{Micah - 2 Months}

Micah Owen, you are two months old!

You continue to grow and develop even though we are currently living in the strangest of times. A few weeks before you were born a deadly virus (known as Covid-19) was wreaking havoc in China and had the potential to spread worldwide. Within only a few weeks after your birth it became a global pandemic and Washington State went into lockdown and our government issued a Stay at Home order to help contain the spread of the virus. Thankfully, you are safe and with everyone who loves you!

Micah you are a very calm and delightful little guy. At around 6 weeks old you started smiling and cooing when you are awake. You are very generous with your smiles and it is so sweet. You love it when your brothers play around you and show you their latest creations. You seem to especially love when the boys lie on their backs with you on your activity mat. You smile, coo at them, and stick out your tongue. If your brothers become too loud or excited you will let them know by kicking your legs, getting fussy, or letting out a loud cry. You don't cry often, but will briefly cry when you are waking up from sleeping or when you are hungry. That cry is strong and fierce, but as soon as you hear our voices or you get picked up you are a happy camper.

At two months you weigh 15lbs, 4oz (93rd percentile) and you are 24.8 inches long (97th percentile). You are quickly growing out of 3 month size clothes. During this last month we transitioned you from breastfeeding and supplementing with bottles to solely bottle feeding. Mama was struggling with your latch and because we could not see a lactation consultant in person, it just made the most sense to go to bottles. While this was sad for Mama as she really enjoys the time to connect, it opened up more opportunities for Papa to connect with you and he really enjoys his special time feeding you at night and on the weekends.

Developmentally we see your eyes tracking what is around you. You follow our faces, our hands, and you will turn your head when you hear Mama, Papa, or your brothers. You also are tracking your own hand movement. You haven't figured out that you're moving your own hand, but that connection is coming soon!

You are falling into a more consistent routine with eating and sleeping. You are typically awake for 60-75 minutes. When you wake up you have your bottle and then have playtime. For play you like to hang out on your play mat and look at your hands or the toys that hang above you, sit in your bouncer seat, take a bath, or be held. After play time you have little squeaks that you start making to let us know that you are tired but the cutest sign that you are tired is that you furrow your brow and the brow line starts to turn red. During the day you typically nap in your swing because that is the easiest spot to put you while mama chases your big brothers around. At night you sleep in a bassinet in the downstairs bedroom. Your naps are usually 45 minutes to 3 hours long and you usually have around 4 naps a day. Naps get shorter as the day goes on, we think this corresponds with your brothers getting louder in the late afternoon. At night your stretches of sleep have continued to increase, you've been doing one 5 to 7 hour stretch each night which allows Mama and Papa to get at least one decent uninterrupted chunk of sleep. You have also had a few evenings recently where you wake up, fuss for a few minutes and then put yourself back to sleep. Typically, you go to sleep for the night sometime after 8pm and you do a dream feed around 10pm, after that yourlonger stretch of sleep. You will typically wake from your long stretch of sleep in the early morning and do one more feed/sleep and then are up for the day anywhere between 6am and 8am. 

Micah, as a third born, you would normally be carted all over the place to get your brothers to where they need to be. Since we are in a season of staying at home, our days move slower and truly revolve more around you. It has been a sweet time of enjoying having a baby in the house, your presence brings us all so much joy. You are loved fiercely little guy!

Here are some few photos from your second month of life.

{Micah - One Month}

Micah Owen, you are one month old today!

Micah, we are so excited to have you here and apart of Team O! Your big brothers have nicknamed you Baby Mikey and we love it. You are incredibly sweet, but also very opinionated. You do not like to be laid down on a blanket, in a swing, or in a bouncer - though you do put up with being put on your boppy lounge pillow.  You love eating and being swaddled. At night you spend a few hours cluster feeding before bedtime, but then you have been generous with a few good evening stretches of sleep. When you are hungry, you have a very strong and loud cry to let us know that you are ready to eat.

This first month has been a whirlwind of activity for you Micah. During your first week you had a frenectomy procedure to help with breastfeeding. In your second week you were diagnosed with Thrush and had to start medication. In your 3rd week you had your circumcision which went well, however the next day you pooped so hard you pushed your bandage off which pulled off a scab. Mama and Papa could not get the bleeding to stop, so papa took you to the doctor's office and was there for a few hours and the bleeding still wouldn't stop. You and papa ended up taking an ambulance to the ER. The ER doctors were able to stop the bleeding and you had to stay for a few hours to be monitored. That was a busy first month for you Micah, but you are a tough and resilient little guy!

You have been gaining weight like a pro and before your second week, you had surpassed your birth weight. At one month you are now nearly 11 pounds. At about 2 weeks old you started getting very fussy which seemed odd for your disposition and we didn't know what to think. After the second day, we were wondering if you were wanting more food so we started offering you a bottle in between nursing sessions. You had some struggle starting with the bottle, but once you figure it out, you gobbled up the milk and stopped being fussy.

As you start to have more alert awake time, you have have been following our faces with your eyes. Your brothers adore you, they love snuggling and giving you kisses. You can often hear them bickering in the morning for the best spot in the house which is wherever you are at and the direction you are looking at. Elijah and Levi love helping anyway that they can - whether it is getting something for you, sharing a toy with you, or pushing your stroller.

You're only one month old so we're not exactly sure who you look the most like. Depending on the day and the angle we look at you Mama and Papa are convinced that you look exactly like Elijah or exactly like Levi. Right now, your side profile reminds us a lot of Levi, but face on you look like Elijah. So we think you're going to look a bit like each of your brothers. 

Micah, you are here at very strange time in the world. There is currently a novel corona virus (Covid-19) spreading all around the world and because of that we are quarantined at home. If we go outside, we practice social distancing which keeps us at a six foot distance from other people. This means you have not had very many visitors. Thankfully Grandma Robin and Grandpa were able to get to see you before all visits were put on hold, they loved meeting you. During the next month, we will probably continue to be at home keep our family and others we may come into contact with healthy.

Here are some photos from your first month of life!

{Micah Owen - Birth Story}

Micah Owen, your entrance into this world could not have been timed more perfectly! The evening before you arrived - mama, papa, Elijah, and Levi went out to dinner one last time as a family of four. After dinner we dropped your big brothers off with the Kaetzel's as we were anticipating a scheduled induction the next morning.

On Monday February 17th at 2:50am, I woke up suddenly thinking that I needed to go to the bathroom. When I stood up, I felt liquid run down my legs. It didn't feel like enough or dramatic enough to be my water breaking. I got up and went to the bathroom and laid back down. A few minutes later, laying in bed, I started feeling a tightening sensation in my uterus. Six or seven minutes later I felt the same sensation again. I realized that the sensation was gradual to start, somewhat painful, and then a slow end. Then it hit me, this wasn't a random sensation - I was having contractions!

I laid in bed for an hour and a half, just letting the contractions do their thing. I didn't have a clock to look at, but could tell that they were still spaced far apart. At 4:30am I moved to the living room to let papa sleep. I walked around a bit and hung out on the couch. I even started messaging Auntie Destiny because I knew she would be up. By 5:30am the contractions were six minutes apart and lasting between 45-60 seconds and were getting more intense, I needed to stop and breathe through them. Your papa was awake and I encouraged him to go to the gym to get a run in before we headed to the hospital. I knew we still needed to have contractions 4 minutes apart for an hour before calling the hospital. 
Papa went to the gym and in between contractions I jumped into the shower and started to get ready. This activity made the contractions come more frequently, sometimes only 3 minutes apart. 

By 6:30am, I was having contractions anywhere between 3 and 6 minutes apart. I called the hospital because I was on the schedule for an induction and let them know that I did leak some fluids and was having consistent contractions. They told me that a third birth can be a wild card and that I should head in. Thankfully papa was just getting home from the gym. 

At 7:30am we were admitted to the hospital and at 8am the doctor confirmed that my bag of waters had broken and I was 5cm dilated. By this point, my contractions were coming less frequently so the doctor recommended augmenting them with pitocin, which I started at 8:26am. Papa and I walked around for about 15 minutes to help increase the frequency and duration of contractions. 

At 9:10am the nurses switched to a Bluetooth monitor to keep track on your heart rate and contractions because the wired one was intermittently losing your heartbeat. In order to set this up I had to stay still for 15 minutes. I took this as an opportunity to take a quick nap. At 10:30am the contractions started getting more intense and were coming 3.5 minutes apart. I labored for a while on a birth ball. Around 10:45 I said I wanted an epidural, papa encouraged me to wait a few more contractions and to see if I still wanted it. I made it through one or two more contractions and then was adamant I wanted it.

At 11:09am I received the first dose of the epidural, but did not get the immediate relief I was hoping for. At 11:15am in the midst of the epidural not fully working, I was panicking and started to realize I needed to push. I was checked by the nurse and told that I was fully dilated but the doctor was delivering another baby. I was asked if I could wait. Oh goodness, that felt like forever and papa pressed the button to give me a second dose of the epidural. I managed to make it through a few more contractions and then told everyone I needed to push. The nurses, sensing my urgency, asked the midwife to assist in the birth to let me start pushing.

At 11:45am I started pushing and shortly after the doctor arrived and relieved the midwife. At 12pm, the Doctor asked papa if he wanted to deliver you. Papa was very excited at the opportunity and asked if I was okay with it, which I was. I heard the doctor coaching papa on what to do depending on how you turned coming out. As a contraction would come on I was being coached to push you. Papa asked the nurse to bring in a mirror so I could see you crowning and that was encouraging as I could see your head. While I labored and papa helped deliver, the doctor would rub your head to keep your heartbeat up as your heartbeat was dropping a bit in between contractions. During my few final pushes the doctor noticed that your umbilical cord was wrapped around your neck and papa pulled the cord around your body so you could safely come out. At 12:08pm I gave my final push, papa pulled you out and placed you into my chest. Micah you looked up at me, so alert and interested in everything around you. You quickly started rooting out my breast for comfort and latched on for your first feeding. At birth you were 9lbs, 5.6oz and 20 inches long.

Micah, it is incredible that as our third child, you gave us so many firsts. My first time going into labor on my own and papa's first experience delivering one of his boys. We are so grateful that you are here and our family of five is complete!