We’ve uploaded another set of pictures of covering William’s first month or so at home. We were very fortunate to have Grandma Flack and Grandma and Grandpa Wong with us during these intense first few weeks: they were a tremendous help as we re-adjusted to having a newborn around, and they made it much easier for Julia and Joseph to get used to having a younger sibling siphoning most of our attention away from them.

So far, the older kids are coping pretty well with William’s presence. Julia loves helping out with him, and has been very gracious about sharing her room during late-night diaper changes and the occasional afternoon nap. Joe seems to be a bit more affected, but is holding up well overall. He’s regressed a bit in some ways—for example, we’ve caught him sucking his thumb a few times, a habit he had finally kicked over the summer—and he’s sometimes just a bit awkward and overzealous in his interactions with the baby, but there aren’t any signs of real jealousy.

So far, William has been a pretty well-behaved baby. He gets a bit cranky in the afternoon and evening, largely because he’s tired: for whatever reason, he has a hard time taking a nap except in the morning, right after I take Julia and Joe to school, so by the time evening rolls around, he’s usually pretty unhappy. On the plus side, once he gets to sleep at night, he’s usually good for two or three solid hours at a time, and he doesn’t require a great deal of convincing to go back to bed after nursing. He particularly likes to rest in his swing; in fact, last night he slept there for six hours straight from 7:30 until 2:30 in the morning. Unfortunately, Julie and I weren’t able to go to bed because we didn’t want to leave him alone in the kitchen, but hopefully it was a sign of more restful nights to come.

Gallery: William at Home