Well, that tears it. We're officially grown ups. Yesterday we put aside our pride and said goodbye to our youth and bought ourselves a minivan. Nah, I'm just being dramatic. I actually got over the anti-cool factor and started lusting after power sliding doors about five minutes after we left the hospital with Philip. And now, the wait is finally over. We are now the proud owners of a new-to-us, certified pre-owned silver pine mica '09 Toyota Sienna LE. Aahhhhhh. The 8 seater model. You know what that means right? Room for four more kiddos!
*Insert picture of Phil packing his suit case here*
Okay, maybe just one more... or two. ;-)
In any case, it's the ultimate family vehicle and I'm so glad relieved we finally crossed the line from life in the fast lane to life in the car pool lane. They really ought to hand these things out when you leave the hospital along with those diaper bags full of formula samples!
I haven't been very good about keeping up with this blog since Andrew was born. To be honest, I just don't have the time! I'm back at work part-time and taking care of two little boys and a household the rest of the time. By the time I get Andrew to sleep at night (and he's just now starting to fall asleep at a predictable time and stay asleep once I lay him down in his bed) all I want to do is mindlessly surf the web and hang out with Phil. So it's not that there's nothing going on or that I have nothing to say, it's just that there's not enough time to talk about everything that's going on!
December was a super busy month. Normally I love Christmas and the anticipation and business of the days leading up to it, but this year I could really take it or leave it. Not sure why. Blame it on the sleep deprivation! However, this year we have a two year old who was very into this thing called Christmas and you couldn't help but get excited too when you saw it through the eyes of a little one just big enough to get excited himself!
So despite constantly feeling like there wasn't enough time to get everything done, we managed to pull off a great first Christmas as a family of four. We put up lights. We saw Santa. We baked cookies. We had pictures taken of the boys in their holiday clothes and sent out Christmas cards. We bought we may more presents than originally planned!
Christmas morning was so fun. We got the boys up and dressed, and I went downstairs and put cinnamon rolls in the oven, made coffee, lit the tree, and turned on Christmas music. Phil brought Philip and Andrew downstairs where I was waiting, video camera in hand, to catch Philip's reaction when he saw that Santa Claus did indeed come, just as we had been telling him for the past few weeks. It was so fun to watch him opening his gifts!
Once the gifts were all open Phil made us a basil and potato frittata and we spent the rest of the day enjoying our new presents and each other's company. As a child of divorced parents, I spent almost every Christmas of my childhood traveling in between houses on Christmas day. I made a promise to myself back then that when I had a family of my own, I wouldn't make my kids leave their new toys behind and pack us all into the car to go visit relatives. Visiting with family is done on Christmas Eve and the days after Christmas, but Christmas day is reserved for us. So far, I absolutely love it!
After all, I wouldn't have been able to enjoy this peaceful moment in quite the same way had we not been in the comfort of our own home. ♥
Because I was curious after weighing Andrew yesterday, I took the boys' measurements this morning.
Philip: 27 1/2 months old
Weight: 26 pounds
Height: 34 3/4 inches
Percentiles: 15th for weight, 32nd for height
And these are mostly for posterity because I'm a dork and like to know exactly how he is still fitting in his rear facing car seat!):
Torso length: 12 1/4 inches
Seated height: 20 1/4 inches
Andrew: 4 months old
Weight: 17 1/2 pounds
Height: 24 3/4 inches
Percentiles:
84th (!!) for weight, 29th for height
Car seat measurements:
Torso length: 9 1/2 inches
Seated height: 15 1/2 inches
Andrew's measurements are as accurate as I could get with a bathroom scale, a measuring tape, and a wiggly baby! I will know for sure how big he is next week at his check up!
He's just too darn cute. And getting sooo big! He has his 4 month well baby appointment next week so we will find out for sure then, but I attempted to weigh him here at home and I think he is close to 18 pounds. Wow! Our 2 year old is only 26 pounds! Needless to say , Andrew is foiling my plans for getting extra use out of all of Philip's baby clothes. He's already in size six months. At 4 months of age, Philip was finally fitting comfortably into size 3 months clothing. What a contrast!
Andrew is such a joy. He's still a complete Mommy's Boy but he's becoming more and more comfortable with Daddy these days which is such a relief. He's still nursing every two hours hours, pretty much around the clock. Sleeping through the night appears to be a ways off at this point in time. It's okay though. This time around, I am soaking up every minute of my mommy and baby time as I know all too well how fast it goes!
He hasn't rolled over yet but I think it's coming. When we lay him down he works really hard at trying to swing one leg over to the other side. He watches his big brother run around all day with such interest. You can tell he is just itching to get moving, too! He enjoys tummy time and is working hard at pushing himself up with his arms when he's laying on his belly. He's already a strong little boy.
He's also a very "oral" baby like Philip never was. I can already tell we are going to have to be more careful about what gets left out within his reach once he's a bit older. Everything he manages to get his hands on already goes right to the mouth! He is also very talkative. I swear he just loves the sound of his own voice! In addition to cooing and babbling, he shrieks, squeals, and laughs and is just a loud baby in general!
He loves to stand up. He isn't content with sitting down for long and prefers to be held standing up right so he can practice picking up his feet and moving his adorably chubby legs.
He still has blonde hair and bright blue eyes and he's just gorgeous. But I still marvel every day how two people can have two children who look so completely different. It's been discovered that, while Philip looks exactly like both his mommy and daddy smooshed together, Andrew looks remarkably like his grandpa! The resemblance to Phil's dad is just too funny: when Doug is holding Andrew it looks like he's holding his own son!
Philip is a wonderful big brother to Andrew. He has yet to show any signs of jealousy and he loves to show Andrew his toys and give him hugs and kisses. Tonight we decided to make an attempt at giving them a bath at the same time and Philip was so excited to have his brother in the tub with him. He just adores him and you can tell Andrew is already in awe of his big brother. He thinks Philip is absoultely hilarious and will frequently smile at him and crack up laughing if Philip is also laughing. It warms my heart so much to see the two of them being to interact with each other. Truly, the best part of having two children is seeing their relationship with each other blossom. I hope they will always be best friends. I am so blessed to be the mother of two such wonderful little boys!
Yesterday we took the boys to see Santa. Philip lead us to believe he was excited about this, after weeks of us giving him prep talks about the big day. We were hopeful that he would surprise us and actually sit on Santa's lap and tell him what he wanted for Christmas (Bigfoot and a Woody doll), as he had been saying just that since we told him he was going to get to see Santa.
Ummm.... not so much.
And that was the best shot.
On the plus side, Andrew did great!
You've gotta love this age. He had no idea he was even sitting on someone's lap. All he knew was mommy was off to his right making big goofy faces at him. I only regret not taking Philip when he was Andrew's age for his first Christmas (I had all of these silly first time mom worries about germs--ha!)--that might have been our only shot at a picture of a smiling Philip sitting on Santa's lap! ;-)
Andrew turned three months old this past Wednesday. How the heck did that happen already?! What they say about it going even faster with the second baby is so true. These past three months have been a blur. I can't believe Andrew is already a quarter of a year old. He's so different from the newborn we brought home in August.
He is growing and changing by leaps and bounds! Our chunky monkey is such a contrast to our first baby, who was itty bitty at 6 lbs 3 oz and is still on the smaller side at just around 25 pounds at age 2. Andrew is already foiling my plans for lots of hand-me-downs by outgrowing his clothing far more rapidly than Philip ever did. Case in point: Philip was in newborn sizes until he was 2 months old. At 3 months old, Andrew is in 3-6 months sizes and steadily outgrowing those! He's not unusually large, by any means, but he has such a nice little baby heft to him . He's so cuddly and he has the best little cheeks for lots of kisses. He's just a beautiful baby, if I do say so myself. ;-) He's got silky blonde hair, and lots of it, and the prettiest blue eyes that absolutely light up when he smiles his big open-mouthed smile.
He's definitely attached to mommy. Oh my. Most of which probably has to do with the colic and stomach issues he's dealt with, and the fact that I am his food supply, of course. He's just now starting to come around to daddy if that is any indicator of the level of attachment we are dealing with here. I honestly don't mind it though. I know before long daddy will be the one in demand and he won't be so eager to cuddle with mama. I am treasuring our bonding time together. Little boys grow up fast.
Milestones from Andrew's 3rd month of life include:
Improved hand-eye coordination. He loves to lay in his play mat and bat at the colorful toys dangling in front of him. He holds on to objects that find their way into his hands. He likes to hang onto mommy's necklace or hair (ouch) while he's nursing. He's got a super strong grip!
Cooing and babbling. He's "talking" up a storm! He'll frequently let out these long sighs that turn into an exaggerated coo. So cute.
Recognizing mommy. He gets so excited when he spies me. His arms fly out anda he starts smiling and cooing.
Eating. He's still nursing every two hours and breastfeeding is still going well.
Sleeping.. nothing great to report here. Lately, he's been waking up very frequently. He normally does okay until about 3 am and then he's up a couple of times per hour until morning. I think the change in the weather has caused him to become stuffed up over night and he has a hard time breathing through his nose. I've tried everything to help with this and to no avail. Such a bummer because I don't think his sleep is going to improve until we get this stuffy nose problem under control.
The colic appears to be subsiding--Praise God!
Andrew celebrated his first holiday on Halloween. We didn't dress him up as he slept in the Ergo while we took Philip trick-or-treating around the neighborhood. Thanksgiving is this Thursday and we'll be headed to Northern Virginia to spend the holiday with Phil's family. I return to work part-time the following Monday and then Christmas will be right around the corner! It's definitely a busy but wonderful time of year, made all the more wonderful by the addition of our sweet baby boy.
