Thursday, February 24, 2011

Check out these photos by Kevin!

Kevin stopped by yesterday, and he brought his camera.  Levi is 17 days old in these shots.  Amy brought Maddie over, too, and we all enjoyed snacking together and watching the crazy winter weather come and go.


Does our house have a revolving door?

We have had a lot of visitors again.  It is so great to see family and friends!!!
Relaxing with Daddy

Relaxing with Mommy

Enjoying the activity gym

John, Amy, and Maddie brought us dinner on Friday night.  It was fun to have two little ones in the house!

Time with Grandpa Gorham and Uncle Stephen
The blue fleece vest girls. . . .  No, they didn't do it on purpose!
Great Grannie: is she laughing or in pain?

Napping with Grannie



Monday, February 14, 2011

Doctor's Visit #2

We went back to Dr. Pollard's office today for blood work.  This time Levi weighed 7 pounds, 14 3/4 ounces--a nearly 8 ounce weight gain in three days--and his height was measured at 21 inches.  (Maybe sometimes he stretches out more than others?)  It was a good visit, but he was extremely unhappy about the trip home again.  Poor screaming baby!

We've had a lot of visitors lately.  Grannie and Grandpa Garrett, Auntie Jill, and my Grannie (Margaret) stopped in on Saturday.  Grannie (Beth) kept us company while Nathan was at church.  Carmen, Bass, and Vivienne met Levi after church, and Grandpa Gorham and Uncle Stephen joined us for dinner.  Today Aunt Stephanie and Cousins Ethan and Garret came for a couple of hours as well.  Our front door has never seen so much use!  It's great!

Saturday, February 12, 2011

First Doctor's Office Visit

We were the typical parents of newborns: even though we started putting Levi in his winter outfit and packing him into the car seat 20 minutes before we needed to leave the house, we still arrived late for our appointment!  Fortunately Dr. Pollard, at Evergreen Children's Clinic in Puyallup, was running a bit behind.

Our height and weight check yesterday revealed that Levi is 22 inches and down to 7 pounds, 7 ounces.  (He has lost a whole pound since Monday night.)  We asked the doctor about Levi's excessive gas, and left satisfied that the problem would taper off as our feeding sessions become more productive.

After the appointment was over, it only took the two of us 15 minutes to get Levi redressed and strapped into the car seat.  Quite the speed demons, aren't we?

More pictures of Levi

These photos were all taken by Kevin on Tuesday, February 8th.




Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Levi Wakeman Gorham

He has arrived!  Levi Wakeman was born on February 7th, 2011 at 6:01 P.M.  He weighed in at 8 pounds 7 ounces and measures 20 1/2 inches.

After an easy pregnancy, labor with Levi was just as easy.  We checked into Good Samaritan Hospital in Puyallup at 6:30 Monday morning.  By 7:00 I was strapped up with monitors.  Having not felt any contractions in the last week and a half, I was surprised when the nurse told me I was in the middle of one.  At 7:45 I was given a pill to help begin labor induction.  At one point the baby's heartrate dropped, but they had me change positions, and he improved.  At 10:45 I was given another dose.  Not long afterwards an alarm went off to signal that the baby's heartrate had dropped too low again.  It happened one other time before pitocin was administered around 2:00.  By 2:15 the pitocin was shut off because the baby's heartrate set off the alarm two more times.  He was considered "intolerant of contractions."  (Ironically, I was perfectly tolerant of them and could not feel them at all.)

By 4:30 it was definitely decided that we should have a c-section.  It was not considered an emergency, but it was scheduled for 5:30.  After a relatively quick prep, I was in the OR.  Dr. Romig and Dr. Eun worked hard (I mean seriously hard . . . it really hurt) to wrestle Levi out of a fairly small incision.  They actually even vacuumed him out because he was turned kind of sideways.  The first thing he did was eliminate his stools in the OR.  Nathan showed him to me and then took him to the nursery while I was stitched back up.  We spent another hour and a half or so in the recovery room before going to our post-partum room.  Then we got to really begin getting to know each other as a family.
First photo!

Proud Daddy!
Mommy gets to hold Levi

On Tuesday we had all sorts of visitors, and it was really fun to see everybody interacting with this new little person!  Here are some highlight photos.
Grannie (Beth Garrett)
Grandpa Garrett (Brian)

Grandpa Gorham (Bob)
Uncle Stephen Gorham
Cousin Garret, Aunt Stephanie, Cousin Ethan Wright
Great Grannie (Margaret Easterbrooks)

First Cousin once removed (Kevin Poleskie)