Happy 1/2 Year!

01/29/14 – 6 Months

Weight

16 lbs 15 ounces – slightly under 50th percentile

Length

26.25 inches – right on 50th percentile

Health
he has a bit of a rash – too soon to tell if it’s eczema or just life as a baby

He got four shots, including the flu shot!  He charmed all the ladies at the doctors office which got him some extra attention 🙂 A nice distraction after getting stuck 4 times!

Also, he enjoyed the crinkly paper.

Changes

He can sit for longer periods of time now – although not always consistently so we use the Boppy in case he decides to flop backwards (which he does).

We like playing with our toys…

He can make B sounds now along with the M sounds he’s been making for a while.  “mum ba ummm ba ba ba” – yup, I talk baby.

No bad teething days this month but still no teeth.

Eating Solids!! He’s had sweet potatoes, avocados, carrots, and green beans.  We are doing the baby led weaning approach where we are letting Brody feed himself.  It’s going fairly well – he’s still not super into eating but he knows how to put the food in his mouth and he’s eating some of it.  Every night, he seems to get it a little bit more.  He wasn’t very fond of avocados.  He is his father’s son.

Activities & Outings:

Uncle Ethan came for a visit!

Brody’s first snow!

and his first snow man 🙂

We went to a food truck rally in Durham.  No pictures of us – as usual we forgot

Nicknames: Little B, Bro, Broseph, Little dude,  Bro Bro, B-Man, Little Man

Clothing Size: 3-9 Months – all depends on the brand

Often heard:

“He is so agreeable” – says his doctor 🙂
“What a cutie!”
“He has so much hair”
“He’s very calm”
“So handsome”
“Look at those cheeks”
“What beautiful blue eyes”

 

We still suck our fingers – mostly when we are sleepy or upset

Excited hands

Still love our feet

I kept the snowman decoration out 🙂

Snow for Brody’s 1/2 Birthday!

Axel had fun

More feet chewing…

You know it!

Go Dawgs!

We like to be cool like Daddy!

Love our fox hoodie!

We still nap in our bouncer – or on mommy.

first selfie

This is his floor move – legs and arms up and wiggle them

Toe-popsicle

yup – my mom leaves me naked and then puts me in a hoodie

smiles

got bacon?

yup 🙂 – like father like son

love fluffy bums

5 Months

 

 

 

5 months 12/29/13

Weight

15 lbs 6 ounces – (by my bathroom scale)

Length
not sure – we have a doctors appointment in a month!

Health
perfect!

Looking forward to
Relaxing and playing with our Christmas goodies

Starting solids – I’m looking forward to this and dreading it at the same time 🙂

Changes

He can roll both directions!  and he does it all the time.  He kept rolling under the coffee table so I moved it to give him the whole living room rug.

sometimes he rolls over and watches tv…

He even rolled over while I was taking his 5 month photos

He loves his feet – he has two of them 🙂

He also likes to blow bubbles/lip buzz

 

He has been teething off an on this month.  Most days he’s fine.  He just likes to chew on things but sometimes he has bad days…

You can tell his teeth are bothering him when he is trying to put more than two fingers in his mouth.

He hasn’t had a paci all month – when I give him one he spits it out and replaces it with his fingers so I’ve stopped trying.

We also love grabbing at glasses and bringing to them our mouth!  Gonna be eating soon

We love things that are crunchy – This is our crunchy book from Uncle Ethan – we also love our elephant with crunchy ears and our rainbow rings.

 

 

Activities & Outings:

THREE CHRISTMASES.  We had Christmas with Nana and Papaw (Brett’s parents) – then Christmas Day just us three – then GiGi and Grandpa (My parents)  So this little boy racked up the goodies.

Also earlier in December we visited Charlottesville and visited my work and our buddies there!  And got to hang out with Aunt Jac and Care Bear!

Nicknames: Little B, Bro, Broseph, Little dude,  Bro Bro, B-Man, Little Man

Clothing Size: 3-9 Months – all depends on the brand

Often heard:B 

“He has so much hair”
“He’s so alert”
“He’s very calm”
“So handsome”
“Look at those cheeks”
“What beautiful blue eyes”
“Love his coloring/complexion”

Had to take a rainbow picture of our cloth diapers. Still in love with them – but solid foods is going to change the game. (I have white ones too but those are boring 🙂 )

This is how our hair looks after we try to turn over in our bouncer

Cool dude!

 

 

 

4 Months

4 months – 11/29/13

Weight
14 lbs 6 ounces – 50% percentile

Length
24.5 inches – officially over 2 feet tall!  Whoohoo. Also, 50% percentile

Health
We had a doctors appointment on Monday 12/2/13 and he is still perfect.  He might be teething but it’s kinda hard to know since we can’t see anything.  But he’s chewing on things!

Pre-doctor and shots

A day after his shots and still feeling icky.  He ran a fever…and threw up on me! First throw up was my least favorite milestone

Looking forward to
Christmas!! DUH!

Changes

He’s rolled over from front to back! – So now we use the boppy when we want tummy time so he can’t flip over

He’s trying to sit up on his own.  He just isn’t quite there yet.

My favorite…oops we fell over

He sleeps in his crib and has for the whole month of November.  Super Star.  Until lately, he’s been sleeping on average 8 hours a night.  We think either teething or Thanksgiving vacation threw his sleep off because now he wakes up every 3 or 4 hours.

Happy Crib Boy!

See look what I can do…

He has started liking his paci less and his fingers more.  And he’s grabbing lots of things – Like the icing on daddy’s cake and his 4 months sticker.  So we had to safety pin it on.

He loves having his diaper changed!  It can change a screaming baby into a smiling one.  Although usually to mood is ruined once the diaper is changed.

Activities & Outings:

Halloween!  Our little guy was a Ninja Turtle.  His costume was a hit with the neighborhood kids.  Although one was kind of confused “He’s not a turtle, he’s a human!”

Daddy’s Birthday!  Brody helped me decorate the cake and had fun helping Daddy blow out his candles 🙂

We had Thanksgiving with both sets of parents.  Brody was a little overwhelmed by all the different people but we had a good time!  He was so good on his first Thanksgiving.  However, we didn’t take many pictures.

Nicknames: Little B, Bro, Broseph, Little dude,  Bro Bro, B-Man.

Clothing Size: 3-9 Months – all depends on the brand

Often heard:B 

“He has so much hair”
“He’s so alert”
“He’s very calm”
“So handsome”
“He’s so cute” (oh wait that’s me)

I have learned that if he’s in the room with me – he will let me shower in peace.  I’m okay with this :).

Gangsta…

Gangsta’s gotta sleep…

Silly Daddy bought me a mustache!

He refused to smile for me – but that’s what happens when you do a photo shoot the day after shots.  Not a happy baby.

He was done! 🙂

 

 

 

3 months

3 months – 10/29/13

 

Weight
13lbs 13 oz (using our bathroom scales so probably not perfectly accurate)

Length
not sure – no Dr’s appointment until next December

Health
He’s perfect

Looking forward to
His first Halloween and Thanksgiving

Changes
He’s laughed although he doesn’t do it very often.

He’s got the most adorable little legs.

We are getting him ready to sleep in his crib so he sleeps in his pack n play now so he’ll get used to sleeping flat.  He also sleeps wearing a sleep sack now that it’s gotten colder.  He was sleeping 6-8hrs at a time but he’s gone back to 5 hrs lately.

He likes his paci but he also likes his yummy fingers.  If you let him whine long enough he’ll normally put his fingers in his mouth!

He’s super duper wiggly – and drooley so taking pictures are challenging 🙂 too many moving parts

He’s reconsidered his swing – still not his favorite but he will tolerate it occasionally

He’s started sticking his tongue out all the time

Things he likes:

his bouncer

being held sitting up

looking at lights

sock monkey

paci

riding in the car

sticking his tongue out

Things he doesn’t like: being left alone for a while (aka showers) – anything if he’s skipped a nap 🙂

Activities & Outings:

Last weekend, we went to a friends wedding.  He did wonderfully during the ceremony but not so great during the reception.  I think the activity kept him from napping…then he got too tired and just screamed for a while.  It was also during his not so happy time which usually falls somewhere between 4pm and 9pm.

We also went to the NC state fair on 10/19 and Brody got to attend his first tractor show

He’s still my little shopping buddy

We also went on our first stroller ride that required cold weather gear

Nicknames: Little B, Bro, Broseph, Little dude, and Bro Bro.

Clothing Size: 6 months unless it’s made by gerber 😉 – then 9 months.  Goofy Gerber.

Often heard:

“He has so much hair”
“He’s so alert”
“He’s very calm”
“So handsome” (says his grandparents) 
“I can’t believe he’s only 3 months”

Meeting monkeys in the morning;

Who are you?

Oh you look familiar…

Funny Monkeys!

 

 

 

2 Months

2 months – 9/29/13

Weight
11 lbs 14 ounces on Wednesday (9/25) – slightly above 50th percentile

Length
22.5 inches – slightly below 50th percentile

Health
We had a doctors appointment last Wednesday for his normal two month checkup.  But he also perfectly timed a blocked infected tear duct.  We noticed on Monday that his eye had a little bit of sleepy stuff in the corner.  By Tuesday, it was full on goo, especially when he cried.  So the doctor prescribed him some eye ointment that he is not so fond of but his eye has cleared up.

Looking forward to
GiGi and Grandpa’s visit this month

Changes
He SMILED!

9/4/13 – first on camera smile

9/9/13

cutie pie

he’s getting nice and chunky and adorable.  He has great head strength (in my totally biased opinion).  He’s started moving his arms and legs a lot and seems to understand that he’s the one moving them.  Today he was wiggling his feet and grinning at them as they moved.

funny feet

He has always been a chatty baby but he does it even more now!  Tons of coos, oohs, ahhs, and squeaks.

He still sleeps from 4-5 hrs at night, then 3 hours, then he is ready to be awake – He’ll sleep a little longer if you cuddle but that means I have to be awake so we watch Good Morning America in the morning and it gives us time to wake up!

He’s started taking a pacifier and a bottle.  He took the first bottle we offered him with no complaints.  Go Brody!  He will even take one from me which I’ve heard is difficult.  We also give him a pacifier at night and if he gets super fussy but he’s started sucking on his fingers when he gets upset.  Yay for self soothing.  But sometimes he gets really mad that his fingers aren’t doing what he wants – so then we have to give him a pacifier to calm him down.  But he doesn’t really need it – I usually only use it if i’m super lazy because a quick walk around the house would calm him just as much.  Or at night time to let him know that it’s time for bed.

Things he likes: – He loves his bouncer, He likes being held up (sitting or standing) so he can look around.  He still loves looking at lights and bright places in the house.

Things he doesn’t like: He does not like for me to bathe ;). But there aren’t many things that upset him beyond if he’s been left alone for a while.  He’s not fond of the eye ointment that I have to put in his eye.

Activities & Outings:

 We make a great shopping team, we go to the grocery store, Target, CVS, everywhere together.

This weekend we had a doggie playdate with some neighbors and Brody had fun watching Axel play and listening to the adults chit chat.

Last weekend, when Ethan and Natalie were here we went to Hillridge Farms.  Brody had his first hay ride and pumpkin patch picking.

We also visited Charlottesville on 9/15 and celebrated our best buddy’s birthday!  Here is the picture of Clara and Brody meeting for the first time

We also enjoyed watching many Georgia games together!

And he’s always willing to help with my day to day chores

laundry time

Nicknames: Little B, Bro, Broseph, Little dude, and Bro Bro.

Clothing Size: We just started wearing 3-6 months.  Brody has a long torso plus the extra bulk of the cloth diapers and we had to go up a size!

Often heard:

“He has so much hair”
“He’s so alert”
“He’s very calm”
“So handsome” (says his grandparents) 😉

 

 

 

 

Cloth Diapering – One Month In

So we’ve officially made it one month using cloth diapers.  How’s it going you ask?  They are fabulous.  Perhaps we just had a bad experience with a certain named brand disposable (HUGGIES) but before cloth we experienced some kind of leak (pee or poo) once a day (on average – more with Huggies – less with Pampers) – we tried all sorts of things – making it tighter, less tight, pointing certain things down (if you catch my drift) -still B and I routinely got wet.  It definitely wasn’t fun.  You sit there holding your adorable baby wondering if you are having a weird hot flash all of a sudden…nope…you just got peed on. Since starting cloth diapers we’ve only had maybe 4 leaks – and half was because he was a bit small for them in the beginning – the other half user error. I’ve also noticed that we haven’t had any rashes…yes I know at 8 weeks he’s a bit young for rashes – but in those first two weeks of using disposables I will admit that during that middle of the night feeding he didn’t always get his diaper changed – the choices are change it before feeding him and listen to him scream because he is hungry (which is not an option since Daddy has to get up to go to work at 4:30 so we try to be quiet) or change him after he’s eaten which in the middle of the night normally means that you are gonna wake him up.  Now idk about you but at 1 a.m. I normally choose letting him sleep over changing his diaper.  So I noticed during those two weeks his bum getting a little redder than normal 😦 which definitely made me feel awful for choosing sleep.  Well since switching to the cloth we haven’t seen any red on the bum and he is normally in the same diaper from 10pm-5am because I still don’t want to wake him up after our 1 a.m. feeding. Our stash is made up of BumGenius 4.0s.  They are a pocket style diaper which just means there is an insert you put in it – this cuts down on drying time and allows you to customize absorbency.  Fancy Shmancy!  We like the ones with snaps because they don’t collect stuff like velcro does (by stuff I mean dog hair – ick) So you take the diaper off – and put it in the diaper pail – which is lined with a pail liner (or wet bag) – from here you just throw it all in the washer – once he starts eating real food – things get more complicated.  But for now you just do one wash on warm – another on hot – and an extra rinse – and all done!  Well ya gotta dry them and stuff them – then all done!

  Here are the diapers ready to go (for some reason all the blue ones got used in one day (I have two of almostevery color 🙂 )   The diaper changing caddy holds my cloth wipes (cheap washcloths in a disposable wipe container with a mixture of water, baby oil, and baby soap), coconut oil for rashes, and hand sanitizer.  The scissors are to remind me to take the labels off of his toys 🙂   The diapers hanging to dry – the top right is one of the pail liners drying.  It’s super water proof so really the water is just dripping off of it 🙂 – and the bottom left are two baby wet bags for my diaper bag.  They are pretty small but still can hold about 8 diapers each as I found out on my trip to Cville this weekend. The diapers are cute enough to wear without clothes 🙂 – but seriously who does love a naked baby.   This weekend we went to visit a friend for her birthday and LB ended up in only his diaper at one point.  We got so many compliments on them 🙂 – guess it’s nice to have pretty underwear.

“Bad Momma”

I read this article recently about how new mothers get nothing done.  And if a new mom is saying that she gets stuff done then she is lying or not a good mom.  The point of the article was basically to say enjoy these times with you baby and measure each day in moments and not tasks accomplished.  

While I love the premise of the article, not worrying about chores and tasks but just enjoying our child, It made me realize what a wonderful baby I have and how lucky I am.  Because I’m not lying when I say that I do get stuff done during the day, and rarely do I have to wear my baby in order to do it (I would love to but right now it’s just too gosh darn hot for either of us to be smushed together for longer than a grocery store trip).  Luckily he’s chill enough to let me get 3-4 hours of work done for my part time job that I do from home (and am immensely grateful for), as well as keeping a clean house (so I haven’t had to calm my inner OCD yet – which honestly probably needs to happen) and occasionally (thought not as often as I used to) I have time for a craft project here and there AND I still have plenty of time for cuddles – seriously no one need worry that I don’t hold my kid enough.

Anyway the purpose of this post was not to gloat over my glorious child 😉 but to say hey! fellow bloggers don’t throw out words like “bad momma” willy nilly!  Everyone has different mothering styles and basically people…don’t judge.  I’m not going to lie – I used to see people with their babies and they might be doing “no-no’s” like wearing their child facing forward, or putting the car seat in the top part of the buggy, or playing on their iphone.  And I judged.  But now that my little guy is here I realize that all of us are just trying to do the best we can to ‘survive’ and we have to make our own judgments about what to do with our children – am I going to wear my child facing forward probably not (mostly due to the fact that I have a 100 dollar child carrier that doesn’t allow that option 😉 ) – but hey stay informed and then make your own decisions that work best for your family.

Side Note:  Last night my child peed himself in the face during a diaper change – I just wiped his face off and went back to sleep – if you told me this I probably would have been like “oh no poor baby” – not poor baby – pee is sterile and I was sleep deprived from a cranky baby – he can wear a little pee until morning – he’s fine.  Have I heard him poop as I watched his eyes close to go to sleep?  Yes – Have I let him sit in it until he wakes up? Yes – Am I a bad mom? – No – so there.

Rant Over

1 month!

Hello blog readers!  Major changes have been underway – 1) we are temporarily without our domain name…hopefully we’ll get that back in the next month or so 2) I’ve combined my two blogs.  Jaclyn has given me permission to completely overtake the blog – with a new baby it’s just easier to only worry about one blog instead of two!  She has promised to remain a guest poster 🙂

1 month old – 8/29/13

Weight: 9lbs 14 ounces on Monday – he’s been gaining over an ounce a day so he’s probably ten pounds by now!

Length: 21.6 – which is shorter than when he was born 😉 – so someone didn’t stretch him out all the way.

Looking forward to: his Nana and Papaw are visiting this weekend and his first UGA game!  Go Dawgs!

Changes: We’ve been using our cloth diapers for about two weeks and we absolutely love them!  I’ll take pictures to share later.

He’s started spitting up more…not fun.

Things he likes: – his bouncer, his pacifier (it’s new but he likes it), grabbing the mini blinds while being changed, riding in the car, buggy, or stroller

Things he doesn’t like: his swing, being left alone in his room, when I take a shower 😉

Activities & Outings: He’s been to target three times (protected in the ergo so people couldn’t get him).  We also had an adventure recently to get B’s truck fixed – so he got to go to the auto shop, to a rental shuttle, to a rental (I got a lot of car seat installation practice)

Nicknames: Little B, Bro, Broseph, Little dude.

 

We also got his newborn photos back!  Exciting.

For GiGi the schoolbus driver

 

2 weeks old

two weeks – 8/12/13

Week Two

Week two began our first week at home alone.  Daddy had to go back to work so we are on our own during the day.  We are still trying to get in a routine between feedings and changing plus me working from home.  Not to mention the normal household chores of laundry – we have more laundry with this little boy.  Things get peed on – often.

Weight: 8 lbs 4 oz (according to our scale)

At our doc appointment last Thursday he weighed 8 lbs 1 oz.  At his age, he should be gaining .5-1 ounces a day…which he is!

Looking forward to: starting cloth diapers this week

Changes: Our doc recommended that we start giving little B his vitamin D supplement every day (ish) – Breastfed babies do not get adequate amounts of vitamin D so you have to give them a bit extra!

Also, today the last part of his cord fell off (wasn’t really his cord but the scab that was left) – Hooray so now we can take a big boy bath and start our cloth diapers!

Things he likes: – eating (duh), looking at the mini blinds in the bedroom (he can see the light and shadows), being jiggled

Things he doesn’t like: hiccups (he gets them all the time!), his swing on high speeds

Activities & Outings: This weekend, LB and I had our first shopping adventure – we had to go to target for some groceries.  He did great!  I didn’t want people touching him or peering at him so we wore the Ergo which I love!  It was so comfy too walking around in Target – he napped the whole time.  The only negative is that we get a bit warm with him squished against me – so he was all sweaty when we got back to the car.

Today we started going on our stroller walks – I think occasionally I’ll use the Ergo instead of the stroller but I didn’t go out until noonish and it was a bit warm outside!

He’s enjoying tummy time – as much as he can anyway.  As long as silly Mommy doesn’t try to do it too soon after a meal – because then we spit up.  duh!

tummy time

cutie

yay! Belly button!

 

Brody Luke – 1 week old

08/05/13 – 1 week old

Well if I’d done my 39 week photo like I was supposed to, it would have been my last.  Little B was born one day before his due date.

Born: 7/29/13 at 3:38 p.m.
Weight: 7 lb 7 oz
Length: 21.75 inches long
Where: UNC Hospital, Chapel Hill, NC

Brief Labor Story:

My contractions started Sunday evening, Brett was home from work.  By midnight they were about 3 minute apart so we went to the hospital and found out I was barely dilated so they sent us home.  Brett had to leave for work around 5:00 a.m.  My water broke around 6ish so I called him to come pick me up.  We were back at the hospital by 7:30.  I knew that they were going to keep us this time around since my water had broken, but I was thrilled to learn I’d dilated to 5 cm.  By 9, I had my epidural so I was in a super good mood.  We had two wonderful labor and delivery nurses and everyone was so nice.  By 1:00 pm, I was fully dilated so we just wanted a while for Brody to come a bit further down on his own.  He was born at 3:38 p.m.  His heart rate dropped a bit during delivery but once he was out – he was perfect!

After delivery, they thought Brody’s blood sugar was a bit low because I’d had gestational diabetes.  But they continued to monitor it and it returned to normal!  He had a little cupcake sticker on his bassinet to indicate he was a ‘sugar baby.’

This week he has had many firsts –

First car ride home 7/31

First Stroller Ride

First Doctor’s Appointment

First walk with Axel

First bath – not the best picture but I don’t want to over share.

First tummy time – which Brody took to mean take a nap