Pipe cleaners and growing boys

The invitation: a bundle of pipe cleaners and a sample product made from them. I made a crown!

The result: Mr 4. made a rainbow and hung it in the kitchen. Mr. 2 just commented on who was and was not wearing the crown.

What we are reading:

Is there a new baby in your home or about to join you? Read this with your kids!

Frequently requested by my 4-year-old. We recently had our third child and this is my favorite “big brother” book I’ve read yet. It is cute, funny, and accurately depicts what life will be like with a new baby. Enjoyed by the kids and by me.

Do your kids love garbage trucks?

This book is repetitive and thus is a book your kids can easily “Read to themselves” once you’ve gone through it a few times. Also has repeated “Sight” words that the kids can easily recognize. As a mom, I don’t mind reading it once or twice a day, but definitely not over and over. 

Looking for something educational and cute?

This book has beautiful pictures of all of our favorite animals, a moderate (not overwhelming) amount of useful information, and amusing commentary from Pooh and his friends. The donkey (Eeyore?) is especially amusing. I wish my children were as curious about it as I am. 

Supermom Goals / Sleeping arrangements

Here is my supermom plan for the week:

	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Activity	Grocery & Library	Music Class	Dollar Store & Playground	Playdate	Boy’s choice
School/Art	Mazes or Tracing	Sticker Book	Chalk	Water mat	Sensory bin with ice
House	Vacuum	Laundry	Sweep	Laundry	Bathroom
Dinner	Spaghetti	Grilled Porkchops	Chicken with roasted garlic sauce (slow cooker 2-3 hr)	Tortellini Soup	Wieners

I’m not one to make detailed plans because they will inevitably lead to frustration when my children don’t want to follow the schedule. Still, it may be a good idea to have some goals and ideas of things I want to accomplish this week.

If none of the stuff I have planned happens, that is okay too as long as all my (3) children are still alive and well at the end of the week.

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This boy is less than 3 weeks old but it already feels like he’s always been a part of this family. At his two week appointment last Tuesday he was 10lbs 1 oz (89%) and 21.75 in (95%).

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All of the boys have not been sleeping well. Mr. 0 doesn’t sleep well because he is a baby. He still needs to learn the difference between night and day. He also gets the hiccups quite frequently and thinks the morning starts at 6:30.

Mr. 2 and Mr. 4 were staying up way too late because they kept playing and talking to each other instead of sleeping. Then they would wake up super early and be a bit cranky throughout the day. Some of this may be caused by their adjusting to the baby, and Mr. 2 taking advantage of not being in a crib.

Our solution was to let Mr. 4 sleep with the dog (he does not want to be alone) and Mr. 2 would sleep in the nursery in a crib again. The baby would be in our room. Surprisingly, neither of the big boys complained about the change and I am happy to say that they are falling asleep close to bed time (8 – 8:30) and sleeping until at least 7.

5 days old

My advice for a great recovery from birth:

• listen to your nurses and doctors
• Take all the meds even if you feel fine
• Eat and drink as soon as possible
• Get up and walk when you’ve got all the feeling in your legs back.
• Walk every few hours, don’t exhaust yourself but exercise will help with digestion and pain management.
• Have a snack and drink EVERY time you feed the baby. Dehydration and exhaustion can sneak up on you.

So basically because of those things I was able to leave the hospital after 36 hours post c-section. I don’t know why I was in such a hurry, but I felt a little bored at the hospital and I missed my older babies.

The worst pain was the contraction of the uterus as it attempts to return to its original size and the pain in my shoulder muscles from all the trapped gasses. And constipation. Walking and stretching\moving my arms always helped the shoulder pain. And the meds, of course.

Enough about me, how about the baby?

Day 1: he was born hungry and with the such adorably long fingers and toes. He latched right away when the nurse positioned him on the surgical table with me and he ate while they stitched me back up.

Mostly, he looks like a clone of his brothers. He slept and woke up only long enough to eat, about every 3-4 hours. In the night he almost went five hours but the nurses and doctors encourage you to wake him up and feed him every 3 hours…

Day 2: More sleeping and eating. In the evening he enthusiastically encouraged my milk development by refusing to be put down between 8:30 and 11:30. He finally succumbed to sleep and gave me 3 hours between feedings.

Day 3: Morning was all sleeping \eating. We took the boys to the museum of Flight to take advantage of both my mom and Sam being available to help out. In the evening he was again insatiable from 8:30 to 11:30. He slept 2 hours then 3 and 3. He had his first breastmilk poop in the night.

Day 4: He weighed 9 lbs 1 oz at the doctor visit. Everything looks good but we need to schedule another hearing test since he failed his at the hospital. This is apparently a common thing. This is the first day where he was awake for an hour while being calm and quiet. This occurred in the hour before his 8:30-11:30 buffet.

He then slept nearly 5 hours but struggled to go back to sleep after.

(I can’t be mad at that face! I was bad and took him into bed with me and let him snuggle while I tried to catch a little bit more sleep. Remember the safest place for your baby to sleep is on his back in his own bed!)

Day 5:

That’s today! He was awake and happy at lunch time for over an hour, and even seemed to enjoy a ride in the bouncer while I got to eat.