One week

It's another quiet, sunny Sunday morning. Was it already a week ago that I was laboring and finally admitting to myself that this was it? The house is empty except for Dio and me. My mom went to church and the rest of us decided to stay home. Eric and Zari are on a bike ride, giving me some quiet time. Dio was wide awake for two hours this morning, so now he's sleeping soundly in his cradle (see picture below).

I feel wonderful. Except for the postpartum belly and some mild tenderness in my bottom, I'd never guess I just had a baby. I went outside with Dio for the first time yesterday. My mom deep cleaned our car, the neighbors came by to see the baby, Eric mowed the lawn and built another wire cage to cover our raised bed gardens, and Zari played on the swing. I mostly sat and nursed Dio. Well, I did plant a 4x4 raised bed with carrots, beets, lettuce mix, mustard green mix, mesclun mix, mache, celery, kale, and more. Mmmmmm...

My milk was in in full force by day 3 after the birth. I was wicked engorged and well beyond a DD. I joked with Eric that having a baby gives you a free, temporary, and reversible boob job--except you never know what size you will end up with! By yesterday the engorgement had all dissipated. Dio is a very strong nurser, with much longer, deeper sucks than Zari. I'd like to film him nursing, because you can really see those long sucks with the characteristic pause before the swallow. If it doesn't get banned from Youtube, which happened with a short movie of newborn Zari latching on and nursing.

We're still trying to figure out a middle name for Dio. Here are a few possibilities we've been floating around:

• Dio Edward (after my mom's grandfather)
• Dio Brent (after my dad)
• Dio Spencer (after my maiden name)
  
• Dio Ash (if we continue our tradition of basing the middle name on the placenta's appearance, as we did with Zari's rose-shaped placenta print). I don't know if Dio's placenta looks like an ash tree per se, but it sounded better than "Dio Hemlock"!
• Then Eric's proclaimed favorite, in jest of course: Dio Jesus (pronounced "Hey-soos"). He joked that since Dio means "God" in Italian, we needed a "Jesus" to add some symmetry. And the initials would be DJ Freeze.
  

May Day! 5 days old
Story time with grandma and big sister

6 days old

This is my life, as arranged by Zari:
mama bear nursing Zari bear (on the left) and Dio bear

7 days old
We put him in cloth two days ago and were quite happy to stop using disposables.
In the cradle my dad made for me when I was born. Zari also slept in this cradle.
My favorite picture so far