Party Animal

Today E went to his first birthday party!  It was a party for my friend LeighAnne's son, Luke, who was turning three.  The party was at Bounce U, which is this huge building with AWESOME bounce things - I know, I'm so eloquent.  After the fact I saw a story on the news about how people can break their necks at these places - probably wasn't the best idea to bring my 4 month old into one of them and basically toss him to another friend in the moonbounce so that I could climb a ladder just to go down the slide?  Mother of the year, for sure.

Here's a pic of E before:

And after:

 

And just because it makes me chuckle everytime I see it, here's a pic I snapped of my friend Tim going down the slide with his daughter, Tessa.

 Hee hee hee...

After the party we went to dinner at Peddler's Village with Tim, his wife Tracy, and Tessa.  It was all decked out for Christmas - lights EVERYWHERE!  So pretty.  Here's our happy family:

Everett was enthralled, as you can see.

Everett: 3 Months

I'm going to be completely honest- I'm sitting here writing your 3 month update and you're actually 7 months old.  Whew, it feels good to get that off my chest.  A part of me says, "Just give it up, you'll never be able remember things from 4 months ago!".  But I want to try to document what I can remember.  So here goes...

Sleeping: I don't know exactly what happened, but the day you turned 2 months it was like a switch flipped, and everything fell into place.  The first day I decided to try putting you on a schedule I was so nervous about how it would go - especially naptime.  I put you in your sleeper, closed the door, and waited for the sobs..................SILENCE.  You fell right to sleep.  Once again, thank you to my friend Jamie who advised me to really look for the signs that you were tired - I did and it worked!  You usually take about 3 naps a day.  One in the morning, one in the afternoon, and then a catnap in the early evening.  You continue to be a great nighttime sleeper.  You go to sleep around 9 and you get up around 8.  You've been sleeping through the night a lot - yay!!  Every now and then you get up once for a bottle, usually around 4am.  We still swaddle you every night.

Eating: I lengthened the time between your feedings, and that worked like a charm too!  Thanks to Shannon for the great advice!  This month you had a 5 ounce bottle every three hours.  It works really well. You continue to love your bottles like nothing else in this world.  When I take it away to burp you, you let out a cry like I've never heard.  And then just like that, you're happy as a clam when you get it back.  Stinker.

You still enjoy your bath time.  You bathe in the kitchen sink, which is working well for now.  I usually give you a bath every other day.   You're also doing a great job with tummy time.  You used to cry every time we'd put you on your belly but now I actually get some smiles!  You've started to laugh, which is the cutest sound I've ever heard in my life!  They sounds like little grunts - love it!!!










You still like to be held upright - no cuddling or rocking like a baby for you!  I wish you were more of a snuggler, but hopefully someday that will change.  You've been this way since the beginning, so I guess I'm used to it :-(.  You also love to stand - everyone always comments on how strong your legs are! 

We still take you out a lot and you do really well.  You are a really easy going baby.  Grammy Pammy always says, "Do you know how lucky you are to have a baby like him?!?!".  The sad thing is, you're the only baby I've ever been around, so I don't know any better!  If you ever have a sibling, I'll probably learn my lesson...

Everett, I fall more in love with you each day.  You are the greatest blessing of my life, and everyday I spend with you is such a gift.  Thank you for being my sweet boy.  I love you.

Pumpkin Patch with my Pumpkin

As you may or may not know, I struggled with infertility for a looooooong time- at some point I'll do a post about it.  One of the things I always dreamed of doing was going to a pumpkin patch with my little one.  As you can imagine I was BEYOND excited to do this today! 

My mom and I took Everett to Linvilla Orchards, which is a farm about 45 minutes from where we live.  I'd never been but always wanted to go.  Side note- can I just say that one of the (many) perks of staying home is being able to go to places like this during the week?  This place would have been PACKED on a Saturday or Sunday, and it was great today!  Anyhoo, we had a great time and came home with some yummy treats - pumpkin roll, anyone?  By the way, Everett's favorite part of the pumpkin patch was sucking his fingers.

Here's a pic of my little pumpkin:

Everett - Two Months

Everett, you turned two months old today!  How is this even possible?!?  At your two month checkup you were 23 inches long and weighed 14.3 pounds - yikes!!  I can explain...

In some ways, I think your second month was harder for me than your first.  When we first brought you home from the hospital, I was shell-shocked, exhausted, and completely terrified.  Luckily, you were just a snuggly little beanbag who slept most of the day away, so I managed to survive.

During your second month you've become more of a little person, and I've found myself not knowing what to do with you!  I was craving routine, but it seemed like you weren't ready for it.  As I mentioned, you were a great sleeper during your first month - from about 3 weeks on you were able to sleep through the night needing only one feeding around 4am (new moms, don't hate on me).  You also napped really well during the day.  Luckily, you continued to be a great nightime sleeper during your second month, but the naps started to disappear!  At around five weeks, you would wake up around 40 minutes into your nap and couldn't soothe yourself back to sleep.  I tried to help calm you down, but to no avail. The after about 2 weeks of that routine, the naps completely disappeared!  It seemed like every time I put you down for a nap you would cry your little head off until I finally came and rescued you!  I spent most of this month reading every baby book I could get my hands on and second guessing my every move - cry it out?  Don't cry it out?  Swaddle? Don't swaddle?  Study the cries and learn what each one means?  Good luck with that one...

As for your major weight gain, I've been making the rookie mom mistake of assuming that every time you cry, you're hungry.  Oops!  Luckily, I have some good mommy friends (shout out to Shannon and Jamie) who helped me learn the error of my ways.  Just at the end of your second month, I'm making another attempt to get you on a schedule - we'll see how it goes....fingers and toes are crossed!

The last thing I want to do is make it sound like this month was nothing but trouble, but as all moms know, we all make mistakes and everyday we're faced with new lessons to be learned.  Don't worry, little one, this post is all about the mistakes I've made and the lessons I've learned.  I've still loved every moment with you and I'd relive this second month in a heartbeat if I could.   Now let's talk about the fun things that happened this month.

• You continue to love to eat-you've never met a bottle you didn't like!  I had been supplementing with formula and my supply was starting to dwindle, so at about 2 months I decided to stop pumping and make the change to only formula.
• We took the body insert out of your carseat - you're becoming such a big boy!
• At around 7 weeks we started getting some real smiles.  As any parent knows, there is no way to describe the feeling you get when those smiles start popping up - pure bliss :-).
• You're getting much better at tummy time - starting to hold that head up more each day!
• You are SO strong.  I don't know if all babies are this strong, but everyone comments on it!  
• You LOVE to stand up - your legs are so strong that I only need to hold your finders to keep you steady - you do the rest!
• We go out to dinner all the time and you always handle it like a pro!  Everyone says this will end when you're mobile - I guess Daddy will have to take us out even more until that happens:-).

Everett, you are such a gift to me and daddy.  We love you so very much and thank our luck stars for you each and every day!

Everett - One Month

Everett, you turned one month old on August 19th.  Everyone told me how quickly time would go, but I had no idea it would fly by like this.  Even though these first few weeks have had their challenges,  I feel like I blinked and a month had gone by!  Here are some things I want to remember about your first month with us:

• ·         At your one month checkup, you weighed 10lbs, 14oz.  You were 8lbs, 14oz when you were born and you weighed 8lbs, 3oz when we brought you home, so you've gained almost three pounds in the past month!  Wow!  You are 22 inches, 2 inches longer than you were at birth.

• ·         You love to be talked to.  You will stare into the eyes of whoever is talking to you, and many people have said that they feel as though you are listening and understanding every word they are saying. 

• ·         You also love to be held - all the time!  It can be hard to get things done around the house with a baby in my arms, but I'll take it.  I know there will come a time when you won't want to be held anymore (sniff), so I'll enjoy this time while I can.

• ·         You love your hands.  They are always at your face and they are so expressive.  Sometimes it's hard to feed you because you'll want your fingers AND a bottle in your mouth!  In fact, the moment after you were born you already had two fingers in your mouth.  Before you were born I would get my ultrasounds each month, and the technician would always say that your hands were by your face.  It's amazing to think that you already had this little habit inside my belly!  In the past week you've been keeping your hands folded across your chest.  It looks like you're praying and it's just the cutest thing ever :-)

• ·         If I had to choose one word to describe you right now it would be inquisitive.  Your big brown eyes are always taking in everything around you, and your eyebrows are always raised, as though you're already thinking big thoughts.  You love to move around and check out your surroundings.  I have a picture of the two of us the moment that we met, and even just moments after being born, you were already peering at me intensely with those beautiful eyes of yours.  I love to look at that picture - it takes me right back to the moment you were born, and it's a moment that I wish I could relive over and over again.

• ·         You've been developing good sleeping habits this month.  We brought you home on a Sunday, and by the following Thursday you were sleeping until about 4 in the morning, waking up to eat, and then sleeping again until morning.  This pattern has continued throughout the month, with a few minor changes.  Earlier this month we were putting you to bed around 11 or 11:30.  You would get up once around 3 or 4 and then sleep again until about 8.  Over the past week, we've been putting you to bed a little earlier - around 9:30 or 10.  You'll sleep until about 4 and then wake up to eat, but your morning wakeup time changes from day to day.  On a good day you'll sleep until about 8:30 or 9 - yay!!  On a bad day you'll wake up around 6:30 or 7 - grrrr!  On those early days I'll give you another bottle and try to put you back down for another hour or two, which usually works.  You slept in our room for the first few weeks, but you've been sleeping in your room for about two weeks now - such a big boy!  You're still in your newborn sleeper (the taco) and you don't sleep well unless you're swaddled nice and tight.  We'll keep you in the "taco" until you're ready for your crib.

• ·         You LOVE to eat.  Your food intake has steadily increased over this first month.  For the first week you had about two ounces of breast milk every two hours.  This didn't satisfy you so we started adding an ounce of formula to the mix.  This worked for about another week or two, but then you still seemed hungry after you finished your bottle, so we added another half an ounce of formula.  Now you're having two ounces of breast milk and two ounces of formula every two hours.  You gulp down every bottle like it's the last one you'll ever get, so we stop you several times throughout a feeding.  Sometimes you spit up after you eat, sometimes not.  At bedtime and in the middle of the night you only have formula, which I think helps you (and mommy and daddy) sleep better.

• ·         Your eyesight is improving more and more each day!  It is so much fun to watch you in your pack and play while you look at the owls above you, or in your bouncy seat where you stare at the birds above your head. 

• ·         When you were first born, you hated having your diaper changed.  You would scream at the top of your lungs!  Now, you seem to enjoy it. 

Everett, you are such a joy.  We waited for you for a very long time, and I would often wonder why I wasn't being blessed with a baby.  Now I know that God had a plan for us.  You were meant to be our baby, and I couldn't have asked for a sweeter little boy.  I love you.

Hello and welcome to my new blog!  I've been a blog reader for many years and I've always wanted to start my own, but I never knew what type of blog I wanted to have.  Well, this year I finally got my answer- my husband and I welcomed our first baby in July and I decided to start this blog to document all of our new experiences - with a little home decor and fashion on the side :-).  I'm looking forward to sharing more about my family in upcoming posts-I hope you enjoy!