Uncle Ben (not the rice one)

My brother Ben came in a while back from Scottsdale, AZ to meet his new nephew. He was quite taken by him.
Ben was only in town for a week but he stopped by as often as he could to spend time with the kid. Max christened Ben's sweatshirt with spit-up, and made one of Ben's sweaters stink (we hope not permanently) like baby farts.We know that Ben misses Max now that he is back in Arizona, and expect that he'll be back sometime soon.

One month ago

As I write this, I'm sitting in my classroom, waiting for my 6:30 class to start. Mondays are tough, leaving at 7 in the morning and not getting home until 10. That's a lot of hours I don't get to see the kid. I'll be leaving early Wednesday morning to go down to Louisville for a few days. I'll be back late Thursday but I know it's going to be really hard, being away from my family for the first time since Max arrived.

The month has been spectacular. He's been a great baby. He cries when he's hungry or cold, but those are easy things to fix. He's very peaceful and calm. We're so lucky to have him. We love the time we spend with him, even the tough times.

One month ago, Bobbie Jo and I hadn't met him yet (she was in the middle of her epidural), and had no idea how our lives would change, no idea of the size of love we we have for the little guy we would meet six hours later.

My mother gave Max the book "Guess how much I love you" yesterday for an Easter present. Being unfamiliar with the book, I gave it a quick read. The story involves a conversation between a rabbit and his/her child. As the young rabbit responds to the question of "Guess how much I love you?" with his answers "this much", "that much" etc. the parent is always able to one up him. The story ends with the young rabbit coming up with the biggest thing he can, "From the earth to the moon". The parent agrees that is very far, and the child dozes off to sleep. The parent walks away thinking to himself "I love you from the earth to the moon, and back." The story quickly brought a tear to my eye, and is difficult to write about even now.

Who would think that a 5 inch square cardboard book could express something that so many others could never put into words.

Max, we love you from the Earth to the Moon and back, and then some!

Mom and Dad

Due Date

Well, today, March 20th, is Bobbie Jo's due date.
We've gotten to spend 24 wonderful days with our awesome little dude. 3 weeks that have gone by so fast, and have been filled with so many wonderful moments. We're so happy that he was able to join us so much earlier than we were expecting.

I'm growing to love coming home every day from work, grabbing him from his mother's arms (or his bouncy chair), plunking him down on my chest and getting in a little father/son nap.

Bobbie Jo is proving to be a wonderful and selfless mother (as I knew she would be) and is taking care of Max every weekday night. She definitely doesn't have these 10 weeks "off". She works her butt off all day but I know she loves being able to spend all day with him. I take a break at work to look through pictures a few times a day.

It's been a lot of fun, and we're learning a lot. We're already dreading the thought of dropping him off at daycare, and the thought of dropping him off at school, him driving a car, or going off to college terrifies us. I think it's best we just take everything one day at a time - it's much less scary that way.

Photos

Mom (Camille) wanted some more pictures posted, and we really don't have that many more taken. I've added a slideshow to the sidebar on the right, and it will be updated often.

Any time you want to see the newest crop of pictures we've taken, click on the slideshow to be taken to our Picasa Web Album.

Here's an extra cute picture of Max to appease Grandma Camille.

March of Dimes

For the last few years Bobbie Jo and I have been participating in the March of Dimes "March for Babies" (previously "Walk America"), this year's walk is on April 26th. We look forward to walking it with Max in tow.

From Wikipedia:
"Today in the USA, March of Dimes funds researchers are working in biochemistry, microbiology, developmental biology, genetics, pediatrics, and many other fields. Along the way, it has helped support special neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) designed to treat sick babies; drug treatments to replace surgery for babies with a common heart defect; and folic acid education and food fortification to prevent neural tube defects, among other advances."

We have had a few friends whose children were born extremely premature, and they credit the March of Dimes for helping their children become perfect healthy little babies.

We hope that you would be willing to sponsor us by clicking on the banner to the right, or the following link: www.marchforbabies.org/reinhardt. It's extremely easy. Payment can be safely made through a credit/debit card through our page at the March of Dimes site, or a pledge can be made and a check/cash can be mailed or given to us. We have set a low goal of $500, but have raised between $800 and $1000 in previous years. We really appreciate all of your help.

And of course, in case you forget, I'll be sending out periodic emails begging for sponsorship as well.

Thank you so much!

-James, Bobbie Jo and Max

Uncle Matt

Max's Uncle Matt (my brother) came in from his adventurous life boating in Florida/Bahamas/Cancun to visit his brand new nephew yesterday. It was great to see him, and we're excited to have a few weeks with him before he heads back to the open sea.

Matt (like Bobbie Jo and I) isn't very familiar with babies and it was awesome to see how quickly he took to little Max. It was interesting to hear his questions, many of which Bobbie Jo and I couldn't have answered 9 months ago.

So, does he, like, have muscles?
Does he eat food, or just milk?
Does he have teeth?

Matt has been so excited for us through this entire experience, checking in on our blog almost daily. We're so lucky to have him in our lives, and know that Max is going to learn a lot from his Uncle Matt!

A First!

10 minutes ago, my boy peed on my face.

That is all.

-j

Two Week Dr. Appointment

We had our two week doctor appointment this morning. I hadn't planned on going, but someone (who shall remain nameless) kept his mother up all night and we thought it would be best that I drive the both of them to the doctor.

Max is doing well, he is up to 5 lbs 14 oz now which is awesome. They are happy if he's only up to his birth weight by the 2 week appt, but I think he's growing a little faster to make up for his low birth weight. He was also packed full of poo, having not made #2 since he did it on the changing table at 10am yesterday (That has been remedied now, and we have a full load of extra-nasty laundry to get done).

Bobbie Jo liked the doctor and is now home trying to get a nap in. She's earned it!

I can't believe it's been a week

We've been really lucky, Max has been a great baby. He only cries when he needs something (warmth or food), and sleeps through the night except for the 2 or 3 times when he needs sustenance.

He's seems to be enjoying living with us.

I've been so busy with Max and work that I haven't been able to keep up on the blog like I wanted to, but really wanted to get a bunch of things written. This is going to be a long post.

We came home Thursday night to a nice clean happy home. We were so thrilled to be in our home, our new family, the three of us. In only a few hours, the house was trashed and we realized how much work we had ahead of us. Feeding, pumping, changing, wiping, and laundry was kicking our butts in the first few hours.

Because of Bobbie Jo's c-section I made her stay on the couch to get some rest. For the first few days I handled as much of these new responsibilities as I could. It was overwhelming. Thankfully she is much better now, I don't know how I could do any of this without her.

The hospital was worried about jaundice, so I took Max to the doctor first thing Friday morning. Because Max was so much smaller than we had expected we didn't have any clothes that fit him. I took him to the doctor (in the middle of a snow storm) in a diaper, a tee shirt we stole from the hospital, and a hat. We bundled him in a bunch of blankets as I took him out to the car I had been warming up for a half hour. Bobbie Jo pleaded with me to make sure that the doctor didn't call social services and take our baby away. Everything went well at the doctor, we were told to get another blood test on Saturday, and we headed home. After dropping him off with his mom, I went out and bought him a bunch of preemie clothes. The rest of Friday was spent getting our bearings on this parenthood thing. We gave him his first bath, which he hated, and he rewarded us by crapping in his fancy little baby tub. And peeing on the kitchen counter, and the floor, and a little on my backpack.

Saturday morning my sore throat was really acting up. Bobbie Jo gave me some cold medicine, and I took Max to the hospital for his daily blood test. The women at the lab were great, and all of the old ladies in the waiting room gushed over my cute tiny baby. The lab results came back good, the jaundice was going down- no more blood tests. We returned home to our wonderful wife/mother who was doing better, but still needed to recooperate for a few more days. I was beat. This parenting thing was killing me. I straightened up around the house and fell asleep on the couch, Max on my chest. One of my buddies called me up to see how things were going, "I don't know how I'm going to handle this" I said. I can't remember ever being so tired. My sore throat was getting worse, and the medicine didn't seem to be helping. It was an early night in bed.

Sunday morning I woke up in time to watch "Meet the Press", got my coffee started and went to the medicine cabinet where Bobbie Jo had been getting my medicine. As I pulled the pills from the box I noticed the moon icon in the lower corner with the words "Nighttime Formula" printed neatly beside it. I had been taking sleepy medicine all day Saturday, I wasn't a bum, my wife had been drugging me!

Tuesday was quite eventful. I went back to work. Bobbie Jo's mom came over to help out (she had been with us on Monday as well). Max's umbilical cord started to bleed, giving us quite a scare (but perfectly normal). He developed a fungal infection in his mouth (also incredibly common). He was given another bath (and did not poop in it!). And at 8pm we packed him up and took him to our friend Dan's to get his baby pictures taken. Dan does great work (check him out at www.terpstraphoto.com), and Max was great. He was well behaved and extremely cooperative. He, and I, got tired and the three of us came home around ten. We've seen a few of the photos and are very pleased. We'll share them all very soon.

We've had lots of visitors and have loved seeing everyone and getting to show off Max. We appreciate all of your friendship and love so much.

It's been an incredible week. We've learned a lot. We're getting the hang of things, and are much more comfortable with this than we were on Thursday night. We're ready for this. We'll be great caregivers, we're still scared about the parent thing, but we know we are fully capable of feeding and caring for the little guy.

As for Max, he's pretty cool. He's cute. He can pee really far. He hates his hiccups (which he gets often). He likes to fart a lot (like his pop), and he seems to really love his parents. Something about him changes when we hold him. I can't explain it but I think he connects with us too. It's awesome.

We're loving this. It's pretty cool.

Too many Maxes?

When I first mentioned the name Maxwell to Bobbie Jo, she wasn't too sure of it, but the more she thought about it the more it grew on her. We became pretty sure that unless the kid didn't look like a "Max", he would be named "Maxwell". Today we learned that Jenifer Lopez has named her son Max, only a month after Christina Aguilera named her son Max.

Max-if there are 10 kids in your class named "Max" we apologize, but know that you will be the best Max that there ever was.

-Mom and Dad