On Saturday, despite Brian’s rule that there is no Christmas decorations or Christmas music allowed until Dec. 1, I decorated the house. (I’ve also been listening to Christmas music for about a month now).  Chloe helped.  She was so excited by the tree.  She helped put ornaments on and quickly figured out the lights (since I plugged them into a power bar by themselves so they were easy to turn on and off).  I love turning just the Christmas tree lights on before opening her door and watching her face light up when she sees the tree.  She also loves to play with the nativity scene that is under the tree.  She especially likes Baby Jesus and his manger (which is now MIA) and has learned to say Jesus.  She was sitting by the tree the other day, reading a Christmas book that had kids doing a Christmas paegent and she was playing with the nativity pieces on top of that page.  I love the way she is so easily excited and the joy that she has when she sees things like the tree, or the first time we had snow.  This year, I am going to enjoy Christmas with her and try to experience it the way it was meant to be experienced, with the easy, simple joy of a child!

Christmas is coming soon and so we have started with Christmas preparations.  One of these things is Christmas baking.  On Wednesday, Chloe and I made sugar cookies.  They are already gone, due to our discovery of Brian’s huge affinity for sugar cookies.  I very seldom wear an apron as what little bit of flour that gets on me can be brushed off quite easily.  When you are baking with a toddler this is not so, especially when she falls off the chair she is standing on four times because of all the flour on the chair and so you pick her flour covered body up off the floor for cuddles.  While it was incredibly messy and I think I spend more time cleaning up then I did actually making and baking the cookies, it was a lot of fun and she definitely enjoyed it.  Next time, I will just have to make sure that both of us wear an apron.

I always heard that people weren’t as focused on their second child and swore that I wouldn’t be one, but I am noticing that with the time and energy that it takes to look after two children, I am not taking as many pictures of Jacob, and he often plays on the floor by himself.  I also don’t write as much about him and didn’t mark down his developmental milestones as much, so here are some updates.

Jacob has GER (gastroesophageal reflux).  This isn’t really a big deal and he should grow out of it but it results in a lot of drool and a lot of spit up.  We go through about 3 bibs a day, so I had to buy more.  But even in his bibs, he sure is cute

Also, I cut his hair for the second time.  It’s a little short, and looks kind of military, but I think it’s really cute.

He really likes to suck his hands, especially his thumb, but will take a soother as well when I give it to him.

He has started solid foods.  So far he has had apples and oatmeal cereal.  He likes them both, although I find that I have to move his hands to get food into his mouth as he tends to put them in his mouth.

Despite me trying to get him on some kind of schedule, he is still very sporadic with his eating times, although he is sleeping on a relatively regular schedule.

He smiles and giggles all the time.  I think he must be one of the happiest babies around.

He has the cutuest, pudgiest, little thighs ever.  I love to pinch them and watch him giggle.

He is tipping the scales at 15 lbs.

He’s currently crying and needs to be tended to, so I’m going to look after my second child, who I love just as much as my first, even though he doesn’t get the same amount of attention, pictures and notes.

Last night, Chloe was sick.  So, this morning, despite baths at 11:30 and 1:00 in the morning, I gave her a bath, because she still kind of smelled.  I decided to put bubbles in it, which made it her first official bubble bath.  When I first put her in she cried a bit and wouldn’t sit down, so I started playing with the bubbles and she became interested in them.  She then played in her bubble bath until she was a prune.  At one point, I put them on my chin, and she started copying me.

She also decided that eating bubbles was a good idea for a stomach that had spent all night regurgitating.

Last night, I put Jacob to bed at 6:30.  He slept until 7:30 this morning!  I feel great!  I’m not counting on it, but here’s hoping it becomes a trend.

So Jacob is officially weaned.  Since Sunday he has had nothing but bottles!  Sunday morning he woke up and I tried to nurse but nothing was coming out.  Letdown wouldn’t start and I couldn’t even get a single drop out, so I made him a bottle, which he drank.  He took it so I tried another bottle for his next feed and he drank that too.  By evening, he had drunk only bottles and he was content and happy.  That night, he ate at 5:00 and slept until 2:00.  I was ecstatic.  He also started pooping regularly again.  I am so happy.  My baby is full, he is sleeping well, he is eating well, he is gaining weight, he is peeing(was previously only having about 4 wet diapers a day.  Doctors and Nurses like to see at least 6-8) and pooping well!  After spending a month worrying, stressing, feeling guilty, and fighting with Jacob almost every feed, it’s nice to have all that behind us.  Thank you Enfamil!

And the other day I walked around the corner to see this:

(I rotated it, but it didn’t take.  Sometimes that happens)

Tonight, after I had put Jacob in bed, I heard him “talking”.  This is normal.  Suddenly, he started crying.  This is not.  Thinking that he had probably got stuck on his stomach (which he does often) I went in to check on him.  Not only was he on his stomach, but his poor little legs were both through the crib bars, despite the bumper pad.  I would have taken a picture, but the camera was downstairs and I didn’t want to leave him like that while I ran to get it, so no pic.

Also, today he drank nothing but bottles!  Right before bed he completely drained an 8 oz. bottle!  Hopefully this is the start of weaning!  The poor boy was starving and now he is getting food!  Thankfully, I have come to the point where I am completely okay with this.  I figure, I’m better off giving him formula then letting him starve just because I am so insistent on breastfeeding.  Also, it was causing a lot of stress, which is not good for him (or me, or Chloe, or Brian) either.

And now, I will be going to bed, hoping for a stretch longer than 5 hours!

Well, today is Halloween and so I took Chloe to a friends house and we went trick or treating together.  Her daughter is 2 weeks older than Chloe and her son is a couple months younger than Jacob.  Anyway, it was so much fun!  The girls were hilarious.  They didn’t really understand what was going on at first.  Chloe was more interested in following dogs around and trying to go into people’s houses.  After a few times she started to understand and was carrying her own bucket.  One lady let the girls grab their own candy and Chloe just kept grabbing.  I let her grab two handfuls (which is two things) before I took her away.  They were fascinated by the jack-o-lanterns and all the other Halloween decorations.  I really enjoyed it and am looking forward to taking both the kids (with Brian this time) next year!

Every time I asked Chloe if she wanted to put her costume on, she would run away and whimper, so I put Jacob in the costume in the hopes that she would be more willing to wear it.  Once we got to Rachel’s and she saw Isabelle in her giraffe costume, she was willing to put hers on.

And, the girls breaking into the candy after we got back to the house.

I am getting extremely frustrated.  Jacob is still on his 10 day poop hiatus.  The doctors all say it’s normal, the nurse at health link says it’s normal, numerous people say that it is normal, but it is not!  He was sleeping up to 9 hours at night.  Now I am lucky if I get 5.  He eats horridly when he used to eat great.  He cries at random times, with no logical obvious reason, and he was not one of the babies that does that.  He only ever cries if he actually had a problem (hungry, tired, wet, Chloe attacked him, etc.).  The thing that concerns me most:  I think he might be losing weight.  If he’s not than at the very least he is stagnating.  Not good when you are this little!  I’ve got him on pro-biotics, I took him off his antibiotics for now (as I think they may have caused the problem).  I’ve introduced apple prune juice, and the pharmacist (who is the only person in the medical community that agrees with me that something is wrong) gave me a laxative which we will try.  It’s driving me crazy, because even though they are all saying that it’s normal and that he is fine, I know my baby, and this it not normal or fine!  Something is wrong, and I intend to fix it!  (Willing to take suggestions, he’s still EBF except the juice).

The Thumb: all natural

no packaging to throw away, no energy or water used cleaning and sanitizing the soothers, no soothers that get thrown away and no plastic products or energy used to make the soother!