#15: One Month Old

Hudson James Prusz is one month old today! It is hard to believe it.

We had his one month check-up with the pediatrician and he's a long and lean one. Here's the one month stats:

• Weight: 9 lbs, 8.5 oz  (50th percentile)
• Length: 22 inches (75th percentile)
• Head: 13.5 inches (50th percentile)

He changes so much every day. He is starting to see and track objects and people, it's so fun to watch him see things for the first time! He loves his tummy time and is getting stronger every day.

#14: Family Visits!

Hudson had quite the family welcome these past couple weeks! My parents were here through Christmas, and Joe's parents arrived for New Years, then my sister and her husband came to visit this past weekend.

It was such a blessing to have amazing help over the past few weeks...taking naps and being able to shower while a family member lovingly attended to Hudson was such a luxury!

While Nancy and Eddie were here we got to take lots of fun walks and even made it out to dinner one night! We had lots of fun staying in and getting cozy with Hudson. We also got to celebrate a belated Christmas with his parents. Uncle Andy and Aunt Bridget sent Hudson a really cute dragon towel embroidered with his name. And his cousins - Jackson, Brady and Mason - sent him some adorable Lia Molly hats that he can wait to wear!

When J.Nichole and Jake came, they cooked up a storm for us and played lots of dress-up with Hudson! It think they took over 500 pictures. They also got to see Hudson's first bath in the tub (he had to get sponge baths until his umbilical cord completely fell off).

Everyone was such a huge help and will be missed dearly! We head back to Indiana in April for a 10 day visit, so it will be awhile until Hudson sees his grandparents and aunts and uncles again!

Chilling with Uncle Jake, cheering on the Colts!

Mommy, what did Aunty J put me in??

With Aunty J!

#13: Hudson's First Bathtime!

We got to take Hudson his first bath on January 9th! He got daily sponge baths until his umbilical cord fell off, but it took 4-weeks for the whole thing to detatch.

Aunty J and Uncle Jake were there for the big bath day, capturing photos and video (check out the video on Flickr).

Unfortunately, Hudson did not enjoy his bath as much as we did. Hopefully in the next few weeks he starts to enjoy it a bit more...he did love getting cuddled up in his monster towel thought at the end!

All warm in his monster towel!

#12: Hudson's First Christmas

Hudson celebrated his first Christmas yesterday, at 13 days old! We started off our Christmas celebration with Christmas Eve service at Bel Air Presbyterian church. It was a beautiful service and there were 2 other newborns sitting in front and behind us that were born within days of Hudson. Following church we came home and had a homemade lasagna dinner with my parents.

On Christmas morning Hudson woke up at 6:30am, so I fed him and put him back down for some more sleep. After his 9:30am feeding we all gathered around the Christmas tree and started to open our stockings. While Indiana got a white Christmas with beautiful snow, we enjoyed our version of a white Christmas with our DVD of winterscapes and Christmas music looping on our TV. It was the best of both worlds!

Mommy and Daddy got Hudson a little activity owl for when he's a little older (3 months), Grammie and Papa (my parents) got him a warm long john from Baby Gap, Santa brought him a Baby Einstein music book, and my sweet Aunt Karen sent him the adorable "elf" outfit and book One With Sky that came with a cute finger puppet! Hudson gets an extended Christmas with his other grandparents, Nana and Pops, who are visiting later this week.

Later in the afternoon we drove down to the beach and a took a stroll outside. After over 8 days of rain, it was nice to get outside and enjoy what we love most about LA - the weather!

Activity Owl from mommy and daddy

Christmas present from Grammie and Papa

Elf outfit and book from Aunt Karen

#11: Welcome Hudson James Prusz!

Hudson James arrived on Sunday, December 12 at 1:33 am. He weighed 7lbs 5oz and measured 20.5 inches.

Here's how it all went down:

To our surprise my water broke on Saturday early morning, without any signs of contractions. The day before was my last day of work and we attended my company's holiday party that night until almost midnight. I wasn't showing any signs of labor at my doctor's appointment that Tuesday and was scheduled to be induced on Wednesday, December 15.

We arrived at the hospital around noon and the doctor gave me Cytotec to start my contractions. By 2:00pm, I was having full contractions 2 - 3 minutes a part. And around 7:00pm I had my epidural started. About the same time, the doctor gave me Pitocin to help speed up my labor, since I was not showing much progress after 7 hours. With the Pitocin, my doctor thought I would deliver sometime between 4:00am - 7:00am.

Unfortunately, I had some issues with my epidural. It wasn't taking to my right side and made my left side completely numb and feeling like dead weight. Between 8:00pm and midnight the doctors kept trying to fix it. Finally, a little after midnight the anesthesiologist decided to take out and redo my epidural completely. However, when the nurse checked my progress I was ready to start pushing. I went from 3 centimeters to 10 centimeters in 3 hours!

Because of this there was no time to redo the epidural, the doctors gave me a medication through my IV to help reduce the pain and an anti-nausea med to help with the nausea.

While my labor was tougher than I planned, the rest was much smoother. My doctor arrived around 1:20am and Hudson was born at 1:33am! I joked that I had a "natural" birth on my right side and "medicated" birth on my left.

Luckily my mom was able to get on an earlier than planned flight to LAX. She arrived in perfect timing to the hospital around 8:00pm and was able to greet Hudson when he was born!

We brought Hudson home on Tuesday afternoon and we can't stop staring at him! He's just so precious and innocent, it's an overwhelming feeling of love and joy. Joe and I feel so blessed and are excited to celebrate Christmas with Hudson this year.

First day home from hospital!