Week 11

Dunning is 11 weeks old this week! I can't believe how the time has flown! I look at his newborn pictures as I put them together for his scrapbook and marvel at how small he was. He's not that small anymore! When we went to his 2 month check up, he was 9 weeks old and weighed in at 13 pounds 2 ounces!

Right now we are struggling with getting him to eat on a regular schedule. I am an advocate of feeding on cue, but also believe that he should not be demanding to eat every 2 hours because he has become accustomed to it. I want him to get used to eating at least every 3 hours so that he eats more complete meals and not just snacking. He is also eating more at each feeding and needs more time to digest his meals or he just ends up throwing up from being too full! I have found that when he is fussy and wants to take a nap, he wants a pacifier - the REAL pacifier - me. Now I regret not pushing the other pacifier more when he was little because he doesn't like it much now. But I guess it may make it easier to take it away from him later.

He is doing well with sleeping. The past two nights he has slept about 11 hours with one feeding at night. Let's hope it is a trend! He doesn't always go back to sleep very well after the feeding, maybe because he is too tired to burp. He'll grunt and move around and around in his crib. But very rarely cries.

Mikel recently went to Mexico and I was super sick, so my mommy came down and helped me with Dunning. They feel asleep on the couch together!

Staying at home has been fun, but hard to be able to do creative stuff like scrapbook and keep my blog updated! I hope that when he is holding his head up more, I'll be able to let him sit on the floor and play more by himself a little each day. Then maybe I can do some yoga next to him. I have 5-10 more pounds to lose, depending on who's scale you look at! The doctor's office scale says 10, mine says 5! I am going with mine because it is the scale I used to tell my pre-pregnancy weight and it is the best comparison for me. :)

Dunning is cooing and smiling. I tried to capture a smile and got this pouty lip expression instead!

Week #5

Dunning is 5 weeks old this week and I can't believe how quickly time has flown! He is such a little man now! We were by ourselves this week as Dad traveled on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. We survived although we were a bit sleep deprived -more than usual! When Dad got back, he said it looked like Dunning had grown while he was gone!

This week I told my work that I would not be coming back from maternity leave. I am taking my two weeks paid maternity after my medical leave is up, two weeks of paid vacation and then a year of personal leave, so I will still remain a Wal-Mart employee for a year. If I decide to change my mind, I can return to my old job until the end of March, after that I would have to find another job. After a year, if I decide not to come back to work, I will no longer be an employee. It was such a hard decision, because I work with such a great group of people, but my job was very stressful and very demanding of my time. I feel that this is the best decision for my family, although I am very nervous about it! I hope I don't get bored at home and spend all my days eating and watching TV while Dunning sleeps! I can't wait until it gets warmer so I can take him to the park and go running.

Next week I go for my six weeks check up to make sure I have healed from delivery. I have lost 35 out of 45 pounds and that leaves 10 more to go!

Blogger returns

Well, it's been so long since I have posted anything, I am not quite sure I remember how!

Little man is here and letting everyone know - he has quite a set of lungs on him. He's as cute as can be and is good most of the time. :) We are still working on a steady nursing schedule - he sometimes likes to eat too much and then spit half of it up and then eat again in an hour. He is supposed to eat every two - three hours. He likes to be held alot. But he is doing really good at sleeping at night. I go to bed really early and get up once in the evening, once in the middle of the night and then once in the early morning and am up for the day (usually), with a nap after lunch. He does well sleeping in his crib - better actually than his bouncer seat or swing. I can't wait for him to get to the stage where he plays with toys and can hold his head up.

He is starting to sleep better at night - 5 hours last night! That's a pretty big accomplishment and the most consecutive hours of sleep I have had since I had him! It reminds me of being back in college - when you would go to sleep around 3 a.m. and have to get up for class around 7 a.m. and think that 4 hours of sleep was sufficient... Granted, you could always nap in your car if you had too...Now you just pray for him to take a nap so you can pick up the house, eat something, get food out for dinner (because it will take you 3 hours to make it between feedings and changings and crying spells) and catch a 30 minute nap.

Two weeks ago we had an adventure - the power went out in our house for 18 hours and we had to vacate to Auntie Lindz's house so we didn't freeze! Other than the trip to the doctor's office, it was our first trip out. I realized that I am an idiot and didn't have the car seat installed properly, so the entire trip, I was checking his head each time I stopped because it kept flopping around. We finally figured out what was wrong the next time we got out of the house and even got a cushion for the head at Wal-Mart, where we saw Auntie Gracie, so I would feel better about going out with him again in the car seat. The third trip out to my office to show him off was a big success.

Fortunately, I have had help from my friends, family and my wonderful husband. I still think he cries too much sometimes and freak out and think there is something wrong with him. But it is apparently normal!

Dunning will be 4 weeks old tomorrow. Below are his stats when born and current stats.

Weight: 8 lbs 1 oz

Current weight: approx. 10 lbs

Length: 18 in

Current length: approx. 21 in

I have lost 30 of the 45 pounds I put on! Hooray! I can't fit in to my pre-pregnancy jeans yet, but I can get them pulled up over my bum! Double Hooray!