The Journey of Parenthood...

Family Trip to Jacksonville!

2012-03-01T13:37:00.000-05:00

When I was pregnant with Brittlynn Zach and I had a discussion about the importance of having easy-to-travel kids. Kye took a ton of trips to Melbourne when he was a baby so we could visit Mom. Britt doesn't get that travel experience because Mom lives in Valdosta now! So it's important that we still take her as often as we can on little vacations. It's important to take Kye too, of course, as we want him to continue to travel well.

Casey and Jordan are getting married the last weekend in March and I didn't want that to be Britt's first experience traveling (it's only a 45 minute drive but it's still staying away from home) as I worried how she would do. We decided that we'd plan a trip for a weekend away sometime in February. The way everything worked out we ended up going the weekend of Feb 17th. We decided to take the kids to Jacksonville, mostly because it's only two hours away. We enjoyed all the visits to Melbourne, but a four hour drive is a little tough with a young baby because we'd have to stop so I could nurse. We'd be able to make it to Jacksonville before Britt would have to eat again so it'd be a smoother experience!

Zach got home from work that afternoon at around 4ish so we loaded up the car and as soon as Britt finished up her 5:00 feeding we left! Super pumped for Brittlynn's first ever trip (btw...I am keeping a list of all the places Britt travels, just like I did for Kye, and you can view it here.)

Yay!

We have a new McDonald's right by our house so it made life even easier. Britt doesn't sleep well when the car stops so we wanted to go ahead and get dinner during her awake time. We went through McDonald's on the way out and Kye got the big kids happy meal (6 nuggets) and ate them ALL. The people also totally messed up our order and gave him fries instead of the apple slices we requested, but he ate all of those too. He watched Monsters Inc on our car dvd player and was a happy camper the whole way.

We got there close to 8:30 which is Brittlynn's last feeding of the day. Yes. 8:30. Kye's bedtime is 7:30. When you have two kids you have some situations that come up where you have to decide whose schedule is more important. Right now, Britt's is. And in this circumstance it made more sense to let him go to bed late (and skip bath) in order to keep her on schedule. It all worked out well. Britt and I ran up to the room and I started nursing her while the guys got everything unloaded and set up for the night. Kye took a LONG time to fall asleep so Zach and I weren't able to watch The Office that night...instead we just both messed around on our tablets.

This trip was FILLED with firsts! Majority of them were good...but there were two bad firsts that happened. The first bad first was that I didn't get a picture of Kye and Zach on the hotel bed. I ALWAYS get a picture. I realized it the morning we checked out and Zach was so sweet and said "we can run back up to the room!" I did not want to mess with all that with both kids when we were rushing to get back in time for Britt's next feeding. We didn't take one the night we got there because we were in such a hurry to get Kye to bed :( :( So sad. But I won't forget next time, I promise!!!

Saturday morning I nursed Britt at 7 and the guys got ready then went down for breakfast (I'll discuss my requirements for hotel stays in another post but breakfast is one of them!). As soon as I was done nursing and pumping I got Britt and I dressed and we met them down there!

Ready for a big day!

Kye and Zach were already done eating so I scarfed down really quick (who am I kidding...as a mother I ALWAYS rush to eat, don't you?!?!?!) while they played around in the lobby. I felt a little frazzled but then a lady came up to me and told me that she was so impressed with our parenting and how well behaved Kye was and how wonderfully he said "yes ma'am" all on his own. Totally made my morning and helped remind me that we're doing a good job ;)

Another reason I picked the hotel I did was that it was close to the zoo. I have been wanting to take Kye to the Jacksonville Zoo for awhile as I've heard SO many wonderful things about it. Zach didn't get to go with us to Zoo Atlanta so I thought this would make for a fun family outing. Plus it's a lot of walking which meant constant moving for Brittlynn...and hopefully sleep for her naps!

First time using our City Mini Double Stroller - We LOVE it!

Britt's first trip to the ZOO!

We went ahead and paid extra for our tickets so we'd be able to ride the choo choo, carousel, and pet the sting rays. Zach was so awesome about not worrying too much about money. It was his idea to pay for the bonus tickets and we both were so glad we did. We got enough use out of the extra things to totally offset the cost! The first thing we saw were the sting rays so we went ahead and got to pet them!!!

Kye got this experience at the Georgia Aquarium last summer but his arms were so short then that he couldn't actually touch anything. We kinda had the same issue this time...

Then this BIG guy came by and was up on the sides so Kye could reach! I'm pretty surprised that Kye eagerly stuck his hand down to touch him. I thought he'd be a little afraid but I guess he's like his mama and loves to touch stuff. This ended up being one of his favorite parts of the day and he'll randomly bring up how he petted the sting rays!

It was nap time so Britt missed out on petting the sting rays.

I think from that day the majority of the pictures I took were either of Brittlynn sleeping (I felt guilt only having pictures of Kye so I kept taking them of her even though they were all pretty much the same) or of Kye running. I'm still glad we had the double stroller as we used it plenty, but Kye really wanted to walk everywhere. It was fine by us!

Every exhibit we passed Kye was more interested in the birds than anything else, it cracked me up.

Last summer Kye was kinda into the animals, but he really enjoyed the zoo SO much more this time. He knows more about animals and understood that it was a treat to see them in person. Plus I liked that he was walking around more than he did at the zoo last time. It allowed him to get closer to see things and it was easier to grab him and hold him up and such instead of having to get him out of the stroller over and over again.

More running...

...and more semi sleeping ;)

Even though we were out and about we still stuck to the schedule. She napped in the car seat from 8:30-10:30 then we fed her a bottle and she napped again in the car seat from 12-2. Our plan was to make sure we were back at the hotel by 2:00 for her feeding. I can't skip two nursing sessions without pumping so it'd be a HUGE pain if we tried to stay out longer than that. So you may have noticed...if we left the zoo close to 2:00 that means Kye missed his nap. Yup! We rarely skip nap (the first time ever was for Zoo Atlanta and the only other time was for Disney...) but, again, Britt's schedule comes first and this was what would work best for her. One nap won't hurt, especially at his age (another reason we spread out the ages of our children) and he did fine with it!

Britt didn't sleep as well as we'd hoped she would but it was a little warmer than we had thought it'd be and there were some annoying gnats so I think that messed her up some. Thankfully it wasn't sunny at ALL so we didn't have that issue. We just kept her moving and gave her the paci. She slept on and off and it was better than if we'd completely skipped the naps so it worked out.

Choo choo ride!!!

checking out the kimono dragon

more running ;)

Probably one of the strangest frogs I've ever seen!

At the kangaroo exhibit...Kye was all about these birds

This kangaroo was hilarious...

He kept scratchin and scratchin and even ended up, like a typical man, scratching "himself" pretty good too!

We covered a good bit of the zoo before Brittlynn had to eat at 10:30 and then we hunted for a good place to take a break...that post is coming up next!

The Places Britt Has Traveled

2012-03-01T13:02:00.003-05:00

Travel is SO important to me and has become something our whole family values. I love the idea that we can help our children see the world, or at least as much as we possibly can cover of it :) I'm not promising that I'll always do a great job of keeping this list going, but I'm going to try. Kye has a list as well and you can view all the places he has traveled here. Now it's time to start Britt's list! Here are the places she has traveled:

1. Jacksonville, Florida

Romantic Date Night

2012-02-29T13:42:00.003-05:00

Zach and I haven't had a date night since our mini-Christmas celebration, the weekend before Brittlynn was born. Over two months ago. Granted, we had a baby. I mean, that's a valid excuse to let things slip a little right? No matter how many babies we add to our bunch, our marriage will ALWAYS come first. I'm so, so thankful I married a man who values marriage and who truly desires to see my happy.

We planned a date night the Thursday after Valentine's Day (Feb 16th). It was a Valentine's/Post-Baby date. I did NONE of the planning. It was 100% Zach. He planned everything we would be doing that night, arranged childcare, and even picked out what he wanted me to wear. Of course, the three dresses he picked out ended up not being what I actually wore (one was wayyyy too tight still, one was wayyy to big, and the other required a strapless bra which would be pretty uncomfortable seeing as I'd be missing a feeding and need to pump once we got home), but I LOVED the gesture. It was so sweet!

Everything about the evening was a surprise. I nursed Brittlynn at 5:00 and Zach ran Kye over to Mom's where he spent the night.Then Mrs. Charlotte came over while I was nursing Britt and Zach went over with her everything she needed to do to take care of her at our house while we were on the date. Mr. Rusty also came over. It worked out well because Mr. Rusty has hardly seen Britt at all so it gave him a chance to love on her some! As soon as she finished nursing, I threw on my outfit and we went out the door.

When I walked into the garage only my car was in there and it was already started. Zach lead me around to the passenger side and told me to sit in the back! As I climbed in I saw Trey (Zach's cousin who lives with Mr. Rusty and Mrs. Charlotte) in the driver's seat!!! I cracked up! He was all dressed up so handsome and Zach had asked him to be our chauffeur for the evening. Zach had looked into renting a limo but the cost was crazy high so he asked Trey instead! It was so sweet and thoughtful and really it wa a great thing for Trey too. He got to see how he should treat a woman :)

In the backseat waiting for me was a basket filled with goodies. Zach had gotten me all my favorite movie candy so I could pick which ones I wanted to take to the movie theater with us. We had a gift card for the movies from Mrs. Charlotte as our Valentine's Day present (which we FORGOT to use haha we ALWAYS do that!!!) and a Bistro gift card from Katie as our Christmas present. So he put both of those in the basket as well. He also got out our wine glasses (Yes, we own wine glasses! They were in our honeymoon suite the night of our wedding from the hotel staff along with a bottle of sparkling cider) and a bottle of sparkling grape juice. He even bought strawberries and put them in the glasses.

On top of that, he even bought me flowers!!!

Zach knows my goal every year is to see every Oscar nominated movie (for the record, I've never actually achieved this goal...) so he wanted to take me to see The Descendants. It only played at one time that day - 6:40. He really wanted to do dinner first so he asked the theater if he could rent it out. Isn't he so sweet? It's totally the thought that counts because they told him in order to rent it he'd have to buy out every seat so it'd cost around $1200! Haha. Not worth it! We enjoyed our "limo" ride to the movie theater while sippin' on our fancy drinks.

We were the youngest people seeing that movie by about 30 years or so. But, like I told Zach, when I'm old I'll totally live at the movie theater. I love movies. We enjoyed the movie...and I did a good job holding back some ugly, ugly tears. It wasn't the most up-beat movie that's for sure. I ended up having a good cry over it the next day in the shower haha. I LOVED it though (I love movies that are about real life and real life issues...Zach gets pretty bored by them...).

While we saw The Descendants, Zach paid for Trey to see the movie of his choice that started around the same time. One of his buddies ended up seeing it with him so it worked out perfectly. Our movie got out about 10 minutes before theirs so we walked around the theater checking out all the upcoming movies (HUNGER GAMES!!!). We ran into a huge group of the youth from our church and I was so proud that Zach wasn't the least bit embarrassed to tell them that we were waiting on our "driver."

Next up Trey took us over the The Bistro for dinner. While we ate, Trey took our credit card and he and his friend ran and got themselves dinner. Then when he came back to get us, we paid the bill. Again, great planning on Zach's part! We both didn't eat much during the day so we'd have PLENTY of room for our meals!

The chicken in a lemon sauce I got was AWESOME!

Once we got settled back in the car to head home Zach pulled out another surprise. He had hooked up our car refrigerator (sounds random that we own this but it's awesome for travel!) and had chocolate and strawberries waiting for us for dessert. He doesn't even like strawberries...so I ate almost all of them myself haha.

By the time we got home I was BEYOND stuffed!

Brittlynn had done wonderfully for Mrs. Charlotte and it was nice that she got to babysit her. It was Britt's first time with a legit sitter so I'm glad she did well! We had SUCH a wonderful night. I felt so pampered and loved. To me, the best part wasn't the movie or the dinner...it was all the thought Zach put into each and every detail. And, even more so, it was that he was proud to be doing all of those things for me. Most men will be romantic with their wives but would be mortified if other guys knew about it. Zach's dad knew all the things Zach had planned and Zach wasn't embarrassed a bit!

I truly am so blessed to be married to Zach. I always had a list in my mind of what the perfect husband would be and he surpasses all expectations I've ever had. He's so amazing that I often wonder why in the world he loves me or how I got so dang lucky!!! I cannot express to him enough how much that date night meant to me or how thankful I am to have him and call him mine :)

Valentine's Day

2012-02-28T09:35:00.001-05:00

Kye really enjoys making crafts so I thought it'd be fun for him to make Valentine's this year. Last year I pretty much made them and just let him color on them, remember? This year I got out some valentine's colors of paper and paint and just let him go to town. He got pretty creative!

The sweetest part was that he picked out who got which Valentine and decorated them each especially for the recipient. Of course, he was pretty into the whole hand print thing so most of them had those on it (but who doesn't love a child's hand print?!?!). I have a bunch of left over foam stickers from his birthday party last year so he also used those as decorations.

We handed out the Valentine's to all the locals and mailed the ones we needed to mail. Everyone loved their special Kye Valentine! I was glad that actual Valentine's Day fell on a Tuesday so we could spend the whole day together. The morning started out with a visit from Gramma on her way to work. She got some Valentine's kisses from the grand kids and gave them each their gifts.

I really want Britt to have a good book collection like Kye does!

While Brittlynn was down for her nap, Kye and I started making our annual heart cake in honor of the special day. Last year we used brownie batter for the cake and I thought that sounded yummy again this year. Why switch it up, right?

Towards the end of Brittlynn's next feeding, G-Mama came by. Everyone is getting Britt's schedule down so they know when they can catch her awake ;) It was great timing! She gave all of us our little Valentine's treats before leaving to pick up Colt from school.

For lunch we had heart sandwiches

And a cookie for dessert!

Aren't these cookies that Mom made adorable?

So cute, in fact, that I might have sent some of them to school with Kye for his Valentine's Day party.

After lunch we worked on Kye's Valentine's for school the next day. It was his first time ever participating in a Valentine's Party and he was excited. I wanted to take him shopping to pick out the Valentine's he'd give out at school, but that didn't happen. It was easier for me just to grab some so I figured he'd like Cars ones. I was right ;) I told him a child's name from his class and he picked which Valentine they got.

The set also came with temporary tattoos. I remember those from childhood don't you?!?! Well, they have changed! I figured Kye is old enough now for his first tat so we went to the bathroom to put it on and I was shocked at how bright the colors were. That thing was legit! It also has lasting power...we put it on him on Feb 14th and today is Feb 28th and it's still there. Don't know if we'll be doing another tattoo for awhile!

After nap we decorated his cookies for his class party. I used a heart cookie cutter but they totally didn't look like hearts. I was pretty embarrassed! I still ended up sending them to school (along with some of the ones Mom made) because Zach and I are on Weight Watchers and we did not need all those temptations!!!

I forgot to get pink frosting this year but chocolate sounded yummy for our cake. We also used the m&m's G-Mama got him for Valentine's Day (why she buys candy when we tell her he can't eat it I'll never quite understand?!?). That way he could still eat a few of them but we'd also get rid of them quickly!

That evening after Britt's 5:00 feeding it was time to get our Valentine's on! As a kid my mom always pulled out our Valentine's Day Box around V-Day. We'd make things and put them in the box during the days leading up to the holiday then on the 14th we'd get to open everything. I am all about traditions so we have continued this one on in our home.

Since we were finishing up cooking dinner (omg it was SO yummy! I pre-made and froze this awesome pesto shell recipe and we had a feast with that...SO good, maybe my new fav meal!) we just opened our Valentine's in the middle of the kitchen. That way we could be watching all the food at the same time ;)

Britt's Valentine from her brother

Opening presents

Every year I get him a singing animal toy from Hallmark!

Hooked Britt up with some books

Zach won a free Ipad from Aflac so I bought him a case (we do NOT go all out for Valentine's Day..limit is only $30!)

And he gave me an awesome new straightener. Which was over budget but he said it didn't count because he had bought it in December...I don't quite get that logic but whatever!

Another Valentine from Kye

This is Payton's FAVORITE book so I had to get it for Britt too

It's really adorable and Zach read it to the kids while I finished up dinner

That night Zach and I rented a movie (50/50...VERY good!) and pigged out on the brownie cake so we could get rid of it. Yes, a chill night. But it was filled with lots of love from our babies and each other and that's what matters!

I'm usually not big on shirts with sayings on them but this works for Valentine's Day!

Our happy family!

I hope your Valentine's Day was as wonderful as ours!

Week Ten Summary

2012-02-27T15:56:00.000-05:00

Week Ten for Britt was from February 7th - February 13th. It was a crazy week for us here as Zach was in Texas working. It was my first time dealing with the kids solo for a long period of time. I'm proud of myself though as I worked out a great routine. While it was a tough week for me, it was a learning week as a parent and when Zach went out of town a couple of weeks later I felt much more confident!!!

Nursing: THIS is the reason that I didn't take a ton of notes on things that happened this week. The child nursed for 2 hours at each feeding. Since she eats 5 times a day that means I was spending 10 hours a day nursing. And, like I said before, I was handling it all alone so poor Kye. Thankfully he spent some time with G-mama and Gramma to give him a break! I'm not sure why she was nursing that long. I was on the antibiotics for the mastitis and I think that's what caused it. I'm not sure if the meds affected my supply so she was eating longer to keep me producing. Or if the meds affected her in some way so she was eating longer for comfort. Or even if the meds just made her sleepy so she was nursing longer because she was drowsy. I'm not sure. But it was rough. It wore me out!!! My butt would be numb and I got pretty bored sitting there so much! It's easier to look back on the situation now since she no longer eats that long...but during that time I was worried that she'd start doing that forever and I simply couldn't handle it. I just waited it out though and once the meds were out of my system (10 days...) she got back to normal eating, which for her is still a long time - an hour per feeding!

She is so stinking sweet that this week she started to be more interested in smiling up at me than just eating. She's getting distracted a little easier and is just SO social. She wants to smile and smile. Before this week the girl was mission: eat. Now if Kye dumps out his car bucket, the dogs bark, or even if I cough she'll come off the breast. It's a normal change as she's just becoming more aware of her surroundings. Along with this she is exploring more with her hands and moves them around a lot while nursing too.

Schedule: Her schedule is the same as week nine. Taking two hours to eat at each feeding pretty much screwed up the schedule though. I continued to feed her at the time I was supposed to but a lot of her naps were shorter because she'd take so long to eat. She also got very little awake time this week. I missed Zach, but I also missed Britt!

More About Britt This Week:

She cannot stand to lay in her own puke (which who would want to?!?!). Thankfully we have a video monitor because I can see when she is crying due to puke and can go in, wipe her off, and move her so she'll go back to sleep.
She is back to sleeping solid through the night until 6:45. Good timing too because with Zach gone I needed that solid sleep myself!
I ADORE her huge gummy smile. It's precious
She's starting to burp on her own while nursing so I'm not spending a lot of time burping her like I used to
She's also less gassy, we use the Mylicon still but I don't have to pump her legs and do all of that mess. I think she just grew out of the gassy stage.
The whole time I was on meds she nursed for 2 hours and had bad diarrhea. Medicine has always really affected me. Like dayquill will knock me out. I'm thinking she's the same way because when I had to take mastitis meds with Kye I never remember him having these issues?

All swaddled up!

She had her first MEGA blow out. She poop through her diaper, through her onesie, through her pants, through the swaddle and onto the mat I have covering her sheet. You can tell it was a rough one!!!

Prior to this week I had been running the humidifier at each nap and through the night to help her congestion. She seemed to be getting better so I put it away. It's funny that I learn so many new things this time around...I never knew that you aren't supposed to put the humidifier on wood services or on any material. We have always ran Kye's on his dresser (wood) with a towel (cloth) under it. Oops. We now get one of our metal folding chairs from the attic to put it on when needed!

Britt found her hand this week! When she wasn't eating she was sucking away on it. Although she enjoys it, I don't think it's a "need." As when I swaddled her to go to sleep she didn't fuss about not being able to get to her hand.

I had her play airplane for the first time this week, she loves it! But I have to be sure to cover my shirt with burp rags or I will have puke all over me haha

She still is not a good paci baby. She will take it occasionally and we only offer it when it's really needed. Pretty much only if she will not sleep towards the end of a nap. She sucks that thing SO hard. You can see the outline of it around her mouth during her bath time!!!

I really enjoyed our bath time together, I get why Zach loves it so much with the kids!

Here's some more pictures from this week:

I LOVE that she's so big, I don't have to worry too much about Kye accidentally hurting her!

Kye wanted to use my camera so he took these pictures of us:

My girl!

Postpartum Update: I spent the week feeling very, very tired and worn out. I felt a ton of guilt about Kye. He wasn't getting my best at all. I felt like I was nursing non-stop. Kye's behavior reflected my lack of parenting. He did not do well with Daddy away. Typically Zach will bring him home a "prize" when he is out of town for more than a night or so. It helps keep him motivated to do well for me. Well, this time he did not get his prize. He acted out more. I was more easily frustrated. It just wasn't a good mix. I'm thankful he had school and had his grandparents to help keep him happy when I simply couldn't do it.

I had to pump after each nursing session and in the middle of the night to help fully empty my breasts with the mastitis. After a couple days of it though, I quit the extra pumping. She was eating for so dang long I was sure my breasts were getting empty enough!!! I didn't want to be sending my body the message to make more milk either!

I lost (probably thanks to all the nursing haha) 1.2 lb this week and only have 4 left to go to be my pre-pregnancy weight!!! I have lost 5 lb total since starting Weight Watchers and can officially wear my pre-pregnancy jeans again :) Yay!

Our little family was SO thankful when Daddy returned home!!! We survived it! We also grew and learned from it, which in my perspective is the most important thing to remember during a tough situation.

Just the three of us!

It's ironic that the week that Brittlynn took 2 hours to nurse is the same week that, when Kye was her age, he started taking only 15 minutes to nurse...maybe someday Britt will speed it up ;) I will gladly have her longer feedings with her great napping though...she's MUCH better than Kye was. You can read all about Kye's 10th week here!

Casey's Parker Family Shower

2012-02-26T13:38:00.001-05:00

I LOVE weddings and LOVE getting to be part of them! One of the downsides of being an "older" bridesmaid is that I can't be as devoted as one as I'd like to be. I have two kids. It's kinda tough to drop everything and be there for the bride at all times (which, btw, I believe it the responsibility of a bridesmaid!). I am SO excited for Casey and her upcoming wedding to Jordan. It will most likely be the last wedding I'll get to be this involved with until my own children get married so I was hoping to be at every single wedding related event. Well...that hasn't happened. I was too pregnant to go to the first shower in Atlanta and too exhausted with a newborn to go to the second and third showers in Atlanta.

I also hate that I couldn't host a shower for her myself as I live for that kind of thing! However, the Parker family has a BIG shower for each bride and I offered to host that. It really was the perfect shower for a new mom to host. Everyone signs up to bring things to eat and they even sign up to bring plates, cups, and a corsage. Literally all I had to do was clean my house. Hands down the easiest party I've ever thrown!!!

We had it at our house on Saturday Feb 11th from 10:00 - 12:00. It went so great! Zach took the kids to Chick-Fil-A. It was his first time taking them both somewhere solo (something I have yet to even do...why do it when you don't have to ya know?). She eats at 10:30 so he pretty much just let Kye play while he fed her a bottle then they came back home. Brad took Colt up there and Jordan hung out there too while us ladies showered it up. It all went so smoothly!

Casey and Jordan got TONS of presents, but here's some of them...Payton was the big present helper ;)

A baby shower gift accidentally got mixed in haha is it a sign of things to come? ;)

It has many uses!

A, most likely, inappropriate card from Aunt Karen ;)

I'm all about taking pictures with people whenever possible! So Casey went around and got some pics with some of the family before everyone left!

This picture is classic for two reasons:

1. Aunt Karen actually stayed through the entire shower (longest she's ever stayed at a shower for sure!)

2. Aunt Karen is wearing a Swamp People (is that the name of the show?) shirt.

Aunt Debbie (sportin' Stella and Dot!)

Mom

Aunt Mary

Little Mama

Mema

Mrs. Charlotte

Courtney

Me!

I got to be taller for once ;)

One of the great things about this shower is how casual it is. It's such a nice thing that all the Parker family puts on and they just enjoy visiting with everyone. There isn't any pressure or anything so it was nice that Zach could take his time leaving with the kids and I told him to get home whenever he wanted. That way everyone could see Kye and Britt. Kye LOVED having everyone there. He kept talking about how there were lots of girls at his house haha. And it was such a great chance for all the family to see Brittlynn! They ate her up!!!

Mema's first time holding her!

The sweet gift Casey got for me for hosting...I LOVE pineapple stuff (it's a symbol of welcome plus it's so beach to me!)

I'm SO glad I FINALLY could do something for Casey!!! Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and I enjoyed the opportunity to visit with members of the family that I don't always get to see. We go to church with majority of them but our church is so big that when you sit in one section you pretty much only see those people in your section ;) I had a wonderful time and it was super great to have my house mega clean for a change too! Zach and I want to start having people over more often again, we miss hosting things and having company!

Week Nine Summary

2012-02-24T09:27:00.000-05:00

Week nine of Brittlynn's life was from Jan 31st through Feb 6th. She had a great week while mine wasn't so wonderful but we'll get to that!

Sleep: She officially started sleeping in her big girl crib (you can read why we waited so long HERE). Honestly, I noticed zero difference. I don't think she had a single issue with the transition from the pack and play to the crib. And I'm glad we had her in the pack and play so long as I think it'll help her sleep in it well for when we travel!

I was feeling so horrible that on Tuesday night I slept through the dream feed, again. She actually didn't wake up at all though so she slept from 9 pm until 7 am!!! It was the first time she'd completely slept through the night in awhile and we decided that the dream feed may have been messing up her sleep cycle. When we went in there to get her she was completely unswaddled and had a full poop diaper. We were shocked she slept so great!

She is a beyond happy child. NEVER fusses and really has no sleep cues. I literally have to go by the clock. When I put her down she will fuss for up to 20 minutes but will fall asleep on her own. Sometimes she won't even fuss at all. She really loves her mobile and we can hear her chatting away to it before she drifts off to sleep. We rarely have to go into her room at all now! She now will sleep solid for the nap and will start to wake up right on time for her next feeding. And when I do have to go in and wake her at feeding time she greets me with a HUGE grin. It's AWESOME!!! Her worst nap is the last one of the day (from 6:30-8) which is normal for babies at this age. It can be tough since that's a busy time of the day for Kye but we get through it! We do not use the paci at all unless she simply will not sleep for a nap. I'd say if she ever gets it (which is rare) then it's during that last nap of the day.

At night I completely stopped feeding her if she wakes. Zach takes the mobile out into the living room and turns on the bathroom fan in our room so I can't hear her crying then he lays on the couch until she falls back to sleep. She'll scream sometimes but she will go back to sleep. Often she wakes at like 6 and does this and it isn't too bad at all. Sometimes she only makes a few noises then goes back to sleep and sometimes it's 20 min of crying.

First time sleeping in crib!

Often when she does wake in the middle of the night it was due to her being completely unswaddled. I thought the great thing about the miracle blanket was that they weren't supposed to be able to break out of it so we were pretty annoyed. Then I asked Kelly about it and she asked if we were making sure to swaddle her with her palms down...um nope! When you put them palms down they can't bend their arms and break out ;) It helped SO much!!!

Isn't it a wonderful thing to have a great sleeping child?!?! It's not luck...it's Babywise!!!

Schedule: Since we decided to drop the dream feed she does have a newish schedule now and is down to eating 5 times a day.

7:00: start the day, change diaper, eat
8:00-8:30: change diaper, get dressed, awake time
8:30-10:30: nap
10:30-11:30: eat
11:30-12:00: change diaper, awake time
12:00-2:00: nap
2:00-3:00: eat
3:00-3:30: change diaper, awake time, alone time with Mommy
3:30-5:00: nap
5:00-6:00: eat
6:00-6:30: change diaper, awake time, family dinner
6:30-8:20: nap
8:20: awake, bath, put pjs on
8:30-9:30: eat, last feeding of day
9:30: put directly to bed after eating

I like not having the dream feed and think I'll probably still pump at 10:30 just to be fully empty before bed so I can be comfortable through the night.

Here's what else Britt has been up to:

She ran out of size 1 diapers so I opened a BIG, HUGE value box of them then she started having tons of blow outs so I realized she needed the size 1-2 transition diapers. Awesome. Guess I'll have a TON of diapers for any upcoming baby shower diaper cakes ;)
Even though her hands are usually in a fist, I LOVE her long sweet fingers
While Britt still has wet diapers every feeding (very wet btw) her poop amount went down a lot. Sometimes down to just one a day but she'll typically have a poop diaper in the morning meaning she's pooping at night.
If we skip her bath her hair gets really greasy so she's a must-wash-hair-everyday girl
I don't have to work to keep her awake during feedings anymore, except for the 8:30 one at night as she does get sleepy quick at bed time!
Her nursery is officially (mostly) finished!

She still has her little angel kisses beside her ear and below her nostril. She also still has her stork bite on the back of her neck (hidden completely by her hair though, which she also still has PLENTY of yay!).

She has so much hair, in fact, that if I don't brush it when it's wet then she wakes up with CRAZY hair like her mama and brother do! It cracked me up that this was how her hair naturally was one morning. What was even funnier was that Kye went in with me to wake her up and the first thing he said was "oh Britt your hair is gorgeous!" haha. Kye LOVES to wake up Brittlynn, here's a video of him going in with me to wake her. Love it ;)

She worked on bringing her hands together

and can do it!!!

She's so big that I decided to try out her size 6 month stuff and it fits!!!

Only 9 weeks old and wearing 6 month size already!!!

She has ZERO baby acne, I wish I could have her pretty skin!

Every single second that she is awake she is so happy which makes everyone around her happy too

She has a contagious laugh and smile

I just want to squeeze her when I see pictures this cute :)

Postpartum Update: Whew. Rough one. You'd think by this point that I'd be 100% adjusted and good to go...I'm totally not trying to scare those of you who are adding a second baby to your home, but it's not easy by any means!!!

I mentioned last week my concerns about my bleeding, exhaustion, and headaches. I debated about whether or not to call the doctor and decided I'd call on Tuesday morning (the 7th). Of course I woke up and had completely stopped bleeding! SO my luck! I still decided to call as, also with my luck, I figured I'd start up again. They said they wanted to see me so Mrs. Charlotte came to the house that afternoon and kept both kids so I could run up there. Zach was home too and it worked out good because he was able to show her how to put Brittlynn to bed and how to handle her during naps and such so she'll know when she starts babysitting for us ;) I kinda regretted going to the dr. It was pretty much a joke. The midwife I saw wasn't very helpful and kinda looked at me like I was stupid. She said that I need to make sure I'm eating often and resting. She said that having a second baby is a BIG deal and I need to focus on just taking care of myself. They had to draw blood (yippie) and it all came back fine.

While it's great news that I was fine, it was bad news to me that I need to take it easy. I felt like an idiot and a failure. I mean I'm tougher than that! NINE weeks postpartum?!?! I should be 100% back to normal, not still feeling so tired. I was really upset with myself and had a little pity party to get over it.

Wednesday night I woke up several times during the night, barely able to move my right arm. They drew the blood from the crook in my right elbow so I thought maybe it was sore from that? Especially since I have bad veins? It was KILLER pain. When I woke up I realized I also had a fever. It was 100.5 degrees which is MEGA high for me. Since it was a Thursday Kye didn't have school. I knew I was way too sick to be taking care of both kids and didn't want Kye to get sick so I called Mrs. Charlotte and asked if she could watch Kye for the morning so I could try to sleep it off when Britt slept during her naps. I texted Robyn about it and she said I needed to go to the dr. Good call!!! So instead Mrs. Charlotte came to the house and watched both kids for me again so I could go to the dr. I was able to get to the walk-in clinic right when they opened. Thankfully, the kids pediatrician is also my dr! Isn't that great? So I can use the walk-in clinic too!

Typically I pride myself in never leaving the house looking less than my best. Um. Not that day. I literally didn't wear any make up and wore one of Zach's baseball hats to cover my hair. Awesome. The lady I saw said, right away, that it was mastitis. Which shocked me. The night before my right breast had a tiny bit of pain when I pumped but nothing major. How could it be mastitis?!?! She said the infection was actually in my right breast and my right arm. SO random. She prescribed me 10 days worth of meds (three times a day) and told me to continue to nurse Britt, but always start on the right side. Then to pump after each feeding and in the middle of the night.

It was a REALLY rough time for me. I felt horrible. Thankfully the meds kicked in quick but Zach left Sunday for Texas for 5 days for work. Great timing. On top of that the meds really affected Brittlynn. She started having pretty bad diarrhea like all the time. And she started taking 2 HOURS to nurse at EACH feeding. It was crazy. Poor Kye! He wouldn't get to eat dinner until after his bed time because I'd be nursing her from 5 until 7! I'm pretty amazed with myself for getting through that crazy week. I'm kinda glad I'm behind on the blogging b/c I'm sure I would have been hardcore Mrs. Negative if I wrote this post when it was actually going on!!!

On a positive note I did lost 0.8 lb ;) And on another positive note I got a TON more breastmilk stored up from all my pumping! It's really crazy that I got mastitis because I honestly didn't even see any symptoms coming. It just HIT me. I heard from some other moms that they get it with every child. Since I had it twice with Kye, and now once with Britt, I can only assume I'll be getting it with babies 3 and 4 too.

Zach joked with me soon after Britt was born that he can always tell when I'm tired because my eyes get further apart. It's become a running joke with us and while he was in Texas, while I was nursing for a total of 10 hours a day, dealing with mastitis, and taking care of two kids for the first time completely on my own...I was for sure the most exhausted I've been in a long time so I took a picture of myself. I wanted to see these crazy eyes ;)

They don't really look further apart but my right one looks funky huh?!?! Like smaller and lower!!!

THIS is what exhaustion looks like...at least I'm still smiling!!!

Looking back on Kye's Nine Week Summary makes me feel a little guilty about Brittlynn. I was hardcore working on all kinds of stuff with Kye and I feel like I'm not able to do nearly as much with her. There are so many advantages and disadvantages to each place in the birth order chain. While I feel like I don't work with her on as many things as I did Kye, I feel like she has a big advantage of learning so much from her older brother. She's exposed to a TON more language than he ever was at this age. So it's a give and take I guess. Looking back at his post...I said in it that I was rushing him through milestones and that someday I'd look back and wish I could slow things down. That statement couldn't be more true! I wish I could savior each and every second with my sweet kids while I can!!! I can't even remember Kye being that tiny! Check out his hair too...makes me hopeful that Britt will keep hers because he was already pretty much bald by this point. Poor kid :)

My Favorite {Infant} Things

2012-02-23T14:10:00.000-05:00

I'm sure many of you read Danielle's blog! She is one of my best friends and I'm glad she's joined the blog world as it helps us stay in better touch (or at least know what's going on in each others lives!) She's doing her first ever link-up and I encourage you to check it out and play along!!!

In thinking of my favorite things I, of course, thought right away of parenting. What are my essential parenting tools for an infant (from newborn age until sitting up)??? Well you're about to find out!!! I've done my best to provide a link of each item so you can purchase it for yourself if needed :)

Babywise is, obviously, my most essential item. I pretty much mail out a copy of the first book to anyone I know who gets pregnant. Or at least I try to! If you've never read the book - read it. If you have an older child it's not too late! There is a -wise book for EVERY age and stage!!!

Swaddles are vital to a sleeping baby. I can't imagine how horribly babies slept before they were invented. With Kye I always used the Swaddleme brand but Kelly and Rachael got me into the Miracle Blankets and I love them! A must-have item on a baby registry!

I don't know how we survived so long without a video monitor. It's strange to think that when Kye was an infant we couldn't see him. No wonder we went in his room more than we should have and he didn't sleep nearly as wonderfully as Brittlynn does!!! Being able to see the baby (and the toddler...you bet your butt I still have a video monitor on Kye!) makes it SO much easier to ignore them when they cry because you know they are okay. Sleep training involves a little crying and, while it's never easy, it helps to be able to see the baby. We have the Summer Infant Day and Night Video Monitor (they no longer make my same one sad!) and it's wonderful. When we've had issues with it (after almost three years of use) they have been very helpful and have sent new cords for free!

To probably no ones surprise, I'm not a baby-in-a-sling kinda mama. Each pregnancy I get a sling. So far none of my babies have used them. I tried once with Britt to figure it out and it was too complicated for me haha. Obviously, since I don't carry her around all the time and I have a two year old, I have to put her somewhere. I LOVE my bouncers and playmat. I didn't buy anything fancy. Literally we got the cheapest bouncers (yes, I have two...one on each end of the house for each access) and she uses the same playmat Kye did. During awake times it's great to have somewhere for her to go when I need to finish up with dinner, discipline Kye, or poop ;) Since she is so young, I also do her independent playtime on her playmat. She loves it!

As a nursing mother I couldn't survive without my boppy. I have BIG babies (they aren't born big...but my milk makin self produces LARGE infants) and they are heavy. I can nurse her while holding her but the boppy helps so much to support her and allow me to relax. I'm also thankful I invested in Milkies. They allow me to store up the milk that leaks while I nurse. I then mix it with pumped breast milk and have well over 200 ounces already stored in the deep freezer! I have so much I don't think I'll be able to use it all!!!

Now that I have two kids we needed to get a double stroller. I LOVE our stroller. We used it for the first time this past weekend and omg worth every single penny. Zach couldn't get over how light it was and how easy it was to maneuver! I'm hoping once Britt goes to the amazing 4 hour schedule that I'll get to use it more often for some walks. I highly recommend the City Mini Double!!!

Kye was born in the spring and his room was SO hot. Plus he loved sleeping in dang fleece swaddles that were even more hot. And he puked all the time. So he basically lived in a diaper. It annoyed my mama to death haha ;) With Britt being born in the winter and us not even buying any fleece swaddles I dress her every single day. Plus I think something about a naked baby girl is bothersome?!?! She still pukes constantly but I just clean it up! I personally like the packs of onesies you can get from Carters and the matching packs of pants. Kye wore them too. I think they look comfortable and still cute, Plus I love how tight they are to show off those baby rolls :) At night we use zip type sleepers and still swaddle her. It helps her know the difference from night and day!

We bought the SAME tub Kye had and use it with Brittlynn (The First Year's Infant to Toddler tub). We don't use Kye's actual tub b/c I just felt like that was something she needed to have new. I love it. It's really the perfect tub and it's not very expensive either! I highly recommend it!

Since I'm a mom on the go we invested in one of the TOP breast pumps on the market. Like it was over $300. And, like the stroller, it has been worth every penny. Really it's priceless. I have used that thing in my home, in different states, on air planes, and across the globe. It's amazing. It's fast, efficient, comfortable and hands free. I use all the medela products (except storage bags...lansinoh makes the best milk storage bags and they are cheaper!) including their bottles. They are all great and I really think this pump will last me for ALL my babies!!! I own the Medela Freestyle.

When we do give Brittlynn a bottle we love our bottle warmer. It does a great job and worked so well with Kye that we bought the same brand again. It heats formula, breast milk, and even baby food (although I never heated baby food in it). It's The First Years Babypro.

I am passionate about SIDS prevention so two of my new favorites (since I didn't know about them with Kye) are the Angel Care Monitor and Britt's crib mattress cover. If you didn't read my blog post about the mattress cover then I URGE you to read it here! And please, please, please pass along the info! It could be life-saving!

Those are my top infant favorites! Really with an infant you don't need much and I learned that especially with the second baby. These items are things I use on a daily basis and am so thankful to have. What are your favorite things? Parenting items or just favorites in general? Join the link-up so we can find out!

Britt ~ Two Months Old!

2012-02-22T08:55:00.001-05:00

Brittlynn turned two months old on February 6th. Yes, time is flying by that quickly!!! She has already changed so much...you can see her one month post here. Also you can purchase your baby some belly stickers for each month (great shower gift!) here.

I decided to just keep using Britt's crib for her pics since I did them there month one :) I had a little bear I got for free from Hallmark so I figured we'd do a Valentine's Day themed thing since it is Feb!

According to What to Expect the First Year, Brittlynn can do all the things a baby her age should be able to do including:

smile in response to your smile
respond to a bell in some way, such as startling, crying, quieting (startling always, crying sometimes)

Britt can also do all the things a two month old will probably be able to do including:

vocalize in ways other than crying (cooing)
on stomach, lift head 45 degrees

Brittlynn can do all the things a two month old may be able to do including:

hold head steady when upright
on stomach, raise chest, supported by arms
roll over one way
grasp a rattle held to the backs or tips of fingers
pay attention to an object as small as a raisin
reach for an object
say "ah-goo" or similar vowel-consonant combinations

Britt can also do all the things a baby her age may possibly be able to do including:

smile spontaneously
bring both hands together
on stomach, lift head 90 degrees
laugh out loud (my fav!)
squeal in delight
follow an object held about 6 inches above the baby's face and moved 180 degrees (from one side to the other) with baby watching the whole way

I REALLY appreciate how pro-breastfeeding this book is!!! In this chapter is discusses some formula myths. Supplementing with formula (or adding rice cereal to a bottle) will not help your baby sleep through the night. Breast milk along is enough for your baby. Giving formula to your baby will hurt your milk supply! I also like the suggestion they give for mothers who simply don't pump enough breast milk to give their babies a bottle (a problem I do NOT have!). They suggest adding formula to the breast milk you pump. The baby gets a full bottle, the baby still gets your milk, and you still keep up that supply by pumping.

Another great section talked about the importance of the first three years of life. Now that Kye is about to be three we're done with this "most important" years while we are just starting Brittlynn's (seriously, this is part of the reason we spread out their ages this amount). Research shows that a child's brain grows to 90% of adult capacity during those first three years. While your child's future - like his or her brain - is far from fully cast at age three, it does appear that those early years do form the mold that will shape the person he or she will become. Research shows that the kind of care a child receives during that time determines to a large extent how well those brain connections will be made, how much the brain will develop, how successful, how content, how confident and how competent to handle life's challenges the child will be.

Here's somethings that as a parent you can do to make the most of those first three years:

Every time you touch, hold, cuddle, hug, or respond to your baby with warm responsive care you're positively affecting the way your child's brain forms connections
By reading, talking, singing, making eye contact, or cooing to your baby you're helping the brain reach full potential
Through positive parenting, you'll be teaching your child social and emotional skills that will boost their intellectual development as he or she gets older; the more socially and emotionally confident a child is, the more likely that child will be motivated to learn and to take on new challenges with enthusiasm and without fear of failure
Children whose basic needs are met in infancy and early childhood develop a sense of trust in others and a high level of self confidence
By monitoring and helping to regulate your baby's impulses and behaviors during the early years, you will eventually teach your child self control.
Setting limits that are fair and age-appropriate and enforcing them consistently will enable your child to be less likely to be anxious, frightened, impulsive or to rely on violent means to resolve conflicts later in life.
He or she will be more capable of intellectual learning because of the solid emotional foundation you have provided
Routine medical care is also very important as is any caregiver who spends a significant amount of time with your child should provide the same kind of care you do.

I know this may sound dumb, but I appreciated allllll the tips of things to do with Brittlynn when she's awake. I'm so used to entertaining a toddler that I forgot what things an infant would enjoy! I didn't realize she's already old enough to start "playing" with toys so instead of just having Kye show her all of her toys, he can for real play with her. It says to make sure to put toys to the side, not directly in front of her. It also suggests putting her on my stomach a lot for play. We can do airplane on my feet or calves and I can help her push off my hands while on my stomach. I already sing and talk to her all the time and spend a lot of our time together just sitting with her, smiling, and telling her how stinkin' cute she is. But it's good to know I can be doing other things as well!

You can look back at what Kye was up to in his two month post here. Also here's a bunch more pictures for you to enjoy of my sweet girl:

I love this, you can tell she's laughing with her entire body

My favorite of the month!

Lorelai's 3rd Birthday!

2012-02-21T13:24:00.000-05:00

Kye and Lorelai are one month and one day apart in age. It works out great because I know when I get Lorelai's birthday party invite in the mail that it means I need to get my butt in gear for Kye's party ;) I think it's cute that both of our kids are so into Disney movies right now that they each chose to have themed parties. Robyn did an awesome job sticking to the Rapunzel theme!!!

The walkway up to the party

Love the long braid!

The party was at 10 and lasted until noon. I was having a very rough week that week (more to come in Britt's weekly post on that...). I had a mega busy morning planned. I was going to drop off my stuff for the kids sale, go to a baby shower, and go to the party. It just couldn't all happen anymore. I hate letting people down but I had to miss the baby shower :( Zach took Kye and Brittlynn so Kye could be on time for the party and Britt could be sure to eat right at 10:30. I hurried as fast as I possibly could to get there! I was pretty late but, hey, better late than never :) I missed out on the coloring but it looks like the kids enjoyed it!

Such a good daddy

He dressed in purple to fit the theme :)

The birthday girl enjoying watching Tangled

cute favors and party noise makers!

Rapunzel's tower

cupcakes

The food table was cute too!

It was great getting to see Ashley and Preston, he's such a cutie!!!

Mrs. Becky meeting Britt

Kye was pretty much obsessed with the noise makers

Mrs. Becky is such a good sport!

The balloons were another big hit

Singing Happy Birthday

Opening a gift from "the baby"

To be honest my thought was "how dumb to get Lorelai a present from the unborn sibling" haha...

Then when the balloon came up and it was BLUE I realized the gift from the baby was actually their way of announcing the sex!!! SUPER cute idea!!!

I'm SO excited for them to experience a baby boy!!!

Yay!

Happy girls

She looks so chunky and content ;)

It's rare that I'm dressed so I like to try to get pics when it happens ;)

We've been to ALL of each other's kids parties :)

Btw I'm wearing the Stella and Dot Millie Necklace

The party was a big success! Zach headed out pretty quickly to get Brittlynn home for her nap so I stayed to visit some (since I was late arriving) and let Kye play. I was the only guest left and Robyn announced to the family that they needed prayers for their son...she wrote about it here. Thankfully everything is FINE with him and prayers have been answered, but at the time it was scary news. I felt very honored that she wanted me to know at the same time as her family and it meant a lot to me to be there for her. I HATE that she had to spend those three weeks in worry...but I'm so thankful that he's perfect and healthy and that she can finish out her pregnancy worry free!

Lorelai and her cousin, Ben

Kye LOVED the cookie party favors :)

It was a successful party and Kye had a blast. He kept saying "next is my birthday in March then Stevie's birthday in March." He's a birthday loving child :)

If you want to see more of the decorations Robyn made for the party you can go here!

Monthly Summary - January

2012-02-20T13:32:00.003-05:00

January was a big adjustment month for me with Brittlynn so poor Kye didn't get quite the amount of Mommy attention he's used to! Here's what he was up to during that month:

Playing: I'm thankful we went pretty overboard for Christmas as the new toys are for sure coming in handy! Kye will play on his own so well. He's very very independent and now that I'm busy nursing a baby I'm so thankful we worked so hard to achieve this!!! Independent playtime has paid off! Here's a video of Kye playing with his toys and making them sing over and over. Here's a another video of Kye giving me "prizes" and "treasures." Kye has a huge imagination and I love to watch him in pretend play. He uses these old wooden peg games I've had for ages and calls them his "cakes." He goes around singing happy birthday to all of us and having us make a wish and eat the cake. In this video he's feeding Sadie her cake.

playing with his etch-a-sketch

He got this neat book thing for Christmas where it reads out loud to you...it took me awhile to get around to downloading it all online but now that I have he really enjoys it!

His room time length is now 40 min and he'll often ask to stay up there longer! Daddy built him this house and he was so proud of it!

I don't have all of his toys on rotation (his cars are in constant play!) but I do have lots of toys stashed away to pull out randomly. It makes them seem new and helps keep him very entertained! I am not a believer in having junk all over my fridge so I keep some magnet toys in a drawer next to the fridge that we will pull out when we're making dinner or if I'm busy with laundry or something nearby. He is getting pretty good at letter recognition, E being his favorite letter for sure! Here's a video of him with his letters.

Hiding: Kye still loves to hide and now he's getting pretty creative about it. He will hide and we won't know it then we really will have to look to find him! One day he got smart and dumped out his toys and hid inside the baskets. I seriously didn't see him for awhile. Haha!

so silly!

Independence: Kye has gotten very independent about going to the bathroom. He can go into the bathroom, pull down his pants, use his potty, dump his potty, flush the toilet, then pull back up his pants. Pretty exciting!!! It's GREAT timing too as when he has to go potty while I'm nursing he can handle it all himself (as long as I leave a light on!) I realized from Kelly's facebook that we really should have graduated to the big potty by now. It'd make it MUCH easier to just have him go in there and not have to mess with dumping the small one. I used a seat cover for him to sit on and go potty but it was annoying to be constantly taking off and putting back on so we ended up investing in a toilet seat that has a toddler seat inside of it (more on that in Feb's post). It was also tricky for him pull down his pants and get up the stool by himself. Very awkward! He did feel like a big boy though!!!

While Kye got a lot more independent with the potty this month, we also starting having some issues. He was constipated for awhile then he got the UTI. With a UTI kids will lose some bladder control and we did notice some accidents. He went potty way more often. Part of me wondered if it was the UTI, or because he got to use the "big boy toilet" or because he was wanting attention. Who knows!

Kye has also gotten independent when it comes to his clothing. He likes to put on his underwear and pants on his own. He will not attempt a shirt yet which I find interesting because I thought it was often one of the first things kids would want to do??? Kye is VERY into what he wears. He would live in pjs if I let him and he'll often ask to change clothes right when he walks in the door from school. I guess he likes being comfortable! He came out with his pj shorts and underwear like this:

it's a good look right?

I literally laughed out loud when I saw this site!!!

He also enjoys dressing himself in our clothes...

No, he wasn't putting on makeup with that brush - he used it to "paint" the house

Our Time: My days used to be filled with time of just Kye and I. Now most of my time is spent nursing. While that does take up a good bit of time, I don't feel like Kye has really missed out on a lot of mommy time. I still interact with him while nursing and Brittlynn sleeps so much that he and I still get alone time. Right now her schedule is nice because she's asleep at noon so we get to have lunch just the two of us and some play time together before nap. Plus I can do all of his nap routine with him (potty, story, pjs, prayers) without worrying about her (unless she's crying...which isn't fun!). It was so pretty out during this month that we often ate lunch out back!

Playing bowling together

Snacks: For a long time Kye was not eating a snack at all after nap. He'd just eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner. But lately he's been wanting a snack and I have a bin FILLED with individually wrapped snacks in the pantry. I use these for trips, church and errand running. He LOVES to pick out one for a snack and knows the rule that he is only allowed to have one. What's funny is that he recently told me to "go talk on the phone mommy" when he was picking out his snack. I realized that when I'm on the phone I'm more likely to give into things...that's FOR SURE stopping now that he called me out on it haha! He will try to get me busy doing something then ask for "two snacks mommy???" sneaky kid! Here's a video of Kye picking out his snack

saying "just one!"

Eyes: Kye was born with blue eyes. I have blue eyes and have always hoped they would stay blue. We noticed as he got older he had one dark brown spot on his eye, and I had a feeling it meant those pretty blues would soon fade to brown. He now has such interesting eyes! They are such a mixture of colors!!! Some blue, some brown, some green. Zach's eyes are very similar! Zach says he has hazel eyes so maybe that's what Kye has too!

Hair: Zach and I have had a looooooong debate about Kye's hair. Zach really wants Kye to have a longer hair style. And I like it shorter. You can tell in the pictures...we let it get long then I get beyond annoyed and chop it off only to let it grow again. I made Zach a deal that for the months of Jan and Feb we'd let Kye's hair grow and see if whatever Zach envisions is possible. His birthday, our family pictures and Casey's wedding are all in March...if Kye's hair doesn't look like Zach wanted it to look (or if I loathe it) then we'll cut it before those big events. Stayed tuned to see what happens ;)

Stevie's House: Kye LOVES spending time with his friends and adores the Megow girls (Crissy included as one of the girls!). It was fun being pregnant together with Crissy but it kinda stinks too because she was MEGA pregnant when I had a newborn and now she has a newborn and I'm mega busy with Britt. So we don't get to help each other out as much as we wish we could! It was super sweet of Crissy and Seth to offer to come get Kye for a couple of hours one afternoon in Jan. He went over there to play and eat dinner and had a blast! Here are the pics Crissy put up on Facebook of him from their fun afternoon!

Ladies man :)

Big Brother: Kye is an AMAZING big brother. He's far surpassed all expectations I had for him. He is SO sweet and loving to Brittlynn. He adores her and wants to spend all of her awake time with her. He has to have her monitor to watch her when she's sleeping. It's SO sweet. He loves helping me go in and wake her up after her naps and he likes to be in her room with me and sing with me to her while we swaddle her to get her ready for bed. I've posted these pictures on Britt's weekly posts but I think some deserve to be included here too! Here is a video of Kye helping me wake Britt up, so sweet. I love how he calls her "sweet girl" and how she smiles at him. Here is a video of her watching him talk and him asking to hold her.

Playing with his sis

reading night-night story as a family

bossy already

I couldn't pick just ONE favorite of them together from this month, so here's three:

Kye hasn't tried too hard to compete with Brittlynn for attention. He hasn't asked to sleep in a crib, suck on a bottle (or me for that matter) or take a paci. However, he LOVES to play with her stuff. He thinks it's hilarious. I'm thankful that I set boundaries with her toys before she was born so he knows better than to sit in her swings or bouncers but he will sit in the bumbo and fall over on purpose and anytime we're in her room he LOVES to play with her toys. He gets them all out to show to her :) Here's a video of him showing her all of her stuffed animals. Here's a video of him showing her all of her toys.

I'm one blessed Mommy!!!

More Stuff Kye was up to in Jan:

Kye is very social but you can't force him to talk until he's ready. He's started to say "I'm done talking" and "I don't want to talk about it." I've learned just to ask him once about school or something then leave him alone if he doesn't want to talk...he eventually will open up on his own time and talk and talk and talk about things! He's teaching me patience ;)
He's learning to count on his hand and will ask me if he can count on my fingers
He told me about some of the things he got to eat at Seth and Crissy's and said "don't freak out Mommy." Cracked me up!!!
He loves the movie Tangled and when I tucked him in one day I told him I love him and he said "I love you mommy" then I said "I love you more" and he said "I love you most" (which is from the movie). It was so cute that he did it on his own and now we'll often say it to each other!
When something goes wrong I'll hear him say "oh great" Guess he's learning sarcasm early! Oops!
Mom told me a story when he was at her house this month and she caught him with his hand down his pants. She asked him if he needed to go potty and he said "No ma'am I'm just tickling my privates."
We talked about getting married and I asked who he wants to marry someday and he said "joseph" which made me laugh b/c he was thinking of Mary when I said "marry" ;)
He does a GREAT job of being quiet in Brittlynn's room. At first I wasn't going to allow him to go into her room but when she had trouble sleeping and i found myself in her room quite often I didn't think that was fair to him. Instead the rule is he has to be SILENT when in her room and he does great at this!!!
When I posted about choices one of my readers had a great suggestion about doing a reward chart! I found a magnetic dry erase one on amazon and it came with star magnets which I liked. I don't like the idea of rewarding him for things he should do but I agreed with the reader that right now in his life he needs more PRAISE and LOVE! I thought it'd help remind me to praise him and I put things on the chart that I knew he'd get a star for (like putting away his dishes at dinner since he's a pro at that) and things that he sometimes wouldn't get a star like no spankings or not fussing when movie time ended. He really loves doing it and the stars themselves were the rewards. The BAD thing about it is finding the time every day to actually do it...so it's erratic which isn't my style. I pretty much have already abandoned it but want to pick it back up. I just need to plan a time each day where we can do it!!! Something consistent!
Poor kid will be like 10 before his two year molars stop coming in...we do see another one starting to pop through though!
At bed time (both nap and night) he's started to try to fight it. It was a tough spot this month. LOTS and lots of spankings. I tried everything under the sun but the bottom line is sometimes he just needed to be spanked. He would purposefully do things in order to get out of sleeping...like kicking off his blanket the minute we left the room then yelling out for us to fix it. We would never punish him for not sleeping. And he never tried to actually get out of the bed. But he would get in trouble for yelling and screaming quite often! Thankfully it was a phase!
He loves the humidifier in Britt's room and will play with the vapor from it when I have to go in there
He fell in the back yard when outside with Daddy and got a pretty bad scratch on his face (I edit it out of most pictures). It wouldn't have taken so long to heal but he continues to pick the scab off over and over again!!!
They sing a song about the weather at school and it's translated to a lot of weather talk around our house. :)
Kye loves to play work just like Daddy. I love the way he calls computers his "peters" haha You can hear how he says it in this video.
Kye is like his mama with his dreaming. He has very vivid dreams and will wake up sometimes thinking they are real and will call out to us. Once I went in there and he said his paper had fallen behind his bed...he didn't have any paper to begin with! He also said one morning that during the night he had to call daddy at school to bring him crackers
While helping me bake cookies with Brittlynn he was on the step stool helping and fell off and hit the tile floor in the kitchen. Instead of worrying about himself or crying when he fell he immediately jumped up and went to Brittlynn and kept saying how sorry he was. I think he was worried he scared her? It was SO precious that she was his main concern!
Kye's become very interested in his butt...I know so random! But I assume it's similar to when kids stick stuff up their noses? I caught him a couple times this month sticking stuff in that spot and he had me come into his room during nap one day b/c he "pooped" when really he had just picked something out of his butt...
He is really wanting a bike but says "I don't want to wear the bicycle hats" looks like the helmet battle will be a tough one!
In attempting to not have to go to sleep Kye has started to "march" to bed. He likes to count then march to his pillow then count and jump down to lay down on his pillow. Anything to eat away the time! Here's a video of it!
Whenever we meet someone or see people he always wants to know everyones names
Since he still isn't a big veggie eater but loves sandwiches I've started putting green bean baby food on his sandwiches. I put it on before the peanut butter and he never even notices it's there! Score!
Kye's become pickier about his clothing choices so I'll typically give him two choices of what to wear around the house (he still doesn't have any issues with the clothing I pick out for when we go places). His favorite is his robot t-shirt
He randomly told me to "shut up" which surprised me and caught me off guard as it's not something Zach and I even say. Maybe he got it from school??? I told him it wasn't a nice thing to say and not to say it again!
Kye still enjoys the outdoors. He just loves the freedom to RUN! He'll run around the entire back yard over and over again. He even makes the dogs get sick of it! Here's a video of him running.
He showered with Zach to save time one night and loved it! Zach let him go to town with the shaving cream and he had a blast
Britt and I typically pick him up from school once a week and when we do I will make his lunch ahead of time and bring it in the car. He LOVES eating out of the box so it's like a special treat but it also is a time saver. Since she's getting down late for nap and he's having to rush lunch so he can get down to sleep for his nap...the noon hour is CRAZY and anything I can do to speed it up and make it go smoother I do...the lunch thing really helps!
Kye still loves to sing, here's a precious video of him singing "Twinkle Twinkle"
He has started to take a loooong time to fall asleep at nap. It's quite often that this happens. He'll lay in his bed playing or singing and I don't mind it at all. As long as he stays in the bed I don't care if he's asleep or not!

Kye's Artwork: Fall 2011

2012-02-17T10:26:00.001-05:00

When Kye first started school I knew I had to decide how to handle all the artwork he'd be coming home with. Do I keep it all? Display it somewhere??? I put the question out on Facebook and got TONS of responses. Really, it's an awesome think about Facebook. You ask a question and within minutes you are given lots and lots of answers. One idea that I loved was to take pictures of Kye with each piece of artwork. Then print off the pictures and put them into a photo album for him to have. That way we can "keep" each piece of artwork without cluttering up the house. I thought this was a great plan because it's simple, shows Kye that I'm proud of him, and allows me not to feel guilt over throwing majority of the stuff away.

As Kye brings home his projects we put them into a pile then we'll randomly go into the dining room and take pictures of him holding each thing up. I never force him to do it and always ask him if he wants to. I don't want it to be something he dreads at all. After I get a picture of each thing, and compliment him on his great work, I go through the pile. I keep the cutest things. Or things that are special in someway then I sneakily throw the rest in the trash. He doesn't know I throw them away as I don't want to hurt his feelings but eventually I'll probably let him pick out the ones to keep and the ones to toss.

My plan is to post these pictures in one long blog entry at the end of each "semester" of school. So there will be two of these posts a year...I know it's a TON of pictures (81 to be exact) but I like the idea that he'll not only have the photo album but that he will have them in the blog book (IF I ever do make them...) as well! Here are all the beautiful art projects Kye did in the Fall of 2011!

This is the first thing he made...from his very first day of school

The rest are just in random order, enjoy!

While I'm not a fan of displaying stuff all over my house (even our fridge is bare), I did want to find someway to do something creative with the things Kye (and future children) make. I want them to know how proud of them we are and I want them to feel pride in their work as well. I saw something similar to this on Pinterest and Zach said it was super easy to make! Then my sister-in-law, Chrissy, had the vinyl lettering done for us which was very sweet of her. We put this in the playroom and I change out the pictures as new ones come in. My plan is to go through the displayed pictures as I take them down and have some to keep and some to toss. I'll make a tub for each child filled with all the the "keeps."

I know it may sound hurtful that I will be throwing away probably 90% of the art my kids create. But what do you honestly do with all that stuff you keep??? I like to see some of the things I made when I was younger but it's just a quick glance and maybe a comment or two then that's it. I know I'll keep plenty of things to allow for us to play the "remember when" game and enough for Kye to know that I was proud of the things he did. But there just isn't any reason, in my viewpoint, to hold onto everything.

I LOVE the photo idea because, even once stuff ends up in the trash, it really does allow us to cherish each thing and keep it forever! Seeing Kye come home with a BIG grin on his face, eager to show me the things he made for me makes me so happy. I love how much pride he takes in his work and how much he enjoys sharing that with me. I hope that's a phase he never outgrows :)

Open Book

2012-02-15T22:31:00.002-05:00

For those of you that have known me a long time, you know that I have always been an open book. It's just who I am. I was always that kid at school who wasn't afraid to raise my hand when I had a question. I'm that friend you can ask how you look in an outfit and know you'll get an honest response. I've never been afraid or ashamed to speak my mind.

While I may be outspoken and very honest I don't think I'd be cast as the "mean girl" on a reality show either. You can be outspoken yet not be hurtful about it. I say what I think but, try to the best of my abilities to, say it in a loving way. I never, ever write on this blog intending to hurt someone. I do not write the things I do to offend or for shock value or hoping to be the topic of someones lunch break gossip. The words you read are the same words I would speak out loud if we were to have a conversation. Actually, in "real life" I'm probably even more open and sarcastic. I try to play down the sarcasm on here as I know tone is difficult to read into (hence why I have a MILLION smiley faces on each post and so many "hahas" that my own dad asked if you're supposed to actually say "ha ha" when you read it).

When I started blogging almost four years ago very few people read it and I know now more and more people are reading my posts. I started out keeping the blog just for my own personal journal. To reference someday when needed (which has been SO helpful already!) and for my children to have so they can someday reflect back on their lives from their mother's perspective. As it has evolved, I now also write it in hopes that I can help others. With parenting issues, spiritually, personally, in any way that I can. I am not a person of many talents. I can't draw. Or sing. I'm terrible at sports. However, I've always been a writer. I express myself best through writing and feel like this blog is my way to use the gift God has given me. It is my personal ministry.

I know some people may not like my openness. People have told me plenty of times that they could never be as open as I am. As public about such private things. Just because some people may not personally like what I have to say does not make it wrong or sinful for me to say it. That being said, I'm a work in progress just like everyone else. I hope what you see and read on my blog today is more mature, more God-focused, and more tactfully spoken than what you could go back and read from my entries four years ago. Or even six months ago. I'm constantly striving to improve in my personal walk with the Lord and that growth, I hope, is obvious here as well.

While I am a confident person, I in no way consider myself better than anyone else at all. If I am writing something that I am worried will be hurtful, I delete it. I edit my posts. I don't just write my thoughts and hit "publish." I read and re-read to make sure I'm not writing something that could possibly offend or hurt someone. I read SO many other blogs out there that these women write who don't worry about offending anyone and sometimes I envy them. It's not easy to try to walk that line of being truthful and honest yet also to not offend. And sometimes it's impossible (for example, my post on spanking probably offended some of you who don't believe in it but there is no way around that). I do my best and will continue to do so in the future.

With the evolution of this blog, and the readership that has come from it, I know some people out there don't read it because they are my friend, or because they like what I say, or because they are trying to learn something, or that they just want to see my kids pictures. Some people may be reading it in order to find the bad in it. To pick at me. To gossip about me. To take something I say and turn it into something I didn't intend for it to be. I'd love to be strong enough in my own skin to say that this doesn't bother me, but it does.

We are blessed to live in a world where we can make our own choices and decisions. We all come from different walks of life and have had different experiences. We all have our own personal beliefs on what is appropriate and inappropriate. Personally, I find a lot of what I see on facebook to be inappropriate. Many of my "friends" will post status updates with swear words. Pictures of them partying it up and being obviously drunk. Comments that talk negatively about God or put down those who follow Him. I am offended by such things. They aren't personal attacks on me in any way but I surely don't like to read them or see them. I have the choice to stop being "friends" with those people. I have the choice to not look at their pages or to read their posts. Same with blogging. There is a famous blogger out there that I don't follow. She talks negatively about God quite often and I no longer read her blog or have a link to it on my sidebar. If you read this blog and you don't personally like what you read, you also have a choice. I in no way force anyone to read this. I post a link to my facebook page every time I update the blog. It's pretty easy to simply not click the link.

All of that being said, I do truly care about anyone who may have ever read anything I've written and has been hurt by it in any way. I hate the idea of hurting someone. I especially hate that thought that I could be causing someone to sin. Romans 14:13 says: "Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister" If the things I say here cause anyone to talk bad about me or gossip in someway then I'm causing them to sin.

I urge anyone who has ever been offended or hurt by anything I have written here, or who may become offended or hurt by something in the future, to please contact me. Together we can talk about it. It seriously eats away at me to think that I could possibly hurt someone and not even know it. I assure you it has never been intentional and I'm sure, if such a situation arises, that we can work it out. I will apologize if needed and rectify the situation if at all possible. Matthew 18:15 says "If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over."

My personal email address is deliasgoddess33{at}aol{dot}com (I know it's lame...but I made it up when I was 13 and I was OBSESSED with the Delia's clothing catalog haha).

While I never want to offend or hurt anyone, I will also never stop being myself. This is my blog. My story. I refuse to ever stop being open, upfront, and honest. I am proud of the blog entries I have written. Zach reads each post and he, too, is proud. My parents get emailed updates of each blog entry I write and they are proud of me. I know that for every email I may start getting regarding being upset or offended, that I'll have had ten more from people who my openness has helped.

Thank you to all of you who choose to continue down this journey with me!

Week Eight Summary

2012-02-14T10:17:00.001-05:00

~WINNER!!!!! Random.org selected: True Random Number Generator Min: 1 Max: 97 Result: 5. Comment #5: "Forddygirl And I facebooked it :-)" CONGRATS TO KELLY FORD!!!! Thanks to everyone for entering...I was pretty shocked that it got 97 entries! Hopefully I'll be doing another fun giveaway soon!~

Britt's eighth week of life was from Jan 24 - Jan 30th. It was another tough one for several reasons...

Sleep: She started waking up at night again! This was a new thing for us as Kye never did that. She started waking up at 3, 4 or 5 each night and I'd feed her. I wasn't sure if it was a growth spurt or what so I figured it was better to feed her, especially since it was always so far away from our morning wake up time. Plus my breasts literally ached hearing her cry as they were mega full. It just made sense to feed her and she'd typically only eat for 30 min or so (short for her!) and then be back to sleep. I had been SPOILED by her sleeping through the night. When the early wakings happened, it Killed me. I had a hard time staying awake throughout the day and literally felt more exhausted than I did when she was first born. Maybe my body had gotten used to solid sleep so it was harder for me to go back to not having it???

This week I also gave up looking for sleep cues. The child just doesn't have any! If I waited for her to yawn, get fussy, or seem tired then she'd never nap! Instead I started to just go by the clock. When I'd feed her at 10:30 she'd be done at 11:30 so I'd put her down at noon. Her awake time lengths (including the time to eat) are 1 hour and 30 min. Typically if she's even up a few minutes extra she does fine.

She started to wake mid-nap again and wouldn't go back to sleep and, sure enough, it's her second wonder week! Here's what was going on during this developmental leap. I did notice that she started to study things a lot more so it went along with this Wonder Week. I'd let her cry it out (cio) at the start of each nap, and she typically won't get too worked up and falls asleep quickly. However, half way through the nap if she was upset I'd go in and help her. She would seriously stop crying and SMILE at me as soon as she saw me. Little trickster :) I know she's too young to manipulate but dannnng it felt like that's what she was doing! I'll walk in while she's screaming Then she instantly stops screaming when I pick her up and starts screaming again when I put her down. Most of the time the only way to get her back to sleep was to hold her (with as little stimulation as possible) then lay her back down once she was asleep. I hate doing this as it feels anti-babywise since I'm a "sleep prop" in getting her to sleep but at this age the most important thing is that she IS sleeping...and I do think that she's a very, very social being and may just need Mama sometimes, especially during Wonder Weeks!

Schedule: Her schedule was the same as Week 6. The only thing that did occur out of the norm was that on Sunday night I accidentally slept through the 10:30 dream feed. Zach was hardcore asleep watching tv on the couch and my "nap" from 9:30-10:30 ended up lasting until more like 11:30 when Zach walked in and woke me up. It's pretty obvious that you're exhausted when your husband finds you dead to the world in the bed with your arm outstretched holding your cell phone. I guess, in my zombie state, I grabbed the phone and turned off the alarm?!? I have NO memory of any of this. Obviously we didn't wake her to eat at 11;30 and just went to bed to see what would happen. Well...she woke at 5. Just like she had been doing. That's when we realized it was a little snack she was craving and it was more a routine for her than a need in the middle of the night. A lot of other stuff was going on that week (see more below) so we didn't mess with her and I went back to the dream feeding and waking up to do a snack for her when she'd wake up.

Other Stuff Going On This Week:

She rolled over so great the first time she did it then showed no interest in doing it again. It's like she proved to herself she could do it then just moved on! Zach watched her for me on Saturday and said she rolled over four times for him...maybe she just saves it for her Daddy since she knows he's more into the "athletic" type things?? ;)
On the 27th I was laying her on the floor when she spit up in a HUGE way. It was like a fountain coming from her mouth. I'd heard that babies can die from their own vomit and now I know why. It went straight up in the air then back down all over her face, and all up her nose while also going back into her mouth. She stopped breathing. I stayed calm and turned her over to get all the puke out then got the bulb syringe and cleaned out her nose. It was a scary moment to see her face go red like that but I'm thankful it happened when I was right there and it made me appreciate the Angel Care monitor and video monitor even more!!!
We went to Toys R Us to use up the rest of the coupons I had on Kye's birthday presents and she did horrible. I was so embarrassed because they all remembered me from our last visit and she was SCREAMING. SO many people made comments which only stressed me out more. Stuff like "oh she's tired." Or "Gosh she hates it here!" Or "Poor baby is hungry." Duh, she's hungry don't you see me with the bottle in my hand trying to jam it in her mouth?!?! She would not take the bottle. She also wouldn't take it the night before when Rachael was visiting. It was frustrating. But I stayed calm. I walked around with her for a bit and continued to try and she eventually drank it. One of the people who worked there was so sweet and came over to me while she was eating. She said that she nursed her babies and had a difficult time finding a bottle they would like. She walked me over to the bottle aisle and helped pick out what worked for her (playtex ones). I ended up buying them but while I was in the aisle I also bought new nipples for the Medela bottles we already had!
We tried out the new nipples and she took the bottle SO much better. Turns out I was using the slow-flow kind...but they were too small. They weren't the wide nipples that are like breast nipples. Oops! Now that we got that fixed she takes a bottle much better!
She is very ticklish and it's precious!
She doesn't poop as often...maybe once a day but that's it although her other diapers are mega full of tee-tee
Some of her diapers were green poop again...

We made our first batch of cookies with Brittlynn as the big helper!

She enjoyed watching Kye as he kept her well entertained

She loves to stare and stare

Here's a video of her enjoying her Mamaroo swing!

My view from the dinner table every night!!! Daddy across from my and my sweet kids beside me!

Zach and I have a new ritual for date nights...every monday night we watch The Bachelor together! I love it!!! Seriously, the show SUCKS without Zach. We have to be together to watch it because we love critiquing everything that happens and making fun of it the whole time. Our town recently got an Olive Garden and, since Valdostians are OBSESSED with it, it's been mega crazy busy. Not that we've been able to go on a real date anyways! But still! Zach went and picked us up a meal to go and it was nice!

We did this deal where you get three course for $12.99. It was pretty good but the dessert was like three bites haha!

More pictures of my happy, happy girl!

I LOVE that she still has her hair, even if it is crazy ;)

Sadie kisses

Postpartum Update: Well this was a ROUGH week. Very rough. Really it was partially during her eight week and partially during her ninth week so you'll hear more whining from me in the next weekly summary post :) I FINALLY stopped bleeding, or at least it went to light spotting, and I had my "six" week postpartum checkup. I got to see Stacy (yay!) on Wed Jan 25th when I was actually seven weeks postpartum. Kye was at school and actually went home with Mrs. Charlotte for his nap that day. I was able to go to my appointment, go home and nurse Britt, then go get my hair done. It worked out nicely!

My appointment went smoothly. I was able to see Teresa too and I'm glad she enjoyed my thank you card (and massage!) I sent her. Stacy checked me out and it hurt. Thankfully she didn't have to check out my butt...with Kye I was cut then ripped allllll the way so she had to check out that hole at my postpartum check up (you can read about that visit here). It's funny that the check up this time was more painful than the one last time when I didn't have nearly as much ripping/cutting this time around. She said I was STILL not fully healed!!! One stitch was still lingering and I still had a tender/red spot. :( That means I did not get the "all clear" for sex. Very disappointing and she said I needed to wait another couple of weeks to let the stitch fall out and the area heal. She also said it's important to get lubrication b/c nursing causes dryness. Great. I was pretty bummed :( She did get me a refill on my prenatal vitamins and got me a prescription for birth control. It's a type that is safe to use when nursing and I need it since I get my period so quickly after giving birth...even when exclusively breastfeeding!!! It was great getting to catch up with her and crazy that I won't be back in there for a YEAR!

The day after my visit I started bleeding again, heavy. It was all very strange. I felt like something wasn't right and that I shouldn't still be needed thick pads after this long of a time period. I was also more tired than I had been right after I'd had her. Like falling asleep while nursing her during the day exhausted. I could barely function and just didn't feel like myself. I also got mega intense headaches that made focusing on my parental/wife/household duties even tougher. I was pretty scared that something was seriously wrong with me. I was supposed to go to Atlanta for the day on Saturday for some of Casey's wedding showers and I couldn't do it. SO not like me. But the night before I knew I was just too tired to try to make that drive.

I started to get worried, as did Zach. He was so sweet how concerned he was. I, stupidly, googled my symptoms and read all about new moms who had a piece of the placenta still inside of them and how it caused the extended bleeding and other things to happen. These women ended up having to get a dnc in order to get completely cleaned out. I texted all my go-to prayer mamas and asked for prayers with what I was going through and how concerned I was. It was a crazy week for the "down there" areas...I was still bleeding, Britt was having green poop that worried me, and Kye was dealing with his uti. Not fun!!! Week eight was a rough one on me and sadly week nine only got tougher...so glad I have such adorable children and a hot husband to keep me smiling huh? ;)

If you want to see what Kye was up to at this age, here is his week eight summary! It's so great that at this age Babywise efforts really start to pay off, Kye was just as happy as Britt is!!!

Toes in the Grass

2012-02-13T09:44:00.002-05:00

Something I didn't fully appreciate with Kye as a baby were those moments of just the two of us. For Brittlynn, those moments aren't very often. Typically she'll get done eating at 3 and won't go down until 3:30. Kye is still napping then so it's the only guaranteed time during the day where I'll get to have her all to myself. I try to make that time fun for us both and do a lot of loving and cuddling on her (who am I kidding...anytime this kid is awake I'm cuddling on her!). On this particular day (Jan 30th) it was VERY warm and pretty outside so I thought it'd be a good opportunity to soak up some sunshine!

This makes me laugh

Brittlynn has never felt the grass before and I love introducing my babies to new things whenever possible. I'm excited to take her to the beach and see how she likes the sand...because she did not like the feeling of grass. She would jerk her feet up to avoid touching it and wouldn't let her little toes anywhere near it. She didn't cry or anything, but you could tell by her feet movements that it was not something she wanted to be doing!

She preferred staying on her blanket and being on her belly. She enjoys lifting her head and checking out the world around her!

Visit from the Copponex Clan

2012-02-12T13:25:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the days without posts...it's been a rough week. But I'm getting back in the swing of things now! I have lived in Valdosta for almost eight years. I have made MANY wonderful, fabulous friends who I adore. However, I also have tons of amazing friends who don't live very close to me. I try to make as many trips as possible up to the Atlanta area to visit all of my old (and new!) friends who live up there. Rarely do any of them come down here and who could blame them? I mean I literally am probably the most interesting thing in Valdosta ;) Plus I can go up there and see a TON of people in one visit, and I don't mind the excuses for little get-a ways now and then either! I ALWAYS tell everyone that if they find themselves driving down 75 pllllllease let me know as we literally live less than 5 minutes from the exit and we're a GREAT stop on the way to Florida from Atlanta. FINALLY someone took me up on this offer!!!

Rachael was coming through on their way to Disney and we were lucky enough to get to visit with them!!! It was pretty funny because Greg ended up having to work late so Rach and the kids were stranded at their hotel. Zach went and picked them up (so glad we both use Chicco infant car seats so the base worked!) and brought them to the house then when Greg got off work he met them at our place. Rachael actually came to visit me back when I was pregnant with Kye when she was so sweet to bring Macy to my baby shower. So this is the second house of ours she's been able to see :)

The kids hit it off right away. I haven't laughed so hard in AGES. Macy and Kye were cracking me up hardcore. Even Zach commented on how they played together in a way that Kye doesn't play with most kids. I think they have very similar personalities and play styles. Typically Kye is a little too in your face for kids and I think his mega social personality scares 'em off. In Macy, Kye met his match and the two of them were non-stop talking. Macy may look like her daddy but that little personality she's got is all her mama's. I loved it. She told me all about Disney world and how I could come to her "birthday celebration."

They ran off to his room to play right when they met and soon came out sporting hats and playing the guitar

Loading stuff up in the bookbags

Cracking up

I'd love to tell you that Britt and Brady hit it off equally well...but they just sat there. ;) Rach and I were both so swamped with the kids that we barely got a chance to catch up but I'm glad Zach was there to witness it all. I think sometimes men think when we have play dates that we get our fill of "girl time." But that couldn't be further from the truth!!! You're lucky if you can get through one story or bit of gossip in an entire play date. Kids will keep you on your toes and cause a good bit of interruption!

Comparing sizes...he was four months here and Britt was almost two months

new friends!

Right when Macy saw me the first thing she said was that she was going to sleep at our house. At one point I found her in Kye's room stripping off her clothes. I asked what she was doing and she said she was putting her pjs on to get ready for bed. When I told her that her mommy didn't bring any pjs, Little Miss Personality replied "well you have pjs!" Too smart ;) Rach said it was okay for her to wear one of Kye's t-shirts and she was so happy.

Kye likes the older ladies ;)

Aren't they adorable together???

She hopped into Kye's bed and made herself at home haha

The evenings are kinda nuts around here and I'm appreciative of Rachael for going with our flow. Macy was just as happy as could be to be part of our nightly routine. We ate Zaxby's for dinner and skipped baths for the night then, when it was time for Kye to go to bed, Zach read Macy and Kye a story.

It was precious to watch

Macy was really upset when she had to leave. It was super sweet and meant a lot to me that she enjoyed visiting with us so much. I REALLY wanted to just keep her and not let her leave with her parents. Rachael's pics on her blog of Macy are always adorable but in person she's even cuter!!! Interacting with her made me SOOOO excited for when Brittlynn gets that age. I adore Kye at this age and know Brittlynn will be just as fun as he is! Kye had a BLAST and really wants Macy to come back for his birthday party.

We told Greg and Rachael that next time they drive through they really, really should save the cost of a hotel room and just stay with us! You KNOW if we're up that way we'll totally invite ourselves to spend the night at someone's house. (I'm so not kidding...) Our mini-visit was a great way to see how the kids would do together but it was much too short. I hope they take us up on our offer to come visit again SOON and that we'll plan something for all of us to go somewhere fun together too!

They even came with gifts! Rach gave Britt some of Macy's old bows and this cute Baby's First Christmas Minnie Mouse ornament. It'll look mega cute on her tree this year!

I hope some of YOU will follow Rachael's lead and COME SEE ME!!! We have a big house with plenty of space and would love more visitors. I'm so glad Rach and fam stopped through as we had SUCH a fun night!!! I even let Kye skip his bath and stay up late on a school night. So cool of me...although I made Zach hide the suckers she brought him hahah...I guess I'm not that much of a "cool mom" yet, huh?

Further Prevention Against SIDS

2012-02-08T19:59:00.002-05:00

Something I am very passionate about is SIDS prevention. I've seen how sudden infant death syndrome affects a family. I've witnessed that pain and hurt and I don't want ANY family to have to experience that, especially my own. With Kye, I wasn't as on top of things as I should have been but with Britt (and all future babies) I am taking it very seriously.

We do all the things possible to prevent SIDS: back to sleep, fan on in room, keep the temp at 70 degrees (we have a thermometer in her room so we can always keep track of the temp!), use the angel care monitor, no bumpers, nothing in the crib at all. Even though we do all of those things, it doesn't mean that Brittlynn is 100% risk free of sudden infant death syndrome. The whole thing about SIDS is that they aren't really sure what causes it. Basically these preventative measures are things they have found that lower the amount of crib deaths, but they don't eliminate it completely.

I always appreciate learning new things and Rachael recently shared this article with me that opened my eyes in a BIG way!!! Basically it says that in New Zealand a lot of research has been done on what they call "cot death" (same thing that we call SIDS). They have found that the cause of crib death is from gaseous poisoning (phosphine, arsine and stibine). They are generated from the mattress on which a baby sleeps. Basically what is happening is that crib mattresses are made with protective materials against fires. The chemicals used to make them safer against fire risk are the ones causing the crib death. The chemicals mix with other chemicals...like those found in the baby spit up, poop, sweat, etc and cause a deadly combination. The reason back-to-sleep is so successful is that when a baby is face up they are breathing in less of the chemicals and the chemicals are less dense than air so they diffuse away from the baby's face. However, many babies do still die while back-to-sleep so it's not a full proof preventative measure.

What they discovered in New Zealand is that wrapping the mattress protects the baby from breathing in the chemicals and prevents cot death. There are a ton of numbers and scientific data to support all of this...however I don't really care about that. The ONE figure that popped out to me was this: The research started in 1995 and they began wrapping mattresses with these certain covers. At least 196,000 babies have slept on wrapped mattresses and of those there have been ZERO CRIB DEATHS!!! During the same time period there were 1,010 crib deaths of babies who slept on unwrapped mattresses but slept in parallel bedding situations to those with the wrapped mattresses. Who wouldn't buy one of these covers?!?!?!

I looked more into it on this site and ordered my mattress cover here. I measured our mattress and if you have a standard crib mattress the size you need is size E. I was a little nervous that Zach wouldn't be on board to order it because it does cost $41 (but that includes the shipping from New Zealand). However, he said he didn't care how much it cost. He may not be as vocal as I am about my fears of SIDS but he is equally as passionate about prevention and said any amount is worth it to have peace of mind. It's especially important to order this cover if your using a used mattress as the more the chemicals mix together, the more dangerous it becomes.

To me, the research speaks for itself and makes TOTAL sense. I'm not sure why it hasn't been more publicized, but I am going to do everything in my power to personally spread the word on this. If you're wanting to learn more I urge you to read into those sites and especially this FAQ section here. I'm one of those annoying people on facebook that comments on any picture I see of a crib with bumpers in it and tells the (probably annoyed) mom that they aren't safe. Yup, that's me. But if that baby were to die from crib death and I hadn't said something I'd feel guilty about it. Like I could have helped in some way. It's RIDICULOUS that bumpers are even still available for sale. A few states have outlawed them and companies are slowly starting to stop making them (including Skip Hop Dot). There is NO reason to have a bumper. Sure it's cute but it serves no purpose and can cause your baby to suffocate. Not worth the risk!!! Anyways...sorry for the rant, I told you I'm passionate ;)

The cover takes AWHILE to arrive so be prepared for that. We had Brittlynn sleeping in her pack and play while we were waiting to get the nursery bedding finished up so we just continued to keep her in the pack and play until the cover arrived. She was over 8 weeks old before she finally got to sleep in her own crib!!!

There are very specific instructions for covering your mattress. What would be the point in buying the cover if we didn't cover it correctly??? We read and re-read them to make sure we did it right and here's a break down of what to do (I know some people are visual so I thought the pictures would help):

1. Air the mattress out, preferably in the sun if possible. We left ours on the back porch for like three days. Also if your mattress has any type of cover on it remove it. Ours was covered completely and the cover was not removable, so you'll see further down what the instructions told us to do about it

2. Place it inside the cover

3. Fold the open end of the cover under the mattress and seal the cover using the adhesive strip.

4. Do not cut the cover to fit the mattress. If the cover is larger than the mattress (as ours was and yours will be if it's the standard size), after you seal the adhesive strip fold the extra plastic under the sides and/or ends (ours fit great on the sides, but was too long on the end). Make sure the cover is firm and smooth on the mattress.

5. Tape the extra plastic onto the cover using a wide clear colorless tape (we used packaging tape), making sure not to obstruct the ventilation holes which are on the printed side of the cover.

6. Since our mattress was completely covered with a plastic type material and it couldn't be removed I looked on the website of the cover for how to handle it. The answer was in the FAQ section here. Once we had the cover on, Zach used a knife to cut out the material covering our mattress. He cut the holes out of the holes from the new cover. This cover filters the chemicals out of these two holes from the bottom of the mattress. Zach said he could feel stuff coming out of them already!

7. Covering the mattress is also very important. You MUST use 100% cotton materials!!! The first thing to place on top of the mattress is a pure cotton blanket. We used an old towel as it was the perfect size and was 100% cotton. On top of that place a 100% cotton sheet. We used one of Kye's old ones that doesn't match Britt's room. Then on top of that place your cotton sheet (the pink one crumbled to the side is what we used). Since the study is from New Zealand they actually use blankets to cover their babies as well and they have instructions for that. We, obviously, won't have blankets in the crib. But since Britt does spit up often and changing crib sheets is a pain we also use a 100% cotton little cover to protect the sheets and she sleeps on top of that.

In her crib!!!

8. Since we also use the Angel Care monitor we had to wait even longer until she could actually sleep in the crib. With the Angel Care monitor you have to place the sensor pad on a piece of wood under the crib. Of course the piece of wood we have would cover the ventilation holes from the mattress. So Zach bought a piece of wood from Lowes then measured the placement of the ventilation holes and cut out holes in the wood to match up with the ones on the mattress.

We have shared this information with our parents and have told them that Brittlynn will not be sleeping in their baby cribs until they, too, invest in the covers for their mattresses. Grandparents tend to have used things more than new parents do and the more used the baby mattress is, the higher the risk. I'm not willing to take that chance for sure!!! Wherever your baby sleeps, make sure to have a mattress cover for that bed! They do sell ones for travel cribs, but I don't think it's the same thing as the pack and plays we have here??? I thought about ordering one for the pack and play but my pack and play mattress is more like a thin piece of cardboard with a little cushion on top and I'm not sure how the cover would work for that, if it would at all???

I hope when you read this you are as urgent as I was to order a mattress cover for your baby's mattress. We still follow ALL of the recommendations for SIDS prevention but this is something I strongly believe in and do think it could very well be the thing that stops SIDS from ever happening again. Even if Britt was 6 months old when I learned about this cover, I'd still buy it. SIDS is something that is a risk until a baby turns one and I'd rather be safe than sorry with stuff like this. You can never really be too careful ya know? Also once you buy this cover and cover the mattress, you never have to buy another one. You don't ever remove the cover and can use the same mattress again and again for all your babies. A very worth-while investment!!! A way to cut costs if you're a new parent is to buy a used crib mattress then this cover, I'm sure you can get a used mattress cheap enough to where when you add in the cost of the cover you're coming out about even! :)

Please, please, please if you are pregnant or have a new baby read the links I provided, look into the research, and order a cover. $41 may sound expensive but in the grand scheme of things it's so worth it. I'm beyond grateful to Rachael for sharing this with me and I truly hope that all of you spread the word about this as well!!!

Week Seven Summary

2012-02-07T22:46:00.000-05:00

Brittlynn's 7th week of life was from January 17th - the 23rd. Here's what we were up to that week:

Sleep: BIG events in the world of sleep for Miss Britt! On 1/17 she had her first FLAWLESS day of sleep. Never had to go in her room once the WHOLE day. Hard work takes awhile to pay off but it made it all worth it for sure ;) She also ate wonderfully that day, for about 45 min each feeding and had awesome awake times!!! It was one of those days you just want to hold onto forever.

That night she broke out of her swaddle for the first time but the next night (Wed Jan 18th) she SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT!!!! A little over six weeks old and she slept from her dreamfeed at 10:30 (so I put her down close to 11:30) until 7!!! When Kye first sttn he was eight weeks old and I remember vividly Zach and I freaking out because we were worried about him. Of course this was before we owned a video monitor or an angel care monitor so Zach ran across the house to make sure he was breathing ;) With Brittlynn I didn't panic when I woke up and she was still asleep. I knew the angel care monitor would have gone off if something was wrong. But I did look at the video monitor to see if she was okay and she wasn't there! The girl had somehow managed to scoot herself out of the vision of the camera and when we went in to get her (and shower her with praises) she was completely unswaddled. I'm talking like arms and legs out of the thing. And she had a poop diaper! All these elements that you would think would make her wake up but she didn't! Super pumped about it for SURE. That's two babies in a row...two babies we used Babywise with...and two babies who have slept through the night at or under two months of age. How could you not be a Babywise believer?!?

Thursday we started back to doing shh-pat when needed in the middle of naps and tried not to pick her up unless she was very upset. We also let her cio (cry it out) at the beginning of naps. It worked beautifully as she had her first COMPLETELY solid nap where she didn't wake up one single time. She went right to sleep and slept solid from 11:15-2. So proud!

Schedule: Her schedule was the same as Week Six. Everything went smoothly with it this week and no adjustments were needed! Nursing also continued on going well!

Since she finishes eating at 6:00 and goes down at 6:30, if everything goes smoothly (meaning Zach is home from work early enough to heat up something for dinner and I remember to defrost something before feeding her at 5) then we are able to eat dinner as a family!!! I LOVE it!!! This was our first time doing it. Zach had brought home some free food that one of his groups gave him. Britt joined us at (well on) the table. Our lights are too bright though because I didn't like how warm she felt afterwards so now she enjoys dinner on the floor beside me :)

Tears: I keep forgetting to mention this!!! Brittlynn has LEGIT tears. And has for a few weeks now. Isn't that crazy? I don't remember Kye having real tears this young at all. I'm glad she's such a happy baby and doesn't cry them very often!!!

Miracle Blanket: I have always used the Swaddleme brands of swaddles with both kids but while I was pregnant with Britt I heard all about the Miracle Blanket. Kelly hooked me up with one when Britt was born and since she started breaking out of her swaddles this week we decided to switch over to it. It has NO velcro and the baby's weight is actually what keeps them from breaking out of it. It works great and I highly recommend it!!!

Sleeping solid!

Car Rides: Britt now enjoys her car seat toy! I can't always see her in the car (we need to buy new mirrors because the ones we got this time are garbage) but I can hear her hit the plastic toys! So cute. She is not a fan of the car though. She'll BAWL when I put her in and SCREAM every time I stop, even if just at a red light. We really, really need to go on a far away trip so she can start learning how to deal with it.

Church: With church right now Zach, Kye and Mom go to class and leave the house at 9:10. I pump at 9:30 then get her and leave by 10:10 so we can be at services and she eats a bottle during services then we get home before her nap at noon. I want to be more involved than that but right now it's better than nothing. It's not that I'm putting her schedule first, it's that I'm putting myself first. I know I need to just tough it out but I don't want to wake up even earlier to get ready for church so we can be out the door by 9:10 and by the evening times (Sun night and Wed nights we also typically attend something at the church) I'm EXHAUSTED and can't imagine getting ready all over again and out the door. With time I'll get there!!!

Spit Up: I have accepted the fact that I birth pukers. Kye spit up on the reg and Britt does too. Like LEGIT spit up. Like all the time. I mean every minute they are awake. It's gross but it's my life. I live in the land of puke. With Kye we assumed something was wrong with him but even the GERD medicine didn't stop it from happening. With Britt I assume it's normal since it's the same way Kye did too. I honestly think it's just from me making SO much milk that they get more than they need at the feedings and spit out the extra??? This picture shows why I don't bother getting dressed in "real clothes" during the day and why I won't ever wear anything that's dry clean only:

I love that this is the view I have when Daddy's at home. He is so good with them both!!!

Britt and I went on our first walk...we made it about 6 houses down the street when she started falling asleep so I RAN home to put her down for nap.

Our special quality time is from 3-3:30 when Kye's napping ;)

Still loving bath time!!!

Just some sweet pictures of my girl:

rolling her tongue

First time sitting in her Bumbo chair!!!

Yes, they make Bumbo covers now...isn't that awesome???

I know it's not a good one of Kye but look at her face...you can tell she ADORES him!!!

Here's a video of Britt watching Kye and him talking about how he wants to hold her.

Yes, more sweet pictures. Sorry I can't help myself ;)

Here's a video of Britt having tummy time - lifting her head, having the hiccups and grunting

Here's a video of Britt trying to roll over but getting frustrated, she's super happy when I helped her out though!

laughing

This is my FAV video to date of Brittlynn! She is so so happy...ignore my baby talk but she is totally loving it ;)

She is THE happiest baby EVER!

More stuff going on with Britt this week:

We had our first mall outing together. She was SCREAMING when I walked in the mall and as I was hurrying to get her bottle out an older couple came by to look at her and you could totally tell that they were thinking bad mommy thoughts about me since my kid was crying like that!!!
While at the mall she ate her bottle then would not sit in the stroller while I did some exchanges so I ended up carrying her and pushing the stroller which isn't an easy task. I was able to make two returns then we had to go pick up Kye. Totally not worth it and I ended up going to run errands on a Sat instead, MUCH easier to do alone than with a baby!
She has little to no interest in any toys. ALL of her happiness comes from just looking at us and being social!
She is constantly smiling, laughing and making sweet happy sounds
Her eyebrows remind me so much of Mr. Rusty's. I know that's random but from the front they look kinda dark, light brown reddish even maybe. Then when you look at the tops of them (like look at her from above) they are SO blonde.
She will sometimes wake at 6:30 am but Zach (he does night duty...which has been a breeze with this baby!) can hold her off until 6:45 or she'll fall back to sleep sometimes until 7:00.
She LOVES her brother's voice and will turn to watch him no matter what he is doing, with a constant smile on her face
The schedule is for sure solid now with her as she doesn't freak out, acting like she's starving. She's very calm when it's time to eat because she understands that it's coming and that I'm not going to forget to feed her ;) I LOVE life on a schedule because we all know what to expect next, including the baby!

Postpartum Update:
You'd think from how the week went with her sleeping and all that I'd be reporting how AMAZING I was feeling!!! You're wrong haha. On Tuesday was in a FUNK all day. I posted this as my facebook status: "In a funk. I don't know if it's hormonal or menstrual or what but I can't stop crying! I'm just tired of everything...tired of being tired, tired of feeling like I can't get caught up, tired of hearing a crying baby all day, tired of feeling like I'm letting Kye down, tired of looking like complete crap when my poor husband gets home, tired of living within these walls day after day. It's been too long since my last get-away. I have that desperate need to travel itch!!!"

I didn't think it was a big deal...but I guess it was??? I had a lot of moms respond to it saying that I was saying so many things they wish they could say...and I had so many inbox messages of people concerned that maybe I was suffering from postpartum depression. I appreciated all the love and support, especially this article that one of my friends, Autumn, posted for me. It's good to not feel alone on rough days and that article made me realize we ALL have moments where motherhood is rough!!! I just felt upset and really for no real reason. I realized that next morning that it was because my friendly monthly visitor was BACK! So I was just having 9 months worth of PMS in one day ;) And yes, it IS possible to get your period while nursing. I'm living proof. I got it when Kye was six weeks old and when Brittlynn was six weeks old...and I exclusively breastfed them both. It stinks but it also is such a blessing, I'm very fertile and that's a true gift!!!

When I weighed in I had lost 0.6 lbs so I had exactly 6 lb left to lose until my pre-pregnancy weight. I still wasn't feeling very attractive and didn't like how clothes fit me. I def look best in dresses because jeans, even my maternity ones, make my tummy flab more noticeable!

The CRAZIEST thing to me about this week was that when Kye was this same age...we went to PARIS. Um. I was NUTS. We have yet to even leave Brittlynn alone with anyone...and we left Kye for five days with Mom. I appreciate Mom doing that SO much more now than I even did then (and I appreciated it a lot then!). The reason we haven't had anyone watch Britt is because it'd be a pain for them. Not because we mind leaving her or anything. I was hard on myself this week, feeling like I should be able to handle everything by now and be back to "Emily" by now. I was a BASKET CASE in Paris and I only had one kid...realizing that made me feel so much better about myself this week.

Revamp and Giveaway!!!

2012-02-06T20:16:00.005-05:00

Notice anything new??? My blog has been long overdue for an update! I actually hunted around, thinking I might pay someone to redo the blog for me. Then I realized that if I pay someone to do it I no longer have the control over changing it...plus the cheapest I could find was $80!!! Are you joking? I casually asked Zach about it and he was quick to say, "your blog looks fine." Haha. One of my goals this year is to spend smart and, to me, spending that much money on a FREE hobby that doesn't make us any money just doesn't make sense. Especially when you can google how to do it all for free!

It's still not 100% finished but so far I like it! What do you think? I know it looks like I lost all my comments but it's in the process of transferring them over...the first time it freaked me out but now I know it just may take a couple days (over 1,000 entries is a LOT of posts to catch up on for it!) I also updated my domain name...it's now www.journeyofparenthood.com. Shorter and easier :) No worries though www.emilyandzachparker.blogspot.com will still direct you to here! The BAD thing about updating is I lost ALL of my linked up blogs :( I'm working on getting them all back but if I lost yours please let me know!

I've officially hit 200 followers so it's another excuse for a fun giveaway!!! To celebrate I really wanted to give away something exciting...something that I would want to keep for myself...

That's right! I'm giving away a COACH PURSE!!! It's a leather pleated swing pack with fabric lining and a zip-top closure. It also has an outside zip pocket with a 45" adjustable strap. The dimensions are 8 1/4" long and 6 1/4 high. It's in black but I wanted to use this picture in the tan color so you can see the strap...I totally love it! It's valued at $148.

You know I couldn't have a giveaway and not do something Stella and Dot...so I'm also throwing in a $25 Stella and Dot Gift Certificate! That's a giveaway total value of over $150. Told you I wanted to celebrate in a big way :)

I know you're ready to win so here are all the different ways you can enter:

For your 1st entry: Follow my blog! Leave a comment on this post letting me know that you're a follower. Example: "I'm a follower"

For your 2nd entry: Blog about the giveaway with a link to this post. Once you have blogged about it leave me a comment here including the link to the ACTUAL blog entry. Example: "I blogged www.journeyofparenthood.com/revampandgiveaway"

For your 3rd entry: Post my button on your sidebar of your blog, then leave a comment on this post including your blog where the button is posted. Example: "I'm showing off your button! www.journeyofparenthood.com"

For your 4th entry: Post the link of THIS blog entry to your facebook page then comment on this post letting me know. Example: "I posted a link on facebook!"

For your 5th entry: Visit my Stella and Dot site (www.stelladot.com/emilyparker) and pick out your three favorite pieces. Then leave a comment on this post telling me you're favorites. Example "I totally love the serenity necklace, the sidewinder ring, and the soiree studs!"

Entry Rules

You must leave a comment in order to enter
You must leave a separate comment for each entry (it'll make it easier to pick a winner)
Up to 5 entries per person but you don't have to enter all 5 times
Your entry must meet the above requirements or it will be removed from the running
The winner will be randomly selected at random.org
The winner will be announced on Tuesday February 14th at 1:00 PM
Once the winner is announced you will have one week to contact me or another winner will be chosen. If you'd like to leave your contact information (e-mail address) with your entries, that's great, or just contact me if you're the winner so I can ship your prizes to you!
I will contact the winner and we can work out how you want to spend your $25 Stella and Dot credit.

Can't WAIT to see who will win!!! Thank you again to everyone for reading my blog and keeping me motivated to keep it going :)

Britt and Her Brother

2012-02-05T20:02:00.002-05:00

I was in the process of uploading pictures for Britt's next weekly update when I realized I had enough cute ones of Kye and Britt together to make a separate post for them :) Kye ADORES his sister. He adored her from birth, but Britt, obviously, couldn't return the love. Until now! Even a stranger can see the look on her face and know she loves her big bro. Even though she can't talk, walk, or even sit up yet, I truly enjoy watching the two of them interact. He is always so sweet and gentle and she gets a kick out of everything he does. He enjoys having an easily entertained audience for sure!

On this particular day Kye was ALL about some Britt and repeatedly asked me to take pictures of them together...who am I to turn him down?

It's really starting to be obvious that they are brother and sister huh?

My happy babies!!! (oops sorry..happy big boy and baby...Kye makes sure to tell me he is not a baby...)

I love being a mama of two...when can we add more? ;)

Rocket/Olive Baby Shower

2012-02-04T13:23:00.000-05:00

Crissy is one of my best friends so when I found out she was pregnant with Olive I, of course, wanted to celebrate the new baby with a shower!!! Ashley was sweet enough to get with me about hosting a baby shower for Olive and I'm thankful she did...since I have a new baby myself hosting an event is pretty tough. Being that this is Crissy's forth pregnancy in four years we opted for something low-key and simple. Really, what does Crissy not already have for a baby??? Especially a girl??? All she needed were diapers and wipes. We brain stormed and thought a Girl's Night Out would be SUPER fun! Being at the end of pregnancy is tough and it's impossible to have a Girl's Night with a newborn (especially when you nurse) so this would be one big last event for Crissy before she's cooped up in the house for awhile. If you know Crissy, then you know she's a social butterfly and can't stand to be stuck inside!

For decorations Ashley and I each made a diaper cake

I found this ADORABLE Valentine's Day themed book (Crissy's originally due date was V-day) with the main character being named Olive. I know, I'm awesome ;)

The Megow's nicknamed Olive "Rocket" so Ashley made her diaper cake resemble a rocket!

The Megows also love cookie cake (especially Seth) so I bought the biggest one they had!
The lady was so confused when I called and asked if they could either put a picture of a big olive on the cake or of a rocket haha

Ready to grub out!

When we started planning we asked Crissy where she'd like to have it and, duh, the first choice was Olive Garden. The name kinda fit plus, again duh, Crissy is a born-and-raised Valdostian so she is obsessed with Olive Garden (do you know when it opened up here a few weeks ago that the line was over three hours long to get in every night? That people were waiting outside at 2 pm when it didn't even open until 4??? Obsessed I tell you!). We couldn't have it at the good old O.G. though because they weren't opened yet so we opted for Crissy's second choice, Ruby Tuesdays.

I myself haven't eaten at Ruby Tuesday's very often. It's attached to the mall so I pretty much forget it exists. Um. It's GOOD! I LOVED my meal and the prices were so great. The staff was also wonderful to work with. They were mega laid back and gave us a nice big space all to ourselves. They didn't make us combine checks, let us bring in the cookie cake, didn't rush us, and didn't have any minimum amount we had to spend or anything. Our waitress was awesome and I WILL be doing something like this again there, I loved it!!!

I was also impressed with the turn out for the shower. Robyn hosted me a more "legit" shower for Blitzen (meaning it was at her house and she sent out real invites) and I only had like five friends or less come. We had this on a Saturday night, at a restaurant (where everyone had to pay for their own food), and only did Facebook invites and within 24 hours of posting the event Crissy had 13 people saying they were coming...and they actually CAME! It is just a testament to how amazingly awesome Crissy is and to how many people love her ;)

I love that we were all at one BIG table!

I wanted to get shots of everyone there...let's see how I do remembering names!
Ayla (who just had a baby last week...) and April

Kayla, Ashley, Brandi, and an awesome face from Crissy

Crissy and Brandi

Robyn (due in July!) and Casey
Casey: "Dang I'm surrounded by pregnant women...it better not be contagious!"

Liz and Brandy (due soon as well)

Kristin (who is also pregnant...hope I got her name right...), Nicole, and Whitney

Sisters ;)

While the whole thing was meant to be fun and chill, Ashley and I still wanted it to be a shower and what is a shower without games??? I figured after we all ordered we'd play a couple games...but then we all ordered and I was enjoying the night so much that I forgot about the plan. Yes, I forgot about a PLAN. I know, I was having that good of a time! My original plan was to play a game where I'd set a timer and have everyone write down as many uses of the word "olive" that they could think of in like a minute (like olive juice, olive oil, etc). Then whoever wrote down the most would win! Well Ashley worked hard on a Megow Family themed crossword puzzle so that trumped the olive game and we did the crossword instead. It was entertaining to watch everyone try to fill in the answers! Kayla won and since she's a "wild woman" I knew she'd love the animal print stationary (I love giving stationary as prizes, to me it's so useful!)

Another idea I had to make the night special was for everyone to print out a picture that they thought best represented Crissy as a mother. If you're facebook friends with Crissy then you KNOW the girl posts mad pics on fb like every day. I thought it'd be a nice idea for everyone to pick a picture then write out something about Crissy. As a mother, as a friend, whatever. I bought a cute notebook from Hobby Lobby to put them all in so while Crissy is stuck inside and healing from her c-section (and maybe a little sad that Olive is her last belly baby...) she can be reminded of the amazing mother she is and how many friends she has who love her! Most of the guests forgot to bring theirs with them so we ended up going around the table and either sharing our picture or saying something about how much we love Crissy. She was probably mega embarrassed, but it was SO touching. Sweet April was too emotional to even speak. That's how much all of us love Crissy! I started and did a super short thing just to get the ball rolling and I kinda wish I'd gone last instead as I would have been much more mushy ;)

Since it was a diaper and wipe shower there weren't many gifts to open so we did that as the eating died down. Brandi made Olive this adorable blanket in a rocket print...so special! I love that Olive will have something of her own since you know as the fourth baby and third girl that she'll have a lot of hand-me-downs!

A picture of all the pregnant ladies!!!

To give you an idea of how far along they all are:
Ayla (far right) had her baby last week, Crissy is having hers next week, Brandy (far left) is due soon, then Kristin (hope that's her name...the tall blonde) is due sometime this summer, and Robyn is due in July! I still can't get over how awesome all these ladies look!!!

Had to get a pic with Brandi before the night ended :)

Crissy with her hostesses!

I adore all of Crissy's children but I am especially looking forward to Olive. Kye is a year younger than Stevie (although he still ADORES her! his new thing is to say "my birthday is in March and Stevie's is in March!") and is about six months older than Neela. Olive and Brittlynn will be right at 2 months apart, almost to the day! Plus they are the same sex so I'm mega pumped about them being bffs. And if Britt looks like me and Olive finally gives Crissy a child who looks like her...then people will always think Olive and Britt are sisters too ;)

It was a very, very fun evening! I felt bad having to bolt out of there pretty quickly because I had to get home to nurse Brittlynn. Life of a nursing mama right? But I had a GREAT time! More importantly though I hope Crissy enjoyed herself and that she felt loved for the wonderful person she is!

Aflac Kick-Off

2012-02-03T13:55:00.001-05:00

This year Mr. Rusty hosted his district Aflac kick-off at a cute little restaurant in town (Willy's or something?). It's funny because I'd never even heard of the place and Valdosta isn't very big!!! The awards night was on Friday Jan 20th at 6:30. All the associates and a date were invited and of course I wanted to go. The problem was...who would keep Brittlynn? Literally EVERYONE (or their significant other) is selling Aflac now! Mrs. Charlotte would be there to support Rusty, Mom is an agent, Casey would be there to support Jordan and even Robyn would be there supporting Matt. We haven't had anyone keep Brittlynn yet and we weren't about to have her first time with a sitter be with someone who we didn't know very well.

Thankfully Mr. Rusty told us we could bring Britt with us for the evening. We ended up hiring a babysitter for Kye. It was the first time he's had a legit sitter and it was these two sweet sisters from church. We totally trusted them and weren't worried about him a bit. It did make me realize, yet again, how LUCKY we are to be surrounded by family! Paying a sitter ain't cheap!!!

We were the last ones to arrive because I had to nurse Britt before we left. It worked out okay though as we made a nice grand entrance :) Here is everyone at the event!

Mrs. Charlotte took this pic, made me laugh that Zach was cut off of the first one!

Zach, Kristen, Alex, Micah, Jordan, Casey and Me!

Jason, Marcy, Glenn, Blake, Brittany, Selena, Mr. Rusty and Mom!

Two new people...not sure of their names (and it was a hilariously awkward moment when I kept trying to introduce myself huh Robyn???), Tim and his wife, Robyn and Matt

Zach was promoted to a management position in the fall of 2010. Honestly, I didn't know how I felt about it. Sometimes I still don't. We originally thought he wouldn't move up in the company until he had been in it for at least five years. He'd been in it three when he moved up and it felt a little soon to me. But he's been VERY successful! He has an AWESOME team! Mom actually got the #3 rookie of the year in the WHOLE state!!! How awesome it that?!?!?! I'm VERY proud of how much Zach has stepped up in the management role. He's matured a lot with this big responsibility and I think he makes a wonderful leader. He's giving, fair, and does his best to help his team succeed. Alex (who is Javon's brother-in-law) and Jordan joined Zach's team at the end of last year and Brandi (who did Britt's awesome nursery) has joined him this year already.

Zach has been the #1 in production for the entire state since he first started with Aflac. He's always #1. For the first time...he wasn't this past year. While he had a HUGE production year (he was in the top 30 associates for the ENTIRE country!!!) and wrote more business than he's ever written. He still didn't make #1. He's disappointed in that, because Mr. Competitive ALWAYS wants to WIN, but he's a manager now. Any group he opened he opened while training or helping out someone on his team. Anytime he could he sent them to work accounts for him and gave them very generous splits. Yes, he COULD have been #1 but his team wouldn't have been as successful and that is something Zach takes pride in.

Zach's CIT (y'all need some kind of team name or something)

Jordan, Mom, Zach, Matt and Alex

Mr. Rusty and Zach are similar in their management styles (shocker). They are BOTH very giving and believe in rewarding people who work hard. Mr. Rusty gave out prize envelopes to his top agents in the district (for those of you that are confused...Zach is his team's immediate manager then Rusty is over Zach as well as all of Zach's people).

Mom racked up that night! She won cash from Mr. Rusty and from Zach since she was #1 in his CIT for the year!!! SO proud of her!!!

I was BLOWN AWAY by the numbers...a common thing people complain about when starting with Aflac is that all the businesses around here already have it. That is not true!!! Micah was the #1 group opener in the ENTIRE COMPANY for the year and Jason was the #2 group opener. Out of over 60,000 agents!!! We live in rural south Georgia and they opened more accounts than people who live in big cities! It was AWESOME to hear and such a testament to Mr. Rusty at his great leadership. I hope Zach can build up a team as amazing as Mr. Rusty has!!!

Matt was the #3 group opener in our district, great for his first year especially!

Micah

Jason winning more money!

Zach was the #1 agent in Mr. Rusty's district. Excited about his prize money...adding it to our Italy fund!

Mrs. Charlotte and Mr. Rusty...amazing hosts of the night!

Casey and Jordan

Matt and Robyn

While everyone enjoyed the food, prizes, and hearing a recap of the AMAZING year 2011 was for our district, Brittlynn was really the star of the show ;) Timing worked out great because I nursed her before we left then we just let people hold her and enjoy her during that nap. It is the evening nap which, at the time, she was barely sleeping for anyway. Everyone got a chance to love on her and then she did nod off and Mrs. Charlotte stuck her in the car seat then we fed her a bottle before we headed home! I was SO proud of how sweet she was the whole time. She never cried once!!!

Getting ready to have a new baby of her own in July!

Proud Gramma!

Casey is SUCH a wonderful aunt to both of my children!

Mr. Rusty was beyond sweet to let her come with us, I really appreciated being able to be there

G-Mama always helping out

It felt SO GOOD to get dressed up cute and ENJOY a night out. Yes, we still had one kid with us but really I kinda forgot she was there because everyone else was holding her the whole night!!! I loved going table to table talking to everyone and visiting. It was such a fun night and I'm so impressed with the amazing things that happened for everyone with Aflac last year. I know 2011 will be hard to beat, but I believe in Zach (and Mom and Mr. Rusty and everyone else!) and KNOW they can do it!!! Wouldn't it be great if Zach could continue to build his team and re-claim his #1 spot in the state?!?!

As you can tell, I'm so thankful that Zach works for such an amazing company. If any of you are looking for a career change Zach is hiring and would love to talk to you about potentially joining his team! I'm super pumped for Brandi and think she'll rock out this year!

We got home before 9:00 and had a pretty good report from the babysitters. I felt SO awkward being a "mom." I mean, I know I AM a mom but it seriously doesn't feel like I'm old enough to be hiring baby sitters. I babysat all the time in college and loved it but it's hard to picture myself on the parental end of things. I'm sure both the girls left thinking that Zach and I were idiots. We blabbered on wayyy too much and just didn't know what to say or do. I guess I'll learn with time how to handle all of that kind of thing!

Week Six Summary

2012-02-01T13:33:00.001-05:00

~I'm one follower away from 200 and a super exciting giveaway! I've ordered the prize and when I showed Zach what I got he said I should keep it for myself...it's that awesome ;) ~

Brittlynn's 6th week of life was from January 10th through January 16th (meaning she turned 6 weeks old on Jan 17th). It's crazy to me how MUCH things change week to week! Again week six had many changes in the life of Miss Britt:

Sleep: I always tend to start with the sleep huh? She started to fall asleep on her own at the start of naps! She'll often do a fussy cry for up to 20 minutes but we've learned it's better just to let her cry it out (cio). She also started sleeping for longer periods at night and would go from 11:30-5:30! I would give her a "snack" at 5:30 then put her back to bed until it was her real wake up time at 7:00. When babies wake that early you have three options: don't feed them and try to hold them off, feed them but put them back to bed, or feed them and keep them up and have that be the start of your day. I chose the second option because my breasts were aching to feed her and, to me, she was too young to force her to wait until 7. Also I wasn't about to start my day that early!!! We do a dream feed at 10:30 and this week she started being tougher to wake up for it. We did use the paci a little more often, especially during the evening nap as that's the hardest nap of the day and if she wakes early from a nap and nothing else works. I still wouldn't consider her a paci baby though. I have a feeling she never will be as she just isn't very good at it haha!

Nursing: While week 5 was a sleep issue week, week 6 was a nursing issue week. Britt had a couple of green poops and when I google searched it, it came up that green poop is often an indicator of a baby who is getting too much foremilk and not enough of the nutritious hind milk. It's called hyperlactation syndrome and here are the symptoms:

constantly wanting to nurse
spits up a lot
fussy
gassy
fussy at breast
diaper rash that won't go away
very long nurser
green poop
quick weight gain

She had all of these symptoms. All day of Jan 11th I thought she was going through a growth spurt because she seemed constantly hungry and was back to nursing for longer than an hour at each feeding. Her spitting up had increased a lot and she was fussy on the breast. She'd come off and fuss then shake her head back and forth and go back on. I wasn't technically diagnosed with hyperlactation syndrome with Kye but I was pretty sure I had it. I had SO much milk. I'd pump way more than he ate anytime I pumped and I would spray like crazy whenever I didn't have something against my chest. With Britt, I don't feel like I have as much milk as I did with Kye. I don't leak between feedings and I pump about what she eats. I also don't spray like crazy and I can actually take a shower and not have to RUSH to put something on. So I was confused at how to handle it. Online it said to do something called "block feeding" where you nurse the baby only on one side. This allows them to get a full feeding from that breast and get the hind milk they need then your body will adjust and your milk supply will go down.

Thinking about decreasing milk supply is MEGA scary. I didn't feel comfortable trying it until I talked to the lactation specialist at the hospital. I called up there on Thursday and she was out of town until Monday. Grrr. So in the meantime I decided to feed her from one breast but pump the other one while she was nursing so my supply would still stay okay. I did this all weekend (and it was BEYOND annoying) to wait for her to get back in town. It was great that I was able to store up extra milk and I did think that was the problem because when I pumped I was getting 4-6 ounces from one breast.

When Monday came I was so glad to stop the pumping. When I finally got ahold of her we talked for THIRTY minutes and she was ZERO help. ZERO. It was very, very frustrating for me. She didn't offer any advice or any tips or anything. Basically I felt like I was telling her more than she was telling me. After our conversation I was at a loss for what to do and she seemed to think it wasn't a serious thing so I went back to nursing on both sides. She did stop having the green poop and was happier on the breast so I thought maybe just that couple of days of doing that helped balance things out for her. At least that's what I was hoping!!!

When she does take a bottle she drinks 6 ounces which is a LOT to me...isn't it to you? She is already using the bigger size bottles because the little ones only go up to four ounces. I still use the milkies at each feeding. I put it on the side I'm not nursing on and collect that milk. I get a little over two ounces of milk at each feeding. When I posted about milkies the first time I had some comments on them and one of them was from the babywise blog mom herself! She asked on facebook (yes, we're facebook friends am I not sooo cool??? haha) if I had looked into them because since it collects leaked milk that milk is mostly foremilk and not hind milk. Foremilk is the beginning milk during a feeding and isn't the best part of the milk for the baby. It doesn't have as much nutrients as the hind milk has so if I feed her 6 oz bottles of all the milk I collect from the milkies then wouldn't I basically be giving her a bottle of pure foremilk? That made sense to me and I asked the lactation lady about that too...and shocker...she hadn't ever even heard of milkies. And was clueless as to if it was okay to give her bottles of it or not. She's rather useless huh???

I decided to still use the milkies but now I keep that milk in the fridge separated from milk I pump. When I go to make a bottle from it or freeze it I mix the two together so she's getting a good blend! It's a little extra work, but I'm all about storing up milk. I still HIGHLY recommend milkies. I have yet to establish any kind of pump schedule and I don't think I'll have to as I have SO much milk already in our deep freezer!!! Such a blessing!!!

I'm much more comfortable nursing now and during this week I moved all my stuff to the living room to nurse at all feedings except the middle of the night one. I'm more comfortable on the couch and I love the natural lighting. I think she stays awake better out there too!

It's interesting how timing works out because it was about this same time with Kye when I started having nursing issues. You can read about them here and here.

Schedule: Babywise says that at 5 weeks old babies can begin to transition to eating every 2 1/2 - 3 1/2 hours instead of 2 1/2 - 3 hours. The DAY Kye turned five weeks old we threw his new schedule at him. With Brittlynn I wasn't in a huge hurry. I felt like she wasn't consistently sleeping through her naps and didn't want to rush her into a new schedule if she wasn't ready for it. At that point we were also doing the cluster feed in the evenings and Hogg says between 6 and 8 weeks old you stop the cluster feeding. I didn't want to change her schedule to 3 1/2 hours then change it again when I dropped the cluster feed so we just waited longer and shifted it all at once. On Friday the 13th she and I picked up Kye from school and ran an errand before hand (her first trip to Target where I had time to only do returns before leaving haha). When we got home she slept mega solid so I just let her sleep and fed her when she woke up at 2. That marked officially moving the schedule ;) Here is her new schedule that she will stay on until she goes to a 4 hour schedule at about 4 months old:

7:00: start of the day, change diaper, eat
8:00-8:30: change diaper, awake time
8:30-10:30: nap
10:30: eat
11:30-12:00: change diaper, awake time
12:00-2:00: nap
2:00: eat
3:00-3:30: change diaper, awake time, special alone time with Mommy while Kye sleeps
3:30-5:00: nap
5:00: eat (I did 3 hours here rather than 3 1/2 because we eat dinner as a family at 6. While this means I can't actually cook the dinner, we can at least eat it together once Zach cooks it haha)
6:00-6:30: change diaper, awake time, family dinner
6:30-8:00: nap
8:00: awake, bath, ready for bed
8:15-9:15: eat
9:15-10:30: put to sleep straight from eating
10:30-11:30: dream feed (wake her up to feed her then put her right back to bed)
she was waking up around 5:30 for a middle of the night snack then right back to sleep

I like the new schedule better than the old one, although Kye naps from 1-330 so it kinda stinks that she eats RIGHT in the middle of "my time" each day. I don't get much time where they both are sleeping. Only from 1:00-2:00 and that's if Kye gets to bed right on time for nap (which on school days is hard) and if Britt sleeps solid from 1-2 which the second half of naps is often tough. Usually I'd have more "me" time in the evenings but by the time Kye gets to bed she's often fussy/in and out of sleep and I typically jump in the shower before her 8:00 feeding then I go to bed at 9:30 to nap before the dream feed. If you're wondering how I get everything done during the day with this schedule and Kye's schedule (which is 7 he's up and eats, 12 is lunch, 1-330 is nap, 6 is dinner, 7 is bath, 730ish is bed)...I'm wondering the same thing haha!

Here is other stuff Britt was up to during this week:

Skin: Her baby acne is starting to clear up. We started to give her a bath every night and I think it made a big difference. She really needed the bath because her hair gets so GREASY if it's not washed every day! So strange!?! Also her shedding skin is done. I think for real this time!

Picture of the acne (yes, I've edited out of her pictures...it's temporary why have it there?)

Independent Playtime: I couldn't BELIEVE it was already time to start independent playtime!!! She seems to young for it to me but I'm hardcore babywise so we're doing it. It's really not hard to do either. At this age all that independent playtime is is putting her at her playmat for 5-10 minutes at a time and I stay in the room but out of her line of vision. I don't talk to her etc. I just use that time refilling her humidifier and straightening up her room. Right now I don't have a set time I do it each day, I figured I'll get more strict about it when she actually moves to the pack and play for it which I think is at 3 or 4 months old? Not really sure, need to check into that!!!

First independent playtime on Jan 10th

Here is a video of her on the playmat being sweet and reaching for her toys

Tummy Time: Everyone knows the importance of tummy time for your baby. Since babies sleep on their backs they don't get enough time on their stomachs to develop their muscles and such. Plus tummy time helps avoid flat heads and hair loss ;) I'm all about it! I stick her on her tummy for a few minutes several times a day. I don't do anything fancy, I just lay her on a burp rag (because she WILL puke) whenever I need to put her down. With Kye running around and "needing" me all the time it's pretty easy to get in a good bit of tummy time, even with her short awake time lengths.

Here's a video of her doing tummy time

Rolling Over: The BIG milestone happened this week!!! Can you believe it??? Only 5 weeks old! It was on Sunday Jan 15th. Kye spent the night at my mom's the night before so Zach and I were playing with Brittlynn after her first feeding of the day. I went to the bathroom to start getting ready for church and Zach yelled to me "she just rolled over!" I didn't believe him at first! I ran out and she did it THREE more times!!! Zach was excited that he got to see that milestone, I am too. With Britt I feel like he doesn't get to spend NEARLY enough time with her. He is such a wonderful father but he has to help with Kye a lot and doesn't get to help with her as much. So that was a special moment for the two of them. She was cracking us UP with the rolling over. She LOVED it. She'd roll over and have this HUGE grin on her face then you could tell she wanted to do it again and again. It was adorable.

I took a video hoping she'd do it, and she did right away! Here is the video...only watch for the first roll over because she never does it again ;)

She did it four times in a row then didn't do it again for a couple weeks haha! I tried to do it again with her after her next feeding but she fell asleep right away instead. I guess it wore her out ;)

Bath: This week we started fully submerging her in the bath water. Her first "legit" bath was on Jan 11th. We still did it in the sink but after that moved her into the bathtub. It's just easier in there. Yes, for the first bath Zach made bubbles with her body wash. He did it before I realized it and he didn't know about the whole bubble baths create yeast infections with girls thing. He knows now though ;)

She LOVES her bath time!!!

First bath in the REAL bath tub

I'm glad she's a happy bath baby. Both of our kids have been. I really think it's important to let Zach enjoy that one on one time with the kids so I try to do other things while he gives them their baths. It's not that I don't want to bathe them, it's that I want my children to have quality daddy time. I rarely got that growing up and it's important. I'm glad we do her bath stuff before she eats as I do see the logic in it (wouldn't bathing her wake her up more?) and it seems to be working for us, at least for now!

Warming up by the fire

First Target Outing!

Nursery: We didn't find out what we were having with Kye or Britt. With Kye we did a neutral nursery but I didn't want to have something neutral this time around. So we waited until after she was born. While I'm glad we did this, I don't think I'll do it next time. It's hard to decorate a nursery with a newborn!!! It's going very slowly but this week was exciting as her chair finally came in! I like for each kid to have a chair in their room for us to read bed time stories in with them and I wanted hers to be very girly! I got it from Target online and I LOVE it!!!

She did not want to let go of her rattle ;)

Right after she enjoyed her new chair she had her first big blow out diaper! Glad it didn't get on the chair!!!

Always have to have a couple pictures with Big Brother

Now that she's spitting up more the dogs have taken a big interest in her (why they enjoy eating spit up is a mystery to me!)...Levi is lurking around every corner of her awake time!

ready to pounce at the first sight of puke

How big is Brittlynn?

So big!

During this week in Kye's life I did my first legit weekly post so it'll be easier from here on out to compare them a little! Here is his week 6 summary!

Postpartum Update: I lost 4.10 lb in my first week on Weight Watchers! I have a little over 6 lb left to lose to be my pre-pregnancy weight! It's tough when first getting back on it but I get SO many points because I'm nursing. It's really the best weight loss program and I love that Zach and I can do it together and that we can eat whatever we want. It's ALL about portion control!!! My bleeding got even less and I was able to start wearing panty liners (it's crazy that I'm STILL having postpartum bleeding 6 weeks out!). My bleeding got less but my female area was painful this week for some reason? It was tender and sore. My weight is not too bad, but I hate seeing my stomach in the mirror and think I look terrible in clothes. It's flabby in the front and my love handles are big. I have to keep reminding myself that I don't have much weight left to lose but my BODY will still take awhile to get back to normal. I'm not going to be all negative town and say it'll never be normal because I thought that last time around and it DID go back...it just took until I quit nursing for that to happen!

Overall this week I was less frustrated as things seemed to be getting on a good routine and she was doing so well. I REALLY enjoy every second with her, my favorite things about her are how much she smiles and the sweet cooing sounds she's constantly making. I just want to squeeze her I love her so much!!!

Movie Date

2012-01-31T13:15:00.000-05:00

I LOVE having Brittlynn here, but I do also miss the fun times Kye and I had prior to her birth. We did SO much together, especially during the end of my pregnancy. I got pretty spoiled with my "Kye time" ;) As a nursing mother, I am pretty tied down to the house right now and it was SO great that Kye and I got to go out and do something fun just the two of us.

When I first heard that Beauty and the Beast was coming out in 3D I knew it'd be a fun thing for us to do together. We didn't go see Lion King when it was out because I worried the daddy dying part would be extra scary on a big screen. But Beauty and the Beast is pretty mild so I thought it'd be perfect for his age! We went on a Sunday afternoon so Zach could keep Brittlynn. We left at 4:45 and I pumped before leaving so Zach could give her a bottle when it was time to eat then I was home before the next feeding. It all worked out super smooth!

He kept thinking we were going to Disney World! I told him we were going to see Beauty and the Beast on a big tv, like a show, and he remember the Beauty and the Beast show we saw at Hollywood Studios and got super pumped. He even wanted to wear his Disney shirt!

Ready for our night out on the town!

Lookin' gangsta

Having that time together was really special for me. It made me remember back to babysitting Madeline and Candler in college. I wasn't a parent. I didn't have to discipline. We joked around non-stop and just focused on having FUN. I treated this afternoon with Kye like that. I put away my "Mommy hat" and instead pretended to be his babysitter. We had a BLAST!!!!!! We were laughing the whole time and just being silly. He was mega pumped to get to eat dinner at the theater (I packed us both peanut butter crackers), so much so that I was worried he'd rat us out to the people that worked there :)

We saw it in 3D so of course I have to get a pic of us in the glasses ;) I accidentally had Kye's and he had mine!

Even the previews were in 3D which was neat. But honestly, by the time the previews ended, I was already over the whole 3D thing. It's cool for like 5 minutes then you get used to it and don't even notice it anymore. Personally, I think it's a fad that will die out pretty quickly, but we'll see. We both enjoyed the movie...Kye got scared at a few parts with the beast. I'd ask him if he wanted to leave and he'd say, "no ma'am just hold my hand." Gladly! I think he was more scared of the shark in the Nemo preview than he was of the beast in the whole movie. Even though he loves Nemo, I'm not sure if we'll go to that or not??? We'll see when the time comes. When it was over he didn't want to leave and kept talking about the princess.

We had some time before I had to be back to nurse Brittlynn and I didn't want our quality time to end so I called Zach and he said it was okay if we got ice cream. I tried to take him to The Mixx as I want to give them as much business as possible since they are owned by Christians...but it was closed. So we went to their competitor. It was still good and Kye was PUMPED! He was dancing around the place singing about how he was going to get pink ice cream. They didn't have anything pink but I don't think he really knows what color pink is so he was fine with what he got. The three m&ms and two cookie pieces I put in for him were a bigger hit than the ice cream itself ;) We laughed and laughed together and talked about the movie, about Disney World, about his birthday party, about school and about Brittlynn. I asked him how he liked being a big brother and if he loved his sister. He honestly have never ONCE said a bad thing about her and he only talks about how cute she is and how much he loves her. That makes me so happy!

Ice cream high ;)

It was a WONDERFUL evening together and I hope we can do more things like this in the future. I really want someone to babysit Britt sometime soon (hint hint grandparents!) so Zach and I can take Kye out for a fun time just the three of us. Heck, I want someone to babysit both kids so Zach and I can have a MUCH needed date night! ;) I know with time we'll be able to do all of those things!