As They Grow

This is mostly for me to remember what they were like at their specific ages but you may find things interesting too. 

An outtake from the post-Baptism party. 

M at 6 weeks old today!

• Is starting to smile real smiles and make good eye contact
• Loves to be held most of all
• Can roll from tummy to back both directions now. (Added to the right yesterday.) 
• Uses the above skill to get out of tummy time frequently. 
• Probably going through a growth spurt because ALL THE SLEEP and eating just enough before drifting off again. 
• Knows when the family is eating dinner and demands to be held during it. Doesn't matter if she has just eaten or was totally asleep. 
• In 0-3 month clothes, most are still way too long in the legs. 
• Has started appreciating the full swaddle. 

C at 2.5 a week ago today!

• Loves animals. (Figurines, pictures, videos etc.) But the walrus is still the best. 
• Loves to make messes. 
• Definitely expresses his twoness with fits. Sometimes for no reason at all. 
• Very generous with hugs and kisses
• Really starting to get an ear for singing and I think it's the cutest thing ever. 
• Wears 3T shirts but just only barely into 2T pants and they're long and no matter how much I adjust the waist still loose. 
• Still naps but it varies now if he'll go right to sleep or stay awake for a while reading in his bed. A few times he's skipped it all together and it hasn't ruined everything. 
• Loves any kind of water activity. Swimming, showers and baths. Getting out is the worst part. 
• Hasn't determined hand dominance yet. Automatically reaches for markers etc. with his left hand but is more precise with his right. 

Often heard phrases: 

"I Help You" (I need help.) 

"What are you doing?" (About 80 times a day.) 

"Mmm [insert food he's eating here] tasties. It's tasties." 

I love my little minions. C is generally quite good with M and he makes her smile which is about as good as it gets with this age! 

The Past 5 Days: Pizza, Thanksgiving, Pool Party, Baptism and Family

I hope you all have had a wonderful first day of Advent and a very happy Thanksgiving weekend. There's been a lot going on here the past 5 days, lots of fun and lots of exciting things. Hang on to your hats because this post is going to go fast and be loaded with pictures. 

On Wednesday Husband took the day off to prep for the weekend. We were hosting so there was some last minute cleaning and food prep to do. Also on Wednesday C turned officially 2 1/2. My parents and my brother Peter arrived that evening after a slightly icy and slow going start. Peter met M for the first time. He called her Baby Slaggy because he thought Slagathor would be a good name for the baby.We had a pizza party and had a good time! 

My mom made C a laminated sheet of animals from National Geographic magazines. It is his favorite thing. Here are Peter and C enjoying the sheet. 

Thursday morning brought making Monkey Bread and watching the parade. That was really fun and we had a good time! My family arrived from the hotel and we spent the afternoon playing games and chatting. My brother S arrived mid-afternoon and it was his chance to meet M for the first time. That was swell. Husband and I prepped a turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing, glazed carrots, corn and rolls. It all turned out GREAT!! 

C and I made everyone a turkey as a place setting earlier in the week. 

We had pie for dessert. My blueberry loving boy enjoyed his blueberry pie enormously. 

M joined in her first holiday game night. (She's holding her dry erase marker.) When my family gets together we play games. It's what we do. The game of this holiday was primarily Say Anything. It was really fun!

Friday was kind of a typical day. Husband went to work. My kiddos and I went to the hotel to visit and so C could go swimming. I took pictures but on my mom's phone so I don't actually have any. He had a blast! He also took a shower afterwards but since we were at the hotel he used big boy not tear free shampoo and Dove Men's body wash. I though that was SO funny because he smelled just like a little man the whole day!

Yesterday was a very special day because M was Baptized after the 4:30 Mass. It was a beautiful little service. There was another Baptism during Mass but I like the afterwards ceremony better because it really is all about the Sacrament of Baptism, with a mini homily and the blessing of the parents. Deacon Bob did a great job and really made it special for us! 

Just about to the actual Baptism part. We're very reverent. No seriously though, this was a fluke that this picture was taken and turned out halfway decently. I just think it's too funny. 

Washing the sin away! Praise His Glorious Name!

During the parents blessing. My brother S and our friend Lisa are the Godparents.

A new little Catholic! 

After the Baptism we had a little gathering at our house with my family and Lisa and her husband. It was a much smaller ordeal than C's Baptism after party and therefore was much less stressful. 

Today my family left and Husband's brother's family popped in for a visit. Well, I was expecting a short few hour visit and got a whole day visit. M met her cousins and the final uncle and only aunt. So now M has met almost all her major family players with the exception of her great-grandparents on my side. I took exactly zero pictures of their visit however. 

This evening we watched a Christmas movie and set up our Christmas trees. 

We let C decorate the tree first and he just piled them all on balanced on the branches. But he had fun which is the most important part. 

After bedtime we redistributed the ornaments. We have yet to bring up the tree skirt or any of the other Christmas decorations from the basement but we certainly will tomorrow. We also haven't added our ribbon to the tree yet. 

And with that, we head to bed because hosting for 5 days in a row is exhausting. But we are so glad we didn't have to travel, were still able to celebrate Thanksgiving with family and induct our little girl into Catholicism. Success! 

Being Productive Energizes Me

Hello and happy Monday! I am not usually a Monday person (at all) but I am still pumped by this weekend and it has carried over into today. I'll take it.

Saturday brought the opportunity to sleep in a little. M was content going back to sleep after her 6ish feeding and I was not complaining. We slept until about 9;00! Heavenly! While the girls stayed in the boys went out. They got an oil change, did the grocery shopping and C got a hair cut. How's that for all before lunch?!

During nap time we did a photo shoot of Miss M because she turned one month!

She really has such a serious face most of the time. 

Saturday night was Family Movie Night! We watched Enchanted. I picked it because I am kind of over some of the other movies C has been watching nonstop. And he loves music. Joke's on me because we have been watching "Mouse and Bugs" (Happy Working Song) on near repeat since then. But we had a good time watching as a family and had fresh oatmeal chocolate chip cookies as a picnic. We all sat on a blanket in the living room and we of course did "clink" (cheers) many many times with both cookies and our milk.

After bedtime on Saturday the adults really partied hard. We moved our entertainment center, vacuumed and dusted behind it, took the blinds down and put the insulation plastic over the windows. We also rearranged some furniture so that there's a table by the chair I use when I feed M. Pretty exciting stuff I know.

Sunday afternoon was equally exciting. We did the insulating wrap on the big front window while we waited for Kathryn to come over. Then Kathryn and I went out running errands. I checked off everything on my list.

• Baptism Outfit for M
• Ham for Thursday
• Tights for me for Saturday
• Order Baptism Cake
• Stamps

Kathryn was able to start her Christmas shopping as well. Our productivity continued into the evening with a tasty dinner and watching The Good Wife. (Better than last week's episode for sure.) And of course the ever popular at our house, insulating wrap on yet another set of windows. We finished up the night putting stamps on the birth announcements so they could go in the mail. 

This morning we woke up to snow. And I've somehow managed to be fairly productive. We started our place cards craft for Thursday, I did a load of laundry and I'm about to make applesauce to can. Snazzy stuff. 

Have a swell day! 

4 Weeks

Broken record over here but how have FOUR weeks passed already?! It's so hard to believe!

Going from one kid to two has been a major learning curve for me. There were things I didn't anticipate being hard that seem impossible. (Bath time.) There are things that I anticipated being hard that for the most part have been easy enough. (Making sure C gets enough attention and is still being read to.)

I can safely say that four weeks in we are passed just surviving and we're on our way to thriving! That is certainly not to say there haven't been plenty of weak moments. There have been times when I am brought to tears with how inadequate I've felt. But somehow, our house hasn't fallen into a complete mess. Sure, the living room isn't picked up as often as I'd like but prioritizing has been key for us.

C has been a rock star. There have been fits and he is more attached to his nuki again (we had gotten to just in bed and we've regressed a little bit) but I'm not worried. He genuinely loves M and tries very hard to be helpful. Obviously some days are more helpful than others. My goal for the next few weeks are to reincorporate learning time back into our days.

M is doing well at 4 weeks. She can roll from tummy to back to the left. She is starting to make real eye contact and respond to my voice. When I smile at her she smiles back (my favorite) but she does kind of have discontented resting face right now. She has the most squishy cheeks and I could kiss them all day. She is very different than her brother and while that is 100% okay it has been a major eye opener for me. I am thankful she doesn't cry as loud as C did. Her favorite things include eating and being held. She does a really nice job sleeping at night though so I try to humor her as much as possible with the being held during the day.

She is definitely our kid in that she is all torso with short legs. C was just the same. The result is her newborn clothes are officially a little snug but she is swimming in the 0-3 month clothes. He feet don't go anywhere near the feet in footie pajamas. 

Look at all that extra fabric waiting to be filled in.

From a few minutes ago. She has since woken up. 

As for me and Husband we are good too. 

All in all, it's crazy that it's been 4 weeks already!

Warm and Toasty

Well I sort've dropped the ball on the Week in My Life posts. Friday/Saturday/Sunday just kind of fell by the wayside. Oops. But no bother, the first 4 days were a pretty good overview on my life. Honestly, it's that my normal blogging time is either in the morning or during rest time. And typically M doesn't let me do much else but hold her during those times.

And I could stay up to write but I'm going to be honest, in our newborn parenting stage we have become senior citizens and the entire household is upstairs in bed by 9:00 nightly.

But right now she's sleeping without being held so I am going to try and pound out a post quick.

First the big news: our house is warm!! Our furnace has gotten slowly more and more temperamental and we had the guy come out and look at it yesterday. This is kind of a long complicated story but I'll make it quick.

The guy came out at 8:30 and by 9:30 gave us a clean bill of health on the furnace and was on his way. Only for the furnace to act up and die by 10:00. He came back about 11:45 (we called right away) and was with us until 2:30 making sure the furnace was playing along and working well. So to the tune of $700 our house is warm and cozy. Totally worth it. Plus, that cost also includes a check and cleaning of the air conditioning come spring.

We also ordered our Saran Wrap the windows kits (you know what I'm talking about right? When you use a hair dryer to shrink Saran wrap to make windows not drafty?) off of Amazon. (SO much cheaper than Home Depot or the Ace Hardware store prices.) So we'll be able to do that this weekend and the house will be even warmer.

In other news M's baptism is officially scheduled. After a very complicated process with some disorganized individuals in the Parish office I am very happy to say it all worked out great and I am looking forward to next weekend! It's handy we could combine it with our Thanksgiving weekend when my family is in town anyhow.

It snowed over the weekend. Not a lot, just about an inch but C very much enjoyed it. He got to play outside on Sunday for a while and LOVED that. The only thing about the snow is that he is fairly convinced that snow = Christmas. So he wants to watch Christmas movies and sing Christmas songs. He would also like a Christmas tree. I have given in on the movies and music but I am holding out on the tree until after Thanksgiving!

With that, M has woken up so I should go rescue her. Happy Tuesday!

Prepare to Be Bored: My Everyday Life

I've done the vague overview of my day and then two stories from my day. Today we get the full on what one of my days is like post. There's only going to be one because at this point in life every day is pretty much the same. My days are really not exciting. But there's a certain beauty in the monotony of my every day. 

Husband woke me up at 7. This is actually new to this week. Prior to the arrival of M in our world I would sleep until 8 and C would play in his room or in our room and let me. Now I have to be on my A-game all day so being conscious before Husband leaves is a good thing.

We went through our new-typical morning routine where everyone does their own thing and we all make it downstairs by 7:30. Husband washed some dishes for me before his departure. I "made" a breakfast for C. He gets a blueberry Nutragrain bar. And milk. Apparently my child is being sustained on Nutragrain bars as that was his "main item" for dinner last night as well. I suppose there are worst things to eat every day.

The morning passed with little of interest. We played cars and animals. We read books. We changed diapers and while we're down on the floor we do tummy time. And I had to bribe C with pictures of tractors (Google Image Search) to get out of M's car seat and bring her nuki back while I fed her. Yesterday it was the rock n play. I think he's just testing me.

We got okay mail. A card from my Grandpa. An American Girl catalog. No bills. Some junk. What am I saying? That is a GREAT mail day.

I turned on Despicable Me. There comes a time every day where I just need to get something done and that is where Despicable Me comes in. I do try to keep the TV off for the rest of the day to make up for this assembly of minions. During the movie I folded the laundry I washed and dried yesterday and M did more tummy time. C quoted the movie to me and unfolded everything in his pile. 

After refolding the pile I started prepping lunch. The menu included shrimp poppers, green beans, corn and apple slices. I was trying to use up our Connell Reds because it's not my favorite apple variety. We ate and C actually ate one of the shrimp poppers. For a kid who eats little to no meat it was a rare sight.

Because I was feeding M, I got C up for rest time late. (1:10) The result is 30 minutes of him not in his bed while M fed on the other side. I am not good enough at nursing yet to be able to just wander around the house so I hollered but eventually put M down and went up to put him to bed. After I tucked him in for the second time he asked to sing the Sunshine song. (You are my Sunshine) We sang it 3 times. Once he helped sings, once I sing his own special C version and once just normal but by myself. He wanted to sing Baby Beluga but I just said I love you and have a good rest, This was enough to get him to sleep. Ten minutes late to nap sure puts a spoke in his wheel though.

I came back downstairs and because M was sleeping I started to clean and tidy the living room. I got about 7 minutes in and M woke up. We snuggled and M took a nap snuggled on me. I may have dozed off but mostly just perused the internet. I did make a phone call and send some emails out so it was not an entirely unproductive rest. With 15 minutes left of rest time I put M in the rock n play so I could finish getting things clean. The room is driving me nuts so even if it's a complete mess just a little later it will be worth it to me to have it clean for a few minutes. After I got the floor picked up I dusted the coffee table and television. The sticky hand prints were no match for Pledge Multi-Surface!

At 4:00 I woke up C. He is a beast because his nap was almost an hour short. I bribed him downstairs with the prospect of vacuuming! He bought it. We vacuumed and life was good.

We Skyped with my brother at college. Then we looked at pictures of penguins. Google image searches are pretty nifty for distracting/entertaining/appeasing 2 year olds.

We read his new dragon book and looked at pictures on my phone. Husband called right in the middle of that which brought on a total meltdown. Husband got home. We (M and I) Skyped with my dad while C had a fit. (No idea why.) Then we all convened to the kitchen to make dinner. C was still throwing a fit so I thought we could bake a cake. That didn't work well. He had to go to time out for a bit with Husband. When he was back under control, the cake went in the oven. Husband made eggs, bacon and blueberry pancakes for dinner and C licked the beater.

Since he was already messy we added some blueberry syrup to his pancake. He did a good job eating it AND had 2 pieces of bacon. It was a record setting meat eating day for him. Al Roker has weather forecasts but C had meat eating!

After dinner we all went immediately upstairs for showers. C went first. He may or may not have revolted when it wasn't his turn anymore. I got to go next and then M. Once we were all in pajamas and smelling good, we went back downstairs for the last few minutes of Wheel of Fortune.

We sort of watched The Big Bang Theory, or rather it was on. It is hard to watch shows with toddlers and newborns around. Plus... central time zone is dumb because shows start before bedtime! So during that there was more reading and playing.

We Skyped with my parents until Husband to C to bed at 8:00, right on time. After I was done talking to my mom, we got ready to go upstairs for the night. I frosted the cake and put the lid on it and the last 3 members headed up the steps.

We updated some addresses on our spreadsheet because we have birth announcements to send. Now it is 10:22 and I am going to hit publish and go to sleep!

And that was my Thursday in a nutshell. I make no apologies but it wasn't a super exciting day.

And I Feel Good

This morning I was minding my own business on the couch. I was holding my favorite 3-week-old. (Seriously, it's been 3 weeks already! It's going warp speed!) We were, of course, watching Despicable Me because my favorite 2 year old loves to watch the minions. 

Through the blinds came a sunbeam and it was directly in my eyes. Most people would be annoyed by this. I did, in fact, find it distracting but I just embraced my sunbeam. The day after M was born, Husband went to work and my mom came and sat with us at the hospital for the day. Our room had a big window and it was sunny. 

As it happens, my mom and I have a philosophy which basically says to enjoy sunbeams. We just close our eyes and hum. In fact I am under strict instructions, when my mom is old and senile, to spritz her with perfume, wheel her into a sunbeam and put a piece of chocolate in her mouth. Needless to say we quickly indoctrinated Little Miss M into our "enjoy the sunbeam" group. 

My mom even made up a song called "In my Sunbeam." 

So this morning when the sun was shining, I just held my girl and closed my eyes and hummed. 

Look at that gorgeous sunbeam!

It is cold here now. With no end in sight. Definitely too cold to go play in the yard just yet. (I mean I guess technically we could all bundle up but that takes a lot more effort than I am willing to put in at 8:00 AM.)

Besides, we were watching Despicable Me. 

So I just enjoyed the sunbeam. I even sang "And the sun shines just for me, and I feel good." Are you a Boy Meets World Fan? No? 

I'm not crazy. It's just one of the funniest episodes. Here. I'll stick the video in here. If you are not a "video in a post" kind of person I'll tell you that the song I am talking about is in the first 35 seconds of this episode.

And this morning? This cold Wednesday morning, the sun was shining just for me and I did feel good. I am glad I took the time to just enjoy it too because a little while later I would go and make my oatmeal and when I got back the clouds had overtaken the sun. 

But my heart is still in that moment. Snuggling a baby, a cheerful toddler and a sunbeam. Life is good. Days are made of the little perfect moments.