Thursday, March 13, 2014

Update: Adjusting to life with a Newborn & a Toddler

You know, newborns are funny creatures. Think about it, the average newborn comes out looking something like a cross between a potato and Gollum half the time. They’re covered in hair in weird places, like their earlobes and their backs and their foreheads. Sometimes they sleep ALL the time, except for the time you want them to sleep. They cry , eat, cry more, pee, and poop things that don’t look like human poop.

And yet, we love them so much our hearts could burst. Despite the smells and pee on us, we feel so much love to these tiny humans we created.

So far, we’re going on 2 weeks home with the newbie, and we’ve adjusted accordingly. The first week was interesting… for 2 days, she would only sleep on me or in her swing, so I spent 2 nights on the couch camped out next to her swing while she slept. Mind you, this was a few days after my C-section, so I was miserable once I woke up… Sleeping on the couch does not make you feel great post-surgery. The first night my newb slept in her bassinet, I was praising whatever deity allowed me those few hours of sleep. I needed them so desperately, I was willing to trade anything for that time sleeping.

And she eats like a little horse! (Ok maybe more like a Shetland Pony, but you get the picture) She’s already gobbling down 3 oz per feeding every 3 hours. And since she is currently going through a growth spurt, she’s up to 3.5 to 4 oz some feedings… mind you when she eats more, she waits longer to eat again, but still! And it’s not overfeeding, the kid rarely if ever spits up.

She wears a 0-3 month or 3-6 month size clothes. My oldest was a little runt compared to this tyke… My oldest wore newb sizes for 2 months… she was born 7lb 13 oz. My newbie? Born 9lb and 12 oz., and she’s in a way bigger size. She can’t fit into newb onesies anymore, and she barely fits into her newb one-piece sleep suits.

But that’s all ok. Because she is totally worth all the adjustments and the clothes. (Thank God for Hand-Me Downs…)

My oldest is adjusting pretty well, some of the things this kid says to her sister is hilarious… I’m like, where did you HEAR that from, because we never said it! Like earlier, she said “Please, stop doing that, no more crying!” to her sister in the car on the way home from the store. We’ve never told her sister to stop crying, babies cry, it’s normal!

Or, the ever-hilarious “Please, just no, you be quiet now!”. Yes, we’re telling her that she needs to talk nice to her sister, but we can’t help but to snicker a little when she’s not looking. However, on the flip side, she sees her sister cry, and she gets worried and says, “Chloe’s frustrated? She hungry?”. She worries so much about her baby sister, it’s very cute, but she’s not as interested in holding her anymore. I think the novelty wore off to her. But she’s adjusting well, and she does help us a LOT, she helps shake bottles, and throws out diapers, she’s even helped with changing diapers by wiping her sissy’s booty for us when we let her. She knows not to pick her up without us helping, which was one of our big worries.

The hardest part has been finding the time to do my homework, to be honest! I’ve got to really buckle down this week to get that done in the timeframe that I have!!

So, as I sit here tonight with my 2 week old on my chest, I think about how the last 2 weeks have flown by and how things have changed so drastically… We’ve had a lot of life changes in a very short period of time, some of which I can’t talk about right now… suffice it to say, our life has gotten a lot harder in some ways, but in others, man I wouldn’t trade it for the world. I can’t imagine life without our Chloe anymore.



Anyhow, I just wanted to post a quick little blog update! As you can see, she’s definitely getting big fast! Planning to work on more stuff in the weeks coming up!


Do you remember when your little ones were newborns? What was the hardest part about adjusting with a newborn for you?

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