One Month

Happy one month to our sweet Emma Kate!  Hard to believe she's been here a month yet it also seems like she's been with us forever!  I didn't realize how much I missed having a newborn around but she is the sweetest baby and I am loving our time together.

She is a pretty chill little girl, content to hang out and go with the flow of whatever big sis has on schedule.  She seems like a pretty easy baby to me and she has settled into her own little routine that is fairly predictable for me.  She eats around every 2.5 hrs during the day, will stay awake to play for another 30 min or so after eating and then naps for usually around 1.5 hrs.  She is great about napping in the car, her rock n play and her crib though I think her favorite place to nap is in someones arm :)  She can sleep through a tornado... tornado Harper that is.  We were so crazy about keeping everything so quiet when Harper was a baby and napping but there is no chance this little one is getting a quiet spot to nap.  Fortunately she's learned to sleep right through her wild big sis!

Harper still loves her and will always ask about her when she's not around.  H loves to find paci's and bring them to me if EK is fussing and is also pretty helpful about throwing diapers away for me.  Unfortunately big sis does always want whatever blanket EK is using to wrap up her own baby/bunny with.  EK always sleeps swaddled and loves it.  We had a little trouble moving her into her crib for whatever reason she did not want to sleep there at night.  She would nap during the day no problem but at night she just wanted to play in the crib ;)  Fortunately we've moved past that.  She will usually sleep for 4-5 hours, eat, then for another 3 or so.  She might get to come sleep in the big bed about half the time if I have trouble getting her back to sleep after eating but she is getting better about that.

Her eyes are still pretty blue and her hair very light.  She has a bit of a mullet going on with the back being pretty long but the front has mostly fallen out... poor girl!  Sometimes we think she looks like Harper and sometimes not at all... we will see if those eyes darken up!  We moved her up to size 1 diapers the first week but I'm glad to report I didn't shed any tears this time around ;)  I also cleaned out her dresser of all her newborn clothes today so she is officially only wearing 0-3 and 3 month clothes.  Such a difference from big sis.  I bought her a few newborn outfits bc I felt like evvverything she owned shouldn't be a hand-me-down.  Unfortunately she didnt even get to wear all of those before growing out.  Oh well!

She's been all over in her first month- to Etown, Indiana, the zoo, the pool, golfing, library.  She is content as can be when being carried in the K'tan baby wrap and it is great to leave my hands free to help wrangle big sis as well.   Having a newborn this time has not been difficult... the difficult part is just adjusting to having two kids.  It's hard to not be able to attend to both of their needs immediately but I'm sure it's good for them to learn a little patience.  I also feel like while Andy and I are together with both of them we're each kind of doing our own thing... attending to one child at a time. haha.  When it was just Harper we were at least hanging out with each other or focusing on the same little person.  I have loosened up a little bit this time around and we have left the kiddos with our fabulous sitter twice already.  I miss them a lot but it is nice to just hang out with him for a bit :)

We went to the doctor at 2 weeks and her weight was up to 9lbs 11oz.  I'd guess she's at least 11 lbs now but we don't go back to the doctor until 2 months.  I believe she was 95% in head and weight and 80% in length at the 2W wcc :)  We joke that God made her solid to withstand the tough love she's getting from Harper and Claire :)

I'm writing this with her snuggled on my chest while Harper is napping and I know all the moms out there remember that there is almost nothing better than a sweet newborn sleeping on you.  I feel so much less anxious this time around and am doing my best to cherish all these quiet moments with just the two of us :)  Naps are hard to come by for mom these days because it seems like there are sooo many things to accomplish while Harper naps but we do our best to snuggle for a least a bit everyday while big sis is napping and again when she goes to bed :)

I haven't saved her one month pics yet to the computer but I will add one as soon as I do.  We also had newborn pictures done... that was challenging.  All I wanted was a cute picture of the sisters together.  Unfortunately we had been taking pics for 2.5 hours before we started putting Harper in them... and by that time Harper was doooone with it.  Our sweet photographer offered to come back by the house and she definitely was able to get some keepers though so I'm so excited to share those!

the facial expressions here are just too much

Happy 1 month EK!! :)

23 Months

Just one month short of having a two year old!! So hard to believe! Of course this has been a very eventful month with Harper finally becoming a big sister.  Everyone has asked how she is adjusting and honestly she has been great.  From the get go she has been sweet and gentle with EK, always asking to hold her.  The holding only lasts about 10 seconds or until EK starts to cry and then Harper says 'all done' and practically pushes her off her lap ;)  She will ask to pet, hug and kiss her.  She loves to find her paci's and will do her best to shove them back into her mouth whenever they pop out ;)

The downside to the adjustment was her behavior in general for the first week or two.  woh wohhh... Andy was off the first week and we had a ton of fun but Harper was definitely more ornery than normal.  Even though we made it a priority to give her plenty of attention she still found extra weeks to seek out some more attention ;)  But, we've moved past that phase and she is doing great.  Fortunately my first week alone with both girls it's like Harper just knew it was time to be a helper and she was so well behaved for me.

She continues to crack us up constantly.  She has all these funny sayings that are always amusing us.  She will ask to hold, pet, hug and kiss things - including rocks, animals on TV, babies, food, etc.  Oftentimes she will hug and kiss her food before eating it.  She loves saying coooome here to things that clearly are not coming, such as birds and toys lol.  We found out she has a little boyfriend at school so if you ask her about Thomas, don't be surprised to see her make a little hugging motion.

She has the funniest fish face which is brand new.. maybe inspired from her first fishing expedition.  In years if she reads this she will say, ohmygosh mom, I cannot believe you let me kiss a fish.  And I will say giiiirl, believe me, I did not want your lips anywhere near that thing! haha.  g-ross!  Another cool thing she has started to do is pretend play.  She will feed us pretend food or play with her animals in some little story she has made up.

She is a bit bossy and I am looking forward to the day Claire can talk and put her in her place ;)  She loves to say 'get up' and pull us up... or attempt to move baby sis ;)  She is not the best at sharing and for whatever reason I feel like this is particularly bad with Claire.  If Claire attempts to hold any toy that Harper has marked as her own she will say 'no no no, hoppy'. Hoping this gets better with time!

We took our first trip to the ER this month.  After tripping in a hole, Harper had a pretty bad limp.  Uncle Dave happened to be working that evening so we went in for an xray.  Fortunately all was well and nothing was broken :)  Harper also had her first episode of vomiting... so pitiful.  Of course we were out at a restaurant with Andy's friends when it happened.  The poor thing was so scared... she was crying and just kept saying 'scary scary' over and over again.

We've spent many afternoons at the pool and know we have many more to come.  It's amazing how worn out she is after a few hours there but she has such a blast.  She loved playing at Papa's pool and will talk about the slide for many days following.

I'm so, so happy to have had EK when we did... the most unexpected benefit is an entire summer off to enjoy with both my girls and that is exactly what we're doing :)