More photos

To see more of the photos that our friend, Laura, took of Jacob last week click here.

Or if you are on Facebook, I have posted all the pictures there.

Jacob's first photo shoot

Jacob said - I'm really tired, do we have to take pictures now?
Here are just a few of the other photos from last week:
Poor Jacob, he has to put up with Colby doing this to him at home all the time too.


Jacob is very modest and does this every time we take off his clothes.

5 Years at PwC

January 5th marked my 5th year anniversary at PwC. I received a note on behalf of the Managing US Partner thanking me for my contributions and dedication to the firm. I also received a link to a website where I was offered many choices as to an anniversary gift. They ranged pretty widely in taste (and price). I opted for a pair of Maui Jim sunglasses (retail price of $160).

Not exactly my color, but it doesn't look bad on me (Julie agrees).
We'll see if I make it to 10 years there. If so, I can't wait to see what kind of gift awaits.

A Positive AT&T Experience

Well, I can't say I've ever had a really great experience with cell phone providers.  But, today is an exception.  First off, I had gotten the unlock code for my T-mobile BlackBerry 8320, so it could be used on other networks, and let Julie try it out.  She LOVED texting with a full qwerty keyboard, but it kept shutting off randomly.  After using it for three weeks, we switched her back to her old phone.

Now, imagine my surprise when looking at my at&t wireless account online and seeing a $175 charge for "Other Usage" on Julie's line.  It turns out, that even though I had set up the BlackBerry to use the WiFi, some data was coming/going over the at&t network.  I had set up Gmail and some other apps that were supposed to go over WiFi on the BlackBerry that were apparently not always using WiFi.

So, I called up at&t support and laid it out for them.  I suggested that instead of billing me the whole amount, they just charge me the $15 for a data plan.  I mean, if we were planning on using that much of their data services, we'd have signed up for the data plan.  The support person said she needed to look up something on the account, and when she came back she said that it would not be a problem and then made the needed updates to credit back most of the charges to our account.

It looks like it pays to stay cool and calm, and to have a suggestion ready when calling support.  Like I said, I can't say I've ever had a really great experience with cell phone providers, but, today is an exception.

More photos from the week

Jacob loves to sleep against Daddy's chest.


Now that Jacob is having more awake time, we have started laying him down on a mat that some friends gave us for playtime.



Jacob really is getting big(well, bigger - he is still pretty small!). This week he outgrew his preemie clothes and moved into newborn size and he finally fits in his swing.

One month already

The past couple of weeks have been a big adjustment around here, especially since Justin wasn't healing as well from this surgery as he did the first one (although he did much better when he was actually in the hospital for this one).

We have been doing a lot of this around our house:


And when we aren't sleeping, Jacob is eating and getting bigger (and starting to grow out of his preemie clothes!). Here is a comparison of how tiny he was in his car seat when he came home from the hospital and how not as tiny he was in his car seat today going to his one month check-up. There is no longer room for the extra padding around his head when he is in the car seat!



At his visit today Jacob weighed in at 6 lbs, 1 oz - a whole pound (and 20%) increase from his weight less than 3 weeks ago. He also measured in at 19 inches long and a head circumference of 34 cm. He is still not on the charts as far as his development (still under 5th percentile), but hopefully by next month he will be.

In the meantime - I can totally tell that Jacob is eating lots. So much, in fact, that I am not producing enough milk for him. Because Jacob is a preemie, nursing him is more complicated than if he had been full-term. He was bottle-fed in the NICU most of the time (with milk I pumped), but even if I was there he would always get a bottle after I nursed him (preemies get super-tired putting forth all the effort to nurse). Even once Jacob came home, I continued to pump after every time I nursed him and he got a bottle to make sure he was getting enough to eat. For a while there was tons of extra milk in the fridge here until last week when I suddenly started getting almost nothing when I pumped, yet Jacob was wanting more from the bottle after nursing (even though he seemed to nurse really well). As things stand now, I am running out of stored milk. I have started taking supplements to boost my milk supply and am continuing to pump every time I nurse, which means that I am almost always either nursing, pumping or cleaning pumping supplies. No wonder I haven't been blogging.

We were also told today that due to Jacob's prematurity, he should not be around other children until he is about 3 months old. The doctor specifically told us not to take him to church - too many kids and too many people who would want to see him and touch him. However, we don't have to keep him shut up in the house anymore - the way it has been since we brought him home. That is, as long as it is somewhere where people won't be trying to touch him and breathing all over him.

Right now Jacob's elephant (from his future aunt Joanna) is bigger than he is - maybe things will be different next month.


I should also mention Colby (our first "child"). He is very curious about Jacob and likes to smell his head, and lick his feet. So far he has been really good although we can tell he is a little confused and maybe depressed that he doesn't get all the attention anymore.