Connor's 1st Road Trip

Last weekend we took a quick road trip up to the bay area to attend a funeral. My dad was already going, so we went with him. We left Sunday morning around 9 and arrived at Abbie and Rafe's house around 7pm. Connor was the perfect little baby. I fed him before we left, when we stopped for lunch, and gave him a bottle in the afternoon so we could keep on driving. We stopped a few times for gas and when we stopped I always changed him, so that when we arrived at Abbie and Rafe's we had only a minor diaper leak. Then I fed him again as soon as we got to Abbie and Rafe's. Other than that he slept, we played and he only fussed for five minutes while I tried to find him a bottle.
Sunday night Connor slept from 12-5:30 then ate and went back to sleep until 7:30 or so. Monday morning was the funeral followed by a delicious lunch of Greek food and then we went to the cemetery for a graveside service. Afterward we went to my cousins house for a couple of hours and then back to Abbie and Rafe's. Monday night Connor slept from 11-8...yup 9 straight hours! It was wonderful! We ate breakfast and hit the road a little after 9. We stopped for lunch and then kept on driving. After lunch I changed Connor, then he was asleep at the next gas pit stop, so we let him sleep...that was a mistake. We stopped in Rancho Cucamunga to visit the Bass Pro Shop. Peter had been dying to go there, so we stopped and checked out the store. And my what a store it was! Pictures of that will be in the next post (I have to get them from my dad.) When we went to pull Connor out of his car seat I noticed poop all over the side...we had encountered a major blowout!

Laughing at his animal friends

I cleaned up Connor while Peter cleaned up the car seat...it was disgusting! Sad thing though, the diaper wasn't full, it just leaked out the side because of the way Connor sits in his car seat with his feet up-which caused a gap. Once we were all cleaned up we went in the store and walked around a bit, then got dinner there. We arrived home around 9:30 or so. I took apart the car seat and put the fabric in the washing machine along with the poopy clothes while Connor got a much needed bath.

Hello there :)

27 Minutes

So I have been reading "On Becoming Baby Wise." Which was highly recommended from my sister-in-law who has a 5 month old who sleeps through the night and goes to bed without fussing. The book says that there are many things to avoid to get your child to sleep but the three most important to avoid are:

1-Don't let the child fall asleep while nursing.
2-Don't rock the child to sleep.
3-Don't let the child sleep in bed with parents.

Guess how many of those we do?...Yep all three. So I ordered the book and it arrived on Wednesday and Thursday I started following the techniques. Some of which I was already following, but many I was not. What I really wanted to get out of this was that Connor would go to sleep in his crib and be able to self soothe if he woke up early.

So Thursday morning he was up at 5:30. I fed him and then we played a little and then I wrapped him up in a miracle blanket and put him in his crib while he was still awake. I listened to him cry for 27 minutes before he fell asleep. Throughout that time he calmed himself down several times so there were times that he was quiet, then he would cry a little. Once he was asleep he slept for 2 hours. At the end of 2 hours I checked on him (I checked on him numerous times while he slept) and he was awake and happy. I changed him and he threw smile after smile at me. I fed him again and he started falling back to sleep. We had some tummy time and then it was time for another nap. He cried 2 minutes and then was quiet. Was this some kind of miracle? The evening nap was a bit trickier and he ended up falling asleep in the swing and then nighttime was a bit hard too. He cried for 30 minutes and wasn't giving in so I picked him up and rocked him to sleep and then put him back down. He slept in 3 hour increments during the night which is pretty usual for him.

Thursday photo-check out the cute socks. This is a miracle blanket, but we don't wrap up his feet anymore because he always kicks his way out of it within a couple of minutes.

Friday the morning naps went like clock work. He didn't fuss at all when I put him down. He talked to himself and kicked his legs and went to sleep. His evening naps weren't too bad either. Though he really wanted a pacifier and calmed down really fast after having one, but couldn't keep it in his mouth. So I rolled up a receiving blanket and propped it against the pacifier so if he spit it out, he could still reach it to suck it back in. He also took one while in the Ergo while we shopped at Costco. Nighttime he was fed and then rocked and put down. He slept for 5 hours 11:30-4:30 and then was changed, fed and barely rocked and put back down. He slept almost another 5 hours (4:50ish-9:35). He woke up briefly at 8:30 and went back to sleep. I felt great this morning when I woke up.

Friday photo-My ingenious plan to hold the pacifier in. The pants he is currently wearing he was able to kick himself out of. He really hates having things on his legs/feet.

Two Month Check-Up

Monday Connor had his two month check-up and got six vaccinations. Four were shots (one shot had two vaccines in it) and one was a liquid he swallowed. The nurse had me hold him while the liquid was given. At first he wasn't terribly happy as the liquid was very cold, but he got over that quickly and started sucking it down. When it was gone he got very upset as he wanted more. The nurse then had me put him down on a table so she could give the shots in his thighs. This was directly after the liquid so while he was mad that the liquid was gone he turned bright red. The nurse was worried at first that this might be a reaction to the vaccine and then realized that he was mad, so she continued. He took the first shot and screamed and as the other shots were given he cried and when it was all done he got two sparkly bandages and then calmed down. He was quiet by the time he was dressed and buckled back into his car seat. He then fell asleep during our five minute drive home. He was a great trooper!
His two month stats are: Head is 15 1/4 inches, he weighs 9 lbs 14 oz. and he's 24 inches long. Or as the doctor puts it, Connor is long and lean.

Monday afternoon Connor was very good. Then around 6:30 he was so fussy it was really hard to calm him down. He finally went back to sleep and slept until midnight, then back to bed around 1am after eating. We both were back awake at 5:30am. We had a ton of fun doing this:
I love his big open mouth smiles...they are always followed by squeals, which are just so darn cute!

Fun with babies

On New Year's Eve we went to the O's. Upon arrival Camille anxiously asked if she could hold baby Connor. Within minutes of rocking in her arms she had him asleep. He woke up a couple of times and she just rocked him back to sleep.
At 9:58pm Chris announces that it's two minutes until the new year and gets his girls excited to blow noise makers and such. Peter and I look at each other dumbfounded. I ask, "It's midnight already?" Peter says, "It's only 10 o'clock." Apparently we don't have enough kids to understand why 10pm is midnight on New Year's Eve. After the kids had their New Year's party they went to bed. Connor was having a hard time so we headed home. At midnight we were all in bed.

On Wednesday I watched Claire during the day and on Thursday I watched Claire and Ellie. Claire did a great job of entertaining herself while Connor ate. During one feeding Claire was playing behind the couch and would keep asking if she could use/play with different items. She put on one of my "hooter hiders" and then put a teddy bear under it and told me she was feeding her baby while I fed Connor. Later she put one of Connor's shirts on a teddy bear and buckled it into his car seat. She also played with the bear on a baby blanket and tried giving it a pacifier. I was surprised that she didn't try to put a diaper on it, as the changing mat was also out. She also enjoyed playing in my shoes.
Claire was really happy that she got to play with Connor all day Wednesday and not have to share him with her sisters. Later that night Mary called to say that she told Claire that she didn't have to work on Friday so she would play with Mommy all day. Claire said, "No, I play with Aunt Mandy." Sounds like she really had fun.

Tuesday morning while I took a shower I had Connor sitting in his car seat. Normally he doesn't like this, but he was a great trooper. In fact he was waiving his hands and kept bopping the little noise makers that jingled...then he would squeal with delight. I kept sticking my head out of the shower curtain to see my super happy baby playing with the toys. By the time I had a camera, he was done sitting in his car seat.

Here's our happy baby-9 weeks as of tomorrow, pictures were taken this evening.

Christmas recap

This year was a crazy Christmas-Thursday was the first day in about two weeks where we had the day to ourselves. On December 15th Peter’s brother Sean and his family arrived from Florida (Sean, Amy, Kirk-3yrs, and Heidi-5 mos.). We spent nearly every day with them. We had many fun adventures and really enjoyed spending time with them. Amy took a lot of fun pictures of the kids with her really cool camera. We’ll post when we get them. For being three months older than Connor, Heidi is a real moose! Heidi was roughly the same weight as Connor, so we’ll see if he turns into a moose in the next three months too.

Chris and Mary and their girls Camille-7, Ellie-5 and Claire-3 also came for the festivities. We had a great time playing games with everyone.
Christmas Eve was spent with Peter’s family. Peter made peppermint fudge and peanut brittle-yummy! We had appetizers and socialized with family. There was also the telling and acting out of Jesus’ birth with Connor being baby Jesus, Ellie was the angel, Claire was Joseph, Camille was Mary, Mary who was holding Connor became the manger, Sean was a sheep and Amy was the shepherd. Peter and Laurel were two of the wise men and the rest of us chimed in as well. Oh yes and Kirk was the crocodile. It turned out pretty well-we had a lot of fun! The evening also consisted of reading the first chapter of a biography Peter’s grandma wrote-Chris added quite a bit of commentary to the story, making it absolutely hilarious. Chris also read a letter written by David’s dad-which was the first Christmas letter in a very long time and it described past Christmas and life explorations-it was really neat to hear.
Christmas morning we received the best gift ever-Connor slept 7 hours!!!! It was amazing! I fed him around 11pm, he was asleep at midnight and then didn’t wake up until 7am-that’s a first for us! I woke up at 5 expecting my little alarm clock to wake up too and he didn’t so I went back to sleep, well sort of. I kept anticipating him waking up so I didn’t really want to go back to bed. At 6 I got up for breakfast and then went back to bed. At 7 my little guy started stirring and then was awake. I fed him and then he got to see what Santa left for him. He got a couple outfits, Cookie Monster and Elmo socks, some Dr. Seuss board books and a couple Winnie the Pooh bottles that he’ll be able to use in a couple of months. After we were dressed and ready we headed to Peter’s parents again for presents. Around 9:30 Chris and Mary arrived as well.
Peter and Connor gave me a Cricut Expression, my mom, sister and Chris gave me several cartridges for the Cricut which of course I’ve had fun using. I’ve started putting together some fun pieces for Connor’s scrapbook. I also got Apples to Apples the Disney version. Peter and I also received a Lion House cook book, Tell me the stories of Jesus, The Christmas Oranges DVD, a biography about Peter’s grandma, a car emergency kit, a Chinese decoration, a nativity set, and a nativity stacking doll.
Peter also got a super duper cordless drill, two Chuck Norris t-shirts that are super funny, a sweatshirt, and a train set.
Connor got some clothes, toys, more board books, pacifiers, and a turtle nightlight that projects stars all over the ceiling.

At noon we headed over to my parents house. Joshua-9 and Bubba-5 were anxiously awaiting our arrival so they could open presents. We opened presents and then ate lunch/dinner around 1:30. Santa also left Peter and I stockings at my parents house-which was pretty cool. After dinner we all took a nap. When we woke up we headed back to Peter’s parents house for our second dinner followed by an amusing game of “Apples to Apples Disney Edition” with the nieces followed by “The Game of Things” once the children had been put to bed.
Sunday the 26th Connor was blessed in church since we had family in town. After church Connor and I headed to my parents house to have Christmas again now that Abbie and Rafe were in town. My aunt and uncle arrived late on the 24th and left around 4 on the 26th to head back home. Connor and I got to visit with them a little bit before they left. Then Sunday evening we played another amusing game of “The Game of Things” as we also gave that game to Abbie and Rafe. Seriously a fun game to play with a group of people!

Monday the 27th we got a late start to the day, visited with Abbie and Rafe for almost two hours and then left to go get family pictures taken with Peter’s family in Old Poway Park. We were the first family to arrive so the photographer took our little family photos first. Connor wasn’t very happy in many of our pictures. Sean arrived to save the day with a pacifier and would wait until the photographer was about to take the picture and then pull the pacifier out of Connor’s mouth-this technique worked pretty well. When our pictures were done then the rest of the gang had arrived and we took the big family picture. Now trying to get six children ages of 7, 5, 3, 3, 5mos and 7 weeks to all look good at the same time is down right near impossible. I’m curious to see if everyone looked good in at least one picture. Connor was the best behaved as he was asleep for the whole thing. Camille then comes in second with probably Heidi in third, after that it was a toss up to who was constantly complaining, crying, making funny faces, or picking their nose.
Tuesday the 28th we spent with my family. The 29th we said goodbye to Sean, Amy and the kids then went home to relax-our first day home in a long time!

Today is New Year’s Eve-Now normally I don’t bother with new year’s resolutions as I can never keep them. Like for instance I don’t bother with saying that I’ll stop biting my nails, because yeah that won’t happen, at least not for long. Though I did come up with an idea-I will try to update the blog more often. So there you have it. Happy New Year everyone!

6 weeks

Here are some more fun pictures of our little man
Big yawn (5 wks)

Yes I am mad
Another big yawn
This one is from his first week-I had to include it
Grandma B bought me this super cute bear outfit to keep me warm and happy in my car seat.
Aren't I adorable?!
Yesterday we went to the model train museum in Balboa Park with Chris, Mary, their girls, Sean, Amy and their kids. We arrived first and Connor wasn't too happy in the stroller so we headed back to the car and put him in the ergo baby-which I love by the way! Connor slept soundly through the whole museum.

This is in the Lego room

Here's another fun room-this was probably my favorite room, there was so much to look at. This was my second time going to that museum so I really didn't take many pictures. I liked this train as it had the smurfs on it. They had a lot of very creative trains decorated just for the holidays. There was a sponge bob one too.

Here's Connor in a holiday outfit Grandma O gave him. Our neighbors gave us the socks, we also have green, blue and black ones. I love how they look like shoes.

3 1/2 weeks

My how time flies, our baby is almost a month old and we haven't posted nearly enough pictures of him yet...so here are a few. Do you see a running theme? He does have eyes, and he does open them occasionally...generally between midnight and 3am.

Sleeping with Daddy

Sleeping with Grandpa

Connor and I went to the Zoo today with Kira, her boys and her mom. We got to meet this little guy. He's a pengalin (I'm sure I spelled that wrong). He's one of only two that the Zoo has and they are the only Zoo to have them in captivity. They don't usually live very long in captivity. He has a super long tongue, it was fun to watch him.

When Peter got home from work he found Connor and I like this.
We had a great time-Thanks for inviting us to go with you!

10 days old

Ever wonder what a baby looks like on the inside? I assume it's a bit like this, just flip him upside down. This is one of Connor's favorite sleeping positions.

This is another favorite position
Taken at the hospital...one of the many faces he dazzles us with
Want a kiss?

Thinking

Will you please turn the flash off?
Staring at daddy

Look at the size of those feet! Now imagine those kicking you in the ribs constantly.

I'm ready for my first Doctor's appointment!
We have decided that Little Squirt was a very appropriate nickname for him. This was the outfit he went to his doctor's appointment in. He came home in a second outfit and before long he was in his third outfit of the day. After a couple days of constantly wetting his clothes and mine, and the bed and basically anywhere he was we were given advice on how to solve that problem. Now he generally stays in one outfit for the day...unless he decides to be a little squirt. :)

Our Family of Three

It all started at 10 o'clock last night. Mandy and I had just returned home from a very tasty dinner at a Casa De Pico's for my Mom's birthday. Mandy hadn't taken a nap in the afternoon, so she was more tired than usual. That's when the pains started.
These pains were much stronger and more regular than she had ever had before. Of course, we wanted to make sure this was the real thing and not the fake labor, since we really didn't want to head over to La Jolla just to be sent home. So she endured them until 1 AM or so. We tried to cope with them by changing positions, having me massage her back, taking a warm shower, etc. By 1 AM, the contractions were coming 3-5 minutes apart, and were fairly regular. At this point we realized it certainly wasn't fake, and headed to the hospital.
When we got there, they hooked Mandy up to the contraction monitoring machine and observed her for 1 hour. It turns out she was in labor, but it was very, very early. Mandy and I were shocked because how intense the pain was, even at this stage. Mandy could hardly walk. They gave us a choice: go home and come back later, or walk around and see if it progressed farther. We chose the latter--I think both of us would have been pretty shook up if we ended up back at home. Poor Mandy wasn't going to get any sleep or rest where ever she was.
Lucky for us, after walking around for an hour, with every 5 steps or so followed by massive contraction, they decided that Mandy was in enough pain to go ahead and admit us. This was about 4:30 or5 in morning. Both of us were exhausted. Within an hour, they administered her epidural--and it was a miraculous thing. How on Earth did they ever have babies before they came up with this stuff? Mandy felt TONS better and was able to rest at that point, although she wasn't really able to sleep much since she had her blood pressure being monitored every 5 min and nurses had to keep doing tests, setting things up, etc.
Anyway, after a few more hours of contractions and some pushing in the final hour, little baby Connor was born at 12:02 on Saturday, Nov 6. Our handsome little mini-man weighed 8 lbs and 7 oz, and was 21 inches long. And then there were three of us.