Tuesday, August 26, 2008

lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

On Saturday we needed to get out of the house, so we got in the car and started driving...usually doesn't lead us anywhere interesting, but this time we headed to the Denver Zoo. We figured we'd just walk around and head home when it got too hot but luckily about 30 minutes into it we got incredible cloud cover and a nice breeze so we hung out for quite some time, showing Colin all the animals and having a great time together. Some pics...






Sunday, August 24, 2008

2 month Pedi appointment and shots :(



So, last Wednesday the 20th we had our two month appointment with the pedi. Colin did great - he's 24 1/4 in long and weighs 11 lbs 5 oz - He's exactly five pounds higher than his birth weight!! He was 90th percentile for height, 50th for weight, and 40th for head size. I swear he's going to tower over me when he hits junior high!

We also had the two month shots, and after reading Dr. Sears' The Vaccine Book and talking to our pedi we have decided to delay a few of the vaccines. Didn't want to overload his poor little body with too much when it wasn't necessarily the right time for a vaccine. So, that being said, he got 3 shots and one oral vaccine. He hated the shots and cried (so did mommy) and was so happy when they were done. He got pretty sleepy afterwards and we gave him some baby tylenol to help.

Unfortunately I had forgotten all about the appointment when I scheduled our family photo shoot with Sara, so she came over and he was just too fussy. We tried, but when we got to the park Colin wouldn't/couldn't stop rying/screaming so we postponed it. Will most likely reschedule the shoot for after the holiday weekend.

Monday, August 11, 2008

getting bigger everyday...

I can't believe how much Colin is growing everyday. He wore his last newborn pampers swaddler yesterday - we're now on to size one's. I hate to admit it but I got teary-eyed when I realized my baby boy is growing up.


He's also just found his hand and will suck on the whole hand if a binky isn't available... I haven't been able to catch a picture of him doing that yet though, so instead - look at how cute he is in the bath...






Thursday, August 7, 2008

Pics of the wrap :)




Baby wearing

I am a huge believer in baby wearing. After reading about all the benefits of baby wearing while I was pregnant, I researched different slings and wraps, and decided I like the hotsling. So, I searched on ebay and got a smoking deal on a super cute one; I think I spent about $10 (which al came from doing online surveys - so it was basically free!). Once Colin arrived, we quickly discovered it didn't work. He was too long, or just didn't fit right in it so I put it away, figuring I'd sell it, and just resigned myself to holding and carrying him. He was so small it didn't really matter at that point.

When he was about a month old we took him to our Bradley instructor's house to show him off and share our birth story. She is a big supporter of baby wearing and told me she really liked the maya wrap with her two little ones. So, off to craigslist I went and found one there for a good deal... which he again hated. I realized that both of these used the cradle carry, and I guess he either didn't like it or didn't feel comfortable.

A little sad that I spent $40 on two carries that he didn't like, we used the snugli for a walk. He loved the way that one held him. I didn't want to use a snugli as our main method of carrying him since I've heard various arguments from the medical field that it's not good for their development and bone structure. But, I wanted to find something that mimicked it - preferrably one I could make.

Tada! Here is what I found - used a 40% off coupon to Hobby Lobby yesterday and bought 5 yards of white cotton jersey knit (makes three wraps) and cut it this morning. He LOVES IT! Finally found an awesome solution. Will post pics of him in it later...

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Sleep

Colin loves to sleep on me. I've written about that before, and how we didn't plan to co-sleep but kinda feel into it when we decided that getting sleep was more important than sticking to a plan we made before he actually arrived. It worked well, though at the beginning "sleep" mainly consisted of Colin sleeping on my chest. The first night in the hospital he was so pooped out he slept all night, not a peep out of him. The nurse came in around 4 to wake us up for his feeding (he had eated around midnight the night before) but we couldn't wake him up... extremely nervewracking and I realized then and there that a super quiet baby at night wasn't necessarily a good thing. After quite some time trying to wake him up it was decided that we'd take him to the nursery - ugh. I got ready to fight the nurses on the formula issue. Chris went with him immediately, I stayed for just a minute or two to tend to a few things, then met up with them in the nursery. Luckily, his glucose levels were great, which meant that I wouldn't have to fight the formula battle just yet. Turns out his core temp had dropped to about 97, which is very low for a newborn, and he was sleeping because he had to - no energy to be awake. The neonatal nurse wanted to keep him in the warmer for a few hours to bring his temp back up and promised he wouldn't get any formula, and that she would bring him back to us when he was better. With that, Chris and I headed back to our room to get some sleep.

The next night was much better. He acted like what I would expect a newborn to act like, but Chris and I decided to bring him to our bed. It was too hard for me to get in and out of the bed to get him when he cried, and honestly, we couldn' t take our eyes off him. That's how the co-sleeping started. He slept so much better when he was with us.

Our first night home from the hospital we learned that our beautiful plan didn't work so well. He fussed the entire time, and I finally went to the living room recliner and pseudo-slept with him on my chest all night. There was really no need for both of us to be completely sleep deprived, and Colin wasn't leaving my arms yet.

Luckily we discovered the miracle blanket somewhere around week 3 or 4 and ever since then he's only woken up once at night. Granted, he is an earlier riser (somewhere between 4:30 and 6am no matter what time he goes down for the night) but we've learned to adjust our schedules and to find nap time for us. Weekends are much easier to find time for a nap...

Right now Colin is asleep on my legs - and that's pretty much par for the course on naps - he really doesn't sleep well during the day unless he's napping on mom or dad (preferably mom). So, I have figured out how to do many things while he's napping on me...blog, clip coupons, catch up on emails, pay bills online...you get the drill. And while sometimes I think how great it would be if he napped in his crib so I could cook, clean, do laundry, use the bathroom etc... I know it won't be forever, and there will be a time that he won't want to nap on me and I'll long for this time. So for now, I'm just going to enjoy it.