2 months old!

Sammy is 2 months old.  My how time flies.

She continues to be a wonderfully easy baby.  Amazingly, she continued a pattern of sleeping through the night and we can now consistently get 7 hours from her...from about 10 pm to 5 am.  It's fantastic.  I don't feel the need to nap during the day and I'm sleeping well at night.  I could actually function at work if I chose to go back now, but I'm going to head back in the second week of August.  I know I've said it before, but I just can't believe how different my kids are already!  We'll see if that stays the same or changes as they grow up.

This past weekend, I had to fly solo with both kids since my husband was doing the Bike for MS ride - a 150 mile ride over 2 days.  I managed to get through the weekend with both baby and toddler intact, but it was definitely hard at times.  Last night, during dinner time, Sammy was screeching because she was hungry and Ian was giving me a hard time about eating his food.  I was exhausted from the weekend and out of patience and as I picked up Sammy to try to calm her down, I said quietly, "Sammy, just...shut...up."  I know it's awful.  And I felt horrible afterwards, especially when Ian started repeating "shut up."  Awesome.  Mother of the year award over here.  At least I didn't swear.  I told Ian that it wasn't a nice thing to say and asked him not to say it, but of course, he said it again this morning.  I'm sure it will be the first of many not-so-nice things I teach my child.

Ian is saying some really funny things lately too.  I asked him, "How much does momma love you?"  The normal answer, which I taught him, is "So much!"  The other day, he said, "Momma loves me 6."  It made me laugh pretty hard.  And he's saying some pretty complex sentences now.  He said, "When I fell down in the gym and hurt my knee they gave me a band aid."  Wow.  I mean, he's only 27 months old.  His teachers consistently talk about how verbal he is.  I'm very proud of him.

First Smiles

Sammy has started smiling.  She first started showing real social smiles around 7 weeks and now that she's 8 weeks old, I'm starting to see that smile more often and more consistently.  Here is the first smile that I was able to capture on my camera.

And and and!!!!!  She slept through the night last night.  Incredibly, at only 8 weeks of age, she slept from 10:30 pm to 5:30 am.  7 whole hours of blessed sleep for me and my husband.  I shouldn't be that excited given that nights with her aren't that bad.  Usually we're only up once with her around 3 or 4 am and after her feeding/diaper change, she falls back asleep.  I definitely cannot complain about her nighttime sleeping habits.  I am SO much less sleep deprived than I was when Ian was this age.

2011 Spring School Photos

Here are Ian's school photos.  He is 26 months old here.  So so so so so so cute!  I can't believe how good they came out and I'm so glad we thought to put him in the hand-me-down tuxedo that has been hanging in his closet for the last 2 years!  I will never understand how the photographer not only got him to pose, but also captured his real smiles.  

Fun with Colors

Sammy will be 7 weeks old tomorrow and as of yet, her eyes are still blue.  Here is a picture of her during her bath.  I think it shows off her eye color nicely.

I can't wait to see whether they stay blue or turn green.  I guess it's possible for them to turn brown, but even the doctor thought they were so blue that they would probably stay blue.

Speaking of colors, my mom bought Samantha a bunch of different colored headbands.  So I've been having a lot of fun dressing her up and putting on matching headbands.  Here are some fun pictures.

My husband thinks I'm putting her back in the 80's with the headbands, but I don't care.  This is my one and only daughter and I'm going to dress her up until she is old enough to yell at me.  

My toddler son, who is almost 27 months old now, has always had a strong will.  He is now using that will to refuse any and all clothes that we pick out for him.  So he is now picking out his own outfits, which, as you can imagine, is incredibly funny (ands slightly embarrassing).  He went to school on Friday with a white and red shirt, green plaid shorts and blue striped socks.  As long as he is happy.  :-)

Sammy is 6 weeks old!

Sammy is 6 weeks old!  I took her to the doctor yesterday for a regular checkup and her statistics are so funny:

Height:  23 inches - 92nd percentile
Weight:  9 pounds 14.3 ounces - 51st percentile
Head Circumference:  36.8 cm - 24th percentile

I guess I gave my long and skinny child my small head!!  She weighs less than my son did at this point.  He was 11 pounds 11 ounces at 6 weeks.  Then again, she started out much smaller because she was born early.

Here are some pictures we took while waiting for the doctor to come see us:

Sammy continues to be a super awesome baby.  She has gotten fussier between the hours of 5 pm and 8 pm, but overall, is very calm and happy during the day.  She hasn't been too consistent at nighttime, but the last couple of nights were fantastic.  She slept for 5 hours each night in her pack n' play and then after a diaper change and feeding, slept another 3 hours.  AWESOME for us.  I'm much much much less sleep deprived overall than I was with Ian.

I had my own 6-week checkup and am now free to do whatever I want to do.  While I cannot diet because I'm breastfeeding, I am going to increase my exercise levels.  I currently weigh 152 pounds, which leaves me with 9.5 pounds to lose to get back to my pre-pregnancy weight.  I think that should be manageable over the next 2 months.  Hopefully, when I start back at work at the beginning of August, I will be able to fit into my regular clothing again.  I just need to stop eating dessert!

The doctor asked me what I was planning to do for birth control.  I laughed and said my infant was birth control!  And then she said, "No, seriously.  My daughters are 13 month apart in age."  As it turns out, she had a son and then a daughter by IVF.  Then, 4 months after giving birth to her second child, she got pregnant naturally!  I can't believe I heard this story from my own doctor.  I'm not expecting that we will be able to get pregnant naturally, but I don't want to risk it either.  We are very happy with our family of four.  So I agreed to start taking a progesterone-only birth control pill (Cam.ila) (a.k.a. the minipill), which is safe for breastfeeding mothers.  I also got information about two different types of IUDs and we may go that route too.

And I leave you with the following images:

I asked my husband to take some pictures after I got my hair cut and highlighted.  I wanted to capture the prettiness before I went and got sweaty mowing the lawn!

And here is Ian, lovingly nursing Elmo on his mini-boppy pillow just like Momma nurses Sammy: