So different yet so the same

For starters I cannot believe that Chandler is almost a month old. Btw, we changed his middle name last minute to Jack...let's just call it a tradition to change names at the last second. We had been going back and forth between Blake and Luke and then Jack got added to the mix. After his arrival, we called for big sister to come up to the hospital to meet her new brother. While on the way we told her that she gets to chose what his middle name is. In about .2 seconds she decided Jack. So Jack it is. We also changed Carson's name last second. I was already a week overdue and randomly asked Vernon if he liked the names we had picked out. He asked what alternatives I was thinking of and fell in love with Carson. We didn't tell anyone about the change until after she was born. We got some pretty interesting responses. Carson definitely fits her over Chloe (my little tomboy is NOT a Chloe by far). I think it'll work out pretty well this time around too.

Being that Carson is almost 7, there was a lot to remember about the first go around of baby-ness. I promise you Vernon forgot everything. I think he felt more comfortable with Carson at first! We're back in a groove now, but at first it was a little weird. You forget how it feels to hold a newborn. When they first come out you hold them like they are butterflies and you don't want to crush them. I'm not saying that you throw all caution to the wind later on, but at first it's as if your touch alone is going to break them. On a slightly grosser note, (grosser...is that even a word???) getting spit up, pee and poop on you no longer affects you. I think I had gone past that stage before he got here because when the thought of watching someone else's kid popped up and that would involve changing them I got that normal, gross-I-don't-want-to-get-pooped-on feeling. But now baby poop no longer freaks me out if it happens to get on my hand during a diaper change. Weird how that works huh?

 

There are some other things that feel different this time around than they did the first. I am on a completely different emotional level with him. It's something that I honestly could not even verbalize for the longest time and didn't dare share with anyone until well after Carson was no longer a baby. More on that tomorrow...