Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Riley and Ethan Meet

We had a lot of visitors while we were in the hospital with Ethan.  We requested that most people come to visit at the hospital rather than when we got home so that we could attempt to ease into a routine and make our adjustments without a ton of company.  We loved that so many people wanted to come and celebrate Ethan's birth, but we also felt that it was best for Ethan to have a few days at home adjusting to his new environment without a lot of chaos.  So we ended up with visitors from 7:30am to nearly 10pm. It was definitely exhausting, but I'm so glad we made that choice.  Our first few days at home were nice and peaceful as a family of 3.

One of our most special hospital visitors was sweet Riley!  We really wanted Riley to understand the process of Ethan coming into our lives, so her hospital visit was important to us.  She wore a "big cousin" t-shirt that my sister made for her, and Riley presented him with a "little cousin" onesie that my sister also made.  She was very proud to give it to him.

Luckily, we got their first meeting on film.




She was VERY excited that she was going to get a chance to hold him.

She was extremely gentle and loving, and didn't have to be reminded that he is fragile and cannot do a lot of things that she can already do.  She did, however, become slightly frustrated when she would speak to him and he wouldn't speak back.  She asked everyone why he didn't want to talk to her!

Although this picture looks like she's giving me the "thumbs up" on Ethan, I actually have no idea what we were talking about in this moment.  So we like to pretend she's giving her approval of Ethan being her cousin.

She's definitely smitten with him, although we are still working on helping her to understand that he cannot do everything she can because she is such a big girl and he is still a baby.  But she definitely enjoys watching him, laying next to him, putting him in his swing (with assistance of course), and giving him lots of kisses. 

4 comments:

Erika said...

Great video. How wonderful to be able to capture that moment. I remember when my niece who was 3 first met her brother in the hospital she said "ok baby I'm ready to play with you!" You look fantastic in the hospital by the way. So relaxed and happy.

Shannon said...

Paige, that made me cry!!! That video is so sweet. I just love it. Your niece is adorable and will be such a great big cousin.

Lyryn said...

Awe, love this! So awesome!

Jax said...

Ohmygosh! This totally made me smile so big! I love it when she gives him kisses! AGH! SO CUTE! So funny tht she wanted to know why he wasn't talking to her... haha! That's awesome.