Week 12: Caleb's first cold

So we've been dealing with the oh-so-pleasant effects of Caleb's first cold. It started as a few little boogers to suck out with the bulby thing (officially called a nasal aspirator). It didn't go away so we took a trip to the doctor to find out that, indeed, it was just a cold and there's nothing we can do but let it run it's course. Evidently "run it's course" for a baby means being fussier than usual and not sleeping soundly for more than 3 hours at a time- gotta love it. By the way, Caleb weighed in at an impressive 16 pounds at the doctor's office on Thursday- WHEW! Caleb used to love his changing pad and would laugh and chat his way through a diaper change. Then we started giving him his super-stinky vitamin drops while he was on it. And, since the addition of this cold, now give him nasal saline drops, triaminic cold medicine, and try repeatedly to suck snot out with the aforementioned aspirator. He starts yelling the second you set him down on it now. On the upside, Caleb and I have had some sweet snuggling/sleeping time together when he wakes up congested at 3 a.m. and can go back to sleep more easily when he's upright on my shoulder in the rocker. There have been several times that we've both passed out until Aaron comes in to check on us.

The weather is finally warming up enough that we have enjoyed several walks around our neighborhood trails. One day was a little brisk so we bundled up Caleb in his OU gear- he looked great (thanks Wilsons- bet you thought it would be the right size for next football season, not now!). Notice the action shot below. It was going to be an adorable picture but Lilah couldn't resist jumping up on the bed and being part of things.

As you can tell from the Week 12 picture at the top of the page, Caleb is really enjoying his stretching these days. It lasts for several minutes, especially if he's been asleep for quite awhile. What makes it really entertaining are the funny faces he makes along with the stretches AND the funny noises that come out the other end. Don't know what it is about stretching that gets him tootin' but, seriously, watch out! Here's a picture of Caleb enjoying some time on his activity gym. Not too interested in playing with all the toys dangling in front of him- just stretching away.

The chair continues to be a big help to us and big fun for Caleb. I wrote last week about Caleb really noticing the dogs for the first time as he sat in the chair on the kitchen floor. Well, now the dogs are definitely noticing that he's on their level. Aaron said I could get in trouble for child abuse for letting the dogs lick him for the sake of a cute picture, but I am sure they will have many more close (and gross) encounters in the future.

This week, my sister turned the big 2-4!! We celebrated last weekend when she was in town but Caleb wanted to give a special birthday shout out to his Aunt Mo! He also says thanks for being such a good babysitter last weekend. Here's a pic of Morgan and Caleb on his first day.

Here are some other random pictures from the week. We are really trying to develop more of a nightly schedule which means that if you're going to do a bath some nights as part of the 'winding down ritual' then you need to do it all nights. So, here we are. This robe was from one of Aaron's co-workers. You can't see it too clearly but it's even embroidered with his name. He kinda looks like a boxer getting ready to enter the ring.

Although we are working on the grasping skills, they aren't quite there yet so I picked up these wrist rattles at a recent trip to Babies R Us. They are supposed to catch his eye and help him practice tracking objects back and forth across his field of vision. I am sure they will serve that purpose at some point but for now, they are acting as great chew toys/slobber catchers.

And finally, this picture just cracks me up. It should have a caption that reads, "Twelve weeks already?!? Yikes!!"

Have a great week!

Week 11- lots of pics

(Thanks to Temp for the cute Baby Gap onesie seen above!)


It is funny how we go in spurts of picture taking. This week was full of pics!

Valentine's night we realized that Caleb was probably strong enough to try out his "Bebepod" (aka Bumbo Chair, we just have a different brand). He LOVES it. He's obviously too little to really sit up by himself but the chair helps support him. He looks like a little man. When you first set him in it, he tries to find his center of balance so he kinda bobs around and looks a bit like a chicken or a weeble (sp?). I wish there was a way to post video clips on here because it is pretty entertaining to watch.


The chair is going to be a BIG help in corralling Caleb without having to put him in the swing or pack-n-play. For example, I was working in the kitchen and instead of leaving him in the other room, I could put him in the chair on the kitchen floor. It was great to watch his eyes get bigger and bigger as he took in life from that vantage point. I think it was the first time he really noticed the dogs. His eyes kept following Samson back and forth across the kitchen. The chair is also the ideal place to keep him still while trying to put on a hat. I realized we have a basket full of hats that he's never worn. This is partly because hardly any of them fit since he has a big ol' melon head (it is in proportion to his body, though). I found this cute blue one and thought it would match his outfit nicely. I think this is maybe one of the cutest pictures we have of him so far:


A new habit has begun...the "don't go #2 for a day then let it all out the next day" adventure. Twice this week, Caleb didn't have a dirty diaper for a day. The books say this is common around this age but he's usually a 2-3 dirties a day kinda guy. So when he didn't poop for a day, we knew we were in for it the next day. And, sure enough, we went through three outfits in the course of about 90 minutes. In fact, the second blowout of the day came three minutes after I took the picture in the blue hat. It was such a disaster that it would have taken an entire container of wipes, so I just took him in the bathroom and put him in the tub. Notice the "who me?!?" look in the picture below. This was after the impromptu sponge bath.


The weather is finally warming up a bit which means he's not stuck in fleece all day. However, I loved this outfit that my cousins Jill and Mary gave us at a baby shower last summer and was afraid he would outgrow it (it's 3-6 mo.) before it got warm enough to wear it. Plus he looks super-cool in the layered look with the white longsleeve onesie underneath it. I like the blue and brown together and the little monkey is perfect for my "little monkey".


Another new favorite is the Baby Einstein video series. Our TV is elevated enough that he can't really see it unless you put him on the table in his bouncy seat. But once you get him situated, he stares and talks at the screen and pumps his legs up and down like he wants to jump out of there and get closer to it. He also gets to watch the videos at the babysitter's house and they have a really big screen TV so he really likes to watch them over there. You can't really tell what he's doing in this picture, but trust me, he's watching Baby Beethoven. As a side note, can you even imagine how filthy rich the inventor of the Baby Einstein stuff is?!? Seriously, just filming toys and putting music behind it and...voila: you're a millionaire!


Funny story about peeing (or tinkling, as my mom would say)...One night this week, Aaron was changing Caleb's diaper. He says to me, "I almost hate to say this because I know as soon as I do that it will happen but, when is the last time Caleb sprayed either one of us?". And, honest to goodness, he didn't finish the sentence before Caleb started spraying all over the place. HA!!! The other funny potty story was when we were giving him a bath on Saturday and I was singing the ABCs to keep Caleb entertained. Aaron decided to educate us by singing the alphabet in German. So he gets to LMNO (or however you say it in German) and no sooner does he say "Peh" then Caleb "pehs" all over the place. I keep telling you guys he's a genius baby!

Friday night Caleb got to meet a special member of our extended family when my Aunt Debbie came in town. Her plane was delayed so Caleb was up later than usual but was very well behaved and was actually quite a show-off, grinning and gurgling all over the place. Aunt Debbie had just visited her grandbaby #4 so she showed off some cute pictures of Ada.


Saturday night Caleb got to hang out with Grandma and Aunt Mo when Aaron and I went to dinner with our Sunday School class. He had a great time and certainly kept those ladies entertained. We stayed home from church because we all had the sniffles so Sunday was a pj day.

Sorry this post is so delayed. I will try to do better next week or post mid-week so it doesn't take an act of Congress to write this thing.

Have a good one~

Happy Heart Day!!

Just a quick note to wish everyone a Happy Valentine's Day! I was thinking as I changed Caleb's diaper this morning that if you just give him some wings and a bow and arrow he would look a lot like Cupid. But because we didn't have any wings or bow and arrow, he just had to wear his new Valentine pjs all day. (By the way, pretty hard to find manly-looking Valentine outfits).

It started out as a crazy morning. Our babysitter had a sick daughter so we were forced to go with our Plan B. Then we realized we didn't have a Plan B. So, I ended up taking Caleb to work with me for an hour or so while Aaron ran to the office. Then he came by Riverfield and picked up Caleb. Today was my short day, so I was home by 12:45 to relieve Aaron so he could go to work. It worked out fine for today (and everyone at school was glad to see him) but it won't really work in the future so we do need to come up with a backup plan, I guess.

Aaron got me a great Valentine's present. It was an edible bouquet of strawberries, pineapples, and grapes. It even used a head of lettuce to stick the fruit skewers in to instead of florist foam. And it came with fudge sauce to dip the fruit. He brought it up to me at work when he came to get Caleb. What a great and creative gift! I am so glad he is my Valentine :)

Week 10

Well, it's week 10 and, beside the fact that he likes to take a pretty long nap around 4:00 every day, we are still not really on a schedule. All the books say that a schedule will start to "appear" between weeks 6 and 12. Still waiting :) Hopefully being at the babysitters with her schedule will help things.

We enjoyed a relaxed Thursday and Friday. Samson had minor surgery on Friday to remove a 'skin tag' (kinda like a mole). Since he was under anesthesia anyway, we went ahead and had them clean his teeth and cut his nails. He's like a new dog now but on Friday, he was still pretty drugged up when he came home. Here's a funny picture of his glassy eyes and his stitches. I think he really likes not wearing his collar.

Over the weekend, Caleb received a Valentine card from Grandma and Grandpa Long with his first $5 bill in it. Aaron told Caleb to put it in his piggy bank and save it for his first pack of baseball cards. So that's what we did. (Notice the adorable Chiefs pacifier!)

I've gone through some of Caleb's closet in the last week and found several items that I had forgotten about. One was this great super-soft blanket with a little lamb head on it. My friend Mandy brought it to us this summer when she came to visit, before I was even out of my first trimester. When I put it in his car seat with him, he immediately snuggled up with it so now it goes wherever he does. We call it "Lamby" and he loves it. In this picture, he was cuddling with it in his swing.

The big event of the weekend was that today was his first trip to the nursery at church. Asbury is big enough that they have a pretty in-depth system with security cards and scanners so we were a bit clueless. Caleb had fallen asleep in the car but as soon as we went to get him out of the carrier and hand him over the the teacher, he woke up. Usually, he would go back to sleep but, when we came to pick him up, they said he had not slept at all while he was there. He did have a sticker on him that read, "Changed with love and care" so he was evidently busy doing a big job while we were in Sunday School. We asked how he did and they said, "fine" but I don't think the church nursery will tell you if your child insisted on being held the whole time (my guess is that's what happened). Oh well. It's the first of many many Sundays there so he'll get used to it and so will we. It was very nice to be able to sit through the whole class today instead of Aaron and me tag-teaming with Caleb out in the hallway.

A couple of weeks ago I posted that Caleb was in his 3-6 month clothes. What I didn't realize was that most of Carter's (and several other brands) clothes that have Size 6 Months on the tag are the measurements for 3-6 months in other brands. So there have been lots of clothes that are perfect for right now, pjs especially, just hanging in his closet. So we are phasing out some of the too small clothes and it is sad. I keep trying to squeeze him into his "I Love Mommy" onesie from Gap but it's time to put it in storage now. Here's a picture of one of my favorite pj outfits. You can see that his little legs can't really even stretch out anymore so it's going in the storage bin too. It is cute though, huh?

Well, I need to go and prepare for another 1/2 week at work. I think I am going to create a checklist and tape it to the back door to make sure I don't forget anything. Have a great week everyone!!

We made it!!

Well, we survived my first partial week back at work! Of course, Caleb was fine and had a great time with Amy and her girls. I was the one having separation anxiety. I was fine once I got to work, unless people asked how I was doing- ha! The rest of the week was much less tearful and it's easier to go back to a job that you like where you have great co-workers.

We are home today enjoying being lazy. The whole get up and out the door by 7:30 three mornings in a row was enough to do us all in. Even Aaron commented last night that it was nice not to spend the whole evening getting ready for the following morning. Caleb and I will get out and run some errands this afternoon then get home in time to cook a real dinner (so far this week we've had leftovers or take out).

Sorry for not having any pictures to post. I'll have more now that we're home with a bit more free time on our hands.

Two Months/Nine Weeks

I know I say this every week but I really can't believe that Caleb is already 9 weeks old! He seems to grow and change each day- it is fun to watch him interact and learn. As you can see from the 9 week picture, his grin comes more and more often and is more easily coaxed from him.

This was our last week at home together and Caleb and I enjoyed it. We ran some errands, and Caleb got to hang out at Aaron's office while I got my teeth cleaned. But mostly we just sat, bounced, and walked around the house. We also made sure to watch the TV appearances that Lauren had after winning Miss America.

Friday was a big day because it was the dreaded first round of immunizations at his 2 month appointment. Of course, Caleb didn't dread it because he had no idea what he was in for. In fact, it was funny because he was really laughing and smiling all morning long. First he was weighed and measured and....(are you ready for this?) he was a whopping 14 pounds 5 ounces and 25 inches long. That's the 97th percentile in height and 96th in weight!! He is a big ol' boy and the doctor said he was already doing some things developmentally that 4 month olds do, which is good since he's about the size of a four month old. Then came the shots. You can really tell that these nurses do this all the time because she had it down to a science. There was one oral vaccine and 4 injected ones- two in each leg. I thought Caleb would throw a complete fit but he really just had one long wail then some whimpers. Here's a shot of his thunder thighs with his cute band-aids.


In addition to being his 2 month celebration, Saturday was also a fun shower hosted by Heidi and Carolyn. Below is a picture of Caleb with Heidi, Ashton, and Carolyn.


Caleb was very well behaved, though it could have been due to the Tylenol we kept him on for a day or so after his shots. He was making all sorts of funny faces and flirting with the ladies, like Jan in the next picture. My mom was there and did a good job of not hogging her grandson :)


Caleb was fortunate to get some great gifts- from clothes to gift certificates to toys and even some thank you notes for me to write. The cake was adorable. Thanks again to Heidi and Carolyn for their thoughtfulness. That night, Caleb went over to my parents' house while Aaron and I went out for a belated anniversary dinner. It was a very busy day and Caleb slept very well that night.


Here's a funny picture of Caleb and Aaron. It was on a night that Caleb was getting fussy (he's started recently to cry before he falls asleep whereas he used to just pass out without crying or anything). Having tried just about everything, Aaron put Caleb up on his shoulders. For awhile Caleb just looked around while holding on tight and holding his head up. But eventually, sleep got the better of him and he konked out. Pretty funny.


Last night was Caleb's first Super Bowl though it was less than exciting. We met up with some of Aaron's co-workers and some other friends up at his office and watched on their big projection screens. There were several other babies there but Caleb really just slept most of the time so he didn't really make any new friends. He did look great in his "World's Cutest Quarterback" outfit (see the 9 week picture at the top). We got home later than expected so then I rushed around trying to get everything together for my first day back at work. Aaron was very helpful, mostly because he could see I was on the verge of an emotional breakdown, I think.

This morning, we all rushed around to get everyone out the door on time. The dogs were totally perplexed as to why we were up so early (and probably also wondering what I was doing showered and ready to go before noon!). I dropped Caleb off at Amy's house and didn't shed any tears until I was walking back to the car. Then I started crying; good thing I had thought to bring my makeup with me for touch-ups. Even though I really like my job and the people I work with and even though I know Caleb is in perfectly capable hands, I still felt like I was abandoning him. I know I should have taken a picture of my dropping him off but I couldn't bring myself to do it.

I was really fine by the time I got to work and just jumped in with both feet back into my job. The day went quickly- maybe because I had to go back home at one point. I was so smart for remembering my makeup but failed to remember to bring empty bottles to pump into- duh!! It was a good day and Caleb was happy to see me when I picked him up (or at least that's what I am telling myself). I am sooooo thankful that I get to ease back into the work thing gradually by working part time. Tomorrow I work another full day then 1/2 a day on Wednesday then we can stay home and snuggle Thursday and Friday.

OK, must go and prepare the diaper bag, my lunch, Aaron's lunch, etc for tomorrow...gotta love motherhood!!

Oh, welcome to our family, Ada Rose! My cousin Brett and his wife and sons welcomed their new addition this afternoon. Can't wait for these 3rd cousins to meet one another.