Category Archives: baby

Brrr

I think the one bad thing about having a baby in the winter is that it makes going outside even less desirable than usual. It’s easy enough to bundle up Phoebe with her warm car seat cover, but we also want to avoid exposing her to the many ickies that are making their rounds. Thankfully she’s just had normal baby congestion, but we need to get the humidifier on the furnace looked at as it isn’t working and would make a huge difference if it was. In the meantime, the kids and I stay inside a lot, and make Josh do lame Winter maintenance. 😉

While Enzo’s growing independence can be somewhat difficult at times, it’s also great to see him more able to play on his own now. He spends more time in his bedroom, and he’s really getting into his puzzles and reading. Often at night he falls asleep reading after we’ve said “Night Night.” Keeping this in mind, we cracked open a reuseable sticker pad, and he’s been enjoying it. He doesn’t fully understand that you can create scenes with the stickers, but loves to pull it out and generally wants to see the Choo-Choo page.

Mostly his creations end up being of tragic train crashes and carnage, but eventually that might change… or not, if he’s his father’s son. 😉

We’re finally at a point where we’ve gotten the downstairs better arranged, so we’ll move some of Enzo’s bulkier toys down there that way there’s more room to play and offer him a change of scenery during the winter months when we’re indoors more. Plus, Phoebe needs room for her bouncy chair and blanket and eventually other bulky infant toys that we’ll have to split between the upstairs and down. If anything, Enzo will just be glad to see his kitties more often… too bad Ziggy is never excited to see him. Oh well, she’ll have to learn.

Just about over…

And just like that, almost 6 weeks is gone and it’s back to work I go on Monday morning. As you can probably guess, I’m not super excited about going back. I know Phoebe will be well looked after at day care, but still… she’s so tiny and I know she won’t be held as often as I hold her during the day and I’ll miss those sleepy baby smiles. Unlike Enzo, she’s a hard one to catch smiling on camera. 😉 Sassy little miss.

Most often she’s quite seriously taking in everything around her, or… sleeping. It’s kind of nice that babies sleep so often at this age, especially since I’ve caught Enzo’s cold and have been rather tired and under the weather for about almost a week now. I’m just glad it’s now rather than right as I start work, and I’m hoping that since Phoebe isn’t showing signs of illness yet, she won’t at all. I’d hate for her to get sick so young, though, I know sending her to day care during the winter is risking it… not that we really have a choice in the matter.

I am hoping that things will settle down once we’re back into our old routine, or rather start a new routine. I know Enzo has always done better when things are done the same way each day, so hopefully over the next few weeks he’ll get back to his old happy self… or this is the terrible 2’s we’re entering and there’s simply no going back. Don’t let this happy face fool you – he’s been a bit of a terror lately.

He’s still very attached to his pacifier and demands it all the time – as well as a number of things or else he melts into a crying puddle on the ground. Offer him a sippy when he doesn’t want it? Melt-down. It’s tiresome, that’s for sure. We’ve been trying to get him to bed earlier because we thought he might be sleep-deprived, but despite our best intentions he simply sits awake in bed until the usual time, so maybe sleep has nothing to do with it. We’re also trying to have Josh take care of Phoebe a bit more giving me the chance to get Enzo ready in the morning or evening, but he often cries for Daddy and pushes me away at first. Last night, I put my foot down and told him Daddy was feeding Phoebe so he was stuck with me, and he cried a bit at first, but I just stayed out of his reach and eventually he acted like nothing happened and was happy I was there. Toddlers are exhausting. I suppose we should have expected this since Enzo was such a easy and happy baby… we were bound to have a super emotional toddler. We have discovered that he’s just really trying to be very independent right now, so we’ve been doing what we can to allow him to do things on his own – a stool so he can climb into his chair, and letting him walk down the stairs and out to the car on his own two feet. I just hope these tantrums relax a bit in the future.

Pretty In Pink

Who would have thought we’d be surrounded by so much pink and that it would actually grow on me? While we didn’t use much pink in Phoebe’s room decor, most little girl items are pink, and while at first we tried to avoid it, I have willingly given in.

When we found out we were expecting #2, I admit I really wanted a second boy. Boys were familiar and I figured it would be easier to just have boys and nice for Enzo to have a brother, but I should have known better. Josh and I had talked about our future family long before it was an actual thing, and we had always talked about having a boy and a girl – not that you can really choose these things, but that’s what we saw in our future. So, it really wasn’t a surprise when we found out Phoebe was a girl, and we had her name picked out since before we knew Enzo was a boy… it had just been waiting for it’s recipient.

Our lovely little girl. It’s a strange feeling that probably only a mother can understand, but as soon as I saw her I felt like I already knew her… and to an extent I did – I had carried her for 9 months after all. I love watching her every day, though, and wondering how she will change. The physical differences are already apparent when comparing her to Enzo’s baby photos, so I’m curious to see how much more she’ll change and who she’ll favor. I’m also wondering if she’ll be as happy of a baby as Enzo was and whether or not she’ll follow in her rowdy brother’s footsteps or be more of the quiet mouse I imagined.

Either way, I’m glad these two will have each other. I was lucky to have both a sister and a brother, and I can already see how much Enzo loves his baby sister. He gives her sweet little kisses and always wants to know where she is and what she’s doing. The other night he insisted that we all sit in his room together for stories before bed… even “Bee Bee,” which warmed my heart. He normally just wants Mommy and Daddy, so last night when he specifically requested her when Josh tried to come in without her, it was a nice moment, and I got a glimpse of the nights to come as they grow older. I know they won’t always get along, but at least I’ll always have these moments to remind them of. 😉

3 Weeks

It’s amazing how quickly three weeks can pass. The first week passes so fast simply because a couple of those days are spent in the hospital and then you have the various doctors appointments, then the second week we had my mom here, which was a big help especially with Enzo being home for a great deal of that time since day care was closed for Thanksgiving.

We’re so happy to have Miss Phoebe here, but it’s amazing how different having a baby is when you already have a toddler under the age of 2. While Enzo loves to give his baby sister kisses and bring her nuk whenever she cries, he is also very much going through a bit of a regression. He takes her bottles, has become very dependent on his nuk lately, wants to be held almost constantly, and has been throwing more tantrums than usual. He hasn’t been very happy with me lately – probably because I’m the main person feeding her and for the first few weeks my time was mostly spent nursing, supplementing and pumping for the baby, so there has been some jealousy. At the very least, he’s attached to Josh for the most part, but that isn’t always a good thing if Josh needs to step away.

Hopefully over the next couple of weeks things will settle down and Enzo will get used to our new addition. With luck we can come up with some kind of new routine by the time I head back to work so that we can both spend more equal amounts of time with him as well (if he wants to that is). I admit it’s hard when he cries and I go to hold him and he says, “No, Daddy.” I guess I can’t blame him, though… his world has been turned upside down and Mama does spend a tad more time with the new gal rather than her little boy.

That being said, I’m also still trying to get our little miss used to taking naps in her crib. So far she really only sleeps well when being held or nuzzled up against me at night. Obviously not something we can keep up long term since she’ll be in day care in three weeks, though.

39 Weeks

On 11/12/13 I would have been 39 Weeks pregnant, however, baby girl had other plans in mind. Unlike her brother, she would be a tad early and arrive in an entirely different fashion.

It was around 7:00pm on Monday night when I started feeling cramping and lost my mucous plug. Sorry if that’s TMI. I knew that it could mean labor could start soon, or still hold out for another week or so, so I didn’t think too much of it, but let Josh know and tried to prepare a few things. We stuck to our normal routine and by 8:30 we were hanging out in bed and decided to watch something. It was around 9:00 when the contractions hit, though I figured as with Enzo, we’d have a while before anything really happened.

This time it was different, though. The contractions went from 10 minutes to 8 minutes pretty fast and then before we knew it, we hit 4 minutes apart and they were getting more and more intense. This was not going to be like Enzo’s birth with a slow and steady increase over time. Josh quickly started getting our things together and I attempted to help in between contractions, while he let his sister know we’d be dropping off Enzo sooner than expected. The little man was slightly disoriented, but mostly asleep as we all bundled up and headed out to the car sometime after midnight.

We weren’t even halfway to Josh’s sister’s house before we had to change plans. .. my water broke in the car. I remember telling Josh it had happened, but was mostly concerned about the upholstery. 😉 The plan was now to just get to the hospital and Leah would meet us there. It was the longest drive ever, even though Josh was speeding big time and every bump was torture as the contractions got more intense and closer together. Josh kept apologizing for every bump until I yelled at him to stop apologizing. Ha ha.

We finally arrived and even though Enzo was wide awake, he was quiet as a mouse, taking it all in. We were hit with our first roadblock when the elevators weren’t working, however, so there I was leaning over a chair while Josh held Enzo and the security guard attempted to do something as slowly as possible and then proceeded to tell me to “get in” mid contraction. Thanks, Guy. We were rushed pretty quickly to a room and while I waited for Josh’s sister and the tub to fill the nurses and my midwife got ready. It was all happening a lot faster than I anticipated and I was definitely taken off guard. Leah arrived and Enzo said ” Buh bye, Mama” and before I knew it I was 8cm dilated and getting moved to the tub.

I’m so glad I got the water birth I had wanted to have with Enzo. The warm water felt so good, even though I wouldn’t be in it for long. Within about an hour of arriving I was ready to push and suddenly it was over. Our precious girl was here, born at 2:18 am and weighing just 6 pounds and 11 ounces. I’m still shocked that it only took about 5 and a half hours, which I definitely prefer over 38 hours. 😉 It was everything I could have hoped it would be.

Dino and Bunnies

Every day adventures