3 Months

J is 3 months! I'm still freaking out about that. :) He is our little blessing and changes so much everyday! I'm trying to think of where to start.

So, my sweet J is wearing 6 month clothes! I must have not realized how small his 3 month stuff was getting. One day I tried a 6 month and it fit so well, so when I went to put on a 3 month, I realized how small it was. LOL. J is still taking 6oz every 3 hours. The amazing news though is that we are finally completely off of his Nutramigen (his special formula for colic). He has done really well with the transition. So, if you saw my Facebook question about rice cereal (which was one of the dumbest things to do EVER!) we have decided to hold out. With him still adjusting to regular formula, we don't want to ruin the good thing we have going. While I appreciate people's ideas, no one knows my baby. I should have kept that question to myself. That opened a whole can of worms and in the end, I don't know that people really understood what I was asking. Anyway, lesson learned. :)

J is loving his voice. He has learned to squeal and loves to do it. He has started grasping at his toys that hang down from his play mat and will even put them in his mouth. Last week, J slept through the night every single night! However, Saturday he was super fussy, which isn't like him. He didn't sleep very well that night and then was fussy Sunday. He has followed this pattern since Saturday night. I know it is a month early, and is somewhat unlikely, but I am thinking he may be starting to try and get a tooth. He has been drooling excessively and chewing on anything that comes to his mouth. He hasn't had a fever either. So I pulled out his little Tommee Tippee "Chewther" and he is loving it.

Besides this little hiccup, J is such a good baby. He is so happy and fussiness is really out of character for him. I can safely say he is a mama's boy, but he also really loves his daddy! When Tejay gets home from work/school, if J hears his voice, he stops what he is doing and will look for him.

We are so excited to go through the holidays with him! On Thanksgiving, I gave J a lick of banana pudding. He LOVED it! He might be a banana boy, but really, if you drank milk all day, you might like the change in flavor also. :) We are loving all the fun holiday outfits also.

Other news: Tejay is almost done with his last fall semester of undergrad! He will graduate in May from ASU. He has started sending in applications for law school! I am so proud of him! He works so hard for us and still  manages to fulfill his Young Men's presidency calling, and take 18 credit hours! I seriously love him!

I ran my first 5k after J was born on Thanksgiving. For only having 6 weeks to train, I feel like I did well. I did it in 41:04. This includes the 6 stops we made with J before Tejay cut out early to take the fussy baby back. I think I will be doing another one in January to see just how much I can improve.

WARNING: Flood of pictures below! (No particular order).

Getting ready with mom.

J's first race.

He loves his new "perched" position.

Watching college basketball!

Not feeling very well. :(

Hanging out with mommy.

Finished the race!

Running is hard work!

Seriously mom?

Meeting Aunt Kacie

LOVE HIM!

He loves to nuzzle in to sleep.

Such a cute boy!

Setting the record straight...

 

So I didn't realize that I was falling in to what I call the "Facebook Life." The life that looks absolutely perfect online, when you really have struggles. I've had some family make comments about how things have been so easy or how things have been perfect. So I'm here to set the record straight. It isn't that I want to paint this fake picture of how our life is, I just don't think it is important to dwell on the bad. But, I'll still bare all... good and bad.

So starting with my pregnancy....
Yes, for the most part, my pregnancy went smoothly. I didn't have morning sickness at all, I was able to exercise through the majority of it, and I mostly felt great. However, I got soooooo swollen sooooo early! I didn't have ankles, calves, cheek bones, or a nose for at least half of my pregnancy. People deny it, but I know they were just being kind when they told me how good I looked. I've seen the pictures... Like the one below, and I am so embarrassed that I looked like that! Now that I have lost some baby weight, I will come out and admit that I gained 55 pounds! (I'm happy to say that I'm down 35.) So, basically everything looked peachy on the outside, but I am sooooo glad I'm not pregnant anymore!

38 weeks

Labor/Delivery: Ok, so really I can't say anything bad about this. Honestly it was so much better than I had expected/was told it would go. I did have a really negative nurse. She kept telling me that I would be in labor for at least 16 hours and push for 1-2 hours. It was nice to prove her wrong. The worst part of it all was the epidural. That part gives me anxiety thinking about having another baby. The lidocaine they give you to semi numb the area didn't work. Then, it took 3 tries to get everything good. It hurt so bad and I cried! But that was the worst of it.

First night home: Jaysen was up the WHOLE NIGHT! Tejay and I stayed up in shifts. I cried every time Jaysen cried because I was exhausted and I didn't realize how hard it would be. Then I would feel guilty if I was sleeping and Tejay wasn't. Jaysen had sleep issues for the first week. Every day around 5 I would start to have a panic attack thinking about the night time. I would worry about if he would sleep or be awake, if he would stay up after eating, etc.

At about 3 weeks Jaysen got colicky. For about a week he would cry and cry! There was one night I called Tejay while he was at school and made him come home because Jaysen had been crying for 3 hours. That was the hardest week of being a mom so far. I went back to getting panicky and crying when he cried. Once we got him on his special formula, it got much better. (And has continued getting better.)

Now, with an almost 3 month old, we have pretty good times. The only thing that I get anxiety about is putting him in his car seat. For some reason, when I go places with him, he hates being in his car seat and will usually cry a lot during a car ride. It is getting better and we are figuring out how to keep him entertained. :)

So, as you can see, nothing has been perfect! We have had our own struggles and hills to climb. But, with that said, I have loved being a mom and have had so much fun with my sweet snuggle bug. Good and bad, he is perfect and I am still so in love with him!

2 months

Here comes a flood of updates! So Jaysen is 2 months old (technically 9 ½ weeks.) It is weird how pregnancy is based on weeks, but then when the baby is born they don’t turn another month old until the day of the month they were born. Weird. Anyway, he is such a big boy for how old he is. He had is 2 month check up last week and he weighed 13.14 lbs and was 25 ½ inches. That puts him in the 90th percentile for weight and the 97th percentile for height. His pediatrician said that since he is so long, he doesn’t look like he is big, but that Jaysen is a big baby.


We are finally in the process of switching him back to normal formula. He has been on a hypoallergenic formula since he was 3 weeks old because of colic. We are doing half and half and it seems to be going well. I am hoping that within the next week we can switch the ratios again. People complain about how expensive baby formula is, but until you have to buy the hypoallergenic stuff you have nothing to complain about! We are so excited that we can finally start buying formula that is under $40 a can!

Jaysen still eats 6 ounces every 2 ½ - 3 hours. He isn’t much of a napper. He will usually take a few catnaps that are between 30 and 45 minutes and then maybe 1 nap that is 2-3 hours. We have been able to put him down for the night between 8 and 9 and then he will sleep till about 2 or 3 and eat, then go right back to sleep till 6 or 7. It has seriously been such a blessing to have a baby who sleeps so well! We have even ventured to put him in bed without him being fully asleep. 3 out of the 5 times we have done it he has been able to get himself to sleep. The other times, he will start to fuss, so I will go in to soothe him, and he will just start chatting with me. He is just too cute not to snuggle at that point.

We had to take the little net insert out of his bath last night. He is too big for it, so now he sits in his bath tub like a big boy! He loves to sit in his Bumbo! He started sitting in it at 6 ½ weeks. He thinks he is big stuff.  He is starting to get more and more fascinated with Rylee. She loves him! We have started to give her more freedom when it comes to being around Jaysen. She loves to sniff his feet and follows us where ever we take him. If he is in a different room and he starts to cry she will run in to wherever we are and stare at us, then run back to where he is. This pattern continues until we go get him.

Jaysen is a little chatter box. He has found his voice and LOVES to use it! We talk the most on his changing table, but really, wherever you are, he will talk. We even have to stop feeding him at times because all he wants to do is talk!

He has been able to control his neck almost perfectly for the past 2 weeks. He has always been super strong, but I notice that it has gotten even better. He is starting to push himself up on his arms during tummy time and has started to move his arms to get his toys. He still keeps his hands in fists a lot, but with how he is developing in other areas, I’m not too worried about it.
I went back to work last week. It seriously was the hardest thing ever! Had you asked me 4 weeks ago, I was ready to go back in a heartbeat. But when it came to the week before going back, I was totally dreading it! Monday was the worst of it. I cried all the way to my mom’s, all the way to work. I finally gained some composure, but then every time someone would see me they would bring up how hard it was to leave him and I would start to cry all over again! Now that we are settling in to a routine, I am happy to be back. I really do love my job and enjoy getting out every day.



After my first week back at work.




His Halloween jammies!




He got 5 shots at his 2 month appointment! Poor guy.




Jaysen loves his toes! He sat there for 20 minutes just wiggling and staring.




6 1/2 weeks and sitting in a Bumbo!




First zoo trip!



8 weeks old!



Happy Halloween



Looks like his daddy!



We also got our first family pictures. Here are a few of them. Thanks Shelby!

7 1/2 Weeks

Time seems to be flying by. My happy baby boy is 7 1/2 weeks already! He has truly been a blessing to us. Jaysen is such a happy baby. He is very alert and loves to look around. During the day he will usually be awake after he eats for at least an hour, sometimes 2. There are some days where he will only take a few 30 minute cat naps and only get a total of 2 hours of sleep for the whole day. Those are usually the nights that he will sleep through the night. That is usually about 2 or 3 times a week that he will do that. I am so lucky! The nights that he doesn't sleep through the night, he will only wake up once (usually around 2 or 3).

He finally has decided that 11 is too late to go to sleep. Most nights he is usually down by 10. There are some nights where he decides that 9 is a good time. As you can tell, we are still trying to come up with a routine.

Jaysen eats 6oz and we are lucky if we make it 3 hours. He usually starts fussing around 2 1/2. I use to be really strict on making sure he hit his 3 hours because that is what his pediatrician told me to do. But, I finally decided that my baby knows when he is hungry. If he doesn't get hungry until 4 hours after his last feeding, fine. But if at 2 1/2 hours he is showing me all of his hunger cues, then I'm going to feed my baby. Especially if the frequent feedings during the day help him go longer during the night.

A week ago, we weigh him and he was a whopping 13 pounds! He is big, healthy boy!

Jaysen is also a little chatter box. Our best conversations are on his changing table. 

 

We had Jaysen's blessing yesterday. It was such a wonderful experience. We were able to have a lot of family come and it was so great to have them all here. It is such a surreal experience to sit there and realize that you are blessing your first child. Being a mother was something I dreamed about since I was little, and to think I'm finally a mom to a beautiful baby boy is just crazy!

 

We had to put a bib on to make sure he didn't spit up on his outfit.

Bored with the picture taking.

Jaysen's cake.

 

 

I feel so blessed to have this amazing man as my son's father and my eternal companion. I am so happy he has the priesthood and was able to bless our baby.

Here are some of my favorite pictures. I am so in love my little family! We have never been happier!

 



Such a happy boy!

This is how we take our naps. On mommy or daddy, or in his swing.

My big boy!

Rylee hates her boundaries!

All ready for church.

So handsome!

Writing an essay with daddy.

Bath time.

Sitting in his Bumbo at 6 1/2 weeks!

When he is fussy, we put him in this chair in the bathroom with the fan and shower on. He loves it!

4 Weeks Old

How did my baby get to be 4 weeks old!? Time has gone by so fast! We love him more and more each day.

Since my last post, a lot has happened with my little man. I had to stop nursing because my supply wasn't coming in. Within 3 days of being on formula full time, he started to get really fussy. This has not been the character of my baby, so I could tell something was wrong. After about 5 days with an extremely cranky baby, I finally called his Dr. and took him in. Turned out that he had colic. It was hard not to blame myself for it. I know they say this shows up in babies around 3 weeks, which is when I stopped nursing, but it was hard not think it was my fault. His Dr. put him on a hypoallergenic formula which seems to be doing wonders! I finally have my happy and content baby back! Don't get me wrong, he still has his "witching hour" moment at night, but he is basically back to normal.

Some milestones with my sweet boy:

- At 3 weeks he weighed 10lbs 4oz
- He holds his head up so well! He has also started to push up on his arms.
- He is starting to find his voice. He will spit out a coo here and there which is fun to watch because it will usually startle him. I love to watch him because you can tell he is trying so hard to figure it out!
- He is up to 4oz every 3 hours during the day, and usually about 4-5 hours at night. (We had a night last week where he slept 6 hours!)
- He is a wiggle worm! When on his back or belly he just wiggles non-stop.
- I know they say it is too early, but I really think his smiles are genuine. At least when he sees mom and dad. :)

The other day I packed up all his newborn clothes. It was kind of a sad moment, but he hasn't been able to wear newborn clothes at all. He is in 0-3 months and some 3-6 month clothes. He also has been in a size 1 diaper for 2 weeks.

He is such a good baby! I love him to death! I am so grateful that I get to spend 4 more weeks at home with him.