to have a baby sister than a baby brother. But as it turns out, he doesn't seem to understand the difference - he always refers to the baby as "he".

The birth

As you all know by now we've had a little baby girl and I thought I should share with you how it all happened. It is quite fascinating how similar it all was to Elias' birth, only a lot faster.

On Monday morning I woke up at 6.30 because my waters broke. It seemed to be more water this time than last. Immediately I woke David up and he called the hospital while I had a quick shower. Unfortunately the line to the hospital was engaged so it took maybe 10 minutes before we could get through. Once we did she told me that they were full and she would find out where we could go instead and call me back. At about 6.50 she called me back and told me we should go to Södertälje hospital. By now I had had 2 contractions but they weren't very bad. At 7 o'clock we were in the car and started driving. Now the contractions started to come quite often but they weren't too painful. By the time we got closer to the hospital it was starting to be quite hard work though and I had to focus on "breathing through" the contractions. We got there at 7.25 and David went in to ask where we should go while I was trying to get out of the car. A nurse showed me the way while Dave parked the car. Now it was really starting to be quite intense.

I went up in the lift to the maternity ward where a nurse received me and showed me to an examination room. I was starting to feel quite overwhelmed by now by how intense the contractions where and sort of lost my ability to communicate very well. After a little while the midwife came in and asked me a few questions but I think she could tell by my actions and the way I looked that it was the real thing and she decided it was time to go in to the delivery room. They had to wheel me on the bed there because by now it was impossible to stand up and walk. In the delivery room she wanted to examine me to see how far the labour had gone but soon realised that I was ready to push. I did sort of realise that my self too, but just couldn't believe it and therefore didn't say anything. I was pretty shocked at the speed of the development and before I knew it I was lying there pushing the baby out. At 7.46 she came out, only 20 minutes after arriving to the hospital.

After it was all done I was in a state of happiness mixed with shock. I couldn't help but think what a close call it had been. We really couldn't have been any earlier at the hospital and if there had been any traffic problems on the way we wouldn't have made it. Had we been 5 minutes later I don't know if I could have made it in without help... Oh well, no use in thinking about all the things that could have gone wrong when it all went well.

One thing is for sure though, there won't be a number 3. The first delivery took us 3.5 hrs and this one 1 hr 15 mins, so next time I guess the baby would come out when the waters break!

Pictures

Will do a proper blog entry very soon, I promise, but for now you'll have to do with a few pictures in the new album January & February 2010

She's Here!

6.30 water broke
7.00 left for hospital
7.25 arrived, contractions severe
7.46 baby girl born