2 months

Today marks the 2 month mark for Elliott!  I am not sure I should be writing this update today as it was a challenging one, sometimes with Elliott, but to be honest the last 2 months has been HARD with Hannah.  She is usually so easy, and had no problem with any transition except for this one. She is definitely jealous and making it hard to enjoy Elliott who is actually a fairly happy guy. Oh well, this too will pass....
Today Elliott had his 2 month appointment today and is a healthy growing boy, except for possibly some reflux issues. He is still in the 50% for weight and head size- 5.51 kg and 40 cm respectively. He dropped from 50% to 45% for height.  He seems so big to me, so it is interesting that he is only 50% for weight.

He sleeps pretty well at night, still waking 2 times to eat between 11/1 pm and 4/5 am, but he goes right back to sleep for the most part... but I am definitely looking forward to this dropping to once a night, then maybe my bedtime can be later than 8:45.
He is good at holding his head up on his tummy and with head control while sitting.  I try to keep him upright for 15-20 min after eating to help with reflux, but when he is allowed to lay on his back he loves his little baby play mat.

We just purchased a Thule Chariot that is a nice bike trailer and jogger that he loves to ride in so far, with the infant sling installed... plus it allows us to go on family bike rides and runs again... That was our expensive anniversary present this year.
His next appointment is in 2 months, and I am excited to see the changes that happen in these two months... excited to say goodbye to the newborn stage.... I love older babies so much more!!
Also hoping we have a better report for Hannah in the next two months!

Comparison

Next week I will write an update after Elliott's 2 month check up. But, today I was dressing Elliott in our warm Patagonia suit that we also used when Hannah was a baby... yes he is dressed in pink and flowers for the sake of staying warm. But when I put the hood up I remembered that we had taken a head shot of Hannah in the Patagonia suit, closer to 11-12 weeks, but I thought it would be fun to put them up side by side... so Elliott is 7.5 weeks and Hannah 11-12 (although I think Elliott is almost the same size!!).  Decide for yourselves if you think they look alike!

Hannah

Hannah

Elliott

Elliott

One month down

Cute big sister!

Grandparents came to visit, Yea!!!

Well since I am here writing this blog post it is proof that we have survived the first month of having a newborn and a toddler! The first three weeks were very nice having help from John and my parents, the last two have been survival mode!

 It is getting better for me personally, I think my post pregnancy  hormones are adjusting (I don't remember crying at all with hannah) and I am getting used to the fact that in the next year I will be spending much more time at home, as it is a mission to get two little ones out the door besides on a walk or run! This is harder than it sounds as I am not a home body, John and I love to go go go and be outdoors, but it is good character refinement!  Plus I am a mommy who likes routine, and while we are out and about with elliott I believe a routine helps a baby out and like one of my favorite books says, Healthy Sleep Happy Baby (child).

Sledding in engleberg, don't worry Elliott and I didn't actually go down the mountain

In general Elliott is a quiet baby, but he does fight falling asleep, although he is tired, but once asleep he is a good sleeper... going up to 5.5 hours at a time at night (although 3.5-4.5 is more common). We still have him sleeping in our rock n play sleeper, which is like a bassinet at an incline. I thought we would transfer him to the crib full time at 4 weeks like we did with Hannah, but he sleeps well so I haven't wanted to change it.... although he seems to get very warm in there.

Big sister starting to be less jealous

So far he is a healthy boy, 50% for height and weight (53.5 cm and 4600 grams) and head circumference was 60%.  Hannah was always under 10% for weight and over 70% for height. He checked out healthy so far today at the doctor (of which the appointment was 90 min with the doctor and assistant), but he is still jaundice so they are checking his blood for that. I blame it on the fog that has been blocking our beautiful sunshine for the last month, but they will inform we tomorrow if there is anything we need to do about it.

So far he seems to be a relaxed little boy, besides fighting initially falling asleep, a much better nurser than Hannah, and besides that I can't tell much difference between him and Hannah.... with time I am sure I will be able to.

Hannah first snowman

Big sisters art work from "school"

Valentines dinner in, we splurged on steak and it was actually good!!

A baby story

Last Friday at 10:57 am, 11 hours after his due date, Elliott Patton was born weighing 3.46 kg and 50 cm long..... yes everywhere except America uses grams and cm for measurements. Basically he was 6 oz heavier than hannah and a half inch longer, even though to us he looks smaller and the doctors thought he was going to be much smaller. With both babies my due date was fairly accurate, Hannah was 8 hours early, Elliott 10 hours late.
My labor and deliver with Elliott was so much different than with Hannah. Here the midwifes and OBGYN doctors work together, every woman has both, but it seems like the midwife is usually in control of the labor and delivery unless something seems to be going wrong.  We had met with our midwife about 3 times before the birth. It was so easy, I just called her Friday morning when my contractions were getting strong and she said she would meet us at the hospital. We walked to the labor area and met her, we didn't have to see any nurses, any other doctors just her.
With Hannah I was in labor for 30 hours and everything obviously progressed very slowly.

we love the rock n play!

Elliott with Tammy

This time around I got up to go to the bathroom at 2 AM on Friday and felt my water break, I decided to lay in bed and just see how I felt after that. At about 4 AM I got up and started to time the contractions, to my enjoyment this time the early labor was stomach contractions, with Hannah everything was in my back and that was awful. Finally at 5:30 I got John up, I called the midwife and our friend Tammy who was going to watch Hannah.

Elliott with Trini and Hannah

The midwife said to meet her at 8 AM at the hospital. In the 5 minute car drive to the hospital I had 3 contractions so I knew things were speeding up! When we got there I had to lay down to monitor the contractions and babies heart rate. Unfortunately laying down seemed to shift the pain into my back..... Not pleasant. Also she told us that I was already 7 cm dilated when we got there and that this baby was most likely going to be born before lunch! After this I laboured in about every position imaginable while John massaged my back and encouraged me alone the way. At about 10:30 she told me I had to push and that the baby needed to come out NOW because they thought the cord might be around his neck... up until then it was just the midwife, John, and I, then the Dr came in with the vacuum and said she would need to use it if the next series of pushing wasn't successful due to the risk of the cord being around the neck. I had only pushed about 4 times before this, but nonetheless on the next push baby Elliott was born with the midwife catching him right onto the hospital floor. The cord wasn't around his neck, his heart rate might have just dropped a few times due to the speed and intensity of the contractions. We were able to do skin to skin contact and nurse right away.... This wasn't possible with Hannah because she had to get her lungs checked in the NICU right away. The whole experience was as relaxing at birth can be, with classical music playing in the background and minimal people involved and even speaking german the whole time!

Elliott and Hannah as newborns

We stayed in the hospital about 48 hours before coming home.  Having 2 at home hasn't really sunk in yet, but Hannah seems to be having a hard time with the transition. I am hoping having my parents here, from today, for two weeks will really help. I also can't yet imagine getting out of the house with two kids in the car yet, walks in the stroller I can handle, but actually driving somewhere and getting there on time.... maybe in a few months :)

Thanks Tammy for the blanket!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.... Einen Guten Rutsch

Knee deep in snow in Chamonix

Yummy hamburger in Chamonix!

Opening her duplo train

So we are a little late wishing everyone a Merry Christmas, but right on time for the Happy New Year :)  This year we did not fly back to America since I was 37 weeks pregnant, so we had our first Christmas as a family, without seeing any extended family. It was nice and relaxed, well relaxed for us. That is one thing we have learned about ourselves this year is that we don't know how to relax very well and we like to be time efficient with our activities. Simply put we are not gemütlich people, but trying to learn just a little bit how to be!

Christmas morning walk

Hiking in Chamonix

John would typically have about two weeks off for the Christmas holiday, but his project at work had some deadlines this year so he worked 3 days of the holiday. Which works out good because of working those extra days he can take a whole week off after the baby arrives, without using vacation!  Since he worked some of the holiday and we didn't want to get too far away from home, being that I was 2.5 weeks away from my due date, we decided to rent a apartment outside of Chamonix, France. This town is an outdoor lovers paradise and is situated at the base of Mt. Blanc. We enjoyed a lovely hike, snowfall, snowshoe hike, shopping, and good food. We would love to go back in the summer for more hiking. It is also a very kid friendly area with daycares available for children on the ski slopes and in the town, so maybe we can take advantage of that next time :)  Plus it was a nice last trip as a family of 3.

As we look forward to the next year, the obvious thing that we are awaiting is the arrival of "Baby Brother" in January. We are excited, nervous, and realize that our fairly simple life is about to get crazy again..... oh the joys of the newborn stage :)

Enjoy the photos!

Snowshoeing yesterday... John and I had the day off while Hannah had fun at daycare.

Hungry for a snack

snow day in Chamonix

We hope you all have a blessed 2015!

Baby boy 34+ weeks

  I had just finished typing a nice long pregnancy update and for some reason it didn't save... Talk about frustrating. So this version will be much shorter. I haven't written an update since 25 weeks. To be honest not much has changed with how I feel: still tired (maybe getting slightly worse), still able to hike, run, swim, ride bike, and still nervous to be adding a second child into our family.... Especially since Hannah seems to be going through a stage... Miss independent we will call it. Her phrase is, "Hannah self." We just pray for guidance as we discipline and teach her and also pray that she wants to be very helpful when baby brother arrives. 

Some things/symptoms that are starting to develop: heartburn, slight difficulty breathing (I think his bottom is in my diaphragm), and the feeling that he can't possibly get any bigger and take up any more space. Nothing too awful, but definitely physically looking forward to the next 40 days going by quickly but not quite ready to experience the craziness of having two kiddos.... I am wondering what his personality will be like since he is much more of a mover and shaker in there than Hannah ever was. 

To wrap things up I finally have a baby bump picture and some throwback photos to my pregnancy with Hannah.

 34 weeks with baby boy

 35 weeks with Hannah 

  At a baby shower at 32 ish weeks

  Baby Hannah at 3 days old, I wonder if baby boy will look like her?

Big girl

I wanted to wait a bit before I posted about Hannahs newest step towards becoming a BIG girl. We started potty training about 3.5 weeks ago! We basically stayed home the first two days and let her run around with no diaper on. She really caught on after the first day as to when she had to go potty...as long as there were no distractions :) After two days we did take short trips out, but since she has a bit of a fear of big people potties we always were close enough to run home. Then after 4 days at home she went to daycare for 10 hours, diaper free (well they put a diaper on for nap time there), they were quite shocked that she showed up diaper free. She has only had 2 accidents at daycare which we think is quite good since the workers A) speak a different language as our home potty training language and B) the workers don't know her bathroom cues quite as good as us and C) she is there 10 hours. Now after 3.5 weeks she has very few accidents and also does pretty well at nap time (up to 3 hours) staying dry.

What she really had difficulty with in the beginning was pooping. For about 2 weeks before starting potty training she actually was holding it in, even with the diaper on. Thankfully, now after several tears she does quite well most days. She still holds it in occasionally, but it is much much better! That makes mommy and daddy also much happier.

She has even conquered going potty in the woods while we are out hiking! She is ready for backpacking!

I will leave you with one pregnancy photo that was taken on one of our hikes this weekend. I have my 34 week appointment this week, after that appointment I will post another baby update and pictures from this pregnancy as compared to with Hannah.