After much anxious waiting, we are finally grandparents to a beautiful baby boy.  Oliver Maxwell weighed in at an amazing 9lbs 3oz and we can’t wait to meet him in person.  Before I walk you through what happened here are some pictures.

Kyrston a few days before the baby was born.

My son-in-law Jeremy and Oliver.  Oliver has his “I was just born” cranky face on.

He likes being swaddled from what I hear.  That’s a pretty cute face!

One of the common misconceptions about the full time RV lifestyle, is that you can be with family for all the big events.  If you are a retired RVer that may be the case, but us working RVers have similar challenges as those with full time jobs.  That being said we could have made some different choices and been there for the birth (my friend Kelly was there for her first grandchild), but in our case we did not.

So it was rough being so far away from my kid during this important moment, and even rougher when her labor drug on and she was in pain.  Regardless of the reason, it’s hard to watch your child suffer and even though pain is a completely natural part of childbirth, it was hard for me to handle.  It was even worse when things got complicated and after 18 hours of labor they decided to do a C-Section.  Thankfully the decision was not an emergency and they were able to choose, and given the lack of progression I thought it was the best choice.

Turns out it absolutely was because Oliver weighed in at a whopping 9lbs, 3oz!!!  Kyrston, at 5’2″, is smaller than me, and I had trouble delivering her at 7lbs, 14oz.  As a matter of fact when the midwife saw the size of the baby she said he was never fitting through there!  All that really mattered was everything turned out well, and there are advantages to having a bigger baby.  He’s eating like a champ for one thing, and much less scary for a first time mother.

A couple of weeks ago I made my flight arrangements and will be with them August 7 through August 17th.  I picked those days deliberately because I wanted to wait until Jeremy’s paternity leave was done.  I think it’s important that they spend time as a family adjusting to the new normal and having a mother-in-law watching every move wouldn’t be my personal favorite.  Now that he is here though I can’t wait to meet him in person and am spending as much time as possible finishing his baby blanket.

This Cross Stitch turned out to be waaay more work than I originally thought. Thankfully all that is left is the outlining and I think I can get that done in time.

As far as my grandmother name, I haven’t decided yet.  I would like to meet him first and am even open to letting him decide what to call me, which could take awhile.  It’s also too soon to tell who (if anyone) he looks like.  Again, more than happy to see how that plays out over time.  Really I think the important thing for us as Grandparents to remember is ultimately it’s not about us.  Yes, having our first grandchild is a major milestone, and thankfully we are both very excited about the circumstances.  That being said as a life impact Jeremy and Kyrston are the ones whose lives are completely going to change, and we want to do everything we can to help while allowing them to live their lives as they see fit. Ultimately, I do believe this birth will have an impact on how we travel, but for right now the focus is being supportive of their transition.

One last thing.  I really wanted to thank everyone who clicked our Amazon link over the last several months.  That little bit of extra money (ranging between $27 and $109 dollars each month) has allowed me to splurge and buy some presents for Oliver.  It helped me feel part of the process and made both myself and my daughter very happy.  As you know we live on a pretty tight budget so having that little bit of guilt-free money to spend was fantastic.  Thanks so much to everyone who participated!

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