Our apartment kind of exploded once we walked in the door. We had things set up but once we had her we moved some things around to make things flow better. Jake continued to take care of almost all of the diaper changes which was great. He is also really awesome at soothing her so he did a lot of that which was nice since I was spending so much time feeding her I could have a break and he could do a few things.
Here are lots of pictures of our time at home:
You can tell how asleep she is by where her arms are. When they hang down like this she is o.u.t.
Loves having her legs straight.
Linnea Marie Janzen
On July 9th at 4:15 pm we finally decided on her name! Linnea Marie Janzen. We called my mom and dad to tell them and then video chatted with Jake's parents to tell them before we announced it to the rest of our family and friends.
Jake was on diaper duty when he was home. Three summers ago I watched two of my nieces, Avery (1.5 at the time) and Jocelyn (10 months). Jake would come home for lunch and hang out with us. I made the mistake of commenting on how Jocelyn was "filling her pants" while we were sitting at the table. Jake does not like to discuss bodily functions while eating and it turns out he hates the phrase "filling her pants." So shortly after Linnea was born he decided instead of mentioning poop or the filling of pants he would say she was "working on a project" and projects usually need "maintenance" done. Now we say she is "working on a project" if we need to let the other one know about it so they can take care of it.
She has been in the size 1 Libero and Pampers diapers so far. We like the Libero ones best. The Pampers seem to make her bottom red. I'm still trying to figure out which wipes I like best. I'd like to get a case to put them in so I can grab a wipe with one hand but they don't really have cases here.
She had a couple of open-air accidents that were hilarious. I'll spare you the pictures but here is the story. (Skip this paragraph if you don't like reading about poop :) . . .) Jake was changing her diaper one of the first few days we were home and all of a sudden she started peeing. He quickly covered her up and we started laughing. Then she farted and there was a little puff of mist through the pee. At that point I got out of the chair to walk over to them while we were laughing. That is when she decided to poop. Nothing was covering her bottom and the poop shot about 3 feet out and hit the floor just missing our kitchen table. Thankfully Jake was standing to the side of her or else he would have gotten the brunt of the hit. We hadn't laughed that hard in a LONG time.
She would have been 41 weeks on this day but thankfully she was 3 days old instead :).
Meeting her BFF Leighton. Jan and I have been best friends since 6th grade. I am 1 year and 11 days older than Jan and Leighton is 1 year, 1 month and 18 days older than Linnea. I'm sure they will be fast friends once we move back!
We have turned her box now so the head is right by me but this is our new sleeping arrangement. We always planned to have her sleep in the hallway. I never thought I'd have her sleep in our room and then we did. #firstofmanywewontever. . . . If it wasn't for her spitting up amniotic fluid the first few days after being born she would probably be in the hallway. It was just so scary watching her gag on it so I wanted to make sure I could hear her and quickly help her if needed. I also am freaked out about her not breathing so I like being able to look over and double check. We read that there is a decreased risk of SIDS when the baby sleeps in your room so now that she is no longer spitting up amniotic fluid (only breast milk) I think she will still stay in our room for a while. She grunts a lot in her sleep so part of me wants to move her so I can get more sleep but I also want to keep her as safe as possible.
She was sleeping with a hat on until we went to her 5 day doctor's appointment and asked about sleeping in a hat and they said not to do that anymore. They just do it in the hospital when they are brand new and still figuring out how to regulate their temperatures.
Here she is at 4 days old.
5 Day Check UpOn Friday, July 10th we had her 5 day appointment at Danderyd Patient Hotel.
Her first stroller ride!
It takes about 40 minutes to get to Danderyd from our apartment. Jake stood next to her the whole time to make sure she was okay and she just slept the entire trip.
The way the hospital was organized seemed neat to me. They labeled the elevators with letters to help you know where to go. We knew hiss L (elevator L) would take you to the labor and delivery floor. It was a neat system.
Her jaundice level was 0 which was awesome. She had gained a few grams since her lowest weight check at the hospital and the midwife said that breast feeding was going well after watching us for a few minutes.
After her appointment we walked around the metro stop until we found this painting.
This artwork was done by Pierre Olofsson. Jake saw some of his work in an antique shop and liked it. He then painted a picture for Lisa and Gray based off of this painting.
Here is the one he painted for Lisa and Gray.
Feeling all the Feelings
"They" say your hormones hit most around days 4-5 and wouldn't you know . . ."they" were right again. Yowza! I didn't have too many mood swings during pregnancy but I had a few days when I was feeling all the feelings. Most of the time those feelings were annoyed, frustrated, and agitated for little to no reason. Well, it turns out after having a baby I felt all the feelings again right when they said I would. The feelings were different though than during pregnancy and the feelings really just made me do one thing, cry. I am not a crier. I have to have to right circumstances all put together before I typically cry. I usually warn Jake before I start to cry just so he knows since it is so rare. Well, I did that the first or second time I cried and then I stopped warning him. It was happening too often. I would cry because I was frustrated or tired but I would also cry when I was talking to Linnea and telling her how excited I was to be her mom. I was a mess for a few days. I remember the first day I didn't cry and it was such a big deal! Jake did a great job of comforting me.
One thing that was still really hard was my memory/brain function still wasn't back to normal. I had a million things running through my head that I wanted us to do or think about or talk about but then later I couldn't remember any of them. I started telling Jake and at first he would say things like "It's okay", "don't worry about it", etc. but that usually made me cry :). I told him I needed him to either write down what I was telling him or validate what I was saying by saying something along the lines of "I know", "Okay, we can do that." Most of the things were trivial like we need to get a canvas basket for her clothes, or I need to send an email to so and so, or I want to wash her hair, etc. My body needed to rest and so did my mind but I was finally home with my baby and I had so many things I wanted to do.
Usually after a waterworks session I would tell Jake I was thankful we didn't have anyone staying with us. Both sets of parents wanted to come to help out and see/hold/rock/spoil the baby. We pretty much said no as nicely as we could. We wanted to figure out this parenting thing on our own but we also realized that living in Sweden would complicate things. Our apartment is tiny so having four adults and a newborn all in one small space seemed very overwhelming to me. I would be breastfeeding a lot and I didn't want to have to do that in front of my dad or Jake's dad and I didn't want to have to do it in my bedroom considering the number of hours I spent breastfeeding at first. It would also be hard because if we needed something from the store I wasn't sure how comfortable our parents would be with going to the store by themselves. I didn't want Jake to go with them because then it would be either me alone in the apartment with the baby or all four of us with the baby and I just wanted time with Jake and Linnea. Then when the hormones hit and I was crying about everything I was thankful that I could do that with just Jake around.
Now that things have settled down and we have things figured out a little more Jake's parents are planning a visit at the beginning of September. I think the timing of that will be much better. I'm excited to have her be around people that knew us before I was pregnant. I'm sure Jake's parents will be fighting over who gets to hold her while they are here.
Visitors
Linnea had a few visitors once we were home.
Chelsea brought Linnea a hat and some socks and she brought me egg free cookie dough for my birthday! It was SO good! She also volunteered to take a few pictures of the three of us which was so thoughtful.
Riandi and Franna came to visit Linnea!
I wasn't sure Angela was going to give her back :).
Jake's boss Bert-Åke and his wife Gunn. Bert-Åke was impersonating Linnea.
Jake's coworker Tim and his son Florian.
Mona, Tim and Florian meeting Linnea. We are going to the archipelago with them in August which should be a fun trip.
Linnea isn't so sure about the big guy in her bed. As her parents, we are very thankful she is so skeptical. Florian was 3 months old and Linnea was 3 weeks old in this picture.
Jake's girls taking a nap. He slept on the grey pillow in the middle of us.
One of the middle of the night feedings. I can tell it must have been between 12-3 am because it was actually dark outside.
Jake's favorite picture of us. I wish you could smell what I was smelling in this picture.
My mom has a picture with each one of her grand kids when they are infants so she wanted one with Linnea. We had to improvise a little but I think it turned out great!
Jake rolled over to my side of the bed to help out or to stare at his little girl.
A walk through the park.
We took some weekly pictures with her. The just born pictures were actually when she was 6 days old. She was so alert during the little home photo shoot.
I love this picture of her. She has the same first and last initial as her Papa Larry!
My Mom made this quilt.
A little Michael Jackson move!
She was exactly 1 week old in this picture since she was born at 5:31 pm!
I'm not so sure she will be able to fit in the box all the way until we move back home.
We had her newborn pictures taken when she was 12 days old. They are great! I can't wait to share them and get some printed.
We went to the park to watch Dad play ultimate frisbee. She was really impressed.
She had a range of emotions during this photo shoot.
She seems a little skeptical about being 2 weeks old.
Jake's Back to Work
Jake went back to work right after she turned two weeks old. The first day I woke up with a fever and possible mastitis. #awesometiming Thankfully, she had her first doctor's appointment that day at 2 pm which Jake was going to go to so I only had to make it through half a day without him. The rest of the week went pretty smoothly except for that Wednesday. She typically only cries when she is hungry, needs her diaper changed or is tired but on that Wednesday she just cried for no reason. At one point we were both in tears and I was encouraging Jake to come home early. After he got home he suggested that I schedule a massage for myself. #Imarriedawinner Ever since that tough day we have had mostly great days.
Date night on the balcony.
Her umbilical cord finally fell off.
My first bath. Thanks Miss Molly for my blue whale. It keeps me nice and warm!
So far her bath times have been kind of hit and miss as far as her liking them. The first one we stumbled around a lot and she cried quite a bit at the end. She did that a few other times as well but then we got a little bit smarter and gave her a bath in the bathroom instead of the kitchen so we could warm up the room more. That seems to really help. #duh
I love tummy time and Mom loves pants with things on the butt :).
She spends the whole night in her box and takes most of her naps in the box as well but sometimes she likes to sleep on daddy (or maybe he is the one that likes it).
We gave her a pacifier around 2.5 weeks. She won't take it all the time but she does like it when she is upset or trying to fall asleep. It has been great because I can lay her down awake and she will suck on it for 5-10 minutes and then be out like a light. This has cut our night time feeding routine in half!
Like I said, not so sure the box will work until we get home. She is a spaz sometimes when she sleeps.
Not so sure about bath time.
Reading is fun!
Eating and Sleeping
She was very sleepy the first 4 or 5 days and we had to wake her for every feeding. Waking her up was hard. We would strip her down, rub her with a wet washcloth, blow on her, etc to get her to wake up and sometimes she would sleep through that. She didn't seem all that interested in food. After day 5 she kind of figured out what the whole eating thing was about and finally started letting us know when she was hungry.
During the day she usually eats every 2.5-3 hours for about 15-25 minutes and then stays awake to play and do tummy time for 30-45 minutes after her feeding and then sleeps the last hour of her 2.5 hour cycle before waking up to eat again. In the afternoon she usually takes a long nap and sleeps from feeding to feeding which is great for me. I usually eat and then nap during that time.
At night she usually goes 4-4.5 hours once (or when she is feeling generous twice) at night and then starts to taper it down to 3, then 2.5 hours and "wakes up" for the day between 5:30-7:30 depending on how long she slept at night. During the first two weeks her night time feedings took about an hour to an hour and 15 minutes. Jake got up with me in the middle of the night for most of the first two weeks but then I started letting him sleep through those feedings so that after she woke up for the day between 5:30-7:30 I could pass her off to him and go back to sleep for about an hour and a half before her next feeding. Thankfully she didn't ever really have her days and nights confused which followed the same patterns as they did when she was in my belly.
Lots of grunting and squishy faces while waking up.
Once we started giving her a pacifier her night time feedings got a lot shorter because she could put herself to sleep instead of using me to do it. Around week 3 she was getting more food during a shorter amount of time so her feedings got faster. The first two weeks I was averaging about 4.5-5 hours a day feeding her and now I'm closer to 2.5-3 hours.
When I feed her I usually feed her on one side, burp her, change her diaper and then feed her on the other side and then burp her again. For a while she would spit up quite a bit after she burped and then she would get the hiccups and with every hiccup more spit up would come up. It was kind of funny and then really frustrating. She seemed to be getting better about not spitting up as much around 4 weeks.
I've been using an awesome app called Baby Connect. They have a trial version which we used until we decided we liked it enough to buy it. I can keep track of how much she nurses on each side, her diapers and her sleep. You can also track bottles and lots of other things.
You can also see a timeline of your day and graphs.
The app was $5 and Jake and I both have it. It syncs really well between the two of us. It is nice because in the mornings after Jake takes her so I can get some sleep he can see (without waking me up to ask) when she last ate, had her diaper changed or slept. Then he knows if she is fussy what she might want.
Our daily schedule looks something like this:
7:30 - I usually stay up for the day if she eats after 7:30 but if she eats before that I usually try to go back to sleep until Jake leaves for work.
10:00 - I eat breakfast and shower if I haven't done that already after her first feeding. We play on the floor and read books or sing songs before she usually falls back asleep around 11 or 11:30. We also run errands sometimes after this feeding.
12:30 - She usually falls asleep right after this feeding and sleeps until the next one. I eat lunch when she is asleep and usually take a nap. I don't do short naps well. I have been sleeping between one and two hours while she sleeps which definitely helps me make it through the day with a better attitude ;).
3:00 pm - We might go on a walk after this feeding or clean up the apartment.
5:30 pm - Jake gets home around this feeding. He usually hogs her since he has been gone all day while I make dinner.
8:00 pm - Sometimes we eat dinner after this feeding or if we had dinner before we might go on a walk. She usually falls asleep pretty hard after this feeding. For about a week I tried feeding her again around 10:30 so that I could go to sleep after that feeding and get a nice chunk of sleep in before she woke up but we had a really hard time waking her up at 10:30. Now I just go to bed around 10 or 10:30 pm knowing she could wake up anytime between then and 2 am depending on how she feels.
1:30-3 am - She usually wakes up at some point during this time frame. She eats and falls back asleep for the most part pretty quickly. If she doesn't fall back asleep very quickly she is usually just grunting, not crying, which is nice. I am getting pretty good at sleeping through her grunting.
5:30-7:30 - She usually wakes up again sometime in this time frame. I try to put her back to sleep after the feeding but she is usually pretty awake. I nudge Jake for him to take her especially if it is before 6:30. Then they get some bonding time before he heads to work :).
I went to a breastfeeding clinic to make sure things were going well and it was really great. I was able to ask lots of questions and get some really good tips. She said I could stop waking her up during the day and at night which was reassuring. One funny thing she told me was that babies like to eat a 3 course meal, an appetizer, entree and dessert and some babies like to have fika after that :).
She seems satisfied :).
My little monkey!
Milk coma
Thanks Miss Kelli for my super cute shoes! I can't wait for football season!
This first month has flown by! I still can't believe she is here and she is mine! I am so lucky to be her mom! I can't think of a better feeling than when I'm rocking her while smelling the top of her head. I wish I could bottle that up because I know it will go by too fast.
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