I Love 2-year-olds :)

I truly don't understand why people talk so badly of the "2's." Its true that there are rough times. Two year olds are testing boundaries, figuring out the world, and learning at astounding rates. I LOVE having a 2-year-old. I love our little Lady :) Abi amazes me every day with the things that she knows and the things that she says. We were at Kris' parents tonight and Abi saw something that Nana had - I guess it was a leprechaun playing the bagpipes and from the other room I heard, "Nana, is he playing the bagpipes?" How on earth does she know anything of bagpipes??? I can't keep up with all her learning! She knows all her letters (capitals and most lower case), can count to 20 (only missing 13 and 14), counts backward from 7-1, can do puzzles by herself, knows her way around the i-pod/i-pad much better than I do, memorizes books and "reads" them back to me. He imagination grows daily and keeps me in awe. I wish that I could remember every single moment... Reminds me that I need to keep up with the baby books and her "cute sayings" book... I'm so far behind and its so hard to catch up!!!

Sleeping Troubles :(

I'm beginning to wonder if we will ever get sleep again in this house... Abi was a harder baby in that she screamed for 4 months and never took more than a 45 min nap till she was 1 1/2, but tough times seem to be dragging on this time. The best thing the first time around was that Abi slept through the night at 8 weeks and never stopped so we were at least getting good rest at night. At just about 4 months Daniel was finally able to make it through the night without having to get up and eat at 4am, but he doesn't "sleep through the night." We are up with him anywhere from 3-7x's a night putting the Nuk back in and trying to get him comfortable to fall back to sleep. Often he still wakes up at for an hour or so at a time around 3am. What is that all about??? I finally had a thought a couple weeks ago - he was sleeping absolutely wonderfully during the day. He was taking 2-3 naps and his afternoon nap was 3-4 hours long. So I thought that maybe he was sleeping too much during the day and that was why he was up so early in the morning thinking he was done sleeping.... Having this genius thought I started waking him up from his naps so he would take just a 2hr nap in the morning and a 2hr nap in the afternoon and a 45min evening nap - but they say "never wake a sleeping baby!" What am I doing??? Seemed to work for a couple weeks in that he wasn't thinking he had to stay awake so early in the am (though still up several x's at night.) Now - we've just gotten to the point where he is still up multiple x's at night and will only sleep 45 min at a time during the day - he hasn't had a good nap in days... I don't even know what to do anymore. We have another issue - its a bundling issue... The only way to get him to sleep is to still bundle him. BUT - you have to leave one arm out so he doesn't freak out, lay him on his right side with a soft blanket by his face and a pillow behind his back so he doesn't roll over. He's teething so he wakes up and sticks his hands in his mouth and takes the Nuk out and then can't sleep. He's strong - the second he's at all awake he's all tangled in blankets and completely unwrapped... Tried leaving him unwrapped and he just plays and cries because he can't get to sleep that way... I feel as though I have no idea what I'm doing. We've been trying solid food. Little Man thinks that he's starving to death at his very tiny 17lbs 4oz, and can drink 8-9 oz of formula at a time. He's the same size at 4 months that Abi was at 6 months and drinks as much as a one year old. He has NO desire for solids though. I've been trying for almost a month now and it just ends with him crying and me frustrated. I finally thought that if he didn't like cereal, then maybe he'd like it better with fruit in it. He likes it but has no clue that he has to open his mouth to get it in and then thinks it isn't fast enough. So far I haven't been able to get more than a couple bite in before breakdown. I'm frustrated - but I love my son. I'm struggling, he's struggling - we all are... He started teething in earnest and is proving to be much more tough on him than it was on Abi. He's obviously in pain often and it makes me sad. Nothing seems to help it much either. Sadly I don't think any teeth are close to coming in - I can't see anything yet. I'm partly sad because after a few rough months in the beginning he had turned into a really happy little guy with a great personality... Teething has made him pretty miserable and the happy times have been fewer and farther between. I hope that once he gets a couple teeth in he will get a break to be happy again. Its been a rough couple days and I need an attitude adjustment... I've reached the point in sleep deprivation where I have had a headache everyday for a couple weeks, I feel like I'm in a constant fog, and I can hardly keep my eyes open during the day. I feel like things would be easier If I could just get ONE full night of sleep. Eight hours of uninterrupted sleep seems like a dream straight from Heaven... ...and a complete impossibility. I'll keep hoping and praying...

Haha!!!

So... Yesterday Kris Dad and wife were coming to visit. He went out to buy coffee as we had none and left it on the counter. A little later He was doing dishes while I took a shower and Abi pulled up a chair to the counter to play. About half an hour before Kris' parents were supposed to be here, I went to put on a pot of coffee... but there was no coffee to be found. We searched the entire house for about half an hour turning everything upside down and inside out. Assuming that Abi had done something with it, I asked her where it was and her response was, "Its in your box, Mamma." I believed her but didn't have a clue WHAT box and she didn't seem to be able to show me so I decided that she must not really know. Well... after probably 45 min of looking in every single place in the house - Kris found it. It was INSIDE a cereal box in the cupboard. I had looked in the cupboard, but that box didn't look like it had ever been touched!!! I wonder what she was thinking when she did her clever little deed... :) MAN I love that kid!!! :)

4 Month Pic of the D Man!!

Once again its almost time for the next months pics and I'm just getting around to these! :) Here are Daniel's 4 month pictures!!! He's so stinkin cute :)

They said it would go faster the second time around. "They" were right - I totally can't believe Daniel is almost five months old!!

3 month pics etc...

Since Daniel will be four months old on Saturday and it will be time to do pictures again... I figured I should resist the urge to nap and post these pictures which are now a month old!! This first one is before the hair-cut. Poor little man is loosing all his hair in rapid order!
And this is right after his very first haircut! He looks like a totally different boy! I was afraid that I wouldn't like it, but I really do - I think its cute!

Once again I am in awe of just how quickly the time goes by. I can hardly stand that my little man will be 4 months old on Saturday! Yet - at the same time... I've come to realize that infants are VERY hard and I actually start to have a lot more fun right about this age! I sure love my babies!

Daniel has become a really good napper for the most part. I feel that I've finally got him figured out in that regard. He has this little soft "bear-blanket" that he turns his face into and somehow the softness puts him to sleep! Night time is another story... I feed him around 7:30 and put him down. He sleeps wonderfully for about 5 hours and the he's up at 1am, at 3am and at 5am... Usually its just a pacifier check, a re-wrap and back to sleep, but it still means me being up several times a night... By 5am I have to feed him and then he goes back down till about 7:15. Some nights, though, he is up for an hour at a time and I have no idea why... Oh, how I long for a full night's sleep!!!

Its been a rough week at the Milo house... We got another foot of snow and what do you know - the snow-blower died! All the snow combined with the lack of insulation in the attic has cause terrible ice build-up and the rain gutter on the front of our house is being torn right off. We've had some ants in the house that we couldn't seem to get rid of as well and finally had to call an exterminator yesterday... I hope that is the end of that! This is all frustrating and disheartening. I find myself a little down trodden and yet at the same time I'm amazed by God's faithfulness!! We just got our taxes done last week and found out we'll be getting a wonderful return. God's timing is amazing. Hopefully we'll be able to use the majority of that, though, to spend on a newer and larger vehicle. We really need something bigger and want to get it before we have any more trouble with Kris' car!!

2 month pics

These are a bit late... Our little Man is 2 months old already!! Its crazy really! Blogging time has been hard to come by, but since I currently have 2 children in bed (crying and refusing to sleep) I thought I might take a minute to at least post these!

Its been a really busy month... Aaron and Melissa came up for about a week and a half starting Christmas day. It was the best time!! Mercy surprised us and showed up on our door step Christmas day too! :) Silly me - I totally didn't understand why she was sending me a picture of my front door! Then we went to MI for a week to see Ty and Beth. I feel like this was the most relaxing and fun times I've had with my out of town sibs in a long time. It will all be among my happiest memories.

Sadly, though - there has been a lot of stress as well. Daniel spent 3 blissful weeks sleeping when he was born and its been very difficult since. He isn't quite as hard as Abi, but this time around I also have a 2 year old that wants all my time and attention. He doesn't scream quite as much, but is just a bad a sleeper. And when he's over tired he just screams... That came to a head while we were in MI when he abruptly stopped nursing and then stopped eating and sleeping. There wasn't anything wrong with him - seems that he was just overstimulated, but it made for a stressful end of the trip, sadly. I don't understand why both kids have gotten so overstimulated so quickly - not sure what I'm doing wrong. Even with family around and while traveling we kept his schedule the same!! He's done really well the last few days which is encouraging, but it still seems that if I try to go anywhere in the morning it will ruin the rest of the day! What's a body to do? I can't just stay home all the time! ...though in truth I do - way too much - just because its easier in the long run! And this whole sleeping thing... 45 min cat naps - oh so familiar... Abi was at least sleeping through the night at this point! By the plan he should be sleeping 10hrs at night by now and we JUST started getting 8 last week.

Though it was really sad for me that Daniel quit nursing I've tried to convince myself that it was for the best. He was so bad at it anyway. For some reason gulped a ton of air and was so SO gassy... He seems to do a bit better with the bottle, and burps much easier!! I'm just sad that it ended that way and that I was able to do for him as long as I did for Abi. :( At least its easier to see how much he's eating. Within the last 3 days he has jumped from 4oz a feeding strait to 7-8oz!!!

In the middle of all this we had to take Abi's Nuk away. Oh, dear!!! I took her to the dentist at the end of Dec because I had noticed a dark spot on her tooth. Sure enough it is a cavity. :( For now we are just watching it (and the several other stained spots - incomplete enamel???) in the hopes that it doesn't grow and won't have to be dealt with for a couple years. I can't imagine trying to have her get a cavity filled!! We have to brush her teeth twice a day, floss them and put fluoride treatments on the one tooth. She was great at the Dentist - I was so surprised. I had taken her with me the week before so she could watch me get my teeth cleaned. She was awesome till I tried to get her to let the dentist look in her mouth! So I had to make an appt with the pediatric dentist - she LOVED it and was amazing! Didn't fuss once and held her mouth wide open on her own. Even let them polish her teeth and she hates things that make noise!! Anyway - the dentist took one look in her mouth and said, "she's a pacifier baby isn't she?" ...and then showed me how the thing was messing up Abi's bite. So we waited till after the Holidays and took it away. She cried for 4 days at nap and bed times. Now she doesn't cry. But - I fight her for an hour to fall asleep at nap and then she sleeps about an hour. At night she plays for 1 1/2 hrs and wakes up and hour earlier in the morning! 4.5hrs of sleep less a day is taking its toll! ...on her and me... Today she was a wreck... She fell right to sleep at nap time!! ...and only slept 45 min... :( Humph. Nuks are recommended to help prevent SIDS - then the babe gets hooked on it and finally starts sleeping good - then it ruins her bite (hopefully not permanently???)!! That's just a little bit frustrating. I'm sooooo hoping that we're able to get back to a better sleeping habbit again....

Danny is crying again... I must go....

1 Month Old!!!

Our little man is 1 month old already. I know it went fast with Abi, but I think its going faster this time. The first 3 weeks were quite easy - he slept constantly. Its been a lot more rough this past week. He's having a really hard time getting himself back to sleep. I'm not sure I'm keeping him awake too long and he's getting overtired? In any event its been a trying week as we try to figure things out. I still think that he's a much easier baby than Abi was. He doesn't spend all his time screaming! But when he's really tired and can't sleep we do hear nerve-racking cries. He's REALLY gassy too, so now I'm trying to figure out if that is because of things that I'm eating? Its so hard to tell. That is part of his sleeping trouble - when he has gas it wakes him up and then he can't get back to sleep...

He's not so great at eating... his latch isn't good and he gulps air. I wouldn't say that he's a bad eater, but It seemed easier with Abi for some reason.

We've had a month of health struggles. After having Daniel I got a yeast infection just like last time. Just as that was clearing up we all came down with horrid colds/coughs. Even Daniel got a bit of a cold! I didn't think that could happen when they are that young - esp if they're breast fed?? Before all that cleared up I got my first ever UTI. NOT fun! Spent 5 days on abx, then about 4 healthy days, and then the UTI came right back. I'm really blessed that Dr. Carelle was willing to call in a script for me and I didn't have to go in. I went to Urgent care the first time so he had my records. Hopefully all will be well after this 10 days of Abx!! I'm tired of not being healthy. All that combined with my total lack of sleep is making it hard to have a positive attitude!

...side note...

Its been 2 weeks and I only have 4lbs to go till I reach pre-baby weight! ...and then 22 more lbs to go after that. The wonders of only gaining 20lbs this time as apposed to 40lbs last time!! Now if only I hadn't put on that extra 22 prior to getting pregnant! :)

What?

Not the most flattering picture ever, but I just love his wrinkly little legs! :)
Oh, and just so we're clear on it - he was NOT 19in at birth! ...because five days later (at the pediatrician's) he was 20 3/4 inches long! Now that's some fast growth!

So, get this.... Daniel was born on Friday at 7 lbs 12oz. In the hospital they tell you to feed every 2-3 hours so I did because I was there and kinda had to. We were discharged from the hospital after 36 hours and Daniel was 7lbs 7oz. They like it to be a full 48 hours so the Pediatrician asked us to bring him to the office for a weight check in 2 days... ...I bargained for 3 days because Abi already had an appt for her flu shot. So on Wed Daniel was 7lbs 8oz - doing great. His Dr asked me how much he was eating and I said, "oh, about 20 min every 3 hours." Actually, knowing that it didn't really need to be quite that often I was doing 3hrs during the day and 4hrs at night. Her immediate response was, "Oh, you need to work on that! Feed him every 2 hours during the day and no more than 3hrs at night! And do whatever it takes to get him to feed for longer!" Then asked me to bring him back in a week for another weight check. I was frustrated. I wasn't going to push it - I did that with Abi and it was miserable. I know from experience that a baby will feed better when he's actually hungry and that he was getting PLENTY in just 20 min at a time! But - I'm an OCD rule follower... I didn't change anything - kept doing 3hrs during the day and 4 at night for the next week, but I was anxious all week about it because now it was in my head that I might be wrong. And my poor husband heard about it all week! :( Well, I took Daniel back for his weight check this past Wed. and he was 7lbs 14oz!! The Dr's exact words were, "Wow! He's doing great! He's ahead of schedule!! Keep doing what you're doing!" Haha! I didn't say a word. :)

Totally Different

I hesitate to be too hasty in saying this... ...but so far this is a completely different kind of baby experience! Daniel just... SLEEPS! They say that new borns sleep most of the first 2 weeks and then things change... He isn't 2 weeks old yet, so we'll see if that changes, but I know that Abi was already screaming by this time. I literally have to torture him awake to even eat. Pretty sure he'd sleep through the night now if I didn't set my alarm so he doesn't starve to death in his sleep! :) I feel blessed - this has made transition to two fairly easy so far.

Abi has done remarkably well so far with all the transition. She's madly in love with her baby brother - a couple days ago she informed me that he was her best friend! She's precious with him - constantly wanting to kiss him and telling him how cute he is. :) Today we had a bit of a rough day... as well as she really IS doing, it doesn't change the fact that she's not at all good at entertaining herself and is very demanding of attention. Before Daniel was born we had gotten to the place where I could get her to play with toys in her room by herself for about 20 min to half an hour during the day. I think its going to take a while to get back to that. Abi loves Daniel to death, but struggles with the fact he sometimes needs my time and that means she can't have it - she's a little clingy right now! All in all I think the transition is going quite smoothly.

We got to get out of the house to MOM's group this morning. It was great for me, and I was happy to find that I could actually get us all out of the house by 9am. :) Abi was just happy to go "play with her friends!" Our little lady loves her social time - its been hard for her being home most of the last 3 weeks!!!