Jude - 2 and a half weeks old

Jude weighed in at 10lbs, 8 oz at 16 days old, seemed to be around 23.5" long - he's finally uncurling! Here are some photos I took of him this past weekend:







I'd been trying for this shot since he was born. I'm really kind of surprised to get it at 18 days old, but yay for getting it! Everytime I'd tried before he would just try to eat his hands.


I managed to mess with him enough to wake him up eventually. :) It continually amazes me how light his eyes are. After having two kids with very dark eyes, this is a new thing for me. I was really hoping, though, that one of my kids would get my hazel eyes (which I feel to be my best feature - they shift colors from hazel-brown to olive green depending on clothing, mood, and how tired I am). Chances are looking good that Jude will have them! Yay! Funny, because my mom has brown eyes and my dad has hazel eyes and two out of three got the hazel eyes. But I'm just happy that one will get them! All three poor children managed to get my cowlick, right there at the left side of the forehead (well, their right). Poor dears, I have never cared for it! Something about his face, maybe his eye shape, reminds me of my brother Adam, whom he shares a birthday with.

After all that posing torture, Jude gave me a smile! He's been a very smiley baby, but I hadn't yet caught any on camera.

It's interesting, getting to know this little guy. He's different than his brother and sister in so many ways, yet already seems to fit in with the family quite well. He's so far laid back and easy going. Hard to tell that in a baby, but he really doesn't cry much. Often he'll give one loud "WAHH" if he wants something (usually to be picked up or passed off to Mom), and then wait a couple moments or even minutes before repeating his request. It takes a while for him to get worked up enough to really cry, and rarely happens. He sleeps quite a lot, though right now he's having a hard time settling down after sleeping pretty much all day long! We took them to Toy Story 3 today at the theatre, and he slept the whole time, actually the whole trip - lunch, movie, Target shopping, and all. He is even good in the car - only fussing when we put him in. Really, I couldn't have asked for a baby with a sweeter disposition, let's just hope it lasts for a while. ;) He's so big, and quite strong, already has rolled over a couple of times, and he's working on holding his head up (and his neck is really strong). Part of me has been a bit sad my last baby was so big (you know, I wanted a tiny person who would stay tiny for a long time), but he is just an amazing little guy, so I'll over look it. ;)

Leila and Elyas are both adjusting really well to being a family of five. Leila is starting to ease off being in the baby's face constantly (though she still REALLY REALLY loves him a lot - good for someone who was so set on getting a sister!). She's really good with taking care of him. Elyas mostly ignored him in the beginning, and is still to some extent, but also makes sure I am taking care of Jude. I put Jude to sleep in the cradle this morning, and Elyas wanted to know where he was and why he was sleeping there. I think he is starting to see that (at this time at least) having a sibling isn't impacting him as much as he'd feared. Thank goodness Jude isn't like Elyas, who was soooo colicky and needed to be walked, and in the sling, and bounced, and nursed, and sung to constantly for the first 5 months or so, and it had to be Mama. I sometimes wonder if his hospital experience with RSV (at 9 days old) didn't throw off his whole system. I'm so glad Jude waited while we were all sick through the beginning of June and arrived when everyone was healthy, and stayed healthy himself. I really wanted to have one baby I had at home and got to stay at home with!