1 Month as of 5/27/18
Weight:
Height: 21 1/4 inches at 3 weeks
Clothes:
... are SO much fun! Haha! Truly I am having such a blast dressing our girl, and coordinating bows. :) I really had a blast choosing things for Beau to wear, but this is a whole new level! Her newborn clothes are still fitting, and we're wearing some 0-3 but it's all a little loose.
Sleep:
Just like her big brother, this girl has blown us away with how well she sleeps! Everyone said we wouldn't get two good sleepers, and she might change her mind but right now she's honestly sleeping better than Beau was at this age. She's slept a few 7 hour stretches as of the middle of last week. And we haven't really done anything to encourage longer sleep for her yet, other than a good routine during the day. Beau started sleeping through the night at 7 weeks old, so I'm trying to really savor this season of being up with our girl in the middle of the night. I know it's fleeting!
Schedule:
Eating every three hours during the day, with her two longer stretches at night. She's also been great at staying awake and alert for a little bit after her feedings. I was honestly really unsure what getting her on a schedule would look like with Beau and his busy life (haha!) but it's been a lot more natural than I expected.
Health:
It has been so redemptive for us getting to experience the first month of parenting a new baby without any stressful news! (Beau's NICU story
here) When Sophie was born I cried a lot feeling guilty for how awesome it felt that when she was checked out there were no questions or anything. It all went so smoothly and it was such a relief and I didn't want to feel like this made our experience with her better than ours with Beau. Because although I may wish we didn't have some of those harder moments, I loved every second of welcoming my baby boy into the world. I'm not struggling with this anymore.. I know that it's just the beginning of two very different lives and I cannot wait to see all that the Lord has in store for both of my babies. Different doesn't mean better. And oddly enough, in this case not stressful doesn't mean better either haha.
I don't know if this is appropriate to address in the "health" spot.. but I do want to journal these thoughts, even just for myself. With everything going on at the beginning of Beau's life, nursing kind of flew out the window. He latched successfully and nursed for ONE feed, and we had a really traumatic incident with a lactation consultant forcing him to me to eat and his stats were dropping and she kept forcing him and I had to yell to stop because I was terrified. Come to find out he's got really bad tongue and lip ties. Anyway! So I exclusively pumped for about two months and then he was formula fed and happy and we never looked back. At first I felt weirdness over this in certain environments because people are VERY opinionated about how you feed your child. You might be reading this and thinking I should have done something differently, but I firmly believe that fed is best. :) Anywho... my expectations for nursing Sophie were low and I honestly thought I'd probably exclusively pump for awhile and then go about my life as a bottle feeding mama. I didn't even know if I wanted to try and nurse Sophie right when she was born simply because I had such bad memories from before. I equated trying to nurse with stress and anxiety and I didn't want that right at her birth. Anyways I made the decision in the moment to try and nurse her and she did great. Unexpected. So here we are at one month of nursing. Although I have no idea what this journey will look like moving forward, I'm a little proud of myself for sticking with something that felt out of my comfort zone. There are lots of other thoughts I have about this but I'll save them for just in my own brain because this paragraph has probably already been controversial enough somehow without meaning to be. :)
Crying:
Sister does NOT like having a dirty diaper. Can't say that I blame her though. She also doesn't like the initial buckling into her car seat (which looking back at Beau's one month post, he didn't either! things like this are why I'll stick with these updates! so fun to look back on!)
Likes:
Being held
bathtime
her paci
kisses from big brother Beau
tummy time (praise the Lord! Beau hated it haha!)
Dislikes:
wet diapers
being strapped into the carseat
Milestones:
being born + coming home, haha!
Places You’ve Gone:
To church for the first time
Cousin Meg's Cubbies Awards party
Uncle Zac's BTCP graduation
Granny and Pops house
First ever homegroup meeting at the Hardwicks
Uncle Sam & Aunt Kayce's house
Target (lol)
The Pediatrician
Special Moments:
Being born :)
Meeting her big brother Beau, and then the rest of her family
Uncle Collin and Jacqueline coming to visit
Tracey came to visit all the way from the UK and meet her
Two photo sessions with Emi Joy Photography, one in the hospital and one lifestyle newborn session at home
Watching the Royal Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle together at 3am :)
Daddy, Mama, & Big Brother:
The adjustment to two so far has beyond exceeded our expectations. I had no idea how Beau would handle everything, how much he would understand what's going on with her, etc. But he's been all about it. He will come over and give her kisses, wants to help hold her bottle when she's having a bottle feeding, be right there by us for any feeding, etc. Pretty early on he picked up a paci and tried to give it to her. I know this probably sounds silly but Beau never had a paci really so I have no idea how he knew what to do with it, haha! He loves touching her and trying to hold her hand. ALL the time, except during her newborn photos of course.. because that would have been too easy, haha!! So for the most part Beau has really made this adjustment easy on me. They both have a nap at 1pm, so I can either choose to hold Sophie then and have some sweet time with her, or to let both of them nap and get stuff done or rest. I really like that. I just REALLY like being a mom of two.
For me, postpartum has looked differently than with Beau. I felt like I recovered really quickly because I had a ton of energy to be up and down and all around at the NICU. But this time even more so. I felt like my stomach went down faster (although its all still lacking muscle because.. let's just be honest here!) and my weight dropped faster. This doesn't matter at all but at one month postpartum I have 9 pounds to loose. I gained somewhere around 35 pounds total so I feel good about this number. These might be huge to some, or little to others. But it's where I am. :) I know that with diet this can be knocked out but I'm not focusing on that too much right now because of nursing and just not knowing what to expect there. During my pregnancy with Sophie I realized how inaccurately I view myself sometimes. There is a particular photo from our trip to Amsterdam last summer that I remember looking at and thinking I looked so fluffy. Then while I was pregnant I looked at it and realized that all I saw was a happy, healthy mama. I need to get over myself a little bit, honestly. I firmly believe it's important to fuel your body with healthy food and to live an active lifestyle, but I also want to enjoy a cookie. :) More specifically, cookie cake. Anyways I digress but I wanted to recap some of these thoughts. Credit every positive of recovery to getting a shower early on!! Haha!
Also worth noting is that Daddy always does bath time, as he's always done with Beau. It's a nice break for me in the evenings and a precious time for Ben to bond with each of our babes.
Como Tomo Bottles- We used Dr. Brown's bottles for Beau and liked them okay, but they leaked a lot for us. My friend Polly loves como tomo and they're very trendy right now, haha! So we switched and honestly love them. They're awesome. Won't be looking back from this switch. I'm grateful for how easily Sophie has handled taking a bottle along with nursing. I know some struggle with this.
Swaddle Me Swaddles- We tried a few other things for sister but she likes what we used for Beau the most. Our old faithfuls!
Discreet Boutique- This is for sure a TMI item but I was blown away by how much more comfortable these were for the hospital and the few days after than the mesh undies.
Paty brand clothing- I had heard of Paty from a few people but about a week before an online friend told me I needed to stock up on a few things for Sophie. The knit is so light and perfect for hot, Southern summers and she looks so sweet in her outfits. My favorites for sure. Wish I had things for Beau when he was tiny!
Bath Seat- I mentioned that Ben does bath time.. he LOVES this bath seat. He literally was like "why did we ever have the
Puj?" The Puj is still nice for travel I think.. but this bath seat has been awesome.
Copper Pearl Nursing Cover/Carseat Cover- I never had one of these with Beau and absolutely LOVE it!! The quality and price point are great. Really any of the few "Copper Pearl" things I've gotten are great!
Protein Balls- These have been my absolute saving grace for when I'm starving and taking care of babies and can't stop to eat just yet.
This is the recipe I used to use, and some friends brought us the recipe they use right when Sophie came home, and we've now converted to their recipe, at least for now! :)
1 cup oats + 1 scoop vanilla protein powder (I use this!) + 1/2 cup peanut butter (they also converted me to crunchy for this!) + 1/3 cup honey + 1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips + 1 tsp vanilla
Yeti Type Cup- This was one of my major survival items for pregnancy too, but I haven't stopped loving it. I use
these straws and I'm drinking water at all times and honestly still feeling dehydrated haha. This exact cup (in two different colors!) is what I have and love. Worth every single penny!!
