Friday, December 11, 2009

Multimedia message

A gift from crystal. So cute!

A series of Firsts

This last week has been kinda fun for me. He keeps getting bigger, which will always be bittersweet. I was looking at a picture this morning from the first few days home and he's so incredibly tiny and skinny, now he's got cute little pudgy cheeks! As he gets bigger, we get to try new things. I got to give him a bath in his cute little whale tub! He seems to love bath time as long as I make sure he stays warm. He's making some funny faces in these pictures but that's actually pretty typical. He just hangs out in the tub while I wash his body and pour the warm water on him. I use the washcloth to keep him warm. He's such a sweetie and such a good boy for mommy.





He likes his swing too. It gives him a good view of what's going on and he'll just stare at things as it rocks back and forth. He actually was able to track the cute little bugs that rotate on the mobile above him the other day. It's so fun to watch him develop and notice new things!


The last "new" thing that we got to experience this week was sleeping in his big crib! He's been sleeping in the bassinet in our room or our bed and I decided I didn't want him to be scared of his room or crib once we were ready to fully transition him into his room. So during naps during the day I started putting him into his crib. He went down pretty seamlessly at first- a couple whines or 5-10 min of crying and then he's out for an hour or so. Once he wakes up, he doesn't like to go back down to sleep so I have to figure out the right proportion of wake time and sleep time so he doesn't wake up too early to eat. But it's been fun to try new things with him and see how he responds. He's so cute in his big crib! This is a horrible picture because I snuck in when he was already asleep and it was kinda dark in there and I didn't want to use the flash.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

First Month- Beckett

I can't believe it's already been 5 weeks! So Crazy!

I've found the difficult part for me, as the mother, is to see the changes that are occurring everyday. Johnny is always telling everyone about how much Beckett has changed since he was born. I have to consciously pay attention and look for those changes since I'm with him everyday and the changes are still gradual or something that I experience all the time. Johnny even used it as an illustration in his teaching on Sunday and talked about how Beckett liked being swaddled at first and now is all sprawled out when he sleeps. I know that's true, but it's not something I actually consciously recognized as a "change". Even in the last 2 weeks he moved from sleeping on his side with his hands by his face to laying on his back with his arms spread straight out to the sides.

So lets talk about some changes. He has eyebrows now! He was born with a full head of hair and absolutely no eyelashes or eyebrows. Everyday the eyebrows get darker and more defined and the eyelashes get longer- so cute! He's a pretty mellow guy but he is starting to be more and more inquisitive. He's a thinker I've decided (I actually have no idea what's going on in there) but he will just look around the room and stare at stuff and take it in. He follows things around with his eyes and loves tummy time. He can move his head from side to side to follow our voices around the room. I even noticed today the strength that has developed in his spine and neck when I try to burp him. I used to drape him on my hand sitting on my lap and he would just crumple into a ball and now he actually can support himself across my hand. He slept in his crib during nap today and went down with only 5 min of crying. He's such a good boy. Now I'm the one who needs to be disciplined and make sure I put him back to sleep in his bed after his middle of the night feeding.

I can't believe how fast he's growing and how quickly this is going to go by- I see my friends with their babies that they had in May. It seems like that was only yesterday but it's been 7 months and they are so big! He's going to be so big so soon. I need to appreciate every moment, that's for sure!

The First Month - Time with family

So I'm pretty disappointed in myself- I always told myself that when I had kids I would blog all the time to keep family updated with all the little intricacies of our life. Turns out (start laughing now) you don't have that much time on your hands when you're a mom. Doesn't help that we only have one computer that Johnny needs to use most of the time and we don't have much in the way of Internet connection.

This month has been so amazing. My mom arrived the same day Beckett was born which was awesome! The timing worked out perfect. Johnny and I got to share the experience just the two of us and my mom was able to see Beckett on the day of his birth. She stayed for about two and a half weeks and was SOOOO much help to me. I didn't have to do anything except learn how to nurse, try to get sleep, and love on my son. My mom did all the cleaning, cooking, or even just serving us the meals that other brought to us! It was so great! She also brought a nice camera and had little photo shoots with Beckett almost every day. We have so many pictures of those first days because of her (we totally were too distracted to take pics ourselves). It was also great to just have time with my mommy where we would just watch chic flicks and lounge in our pj's all day like old times (except this time I was holding a newborn). Having her here really helped boost my own confidence and I took Beckett out on little excursions much earlier than I probably would have were she not there with me. When it was finally time for her to return home, Vicki and I drove her down to Missoula. It was fun having a day in the "big city" (hehe) but I couldn't help but cry when I dropped her off. Love you MOMMY!

We had 2 days of just the 3 of us and then Johnny's family arrived for Thanksgiving week. It was so great to see them! It was Johnny's Parents, sister, and Bro-in-law and they all were so excited! They fell right into the role of Grandparents and Aunt and Uncle so quickly! I put all plans of schedules and whatnot on hold for that week knowing that they needed the ability to just hold my little man all day. They had such a small amount of time with him I wanted them to really be able to spend as much of it as possible seeing him instead of him napping back in the room. We got to show them around town a little and they got to be here at his 3 week checkup and circumcision. Thanksgiving was so nice for us all because we all just stayed in our PJ's all day, the boys went and played football, we even ate in our PJ's, and then we went out and saw a Christmas Carol (which Beckett slept through). It was so relaxed and nice. They only got to stay for about 4 days and we were so sad to see them go so soon.

As of that point, it was just the three of us. And I won't lie- that's when I started to feel intimidated! Having family here for the entire month really took a burden off me to keep up with everything but I find I'm still intimidated of cooking. Oh how I don't want to cook- he gets gas with all the usual foods (broccoli, beans) and those foods are typically a big part of what I cook. Seems all I eat now are grilled cheese, quesadilla's, and spaghetti. I really hope he doesn't get a milk allergy!

Saturday, December 5, 2009

Multimedia message

This will be Beckett's first christmas. Its so fun having the house decorated for our little family. I'm sure next year I'll need to be a lot more careful about how i decorate. Its time for us to really think about which traditions we want to carry on. I love this season!