Molly | Month One

Weight:  You weighed 7 lbs 10 ounces at birth.  You dropped 1 pound and were back to your birth weight at 2 weeks old.  You probably weigh about 8.5 pounds now if I had to guess.

Clothes: You wear newborn clothes and a couple of 3 month outfits.

Sleep:  You were in the NICU for basically the first week and then the first week at home was a little rocky. You slept all day long and then at night we tried to find our rhythm. That first week home you were giving us some 3 or 4 hour sleeping stints, but then you would have trouble going back to sleep sometimes.  So then we would spend a decent amount of time trying to get you back to sleep.  After that first week, I swear you have been a pretty amazing sleeper!

The best thing we did with you was put you in your nursery after the first couple nights at home.  We started you next to our bed in the Rock N’ Play, but you would make so many little noises at night, no one would get any sleep.  Now, I love having you in your room and we can hear you on the monitor, but you aren’t right next to us.    You will sometimes cry for a couple of minutes after I first put you to bed at night, but you put yourself right back to sleep.  Then you may also cry out for a minute or so around 12 or 1am, but then go back to sleep.  We have had some 6-8 hour stretches of sleep already this month which has been amazing.  A typical night the last two weeks goes from 9pm to 2am.  Then I usually feed around 2am and then you go right back to bed until 630 or 7am.  You have been a great sleeper!  One night you even went from 9pm until 530am!

Schedule: At two weeks, we loosely started following our Moms On Call schedule.  You wake up usually between 6 and 7am, I will breastfeed you a bit and then you have your first bottle about 9am and then every 3 hours after that.  We use that as a guideline, but if you are hungry sooner, we feed you sooner. We also started implementing a bedtime routine and I bathe you around 8:30pm and feed you a bottle in your room at 9pm and then put you in bed.

Health:  Knock on wood, you have been healthy so far!  You spent your first week of life in the hospital as your lungs needed a little more time to recover after swallowing amniotic fluid at birth, but other than that you have been great!

Crying:  You’ve been such a good baby.  I prayed for an easy one this time around 🙂 You mainly just cry when you are hungry and hardly even for that!  You have been good in the carseat so far which neither of my other two kids were very good at.

Feeding:  You eat about 3 ounces per feeding and feed approx every 3 hours.  You seemed to be pretty good at breastfeeding,  but I never feel like you get enough during one feeding.  You usually end up falling asleep or just using it as a soother.   I started pumping a lot and giving your bottles after the first week.  Now I mostly pump and feed you a bottle, but you breastfeed once or twice per day.  I keep the middle of the night feeding on the boob because I’m too lazy to pump and usually first thing in the mornings.  I like the bottle because I know exactly how much you get and it satisfies you well until the next feeding.

Likes:  The swing and your baths.  Bath time is relaxing for you which is so nice.  We take one every night before bedtime.  You get lots of love, kisses and attention from your big brother and sister too!

Dislikes: Being hungry, that’s about it.

Milestones:  Mainly just making some strides in sleep this month.  You’ve made a couple of 6+ hour stretches at night this month which was pretty awesome.

Places You’ve Gone:  We haven’t traveled anywhere with you yet.  You’ve been all around town with us so far and you mostly just sleep which is great!

Visitors:  We’ve had lots of sweet friends and family come by to meet you and deliver food or gifts.

Postpartum:  We’ve been so lucky to have the help of all of our family and friends that have helped with meals.  The entire month of September it seemed like we were fed by so many sweet families from the church, friends, and family.  This has definitely been my easiest recovery.  I honestly felt great from about 3 days post-delivery.  I drove, walked, did stairs, etc.  It has been so much easier than my recovery with Madelyn.

At my 3 week post-op appointment, everything looked great and I got the okay to start back at my Pure Barre classes.  It’s felt great to be able to work out again.

Life with Three: It’s been a little bit more chaotic and complicated with three, but at the same time easier than I expected.  Matt has been a big help taking on extra responsibilities around the house and taking on Brody and Madelyn duty in the evenings.  We’ve had great help from family and we are settling into this new normal.  Brody and Madelyn love to help and give her lots of hugs and kisses which I love to watch.  I’m looking forward to watch these three continue to grow together.  A big help too is that Brody and Madelyn are 5 and 3 and they play so well together and independently.  It’s nice that they don’t need me all the time!  Madelyn is definitely still a Mama’s girl, so she has had to do a little adjusting and has acted out here and there pitching fits; but she’s always the sweetest to her baby sister!

I have to give it to the Rock N Play because it has made her sleep so well.  I love this thing and ours is nothing fancy.  It’s five years old and doesn’t vibrate or rock on its own like all the new ones seem to do. It just seems to snuggle them perfectly and give them that little bit of incline that makes it comfortable for them to sleep!