Life with Lincoln

Things have settled down a bit since coming home from the hospital.

Lincoln was privileged enough to meet both sets of grandparents within his first 3 days  of life.  (He's got some pretty awesome ones.)

Grandpa and Grandma F

Grandpa and Grandma N

I enjoyed all the help from his very cool Grandparents.  They were extra happy to take turns holding him.  I think it was my sister who mentioned that this is a great picture showing how tiny Lincoln is and I'd have to agree.  None of  my pictures do justice to his tininess.

After Grandma N stayed with us a few days, Grandma F stayed over for a few more days.  There happened to be two days off of school my first Monday and Tuesday home from the hospital and those days just happened to be cold and rainy.  So having Grandma over was a HUGE blessing!!  She made homemade silly putty with the big kids and they had hours and hours of fun with it.

From the beginning when I told Isaiah about my pregnancy, he's been nearly obsessed over the doctors cutting me open to get the baby.  It was the first thing he cared about when meeting Lincoln and me in the hospital room and he still talks about it.

And yet, I believe and have a little budding surgeon on my hands.  He kept putting a little lego guy in his flesh-colored silly putty and taking a lego sword to "cut the baby out".

And we played our new game from Grandma N called Even Steven more than a few times.

After Grandma left, I thought we were officially on our own.  But our church jumped right in where the Grandmas left off, bringing us food, babysitting for the big kiddos, and presents.  We even had a sweet little present full of homemade toys and letters from one of our closest family friend's boy.

Lincoln totally feels like part of the family.  He takes a good long nap in the late morning and another in the afternoon with a few in between.  These are almost always in the swing.  As far as nights go, he gives me 2 to 3 hour stretches at best, but I feel like someone who produces what seems like skim milk, this is great.  We've taken to letting the big kids feed him a bottle of formula a lot of nights before bed.  I'm hoping this can give him a chance to get a good amount in his tummy before bed, keep him liking the bottle, and let the kids be more involved in his care.

I think he's happy with the setup...

I wondered if the big kids might get sick of him after a while and ignore him, but they still talk about how much they love him and sneak up into his room when he's sleeping to peek at him.  Caleb is very protective and is super responsible when it comes to taking care of him.  Isaiah is the official kisser and hugger of Lincoln.  Livia is fascinated and helps with most diaper changes, perched up on a stool so she can watch.

We are using these last gorgeous days to hang out outside as much as possible during his naps.

Isaiah's absolute favorite thing to do is shooting bow and arrow.  He's getting so strong that we'll need to take him to a larger space soon.  He's nearly hit the shed a half dozen times.

He taught me how to shoot once and has since become the official bow and arrow teacher for the family.

Cheeeeeese.  (Apparently posing is more important than watching where she's shooting.)

Lincoln is a growing little guy.  He weighed 6 lbs 1 oz at a week and a half and the doctors like breastfed babies to be back up to birthweight (5 lbs 14 oz) by two weeks.  So I guess we're doing well in that sense.  He also loves to hang out by windows.

He hung out by the big window for a good 20 minutes one morning.  His eyes are always WIDE open or shut.  I don't know if he knows he can go in between.

He also knows how to cry extremely well.  He doesn't do it much but when he does, he goes to town and gives it his best.  (He's wearing his "Just Like Dad" t-shirt after all.  Why be mediocre when you can be really good?)

I wish I caught Isaiah's face in this moment better, because he was very concerned over Lincoln's unhappiness and offered a hug to make it better.

And here's a 4-day picture of Lincoln on his quilt I made for him.  I'm hoping to measure him on it every once in a while, but then again he's my 4th kid and I VERY WELL might completely forget.  Here's hoping...

And for my mom and dad specifically, here's a recent picture of him.  They swear he already looks a little pudgier than when they saw him last.  This was taken yesterday.  

It's a bit hard for me to see but I see him all the time.  He's starting to fit into his newborn clothes much better, so I don't doubt them!

And finally, Kyle has been helping out a lot on his break this week.  He was really hoping to get a deer this week and on Monday, he snagged a nice little buck.