A Love that Grows Stronger: February 2018

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Lynlie is FOUR months old

Four months...wow just wow. Now granted she is nearly 5 months as I write this, but holy cow 4 months seems to have FLOWN by!

Time seems to be going even faster this time than it did with any of the others. I truly think its the daily hustle of having older kids that make it go by fast. Gone are my days of being able to stay home in my pajamas all day doing nothing but veg out, play and watch cartoons. Now the baby has to be on a schedule that revolves around pick up and taking the boys to school. In a lot of ways it sorta sucks because I miss my lazy days but I try my best to relish it and roll with it.

This month has been busy with Lynlie celebrating her first Christmas, adjusting to working weekends and just overall adjusting to being a family of 7. Im sort of grateful Christmas is over and we can really begin to adjust. It was so busy trying to go on little to no sleep to attend all family Christmas's. I wouldn't trade it, but I'm grateful to get a little more sleep.

Lynlie continues to be an amazing blessing and perfect addition to this family. She is easy going, a sleeping champ and just and overall joy to be around. Her sweet little personality is starting really show, she smiles all the time and has almost belly laughed a few times, but not quite.

Here are a few of her milestones.

She is a smiling champ. She has a smile much like Landon that is open mouth and takes over her whole face. Her whole face smiles when she smiles. She even has what appears to be a little dimple on her left cheek.

much like her brothers I just have to say her name and her face lights up
She smiles most for mama. She definitely loves me the most (which I LOVE)
She does smile for others especially her dad, and siblings

She is not a fan of tummy time, and to be honest I don't do it very often.

Santa got her a new tummy time mat that I need to get out
She can lift her head 45-90 degrees when placed on the boppy

She holds her head up really well

I often hold her facing out and she holds her head and body up really well; she has really strong head control.

She does a great job of bringing her hands together and she has found her hands. Her hands have started to go to her mouth often
She doesn't like the bumbo or jumperoo yet.
She is still put in the swing on occasion but she will only stay there for a few minutes at a time.
She prefers to be held (who can blame her) and I often can't do a whole lot without holding her

I need to get some wraps to be able to hold her while cooking or cleaning or whatever

She is sleeping a lot!

She typically goes down around 8-9 and I will wake her at 6:30 to feed her while I get lincoln ready for school and she will then sleep until 9:30 or so when I wake her to feed her before going to pick Lincoln up
She takes a nap in her carseat for a short time usually about 30-45 min
She will most days take a nap in her crib for 3-4 hours in the afternoon
She still takes a nap while she nurses around 6-7pm

She is still exclusively breastfed

She nurses 6-8 times a day
often during the day she will sleep while nursing
she will nurse more frequently in the afternoon and evening
She takes a bottle really well!

We FINALLY got rid of the nipple shield!!

I can already tell she is gaining weight!
We got rid of it on Christmas Eve and besides the occasional need of it those first few days we haven't looked back.

She has started to roll from side to side and I'm sure will roll over soon
she will bat at toys on her play mat
if she has a toy she will try to put it in her mouth
She is still in size 1 diapers

I haven't made the switch to cloth and I'm not sure if I will. I can barely keep up with my weekly laundry let alone adding 2-3 more loads a week of diapers.

she is still in 3 month clothes.

She is still pretty tiny so I doubt I'll be moving up soon or anything

She coos all the time, and talks to us constantly. She is so precious

She has been such a blessing to our family and I'm so grateful God gave her to us. I never knew my heart needed a child so badly until she came. She has brought me so much joy and happiness that I didn't know I was capable of feeling again.

Since getting rid of the nipple shield she no longer nurses for 40+ minutes, we are down to 12-15 per side and I can already tell she is gaining weight and I was right! Even the pediatrician was pleasantly surprised!

She is 24.75 inches
She is in the 75th% for height
She is 11lbs 14 oz
She is in the 20th% for weight

She also got her shots, I haven't done the alternative vaccine schedule I did with the boys so she got them all and she ended up getting a low grade fever and in turn got some ibuprofen which seemed to take care of the fever, but she was a little more fussy than normal the following two days but nothing that was too terrible. I might space out her next vaccines since we might do the flu shot at her 6 month appointment so I'd have to come back a month later for that second shot as well.

Over all Lynlie is a joy and makes it really hard to stick to this whole "she's my last baby" thing...but truly Adam and I are content and even though we want more babies we know our family is as complete as it ever could be for now.

Here are our weekly photos

And our monthly pictures....

my little love

almost rolling

Monday, February 5, 2018

Lynlie is 3 Months Old

In true fashion I'm WAY late writing this so I'm going to try my best to remember how things were.

I know I say this every time with each kiddo but every month seems to just get sweeter and sweeter. As much as I hate watching my kids grow, mainly because I just love newborns, I do love watching their personalities start to come out. Her personality thus far is just pure sweetness and happiness. Her smile is much like landon's with that big wide open grin. But she still favors Lincoln most of the time.

She and I should say all of us have survived me going back to work. She gave her papa a run for his money on the first day back, which I figured she would because that day she was so fussy. I'm still trying to get her on a more normal sleep and nap schedule but we will get there eventually. I just feel like my maternity leave was cut short, and went by so quickly with the daily grind of having a school aged kid. I really wish I could have enjoyed her a little more but I did my best to hug and love on her as much as I could.

So here are some of her milestones for this month

She is indifferent about the pacifier. She will take it but not for long. It's mostly used when I'm not around and she can't nurse--thats still her favorite way to sooth.
She still does well with her carseat, she just gives me such huge smiles! She usually takes a nap in it in the morning when we are going to take one of the boys to or from school.

my goal is to get her to take her morning nap in the carseat so that she will take a longer afternoon nap but we'll see how that goes.

She does not like her "bath" time in the shower. Although it's super easy to just give her a shower, I'd still like to see how she does in the bath. But I have yet to give her one, but for the most part she screams the whole time in the shower...so we make them as quick as possible.
She is still in 3 month clothes, She still pretty tiny so I'm not surprised at this...she seems to be quite a bit smaller than the boys so I doubt we will be going up to 6 month clothes anytime soon.
She smiles all the time, I just have to say her name and she will flash me this HUGE smile! I absolutely love it.

she's not quite laughing yet, I can't wait for this
she coo's and "talks" all the time and it seems to be getting more and more frequent so I'm hoping that she will start laughing soon.

She doesn't love to be put down, though I'm trying to work on it. She will lay on her mat for short periods of time, but isn't a fan of the jumperoo just yet. I've only sat her in the bumbo once and she HATED it.
She holds her head up really well and is gaining strength in her core
She hates tummy time and I have to admit I'm not good at making her do it. I think Santa will be bringing her a new tummy time mat for Christmas!
She is not a big fan of the swing, and I have to admit that I'm not a huge fan of the mamaroo swing either, all the older kids had a fisher price one and I loved that swing and so did they, but I just couldn't bring myself to buy another one (inevitably the toddlers break the swing because they sit in it) so we are borrowing the mamaroo from my cousin, its helped a bit but not as much as the other swings have.
She is still exclusively breastfed and we are still using the nipple shield.

I'm so ready to be done, but she still "clicks" her tongue from and it hurts when I try to get her off of it, but I think it could be hindering her growth because she will nurse for 40+ minutes at a time.
she feeds roughly 7 times a day due to her long stretches at night she seems to nurse every 60-90 min during the day...which is hard when she nurses for 40 min!

She had her first family wedding and was loved on by everyone especially my cousin Jeanette.
She saw santa for the first time and of course was a champ.
She will blow raspberries on occasion and has actually started to drool a lot! I bought her some bibs for Christmas because she drools so much!
She is still our champ little sleeper, she still has her occasional 1 am bedtimes but I'm trying super hard to get her on a more normal schedule but following the baby wise principle of eat, play, sleep during the day.

she will sleep for 10 hours and take 3-4 naps a day still
she still seems like she sleeps A LOT!
she is still in the basinett in our room but I'm thinking we will have to transition her soon so she can sleep a little sounder without having Landon or me due to my coughing wake her up
she has taken a few naps in her crib but nothing consistent.

Lynlie is truly such a blessing and we are so lucky she is ours! I thank God everyday for giving us to her and I thank Laynie for picking out such a beautiful and perfect addition to our family....and now for the photo shoots...

Here are the weekly photos

And our monthly pictures.

And of course her 3 month pictures with Alicia... could she be any cuter???

Lynlie is TWO months

how two months has passed I will never fully comprehend. I thought that time went by fast with Lincoln but that is nothing compared to now with Lynlie. I think time feels like it's gone so fast because we are just so busy with the Linc and Lando and taking them to and from school all the time, my days just go by so fast and she spends half her day in the car.

But none the less days running together or not, Lynlie is a true blessing. She has been such a perfect addition to this family! She makes my heart swell and I'm so grateful God entrusted her to us.

She has really started to develop quite the adorable little personality where she smiles all the time and is one happy little babe. She still isn't quite on a schedule but I think thats because we aren't really home. For a few weeks shes been going to bed between 1-2 am!!! Now she will sleep for 7-9 hours and eat and want to go back to bed. This mama is uber tired since I get up at 6:30 with Linc. So i've really got to get her schedule shifted back a few hours.

Other than the sleep thing I'm truly enjoying being a mama of 5. I'm trying my best to have life slow down a bit so I can enjoy Lynlie. Since she is most likely our last I just want to enjoy every single second I can with her. She is just so yummy. I could kiss her sweet cheeks all day!!

Here are her milestones this month

She sleeps roughly 7-9 hours at night pretty regularly. there were a few weeks of bedtime being 1-2am but we are slowly moving to the 11pm time frame :)

she still naps between each feeding, but I'm trying to get her to stay awake in the evenings so she will go to sleep at night.

She is SUPER happy in the morning. She is all smiles and coos.
She does a pretty good job in the swing. I have to say that I don't love the mamaroo swing as much as I loved our lamb swing. Just doesn't seem to be as soothing to them. But since it was lent to us since the boys broke the other one it will have to do.
She doesn't get a lot of floor time, mainly bc we aren't home a lot, but when she does she does pretty well with it so long as someone else doesn't hit her in the face or kick her by accident.
She HATES having her diaper changed. She just screams!!!
She is exclusively breastfed and hasn't even had a bottle yet

she will typically eat every 2.5-3 hours
we still use the nipple shield. I've tried a few times to get her off, but she still clicks her tongue and bites down. I'm beginning to get nervous that she will use it forever!

She holds her head up really well
She hasn't had much tummy time on the floor, but she does lay on my chest and she does ok with it. I've never been real good at tummy time and all my kids are fine, so I'm much more relaxed about it this time. Plus I'm in no rush for her to do things, I'll keep her small for as long as I can.
She doesn't love showers. She will usually eventually relax but she's not a fan

she still hasn't had an actual bath yet...
She doesn't mind me washing her hair in the sink. I do this every few days because I Hate greasy baby hair!

There have been a few times where I have to use the Moby with her because I can't get anything done without it
She gets super fussy when shes tired. It's really the only time shes super fussy. Most of the time this happens at night.
She still isn't a huge fan of the pacifier but I did break down and buy a Wubanub and she seems to take that better than anything else.

you still have to work with her quite a bit to get her to take it.
she only sucks on it to fall asleep then she spits it out

We got off a normal 2 month schedule due to her doctor being out of town so we just had her 2 month check up when she was 10 weeks old. She got her shots and her siblings got their flu shots.....yes I'm crazy! Unfortunately she didn't gain a whole lot of weight...only 1/2 lb but she did grow 1.5 inches. But with the minimal weight gain he wants to see her back in 1 month...so in the mean time we are going to try to increase a feeding each day and get some lactation help.

She weighs 10 lbs even
She is 24 inches long
She is 25th% for weight
She is 90th% for height

I don't know what it is about my girls and their struggle to gain weight as babies but I just hope that we get this under control. Nothing brings back a little PTSD as hearing that your baby isn't gaining weight.

All things considered I think we are adjusting to to being a family of 7 fairly well. It's chaotic at times but it's fun and truly enjoyable. We love all these kiddos and Lynlie is just the icing on the cake. She has such a sweet little personality and we couldn't be more grateful to God for entrusting her to us.

Here are our weekly pictures this month