Holding hands

We are learning to walk together as a foursome, by God's grace. :')

Hana's first week - and on

 

Hana nurses effectively for about 15-20 minutes before calling it quits to one breast. Her whole meal's affair - nursing from both breasts, with its various points of changing diapers & socialising - takes about an hour & a half. If these needs are satisfied, she will sleep right after nursing for two hours and a half before the next feeding. At night, she can sleep significantly longer, waking up for two nocturnal feedings. 

Hana gained 400 grams in her first week. She was fully breastfed from Day 4 of her birth. 

My experience with breastfeeding Sethia had been not only unsteady, but a little traumatic. It lasted only for a short 2 months. Breastfeeding Hana now feels spontaneous & common-sensical, like her almost painless birth. With Sethia, it was an 21-hour labor; with Hana, I arrived at hospital at about half past seven, an hour later at half past eight she was born. I thank God for the experiences with both Sethia and Hana, for both humble me: nothing really depends on me.

Hana Puspa Kurniawan

Hana's scheduled date of arrival was 25th May. She arrived on 31st, 6 days late.

Should she have arrived earlier, we would likely miss our family worship's Bible reading on the evening of 30th, which providentially was 1 Thess. 5: 1-11.

"Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, "There is peace and security," then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing." - 1 Thess. 5:1-11

The LORD's coming, though it is not known, will certainly come, at its full and appointed time. It has its inevitableness and its suddenness, just like the travail of a woman in labor. But we, Christians, would not be surprised, because we have been waiting for it with expectant joy, just like the woman has waited for the birth of her child. 

What a satisfying joy to be built up and encouraged by this reading in the evening just before the contractions came at 4 in the morning. Hana was then born at 8.28 am on the next day, weighing 3.270 kg with a petite length of 48 cm. 

On 1st of June, the first day of supposedly summer in Norway, it was raining snow in Trondheim. But Adi and Sethia - on their way home after their hospital visit - were graciously given a glance of a beautiful rainbow. We were again reassured of God's prevailing grace. 

So we wanted to give Hana a middle name that gives a sense of "times and seasons", and chose "Puspa". Puspa means flower in Indonesian. This will remind us of the last day of May, the last month of spring in Trondheim, where flowers have begun to bloom. Puspa is also my [Grace's] mother's middle name. 

Hana is simply Greek's Anna/Hebrew's Hannah in Indonesian. It means "Grace". :) Providentially, it also means flower in Japanese. ;)