Colin & Claire: Grandmom's visit, 1 month old, Urology visit

It has been a busy past 5 days! Grandmom arrived on Thursday to meet Colin for the first time. Colin was very excited, and Grandmom got to hold him right off of the plane. She stayed through Saturday, and we had other visitors on Friday night. Paula's sister Patsy and her husband Dave (Peter's aunt and uncle) were driving through from Pennsylvania to Wisconsin, and we all had dinner together at our house. Saturday we went and walked around Mass Ave downtown to do a little shopping. Colin was getting fussy, so we didn't spend a whole lot of time shopping. Then we took Grandmom back to the airport, and we headed off in the opposite direction to Colin's Great-Grandpa's house for a birthday party. We made it in time to sing, and Colin woke up in time to meet some other family members and hang out with Grandma and Grandpa for a few minutes before we left.

Sunday Colin went to church for the first time. He was pretty good through most of the service; he became really agitated right as the introit started, so I stepped outside with him. Then he decided to make the silent prayer not so silent. But other than those 2 times, he sat quietly awake. He met lots of choir and bell players, and the pastor who married us.

Monday was Colin's one month birthday, which I cannot believe is already here. We shamelessly stole Geoff and Gena's photo idea: marshmallow pictures. If you aren't a follower of their blog, the marshmallow pictures involve placing one marshmallow for each month by Colin and seeing how his interactions with them change over the months. Unfortunately, Colin was SUPER cranky that day. We probably had 10 minutes all day where he wasn't eating, crying, or sleeping...so the pictures aren't great! I was hoping for more natural light, but those 10 minutes didn't coincide with much natural light!

Thanks for the blanket Aunt Ebs! He was definitely a little monster this day!

Today, we went to the urologist. He is wonderful! He gave us some background on himself, and he has some awesome credentials. He removed Colin's stitches (which we were all surprised hadn't dissolved yet), but he wasn't actually able to check on the actual location of the hypospadias; however, he did say that it wasn't incredibly severe because he couldn't see it near the scrotum. He told us that he does about 100 hypospadias procedures a year, and their pediatric urology group is the busiest in the nation. The plan is for Colin to have surgery in July because he will have to undergo anesthesia, and they like to wait a little while before doing that. I'm a little disappointed that we have to wait so long, but I feel very comfortable with Dr. K's decision. If it turns out that Colin's case is not very severe, then he will just be circumcised, and it will be over. It will be an outpatient procedure regardless. So not much happened at the appointment today in reality.

I have a week and a half left at home with Colin (guaranteed...possibly 2 and a half weeks). I am planning to make some changes regarding my work schedule, but we haven't set anything yet, so I'll wait to publicize those until later.

Here's a few extra pictures from the past couple of weeks: