Killean-5 months

Killean is now 5 months old! He is a very smiley boy!  He really enjoys playing with his brother...even when his brother gets a little rough.  Killean smiles when Rowan screams in his face or pushes on his stomach, which unfortunately encourages that behavior.  But it's definitely their relationship developing.  They love each other, and I love it. 

He also loves music, eating his foot, and his jumper.  Oh...and talking.  Oh the talking!  He usually talks over me when we are reading books.  And he loves to tell stories as often as he can. 

He continues to be a good eater and is still eating at least once, but usually twice during the night.  He's got some chunky, CHUNKY thighs and weighs about 16 pounds.  He's fitting comfortably in 3-6 or 6 month clothes, though some are getting a little tight. He doesn't have much hair and no teeth yet.  I was convinced he would be getting teeth soon, but it turns out he just likes to chew on our knuckles. We're holding off on food for a while still since he has a sensitivity to dairy.  That and he doesn't seem that interested in food yet.  He sits up with assistance pretty well, but he isn't showing an interest in our food yet.  It's just a matter of time until he gets exposed to the world of fruits and veggies!  He loves to put things in his mouth, but he doesn't seem too drawn to our food.  Right now, he's content with milk.  

He is a pro a tummy time now.  He doesn't mind laying on his stomach and looking around.  He does get tired of it after a while, but most of the time he's perfectly content to lay on his stomach.  Now...our problem comes in when he wants to get off his tummy.  He CAN NOT figure out how to roll from his stomach to his back!  He can roll from his back to his stomach all day long, but the opposite direction-no way no how!

He suffers from some very dry skin.  He has a terrible patch of dry skin under his chin.  Vaseline is doing OK at helping that, but we have to put it on often.  Unless it starts to bother him more, we'll probably check with his doctor at his next check up to see if there are other options we can do to help him out.  

I love how much he smiles.  And when he smiles, he smiles with his whole face.  He is a happy, happy baby and shares that happiness with us often which we just love.  

SNOW!!!!

We FINALLY got some snow out here!  Rowan has loved the idea of making a snowman.  Unfortunately, the snow we got was very light power.  Easy to shovel, not so good for snow man making.  But, it's still fun to play in.  Rowan has had a lot of fun playing in it.  Today when we were out shoveling, he laid down and said he was making a snow angel.  Neither Ian nor I know where that came from, but somehow Rowan intuitively knows that you get to make snow angels when you lay down in the snow.  So much fun to see him playing outside for an hour and just loving every minute of it.

Playing in the snow while it's snowing

Throwing snow at daddy

Lots of snow!

Making snow angels!

Killean 4 months!

Four Months old!

Killean is now 4 months old!  He's doing lots of growing, smiling, and playing.  He has recently discovered his tongue and has lots of fun playing with that.  He has a hard time getting laughs out.  He's definitely ticklish, but he doesn't quite know how to get laughs going.  Once he does get them going, he gets some good laughs.  He does smile all the time though.  And when he smiles, he smiles with his whole face.  Rowan makes Killean smile a lot which is pretty precious to see.  These brothers are getting to be pretty good buds already.  

Big boy!

We've figured out that Killean does has a mild sensitivity to dairy.  Over the last couple of months, I noticed that his poos were a little funky. That and he was pretty fussy at nights and had a hard time settling down.  Plus he was pretty gassy and spit up a bit.  All of these things were signs of an intolerance to dairy.  So I cut that out of my diet for a while.  This last weekend I decided to see if this dairy intolerance was all in my head of it was for real.  I had some pizza and ice cream on Saturday night.  Then Sunday I had a cheese stick with lunch.  Sunday night Killean decided going to bed was over rated.  Prior to Sunday night we were getting into a good routine of getting him to bed around 7:30.  Sunday night: going to bed was not happening unless he was being held.  Same thing Monday.  Monday he also seemed to be having a little more trouble pooping, but we didn't notice anything too off.  Tonight, he was way more fussy than normal (though he did get shots today too...would make me fussy!)  Ian managed to get him to go to sleep on his own, so here's hoping we're settling back into our routine.  Until then, I'm going to keep cheese and such out of my life until we're closer to a year and/or weaning.  But man, I'm going to go on a dairy binge when I can!  Cheese.  Ice Cream.  Milk.  It will be glorious.

Despite some of these dietary limitations, Killean is definitely growing!  He weighed in at 14lb 15oz today and about 25 inches.  I've been feeling like I'm not making enough milk to keep up with his demands.  This has been insanely frustrating for me.  With Rowan, I had enough milk to feed him, build up a freezer stash, and donate milk to a milk bank.  With Killean I'm having to do some power pumping at work to make sure he's got enough.  I don't have much in the freezer, and what I do have is filled with dairy so I'd rather not give him that unless we have to.  I can honestly say I've never been so happy to work in an office by myself.  I can pump every two hours without stressing too much about my lack of productivity or bothering coworkers.  Now if only they could install a sink in my office. That would be great!

Happy boy sitting up so big!

He's great at sitting up with help-he's got a steady head and strong neck.  He doesn't mind being on his tummy either.  He seems to like holding his head up and looking around.  He hasn't quite figured out the rolling over thing.  He can, and occasionally does, roll over from his stomach to his back.  He also can, and occasionally does, roll from his back onto his stomach.  He's putting a lot of stuff in his mouth and chewing on his hands (and ours) non stop.  No signs of teeth yet, though for a moment I thought he might be getting one on the bottom.  We'll see when that first one pops through.

We love our boy!  He's a happy guy and brings a lot of happiness to our family-picky eater and all!

Looking into 2015

Now that we're a bit more than a week in 2015, I feel like it's time to put into writing some hopes I have for this year.  I'm not one that's big on New Year's Resolutions.  I have the philosophy that if you feel like you need to make a change in your life, then do it.  There's no reason to wait for an arbitrary date, just do it.  However it's hard not to get caught up in the spirit of reflection the new year brings around.  Everyone's talking about what their year was like last year and what they're looking to do differently in the coming year...it's hard not to get sucked into that. 

So here I am, getting sucked into it.  What 2014 looked like and what I hope for in 2015. 

I'm not going to say 2014 was a bad year, but it certainly wasn't one of my favorites.  I feel like it was marked by so much change, and so much chaos at times, that I forgot to really enjoy any moments.  We started the year talking about our goals-me wanting to run another half marathon, paying off our 2nd car, doing some home improvements...and then BOOM, we found out we were pregnant with Killean and that changed some of our plans.  Took a moment to reset and them we were good.  And then BOOM, find out I have an actual opportunity to transfer to Lincoln instead of a possibility of a potential transfer to Lincoln.  Decide to take that chance and start moving towards that.  Spend quite a bit of time getting the house ready to sell.  BOOM, sell the house in a weekend (well...a few weeks after the back and forth with the buyer).  Scramble to find a place to live, and find one we think will be decent.  Tiny, but cheap and livable so we can save a good chunk of money and then buy a house summer of 2015.  BOOM, have a baby.  (Ok...this one really wasn't a boom...we knew it was coming.  But still, big event that drastically changes how your day to day life looks.  So...BOOM!).  Barely start adjusting to life with a second child and BOOM, apartment has mold so we have to move.  Move into a different apartment unit in the same complex, realize the apartment managers/owners are not that great (to be kind) and decide to move on the buying a house thing about 8 months earlier than expected.  BOOM, find a house and move in.  BOOM, go back to work.  BOOM, holidays.  BOOM, welcome 2015!

I know the year held more than that, but that's what I see in my memory highlights as I look back.  There's lots of good in there, but lots of BOOMS too. And no matter how good the BOOMS are, they still shake up your world a bit.  I'm truly not complaining because I'm VERY grateful to be where we are.  I love how the timing worked out wonderfully with everything that came at us this year.  I wouldn't have chosen that timing, but I think it all worked out pretty darn well considering. 

But for this next year...I would love to look back at 2015 in about 360 days and not see as many BOOMS.  I would love to look back and see memories of time spent with family-near and far.  Memories of laughter and fun. The feeling of setting a goal and accomplishing it-not being derailed before you even take your first step.  I would love for 2015 to be a calmer year, where we get to enjoy our time and those around us.  I want to take the time to be in the moment and feel ourselves settle into where we're at.  I haven't felt settled for a while...it would be nice to have that feeling.

So that's what I'm hoping for in 2015.  I'm hoping for a chance to relax and enjoy life.  I'm hoping for a chance to develop my relationship with my boys, and deepen my relationship with Ian.  I'm looking forward to the changes and challenges that will come with my desire to feel settled (not sure how that will work my personality that is always go, Go, GO!), but I'm hoping that includes a chance for me to read a book (or two)...have regular date nights with Ian...go the museum/park/zoo with my boys...save up some money for a trip with my girlfriends and maybe get an awesome Christmas present for our family next year (thinking a new refrigerator!!!!-real exciting, I know!).

Maybe by June or July this idea of settling will seem boring and torturous.  But for the forseable future, I can't imagine anything better than enjoying a glass of wine on a Saturday night and just soaking in the calm of a home where everyone has gone to bed.  That seems like pure. heaven.

Here's to a happy 2015 filled with all your wildest (or calmest) dreams!

Killean 3 months-and something about that other kid too

Killean is three months old now!  He is getting bigger, and bigger, and bigger!  He's still fitting into 3 month clothes, but I don't think that's going to last much longer.  Sleeves are getting short on sleepers.  Buttons are getting harder to fasten on onesies.  He's just starting to get too big for that size.  Looks like we may end up needing to buy a few clothes for him anyway if he grows faster than Rowan did and we no longer have seasonally appropriate clothes in the right size.  Not sure on what his weight is now, but we'll get an update at his four month check.

Killean is turning into a very smiley boy.  He's a pretty happy baby.  Until yesterday, we had only heard good laughs out of him in his sleep.  A couple of time we were holding him and he just started to belly laugh.  The best we could get out of him when he was awake was a little chuckle or a "huh" and that's about it.  Yesterday though, he started to laugh when we finished nursing in the afternoon.  I dont' know what was so funny, but something struck him as funny so he laughed.  Then we were watching Rowan play the drums and saying "bang" and THAT was hillarious.  Laughing and laughing at our brother.  It was awesome to hear.

Trying so hard to get that thumb!

Killean really want to be a thumb sucker.  We'll find his hand in his mouth while he's sleeping sometimes, but he usually keeps his thumb tucked in his fist.  A couple of times though I've been holding him and have seen him pull the thumb out and stick it in his mouth.  I'm pretty sure he'll start sucking his thumb here in the next couple of months.  We try to trade the thumb out for a pacifier, but I realize there's only so much we can do.  Hopefully he doesn't get too attached to his thumb.  If he does, we'll deal with that down the road though.

He's currently going through a growth spurt I'm sure of it.  He's eating more frequently at night so I'm guessing he's working on growing some more.  Trying to keep up with his big brother I guess =)

Rowan...oh yeah, there's another kid in the house.

Rowan is staying ever so busy.  I have felt like I've put him on the back burner a lot more lately-which I knew would happen.  Babies just need a lot more attention and he's more self sufficient.  Generally he does fine.  Sometimes though, you can tell he really misses being an only child.  He will insit on sitting in my lap while I'm nursing Killean.  He won't want me to read bedtime stories or rub his back at night if it means Killean will be with him-he'd rather have me go be with Killean and dad read books and rub back.  He's adjusting though-as we all are.  And he definitely loves his brother.  He likes to see him and is pretty tender when Killean is sleeping.  He's a two year old though, so sometimes when Killean is sleeping it's more fun to pull on a leg or tickle him than let him sleep.

"Rowan love Thomas"

Rowan's current obsessions are: Thomas and friends, Polar Express, train tracks (catching a theme here?), and Play-Doh.  He will stay entertained by Play-Doh for an hour if we let him.  We have to watch lots and lots of Thomas everyday.  And the other night? We had to sleep with our Henry and Thomas toys.  We still also love our pirate toys and our puppies.  When we went to visit Santa, we asked him for a puppy costume (thank goodness Santa lives in the day of Amazon).  Rowan's a smart and sweet little boy who continues to amaze us with all he can do and all he is.

Christmas train window cling fun

Lesson learned:If mom goes to work on laundry while Rowan takes a bath, all bath toys will end up in the bath tub

Fascinated by a new toy that jiggles when you pull it.

The jumper is much more exciting at 2 than it ever was at 9 months or so

Merry Christmas from my littlest elf!

Blessed for Thanksgiving

Play Doh Time

I'm sitting here alone in our quiet house-too tired to get up off the couch and crawl into bed-and I keep thinking about all the things to be thankful for right now.  Maybe it's the holiday spirit getting the best of me.  Or maybe I'm just seeing all the blessings we have.  But right now, life is pretty good and I'm so very grateful for that.  We're mostly settled into our new home.  We've been here less than a month and have had at least one house guest the entire time we've lived here.  I'm not complaining about that in the least.  I'm just noticing the quiet a bit more tonight since there aren't any extra bodies around.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with my side of the family.  We welcomed my parents and their dog Skye as well as my brother and his family into our new home. All in all there were 6 adults, 5 children, and 3 dogs here.  We had a full house, but it was so much fun to have them all here.  My nephew Derick and Rowan had so much fun together.  Rowan especially enjoyed playing with Derick's Thomas toys and playing with Play-doh.  After Derick left, Rowan asked to "Play play-doh Derick again".  They became fast friends and it was fun to see them play and interact.

Anna, Alex, and Killean-the 2014 babies

Rowan also bonded with my dad's dog Skye.  He got a kick out of playing with her.  His favorite game: throwing the ball down the stairs and waiting for Skye to bring it back up again.  A close second on his list of favorites was feeding Skye.  I'm not quite sure why feeding a dog is so much fun, but it was.  So he helped feed Skye her breakfast and dinner every day.  It's the little things I guess...

In the days leading up to Thanksgiving, I got to spend some time with my dad butchering an elk.  No-that's not a euphemism.  That's what we actually did.  My dad went elk hunting before coming down here, and he got a BIG cow on the second day of hunting.  You could tell he loved telling the story of seeing so many elk during the trip and the adventure he had with my uncle getting their animals into their vehicles.  Sitting in my new garage with my dad brought back lots of memories of my youth when we spent countless hours on weekends processing the game we hunted.  Helped make my new house feel more like home instantly.

All 5 MacLeod Cousins

Our Thanksgiving meal was supposed to be simple. We thought we had a simple menu...and then I listed out all that we were cooking and Ian reminded me that we did not have a simple menu.  All the food was delicious.  We discovered some quirks about my new kitchen in the process, but everything was perfect-quirks and all.

But no matter how much fun the kids had playing, or how good the food was, the best part of Thanksgiving this year was having everyone at my house.  There's just something about having your family around you that makes a house feel like a home.  It's not often we all get to be in the same location, but for about 36 hours all 11 people in the MacLeod family were under one roof.  We laughed, talked, chased children, and enjoyed each other's company.  It was a wonderful holiday and I'm so very, very thankful we got to have that time together.

Killean-two months

Two Months Old!

Killean is two months old now!  And what a whirlwind it has been.  We've moved into our new house (yay!) so hopefully things will settle down a bit.  Except for the fact that I'm starting back at work...and then there are the holidays...never mind.  We'll stay busy =)

Killean is doing well though.  He's growing and getting to be more alert during the day. Don't get me wrong, he still sleeps a lot, but he's having more times of being awake when we're just at home hanging out.  When he's awake, he's looking around and trying to observe and absorb the world around him. He is starting to smile more and more. He loves when we sing to him and when we make funny noises.  Raspberries almost always incite a smile.  

Fair skin, fair hair.

His sleep is far more challenging than Rowan's was.  Killean is real hit and miss when it comes to sleeping for long stretches.  Some nights he's going about 4 hours between feedings.  Other nights, it's more like 7 or 8.  It's a bit frustrating for me when I'm not sure when he's going to wake up in the morning.  Makes it hard to know whether I should pump or wait to nurse in the mornings.  I'm sure we'll get it figured out when I start back at work for real, but for now it would be nice if he would be a bit more consistent in the waking and eating department.  

Getting Killean to sleep is different too.  He seems to prefer falling asleep in bed with me.  The other night I was rocking Killean in a chair to get him to sleep.  He would doze, but not really sleep.  I laid down with him in our bed and in less than a minute he was OUT.  He even had a little grin on his face in the process of getting him into bed that just screamed "I win, I win!"  I'm honestly not sure how I feel about that.  I swore I would never have kids sleep in the bed with us.  I just feel like it's OK for kids to have their space, and parents to have their space, and beds are areas that can be "mine" and not "yours".  However, Killean seems to disagree. If we put him in his pack and play sleepy, but not sleeping, he won't usually fall asleep.  If we hold him until he sleeps and then transfer him, he'll sleep for a while, but wake up after a few minutes.  If he does manage to sleep for a while, he'll only sleep a couple of hours before waking up.  If he falls asleep in bed with me after nursing, he'll sleep for the 7-8 hour stretches I've been longing for.  Usually he'll sleep this long even if Ian transfers him to his pack and play when he comes to bed. I can't really complain about having some one-on-one time with Killean where we just get to be together though.  It's quite nice not to be pulled one way by a toddler...or cleaning...or whatever and spend some time with my son.  

Sweet Blue Eyes

Killean is certainly a mama's boy too.  Not only does he seem to prefer to sleep with me RIGHT there, but he seems to be much more calm around me most of the time.  I know this is incredibly frustrating for Ian, but there's not much either he or I can do about it.  If Killean is upset, Ian will try EVERYTHING to calm him.  If nothing works, he'll hand Killean to me and I won't do anything different (or sometimes anything at all) and Killean is calm in a matter a minutes...sometimes seconds.  I think a big contributing factors is the fact that Killean has had very few bottles (from anyone, let alone dad) in his life.  I've been the almost exclusive source of food for his two months of existence.  And who isn't comforted by food, or the memory/association of a person or place with a favorite meal?  I'm sure once he starts getting more bottles from Ian this dynamic will change.

We haven't even attempted cloth diapers yet.  With the move and everything it just hasn't worked out.  I think here shortly I will be pulling them out.  I figure even if we only do cloth diapers for some of his changes, we're saving some money and some tress in the process.  I'm not going to lie though, the though of not having to keep up on laundry for two adults, two kids, AND diapers is almost appealing enough to skip cloth diapers this time around.  

He eats like a champ.  He's eating about every 2 1/2 to 3 hours during the day.  Sometimes he eats rather quickly, other times I feel as though he's latched onto me for an hour.  Thankfully he is content to go for longer stretches if he manages to fall asleep, so life can go on if it's hard to find a place to stop and nurse every 2 hours.  I have nursed him while walking around (looked at a couple of houses WHILE nursing...boom!), but I much prefer the chance to sit...relax...and nurse rather than nursing on the go.  The result of all this eating:  at 2 months he weighed 13 lb 8 oz and measured 24 inches.  That's almost 6 pounds bigger than birth weight!  Way to go buddy!

Getting our work out in

I have wondered if Killean has a sensitivity to dairy.  One of the challenges with his night time routine is that he can be QUITE fussy at night.  It's not quite colic, but some nights he's just mad and we can't get him to calm down.  That has settled down SIGNIFICANTLY in the last few weeks, but for a short time there, I was afraid we were going to have a baby with colic and I was bracing myself for some long nights.  Once he did get to sleep, he was pretty fidgety and didn't seem to settle that well or quickly.  Then I noticed some of his stools were almost a little mucousy too.  The wonderful world of the Internets told me that those were signs of MSPI-Milk and Soy Protein Intolerance.  So I started an experiment and cut out obvious sources of dairy in my diet (milk, cheese, yogurt, sour cream, etc).  I didn't look at all the labels to cut everything out, but I wanted to eliminate a bunch of the 'big ones' to see if we noticed a difference-and we have.  I have slipped a little bit of dairy into my diet here and there (first time having cheese on a pizza in over a week was GLORIOUS!) and haven't noticed any ill effects.  When we go to Killean's 2 month check next week, I'll bring it up with out Dr. and see if we can get any recommendations from him.  I'm not convinced he has MSPI, but I'm also not convinced he is easily digesting mountains of dairy all that well.  I LOVE dairy products and was consuming a lot of them.  Perhaps 24-32 oz of milk, cheese in at least one meal, and other sources of dairy (milk chocolate, yogurt, sour cream, butter, ice cream, etc) every day was just a little too much for Killean to process.  Until then, I think I'll probably greatly limit my dairy intake for a while just to make things easier on him.  I did the same thing with Rowan, so it makes sense that I shouldn't OD on the dairy with Killean too.  

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