Kason: Three Months Old

I am way late on this post...but this Little Mister is now THREE MONTHS OLD!  I really, really can't believe it!  He is the happiest little guy I have ever known!  He always has a huge smile on his face and his new favorite hobby is chewing on his hands (as shown in the last pic!).  He is still as laid back as ever and is sleeping through the night consistently, this mommy is well-rested for sure!  I am slightly obsessed with this little guy, I just can't get enough of his smiles and snuggles!  He already brings so much joy to our little family and I can't imagine it without him now!

Kason: Two Months Old

I am SO behind!  But, this month mister Kason turned two months!!!  He is such a sweet little guy and has already brought so much joy into my life!  He is the smiliest little baby ever, if you talk to and smile at him he will just smile right back up at you!  He is also an amazing sleeper, he is asleep by 9 every night and sleeps until about 4 AM.  At 4 we nurse then he is right back to sleep for another few hours.  I am definitely one well rested mommy for having two little ones!  Nursing has been going really well for us and I am so relieved that it has worked out.  It is definitely time consuming and a huge commitment, but well worth it!  I love this little guy more than I ever thought possible!  Here are some of his two month pics!

Fit Mama - Week 2

So, after having two kids only 13 months apart, my figure now needs a little attention.  But this post is about more than just weight loss, my family is undergoing a lifestyle change of our eating habits.  Obviously, we want to raise our children with healthy eating habits and give them the best start at life, but to do that, David and I need to change our habits.  We can't expect our kids to eat well if we don't set the example for them.  That being said, we are eating according to Dr. Joel Fuhrman's Eat To Live plan.  We are essentially becoming 'nutritarians'...the majority of the foods we eat are nutrient-dense.  We have cut out dairy almost completely (it is so horrible for you!) and eat very limited amounts of meat.  The majority of our meals are made of greens, veggies, fruits, nuts, seeds and beans.  This is the healthiest way to eat and will set our children up to be healthy later in life.  We are really excited about this and have been doing really well eating according to this plan, and Fenna loves it!  I see and hear so many stories of toddlers being picky eaters, but we have not run into that problem!  Fenna loves anything green you place in front of her and eats like a champ!  I have actually been worried before that she was eating too much!  Having explained all of that, I am also very hopeful that eating this way will help me shed some of those extra lbs from the babies!  So, my top weight at the end of my pregnancy with Kason was 205 (which was actually also my top weight with Fenna).  After giving birth I dropped about 20 lbs almost immediately then stayed in the mid 180's for the first 5 weeks post-partum.  So, when I began this at 5 weeks post-partum my starting weight was 183.4 (yikes!).  For my height and build a good weight for me is around 125, but personally my goal weight will be 140, if I can get there I will be a happy camper!  As you can tell I obviously have a long way to go!  As of this morning, about a week and a half in I am 175.8, so I have made some progress already!  Now, to help motivate me, I am going to post pictures throughout this process.  These first couple really scare me because I think I look better than I actually do, but when I look at these pictures I realize that I need to stick with this!  I can't believe I am posting these, I know they are horrible, but hopefully soon I will have new, better ones to replace them with!  Here we go...

Kason: One Month Old

WOW!  How time flies!  I can't believe I am writing this post already (and I'm even a few days late)!  Time definitely goes way too fast once little ones start entering the picture.  I am definitely trying to cherish each moment, but they disappear so quickly!  At his 4 week weigh in he was finally back over his birthweight, so we were able to stop taking him to the doctor weekly, thank goodness!  Now, he's already getting too big for his newborn clothes, and I don't think I mentioned that he skipped newborn diapers and just started with size 1 right from birth!  He is sleeping very well at this point, at around 3 weeks old he began sleeping in 4 to 5 hour stretches and usually only wakes up once per night (around 2 or 3 AM usually).  I'm definitely not complaining about that!  He is really just the sweetest little man, he only cries when he needs to be fed and is quite alert when he is awake.  He can already follow things with his eyes very well and keeps his head up like a champ!  Kason has been quite the busy little mister, in his first month he has already been to the zoo as well as the pumpkin patch!  Having a second child definitely brings in another dynamic, but we have been working hard at making sure we are still getting out and about (if it was my choice we would probably never leave the house!).  All in all, we are so in love with our little mister and I just can't imagine him not being a part of this family, he was definitely worth the hard weeks at the end of the pregnancy!

Little Mister

Well, our little guy turned 3 weeks old this week!  Which is completely unbelievable...it goes way too fast!  Unfortunately, he has had some trouble starting out.  At his first check up after we were discharged from the hospital he became very jaundiced and had a biliruben level of 20, which is very high.  He had to be in a biliblanket 24/7 for 4 days and was having blood drawn every couple of days to check his levels.  His biliruben level on the fourth day came back as 14.5 so we were thankfully able to take him off of the biliblanket at that time.  Even now (over a week later) the whites of his eyes are still a bit yellow, but that is apparently the last place that the signs of jaundice disappear from.  He has also been having a bit of trouble gaining weight.  At his 3 week check up he was still not back up to his birthweight, but he is only a few oz shy of it at 8 lbs 12 oz.  Now we have to take him in for a weight check next week as well, when he turns one month old, and hopefully he will be past his birthweight by then!  We are nursing like crazy to try to get him to gain (and avoid having to supplement with any formula (which we had to do a few times while he was on the biliblanket to try and get the biliruben out of his system)).  

Other than that, little Kason is doing so, so well!  He is a very laid back baby, much like Fenna was.  He is sleeping 4 to 5 hours during the night, so I am one well rested mama!  Fenna has also been sleeping so well, she is currently going to be around 7:30 every night and usually sleeps through the night!  I'm not sure how I ended up with two AMAZING sleepers, but I am definitely not complaining!  We also have weened Fenna from bottles/formula completely...so glad to be done with that!

David went back to work the second week after Kason was born so it has been a bit challenging taking care of two!  There are definitely difficult moments, but overall it is not as hard as I thought it would be.  This week though I do have my sister staying with me to help out with Fenna so I can focus on making sure that Kason is nursing long enough, which will help him put weight on.

I have been so bad/lazy about taking pictures lately (ain't nobody got time fo' that!), but here are a few shots of the kiddos and our lives lately!

Kason Joseph

On September 16th our lives were again changed forever with the addition of Kason Joseph!!

On September 16th I had my 39 week checkup.  I was 6 cm dilated at that point and still not in labor!  At that point I was freaking out a little that if I did start to go into labor it would go so quickly that I would not make it to the hospital...so I chose to be induced.  Even typing that makes me cringe.  I never thought I would chose to be induced, and I feel selfish for doing so, but I made the decision and thankfully we were blessed with a healthy baby boy.  We went into the hospital at 2 PM that day to begin the induction and there was no turning back, we were so ready to meet out Kason!  I received an epidural (which didn't completely work) and waited for the doctor to come in and break my water.  When it was time to break my water, the doctor was about to begin and apparently my water broke on its own at that exact moment...at least that part was natural!  From there it was just a waiting game for the baby to get in position and arrive.  I was rolled onto my left side to help encourage baby to drop, and soon after that the intense labor pains arrived.  It started small on the bottom part of my stomach but quickly spread to the rest of my stomach then to my back.  HOLY COW...back labor is HORRIBLE!  And yes, I did say earlier that I had an epidural...we later found out that the way it was directed most of it ended up in my legs from my knees down (they tried to make me walk before I was ready and I nearly wiped out, the nurse barely caught me!).  I told the nurses how much pain I was in, so they checked me and sure enough the baby was already crowning!!  The doctor was there soon after that and the pushing began.  I don't remember how long exactly that lasted, but it wasn't long at all, maybe 4 or 5 contractions and at 6:57 PM Kason Joseph had arrived!!  Here is our beautiful little boy!

Waiting for Baby

Anyone who knows me knows that I absolutely LOVE being pregnant!  It is honestly one of the only times in my life that I have felt completely comfortable in my body.  I love the bump, I love knowing there is a life growing inside of me, and I don't even mind the stretch marks that much (they do go away eventually, right?!?)!  However, these last few weeks have been rough.  Really rough.  Baby Boy is definitely taking a toll on my body.  Besides being exhausted all the time, it's been painful to even walk.  And I sooo miss being able to sleep on my stomach and roll over in bed without screaming out in pain and taking 5 minutes.  The aches and pains are definitely getting to me...these last weeks have been much worse than I ever remember the last weeks being with Fenna.  And I have been getting down and feeling sorry for myself.  But today I had a wake up call.  I met a very happy, friendly lady who was wearing a stocking cap and eating a jar of baby food for lunch because she had recently undergone chemotherapy and that was all her stomach could handle.  I read a story of a boy born with no limbs who didn't let that stand in his way of doing everything his brothers did, and another of a baby that died within hours of being born.  I can't imagine that heartbreak.  I have friends and family that aren't able to conceive.  I cannot imagine that pain.  I have nothing to complain about.  I have an amazing 13 month old and a little boy I am going to hopefully meet very soon.  I need to keep everything in perspective.  Sure, I am in a little pain right now, but this will pass and when it does it will come out as a huge blessing.  So, I want to share some pictures (taken by the every so talented Melissa Pennington Photography) that make me feel beautiful so I can remember how blessed I am to be able to carry this child, this new life that God created.

  

I'm Not Super Mom

I'm not sure how to start this post because I've never had a post this negative before, but I need to get this out.  Let me just preface by saying that I honestly have nothing to complain about, I have so many blessings in my life.  Despite that, sometimes I just feel beat down and like a failure.  Fenna Mae just turned one a few weeks back, and I'm now a little over 36 weeks pregnant with Baby Boy (we changed his name btw, it is no longer Mason) and I am tired.  I am at the point where my body just hurts all. the. time.  After sitting in a cubicle for 8+ hours a day I come home and there's dinner to make and a seemingly never ending pile of dishes to wash.  I feel like I don't have enough time to get everything done and I especially feel like I don't have enough time to spend with my sweet girl.  I feel like a bad mom.  When I get home I'm rushing around trying to get everything done and by the time I am free to play with Fenna, I am exhausted and don't feel like I am giving her the 'mommy time' she deserves.  And then before I know it, it's her bedtime.  She has been going to bed SO early lately, between 7:30 to 8, which is good, but it also means that I only have about 3 hours with her after I get home from work.  And I waste most of that time trying to straighten up the house and get things ready for the next day.  It's not enough time.  I'm not being a good mom.
There's so many things I want to do better at, but it's all just thoughts in my head.  I want to be a better mother, a better wife, a better housekeeper, a better photographer...but wanting doesn't get you anywhere, and that's exactly where I seem to be stuck at.  I look at other mom's who seem to have it all together and I just wonder why I can't seem to make anything happen.  I have dreams, but I'm too scared to follow them...but who has the time for dreams anyway?
I'm not quite sure what the point of this post is, besides me letting out some emotions (give me a break I'm super pregnant, that's what we do!).  I'm just hoping putting this out will maybe give me a push, or some motivation to DO SOMETHING.  To change what I'm doing now.  But at the same time, I know it won't.  I may be back in a few months posting the same thing...but maybe eventually I will get where I want to be.
And since this post was so depressing, I'll try to brighten it up with some Fenna during our play time together tonight (I have also been slacking on taking pictures!)!  Can never go wrong with that!

 

I have a ONE YEAR OLD!

On August 12th my little baby girl turned one year old!  I can hardly believe how fast this first year has flown by and how much my Fenna Mae has changed in that time!  She is walking, talking (gibberish!), trying to crawl on things that are way too high for her, and has just the sweetest little personality!  She is almost completely on table food now, besides her morning and night bottle (and middle of the night bottle sometimes, AHH!).  She LOVES food!  And we have decided to raise her as a nutritarian (only eating nutrient dense foods), which means no cow's milk and very few dairy products or processed foods.  To replace cow's milk we have been giving her a coconut/almond blend instead and she has been loving it!  She is a pro at drinking out of a straw, but we need to work on her sippy cup skills a bit still!  It has actually been a good decision for our whole family because David and I are eating healthier now too!!
I've been meaning to post on being super pregnant while having a young toddler...let me tell you it can be a challenge!  I'm currently 34 weeks + 6 days.  Fenna is definitely still too young to understand that she will be getting a little brother soon, but with her laid back personality I think she will adjust just fine!  We did change the baby's name also, but that will be announced when he is born!
Yesterday we had Fenna's birthday party (what the heck do you do at a one year olds birthday party!?!?)!  Everything went great and we had so much family and friends swing by.  Please enjoy some pics from Fenna's cake smash (we made her a banana/applesauce cake!) as well as her birthday party!!

And a few from her party!

And her Newborn to One Year Old pic!!!  Love this one!