St. Patty's Day

 Just a quick post to share some pictures of the kids' St. Patty's Day outfits. 

Bryce's shirt says: Lucky to be this Awesome!

Blaire's says: Who needs luck when you're this cute!

Silly face picture with my silly boy!

Valentine's Day

Since Nic had to work Valentine's Day, I spent the evening with my other two Valentines. Of course I had to spoil them with gifts!

Bryce's gift.

Blaire's gift.

1/3 Birthday AKA 4 month

I had every intention of posting Blaire’s 4 month old update a few weeks ago, but time has continued to elude me as it always does. I’m hoping one day I’ll have more time to update this blog more than I do now. There’s so many things I want to keep track of so that they’re not forgotten, and I feel with once a month updates there’s so much I could still miss. So for this post I will limit pictures and details that occurred up to March 5th.

Unfortunately on Blaire’s actual 4 month “birthday” we were at the doctor for a sick visit, which was our third within the prior 4 weeks! Of course when I tried to take her “official” 4 month picture, she wasn’t quite up for the activity so here’s the best shot I got.

Then I fondly recall that Bryce's 4 month picture was pretty similar to this one.

Pretty much Blaire’s 4th month of life can be summed up as sick! BOO!

On Wednesday February 12th, the daycare called me and said that Blaire was running a low fever. She had been coughing a little up to that point so I was afraid she had RSV or even the flu considering Bryce had that a couple weeks prior. So I took her into the doctor and the doctor was so confident that she had RSV. They did a pulse-ox on her, where her oxygen was 97% and then they ran the flu and RSV tests which were both negative. So we chalked it up to being a cold and he sent us home with an Rx for a steroid to keep the inflammation in her lungs suppressed. On this visit with clothes on she weighed 14 lbs 7 oz!

We went through the weekend and she started to show some signs of improvement but then it seemed to get worse again. I took a picture of her in her cute little Valentine’s Day Outfit, but you can tell my baby girl still wasn’t feeling better. 

The next week we kept her out of daycare. Her appetite still hadn’t returned and she was coughing so bad that she was throwing up at least once or twice a day. It was obvious she was losing weight, I could see it in her face! So on Thursday, February 20th I call the doctor again and I took her back in. She weighed 13 lbs 5 oz on this visit, which was more than a 1 lb loss from the prior week. They tested her again for RSV and the Flu, but this time she was positive for the Flu plus she had an ear infection! Since she was kept out of daycare for more than 7 days at that point, we can’t figure out how she got the flu unless Nic or myself carried it but never got it, since it had been 3 weeks since Bryce had it. She was treated with Tamiflu, Amoxicillin, and eye drops.

We went almost two weeks without any doctor’s visits. YAY! By this point the coughing was completely gone. She still would experience a little congestion here and there, but she’s had that pretty much since she was born. Of course it couldn’t last too long. 

On Wednesday, March 5th daycare called me and said Blaire was running a fever. When they took it under her arm it was over 102 degrees, so I guess you add one to get to the actual…which meant it was over 103!! I panicked and called Nic since he was close by where he could get her. Then called the doctor who was closed for lunch. Then called daycare back to see if they would give her some Tylenol to try and bring it down. Then I was able to call the doctor back after they returned from lunch and get her in within the next 30 minutes. 

Nic met me at the doctor’s office with her. On this visit, with clothes on, she weighed 15 lbs 1 oz; that was good she had gained back what she had lost and then some. Her temperature was still over 101. They tested her, yet again, for RSV and the flu. At this point I just knew she had RSV! But both were negative! He looked at her ears and determined that she still had an ear infection in the same ear…so more antibiotics we got. This time she was prescribed what the doctor called a baby z-pack. It was a once a day dose for 3 days. When we got home, we gave her the first dose…which she spit-up within 5 minutes. 

All evening and throughout the night we kept her on Tylenol to try to keep the fever down. It seemed to stay over 100, and spiked again to over 103 in the middle of the night, but by morning she was back to her normal temperature. We gave her the second dose of antibiotic, which again she spit-up! At least she acted like she was feeling a little better, as long as we kept Tylenol in her every 4-6 hours. The next day I gave her, with her bottle, the third and final dose of antibiotics. This time she kept it down…but then when I picked her up from daycare she had broken out in a rash! We had a little bit of the antibiotic left that I would have liked to have given her since the first two doses didn’t work out so well, but at this point we were not going to do that.

That was all the happenings for the majority of her 4th month of life, for which she was sick most of the time. She had been sick for about 25% of her life up until that point…can’t you tell I’m a numbers person! 

Thankfully I still managed to catch some good pictures of some new things she did during the month

Getting some love from brother! She's thrilled, can't you tell?

She's actually smiling during tummy time! 

Slept in her bassinet for the last time! 

Slept in the pack n' play for the first time in an effort to transition into her crib. She actually started out in the middle of the pack n' play lying perpendicular to how she ended up.

Started enjoying bath time!

Playing!

Got acquainted with her bumbo seat.

I did move her into size 2 diapers on the 1st of March, though it probably could have happened sooner but I was determined to use every last size 1 diaper we had, even if they looked like a skimpy bikini bottom on her.  

Hopefully, I can post her 5 month update this weekend!

Quarter Birthday

 Oh Blaire…our little chunky monkey! Or as Daddy first earned the nickname of “Tubs”, some are now calling you Tubs Jr.

Today my baby girl is 3 months old! 

Last night I weighed her in fear that I would forget to do it today…according to Baby Stats on Wii Fit Plus she now weighs 13 lbs 14 oz! We kissed 0-3 months clothes goodbye two weeks ago and she is fitting very nicely in 3-6 months, though if she grows much longer anytime soon she won’t be able to fit in the sleep n’ plays. We’re STILL in size 1 diapers, mostly because I’m trying to use up what I have left. As soon as they are gone, or if she starts having too many blowouts, I’ll move her into size 2. I think it helps that she carries most of her weight in her thighs and head…which could be why she still doesn’t have complete head control! LOL!

She has continued to sleep REALLY well, thank goodness! She normally sleeps from 8:30pm to 4:30am, give or take 30 minutes on each end. When she wakes up, she eats and goes back to sleep until around 7:30 or 8am, or earlier if we wake her up.

So what has Blaire been up to. 

She’s giving us some laughs here and there and can give some REALLY big smiles! 

She seems to have really good control of her head, though she can still be a little wobbly here and there…see note above ; ). 

She’ll tolerate a few minutes of tummy time, but sometimes just lays there in what looks likes defeat. 

She really, really loves her brother and his wild faces. He can always solicit big smiles out her.

She’ll follow us with her head and eyes across the room. 

 For the past week or two she’s started chewing on her hands and slobbering a little…maybe a precursor of teething and sleepless nights? 

She especially likes to chew on my shoulder and leave me a nice little slobber spot on my shirts. 

She’s started grabbing the rings on the toys hanging in front of her and holds on to them for a while.

So we're a quarter of the way to her first birthday...sigh!

January Recap

Wow wee! January was a hectic month!

I returned to work on the 6th, and I think now on February 2nd we now have a pretty good schedule down. Of course it’s the start of my busy time at work so my days fly by almost as fast as the evenings and weekends do. At work I have access to a lactation room, so it’s allowed me to continue “breastfeeding”. I’m still overproducing by A LOT! In fact, my weekly average is 85 ounces while Miss Blaire eats 30-35 a day! This weekend I reached the halfway point to my 6,000 oz freezer stash goal. If it keeps as it has been I should have no problem reaching that goal by the time Blaire is 6 months…then I can wean and have enough milk to get her to a year or very close to it.

Unfortunately, on January 13^th Nic’s paternal grandmother passed away, leaving him with one living grandparent. :'( After a week where we spent most of our time with the family, we laid her to rest on January 17^th. She was 83 years old and had Alzheimer’s for several years. I couldn’t help but be overcome by the amount of love and devotion Nic’s Grandpa has shown her through these past several years, even when this awful disease made her not act like herself. Most of their lives she took care of him, but gradually that transitioned to where he took care of her. Considering divorce has ran rampant in my family starting with my maternal grandparents, it’s nice to see a lifetime of love like that and it makes me want to make sure Nic and I achieve that level of lifetime love and devotion in our marriage. I’m so glad we were able to get the picture we did at Christmas, the last with the entire family!

Speaking of lifetime love…we made it one year closer to that goal on January 18^th when Nic and I celebrated our 11^th wedding anniversary! Given the recent events, all we managed to do was sneak away for a quiet dinner (sans kids) at Osaka.

Throw in a couple of birthday parties and we could pretty much kiss January 2014 goodbye...oh until Bryce came down with the flu...even after receiving the flu mist in November! So far no one else has gotten it in our household, and most importantly Blaire, though my Mom did end up with it after keeping him on the day he came down with it. 

Speaking of Blaire...I think I'll save those photos and details for my next post which will be her 3 month post! Eeek!

Christmas 2013 - Blaire's 1st!

Blaire's first Christmas has come and gone; and as surreal as it sounds, it was Bryce's FIFTH Christmas! Like Bryce's first Christmas, we can sort of consider Blaire's first Christmas a White Christmas. Though we had to drive a few hours to get there, but when we did get to Wichita to celebrate with my Mom's side of the family there were several inches of snow on the ground. 

Leading up to Christmas we did lots of wrapping of presents. This year Bryce was really big into helping with just about everything. Below is a picture of him trying to wrap one of Blaire's presents all by himself. Of course shortly thereafter he got bored and I had to finish the job. 

This year with the addition of Blaire, I ordered us all new custom stockings. I know I could have just ordered a new stocking for Blaire, but since I'm just a little OCD, I had to make sure they all kind of matched. Besides, I shouldn't have to order any more since we're not planning on adding any more to our family. 

Our Christmas festivities began the Sunday before Christmas with a trip down south with my Dad's side of the family. Our initial celebration was delayed a day due to an ice storm that hit. We made it safely down there and the kids enjoyed playing outside in the cold, cold temperatures!

Christmas Eve morning we made some cookies for Santa. Bryce was a really big helper...

Of course when it was time to decorate them he was already over the entire activity...so I handled that part.

Early, early Christmas morning Santa stopped by our house...

Bryce and his sleepyhead self evidently couldn't see the massive amount of toys Santa left, as he started crying and asking why Santa didn't come.

But he quickly wiped the sleep out of his eyes and saw many of the things he had on his list. Shortly thereafter, he exclaimed that "this is the best Christmas ever!" My heart melted!

Of course I planned out a cute outfit for Blaire to wear to our Christmas day activities.

Meeting and being adored by a Great-Grandma

Daddy and his favorite girl...even if she's in frilly clothes!

Of course that outfit didn't last, so our family picture didn't have her in a cute outfit. I did dress her back up in it at a later date so I could get a picture of she and Bryce together. See the bottom of this post.

And for our 4th consecutive day of Christmas celebrations we went to my Mom's house so the kids could open their present from her...she didn't want to haul everything to Wichita on Christmas day.

And for our Christmas outfit redo!

 He sure loves his sissy!! <3 font="">

Two months...already?!?

So today my baby girl is TWO months old! 

Obviously, I couldn't choose just one picture to share!

At two months, she's still in size 1 diapers, though barely! She's also fitting comfortably in 0-3 months clothes but some are starting to get small, especially the outfits with pants. Her two month doctor's checkup was on New Year's Eve, at which she was exactly 8 weeks old. She weighed 11 lbs 10 oz (78%). Her head circumference was 15 3/4" (84%) and her height was...wait for it...24 inches!!! Unbelievably, a child of mine in the <97 4="" believe="" birth.="" br="" but="" couldn="" for="" grown="" had="" height="" i="" in="" inches="" it="" length="" m="" nbsp="" she="" since="" stay="" still="" sure="" t="" that="" way="" won="">

Blaire is smiling a TON! She's cooing at us and we're just waiting for her first awake giggles. She does a lot of chuckling in her dreams, but so far we just get squeaks for laughs. She holds her head up well and keeps it pretty steady, but absolutely HATES tummy time! If you want to ruin her good mood fast, just initiate tummy time!

 

She's still sleeping really well. She typically wakes up around 3 or 4am after going down around 9 or 9:30pm. It's very likely that when she wakes up at 4am, I'll probably just get up for the day. I'm just going to try to move our bedtime up so that I'm not completely sleep depraved.

She's still getting 100% breast milk as I'm exclusively pumping. I have a MAJOR oversupply! In fact, being the spreadsheet enthusiast that I am I can tell you that my current weekly average production is 75 oz! AND since about week 3 I have been seeing an average increase of 5 oz nearly every week. I set a goal of only pumping until June 1st and at that point having enough frozen milk to get her on breast milk until her 1st birthday and I believe if my supply keeps like it has, that I will easily achieve this goal. Right now in the freezer I've got over 1,700 oz and my goal is 6,000. I'm nearly 1/3 of the way there and have been freezing between 40-50 ounces a day. 

How did this happen so quickly?!? Not only is she growing up way too fast, but I'm supposed to be returning to work tomorrow! I say "supposed to" because we have had some snow and ice that have left the roads a mess. So if schools are closed tomorrow, then it's very likely daycare will be closed also. I've been preparing myself mentally all week about returning...so far no tears have been shed but I might break if I don't go back to work tomorrow as planned. Darn my Type A personality!

So to keep me distracted...I'll be posting our Christmas post shortly!