Mason - 4 Months!

Mason is 4 months old!!!

He has grown so much over this past month!!! He is making all kinds of new noises. He's been sitting up with our help for several weeks, but now, he's starting to try to sit up himself. It will probably be a while before he can, but it's awesome to watch him try.

He has rolled over a few times, but he's not doing it consistently. Speaking of rolling over, tummy time is so much more fun than it used to be! Now that he can support his weight up on his elbows, he's much more tolerant of it. We've passed our goal of 10 minutes at a time, which I never thought would happen! While he's doing tummy time, he scoots a lot, so I think he's much more interested in crawling than rolling. 

He's interested in toys now. He really likes rattles and Sophie. He's not really reaching for them on his own yet, but if you put them in his hands, he will play with them. He's very interested in chewing on everything.

He and Bailey are also starting to take more interest in each other. I've even caught her snuggling with him a couple times. :-)

Don't worry...I was laying beside them the whole time. He fell asleep nursing and I only got up to take this picture.


He laughs and coos a lot and it is super adorable. He's definitely finding his voice and experimenting with all the sounds he can make.

We got to go on a date night to Josh's company's holiday party. Since we were already getting dressed up, we used the opportunity to take some family pictures in front of our Christmas tree. This also happened to be the one year anniversary of the day we found out we were pregnant, so it makes me love the pictures even more! Anna and John babysat for us, so Mason got to hang out with Savannah for a bit! Here are some photos John snapped for us before we left.

Pearls and bowties!

Who wouldn't want to smooch those cheeks?!?

 
Josh bought this Tigger for me while he was at Disney. It used to be bigger than Mason. Now it's not.

He had another play date with Savannah when we babysat so Anna and John could have a date night. We did something crazy and ventured out with two infants. We decided to meet friends for wings. We were hesitant since we had only kept both babies a couple times even at home, but I'm glad we did it.

Mason met Santa twice this month. Both times were right after a nap that we woke him up from, so we didn't get any smiling pictures, but we did get some cute ones!

The first Santa was at John's work.

So stereotypical...pulling Santa's beard.

I think this is so sweet!


We wanted to get a picture with both the babies, but he was kind of over it at this point.

This was the second Santa, at our birthing center. We got to see the nurse that led our natural birth class!

LOVE the bowtie and suspenders!

We went to VA and he got to meet his great grandma, great aunt and uncle and Josh's cousin.

 With his great grandma! We had him dressed really cute, but it was literally about 80 degrees in the nursing home. He was getting so fussy because he was so hot, so we put him in lighter clothing. I don't even know why we had this in his diaper bag in December, but I'm SO glad we did!

With his great uncle KK. I have a feeling these two will get along great! He has the best Donald Duck voice!

We rode there and back in the same day and he did great on both rides. He slept for the majority of the ride both ways.

All of the emotions!!!

I haven't talked much about how the transition to actually being a mom has been for me, so I thought I should do that while he's still young, while I can remember some things and before I'm a mom of a toddler, because I'm sure it will change again then. I didn't know what to expect with adding a baby to our family. I don't think you can really mentally prepare yourself for it. People tell you things, but that's completely different from experiencing it yourself.

Mason was just 3 days old here! How do you prepare yourself to be responsible for that wonderful little life? You can't, you just jump right in.

The emotions I go through are crazy. I'm definitely a much more emotional person now...like, a total mushball. At my 2 and 6 week checkups, I had to do a post-partum depression screening. Everything looked great at my first one. At my second one, I didn't score as well. I wasn't depressed, but I had room for improvement. I talked to my midwife about it (I had actually talked to Josh about it a couple nights before, so this wasn't news to him). I couldn't make sense of any of it. I didn't really know what was bothering me, so I had to dig really deep to figure some things out. That only helped so much, because it still didn't make sense to me. After weeks of thinking and praying about what in the world was going on in my mind, I think I've figured it out to an extent. I was struggling to figure out what my new role was. While I was working through that, I kind of forget about taking care of me sometimes. I guess it started around the time Josh went back to work and our new real life started. It was kind of like his parental leave was the honeymoon phase. I'm incredibly thankful that he had that leave. Having him with me so we could learn how to take care of our new baby TOGETHER was definitely a blessing! Anyway, here's my crazy thought process, that I wrote like 2 months ago...

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I love taking care of Mason, but I'm still struggling to adjust to our new normal. I'm incredibly happy, but it's still easy for me to get sad over the dumbest things. I'm not happy with the state of my house. It really bothers me that I can't figure out the right balance of caring for him and caring for the other people/things in my life, including myself. If I get "enough" cleaning done for a day, I feel guilty that Mason only did tummy time once and I didn't throw the frisbee for Bailey. For the record, I define what enough is. Josh puts 0 pressure on me to get any housework done, so all that stress I have about it, I put on myself. If I spend the amount of time that I want focusing on Mason, I feel guilty that Josh comes home to a sink full of dirty dishes and a floor covered in dog hair and I didn't get any exercise. I'm learning to be OK with the fact that I can't do it all, but it is a very long, hard lesson to learn! Now, I'm back at work, and it's even harder. Cut that time I had to divide all those things into down to almost none and imagine how crazy that makes me!

Another thing I'm having trouble adjusting to is how needy I feel sometimes. Josh literally did everything for me during those first couple of weeks. I didn't change any diapers until we transitioned to cloth, so Mason was about 4 or 5 days old. Even after that, Josh changed all of the middle of the night diapers and most of the daytime diapers. When Mason needed to eat in the middle of the night, he got up with me just to keep me company. I didn't get my own food or water...he even brought food to me in bed (I still can't believe I ate in bed). He washed all of the laundry and took out all of the trash. He didn't have to work and we had help with meals, dishes and such, so he made it his full time job to take care of me and Mason. I never had to ask for anything, it was kind of like he read my mind and did exactly what I wanted before I even got the chance to ask for it. Every woman's dream, right? It was really nice. I hate asking for help, even from people closest to me. I only want them to help if they REALLY want to and I feel like if they REALLY wanted to, they would just do it. I know that's ridiculous, but it's what keeps me from asking for help, even when I want to. Anyway, I guess I got a little spoiled by all of that. As I started to heal and become more mobile, Josh took on more responsibilities, like yard work and actually going back to work, so he couldn't spend ALL of his time and attention on us anymore.  I guess that was just a harder transition than I expected. Josh still does a great job of taking care of me. He helps me clean the house, he almost always washes the dishes, he cooks dinner some nights and lets me do whatever during that time, he starts diaper laundry while I feed Mason at night. He does all of the right things and more, but I still feel so needy and it frustrates me. A lot.

It was just the two of us for a long, long time. Then we got Bailey. She was really good practice for a baby, but it's so different at the same time. Now, we have a baby to share each other with while we're also trying to make sure our fur baby doesn't feel abandoned. I don't want to be less of a wife because I'm so busy being a mother. I think it's very important to always make our marriage a priority and sometimes, that's harder than I thought it would be. Sometimes it's hard to remember to show Josh how important he is to me when there's a baby by my side who relies on me for EVERYTHING.

On the brighter end of emotional things - You always hear people say you'll fall in love with your spouse all over again once you have a baby. I wouldn't say I doubted that, but I didn't understand it. Now, I completely understand it. It's so very true. Not only did Josh help me bring this amazing little gift into this world (and not just by getting me knocked up), he was there with me every step of the way during pregnancy and labor. All of the appointments, the bad days of pregnancy and the good, every single step of labor - he was my rock and my voice of reason when I started to doubt myself. He literally (and figuratively) held me up while I was pushing our baby boy out.  He's been by my side through all the craziness of having a baby and raising him and that has taught me to love him in a brand new way. Even after all the things he saw when I was in labor and the way my body looks now, he's still attracted to me. There's nothing sexier than the man you love caring for you and your baby that way, as weird as that may sound. I feel SO incredibly blessed to have him in my life!

And of course, I feel so much joy when I'm able to take care of my baby. I'm healthy, he's healthy. When he's upset, I can (usually) calm him down. Our breastfeeding relationship has come such a long way and I really do think that has helped me emotionally. I look at him and I see his daddy (and a little bit of me), and that makes me so happy. Together, we made this amazing little boy. Getting to watch him grow up and help him to learn everything he is learning is such a fulfilling feeling.

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I'm doing SO much better now. I'm trying to get better about taking time to myself and that really helps. Josh sends me upstairs to take a bath so I can decompress a couple times a month. I want to start doing this once a week, because it really does help, but we have limited time between when Mason goes to bed and when we go to bed. It's hard to "steal away" an hour of that time. I know how to be "selfish" when it comes to other people, but not to my boys.

Adjusting to being a mom is not easy. Being a mom is not easy. It's a hard, hard job, but it's the best job I've ever had. 

3 Months and Counting!

Our little guy is 3 months old!!! Actually, since I finished this post so late, he's closer to 4 months than 3, but here's his 3 month update anyway!

We picked out his first little pumpkin.

I just love his little overalls.

We hosted an Oktoberfest party, which was Mason's first big gathering. We had a really good time and we dressed him up in his own little lederhosen. He stayed awake long enough to meet a few friends for the first time and snuggle with a few others, then went to bed.

We went to Asheville to celebrate my 30th birthday! I love that place, so I was very excited to go there with Mason. While we were there, went to a great little farmer's market, ate some delicious food and we took him on his first hike. He was a champ and only got fussy toward the end when he was hungry. We stayed with some friends and they babysat him one night so we could go out on a date. We had a really great time having dinner and checking out some breweries downtown.

At the farmer's market. I love our Lillebaby carrier! He was hungry and I was able to feed him and cover him up while still browsing the farmer's market!

Our sleepy little man. I love this so much.

Daddy wearing Mason while we were on our hike.

Oh hey! How did we get here?!?

We took him out to stretch, snap a few pictures and change his diaper before heading back.

We celebrated Mason's first Halloween. I surprised Josh by dressing him up as Willie Nelson. We went to see Willie in concert while I was pregnant, so I thought it was fitting. We met at his pediatrician, then we went over to Burlington to pick up a Christmas gift that I had seen for Mason. I snuck the costume on him really quick after Josh put him in the car after his appointment and he was wearing it when Josh opened the door to get him out at Burlington. Mason was super cute and Josh loved it! Even better...his costume only cost about $5! Big win! We went home and passed out candy. I went up to put Mason to bed about halfway through.


We didn't get to take him to a game or even a tailgate this season, but he pulled for the Wolfpack from home. :-)

He's changing and growing so quickly! He's smiling so much now and he's even laughed a little! He's making noises all the time. His little "ooo's" are the cutest! He's still enjoying bath time. He's nursing like a champ and breastfeeding is going great!


He's really not a fan of tummy time. He actually hates it and we rarely get more than 2-3 minutes at a time. He rolled over for the first time on the day he turned 3 months. He didn't seem to like that either. I think it scared him.

WE HAVE A 2 MONTH OLD!

Y'all, I thought time went by quickly when I was pregnant! That was nothing compared to how it is now! Mason's second month with us has been a whirlwind and it hasn't slowed down any, hence why I'm posting this so late. Here's a rundown of what we've had going on...

He's sleeping all night already, which is amazing! He's sleeping 10+ hours per night. He wakes up sometimes, but he almost always puts himself back to sleep. We consider ourselves VERY fortunate that he is sleeping so well and I keep waiting for him to turn into a little baby who just will not sleep. We don't get 10 hours of sleep. He wakes me up with noises sometimes and there are things that just have to get done, but we are getting more sleep than I expected at this point. Most nights, we get to sleep through the night. This is much better than the nights full of naps during those first couple weeks!

He's changing so much and so fast! He follows us with his eyes and recognizes our faces and voices. He blows spit bubbles all the time and his head control has improved so much!

 He has the most contagious little smiles!

Josh and Mason went with me to my 6 week follow up visit. I've healed up just fine. Woohoo!

We took our first road trip to MD with him during his second month. He did great. We only had to stop twice. He met his little friends, Ashlyn and Zachary and his Auntie Jen and Uncle John. I took him by my old office to meet some co-workers, but since it was Friday and we didn't make it in until after 2:00, there were only a few people there. Mason did great on the trip with the exception of sleeping. He's used to sleeping in his crib and he does great. For the trip, we took his rock n play for him to sleep in. He woke up every 1-1.5 hours.

 Zachary holding Mason

He's so tiny next to Z!

 This picture of Mason and Ashlyn cracks me up!

 We've been taking him out a lot more. This is at Lowe's. We went to pick up some wood for Josh to build a table and a bamboo plant for Mason's room. I couldn't resist walking him through the fans. He loved it! I've finally gotten comfortable taking him places by myself. He doesn't mind being worn anymore, so it's much easier!

He still loves bath time. :-)

At Mason's 2 month appointment (which actually fell on Halloween, 10 days after he turned 2 months), he weighed 12lb 1oz and was 23in long. That's the same length they measured him at for his one month appointment. One of the measurements was wrong. He has outgrown clothes in length, so I know he got longer. The pediatrician said it's really hard to get an accurate length on them because they're so wiggly. He had to get vaccinations at that appointment, but overall, it went great! He was fussy when he got poked, of course. I fed him afterward and that calmed him down quickly. He was fine after that. 

Mason's First Month

Y'all, we have a one month old!!!

At our appointment (which we actually had at 5 weeks), Mason weighed 10lb 6oz and he was 23in long. He's growing so fast!

I haven't blogged much since he's been here. I've really been enjoying my time bonding with Mason - and really with Josh and Bailey too. We're all adjusting well and I love our little family! Here's an update of our past month together. 

Daddy's Lion King intro of Mason - he was just a day old here!

Week 1 

For the majority of our first week, we had one of our moms staying with us. Josh's mom stayed the first 2 nights and my mom stayed the next 2. We weren't sure if we would want to have anyone staying with us at first, but in the end, we were really grateful to have someone around to help out. It gave us both the time to focus on getting to know our brand new baby! The first week was interesting. It was so much fun! Even though we were tired and exhausted, it was so exciting to take care of Mason...even in the middle of the night. We were waking him up every couple hours to feed him and change his diaper. He slept in the rock n play beside our bed for the first couple nights. The first night or 2, Josh had to wake me up. I didn't hear any of Mason's noises or the alarm clock. I was surprised that Josh heard so much. I've watched him sleep through a fire alarm before, so I never thought a little baby noise would wake him up. Haha. Josh would get up and change Mason's diaper, then bring him to me so I could feed him. He would bring me snacks and make sure I had water. He even brought me breakfast in bed one morning (we don't eat in bed...ever - so that was actually kind of weird) and fed me while I fed Mason. lol. We had our 2 day visit with our nurses from the birthing center. Mason and I were both doing great! Mason ripped his umbilical cord out when he was 5 days old! It was scary, but he was fine. We had some newborn pictures taken and I love them! Here's a link to Tristin's website with his pictures.

We had some latch issues to work on and one of the midwives at the birthing center recommended trying a chiropractor. Mason had a high bite and his chin was set kind of far back and she was able to help us out SO much! Once we got the latch issues taken care of, breastfeeding has gone pretty smoothly.

Later in the week, we had Mason's first appointment with the pediatrician. That also went well.

On his way to the pediatrician. He was 4 days old here.

Here are some of my favorite newborn pictures

Week 2

We started getting out a little during Mason's 2nd week. We had a 2 week appointment with his pediatrician. Since it's right across the street from a shopping center, we decided to grab Chic-Fil-A for breakfast and stop to pick up some clothes for me. I didn't plan postpartum clothing as well as I thought I had!

First walk in the neighborhood

Mason had his first real bath this week!

Pre-bath...not so sure about this...

 Post bath. He did great!

Week 3
We continued to get out a little during Mason's 3rd week. When he turned 3 weeks, we celebrated by going to Lake Johnson for a walk and getting ice cream.

Milk coma

Daddy with his mini-me


Mason's first trip to NC State (outside my belly) and Bailey's first trip back since she was just a puppy!

Week 4
Week 4 was daddy's last week at home. We tried to make the most out of it, but we also relaxed a lot. We went to the beach for the day during this last week. We stopped by Ferguson's in St. Pauls on the way so we could get some food and Mason could meet some old friends. Mason did great on the ride to the beach and didn't get fussy unless he had a dirty diaper or got hungry. We went to Carolina beach and walked on the boardwalk, relaxed on the swings a little and walked on the beach. Mason slept through all of this. We grabbed a late lunch/early dinner after this and Mason stayed awake to stare at the fans the whole time. On the way back from the beach, he was a little fussier. I think he was just tired of being in his car seat. He was also starting to get hungry before we made it home. We enjoyed ourselves, but we were exhausted!

We went to visit Josh's co-workers and go out to lunch with them later in the week. Mason was great and he enjoyed his first trip to Daddy's office!

Mason also started sleeping in his crib through the night this week!

 This little guy just melts my heart!

Mason's Nursery!

I never posted any pictures of Mason's nursery before he was born, so here goes!

We decided on a Winnie the Pooh theme for the nursery way early. I briefly considered getting the basics done in the nursery, but waiting until the baby arrived to actually decorate it. This was my way around not finding out what the baby was but still being able to get a gender specific nursery. lol. Pooh is gender neutral and it was Josh's first choice for a nursery regardless. When we bought our crib (I was only 14 weeks pregnant then!) that changed. I decided I wanted to have the nursery done before the baby came. So, Pooh it was!

 This is the view from the door. We will be adding one of Mason's newborn pictures to the left side of the window. 

 This is from behind the recliner. The print above the dresser/changing table is a Hundred Acre Wood print. I might add something small to either side of it, but I probably won't ever get around to it. Mason loves looking at this during his diaper changes! This is the decal I got for above the crib. it's perfect for the nursery!

This is from his laundry basket. The bookshelves are wall mounted spice racks from IKEA. The side table is made of 2 crates. We decided to get a recliner vs a glider after sitting in a bunch and I'm so glad. My milk flow is pretty heavy and reclining during feeding works out much better for us than if I have to sit upright. I keep a basket beside the recliner that has snacks, water, burp cloths, chapstick, and other things that I might need while I'm feeding Mason. This was a great tip from our breastfeeding class!

Mason is sleeping in his crib as of last week, so we're already using the nursery daily!