I am ONE month old!
I like: sleeping, tummy time (if I'm ever awake), binkies, being fed, and being warm
I dislike: being awake (even if it's needed so she can go to bed on time), not having a binkie if I'm awake, being cold in any way (lotion at bed time is her absolute least favorite thing in the world), being in the car seat if it's not moving, gas bubbles, and being held (she likes to squirm around quite a bit)
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| We thought getting her to be a finger sucker Over a binky would be easier...here was our Cute attempt at creating a thumb sucker :) |
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| But she's also so cute with a binky! |
I am now: according to our unofficial weight check she's almost 9 lbs (it was 9 lbs with pajamas, a full diaper, and I'm pretty sure the owlet so we'll just say about 8.5) and 20.5 inches long! Just like her sister she's got a big noggin so newborn tops are getting tight, but pants still fit fairly well. She's also still in newborn diapers (and hopefully will continue to be so until we use up all the ones we bought before she was born). We won't have an official weight/height check until 2 months though :(
A Typical Day looks like:
6 AM to 7:30) I usually fuss around until mom gives me my binky (usually I have gas pains)
7:30) Officially wake up with my sister. Mom makes my bottle first since I'm the louder one :P
7:30 to 8) Breakfast time for the girlies of the house (dad is at work so he can get his own breakfast if he wants).
8 to 9) play on activity mat, tummy time, hang with mom, whatever. I rarely make it all the way till 9, but that's what this time is for.
9 to 11) sleep and sleep and sleep. Maybe squirm to look for my binky, but mostly sleep.
11) Change my diaper, eat a 3-3.5 oz bottle, get burped and go back to sleep
11 to 2) sleep and sleep. Squirm and sleep.
2 to 3) change, eat 3-3.5 oz again, get burped, and be awake for more activity mat/tummy/hang with mom time. This is mom's secret favorite time because I'm really alert and fun at this point. Plus she's well rested (Cara takes a nap from 12:30 - 2:30 so mom gets "me" time right before needing to wake me up at this point...she's usually in a good mood).
3 to 5) sleep and sleep again...I like my sleep.
5) change, eat 3-3.5 oz again, get burped, and go back to sleep
5 to 6:30) sleep
6:30) they force me awake to play with them so that I go to bed on time.
6:30 - 7:15) play with dad since he's off work and everyone has had dinner at this point.
7:15) eat a 1.5 oz bottle in preparation for bed.
7:15 to 7:45) play, hang out, whatever.
7:45) get ready for bed. Usually that entails a diaper change, lotion (I hate that part), put in my pajamas and sleep sac, and a nice 3 oz formula bottle to top me off. Most of the time I pass right out after this bottle (IF I don't get the hiccups...that keeps me awake for too long). I get a bath on Sundays and Thursdays at 7:30 and then the same routine after that.
I usually sleep good until 1/1:30 AM then I need to be changed and fed. After that I sleep until about 4:30/5 when I need to be changed and fed once more. Usually I only eat about 2-2.5 oz during those feedings...what can I say? I like to get back to sleep quicker.
A Typical Day looks like:
6 AM to 7:30) I usually fuss around until mom gives me my binky (usually I have gas pains)
7:30) Officially wake up with my sister. Mom makes my bottle first since I'm the louder one :P
7:30 to 8) Breakfast time for the girlies of the house (dad is at work so he can get his own breakfast if he wants).
8 to 9) play on activity mat, tummy time, hang with mom, whatever. I rarely make it all the way till 9, but that's what this time is for.
9 to 11) sleep and sleep and sleep. Maybe squirm to look for my binky, but mostly sleep.
11) Change my diaper, eat a 3-3.5 oz bottle, get burped and go back to sleep
11 to 2) sleep and sleep. Squirm and sleep.
2 to 3) change, eat 3-3.5 oz again, get burped, and be awake for more activity mat/tummy/hang with mom time. This is mom's secret favorite time because I'm really alert and fun at this point. Plus she's well rested (Cara takes a nap from 12:30 - 2:30 so mom gets "me" time right before needing to wake me up at this point...she's usually in a good mood).
3 to 5) sleep and sleep again...I like my sleep.
5) change, eat 3-3.5 oz again, get burped, and go back to sleep
5 to 6:30) sleep
6:30) they force me awake to play with them so that I go to bed on time.
6:30 - 7:15) play with dad since he's off work and everyone has had dinner at this point.
7:15) eat a 1.5 oz bottle in preparation for bed.
7:15 to 7:45) play, hang out, whatever.
7:45) get ready for bed. Usually that entails a diaper change, lotion (I hate that part), put in my pajamas and sleep sac, and a nice 3 oz formula bottle to top me off. Most of the time I pass right out after this bottle (IF I don't get the hiccups...that keeps me awake for too long). I get a bath on Sundays and Thursdays at 7:30 and then the same routine after that.
I usually sleep good until 1/1:30 AM then I need to be changed and fed. After that I sleep until about 4:30/5 when I need to be changed and fed once more. Usually I only eat about 2-2.5 oz during those feedings...what can I say? I like to get back to sleep quicker.
This Month I: Enjoyed being a newborn and running my parents through the ringer. I was so nice in the beginning and slept a lot, but after a week or two it was a complete guessing game. Luckily my parents figured me out a bit towards the end of the month and my awake time is much more peaceful.
I became alert quite a bit towards the end of the month and love to wriggle my arms around when laying on an activity mat. I love having a binky almost the whole day though they won't let me have one at night since I can't keep it in my mouth for longer than 5 minutes).
I celebrated mom's birthday yesterday and gave her a good day and night of sleep (mostly). I also had my first (and quite a few others) bath and have enjoyed being in the warm water...the cold part I absolutely hate! I haven't experienced anything outside except for being in the car seat just yet, but I'm told that's for the best as it's too cold and I need some vaccinations first. I look forward to my first Christmas and seeing Nana next month :)
I became alert quite a bit towards the end of the month and love to wriggle my arms around when laying on an activity mat. I love having a binky almost the whole day though they won't let me have one at night since I can't keep it in my mouth for longer than 5 minutes).
I celebrated mom's birthday yesterday and gave her a good day and night of sleep (mostly). I also had my first (and quite a few others) bath and have enjoyed being in the warm water...the cold part I absolutely hate! I haven't experienced anything outside except for being in the car seat just yet, but I'm told that's for the best as it's too cold and I need some vaccinations first. I look forward to my first Christmas and seeing Nana next month :)
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| First black eye...she gave to herself one night. So sad! |
Parent's Notes: Well, just like with Cara the first month was a challenging one for us (or at least for me). I forgot that you really have to figure out a newborn and their likes/dislikes/preferred "schedule" and it's not always easy. The most challenging part of the first month was easily feeding Gwen. We started it off breastfeeding, which was nice because I wasn't able to do that with Cara. However, by the end of the month we are doing basically what we did before, Gwen gets mostly breast milk bottles, but then we do formula ones for putting her down and then throughout the night.
I (Jodi) had a REALLY hard time with accepting that we needed to bottle feed Gwen. I made it almost 3 weeks of exclusively breastfeeding, but by the end of the 2nd week I realized she just wasn't getting enough from me and it was effecting my supply. If I wanted her to at least have breast milk I needed to exclusively pump and give her bottles. I cried many, many times over this. You can read more on this post about our breastfeeding journey. In the end, I'm happier with what we do now. Both of us can feed her and get her ready for bed, and I know what she's getting and that she's actually eating.
I forget how "boring" the newborn days are when they sleep a lot. I still have those "I should be doing something with her" feelings even though there's not much she can really do. I do try and do tummy time, walk her around, and read to her when possible, but with Cara around it's not always easy to focus solely on Gwen, but I do my best. I honestly love her alert time so that I can talk to her about how excited I am for her to start to roll over, sit on her own, and all those fun things I remember with Cara that made having a baby so much more fun. I feel bad I can't do our house walk through like I did with Cara, but I know Cara would want to go with and we're currently hiding some Christmas presents in rooms that she can't go into.
Speaking of Christmas, I'm SO looking forward to that this year! Even though Gwen has NO idea what it is, I'm still so excited for the new toys and clothes for them. I'm also excited to see Cara's reaction to it. So far Cara seems to love her sister. she loves touching her and pretending to tickle her. She can be a little more rough than she realizes, so we're working on soft hands and being nice.
Overall we're getting into a routine MUCH quicker this time around so I'm excited to report that. We're still working on bedtime going smoother (if she gets the hiccups we know we're in for a long night) and getting her to sleep later in the morning, but gas and possible constipation issues are causing some issues. We've been giving her Gripe Water to help with that as much as possible and even got some of those Windi's to help and so far it's helped a little, but we just need her poor body to mature a bit more to help us help her.
I (Jodi) am also really happy that I've been able to juggle having both girls on my own while Larry works. I feel like I relied on him a lot when Cara was born and felt so overwhelmed, but this time around I've been doing my best to not rely on him. Sure, I'd let Gwen sleep in the office for him to keep an eye on, but if she fussed I did my best to rush to her to solve the issue rather than let him. I also may have asked him to put Cara down for a nap or wake her up a couple times just to help me out, but I'd say 95% of the time I've been able to do it all on my own while also doing dishes, keeping the house mostly tidy (except for Cara's toys), shower, pump, and take care of myself at the same time. This is my biggest accomplishment of the first month.
I will also say one of the biggest helpers this time around has been multi tasking. I get her bottles made and ready while I'm pumping during the day so that once I'm done I can wake her up to feed. I watch shows I wanted to catch up on during night feedings so that I feel I'm crossing off things on that to-do list, and I read books while pumping at night (this is to avoid looking at my phone to wake me up AND to get some books read while I'm just sitting there). I don't feel nearly as exhausted this time around AND I feel like I accomplish more. It's been such a great feeling getting so much accomplished at once.
I (Jodi) had a REALLY hard time with accepting that we needed to bottle feed Gwen. I made it almost 3 weeks of exclusively breastfeeding, but by the end of the 2nd week I realized she just wasn't getting enough from me and it was effecting my supply. If I wanted her to at least have breast milk I needed to exclusively pump and give her bottles. I cried many, many times over this. You can read more on this post about our breastfeeding journey. In the end, I'm happier with what we do now. Both of us can feed her and get her ready for bed, and I know what she's getting and that she's actually eating.
I forget how "boring" the newborn days are when they sleep a lot. I still have those "I should be doing something with her" feelings even though there's not much she can really do. I do try and do tummy time, walk her around, and read to her when possible, but with Cara around it's not always easy to focus solely on Gwen, but I do my best. I honestly love her alert time so that I can talk to her about how excited I am for her to start to roll over, sit on her own, and all those fun things I remember with Cara that made having a baby so much more fun. I feel bad I can't do our house walk through like I did with Cara, but I know Cara would want to go with and we're currently hiding some Christmas presents in rooms that she can't go into.
Speaking of Christmas, I'm SO looking forward to that this year! Even though Gwen has NO idea what it is, I'm still so excited for the new toys and clothes for them. I'm also excited to see Cara's reaction to it. So far Cara seems to love her sister. she loves touching her and pretending to tickle her. She can be a little more rough than she realizes, so we're working on soft hands and being nice.
Overall we're getting into a routine MUCH quicker this time around so I'm excited to report that. We're still working on bedtime going smoother (if she gets the hiccups we know we're in for a long night) and getting her to sleep later in the morning, but gas and possible constipation issues are causing some issues. We've been giving her Gripe Water to help with that as much as possible and even got some of those Windi's to help and so far it's helped a little, but we just need her poor body to mature a bit more to help us help her.
I (Jodi) am also really happy that I've been able to juggle having both girls on my own while Larry works. I feel like I relied on him a lot when Cara was born and felt so overwhelmed, but this time around I've been doing my best to not rely on him. Sure, I'd let Gwen sleep in the office for him to keep an eye on, but if she fussed I did my best to rush to her to solve the issue rather than let him. I also may have asked him to put Cara down for a nap or wake her up a couple times just to help me out, but I'd say 95% of the time I've been able to do it all on my own while also doing dishes, keeping the house mostly tidy (except for Cara's toys), shower, pump, and take care of myself at the same time. This is my biggest accomplishment of the first month.
I will also say one of the biggest helpers this time around has been multi tasking. I get her bottles made and ready while I'm pumping during the day so that once I'm done I can wake her up to feed. I watch shows I wanted to catch up on during night feedings so that I feel I'm crossing off things on that to-do list, and I read books while pumping at night (this is to avoid looking at my phone to wake me up AND to get some books read while I'm just sitting there). I don't feel nearly as exhausted this time around AND I feel like I accomplish more. It's been such a great feeling getting so much accomplished at once.
Update on Post Partum goals:
- Ab Muscles: I've just recently (at the 4 week mark) started my Diastasis Recti "workouts". I aim to do them 3-4 times a day to make up for the fact that I had to wait so long to start them (I was hoping to do them from day one, but being cut in half really changes your plans). I'm hoping to keep this schedule up until I go back to work and then try and do them once or twice a day at that point.
- Working Out: I am a little nervous to start that just yet. I know I had by the 4 week mark with Cara (or close to that point), but I just barely got all the sticky glue that was holding my incision closed off and that hurt quite a bit (just because it was ripping skin that wasn't part of my incision plus some hairs...TMI). I'm going to wait until the 6 week mark and just focus on my DR workouts for now. I have quite the "shelf" from this pregnancy that I'd love to get rid of or make as small as possible!
- Drink 100 oz of water a day: I'm happy to report I'm definitely accomplishing this goal. I know I have to drink lot of water for pumping to keep my supply up so I have a written out plan that entails when to drink my water and refill it. I'm currently up to drinking 4 of my 32 oz water bottle (which means I'm at 128 oz), but I also drink a bit when I pump during the night so I know I drink more than that. It feels good to get to this one so quickly.
- Home updates: this one has definitely been on the back burner. I've organized some things and tried to clean and do some of my to-do list, but it just hasn't been as high a priority as I was expecting. I did organize our books so that the ones we haven't read yet are in one area and the rest are organized by author and that felt good to have that done. But right now I spend my free time watching holiday movies and that's what's important to me. I'll probably be able to do more of these in January.
- Gwen's schedule/routine: this one we are pretty much done with. Like I mentioned, we do need to get bedtime a little better and after our last feeding of the night she gets a little fussy (I tell myself the first stretch of sleep is my best, the second stretch is decent, and then the last one is the worst stretch because she makes so much noise trying to get her gas bubbles out). Other than that we don't do too bad with her routine.
- New Fitbit: I did get my new fitbit a while back so I've been loving watching my sleep patterns. Luckily it hasn't been as depressing to see how much I'm missing out on as it was with Cara. Granted I was sleeping SO awful towards the end of my pregnancy that it honestly feels like I traded in bathroom breaks and constant tossing and turning with feedings and pumping. I think that has helped.
- Cleaning baby items: Not sure why this was part of the post partum goals as I got what we needed cleaned before she made her arrival. I do still need to clean the bumbo and the booster seat for Cara to use, but that's not until Gwen can sit up on her own so that's no big rush. we do also need to get the lounger and higher "crib" part of the pack n play out of storage so that she can use those for nap times, but, again, no rush.
- Post Partum supplies: I did get my new pump, depends, dermoplast, etc. ordered, but I only needed the pump and depends. Everything else would've only been helpful if I hadn't had a C-section. But luckily the useful stuff has been VERY useful and I'm glad I had this on my radar so early.
Goals for next month:
- Work on more tummy time during her alert time. She has a very strong neck already and she actually did roll over on her own a couple times already (but probably only because she had gas bubbles that hurt to be on because she hasn't done it since...and I didn't see her do it. This is according to Larry), but I'd love to get ahead of the tummy time benefits (I feel like I rarely did tummy time with Cara until closer to 3 months).
- I definitely want to read to her more and do more sensory stuff with her. I think she likes being able to touch things so far and it's fun to pretend she's touching it on purpose. I just really want to enjoy her alert time and getting to know her personality more.
- Larry wants to do the same neck workouts we did with Cara where he holds her arms and trains her to bring her head up. Once she can master that then we work on her head being forward and her pulling it backwards so we'll be starting those this next month.
- Continue to stay strong on her bedtime and sleeping routine. Really hope by the end of month 2 she'll be sleeping so much better. I hear 8 weeks is typically when they do that...fingers crossed! I know we need to be consistent for a while for her to be used to it and I'm thinking in just a couple more weeks we'll be to where we want to with this.
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