Tate has arrived!

Tate James Wood is here, and came surprisingly early. I know that Ryan already sent out a descriptive email of the birth story to a lot of people (which I did not read beforehand) but for those of you who didn't get this I'll give you the reader's digest version.
On the 10th I woke up early and thought my water had broke, although I wasn't sure because it was not a gush of water like a lot of people experience. We went to the hospital in the morning and it was confirmed that my water had indeed broken and they said I could go home to see if labor would start and come back later that evening. About 7 that night, I had contractions coming every 5-10 min so we went ahead in. When I got there the labor slowed to a contraction about every 10 minutes so we ended up starting the pitocin around 10pm to get things rolling. I got an epidural within an hour (pitocin makes those contractions crazy!) and was ready to start pushing at 4 am. At 4:16 Tate was born! He weighed 8 lbs 7 oz and was 21 inches long.
I loved having a midwife this time, she was great and really helped me to have a smooth delivery. I really didn't have any tearing this time and let me tell you, recovery has been a night and day difference from Grant's delivery when I had 3rd degree tearing. We were able to leave the hospital the next afternoon and have been doing pretty well around these parts. I am really glad that my mom has been in town, it is making this first week much easier.

Here is the little man straight from the womb. They just plopped him right on my stomach after he came out. He had quite a set of pipes on him!

I had forgotten how little they are brand new. He is such a sweet little guy, we are so grateful he came to our family.

Grant has done suprisingly well so far. He loves his "baby bruber" and will often try to entertain him by dancing around or offering him his toys. However, I know that having my mom here for him to play with is making a huge difference so we shall see if things change come Tues. when my mom has to go home.

I realize that I was pretty bad with belly shots for this pregnancy, so I thought I'd throw the final one on here. This was the day my water broke but before we went to the hospital in the evening. I was 38 weeks and 6 days. Now I get to carry him around on the outside and that is much more fun!

Can't Beat a Good Read.

Erin and I both love a good read and it would seem that Grant shares our love. Above, Erin is changing Grant's diaper while he enjoys a quick review of "Go, Dog. Go!", one of his favorites.

We made a conscious effort to start reading to him from an early age (above, ~2 months old). Note the rapt attention he pays as we discover that what's hidden behind the tractor is a fuzzy sheep. Yay!! I was wondering where that wily sheep had wandered off to.

Pretty soon he started to look through his books by himself. Don't get me wrong, his attention span wasn't very long but he'd sit for a good couple minutes thumbing through a crinkly book. Eventually he moved on to cardboard books, then to books with flip-up's on the pages.

Soon we found that the only way to get him to sit partially still during Family Home Evening was to have a book with good pictures handy. Here Erin is telling the story of Jesus healing a blind man. When trying to explain blindness to him, he thought Erin was playing peek-a-boo but at least he wasn't running to throw his trucks in the bathtub, etc.

Now every night he likes to review a few of the classics before bed: "Go, Dog. Go!", "Best Mother Goose Ever", "Hop Aboard. Here We Go!", and "My First Dictionary: 1000 Words for South African Boys and Girls". We got that one for $1 at the library. Who knew that the South African word for barbecue is braai? 99% of the other words are the same, though, so I feel like we got our dollar's worth.

Now he'll sit and read a book while he has a snack.

On Christmas morning he sat among a sea of trucks (another of his passions) and read his new book. Granted, it was a flip-up book about trucks but it still did my heart good to see him sitting there enjoying his new book.

So if you ever find yourself sitting next to Grant at church and there's an awkward silence between you and you can't think of anything funny or interesting to say, you can always find some common ground by asking about his latest read. Chances are he has it stowed in his diaper bag next to him and he'd be glad to read through it with you.