evynn claire | two months

two months!!

this month has been much less overwhelming and a lot more fun! evynn is full of smiles and chatter and is the perfect companion in our little family!

psst. we totally had to get daddy in the room to talk to evynn to get this grin. such a daddys girl!

How many months old? 2 months

Weight? she weighs 10 lb 14 oz (50^th percentile)/ length is 22.8inches (68^th percentile)/head is 14.9in (25^th percentile)

Doctor check-up? All looks good! Naturally I got a cold two days ago so miss Evynn hasn’t been feeling her best either. Just congestion, no fever so we’re not too worried. But for this first time mom, I feel helpless and so anxious!

Any teeth? nope

Sleep? Ahh.. the dreaded “how is she sleeping?” question.it depends on the night.. we have some nights (mainly those when we were traveling, actually!) where she nurses, I lay her in her bassinet and she’s out and doesn’t even attempt to unswaddle until 5-6 hours later. These days, although I feel terrible about that long stretch, are truly treasured. But, most nights… we bathe, rock, nurse, sound machine, paci… everything. And the kid will.not.sleep. if you lay her down, she cries and we continue the cycle for hours until she finally gives up in the middle of the night. Then she may wake a few more times before morning. I have found that giving a pumped bottle of milk at bedtime helps fill her up quickly then I let her comfort nurse until she “falls asleep”.. we’ll keep trying that. But this is the most frustrating area of newborn life. She also will not nap during the day. How does such a little one survive on 3-4 hours of sleep!?

Feeding? Breastfeeding is going well! There were a few days I exclusively breastfed and she actually seemed full and content and was busting out the diapers. Then last weekend she would nurse for literally an hour and a half and then act hungry an hour later, whew. I am still pumping to help keep supply (and my back to work stash), so in those times if we give her a bottle she finally seems full. I think she just falls asleep so often while nursing that it takes soooooo long to fill her up. Sigh. but such an improvement in breastfeeding over the last few weeks! maybe we're getting the hang of this?!

Eating anything? Mommys milk!

Developmental milestones? She’s all about smiling and cooing at everyone now, such a flirt! She can follow you with her eyes. She hasn’t rolled over yet but definitely thinks about it! And still holds her head up like a champ. In fact, we have to hold her head down to our chest when we’re trying to put her to sleep, she insists on holding it straight up!

Favorite toy? Not really into toys yet.. but she is more interested in her play mat. I’ll also read a few books to her and she’ll smile.

 Speech and language? All about the coo’s. they’re the sweetest little sounds. Aside from her “talking”, she is the noisest baby. She does a 10-15min stretching routine every morning and it sounds like a grown adult’s dramatic stretching noises, ha!

Loves? Nursing, sleeping while nursing, kicking all.the.time (everyone has mentioned how busy she is!), talking and laughing at daddy, walking outside, car ride naps, playing with her hands (constantly interlocking her fingers or twiddling her fingers), cuddling in mom and dads bed!

Dislikes? Lately she’s disliked her paci and tummy time… and sleep. Definitely sleep.

Firsts: illness… she caught a yucky cold and it made her super congested and slightly fussy. This first time mom was a huge worrier and could not sleep hearing her breathe through the night through her stuffy nose. We got a humidifier,  a nose frida (which I totally used to make fun of…), breast fed like crazy and took tons of naps and are already feeling much better!

We love: her crazy loud and d r a m a t I c stretches! Everytime we wake her up she picks her legs up to her belly, arches her back, bends her head all the way backwards, wrinkles her forehead and purses her lips out. It is the goofiest and funniest thing ever! I hope she never grows out of this!

we finally got into our 3 month clothes! but everything is too short, haha! tall and skinny girl ;) 

 evynn loves getting in bed with me/us at about 6 or 7 am and cuddling. she sleeps so well there and just smiles away. 

life lately

(excuse the language in this article) but this is a moms hilarious truth about sleep training.. if that's even a thing. i'm determined it's not. see article for further.

nothing says postpartum workout plan like this mom and baby workout routine.

this clip of ariana grande and jimmy fallon singing songs by other artists.. i can't handle it!

we've been spending our weekdays trying to learn more about each other and figure out some sort of a schedule and the occasional target/francesas browsing to keep my sanity. I also went to a la leche league meeting and it was just wanted I needed.. support and advice! yes!

this past weekend was littlefield's homecoming! thursday night we went to the parade and bonfire (evynn slept through both, ha!) then friday night we had a tailgate at the church before we cody went to the game and evynn and I went to bed :)

...yes i did make evynn a mum. her ribbons were her name, "class of 2032" and "mom & dad" (because we were her date ;))

she is her daddy biggest fan! he can make her talk and laugh more than anyone else. i call on him frequently in the middle of the night when mom doesn't have the answers!

evynn is also all smiles lately! it may take some convincing, but once she's in the mood she has the.cutest.smile

...but she can also be serious hah!

looking forward to the next few days and seizing all fall activities on my last 4 weeks off (tears!). 

hometown tourist

it's been so long since I had been to my hometown that I felt like I was a tourist when we went home this past weekend! We had the busiest trip but it was so great to be with family and friends and introduce our little one to everyone!

On thursday morning we left at 5:00am and hit the road. we stopped in archer city to see Cody's grandparents and eat breakfast with them. Evynn was a hit and such a flirt!

we stopped in Bowie on Thursday afternoon then headed to sherman. we ate at my favorite restaurant then relaxed the rest of the night. 

Friday morning we woke up and I went to get donuts and snapped this picture:

Momo's donuts came to sherman right when I left so I hadn't been able to go. they have all crazy donut flavors-i bought us scores, chai, and maple bacon. Yum!

 then Cody and my dad went on a bike ride around town

 once Nana got home at noon we headed out to lunch at another new spot, Willie Jims. It's such a cute place and did not look like we were in Sherman!

 then we changed into our swimsuits, evynn met her great grandma, and we went swimming. the pool water was perfect and slightly warm so evynn loved it like she loves baths!

 then times for lots of visitors!

 hanging with uncle cody ^ and papa

 we knew we were leaving saturday afternoon so we squeezed in some water volleyball before we had to leave

then we went to the lake for a short visit!

 

aunt shelby and gigi had to meet evynn also!

evynn overall did great on her first road trip, all 6 hours! she slept most of the way! we did have a few blow out diapers that caused me to need an outfit change,but overall all went well ;)

she's definitely a growing girl! newborn clothes and jimmies are too small, yet 0-3 is a little too big. but we made this precious 0-3 dress work for us for church :)

doing life one handed

things motherhood has taught me:

how to survive on 3-4 hours of sleep (i'm a 9-10 hour/night kind of girl...)

to plan out every minute of everyday when traveling (we'll need to leave at this time if i want to feed her at x time)

how to do everything with one hand

Evynn is a sloooowww eater. Like, an average nursing session may be 45min-hour. So, I learned that if i wanted to get anything done, i would have to manage with one hand. I've figured out how to hold her with her positioned properly to nurse all with one arm and use my other arm. Unscrewing pumping supplies and storing milk becomes tricky, but its doable. Fixing dinner-check. doing my hair and makeup-check. packing a suitcase-check. after making dinner and setting the table the other night all while nursing, my arm was complete jello, and she's the smallest she'll ever be! yikes! I'm expecting some killer arms here shortly ;)

oh sweet girl, you've taught us so much! mostly how to love more than we could imagine and somehow find patience when we feel completely empty.

happy september

I am so excited that fall is here!! even better that I get to stay home on maternity leave for 6 more weeks and savor these fall days :)

here's a few goals for the month:

trip to my hometown

labor day cookout with friends

start postpartum workout/diet plan

decorate for fall

plan anniversary trip

tailgate before football game

fall brunch

go to corn maize

attempt a daily routine for miss evynn and I

our life | meal planning

I've been meal planning for months now- looking at pinterest to decide what looks good for the next two weeks then buying supplies to make those specific meals and making sure we stick to it. 

We got these nice notepads a few months ago and they improved my meal planning game even more. i write out what we're going to eat for dinner and take into consideration when we'll be at the church, out of town, etc. to avoid a wasted meal. This has helped us to eat at home the majority of the time which in turn, has saved us tons of money. We moved some of our fast food budget over to groceries for this purpose. 

This round of meal planning I wanted to start eating healthier than we had been (postpartum problems..). we also have labor day plans, so I left a few days blank. 

I do have a "science" to my meal planning and take a few things into consideration: 1) separate types of meat I try to avoid eating beef or chicken or whatever two days in a row 2) separate types of food again, i try to avoid eating mexican/asian/italian inspired meals back to back just to keep from boring ourselves. if you notice on this plan, we have spaghetti squash pad thai one week and fried rice the next. 3) cluster unfreezing/opening food supplies i just mentioned not eating chicken two nights in a row, but i do take into consideration that if i thaw out a whole package of frozen chicken that i need to use it soon. I'm able to get two meals out of 1 package, so for week 1 I cooked chicken for Sunday's meal (chicken strips, broccoli, rice) and chicken salad (for lunch). I also did the same with mushrooms, I opened 1 package of mushrooms that I shared between egg muffins and the pad thai. this prevented letting an open container go bad. 

I try to change up what we eat every few weeks also just to avoid the boredom!

So that's how we meal plan!