and he arrives home

h4. Homeward Bound

At long last, Tobias makes his triumphant return home! Wednesday, Apri 21st, 5:30pm, after 44 long days, Mom, Dad, & Toby at long last leave the hospital bound for home, for good.

An agonizingly long car ride later, and we showed Toby his new digs. And he proceeded to show his displeasure by keeping us up all night fussing and crying and making us question our desire to ever have this little boy.

So, Wednesday/Thursday weren’t our best days (nights). Apparently he’s adjusted to his surroundings quickly though – the last few days have been getting easier and easier. Sleep & eat & change a diaper & sleep & eat & change a diaper etc. etc. Repeat. Throw in the occassional play time to make it all worthwhile. It’s hasn’t been the smoothest transition any of us has had, but it certainly is getting much better! It took us a couple days, but we’re definately starting to relax and enjoy him rather than just take care of him.

*edit*: reading that last bit afterwords makes it sound like it’s been pure hell – it definately hasn’t been *that* bad. It just felt like it at times! 😉

h4. Visitors

Thankfully, we have an abundance of help nearby – both sets of grandparents, a brother and sister-in-law, multiple nieces, all within 20 miles of us. The grandmas have made a number of visits in an effort to reassure the new mom that she is going to be a wonderful mother (ok, and the new dad a bit too). Grandpa F’s dropped in a time or two to check on his potential future farmer. Lynn’s brother Gary stopped by to check on us (of course, I missed him entirely, being passed out at the time).

And me being me, I forget to take any pictures of our visitors with the little guy, finally remembering once with Grandma O…

p(images). !/images/11.jpg (Toby peeks at Grandma Oelkers 1)!:/images/10.jpg

p(images). !/images/13.jpg (Toby peeks at Grandma Oelkers 2)!:/images/12.jpg

p(images). !/images/8.jpg (Toby peeks at Grandma Oelkers 3)!:/images/9.jpg

h4. Feeding

Mom initially had grand plans to breastfeed the little guy. Unfortunately, Toby didn’t agree, and made it a very stressful experience for both Mom and himself. Were he full term and full strength, it might have been a different story. But alas, he wasn’t and isn’t…

So, we’ve decided to forego the torture to both of them and bottle feed him. Right now, he’s still getting expressed breast milk via his bottle, but eventually we’ll be switching him over to some type of formula. Needless to say, Mom and Toby both are much happier with the arrangement!

p(images). !/images/16.jpg (Mom gives Toby a bottle)!:/images/17.jpg

h4. Crib? What Crib?

He’s also decided to be a little stinker and refuses to sleep (for long periods of time anyway) in his beautiful new crib right now. Luckily, we happened to pick up a bouncer/bassinet for him while he was in the hospital, and he seems perfectly content to sleep in that for the time being. And damn if he isn’t the cutest thing… 🙂

p(images). !/images/4.jpg (Toby checks out some toys)!:/images/5.jpg

p(images). !/images/14.jpg (Toby takes a nap 1)!:/images/15.jpg

p(images). !/images/18.jpg (Toby takes a nap 2)!:/images/19.jpg