Dear Doster- 5 Months

Dear Doster,

This month was absolutely a favorite.  We had so much fun doing “fall activities” with you, and you seemed to have a fun time too.

The transition back to work has been a little rocky for me.  I think I still cried every day that I dropped you off at school last month (not because I’m worried about you, mostly because I miss you!).  You LOVE your school; you smile at the teachers every day!  I just get sad that they get to be with you all day, and I only see you in little spurts.  I definitely appreciate my time with more than I used to, and I just try to soak in every moment.

One of the biggest challenges this month was your first ear infection.  A few days ago, your teacher called me and told me that you were running a fever—I freaked out!  Luckily, we snagged you a doctor’s visit and Dr. Bartlett came to the rescue.  It broke my heart thinking about my little man in any type of pain.  You seem to be feeling better now, though you never even acted upset or fussy in the first place. 

Size:

Big boy!  You weigh in at 16lbs and 4 ounces.  You’re in 3-6 months clothing, and occasionally you wear a 6-9 month outfit. You are still in size 2 diapers during the day, and a size 3 diaper at night.

Feeding:

Mostly this month, you continued on your bottle schedule.  You’re still on a mixture of formula and breast milk.  I started producing a little bit more, but pumping is still a challenge at work.  A few days ago we started on rice cereal.  You weren’t so hip to it your first time, but you slowly growing more accustomed to it. We try a little in the morning and a little at night.

Sleeping:

You are still an amazing sleeper, THANK YOU!!!  You are now very easy to put down at night, and you usually sleep for 11 or 12 hours.  Lately, you’ve been waking up at 5:30 and “talking” to yourself for a few minutes.  You go back to sleep, but it definitely wakes me up.  I only get annoyed when it happens on the weekend.

Your napping has improved as well!  You take about 3 naps during the day, anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour. 

Personality:

Happy Happy Happy!  Your teacher at school told me that you are the happiest baby.  She said, “If I had five more Dosters in here, my job would be a lot easier!”

What a big compliment!

You really like looking around and holding your toys.  You love walking around outside, and you absolutely adore being around Brighton.  You smile when you see people that you know, and you are just so content. 

You have been a little fussier now that you are sick—the stuffiness makes it harder for you to sleep.  You are also not a big fan of having your nose cleaned. Sorry Kiddo.

Development:

Checking out those fingers!

You love grabbing, rolling, cooing, laughing, swatting, and holding.  You get a little frustrated if you are on your tummy for too long and can’t figure out how to roll back over.  You love to make funny noises, and laugh when other people do them.  Dr. Painter said that you have excellent head control, and I think so too!  Lately, you’ve been very interested in your fingers. They are adorable, I can’t blame you!

You are such a little charmer and you make me so happy!  Thank you for being such a good baby.  I’m so proud to be your mom. 

Falla' Back, Y'all!

October was such a fun month for our little family and I wanted to take a second to quickly document some of our fall fun.

As I’ve said before, I’m not the most organized gal.  So this blog has to serve as my little digital scrapbook.  There are so many little things that I want to always remember.

Like, Doster’s first Halloween party…

We found out about the Halloween Block Party via one of our favorite stores, KD’s Treehouse.  There was music (a local band for kids, “Lunch Money”), games, food, and fire engines.

Doster seemed to really love his first concert.  He also really enjoyed seeing his reflection in the fire engine.

The next day, we took Doster to the pumpkin patch at Trenholm Road Methodist Church.  Doster was a pretty good sport and seemed to enjoy checking out the pumpkins.  It was such a beautiful day and, as always, Doster loved being outside.

On Halloween, we dressed our little Ninja Turtle for school.  Uncle Thomas dubbed him “Dostertello”, which I thought was adorable.

We trick-or-treated at a few houses near ours, which of course made Doster happy (again, anything outside is a happy time!).

We had visitors as well—my dad, mom, sister and brother came over to enjoy a little Halloween time with Doster.  He was very overwhelmed and over-stimulated at that point.   He fell right to sleep and slept for over 12 hours.  All and all, a pretty good Halloween!

Dear Doster, 4 Months

Dear Doster,

Here we are at four months old.  You are so much fun to be around right now, and I miss you almost every second that we are apart (especially those daytime hours when you are at school).

This month, the transition to daycare/school has been very tough.  Hopefully, a day will soon come when I won’t sob every time I drop you off…

I am constantly astonished at how quickly you grow and how much you change daily!

Size:

At your four month check up, you clocked in at 15lbs 6oz and 23  7/8 inches.  So, it looks like you are a shorty for now!

You are in size 3-6 month clothing and it breaks my heart a little each time I find a new outfit that is too small for you.  You wear a size 2 diaper during the day, and you wear a size 3 “12 hour” diaper at night (and you blow through those on occasion!).

Feeding:

You are rocking about six ounces every three hours during the day.  About 14 ounces of that is breast milk, and the rest is formula.  I’m trying my best to keep up the pumping! The doctor says that we can start you on rice cereal when we are ready, so you can look forward to that in the coming weeks.  You drink a big fat bottle before bed, which is probably why you sleep so well…

Sleeping:

We are so lucky.  I almost hate telling people how well you sleep because I’m afraid they’ll think I’m lying or bragging.  You do a solid 11 hours at night, and sometimes even 12.  Getting you down has become a pretty easy process now that we have our nighttime routine down pat. You are still a little sketchy on the naps, but we’ll take it!

Personality:

Happy Happy Happy!  You love to smile and coo which makes you so much fun to be around.  You laugh and grin at us constantly.

You absolutely LOVE looking at your mobile (another big thank you to The Walls for the borrow!) and you also love chilling on the floor looking at toys.

The only time that you fuss is when you are over-tired (usually after daycare pick up due to the non-napping) or when I try to clean your nose.

My favorite time of the day is when you wake up in the morning.  You are so excited to see me and your dad and greet us with the biggest smile.  It’s as if you are saying: Score!  You guys are both here again! Yes!

Development

I can’t believe how much you are learning.  You are a big “grabber” these days and you love to feel and touch anything. You are a big talker now, and I love to have conversations with you. Dr. Painter says that you have excellent head control, good job buddy!

Your biggest trick is rolling over.  You don’t always do it, but every once in a while tummy time will lead to a roll.  We always make a HUGE deal about it when you do, and you have big smiles.  I can tell you are proud of yourself, and we are proud of you, too!

We are such lucky parents.  We won the lottery when we got you, Doster!

My Tips For Preggos And New Moms

I've had this post sitting in my drafts for a while. I'm not sure why I have been hesitant to share. Maybe it's because I'm hesitant to give advice in any way, shape or form. Maybe it's because I think it is particularly poorly written. Who knows. I've decided to post it after all. I hope it doesn't come across as preachy.


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When I was pregnant my attitude towards advice ran the spectrum.  Sometimes I cherished it and other times it took major restraint to hold back my eye roll.

Now that I have been through the three toughest, yet most rewarding months of my life, I thought that I would dispense a few nuggets of my own. 

1.  The Bunny Sleeper – I LOVE this thing.

I know. I know.  One more thing that takes up a lot of room and costs 50 bucks, right?  Trust me, this sucker is worth every penny!  The first two months of his life, Doster LIVED in this thing.   It’s perfect for babies that have gas, spit up, and are fussy during sleep time.  Though he doesn’t sit in it too much now, he still takes really great naps in it. 

Various sizes of Bunny Seat Love: 

(I love how he is pointing to his tummy)

2. Hospital Flowers

We were so blessed to receive beautiful arrangements from family, coworkers and friends and they truly brightened up our hospital room. But flowers can be really hard to take home from the hospital.  My friend, Joy, had the great suggestion to donate them to hospital patients that perhaps don’t have many visitors.  Great idea! We took home one bouquet and our nurse promised to deliver the rest to some elderly patients on the next floor.

3. Saying No and Saying Yes

I’m a people-pleaser and have a hard time saying “no” to random requests and “yes” when accepting help! 

I was pretty overwhelmed the first few weeks after Doster was born.  We are so blessed to have wonderful family and friends, which meant a lot of people wanted to visit.  In the beginning I had a really tough time denying a request.  When the baby was sleeping, I wanted to sleep, not have a zombie-like visit where I don’t even appreciate our guest because I am so sleepy. I quickly learned that most people prefer honesty and will not be offended if you ask them to wait until you feel more settled.

It was also difficult for me to accept help in the beginning.  I wish I knew why, maybe some sort of guilt-trip in the back of my brain.  But nowadays, the mail man could offer to sweep my house and I’d let him in to do it.  Okay, not really, though I do have a very nice mailman.

  

4. Diapers

I know that every baby bottom is different.  At first I had a hard time letting go of the name-brand stuff, but now that we are in size 2, the Target brand is really rocking for me.  They are half the price of the Pampers!

5. The first few weeks are really hard, but it gets better.

I wish I could go back in time and tell the me of two months ago to calm down.  Call it hormone changes, call it baby blues, call it whatever you like--- I was in a bad place.  Please don’t think I didn’t love being a mom or wasn’t crazy about my baby.  I was just mentally and physically exhausted and I did not see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Once the craziness of the first few weeks wears off and the baby sleeps a little bit more, life is SO much easier.  You learn, you get your routine going, you build confidence and life gets awesome. 

6. You don’t have to wash your pump parts every time, you can put them the fridge!

7. Newborn poops are really loud. Watch out.

8. I think a playmat is a great investment.  Doster LOVES his.

9. Don’t spend a ton of money on crib bedding.  Our pediatrician does NOT recommend a bumper (even though they are super-cute, lame, right?).

10.  Its hard not to splurge on cute baby clothes but you really don’t need that many since you have to do laundry constantly.

Okay, I could babble on and on about the lessons that I’ve learned already, but I think I’ll stop now and leave you with last pearl of Mandi-ness:

11.  The most important words of advice I can give to a first time pregnant woman: Don’t get upset when your plan goes awry.  

My personal birth plan did not include an induction or a cesarean.  I felt defeated when I ultimately had to do both.  In retrospect I wish I could have saved myself the mental stress by “letting go” earlier.  Had I allowed my doctor to perform the cesarean when he first wanted to, I could have saved myself a great deal of unnecessary pain, discomfort and exhaustion (24 hours of it!) and enjoyed my first moments with Doster even more (without blacking out from sleep deprivation so soon!).

When my breastfeeding situation didn’t go exactly as planned, I had to begin supplementing with formula.  I sobbed for weeks, feeling like a failure because my “plan” was so engrained in my mind that I wouldn’t let myself accept reality (more on the breastfeeding journey in a much later post).

It can be hard to free yourself from the mental picture you’ve created.  But if you can find a way to go with the flow and let your plan evolve, you’ll be much happier, much faster.

That’s it for me for now! 

Dear Doster- 3 Months

Dear Doster,

What a wonderful little boy you are!  The past month has been extremely joyful yet very emotional for me since I started working again. We are very lucky that Gran D is able to look after you during my first month back on the job.  It has definitely helped with the transition, and she is an excellent help around the house!

You grow and learn so much each and every day and you have smiles the light up a room.

Size:

I won’t know your weight until your Doctor’s appointment next month, but I am guessing you are between 13 and 14 pounds right now.  You are starting to wear 3-6 month clothing and you are still in size 2 diapers. Incidentally, I’ve discovered that the Target-brand diapers work really well for your little bottom, which is a money-saver!

Feeding:

You love to eat! You typically eat about 26-28 ounces per day, but we’ve up’d your ounces per bottle. I’m pumping at least 13 ounces per day of breast milk, which makes me happy. Pumping is definitely a challenge now that I am back at work but right now we are still finding ways to make it work.

Sleeping:

At nighttime, you are a fantastic sleeper.  Getting you down for the night is not always easy, but once you are there you sleep anywhere from 8-11 hours. You’ve been doing more and more 10 hour stretches and we are very grateful! I have very little willpower for “sleep training”.  It hurts my heart when you cry!  I think our night time bath routine really helps you settle down.

You are a very inconsistent napper.  You fight fight fight sleep during the day, and sleep with one eye open (literally, sometimes!).

Personality:

What a happy baby! When you are not overly-tired you are bubbly and smiley.  You coo and “talk” and have the biggest grin.   You love it when your Daddy and I make funny noises or sing to you.

You are happy when you are able to spread out on your playmat or blanket and look around and take in your surroundings.  You absolutely love your toys, especially the mobile. 

You rarely fuss when I change your diapers or clothes. In fact, you are usually very smiley during those times.

Development:

You are not a big fan of tummy time, but you are getting used to it more and more.  You are great at grabbing your toys and occasionally hold on for a longer period of time.

You are getting so good at holding up your head now! You look so cute when you sit in 

someone’s lap and “sit up” like a big boy.

You are starting to learn how to stick your tongue out at us, which is adorable:

All in all, you are one good baby, and exceptionally cute I might add.  We are so lucky to have you and we promise to try to be the best parents possible.  I’m so excited to watch you grow and am trying to enjoy every little step along the way.