One month

The first month of Calvin's life flew by. But then it also feels like he's been with us for a lot longer than just a month. I think the hardest thing (at least for me) this past month has been trying to balance my time, and trying to make sure I get one-on-one time everyday with each kid. Madi likes her structured "school time" (which requires my attention of assigning and checking her work, listening to her read to me, etc. etc.), while Elle and I always did something special in the afternoons together (which now has been divided and shared with Calvin), and then I want to make sure I get quality time with Calvin- not just nurse, burp, and lay him down cause I'm too busy to give him more time and attention (which always seems to be the case). We were all watching home videos the other day- back from when the girls were babies. I was dying over how much time I spent giving Madi a sponge bath! HA! Cal's lucky if his baths are longer than a couple minutes. I have hours of videos of the girls (well, mostly of Madi)- taping every cute little thing they did and all the adorable faces made. Made me feel a little guilty for Calvin (and any other kids we might add to our family). I am determined to document really well this time around though. I wasn't blogging back when Madi was born, so I don't have a detailed account of her first month of life. And for some reason I wasn't as detailed as I wish I would have been with Elle. I particularly wish I would have documented more about how I felt through all of it. So, just for record keeping sake, I'll be including more of that kinda stuff.

First week:
This was probably the easiest week of the month just because of all the help I was getting- and no one was expecting me to cook, clean, deal with the girls, etc. Everyone assumes you'll be in tons of pain and need at least 2 weeks to recover. Lucky for me, I always feel fabulous after delivery, and this one was no different. I actually think I felt the best after Cal's delivery than I did with the other two. The only pain I had was the major cramping that comes during nursing- which this time was the worst I've ever experienced- but luckily it would stop when Calvin would stop eating. I also had 4 days of a major stiff neck and headaches.

As for Calvin, he pretty much slept the entire first week away. He was never awake for more than an hour at a time. A great eater from day one, rarely spit up, and immediately took to the binky. Not to mention we were completely smitten with him. Much time was spent adoring his handsome facial features, beautiful blue eyes, tiny little body, big feet, and long skinny arms and legs.

Second week:
By week two, I was itchin to get back into my work-out routine. But due to lack of sleep it was hard getting out of bed in the morning. Spencer would get up with the girls at 6:45/7am, giving me another 45 minutes to an hour of sleep. It was at Cal's 2 week mark that I slowly started back into my Gilad videos. Cal also had lots of outings this week- his first Target run (done with both sisters in tow might I add), first park outing, trip to the dentist for Madi, as well as my first night alone (Spencer on an overnight business trip) with all three kids.

And Cal really was still a dream at this point. He was quick to get his days and nights on track- making his longest stretches of sleep at night (one night he went from 10pm- 3am). And when he did wake up I'd just feed him, burp him, and he'd go right back to sleep! It was great! We quickly learned how nice it is having a baby who loves being swaddled! Both the girls hated it and would always fight it until they broke free. With Cal, all we have to do is swaddle and rock a bit.

Third Week:
Day 15 was Cal's 2 week check-up-
Weight: 8 lbs. 15 oz (75 percentile)
Height: little less than 22 in (so maybe height at birth was 21 3/4 inches), but still 90th percentile.

Head: 14 7/8 inches (95th percentile)

It was near the end of his 2nd week when Cal started having lots of fussy awake time (grunting, groaning, becoming harder to burp, etc). Luckily all this fussy time was during the day (I was still getting relatively good sleep at night- blocks of 2-3 hours), but it prevented me from getting anything done! Cal quickly was forced to become a fan of the Bjorn. As soon as he started fussing, I'd put him in there, walk around a bit, and he'd fall right to sleep. But near the end of the week I was getting frustrated with feeling like he was always in my arms or attached to me. Not much can get done under these circumstances.

My favorite thing from this week was all the cute smiles we'd get from our little guy. The best was when he'd be asleep (or pretending to be asleep)- I'd say something like, "Oh you're so handsome." And he'd break a little smile for me. Of course it always happens when we're snuggling or I'm holding him real close and giving kisses, so unfortunately no pictures of theses heart melting grins!

Only serious shots for this little guy!

First Sunday at church - almost 3 weeks old. 

Fourth week:
This was the week where I started to get overwhelmed with everything. Life was pretty much back to normal, or least I felt like life should be back to normal. So I was fitting in everything like we used to (library, park, play dates, errand running), but I was getting overwhelmed with how hard the simple things (like getting out the door, getting myself and the girls ready in the morning, making dinner, etc.) had become. I also don't think I was fully aware of just how tired I was actually becoming. Along with getting back to normal, by Cal's 3 week mark I was getting some type of work-out in everyday (started back on elliptical at 3 weeks, and my first run was at 4 weeks.

Life probably seemed particularly stressful this week because Calvin started to become much more needy. His sleeping during the day was just in short spurts and if we were home he'd wake up and want to be held, bounced, or rocked (my back is super sore from all the bouncing we've been doing with him on our exercise ball). Then at night Calvin will wake up to eat, but take forever to burp. Being the middle of the night, I'm completely exhausted and usually just give up, lay him down, and get back into bed. But then 5 minutes later the grunting, groaning, and gagging will start, forcing me out of bed and again trying to get him to burp. It's exhausting. Some nights the process will take up to 2 hours. And other nights I'll end up just falling asleep with him on my chest in an attempt to get a burp.

Now at one month old, Cal sill can only be awake for an hour at a time. If we pass our hour window he becomes super fussy and takes forever to get back to sleep. The girls continue to be great with him. When we're trying to get out the door somewhere and he's screaming in his infant carrier, Madi is the best about singing him song after song while rocking his carrier. And it always seems to do the trick! Elle's the best about keeping him company- sitting next to him while he's in his gym or in the swing or on his pillow and just reading him stories. She's the one I trust most to leave alone with Calvin cause she doesn't try to touch his eyes or face. She just leaves him alone and keeps him company. 

When I went to upload pictures for this post, I realized I haven't taken hardly any pictures the last 2 weeks, probably cause of how crazy it's been. Plus, he's got some pretty awesome baby acne going on right now (not the cutest to take pictures of:). But I did love this shot of Spencer reading Cal bedtime.  stories. Calvin was actually very interested and sat through 5 whole books!

Then just this afternoon we had some gorgeous weather and decided to take Calvin on his first beach outing. He slept through the whole thing except at the very end when he decided to wake up and eat. We quickly snapped a picture before taking off (wish I would have messed around with my f-stop- you can't even tell we're at the beach).