Five Months.

Time is flying by way too fast for me.  You are almost half a year old, and it seems like just yesterday I was still pregnant with you.  Life is flying by too fast now that I think about it.  I feel like this month you’ve reached more milestones than I’d like to admit.

You are sleeping so much better.  Now, you usually go to bed around 9:30 or 10, and don’t wake up until 5:30 or 6.  One morning, you didn’t wake up until 7, I thought for a moment that maybe I had died, and gone to heaven!  I still really can’t complain.  I am just so glad that you are over that whole waking up every hour thing you had going on for a little bit.  You are usually super easy to get to sleep too.  If you don’t fall asleep eating, I can usually place you in your crib, turn your mobile on, and you will just lie there peacefully until you doze off.  On the mornings where you wake up a little bit before my body is ready to be awake with you (ok, every morning) I now just drag you into bed with me.  You’ve really outgrown your bassinet with your weight, and all your tossing, and kicking.  It may support you, but I don’t fully trust it.  You are a much better co-sleeper than your sister is.  She flips around, is restless all night, and usually ends up kicking us off our own bed.  Not you though.  You usually lay right where we put you, or cuddled up next to one of us, and stay there.  No feet in our faces, or elbows to the ribs in the middle of the night from you.  You are a little cuddler.

You have started “talking” a lot more than you had been.  I have so many videos of you trying to say things, they are so cute.  You are trying so hard.  I love it.  You said “momma” first, which, of course, made me super happy.  No other words yet, but you babble a ton.  When you aren’t happily babbling away, you still like to scream back and forth with your sister.  It’s not a bad scream; it is full of happiness and joy.  It’s actually funny to watch you two communicate.  It is never quiet around here!

Last weekend we took you to your very first photo-shoot!  We’ve been a little behind, and sadly, these are your first professional photos at almost 5 months old.  Unfortunately, there has been lack of time or funds, or both, and it never seemed to work out before now, and it’s only because Grandma Lynn gave me pictures for a Christmas present.  I wish we were loaded so we could have new pictures of you every month, but the eleven million pictures I take with my phone and camera will just have to do, for the most part.  The pictures didn’t go as well as planned.  Originally, we had planned to do an afternoon shoot, because none of us is morning people, but we were snowed out.  Our retake time was at 10 am on a Sunday.  Since it was in Tulsa, that means that we not only had to leave an hour before that, but everyone had to get ready, super early just to be out the door on time.  Again, none of us are morning people… and we had to get up super early.  Before the photos were even done: I had changed you at least six times, fed you three, both you and Quinn had thrown up all over yourselves, and us, and we were all exhausted.  In fact, you passed out before we were even done, so you ended up being in charge.  I have only seen some of the pictures so far; I just hope that even if we have no pictures where we are all smiling there is at least one with you and your gummy smile.  Your dad keeps teasing me that you’re getting teeth, and if nothing else was captured that day, I just hope it was that, because that is my favorite thing you do right now, and looking back at Quinn, teeth are cute, but the smile just isn’t the same.

So far, you haven’t been sick.  Which is a pretty huge feat for this family.  We’ve run you to the doctor a few times for things that concerned us, but so far, it has never actually been anything to worry about.  You have definitely had some weird stuff going on that always freaks me out, but never turns into anything.  This time you burst a blood vessel in your eye.  It started out on a Sunday night as about the size of a pinhead, and by Monday morning, it had quadrupled in size.  We took you to the doctor; they dropped some yellow stuff in your eye, put a black light on it, and said that you hadn’t scratched anything, and that it was like a bruise for your eyeball, so it would just heal with time.  It didn’t seem to bother you too much, but it looked so painful.  When you were born, you had something similar, so I hope it’s not just your eyes being super sensitive, and that it won’t continue to be an ongoing issue later in life.

After the doctor, we took you to see Santa.  You weren’t too sure of the big guy, but you tolerated him enough to get two pictures.  Quinn was scared of him this year, so we didn’t get one of you two together, but maybe next year.  Because of you two girls, I love Christmas more than I ever could have imagined.  Shopping for gifts for you guys to open Christmas morning is addicting as drugs.  Seriously, we’ve had a really hard time stopping.  We found a whole bunch of things that we thought you’d like, gave them all to the grandparents as suggestions, and were a little bummed that we didn’t save anything for us to get you.  It wasn’t a problem long, and we had a hard time not buying everything in sight.  This is probably one of the best Christmases that you will have, it’s a shame neither one of you will probably remember it.  We will take pictures though.

I know I talk about your hair a lot, it is just so awesome!  While we were at the doctor, the second time in two weeks, people remembered you because of your hair.  You are staring to be known as “that cute baby with the super cool hair that I love” by many of the nurses, nurses that don’t even work for your doctor.  Oh, by the way, you gained a pound in a little under a two-week span.  When we took you in to get your eye examined, you weighed 17 pounds!  Your sister only weighs 21 or 22 pounds, you are catching up with her, and I’m starting to wonder that even though you’re not Irish twins, if people are going to think, you are.  Right now, you two are pretty close, as close as a 5-month and a 20-month old can be, I guess.  You make each other laugh, and you both love to spend time together.  Sometimes in the morning, I put you both in bed with me, and we just have one big cuddle-fest.  Quinn loves to take care of you, and you love her paying attention to you.  Sometimes you two leave me out, but I love watching you all the same.

Love you my little Squidget.

Love,

Momma

Four Months.

You are a little chunker, and I LOVE IT.  You have little rosy cheeks, and chubby little thighs, and I love everything about them.  You are going to be a big flirt, I can already tell.  You are constantly batting your big blue eyes, and flashing smiles at anyone who talks to you, or looks your way.

You love to laugh.  Your laughter is magical since it is so rare at this point in your life, and we usually have to work to get it.  We’ve discovered that saying “moo” usually works, but we have to say it in a funny voice, and not the way a cow actually would.  Sneezing also does the trick.  You just love sneezing in general.  Even when you sneeze, you laugh.  Silly girl.

This month is your first Thanksgiving.  I am so thankful to have you in our lives.  You have been a joy and a blessing for sure.  You are probably one of the happiest babies I have ever met.  You really don’t cry that often, and when you do, it is usually an easy fix.  Only recently have you been even near “difficult.”  I think you may be teething because you have been drooling a ton, and teething tablets usually fix the problem right away.  I really don’t want you to get teeth yet, I love that goofy gummy smile you have.

You have started to attempt to roll over, and you can usually get to your side, but that’s as far as you make it.  Only once have you made it all the way over.  You are a pro at lifting your head up when you’re doing tummy time though, but you pretty much have been since birth.  You are a strong little one.  We have moved you to your room every night, and you only sleep in the bassinet now after your first feeding because I am lazy, and I don’t want you to wake your sister up.  If you guys weren’t so cute, I’d think you were trying to kill me by depriving me of sleep.  I love you anyway.

You still have your crazy hair, and everyone still loves it.  I love it.  You also still have your little heart “stork bite” on your forehead.  I’m not sure if it will go away or not, but it is so cute to me because it is in the shape of a little heart, right between your eyes.

I still can’t get over how calm you are, and how most times you just like to observe the situation with a cautious eye.  You may look like your daddy, but I think you may end up with my personality, or at least parts of it.  I love to see how each of us is part of you.

Love you little girl.

Love,

Momma

Nineteen Months.

Wow.  So much has changed in the last seven months.  SO MUCH.

You are my little ray of sunshine.  Most mornings (at least the ones where you end up in our bed at some point during the night), you wake up and pleasantly say, “HI!” to anyone in the room.  Sometimes if we are super sleepy, and you are not, you will crawl out of the bed, ever so quietly, and then start playing with the cabinets very loudly; to make sure we are awake right along with you.  You eat breakfast, usually on your own, and I am convinced it is your favorite meal of the day.  Rarely do you throw any of your breakfast to the ground, and usually you eat every bite, which is uncommon for other meals.  The rest of your day usually consists of singing, dancing, and taking care of all of your babies.  You are such a good momma to them.  You are always so excited when Daddy gets home; I’m not sure who is more thrilled to see who, you or him.  Your days are always filled with hugs, kisses, and laughter.

In July, your little sister, Harper, was born.  You are so in love with her, and are such a great big sister.  You always want to hold her, and love on her.  You make sure you kiss her goodnight, every night, even if the rest of us don’t get any love from you.  You were excited when I was pregnant with her, but I was really nervous about when she was actually here, but you do great.  Your reaction when you first met her was priceless; your face has never been so filled with happiness.  You always want to know what’s going on with her, and even in your young age, you can’t quite “defend” her yet, but you keep a watchful eye if someone other than momma or daddy is holding her.  You love to cuddle with her on the floor, try to rock her in the swing, try to share your food with her, and give her her binky.  Even if she already has a binky, you will take hers away, just to give it back to her.  I hope this continues in your life.  Since she is now smiling and gurgling back at you, it’s easy to see how much joy you bring each other.  You really haven’t shown many signs of jealousy.  Impatience, yes, but not jealousy.  I expect you to be impatient at your age.

You definitely march to the beat of your own drum.  If there isn’t music on that you’re dancing to, sometimes you will just bust out in your own little dance routine.  I honestly don’t know where you picked that up from, because you are a much better dancer than your parents, combined.  You also love to sing.  Your current favorite song is, “I Love!” by, none other than you.  You just belt out “I love” repeatedly, but it more sounds like, “I lub” and it’s pretty adorable.  I hear it several times a day.  Sometimes it’s to me, sometimes it’s for your babies, and sometimes it’s just to whoever is within earshot.  You also love “Skidamarinky dinkydink.”  I’m not sure if you enjoy that one because Daddy has a funny dance and hand gestures that goes along with it, or if you just like the song because it’s a little silly.  You will often do some of the gestures along with us, and sometimes you will just sing your favorite part (I lub boo!)

Your vocabulary has grown.  A lot.  Some for the better, some for the worse.  You were playing with a balloon a few weeks back, and it popped.  I was a little scared because, hey, I am a little freaked when a balloon pops, and you were holding it.  It didn’t faze you, but you did say, “Oh, shit!”  Whoops!  On a different occasion, I dropped something on the kitchen floor that would stain the carpet (carpet in the kitchen?  I know!), and said shit, and then I heard my little echo in the other room say it about 20 more times.  We really need to start watching ourselves.  You love to say your sister’s name (Parper, or Harpah), please (cheese), Bubba (the nickname for the dog), and when we took you to the zoo, you repeated a LOT of the names of the animals back to us.  The most exciting words that you are learning right now are pee pee and poo poo.  You are starting to get the concept of what they are, which means potty training is on the way!  Yay!  Just this morning, you had a dirty diaper, and I changed it, and put you in your crib so that I could clean up, and you semi-squatted, and pointed to your diaper, and said, “Poo!  Poo!”  I asked you if you poo poo’ed again, and you kept doing it, and pointing, so I checked you out, but you hadn’t done anything…  I really do think you’re starting to understand it though.  You still won’t say it before we check you though… even that would be a big help.  Oh well, progress is progress.

Last week we took you to your first pumpkin patch.  You didn’t sleep well the night before, so we were ALL a little cranky that day.  They had some horses that could be ridden (both real and fake) and you didn’t like either one of them.  We took you inside a “museum” that they had set up, which was full of bugs on display, and some corn and pumpkin information too.  You didn’t really enjoy that either, until we got to the kiddie pool full of dried corn.  You loved that, and were a little mad once we took you out of it, and it stuck the rest of the day.  Finally, we took you to the pumpkin patch.  A real pumpkin patch where they grow pumpkins, and not just a dirt field, where they place pumpkins for you to pick out, don’t let anyone fool you on that.  Once we got off the hay wagon, there was a small pile of pumpkins that we set you on to take a picture, one of our friends was there, and handed you a small, completely not ripe, bright green pumpkin to hold.  That was your pumpkin.  We could not get you to set it down the entire time, you were in such awe of your pumpkin, and I was so glad that we got to take you there.  Your reaction to picking out your own, even though it wasn’t even ready to be picked, gave me such joy, especially when I saw your happy and amazed little smile that went with it every time you looked at it.  That evening we took you to the kiddie park for their Spook-a-rama.  We dressed you up as a little witch (the cutest witch ever by the way) but they were so crowded, and we were all so tired, so we walked around, rode the train around the park, which is the only ride you like, and headed home.

We also took you to the zoo that weekend.  It was your third time, and by far our best trip yet.  We went on a semi-cold, semi-rainy, Monday.  Let me tell you, that is the BEST day to go.  The place was not crowded at all, it stopped raining (minus a few sprinkles), and although it was cold at the start, we were all bundled up nicely, and it warmed up throughout the day.  You were so bright, and I could tell that you were absorbing everything we saw.  You repeated back a LOT of the animals we told you about, and many animals reacted to you.  The first thing we went to see was the gorillas.  They were acting goofy; like they have every other time we’ve been there, but this time you were standing at the window, watching when one came up, and gave you a kiss.  It kind of freaked you out, and you were a little upset, but at the end of the day, we had you next to the glass at the grizzly bear encounter, and he swatted at the glass, muddy paw and all, you didn’t seem bothered.  We will have to teach you a little bit better on that one.  During our lunch, we had a few bright visitors come by.  At first, you didn’t notice the peacocks hop into the pavilion, but then they went after food that someone else had left behind, and they started making noise, and you were tickled.  They hung around for about 30 minutes since daddy kept throwing them pieces of bread and cheese, and you loved every minute of it, they were anywhere from 1 foot to 5 feet away at all times.  Once they started clucking (or whatever noises they make that isn’t their loud call) you were even more thrilled.  That may have been the best part of the zoo for you.  We took you to the children’s zoo within the main zoo because last time we missed the petting zoo by about 3 minutes, so I wanted to make sure that we got in this time.  I thought you would really enjoy it, but you weren’t too impressed.  You pet a sheep, and that was that, you just kind of stood in the middle of the place, like, “What now?”  You enjoyed some other sheep, which you couldn’t pet, that we passed by because they were talking to you, and every time they would bleat, you would clap and giggle.  It was a good day.

Your mouth is full of little teeth.  Six on top, five on bottom (almost six though!)  You can feed yourself for the most part, although we are working on making it a little less messy.  Sometimes you get carried away with your fork, and I think you imagine it to be a magic wand with how you fling it around.  For some reason, every time you have a cup, you think it needs to be turned completely upside down, so we’re still trying to master the whole drinking on our own thing.  If the cup is a sippy cup, we are good, if it’s anything else, even with a lid and a straw, it’s a disaster.  You are good at brushing your teeth.  Daddy is trying to teach you how to spit, but so far, it hasn’t been successful.  You are trying though, so I have to give you credit.

I am so excited to see what the latter half of your year brings, but I am saddened because you are growing up so much already.  We rarely have our morning cuddles anymore, and you are little Miss. Independent with most things.  While I do look forward to doing things with you like little projects, crafts, and making things, I miss my baby, who needed me for everything.  Even the fact that you can now pull up your own pants, makes me a little sad, it’s just one less thing you need me for.  We have started to have wonderful moments together, like sharing Necco wafers, which I wouldn’t trade for the world.  I just wish I could have the best of both sides of the spectrum.  I love you, and as always, I am excited to see you grow!

Love,

Momma

Three Months

A whole bunch has changed, since I last wrote you.  You are 3 months now, and time is flying by too fast.  It seems like it is going by even faster than it did with Quinn, which makes me a little sad.

Today we were supposed to take you to your first Halloween celebration, but it was cold, and rainy, so it was cancelled.  We will try again tomorrow.  You are going as a cute little pumpkin!  Tomorrow we are also taking you to your first pumpkin patch.  It’s supposed to be cold tomorrow too, so I’m really debating what you will be wearing, we want to keep you snug and warm, and not let you get sick. 

You are still the happiest baby ever, and I am still convinced that sometimes you wake up in the middle of the night just to smile at me.  It’s such a sweet little smile.  Recently, you have been starting to giggle too.  It’s a quick little chuckle, and we usually can’t get you to repeat it, but it’s there, and we’ve heard it, and it’s absolutely delightful.

We finally got out of our bad living situation, and I am so grateful that you will never remember living in that house.  We are now in a (technically) smaller house, but it’s so much better laid out, and once you start exploring, you will have so much more room to do so.

It amazes me how different you and your sister are.  You are growing so much faster than she did, and we’re betting that by a year, you will probably outweigh her.  She is very petite, and always has been, and at your last doctor’s visit, a few weeks ago, you were already 12 pounds, she didn’t weigh that until she was almost 4 months old.  It’s ok though, it’s reassuring me that you are healthy, and growing along just fine.  It seems like you are always hungry, but again, you are a growing girl!

I got your crib built the other weekend, but you have only slept in it a handful of times.  Since you wake up a few times a night to eat, and you are sharing a room with your sister, I get lazy, and paranoid that you are going to wake her up, and then everyone will be awake in the middle of the night.  However, you have long outgrown your bassinet that is in our room, so we need to get something worked out for everyone.  You kick up a storm sometimes, and can seem really restless and wiggly, so you being in the bassinet wreaks havoc on my nerves sometimes.

You are a pro at tummy time, and actually prefer to be on your tummy for parts of the day.  You hold your head up really well.  You also enjoy time in your bouncy chair, and being in the swing, but it doesn’t seem like you have a favorite.  You seem to like variety.  You also love to sit and watch the fish swim around their tank, even though we don’t have many.

Landon, our dog, is very protective of you.  He was protective of Quinn too, when she was itty-bitty.  If you are on the floor, he is right there next to you, and if you are in either one of your seats, he is close by.  I would love to trust him more, because I know, he just wants a job to do, but after your sister was bit by our other dog, he makes me nervous—all dogs do.

Daddy enjoys giving you your baths as much as you enjoy getting them.  You love to splash around, and just have fun in general.  I’m sure when the summer comes back around, you will love swimming, and we may not be able to get you out of the water.

You still have your crazy hair, and everyone still loves it.  Small parts are starting to go down though, so it probably won’t last much longer.  Since colder weather is coming, I've tested out some hats on your little head, and you don’t seem to mind them.  I also bought some bows, and you let me put those in your hair too!  This makes me a little excited because Quinn never, and still won’t, let me put anything in her hair, so it’s nice I get to dress you up a little bit, even if it’s only for a little while.

Love,

Momma

Two Months.

Ok.  So, here we go.

Two months old... already?

Let’s start at the beginning.  During the late, late hours of July 17, 2013, I started to have some discomfort.  Around 3 am on the 18^th, I deduced this must be labor, and my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart, and about a minute and a half long.  Not a lot of time for recovery.  I had taken a shower the previous day, but I still felt dirty.  We had run errands, and gone to a doctor’s appointment, I needed another shower.  When I got out of the shower, I sent your dad a text.  He’s a pretty smart guy.  He had rigged up a program that when I text “babybaby” that no matter the ringtone volume, or time of day, an alarm would go off.  So imagine his surprise when the alarm goes off, he rolls over in bed, and I am not there.  I was downstairs, on the floor writhing in pain.  We managed to get everything together in a relatively sane fashion (me, anyway, I’m sure he was losing his mind, after all, it was about 4 am at this point), and on the road we went.

You’re already quite the troublemaker.  No sooner do we pull on to the highway to get to the hospital, but we fly (and I mean fly) past a cop car.  So here I am, in a lot of pain.  We have dad and me in the front seat, your sister, and the dog in the backseat, and a 45-minute drive ahead of us.  Not really my idea of a good time.  The last thing we need is to be pulled over and make this an even longer excursion.  So we call 9-1-1.  Explain the situation as calmly as possible.  Neither one of us can complete this process alone, so we help each other out.  The operator asks questions, when Dad can’t respond fast enough, I jump in.  They tell us to turn on the hazards, and be safe.  Will do.  Car fades away in the distance.  Seems like they got the message.  Don’t try this at home, kid. 

Get to the hospital.  My biggest fear, with it being so far, is that, despite the fact that I am now 40 weeks, and 1 day pregnant, this isn’t real labor, and they are going to send me home.  After I get into the maternity triage, they do an exam, and tell me that I’m at a 7, I nervously ask if that means that I have to go home, and they chuckle, and tell me no, that I’m staying there for a while.  Get to my room.  I have no concept of time at this point, but it hasn’t been very long.  Grandpa and Nana Tracey aren’t there yet to take Quinn, so she was hanging out with us for a while, not really sure what was going on.  They came shortly thereafter.

I wanted an epidural, stat, but I had to wait at least an hour, make it through an entire bag of fluids, and wait for the anesthesiologist to show up.  It was agonizing.  I think it actually took a lot longer than an hour, because of traffic, and the fact that they poked me at least 9 times because they couldn’t find a good place for the IV, and so I couldn’t even start the fluids for a while.  The anesthesiologist finally (he probably wasn’t that late, it just felt like it) shows up, sends Dad out of the room, and gets to work.  Once that was in, we were good for a while.  Until the pushing started.  About the time they went to call the doctor to come by (it was about 9ish at this point) I started freaking out.  I was not ready for you at all, I was actually crying pretty hard, and a lot of them dismissed it as emotions, but I was petrified of having another child; being a mother of two.  I NEEDED more time.  You didn’t give it to me.  At 9:52 am, there you were.  They put you on my chest, and you were a wiggly, screaming little being.  I cut your cord, and there you were child number two.  Seven pounds, six ounces, 21 inches long.

Dad didn’t want to “watch” you being born, but he later told me that once you were out, the cord was wrapped around your neck and that when you made your big debut into the world, you were purple, and he wasn’t even sure you were alive.  I’m glad that I was so focused on not screaming anymore and the most painful part over that I didn’t notice him, or you in that brief moment.  It was probably no big deal, because you were never rushed away, and no one ever said anything about it, but if I had seen the panic on his face, or I had seen you like that, I probably would have lost it.  We ended up staying at the hospital for two full days, and being discharged on the third because you were a little jaundiced, and they wanted to make sure you were good to go when we left.

Our first night home was challenging.  I wasn’t allowed to do anything but lift you, and we were all exhausted.  There was a lot of screaming, and many tears from everyone but we survived that first night alone, and that’s all that matters.  The next week was full of challenges as I didn’t feel like I could feed you, and we had a whirl of doctors’ appointments and consultant appointments on how to fix the issues we were having.  It took a lot of work, but by week two, we were back on track, and good to go.

Grandma Lynn came to visit when you were two weeks old for almost a month.  She was a big help because between you and your sister, I was exhausted, constantly.  You two are a force to be reckoned with, that’s for sure.

Not much has gone on in your first two months of life.  You were under your birth weight for a little while, then you shot up 2 pounds in a week, and you keep packing them on.  You have a good appetite, and in general, are a happy baby.  You do have a bit of reflux, which makes you not so happy at times, but we have medicine that we have to give you twice a day, and while it’s a big ordeal to give it to you, because it tastes horrible (yep, I taste tested it for you, but trust me, it could taste a lot worse) it makes you feel better in general, so I make you suffer through it.  You smile a lot, and gurgle a lot.  We love it.  Your sister constantly wants to play with you, and hold you, but she is a little too small at this point.  She is content sitting next to you, looking at you, rubbing your hair, and she will even help us burp you.  I hope you two will be this close later on in life.  The other day she was saying hi to you, you smiled at her, and she just beamed with happiness and pride.  I don’t know if you knew what she said, or knew who she was, but it made her entire day.

Nothing really bothers you, except dirty diapers.  The second your diaper is wet, we had better be on it, or you’re going to make us pay for it.  Most of the time, as soon as the diaper is off, and a fresh one is on, or on its way, you actually smile at us, as if to say “thanks!”  I love it.  You love to sit in the swing.  You generally don’t care if it actually swings or not, as long as the mobile goes around and around.  You sleep pretty well through the night.  You generally wake up twice a night, and I’m ok with that, I can usually get 6 hours of sleep a night.  I appreciate that.  A lot.  Oh, your hair.  Your hair is out of control!  No matter what we do, it sticks straight up.  It is always a hit though, I have yet to hear of anyone not liking it.  Hope that it doesn't last forever for you.

Thanks for joining our family kid.  As always, a rough start for everyone, but we worked through it.  Welcome to the madhouse.

Love,

Momma