Getting ready for Christmas

I'm thankful I'm not pregnant for the all the holiday festivities.  I am enjoying the agility of my post-baby body and looking forward to working out again.  I still have a few pounds to lose (about 9) but considering I have two kids and this is what I looked like six weeks ago a few hours before giving birth, I 'd say I feel pretty good.

Things have still be going reasonably well.  The terrible 3's along with becoming a big sister have made me go a bit nuts with Gabs sometimes (and sleep deprivation doesn't help).  She thinks she can do everything by herself all the time and if she can't or doesn't work out right a tantrum is sure to ensue.  She plays dress up and changes her clothes several times a day which adds a lot of picking up and laundry to my day.  Not to mention she looks like a crazy person which erks me.  She's getting bigger, smarter, and more opinionated.  Fun fun. 

But when it comes to her brother she still loves him so much and never wants him to be sad or out of sight.  Gabrielle made it to see Santa, we cut down our Christmas tree, and made/decorated Christmas cookies.  Traditions done...check.  She also had parent observation night at dance class that I went to and it was so darned cute!!  It was a little crazy but Gabrielle did great....considering she just turned three! 

Oliver has been a good baby.  Pretty chill....just cranky mostly when he is tired or hungry.  He has big goofy smiles and it is so cute!  He is just a very sweet little boy I love bunches.  He just got through his first stuffy nose at 5 weeks old (thanks to having a big sister in preschool who loves to talk thisclose to his face all the time).  We had 2-3 rough nights of him not being able to breath and eat very well but we're back to him getting up twice a night usually. 

Getting our tree

The four generations of Taylor men

Taylor family Christmas

The first time playing on the playmat!  A bit cross-eyed but that's ok.

 

 My babies

Our precious boy :)

And our sweet girly girl

Gabrielle's 3rd Birthday Party

We went to Gab's well check around her birthday and she is doing well! 
27.5 lbs - 17th percentile
35.5 inches - 17th percentile
They stop measuring her head at age three and start taking blood pressure.  Tear.
She is still smaller but perfectly perportionate.

She is also starting (finally) to brush her teeth like a big girl and learning how to spit.  We should have started this about a year ago....but I kept putting it off until Nick finally tought her.  Thank him.

And today Nick and I took Gabs to her first movie at the theater!  She really is into movies and she loved it.  We saw Rise of the Guardians about Santa, the Easter Bunny, Jack Frost, etc and she picked out Skittles for a snack.  She thought it was pretty cool and it was nice for Nick and I to get out with her together while Oliver stayed with a sitter for a couple of hours.

So we finally had Gabrielle's third birthday party on December 2 and it turned out well!  She has been very into her birthday and had her cake picked out for months  (seriously) and she got to pick out all her party decorations herself this year.  I took her to party city and didn't choose princesses, but chose fairies/Tinkerbell instead.  We had sloppy joes, macaroni and cheese, and grapes for lunch - all Gabrielle's current favorites.  She could hardly wait to open her presents, though, so she didn't get much lunch eaten. 

She got lots of Cinderella stuff, some clothes, and some doctor stuff for her birthday.  She also got a "Gabrielle" doll which she thought was so cool.  It has plastic that you can snap on and off which she likes to (and can) do easily. 

Oliver - 1 Month

9 lbs 11 oz - 43rd %
22 inches - 78th %
39 cm head - 95th %

Oliver is one month old, and things have started to settle down around here.  It's definitely still a little crazy but much more doable than a couple of weeks ago.  Evenings are a little crazy between dinner, feedings, bath, bedtime Nick and I are pretty much non-stop until Gabrielle is in bed.  When I had one baby, even though it was hard, I felt like I didn't really need a whole lot of "help" with anything.  With the second baby.....I needed help and was only able to make it though the first month because of lots of help from Nick and visits from my mom and mother-in-law.   

His first night in his crib was this past Sunday.  It didn't go great.  He started off getting up every three hours...not horrible, but not quite the 3.5-5 that he had been doing.  Then after his 3:30am feed he was awake.  When he thinks it's time for "awake time" there's no stopping it.  He's wide-eyed.  I tried to force awake time to end after an hour and a half and I don't think he appreciated that.  Nick got up with him for a few minutes I think and before long he was ready to eat again....and then it was morning and kid #1 was ready for the day!  Ugh.  Anyways, didn't go great. 

The second night he did really well though!  We made sure to keep him awake in the evening and got up at 12:30 and 5:30 to eat - and went right back down easily.  Getting into a little schedule is helping.  He naps in his crib from about 3:30-5:30pm-ish, has awake time until about 9:00pm, wakes 12-1ish, and 4-5ish. 

He is out of newborn clothes and diapers and starting to smile more consistently every day.  He loves to look out the window, at the ceiling fan, and at pictures frames.  He does really well on tummy time; he'd usually prefer to be on his tummy than on his back on the floor. 

A few pictures from Oliver's first month.

Covered in sleepy babies.  When Oliver was a week or two old Gabs was kind of under the weather, so had both my babies take naps on me that day.

Cousins Isaiah and Oliver - about five months apart.

His first night in his crib....one of the few moments he was sleeping ;)

 

And the boy sleeping in in the morning after having awake time in the middle of the night............

 

1 Month Old!  And in his first 0-3 month outfit.

Oliver - 3.5 weeks

Oliver is 3.5 weeks old now and we are getting to know who this little person is.  He really is a good baby - he does not, however, like being in his carseat, being hungry, or being not quite full.  He also can be a bit cranky in the evening time, but nothing too horrible. 

He sleeps swaddled in his bassinet with blue b folded over his legs for anywhere from 2.5-5 (woot!) hours at a time.  And my favorite - he generally goes right back to sleep very easily.  I've planned to move him to his crib Sunday night, so we'll see how that goes.

He is the king of grunts and grunts so loud all the time. 

Likes to stretch and loves to lift his head up.  During tummy time he can lift his head, turn it the other way, and put it back down. 

I swear he is having real social smiles already which is so cute. 

He is a big burper but also spits up which is new to me.  Gabs had an iron stomach and only spit up about 4 times in her life.

At 2 weeks 6 days he had gained 12 ounces from birth. 

He loves to lay upright on my shoulder and sleep. 

Will take his paci periodically but still doesn't love it.  Which is fine I guess.

I'm still exclusively nursing him (he has had about 6 ounces of formula in his life), so we will see how that keeps progressing. 

The first week or two Gabrielle would get really upset when Oliver cried, but now she just looks at him and tells me "I think he's hungry...or he pooped his pants". 

She also thinks he has mastered his numbers already.  She'll get so excited when he's waving his arms around "he did a five!" or "he did a one - he knows his numbers!"

Oliver was laying on the floor the other day and Gabs and I were sitting by him and his flailing arm hit a maraca she was holding.  Gabi got so excited that they were "playing together". 

She really does love him.  She gets excited when he's awake and yells "His eyes are open!  It's awake-y time!"  and says "hi my big boy-ee".  So cute.

The babies

Gabrielle & Oliver. 

 

And Oliver's weigh in went really well yesterday.  He is up to 8 lbs 7 oz....he gained a 1/2 pound in 6 days which is wonderful!

The first 2 1/2 weeks with two kiddos....

I never thought an 8lb little bundle could make our lives so crazy!  We've had good days and bad days.....but basically Nick and I are working 24/7 to be sure the house is clean, the kids are bathed/dressed/fed, the laundry is done.....etc, etc.  Two kids are hard.  I don't know why it's such a change but it is.  I'm up at night with Oliver and then all day I am bouncing between Gabrielle and Oliver until I go to bed....for two hours....before Oliver's first night feeding.  Hard.  It is going well, I just always feel like I'm neglecting someone now that there are two with very different needs at this point. 

 

The first week went really well; the second week was kind of a mess (mostly due to feeding issues/mastitis).  The same thing happened as with Gabrielle - spiked a fever of 103 at five days old and kept getting them until I was on antibiotics.  I felt better but my milk supply has greatly diminished.  His first week of life he gained 7 oz (which is great!) and is second week of life he gained 1 oz.  Not so good.  I am trying a combination of herbs and medication to see if I can regulate again.  Oliver hasn't had to have any formula yet, but it's a possibility.  He goes for another weigh-in tomorrow.  Other wise he looks to be very healthy and pretty happy too, which is nice!  He has had great head control from birth and loves to lift his head while on your should or even a bit during tummy time. 

 

He seems to have a pretty good little schedule, and does well at night usually.  He sleeps for approximately three hour intervals at night, has awake time in the morning, sleeps mostly in the afternoon, and then has awake time from about 6pm-9pm before going to bed.  We won the paci war yesterday too!  I bought the Tommie Tippee pacifiers because they were supposed to be so good.  Well Oliver absolutely hated them and totally refused to use them - he'd rather have a finger or two if necessary.  Ugh.  So I picked up some cheap paci's from Meijer yesterday - he got that sucker in his mouth and never looked back.  Yay!

 

Gabrielle has been doing really well which is a giant help.  If she was a complete basket case on top of everything else I don't know what we would do.  I feel like she has grown up about five years since Oliver came.  She's much more independent from me and just in general.  Which is good and bad - the other day I was feeding Oliver and Gabi was carrying her stool upstairs.  I asked what she was doing and she said "I just going to get some lotion".  Oy....not something you want to hear from a three year old.  But really she is doing great and likes us to be all together. 

 

 

Meeting great grandma Pat

 

 

Jess came to meet Oliver

Oliver and great grandma Taylor

Gabrielle and great grandpa Taylor

Borrowing Grandma Jojo's pinky

Papa Paul holding Oliver for the first time

Meeting Uncle Greg

Greg held Oliver for a couple of hours so we could get some stuff done.  This was one of a couple of days that Oliver only wanted to sleep while being held.

 

His first real bath.  Before the actual washing began

After the washing started.....

 

 

And we even ventured to my parents for Thanksgiving. 

Feeding the birds with Papa