Chunkalunka

Last Tuesday was Tyler's 2 month Doctor's appointment. (Can't believe he's 2 months already!) I was excited to see how much he weighed, but I dreaded the appointment because it meant it was shot day. :-(  I was guessing that he was between 10 and 10.5 pounds, but he was 11 pounds exactly and 22.5 inches long! He's gained 3 pounds in just two months. He really does seem much bigger to me, but I was still surprised that he was 11 pounds.

His doctor asked how long he's been sleeping at night and it's still only been about 3 hours at a time. She said that by 2 months (he turned 2 months, 2 days later) they like to see them sleeping 4 - 5 hours. So being the good little listener that he is, he slept 4.5 hours that night and has slept 4 - 5 hours at a time every night since. Next time I will ask her to tell him 6 - 7 hours.


His shots were so sad! Watching his little face go from happy and content to shock and tears was horrible. They did 4 shots and he screamed harder with every one. And then when he was done he just clung on to me and cried. It broke my heart into a million pieces. I hate seeing him in so much pain! When we got home he slept for a long time. When he woke up he screamed and cried for over an hour straight. He almost never cries for more than a few minutes so it was very unlike him. The only things that helped to calm him a little were for me to walk up and down the stairs with him or do squats. He definitely gave me my excercise that day! Then that night he got his first fever. The funny thing was that by the time he got his fever he was feeling much better. So he was burning up, but happy as a little lark, just smiling away. I gave him Tylenol before he went to bed, which he projectile vomited before I even finished wiping it off his chin. So I don't actually think he got any and his fever lasted most of the night, but he woke up back to his normal self the next morning. I do not look forward to doing that again at 4 months!


This is what Tyler has been up to lately:

2 Months (I forgot my sign)

 Singing

 Smiling

 Eating everything in sight!

I have a great video of him trying to eat this but it took forever to upload and I finally gave up.

Playing

Making new friends at our Mom and Baby Group

6 Weeks Baby!

Tyler was six weeks old on Saturday. Hard to believe! I have definitely not been wishing away the days - I love him being so little. But I have really been looking forward to the six week mark. Because six weeks is when I finally am done with the c-section recovery restrictions. Yesterday was my six week appointment and now I can do whatever I want. I'll have to ease into some things, but there are no more restrictions and that makes me very happy. It made me so happy that after we got home from the doctor Tyler and I took a celebratory walk to Caribou for a Caramel Cooler and it was wonderful.

When I was at the doctor I had just a few questions. Like how do you ease into excersing when your abs have been out of commission for so long? After my surgery they told me "Don't lift anything other than the baby and don't use your abs." So after 6 weeks of trying not to use them and 9 months of them being hidden somewhere around the baby, they are quite weak, squishy and useless. Any excersice tips would be appreciated. All my work out videos are pretty intense so for now it's just the eliptical machine. I'm in a wedding this fall and I am determined to be back to normal. It would be nice if I could be close by the time I get fitted for my dress. So that's the goal.

Ok so this got longer than I meant it to. I really just wanted to excitedly tell everyone that I can carry Tyler in his carseat now and I can carry laundry up and down the stairs and I can stop feeling like I'm pushing it when I lift his stroller in and out of the car! Oh, the simple joys in life...

Mother's Day

A late Happy Mother's Day to all you moms out there. I hope you all had a wonderful day! :-)

Warning: This part could get sappy.

My Mother's Day was amazing. It started in the middle of the night when Carl gave Tyler a bottle so I could sleep. Never has 6 hours of sleep felt so amazing! Then I woke up to my boys bringing me breakfast in bed. French toast, scrambled eggs, bacon and apple juice. I loved the breakfast, but the best part was watching Tyler sitting in his boppy on the bed just staring and smiling at me while I ate. LOVED it!

My beautiful Mother's Day flowers!

Mother's Day was an amazing day for me. I wanted a baby for so long and it was hard to wait sometimes, but now that I have Tyler I understand more than ever that God's timing is perfect and I wouldn't change a single thing about my life. I may have had to wait longer than I would have liked, but it was absolutely worth it to end up with Tyler. I know that God knew what he was doing and gave him to us at exactly the right time. And he is a very loved little boy. He's been hoped for and dreamed of and prayed for, for a very long time! This is Carl's last week of his master's program. I decided that I think God gave us Tyler a little while before he finished the program so that I would understand why we didn't have a baby during the program. I'm fine being on my own with Tyler in the evenings, but it's hard for Carl to be so busy that he hardly sees him. And it's hard for me to get everything done around the house by myself while Carl is off studying and at class all the time. I could handle it for this past 6 weeks, but his program was three years long and that would have gotten old! I am SO excited for tomorrow when we can say that he is finally done with school!

Ok I rambled a little. But what I was getting at is that I didn't need anything for Mother's Day. The most amazing gift in the world was sitting right in front of me and I get to hold him and cuddle him and love him everyday and I am thankful beyond words for that. I'm not going to lie, I cried a few times on Sunday just thinking about how lucky I am and how thankful I am that God chose us to be Tyler's parents.

Psalm 139:12-14 has never been more meaningful to me:

"For you created my inmost being: you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well."

I look at Tyler and I think of the way God designed him individually and perfectly. There is no one like him and there is no one that would have been a more perfect fit for our family. I look at his hands and his feet and his cute little face and my heart melts. I've said this before, but I don't know how anyone can feel a baby growing inside of them and then later look at their baby, a whole little person that was so perfectly made, and not believe there's a God. That can't just happen. Tyler was fearfully and wonderfully made by God. I thank Him every single day for the incredible gift that he's given us. And I just pray that we can be great parents to him and raise him to know and love God with all his heart. He has given us an incredible responsibility and I just hope that we can live up to it and be everything that Tyler needs us to be for him.

  Tyler wasn't a fan of the Mother's Day Family Picture Session

 So we tried again after church. He's more cooperative when he's sleeping.

My little Mother's Day present :-)

This one has nothing to do with Mother's Day. I just like him in his cute little hat.

Life At Home

I have been wanting to get on here and write something for awhile now, but I keep getting distracted and forgetting to do it. I'm not going to lie, it's a little easier to do it when Carl is home so that I can finish in one sitting and not lose my thoughts. But when he gets home I usually forget about it. Not tonight though! Carl is enjoying some Daddy and Son time and in just a little bit he's going to try to give Tyler his first bottle. And then we're grilling out. Because it's finally nice out!!

I kind of wondered what I would do with all my time when I stayed home with a baby. I mean I knew that I would be busy taking care of the baby, but I wondered if I would be at home a lot or out and about. But now I know. I love going places with him. We like to go to the mall and take walks, and this week we've gone to lots of garage sales together. Tyler isn't a huge fan of the garage sales because he has to get in and out of the car a lot and it interrupts his sleep. But he puts up with them pretty well. He lets out some loud cries and gives me his best grumpy face every time I take him out or put him in the car but then he gets over it and is a little charmer for everyone he sees at the garage sales.

I am amazed at how quickly Tyler is changing already! I just love watching him learning and growing. It's so fun to see him start to notice things giong on around him. A couple weeks ago he started to like watching the mobile in his pack & play. So last weekend we bought him a play gym and I was so excited to get it set up for him. I was so sure he was just going to love it. So Monday morning I got it all set up and layed him down under it and then watched as he stared in wide eyed wonder right past all of the cool toys hanging down, to more exciting things...like the wall. And the ceiling.  It was still cute, but he wasn't nearly as impressed with his new toy as I was. But I kept putting him under once in awhile and then on Wednesday while he layed there I heard a rattle. So I turned around and he was hitting the little octopus over and over with his hand and watching it swing back and forth. I was so proud of him. It's amazing how something so simple can be so exciting. But over the last few days it hasn't gotten old watching him play under it and smile and make cute little noises while he hits the same octopus over and over again. He also started to notice himself in the mirror on it and he likes to stare at himself in it. He's still not into his wrist rattles or really any other toy. But he loves his play gym! And he has officially marked his territory by spitting up all over it multiple times.

What else is Tyler up to? He was 9 pounds at his doctor appointment almost 2 weeks ago. He's 22 inches long. He discovered his tongue last week. He sits there and sticks it in and out of his mouth over and over again like a cute little frog. He can roll over! He actually rolled over for the first time when he was 2 weeks old. But he has to be really mad to do it. He HATES being on his tummy (although he's starting to tolerate it more). So if he's laying on his tummy and he gets mad enough he flips himself right over. Sometimes when he lays there he pushes back with his feet so fast that it looks  like he could almost crawl away. It's pretty funny to watch. I hope that doesn't make me sound mean...

In other, none baby related news, this was Carl's last week of class. He has his finals next week and then he graduates and will be done with school forever! And he will officially have his masters in financial mathematics. We are both VERY excited for his last day.

 Taking a break to pose for the camera

 Tyler loves reading stories!

 "Mommy says it's good for me to lay on my tummy sometimes, but I hate it! I'd rather have a flat head."

 Tired out after a long walk. It's tough work getting pushed in a stroller!

Already a little flirt...

Happy Easter!

We hope you're all having a wonderful Easter and that you take time to remember the real reason we celebrate!

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. - John 3:16

We spent our morning at church, ate lunch with my brother Jeff and took naps this afternoon. It has been a low key, relaxing day. Tyler was a stud in his little Easter outfit.

A Whole New World

 Ok, so I knew that life was going to change a lot with a baby, and I was ok with that. Completely excited about it, actually. And I still am. I love every minute of being a mom and having a little family of three. But it definitely is different. Because of the c-section, it has taken longer for me to get back to normal than it probably would have otherwise. The first week I was home from the hospital, I still had trouble walking and it was very diffitult to sit down and stand up. If I dropped something (which I often do) I would just have to wait for some one else to come and pick it up because the effort of bending all the way over was way too painful and exhausting. I wasn't allowed to drive, carry Tyler down the stairs or lift anything other than Tyler. So for the first week, all I really did was hold and feed Tyler. My mom was completely amazing. She cooked, she cleaned, she did our laundry, she drove Tyler and I to our doctor appointments (between the 2 of us, we had 5 appointments in 2 weeks!), and everything else that needed to be done. The second week she was here I really tried to do things myself. But usually I would just start something and Tyler would need me and that was the end of it. There were 2 baskets of laundry in our room for a week and a half. My mom or Carl would put them on my bed for me so I could put them away, and at night when I still hadn't done it, they would move them back to the floor of my closet until the next day when I would try again. Now they are in the guest room and still not put away... 

This week I have felt much better. I stopped taking pain meds, my doctor said I can drive again and I have actually done dishes and loads of laundry (with Carl's help carrying the laundry baskets for me since I'm still not supposed to lift anything.) And I've gotten pretty good at typing with just my left hand and turning light switches on and off with my chin. I have all of these lists of things I want to do each day and if I even get one done, I feel a little bit proud. Today Tyler and I went to Target AND I cut my fingernails. It was a big day. We also had our first little social outing with baby last night. We went to our good friends Jesse and Andrea's house for dinner and a movie and Tyler was a rockstar for it. Such a good baby!
Here are a few more pictures of the beautiful reason I never get anything done anymore :-)

My Little Love

All ready for his first stroller ride!

Our happy little family

We love having Tyler and we are treasuring every single second with him. It already feels like he's getting so big! I don't want to forget a single minute of this time with him as a newborn. He is so sweet and so precious and he is making me so sappy! But we love him more than we ever could have imagined was possible. He is definitely the perfect addition to our family!

Baby Love

It's official. I'm in love. Pretty much all I do anymore is hold my baby and take pictures of him. Oh yeah, and feed him. The child loves his food!

3 Things I've learned from Tyler:

1. He is super baby. The boy is strong! This shouldn't surprise me because I've been feeling his little karate chops for many months now. But he was already trying to do push ups when he was two days old!

2. I am not a good patient. I've never been in the hospital before or had any surgeries so this recovery thing is all new to me. I don't like being told I can't do things!

3. I am such a softie! I've worked with kids for so long and I can be strict with them when I need to be.  But Tyler's cry melts my heart and I want to solve every problem. I don't ever want him to feel pain or be sad, I want to protect him from everything. I don't know how I am ever going to tell him no or discipline him as he gets older!

 Tyler loves his new bouncer from Grandpa and Grandma Bernardy!

 He also loves to fold his hands :-)

So in love...

It took a few tries, but we got the perfect footprint!

He loves Daddy time! And so does Daddy :-)