Cole's Picture Site

Since I only post a few pictures on the blog, if you would like to see more, I will be keeping the following site updated. Also, if you have pictures you would like to add to Cole's picture site, you can add them on this site so all his pictures will be on one page.

http://colepoling.shutterfly.com

Pacifying and Working

From the ultrasound pictures we knew Cole would suck his thumb. It didn't take him too long to find it and he is a pro at holding his pacifier too. (Thank heavens for those because this little guy loves to suck.) The pacifier he prefers is from the hospital and is open to see through. It's hard to tell here but his thumb is in the opening of the pacifier with his hands grasping the top. That's a simple way to get the thumb in!

Otherwise, the process starts like this - fingers in the mouth or hand close to the mouth when

wham - thumb in mouth. The shadows make it hard to see - but it's in there. It's staying in the mouth longer and longer too. I'm still not sure how I feel about it but really I figure there's not much I can do. He'll find a way to suck his thumb if he really wants to!

More First Week Pictures

Because we're new parents and because we can - we take pictures all day every day. Enjoy!

More Sunbathing Pictures:

In his swing - which we're not sure he likes yet - I think he's a little small for it still.

Just hangin' out while mom updates the blog - he really likes to lay on his side but we only let him do it while he's alert.

Our little pumpkin.

First Week in Pictures

Daddy & Cole - Rick is just so adorable with Cole. He gives him lots of kisses and is just so gentle. Once I asked him to wake Cole up so I could feed him and it was more soothing sounds and gentle strokes on his face - probably making him more sleepy! Daddy is just so in love with his baby boy. It is so beautiful to see them together - it makes me love them both even more!

Cole's 1st Walk - we walked to Ryan and Jefra's new home - only about 1/4 mile away! We'll be going here lots. He LOVES his car seat which fits nicely in our stroller. He may not look it but he is VERY content whenever we put him in it. Although we learned last night that he gets very scared driving in the dark car. Mom had to jump in the backseat, turn on the light and talk him through it before he calmed down. Otherwise he loves the car ride!

Cole loves to put his hands together like this - our praying son already! However, it was while taking this shot of him doing so while grandma held him that we realized one arm was purple! Eek! We don't really know why but figured something was cutting off the circulation. We pulled him away and unwrapped him from his blankets and the color quickly returned. I've been cautious to look for this while holding him now just in case. He's so small I'm sure his circulation isn't the strongest either so any tight hold might be just too much. But back to praying - he falls asleep like this in his bassinett too!! Ugh - too adorable!!

Sunbathing - for jaundice. He LOVES the sun. Even if he is fussy he'll calm right down while lying in the sun. Again - just like daddy!


This picture shows just how long his legs and arms are compared to his body - and his long feet! The preemie outfits fit his size well but we have to be careful of the length because his legs are so long he pushes right through the sleepers!

Mom is getting used to the schedule and gaining her energy back (it helps that he has eaten like clockwork - every three hours - for the past two nights). Our little guy is such an angel.

Meet the Cousins!

Robert and Beverly brought Jade and Jeremiah by to meet Cole. Oddly enough, Jade was afraid to go near him but happily talked about him. Jeremiah could not wait to hold him. He sang songs and put Cole right to sleep. It was SO cute!

Tired & Yellow

We brought Cole home Wednesday evening about 7:00PM. Originally, we thought we would be able to leave at noon, but because my waters had broke over 18 hours prior to his arrival they wanted to keep him a full 48 hours. Rick was in class so Jefra came to pick me up. Because 7:00 is the shift change for the nurses we ended up getting to leave without me being a wheelchair. I LOVED that. I'm just not one for being wheeled around. He was 5 lbs when we left the hospital. Newborn clothes just swim on him. NB Onesies fit okay but picked up a few preemie outfits as well as preemie diapers - the Newborn diapers just kept leaking! Thanks to Diane for bringing sharing a few more preemie outfits with us!

Thursday morning we took Cole to his pediatrician who decided he wanted to test him for jaundice levels. He was always a little yellow in the hospital but when they checked him the levels were low and they didn't put him under the lights. I thought the test was just a heel prick. WRONG! It's a heel prick pulling an entire vial of blood from that little heel. When the nurse walked in to take the blood she said to me, "Now all mom's cry." I thought to myself, "Why would she say that? How weird." Next thing I now Cole is screaming in my arms. I am okay until I look down at him and see the look of pure pain. Then I don't know what came over me but the tears freely flowed. I blame most of it on lack of sleep but Rick banned me from the room for all future pricks, pokes and shots because he can't handle Cole and me crying. I'm totally fine with that! I was mad at the doctor at first because I thought it was a bit unnecessary. His heel bled for 2 whole days afterwards!

Here's my Yellow Baby - Still SO CUTE!

Turns out that day and night were horrendous as we had a jaundice "drugged" baby I could barely keep awake long enough to eat anything. One second he would scream for food and then fall asleep before he would even latch! Mom got maybe 2 hours of sleep that night but her efforts paid off. The jaundice started clearing. The doctor called on Friday with the test results and confirmed that his levels were high. Because of his little size the levels can rise really quickly. Saturday morning we took him in and I was dreading another blood test but we didn't need one since his alert moments had improved, his diaper changes were regular and he had gained 3oz in just two days (the average is 1oz per day)! He is just like his daddy - LOVES food!

He's HERE!

So Sunday I felt pretty HUGE and was the first day I was uncomfortable. I thought, "Man, Cole you can come any day now because you feel so big!" My parents were back from their vacation so I said to him, "Okay, you can come now!" I guess I have a very obedient child because Sunday night my water broke. I was a little unsure if that was it but as the morning went on it got worse so that by the time I got to the doctor's office there was no question about it. I awoke at 5:00AM with contractions that were about 10 minutes apart as well. When I got up they slowed down again so I didn't know what was going on - if this was false labor or what - but then when the water kept leaking so I called the doctor. After seeing them, they wanted me to go straight to the hospital and get on pitosin (sp???) Well, Rick had to finish things up at work and mom was the only one at her store and I didn't want to go to the hospital by myself. So headed to mom's store to wait for her replacement and then we'd go together. Right when I got to the store contractions started and were pretty frequent. By the time we got to the hospital they were regular and we didn't need any medication at all. The contractions were moving things along pretty quickly as well. I was 4cm dilated at the doctor's office and was 6cm by the time we got to the hospital. After a couple of hours, when they were getting really bad one nurse said I was 9.5cm dilated. I thought, "Okay, I can get through this without medicine." But after a few contractions where I was totally unprepared and when they would come right on top of each other I started doubting. Then a second nurse checked me and said I was only 8cm. That was SOOOO discouraging. After another hour or so I begged for the epidural. Then life was GREAT!! Thank you, thank you, thank you for modern medicine! I seriously was losing all strength and wasn't recouperating it in between the contractions. Even though the epidural slowed things down it was much needed and I haven't had any side effects. By the time we got to the major pushing with the doctor there I had so much feeling back and basically felt it all so I got the best of both worlds!

So in summary, Baby Cole Frederick Poling was born Monday, October 20th at 6:45PM weighing only 5 lbs 8 oz - so I didn't even have that on the scale for votes - congrats to anyone that guessed between 6 and 6.5lbs as you were the closest! He was 18.75 inches long. He is just SO tiny. I can't imagine pushing out one any bigger though! You mom's that do it are my heroes! He is just swimming in his little newborn clothes so I think we'll have to pick up some preemie outfits.

He's healthy but struggles keeping his temperature up. He's always borderline at 97.6 degrees - just enough for them not to put him back in the warmer. They said since my water broke early the babies tend to swallow more fluid than normal so all night he was spitting it up. Poor guy!

He is a good eater though - just like his dad! He has really long feet and we have no idea where he got those since Rick and I both have small feet. He has his mommy's forehead wrinkle which was very evident when first born but has now smoothed out. And he has the biggest, most observant eyes! Right now he is way too curious to fall asleep easily. He wants to know everything that is going on. We were tip-toeing around this morning so he would fall back asleep but we can't keep that up! We'll spoil him for now though.

Rick is the cutest daddy ever. He loves watching little Cole. It's so precious!! I, oddly enough, can't believe he's actually here! 2 1/2 weeks early but am so glad he is because I was getting anxious with every passing day. And obviously I think he's the most beautiful baby!! I'm doing well and try to sleep when I can. We plan on leaving the hospital around noon on Wednesday. I'll try to keep the blog posted with pictures. My sister-in-law Jefra took lots of pictures last night and has a few of them on her blog. Check them out. (Warning: he still looks like yoda since it was right after birth!) I'll post some of ours from today when I get the cord for the camera. Love to all!

San Antonio ALS Walk 2008

We attended our third ALS walk to support Kimmie's Ladybugs this year. Who knew that two days later we'd be having a baby! It was so great to see Kim again. If you don't know what ALS is it is also called Lou Gherig's disease. It's horrible and so hard to see the ones you love lose their physical abilities. They've made quite a few advances but we're still far from curing or even preventing it. Hopefully one day...

Latest Word

The latest from the doc - still dilated 3cm, 50% effaced and the baby has dropped quite a bit but still has more to go. Basically, her take on the situation is if I were to start contracting, Cole would be here pretty soon. Last Friday I cramped and had Braxton-Hicks (aka. false labor) all day. After that it was back to normal. We'll see what happens this week.

FYI: The picture was taken last Saturday - 36 1/2 weeks along. Now only three weeks to go! Speaking of last Saturday - it was awesome. Rick was away on business on my birthday so he treated me to an entire day of being with me and doing what I wanted on Saturday. It was seriously one of the best days - ever! It's not very common for us to get that much time together without worrying about being somewhere else or having to do something else. Thank you Love!!

4 Weeks and Counting...

So with only 4 weeks left, the docs start giving me the stats. Today's appointment went swimmingly - just like all the rest. I actually saw the nurse practitioner, Brittany, today. She asked me if I knew how big the baby was and how much I was dilated. Well, I haven't been told any of that. She said that was because I had a great pregnancy so far so the doctor really hasn't worried about any of it and therefore, didn't say anything! I've put on 26 pounds total weight so far. She estimated that little Cole is about 5 1/2 pounds which means if she's right that he'll be somewhere between 6 and 7 pounds depending on when he comes and how accurate she was. So now that we have a guestimate - how about we guess the delivery date and the weight - see the survey to the right and add your guesses to comments as well!

I'm already 3 centimeters dilated which doesn't mean much at this point because he hasn't dropped and I haven't felt a single contraction. We're still expecting an on-time delivery but as Brittany said, "You can deliver any day now - we're just waiting!". Eek! I would be ecstatic if he came early, but not THIS early! Besides, my parents are going on vacation tomorrow and Mom says baby Cole will already be on her bad side if he comes while she is away. Don't worry Mom! He's content doing turns and stretching a whole lot in my belly! Oh, I thought with all of his movement he had turned around and was in the breach position, but he is still head down. Good boy! I don't want to worry about that.

I'll have another appointment next Thursday so stay tuned!