3 Months

Boo!

Wow.  I can't believe our little Boo Boo Bear is 3 months old already!  Time really does fly.  What to say about Felix....well for starters he slept 7.5 hours straight two nights ago and 7 hours last night. STRAIGHT!  This is amazing.  He went from giving us one 4-5 hour stretch to this wonderful bliss.  I'm afraid it's a fluke, but who knows.  I guess we'll see.  The bad part about him sleeping so much is that he was still asleep when I left for work.  That made me very sad because I didn't get to nurse him before I left.  I try to get to work at 7 so I can leave at 4.  No more OT for me!  I would have stuck around in the morning, but who knew when he was going to wake up.  Of course, he woke up right after I left.  :-(  I really love nursing Felix, I am already dreading the day I have to wean him.  Or he has to wean me, I should say.  It is just so beautiful to watch him and have those snuggles that are all mine.  Growing him in my womb and giving him life was amazing, but I think being able to sustain him and watch him grow from the food that only I can supply is even better.

Felix is just amazing and is really starting to show his personality.  He is happiest in the mornings (he definitely does not get this from his father).  He will give us lots and lots of smiles and coos then.  Sammer gets up with him  during the week, which is a lot earlier than his usual wake up time, and gets to spend some quality Daddy/Felix time.  He says he doesn't mind getting up early.  I have a feeling this is probably the highlight of his day.  :-)  I love that they get this bonding time together.  Sammer loves his little boy so much, and I love watching them together.  They have their own little routine where Sammer feeds and changes him, they play a little, and he "watches" Sammer get ready for work.  It should also be noted that Sammer is an amazing husband and gets up with Felix at least one day on the weekend so that I can sleep in a little.  Have I said lately how much I love that man?

So Felix is smiling a lot, I think his favorite thing is getting his diaper changed.  He will smile, smile, smile during and after.  There is a little jacket hanging above the changing table and he loves looking at it, he even reached for it this morning.  He seems to be getting more comfortable in the bath.  He's always kind of liked it but now he just looks more at ease and less tense.  We have yet to get a smile during bath time, but I know it is coming soon.  I was so close to getting one tonight.  We can tell that he is trying to talk so hard but only gets out a sound every once in a while.  It's adorable, of course.  The same thing can be said for reaching for/grabbing toys.  He is thinking so hard about it but doesn't actually get his hand up there very often.  He did grab the rattle last week when my parents were here though, that was so cool!  He sits in the bumbo every few days but he can't hold his head up for too long so he doesn't stay there much.

Poor Elvia was initiated with not only one but two big poops.  I can't believe he pooped (big!) twice in one week.  Yesterday it was all over both of them, Elvia was cleaning herself off when I came home.  I should have known it was coming, he was letting out some major man sized toots when I left him in the morning.  Good thing he is so cute!

We don't have another doc appointment until 4 months so I don't have any stats to share this month.  Rest assured that he is growing like a weed and getting cuter every day!  Here is a link to his 3rd month in pictures.  I am particularly partial to the pictures in the froggie pajamas.  Seriously cute.  Check out the difference between the first and last pictures. 

Felix's likes are smiling at Mommy and Daddy, diaper changes, the octopus on his play mat, the baby in the mirror (oh yeah!  He is starting to notice himself in the mirror and it is just precious!), snuggling of course, standing on us and stretching his legs, watching the fishies (this is sometimes the only thing that will calm him down - thanks to Nannie for figuring that one out) and sucking on his fists, particularly the left one.  Oh and drooling.  He drools like a champ!  He also likes hanging out with his buddies Quinn, Amelia, and Sophie.  Ok, Mommy likes hanging out with their mommies.  :-)  We all met up with them and their daddies at the NXNW Oktoberfest last weekend, it was a lot of fun and aside from the car ride Felix was a dream!

Carolyn & Amelia, Anne & Sophie, Lauren & Quinn, Mommy & Felix

The car seat is really his only dislike.  There are two very long 8 hour (at least) road trips in our near future so I really hope he starts disliking it a little less soon.  Sammer finally experienced a meltdown of epic proportions the other day and I think he now realizes that I wasn't lying all of this time.  I wish I had been, I hate it when he is sad.  He has even begun arching his back when I start putting him in the seat.  :-(  Elvia took him for a long walk in it the other day so maybe things are looking up!

Felix is 3 months old, and as precious as ever.

Oh, and a big, fat DUH.

Felix is sleeping in his crib at night!  He has been napping in there off and on for a few weeks but Sunday night was the first night in the crib.  It's funny, he looks like Andre the Giant in the bassinet but a little bitty munchkin in the crib.  Even though the crib is exactly 11 steps from our bed, I still use the monitor.  Sammer thinks this is silly but I'm so afraid that I won't hear him cry for some reason.  I'm sure we'll be able to ditch it soon, but I really don't care about being overly cautious right now. 

I miss having him in our room, but at the same time it is really nice to have our space back.  Now we don't have to worry so much about getting ready for bed or leaving the lights on to read, or the loudness of toons on the laptop.  I guess this means he is growing up though.  SOB.  He is really getting big, more on that in a couple of days.  He is almost 3 months old, ya know. 

He took to the crib just fine, I think.  No problems at all on Sunday night.  Last night he was a little difficult to get to sleep.  That started from the beginning of bedtime though, so not sure it is crib related.  It could be separation related since yesterday was the first day with the nanny.  Who knows.  He finally went down at 9:00, which really isn't too unusual, then up at 9:30, we thought down at 10:00 but really he didn't go down for real until 11:00.  The silver lining?  He only woke up once, at 3am, then he was up for the day at 6:45. 

I am working from home today and Thursday.  It's so hard to hear him cry in another room without going in there.  He wasn't even really crying, just fussing because he was hungry.  But, Elvia is great.  He seems to really like her so that is good.  I notice that she doesn't have to hold him all of the time like we sometimes do.  Hmm. 

I can't say goodbye without a picture.  Here he is in the awesome outfit that our friend Katie made for him.

Pacman!

 

 Felix is 12 weeks, 6 days old.

A job ain't nothin' but work

Well the day came and I went back to work on Thursday, October 20th.  It wasn't so bad, not as bad as I was expecting anyway.  That's because my sister was here and she watched him for the first two days.  That made me feel very at ease, I knew I could call her 100, OK 1,000, times and she wouldn't care and wouldn't think I was (too) crazy.  It was really special that Sissy watched Felix.  Seeing her with Felix just made my heart happy.  I love to see how much our families love him.  

 

 

 

We interrupt this blog for a cute little froggie.  Are these not the cutest pajamas ever?

The first day of work actually wasn't that bad, I'm sure because Sissy was here.  Felix decided that he didn't want to sleep Wednesday or Thursday night though, so that sucked.  I essentially got 45 minutes of sleep on Wednesday and 1 1/2 hours on Thursday.  Fantastic.  I think he knew I was going back to work because he just wanted to be held.  Back to work...it was kind of nice to use my brain for something other than trying to figure out how to make Felix sleep or poop.  Plus I didn't do a whole lot.  I pumped about an hour after getting there, then visited, then went to the benefits fair, then visited, pumped, had lunch, deleted some of the 14,899 emails that I received while out (no exaggeration), pumped, and went home.  Of course, I got there as early as possible so that I could leave as early as possible.  I was fine until I drove into our neighborhood.  I think I was just overwhelmed by the thought of seeing him soon.  There are a couple of pluses about going back to work.  1) It is easier to organize life with Outlook at my fingertips, easier to run errands and "research" on the internet, and 2) I can drive with the windows down and the radio up.  That is a glorious luxury that I have missed since Mr. Felix came along.

Today was the first day that the nanny, Elvia, came.  I was a little more nervous today.  Of course everything went just fine.  Elvia came before Sammer left for work and he said everything was peachy when he left.  Then he came home for lunch and Felix was fine until he picked him up, then he started crying.  It didn't last long though.  Felix initiated Elvia with a good poop.  Poor lady.  He only poops once a week and she got it.  I knew he would poop today, the toots and spit up have been coming on strong the last couple of days.  I have been sleeping with a little bunny lovey so that Felix could be comforted by my smell when I wasn't around.  Elvia said that he loved it.  I hope so, because when I came home it was on his face while he was sleeping in the bouncy chair.  hmm...we will have a chat about that in the morning. 

I am working from home on Tuesday and Thursday this week, just to ease back into it all.  It will be interesting being here while someone else (not named Sammer) is taking care of him.  I'm afraid we may have another night like Wednesday or Thursday...Felix will not sleep.  He went down about 9:00 and woke up 30 minutes later.  It's now almost 10:30 and we cannot get him back down.  He needs and wants to be swaddled, but he is fighting it because he wants his hands to munch on.  Well, his arms flail and wake him up.  Should be a fun night!  Here are some pictures to help us get through it.

First time in the bumbo

Super happy baby!

Last day at home together

Felix is 12 weeks, 5 days old (Do I have to start saying this in months?  If so, he is 2 months, 4 weeks and 5 days old.  That's not much better.)

Our baby is sick

Cue major sad face here.  :-(

Poor baby, we (the nurse, Sammer and I) think he has a cold.  He is super sniffly, runny nose, sneezing and coughing.  It started day before yesterday, he had a runny nose at night and a sort of tough time sleeping.  You could tell he didn't feel good and it's like his nose would drain and that would make him cough when he was lying down.  Yesterday it got a lot worse so I called the pediatrician.  There really isn't anything they can do, it just has to run the course.  The nurse told me to get some saline to spray in his nose before using the aspirator.  His nose is pretty runny and he's sneezing more.  Last night Sammer stayed up with him until about 1:00 while he slept in the Snuggle Lamb (thanks, Mike and Jenn!).  Then I fed him and stayed up with him until about 3:00.  I decided I probably needed to get some sleep so I could be on top of my game to take care of him today.  He woke up about 4:30 and I fed him and held him for another hour.  I got a little weepy and every time I would sniffle it would wake him up, so back to bed we went.  He slept until 8:00!  That is unreal, folks.  Usually he would have gotten up once, maybe twice by 8:00.  He was up for about an hour or so and is sleeping again.  He has lots and lots of snot coming out.  That's good, but I'm sure he's making more as we speak.  His temp was 99.8, getting close to calling the pedi time again.  Poor baby, I just hate this for him.

The good thing is he seems pretty happy.  He's given me lots of smiles and laughs today, between the sadness of having his nose sucked for the umpteenth time.  He doesn't hate it too much, he's a good sport, but he lets me know when we're done with it.  We're having a pajama day and I've read him lots of stories and shared lots of cuddles.  It just breaks my heart that he doesn't feel good.  I thought I knew what love was when I fell in love with Sammer, and don't get me wrong, I love him more than anything.  But Felix...wow, the love just jumps to a whole new level with your child.  There is nothing that would stop me from taking care of him, providing for him, being with him, doing anything for him.  Earthquake?  No.  Tsunami?  No.  Nuclear war?  No way, Jose.  He is my baby.  I would sell all of my possessions and live in a cardboard box if I had to.  And I know Sammer would do the same.  We love our little Boo Boo more than we ever could have imagined.

Extreeeeme close up!

I now understand even more why my parents had picked up my sister and were on their way down here less than an hour after hearing that I had an emergency C-section.  All of those times that they've told me how much they love me and how they would do absolutely anything for me, Sissy, and Bobby really sink in now.  I guess before it was kind of, "Yeah, yeah, I know you love me and I love you, too," but now I get it.  I didn't think it was possible, but having a child makes me love my parents even more.

This is my last week of maternity leave, I go back to work next Thursday.  BOO!!!  We're trying to make the most of it...Monday we met Lauren, Quinn, Carolyn, and Amelia for a walk in Hyde Park (which was lovely), yesterday we went to Baby Day at the Alamo with Lauren and Quinn and saw 50/50.  (Oh, and let me just tell you that Mr. Felix did not make a peep in  the car all the way up to the Lakeline Alamo!   That is FAR people! He slept in the sling through the entire movie, cried a little on the way out of the parking lot and then fell asleep for the ride home.  Oh my gosh, it was heaven!  Last time we went somewhere, he got so upset he made himself sick and puked on the car seat.)  Today we were heading for yoga but looks like only snuggles in our future instead.  In the movie, the main character has cancer (with a 50/50 chance of surviving).  He isn't close to his mother because she is a little coo-koo and overbearing.  Of course when it comes down to surgery time, she is there for him and he is grateful.  She meets his therapist and immediately says, "I want you to know I smother him because I love him."  I know I will continue to smother Felix, I just hope I can find that right balance of smothering and giving him freedom when he gets older.  Right now, of course it is my job to smother him.  And I love every minute of it.

Felix is 11 weeks old today (2 months and 15 days)

PS - Today is Daddy's birthday, as well as Felix's cousin Robert's birthday.  Happy Birthday to Daddy and Robert!!  

Sleep? We don't need no stinkin' sleep!

Oh man.  Since his shots last week, we've had two nights of waking up every two hours.  Except for last night, when he decided to wake up every two hours for a while and then went to every hour.  That was fun.  Poor baby.  The nurse said the rotovirus vaccine could cause an upset tummy for up to two weeks.  I've made a pot of mint tea so that should help if it is his tummy.  I hope it was just a fluke, although he did seem a little sad.  Molds are really high here right now (you know, from all of the rain we've been getting....) and he had a bit of a snotty nose last night, too.  I can't seem to get anything out with the aspirator. I'm tempted to buy one of these.  Maybe that's what was bothering him.  Of course, he will sleep for hours if one of us is holding him.  Mommy is not down with that at night though.  When that happens, I don't get sleep.  If I don't get sleep, it's difficult to function and make sound decisions in taking care of Mr. Felix.  Sigh.  I know he needs to sleep more, I just wish he could.

I forgot to post pictures from his one month photo shoot.  Here he is at one month.

I didn't think he had grown much until I saw the pacifier in his mouth.  That sucker is huge!  The t-shirt he is wearing was given to us by our sweet neighbors, The Sullivans (Jake, Paula, Jarrett, Brian, and Clayton).  Paula was very sick with cancer and they went on one last family vacation to Port Aransas just after Felix was born.  She was so sweet to think of Felix and brought him this cute little shirt.  Sadly, Miss Paula passed away on August 25th.  Her son, Brian, brought the shirt over to us and said how appropriate it was that Felix's first outing (aside from doctor visits) was the morning she passed.  We saw Brian that morning as he was on his way to be with his mother.  Paula is certainly missed by everyone who had the pleasure of knowing her. 

Felix is 9 weeks, 5 days old