Stumpless in South Nyack!

OK, so we live in Upper Nyack, but that didn't roll off the tongue the way I wanted. Yes, finally you're free from seeing the freaky umbilical remnant in all of Josie's midriff-baring shots. It was quite an anticlimactic end for the stump - after waiting for weeks for it to fall off, on Saturday morning I changed her diaper and said "hey, her stump is gone!!" It must have come off during a middle-of-the-night change. Oh well. So the cat didn't run off with it, no one ate it, it just disappeared as quietly as it came, quite unceremoniously in a pile of doo.

Josie is starting to be more wakeful during the day, which is nice, but doesn't seem to be affecting her desire to party at 3 a.m. Ah well, such is the life of the new parents. So if you see me wearing two different shoes, or run into Jeff with pants on his head, just cut us some slack.

Lots of visitors all week, including my friend Wendy, Jeff's brother Roger and his family and his sister Hilary and her family (lots of delicious and loving cousins), and our friends the Novies and Hansons (and their son Spencer, pictured above - Josie's middle namesake's last name was Spencer... is it desitin? I mean, destiny?)....none of which did much to reverse the direction of Josie's eyelids. Oh well. New pics posted of all these fun events!

SHE'S A REAL GIRL

Josie is about 2 and 1/2 weeks old and changing before our eyes! She's a real baby! She makes and hold eye contact for minutes at a time, gives us lots of goofy grins, and even ROLLED OVER on Sunday. She got a really sweet tie-dyed bear as a gift that, you'll see, she stared at and touched with her hand for about 15 minutes. No, it does not take much to fascinate an infant.

Lots of visitors, including our Nyack friend Lezlee (Josie has been LOVING Lezlee's "Loveabyes" CD - check it out at www.lezlee.com) and her son River, Hannah and Papa Rothman, and G. G. Rothman. New pics at right!

My parents left to return to Michigan yesterday, so Josie and I are on our own these days! Today we're going to stroll into town and then up the hill to visit Josie's future best friend Isabella, our friend Jen and Jeremy's baby who was born last week.

BABY PHAT

Josie had her 1 week checkup (11 days old, but a week since her first checkup) and she did great! The doctor said it's normal for newborns to gain 5 - 6 oz. that first week, and our Posie gained... thirteen! Whoooo! I asked if I were nursing her too much and apparently that's not possible. So we'll let her keep suckin' it down. We won't let her have any teen-day body image issues.

In other news, poor Jane took a spill yesterday on one of our crappy Nyack sidewalks. It was terrible. Today we took her to a very cute orthopod here and she broke both her ankle and wrist... and her wrist is going to need surgery when she gets back to MI next week. Please keep her in your thoughts!

More from me and the portly pepperpot soon!

10 days old!

So... we survived the first week, though having both Jeff and my mom here was a godsend. We took turns changing, laundering, holding, feeding, burping, pumping - oh, but only I can do that - and all the other ings one never even thought about before having a child.

Josie's first doctor's appointment went great (see photo) - she has almost maintained her birth weight, weighing in at 7 lbs even. She made a terrific impression by screaming through the entire exam. She has a set of lungs on her, which makes Gram Jane awful proud.

Jeff went back to work today, which was sad... it was nice having a whole week with just our little family. But Mom and I had fun, entertaining company, supervising the sewer guy (don't ask) and even taking a stroll down the river walk, though it took us half an hour to figure out how to get the carseat into the travel stroller frame.


Even though she's only 10 days old, Josie is showing her unique personality - lots of funny faces, squawks, and fast eating - like her father. Per request, lots of pics posted in the galleries to the right - Back soon!

THE BABY HAS LANDED. Meet Josie Diana Rothman!

She's here.

So as long as I'm sitting on a plastic donut with my first real cup of coffee in almost a year, I might as well tell you the whole story! As I posted last week, we had decided to induce on Thursday night. Jeff and I had a last supper at Citrus, our favorite restaurant in our old neighborhood on the Upper West Side, and went to Lenox Hill to check in around 9pm. We got settled, and they just gave me a cream to soften my cervix and said we would start the pitocin in the morning.

We watched TV and fell asleep around midnight. Around 3am, I awoke, confused, to a big gush - my water had actually broken on its own! Aahhhh... BGR and I were finally on the same page. I toughed out the contractions with a little light narcotics until about 8 a.m., when my doctor, the nurses, and Jeff, convinced me that at 6 cm, I was not being "wussy" by starting the epidural. Sweet relief. Whoever invented the epidural should go straight to the head of the sainthood list. Not that, as a nice Jewish girl, I should particularly care about that. But I digress. The rest of the day was actually a nice day off. We read the paper, hung out with our families, watched Sex and the City DVDs, and ate popsicles.

By about 4pm, I was to 10 cm. Time to push! Jeff was an amazing coach. After about an hour, we had Josie Diana in our arms. 7 lbs, 1 oz, and 20.75 inches. It wasn't easy, but it wasn't so bad! I would definitely do it again. Unfortunately, I had spiked a fever during the delivery, so as a precautionary measure they put us both on antibiotics and the pediatrician said Josie had to stay in the NICU until Monday (even though I was being discharged Sunday). She couldn't stay in my room, but we visited her for almost every feeding and she was the star of the NICU - both because of her hair and her fast learning at nursing - and of course because of her beauty and personality. One of the dads in the unit asked if I had had her hair "styled" while at the hospital. Of course, it WAS the Upper East Side, but I assured him I had not.

Unbelievably, around noon yesterday I got an even better present than the gorgeous earrings Jeff gave me for carrying and bearing his seed - the news that hospital policy had changed and asymptomatic newborns in our situation could be discharged after 48 hours instead of 72! So she got to come home with us yesterday - thank god, because I had already been crying all day at the thought of leaving her.

So we're home, and on Day 2. I am feeling pretty good, a little beaten up and pretty tired, but we're happy to be home and falling completely in love with our daughter.

Thanks everyone for your thoughts, good wishes, calls and wonderful e-mails. We look forward to introducing JDR around soon!

Overdue!

So BGR's due date came and went... I saw my OB this morning and we decided to coax her out on Friday if she doesn't grace us before then! She shipped me over to the hospital for a quick sono, which showed BGR is 7 lbs 13 oz!!! Holy Moley! She was very active, bouncing all over and sucking her fingers. I think she wants to meet us as much as we want to meet her! So we're on for Thursday night/Friday morning. Stay tuned!!!