Wednesday, May 30, 2012

#55 - Check!

Number 55 on my list of 101 things to do in 1,001 days was to meet Baby Lobdell.  Tiffany and Trevor welcomed their first baby boy, Harper Benjamin Lobdell, into the world on May 28, 2012 at 7:13pm.  He weighed 7lbs, 4oz and was 20 inches long.  He is so incredibly perfect.  Tiffany had a long labor like me, actually, hers was longer than mine by an additional hour or so.  I thought my almost 11.5 hour labor was long!  The good news was that for the most part, she couldn’t feel anything.  Once it was time to push, she pushed for 30 minutes or so and he was here.  I’m slightly incredibly jealous. 

Since she didn’t have him until 7:13 and I was putting Carter down for the night, I decided not to go see them last night and waited until today.  During lunch, I left work and headed to Shelby to see the happy parents and this tiny ball of preciousness:

IMGP7036

Tiff was feeding him when I got there but I eventually got to hold him.  He slept the whole time I was holding him.  So adorable.  I have a hard time remembering when Carter was this small, and it was only 5 months ago!!!  The smallest Carter ever got (after losing weight after birth) was 7lbs 4oz, so I imagine Harper will probably drop below 7lbs but hopefully not for long.  I can’t wait to see him again!!!  Him and Carter are going to get into so much trouble together in the future :)  Congrats to the new parents!!  Love you guys!

Carter - Five Months

IMGP7035

**I absolutely love this picture of him.  It portrays his personality so well.  Such a happy baby that loves to smile and laugh**

Diapers

Still in size 2’s.

Clothes

Still wearing 3-6 months.

Nursing

He still loves to nurse and I still despise pumping.  You know, it’s one thing when I am working out of our office and am able to pump in my own office with a locked door and blinds closed.  It’s a whole other ball game when I’m at a client’s office and I end up having to pump in the bathroom on a toilet.  I’ll be in there for 15 minutes and I’m pretty sure some women (that have never heard a breast pump) are baffled at why I’m in there for so long and why I’m making so much noise.  The plus side is that I seem to be pumping a CRAP TON.  I have plenty of milk in our fridge and on top of that, I’ve begun freezing a lot of milk so that it doesn’t go bad in the fridge.  I would guess I have close to 40-50oz. in the freezer and at any given time, I usually have about 50oz in the fridge.  I’m pumping more than he needs right now because he only eats 5 times a day, but I probably pump 6 times a day.

On another nursing note, Carter has now begun to get VERY easily distracted while nursing.  He’ll nurse for a few minutes then turn his head around to look behind him as if to make sure nothing is going on that he’s missing.  Then he’ll nurse a little while longer, then turn and look again.  This happens numerous times during a feeding session and it’s quite annoying when I’m trying to get him to hurry and eat because we have to go somewhere.  Also, Carter has gotten to where he plays with my clothes when he nurses.  If I’m wearing one of my nursing tanks (spaghetti strap) he’ll grab the strap and pull it towards him as hard as he can and then let go like he’s letting go of a slingshot.  And that’s about what it feels like when he’s letting go too.  It hurts so bad!!  I have to find a way to make him stop doing this!!  Suggestions welcome!

Sleep

We have officially taken sleep habits from our daddy.  Carter gets no less than 12 hours of sleep every night, but I rarely let him go more than 12 hours without a feeding.  But watch out if you wake him before he’s ready.  He has a wrath.  One morning, I had to wake him after a mere 11 hours of sleep (can I be a baby again?) and he was NOT happy with mommy that day.  Carter has what I call his “happy place” when he sleeps.  His happy place is on his tummy, head turned to one side and his thumb in his mouth.  This is how he sleeps most of the time.  Though about mid-month, we started noticing him lifting his knees slightly which would lift up his butt.  It looks quite strange when looking at the video monitor.  It’s as if he’s just sticking his butt out there for you to see.  Weird.  But he’s done it pretty much every night since we noticed it.  I’ve read that a lot of babies wake up around the 5am range and “talk to themselves” for a bit and fall back asleep.  Carter is no exception to this.  He usually wakes me up around 5-5:30, not crying at all, but just cooing and making noise looking around the room at things.  He falls back asleep and usually stays asleep until I wake him. 

Feedings

We’ve bumped up to 6-6.5 oz this month and I think that is one of the things that’s helping Carter sleep longer naps during the day.  He eats 5 times a day.  On rare occasions he’ll eat 4 times.  At this age, it’s suggested they eat 4-6 times a day, so we’re right on track.  At Carter’s 4 month pediatrician appointment, doc said I could go ahead and do solids if I wanted.  I refused.  I don’t want to even touch solids until 6 months.  He does really well off of just breastmilk so I’d like for him to be exclusively on breastmilk for a little bit longer.  Doc was proud of me for that.  I’ve read that you have to be careful to not introduce solids too early because kids can create allergies if you introduce too early.  On the flipside, you can’t wait too late or they won’t be getting the nutrition they need.  The suggested timeframe to begin solids is 4-6 months, which is why I plan to begin when he’s 6 months.

Carter now recognizes a bottle and when we’re trying to heat a bottle in warm water before we give it to him, he will see it and will try to reach for it, almost falling out of your arms in the process.  I think it is so amusing how far he has come with his motor skills.  He use to just let you feed him no fuss about it, but now if he even sees a bottle, he will reach his hands and his entire body towards it to get it in his mouth.  Of course 9 times out of 10, he misses his mouth when he pulls the bottle towards him.  He is also becoming increasingly interested in what I am eating.  He watches me when I put things in my mouth and studies it.  This is supposedly a sign they’re ready for solids, but again, I’m trying to hold out until 6 months before I start rice cereal. 

Naps

Like I mentioned above, Carter’s naps have increased in length quite a bit.  We’ve officially dropped the 4th nap.  He did this on his own, it wasn’t something I had to do.  He just started taking longer naps at the first three naps that by the time he should go down for the 4th we would be too close to bedtime, so we’ve just been keeping him up slightly longer at night and skipping the 4th nap all together.  So now, we’re at 3 naps that are usually 2 hours if not over 2 hours (with exception to the third nap which is usually an hour or a little more).  Most of these changes were actually implemented the week he turned 4 moths old.  His cycles are now 3-4 hours.  I can’t remember the last time we had to feed him prior to three hours from the last time he ate.

Waketime

This is where we’re struggling these days.  Carter is the best little sleeper God could ever have given us, but due to that, he struggles with waketime.  He can’t make it more than an hour and a half without getting VERY fussy and needing a nap.  He struggles with independent play and I’m hoping that’s just the fact that he’s only 5 months old.  He doesn’t seem to be happy just sitting in an exersaucer or on the floor with a bunch of toys for long periods of time.  He gets bored very easily and wants you to change his activity when he gets bored.  When he was younger, you used to be able to set him in the floor on his ocean mat or in his mama-roo and he’d be content for 30-45 minutes or more.  Not so much these days.  Each activity only lasts about 15-20 minutes tops before he cries to be moved to something else.  It’s like he’s already developed baby ADD.  I hope this improves soon as he learns to crawl towards things and entertain himself.  The only thing that makes me feel better (slightly) is that I’ve heard that babies that are like that usually end up being very smart.  They get bored because they’ve figured out all about the toy that they need to and want to move on to the next challenging thing.  Maybe this is true.  Fingers crossed.

Statistics

There was no 5 month check up so all I can go on is my scale for weight and measuring height on my own. At 5 months old, Carter weighs 15lbs, 9oz and is between 27-28 inches tall.  According to a book I  have, this puts him in about the 50th percentile for weight and 90th percentile for height.  He just keeps getting skinnier and taller!

Abilities

We’re working on sitting up and getting pretty good at it.  I make him sit in the bumbo seat at least once a day for as long as he can take it.  I usually also sit him in front of the TV or a mirror to try to get him to sit on his own.  Right now he likes sitting in front of his playmats so that he can touch the toys that he would be touching if he were laying down under them.  I can tell he wants to crawl sooooooo bad but just doesn’t quite know how to make it happen.  There have been several times where he’s lifted up from his stomach onto his knees, but he doesn’t know where to go from there and usually just falls back on his stomach.  I’m not as concerned with crawling yet, I just REALLY want him to get to where he can sit up on his own for a long time without me overseeing him. 

Other Notable Things

We’re still teething.  His hands are constantly in his mouth and he is CONSTANTLY drooling all over the place.  Doc said that he will teeth for a while before he actually cuts a tooth.  He suggested against using orajel because of how long babies can teeth for.  If you read the box of orajel, it says not to use past 7 days if you’ve noticed a difference in the pain.  Since the pain of teething clearly lasts longer than 7 days, the doc said to just use it on days that he’s really in pain.  Carter is doing fine right now with the pain.  I can tell he can feel the pressure in his mouth, but he’s not overly grumpy about it at all.  I think he could honestly careless about teething toys too.  I’ve tried numerous ones and the face he gets when he puts it in his mouth compares to what my face would look like if I ate poop.  The day before he turned 5 months old, I noticed two front “bumps” that are lighter in color than the rest of his gums, so I think he’s got two teeth coming through right now!!  Which would explain the sickness that’s been going around.  Both Carter and momma have a cold and we’ve now given it to daddy too.  I think his teeth cutting through gave him a cold which he has passed to me.  We got some baby Tylenol that is bubble gum flavored and he seems to really like the taste, so right now, he gets baby Tylenol twice a day (once in the morning and once at night) and I’ve used orajel on his bottom gums at night before bed in hopes that the pain doesn’t keep him awake.  Ready for these teeth to come through!!!

Also, I’m not sure I’ve put this on the blog before, but Carter is NOT a pacifier lover.  He has never taken a pacifier since he was born.  I’m not really sure why, he just has no interest in it at all.  He is, however, a true thumb sucker.  It’s a habit we’ll eventually have to break him of, but for now, him sucking his thumb while he’s sleeping is about the cutest thing I’ve ever seen and I have no desire to make him stop right now.  It also helps his gums feel better since he won’t take teething toys.

Likes

  • Sleeping on his tummy
  • Bathtime
  • Walks around the neighborhood (sometimes - if we wait too late in the day, he’ll get fussy)
  • Neptune’s Ocean Baby Einstein DVD.  He will watch all of the DVD’s, but when he watches the ocean one, he’s glued to the tv and rarely blinks.  I think he’ll definitely be a scuba diver like his daddy.  Maybe by then mommy will get back into diving.
  • Being outside - he now looks out the window when he’s in the carseat at trees and things outside.
  • Sucking his thumb
  • Daddy - we LOVE our daddy.  He makes Carter laugh all the time.
  • The Preacher and his wife.  Wowzers, do we love Mr. Don and Miss Ina.  They can both make him laugh like crazy. 
  • Jesus Loves Me lullaby.  I sing it to him while feeding and rocking him after our prayers every night and he falls right asleep.
  • When you blow on his belly.  He thinks it’s hilarious.
  • This month, we started putting Carter facing outwards in the Baby Bjorn.  We’ve never actually used that thing very much, but he is LOVING it now.  Justin had him at home when I was running errands one day and he walked him around the yard and through the house and garage and Carter just stared at everything.  I’ve been taking Carter on walks around the neighborhood in it instead of in his stroller and he really really loves it so much more than being in the stroller.

Dislikes

  • The period after bathtime and before bedtime.  He cries less when he is having his diaper put on now than he use to, but as soon as you put on his PJ’s, he starts crying and squirming trying to get away from you.
  • His exersaucer.  We just put it together and introduced Carter to it when he was about 4 1/2 months old.  He likes it for about 10 minutes but that’s it.   
  • This isn’t really a dislike…it’s just plain hilarious.  Carter doesn’t like it when you wear sunglasses.  He will literally pull them off of your face so he can see your eyes.  It’s hilarious to watch.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Some Random Photos of the 5th Month

I haven’t been blogging a whole lot the past month, only 4 times actually.  May has been a big travel month for Justin so I rarely have free time when I have to watch little man on my own during the week.  I made a calendar for my mother-in-law for Mother’s Day and as I was picking out pictures to put in it, it made me realize that we do NOT take enough pictures in our family.  So the past few family gatherings, my goal has been to take more pictures, especially when all three kids are together.

Since the twins got baptized last weekend, Justin and Jennifer’s grandparents were in town and we all had dinner at Debbie and Gordon’s one night.  Carter actually slept most of the time we were there, but I was able to get some pictures of him with the girls, but mostly I just got pics of the girls. 

IMGP6915

The girls love their Uncle Justin.  They’re mesmerized by his voice for some reason.  And he really knows how to make them laugh.

IMGP6916

Cynthia and her Nana

IMGP6927

Celia and Papa

IMGP6933

Nana teaching Cynthia how to play with her new toy

IMGP6936

LOVE Celia’s face in this one!!

IMGP6939

Carter finally woke up (after Papa went to wake him up) and decided to join the rest of us

IMGP6945

I think of Will Ferrell on SNL when I see this picture: “You, me staring contest now!……..You win, you always do”.

IMGP6946

Watching a Baby Einstein DVD

IMGP6950

Celia trying to play with her younger cousin

IMGP6955

The next few were taken the next morning at our house.  We don’t LOVE the exersaucer at all yet.  I’m hoping he will when he’s more able to sit-up on his own and move with his feet better.

IMGP6958

Gigi gave us this for Christmas and he loves to play with the owls on the sides

IMGP6961

Our first pair of baby shades!!  And they’re still too big around his itty bitty head!

I can’t believe Carter will be 5 months old next weekend.  I mean, there are still days where I still can’t believe I’m a mom, much less that my son is almost half a year old.  Where has the time gone??

Monday, May 21, 2012

The Twins Get Baptized

Me and Justin’s nieces, Cynthia and Celia, were supposed to get baptized with Carter, however God had other plans!  Poor Cynthia got hand, foot and mouth disease (which is INCREDIBLY contagious) so Jen left the girls at home and Carter got baptized all on his lonesome.  Well, the girls got baptized yesterday with a party following the service at Gordon and Debbie’s house.  I chose to not stand at the front with the family during the baptism because I felt like Jen and Aeron would want pictures of this moment, so instead, I sat on the front row and took pictures for them:

IMGP6967IMGP6968

Just like when Carter got baptized, the twins had both pastors present for the baptism.  After they were baptized, Don went back over to the contemporary service.

IMGP6969IMGP6976

Cynthia getting baptized

IMGP6979IMGP6981IMGP6983

Now it’s Celia’s turn

IMGP6985IMGP6997

Love this close up of Cynthia looking at her mommy

IMGP6998

Jen and Aeron with the grandparents

IMGP7001

Jen’s lifelong friends, the Heath’s

IMGP7008

Carter wasn’t present to watch his cousins get baptized, he was in the nursery.  But he came back after the service for cousin pictures :)

IMGP7012

When we got married, Justin and I got a brick in the church courtyard (like Aeron and Jen did when they got married).  We all recently got bricks for our kids to go next to our bricks and they were installed this week.  Love it!!

IMGP7013

We had a mexican themed lunch at Debbie and Gordon’s house after church.  YUMMY!!

IMGP7014

And yet ANOTHER Edgar’s cake.  At least this one wasn’t at my house for me to eat the leftovers!!

IMGP7018

I just love this picture of Carter and Pastor Don.  Don married me and Justin and was also at the hospital for Carter’s birth.  We love their family and Carter LOVES Don and his wife Ina.  They make him laugh like no one can!! Even me or Justin!!

Sunday, May 13, 2012

My First Mother’s Day

Today was my very first Mother’s Day.  It was pretty special.  I must say though, I was still focused on me and Justin’s Mothers and it didn’t really hit me that I was someone’s mother.  Carter (aka Justin) got me a new running GPS watch as a gift along with a really sweet card :)  I had to wake Carter up at 8am (seriously these days he sleeps at least 12 hours every night and I can’t remember the last time I didn’t have to wake him up in the morning) and feed him.  He was only awake for right at an hour before we put him down for nap number 1.  His first nap is usually 2-2 1/2 hours, but we had to cut it short because we had to get to church.  We woke him up a little before 10:30am and changed his clothes and put him straight in the car and drove to church.  We went into the contemporary service and fed him.  As soon as he was done eating, I took him to the nursery (a first and one of the things on my 101 list that I blogged about here).

After a very short church service, I picked Carter up from the fabulous women that work in the nursery.  There were 6 kids in there, 3 of which were our family members (Carter and the twins). 

IMGP6881

He was so happy!

IMGP6882

We love being lifted up these days.  Of course I don’t do this immediately after he’s eaten.  I learned that lesson when Anderson was young ;)

IMGP6883

After leaving church we went back to Debbie and Gordon’s house to have lunch.  Carter went down for a nap immediately (he had been awake for 2 hours at that point which is about 15 minutes later than he’s capable of going without a nap).  So the whole time we were at Justin’s parents house, Carter was napping.  The twins don’t nap as much as Carter since they’re older, so they were awake the whole time and enjoying a new toy that Nana purchased recently:

IMGP6891

IMGP6893

Both girls are already standing up with some assistance and are trying so hard to learn how to walk!

IMGP6908

Celia loves to play with Uncle Justin’s hair and eyeballs!

IMGP6909

Love my hubby so much!

Debbie actually got both me and Jen a small gift from Lifeway.  It’s a nightlight with our last initial on it with the verse “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord”.  Love it!!  Perfect for Carter’s room!

It was a great day spent with great family.  I thought I would experience this huge wave of emotions being my first Mother’s Day but I really didn’t.  I absolutely love being Carter’s mom, but I experience that every single day that I breathe, not just today.  My role as a mother changed who I am, but I’m sure that’s normal for most mothers.  I feel like the person I was before was just preparation for my role as a mother.  I don’t remember what it was like to not have so much love for someone so small and helpless.  Yes, there are bad days.  Days where Carter makes me want to pull my hair out.  Days where I wonder whether or not I want a second child.  Days where I miss it being just me and Justin.  But no matter how bad a day gets, it never fails that the second my head hits the pillow at night, I thank God for that precious baby boy.  He is my world.  I just ordered a canvas that I’m obsessed with, but I don’t have a picture.  I’ll have to take one once I hang it.  But it sums up my relationship with Carter pretty easily:

You’ll be…

his first kiss

his first love

his first friend.

You are his momma and he is your whole world.

He is your little boy.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there.  It’s the most important job in the world!

#75 and #95 - Check!

Number 75 on my 101 things to do in 1,001 days list was to put Carter in the church nursery when he was older.  We made it to 4 1/2 months.  Carter’s at an age where he isn’t sleeping through loud things anymore and when there’s people around, he wants to look around and make noise, lots and lots of noise.  It’s getting too disruptive to take him with us to Sunday School or to the contemporary service, so today, he went to the nursery for the first time.  He was actually only in there for 20 minutes or so because he was with us in the church service until it got to where he was too noisy and then I took him to the nursery.  He was in there with his cousins Cynthia and Celia and two other kids.  They said he was really good and doted on how adorable he is.  Hopefully he’ll be just as good when he’s in there for longer than 20 minutes!

IMGP6881IMGP6882IMGP6883

These pics are when I picked him up from the nursery after the service was over.  Big thanks to Allison Williamson for making his adorable outfit!!

And number 95 on my list was to make a photo book for my mom for Mother’s Day.  My mom LOVES the photo books you can make on Shutterfly and many other sites.  She said that was all she wanted from me for Mother’s Day.  I didn’t take pictures of all the pages, but here’s a few:

IMGP6874IMGP6873IMGP6875IMGP6876IMGP6877IMGP6878

On an unrelated note, I bought Carter’s first bathing suit in anticipation of summer swim time :)

IMGP6880

There were lots of options, but Justin and I are suckers for Manta Rays since we swam with some on our honeymoon in Hawaii :)

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

#80 - CHECK

Number 80 on my list of 101 things to do in 1,001 days was to get an i-pad.  I thought it would be a while before I was  going to mark this off, but Justin had other plans.  He got me this for my birthday this year:

i-pad

I love that it’s white.  It matches my white camera and Justin already knows that when I get the i-phone in September (when my contract runs up and I can get the i-phone 5 for cheap) I want it to be white also.  I like them white!!!  I’m loving my i-pad so far.  My personal favorite apps:

  • MyFitnessPal
  • Family Feud
  • Angry Birds
  • YouTube
  • Break
  • Flight Aware (I can use this to check on Justin’s flights to make sure he lands safely)

Archive