Prince William

Little Bill enjoyed his first bath today; we are all settling into a bit more of a pattern a little quicker this time. The learning curve with James was so steep- this time we realise these first few days can actually be pretty enjoyable. It helps that wee Willy is already a voracious and regular feeder.
Our nurse (Wilma) comes for five hours each morning and helps out a lot- we have directed her towards occupying Mames mostly, so we can get other stuff done. She has kids of her own and also takes in foster kids so she is pro at calmly dealing with a two year old.
Poor James bore the brunt of Dad's ignorance last night. I put him down in what I thought was a regular diaper (it had Dora on it) though unbeknownst to me this particular Dora indicated a swim diaper, which apparently is not something that will last through a night of peeing. He cried out a couple times in the night when Bill was crying and we let it go thinking he would have to get used to that interruption. This morning he and his sheets were soaking wet and I felt terrible. Luckily he doesn't hold a grudge at all yet.

Billy Goat

Man, are we ready to sleep as soon as James goes down this evening...
We have had to turn up the heat in house today- it is cool outside but little Bill's temp was a bit low this morning so the midwives put an extra hot water bottle in, we cranked up the radiators, and brought in the spare space heater.

By this afternoon he was up to normal temp and sleeping comfortably with his basket propped up above the radiator.
They don't measure length yet here- but Will is a little smaller than James was (though already eating more so we are not worried at all) at 6 lbs. 11 oz. (if I converted 3040 grams correctly...)

My two sons

Everyone is doing well this morning , though Mom and Dad could have used more than 2 hours of sleep. James was excited to meet Mr. Bill and has to be restrained, or redirected from trying to hold him and point out all his features (eyes, nose, etc.) every two minutes. For his part little Bill pooped, peed, and slept through his first eight hours...
It is a world apart from having just one baby around.

WELCOME WILLIAM BURNET MAIER!

Incredible. Katharine did such an amazing job this evening and brought little Bill B. Maier into the world just into the wee hours of August 30th. All the weeks of off-and-on contractions paid off as little Billy (can you tell I can't settle on a nickname?) came to us after two and a half hours of hard work and concentration.
James doesn't know what he is in for when he wakes up in 3 hours...
I think he looks a little like his uncle Bill, and even a little great uncle Bill from my side. Katharine is doing great recovering at the moment and the little bugger has even already latched on.

For your consideration...

I have finally gotten it together enough to post a little bit about my summer apprenticeship in Massachusetts- it's at the Open Building site under links.
Here.

Its Amazing

I was looking back through our photos and little movies (now that I realize Blogger has the video capacity) and I thought- 'Man, this next kid is going to think- How could you have taken 3000 photos of James before he was two?'. Just a symptom of the digital revolution really.
It is amazing though, especially when you have that much documentation, to see how fast the changes take place in a little peuter like James. You have to adapt so fast to the new stages that your mindset is sort of 'well they have always been like this'; then you see kids a couple months younger (or older) and realize that it was not so long ago.
Our house is settled into a sort of holding pattern waiting for Billy Clare (as we call him/her) with contractions still a featured event most days for Kat; especially strong today but manageable (says the husband...). We hope that all these voorweeien (pre-contractions) are doing a lot of the work and will make the birth a relatively smoother process.
As far as James is concerned, he has entered a new level of two-year-oldness in the last two weeks with more stubborn behavior and occasional irrational outbursts; we have retained the united front and are glad we are together for it. Bedtime is especially testing as he will run through every vocabulary word in an attempt to control the moment. The impending arrival of Billy Clare does keep us focused on consistency I think.

We had a nice relaxing weekend with our friend Rick Vaughn, lately of London Towne. Rick and Kat go back to MES days in Charleston; we have been lucky to keep up with him the last couple of years to trade ex-pat stories as he trades energy credits for a firm in the foggy English capital. As he is from a big family as well, we were comfortable that he could handle a potential birth during his trip, especially since James and he play quite well together.



Kat and Rick high above the bustle of Enschede market Saturday.



James and Mom enjoy honey toast on the 'front porch'...



Mames and Mom.



An excellent climber.

One of the changes this summer has been our dog training program. As Katharine had to spend two weeks walking Ghost and Keska with the stroller, she has become more of a hard-ass concerning disciplined dog behavior. Combined with the techniques of the Dog Whisperer, she has whipped these two wanna-be alphas into shape pretty quick.



On a short leash.

We will have to work on the video moments- it takes quite a lot of takes to capture something decent- and uploading seems to still have a few kinks. I just spent a half hour messing around with it and it hasn't panned out. Oh, well. Its hard to be mad at Blogger when it really does make things ridiculously easy most of the time.

Coming soon- Heartwood summer highlights...