Harvey Douglas

Sweet little Harvey joined our family on May 8, 2014 at 9:39pm. He was a week early, and still weighted in at 10lbs! They measured him at 20 and 1/2 inches, but at his 2 day & 2 week appointments he was already measuring over 22 1/2 inches.. so I think he was actually a little taller then that when he was born.

There are no words to describe how much happiness and love this little man has brought to our family. There have been some adjustments for sure. Scarlet is LOVING him, but kinda struggling with us. Which.. I'd SO prefer that way, as opposed to her struggling with him. Her love and kindness towards her baby brother is SO sweet and tender, we just couldn't be happier with our little family.

There've been so many fun things that have happened in the 5 short weeks of his life, but here's some of our favorite things we hope to never forget.

1- A couple weeks ago, Brandon and I were talking about how funny it was that we hadn't been peed on yet. We'd heard that little boys were notorious for peeing all the time on you and to watch out. Well, we definitely should've knocked on wood, because at his very next diaper change, in the 1 second it took to move the dirty diaper out from under him to switch it for the clean one he decided to poop EVERYWHERE, and in the scramble to contain the oozy gooeyness of it all, he decided to start peeing.. again.. EVERYWHERE!! Haha!! Sadly, we grossly under estimated just how much can come out of a tiny baby boy, and thinking he was empty decided to try to clean him up a little before putting on another diaper.. -huge mistake- because he peed.. AGAIN!! And this time, being at a slight angle while getting his back scrubbed down, soaked the whole other half of the bed... sheesh does this boy have distance!! Haha!

2- Scarlet LOVES him. She is always protecting him from things like the loud noise of the blender, or if there's something scary on a show, if he's even the least bit fussy she's snuggling over him and kissing his cheeks and singing him the Tarzan lullaby. It is just the SWEETEST most tender thing I've ever witnessed. She's also so quick to share her FAVORITE blankie and stuffed animals in hope that they'll help him as much as they help her. She will even patiently and quietly explains the perfect way to get the most comfort from them. Like there is this random corner on her blankie, I have NO idea how she chose that particular corner (maybe her amazing aunt Amy slipped something extra special in it when she was making it..), or how she can quickly and easily find it whenever it's needed, but she'll take that exact corner and hold it to her nose and (as Scarlet puts it) 'hhmm' it. That pretty much means she smells it -- SO strange, but that's how it's done, and it brings her so much comfort. I can't even properly explain how much I love that she is so willing to share this cherished secret with her little brother, in hopes that it'll bring him the same instant comfort, I pray every night that they will always be so quick share those sweet secrets and comforts with each other.

3- Before we even knew we were going to be blessed with a sweet little boy, we always thought if our next little baby was a boy we'd name him Emmett. Well, after we found out he was a boy, neither of us really considered that name anymore. So weird, how that happens, but it just wasn't even on our 'list' anymore, and we spend hours almost everyday, I swear, discussing EVERY name there was. We had such a hard time settling on one, and just hoped we would feel good about one after he came and we were able to see him in all his cuteness. Heading to the hospital the only name we were both liking was Wesley, but neither of us were loving it. So again. We were just waiting to see him. Well, when he was born, Wesley was out the window for both of us, and Brandon instantly saw Harvey, and I instantly saw Emmett. Just so random. The next couple days were a back and forth game, and even Scarlet was no help. We called her on our way out of the hospital, trying to finalize the birth certificate. Here's how the conversation went.

Mom - "Hi Scarlet, We're trying to decide on a name for baby brother, do you like Harvey or Emmett better?"
Scarlet - "I don't know mom, it just not that easy"
Mom- "I know! It is hard! But which one do you like to say the best?"
Scarlet- "I don't know mom, I just can't help you with that."
then she started talking about the show she was watching and all the silly things the characters were doing. Before I hung up Brandon took the phone and said..
Brandon- "Scarlet, what should we-"
Scarlet- "I don't know dad! I can't help you!"
Then she threw the phone down and ran out of the room.. Haha!!

I don't blame her, it really WAS a hard decision!! I just wanted someone else to make it for me too!! Haha! But as you can tell, we left the hospital naming him Harvey. And even though I do love the name Harvey, I still look at him and think he is Emmett, and kinda have a hard time actually calling him Harvey. And like everyone says, I'm sure in no time at all, he'll just become Harvey, and there's no way any other name would've worked for him, but until then, a part of me is just not able to let go of Emmett. So silly I know. :)

4- Brandon's starting to love taking pictures lately. He used to be all about video, and still is really, but because of the awesomeness of the DSLR cameras and the occasional photo ops he needs to do for work, he's really enjoyed capturing fun moments of us too! So when I spaced the scheduling of the newborn photo shoot, Brandon was really excited to put his skills to the test! We turned Scarlet's room into a mini studio and as you can see from all the fun pictures in the post, he got some REALLY amazing shots! Well, during the particular photo op below, man do I have an amazing husband.. haha! We had that scarf wrapped around him really loosely and as I was picking him up and unwrapping the scarf it kinda got snagged a little, and me, thinking it was stuck to his diaper just flicked it a little to get it unstuck, and next thing I know.. the small left over part of the umbilical cord goes flying through the air!! I'd ripped it off on accident!!! I couldn't believe it! I felt TERRIBLE even though Harvey hadn't noticed it at all! I, on the other had, was dying. After a quick call to the on-call doctor, I found out that since it wasn't oozing or bleeding it was probably ready to come off anyway.. but STILL!! SO GROSS and SO SAD!! At least one could say it was kinda worth it.. I mean.. just look at those stinking cute pictures though. :)

5- Right after Harvey was born his jaundice levels were great! He didn't have to be under the lights at all in the hospital. But after we got home, his yellowness started getting a lot of attention, and in the super off chance that something was wrong, we decided to get a bilirubin test. Sadly, his numbers came back pretty high, and the pediatrician said he had a pretty rare form of jaundice called breast milk jaundice, which is a type that can come a couple days later, as his body starts to fill with a particular type of protein found in my break milk, and since his liver is still too new to really fight it off, jaundice starts. I did a type of formula cleanse for him, where he had 4 meals of formula, I guess so that his body could really recognize the protein from my breast milk that it was having a hard time breaking down? I'm not exactly sure. But it seemed to do the trick. That mixed with a few days on a bilibed and with a biliblanket and we were able to get him from a 19.2 down to a 13.9! I guess with breast milk jaundice the bililights can only do so much. The rest of the jaundice will take up to 12 weeks to completely leave the body, and it's something the body just has to work out itself. Luckily, it sounds so much sadder then it actually is. The doctor said he's not in any pain, and thankfully and  kinda confusingly.., the breast milk is still really good for him, so we're good to keep feeding him that. The jaundice thankfully didn't create any problems, but I think it kinda think it created an amazing sleeper! Which leads to my #6!

6- Because jaundice makes you really lethargic and tired, Harvey spent the first few weeks of his life pretty much, ONLY sleeping, we rarely saw those beautiful eyes of his. Which made for some really amazing snuggles. Now that he's reached the month mark, he's awake much more, but still sleeping really well at nights! There've been a couple were he wakes up every 3 hours exactly to eat. But then he goes right back to sleep! Most nights he'll eat around 10 or 11, sleep until 2 or 3 sometimes 4, eats and then sleeps until about 7! Man, do we feel lucky! We figured we'd be making up for Scarlet's amazing sleeping habits with this kid for sure, and so far so good! I know we're only a month in, so we're not getting too comfortable, but we will definitely take what we can get from this sweet little guy. He is also very snuggly. He always likes to be held, and we definitely don't mind. Brandon calls him his sleeping pill because it doesn't matter what time of day it is, or what is on the agenda, if you get comfy with Harvey, he will have you snuggled to sleep in minutes. He is just my tender little snuggle bunny, and we just can NOT get enough of him around here.