A Visit from Aunt Lacey!

We were so lucky to get a visit from my littlest sis, Lacey! She made a long weekend for herself and took a break from her studies at BYU to come hang out with us from Thu. through Mon. night.

Her first order of business: give Davey what she called a "faux-hawk". I've never been a fan of this hairstyle for boys (I just don't get why people think it's cute, especially on babies), so since the styling product she used wasn't very strong and his hair was pretty long for it, I was (not-so-secretely) happy when it fell soon after. :)

Lacey and her little creation.

The first day was fun-filled with a grocery shopping trip to Wal-Mart (woo-hoo) and then Lacey took Davey to Target to let him choose a toy. He ended up coming home with Little Debbie Easter Cakes instead... Meanwhile I spent time finishing clearing out Charlie's room so we could move Davey's bedroom furniture in there to make room for his new beds that came the next day. It was nice to have the help and Davey enjoyed the time with his auntie.

Davey and Lacey having some fun with the camera...

Lacey enjoyed spending time with Charlie, too.

Saturday Lacey and I got to have some girl time and did some shopping at the local outlet mall. It was fun to do some looking for me after so long, but I still ended up buying only things for the kids! The story of a mom's life I guess.

Sunday was pretty low-key with church and hanging out at home.

And Monday we had a fun time at the zoo! I finally broke down and decided to become a member.

Davey loves checking out the tropical fish and pointing

out the Nemo and Dori look-alikes.

His favorite display is still the giraffes, though...

And we got to see the 3 week old baby giraffe! So cute!

You kind of have to look closely to see it in the pic.

So big and so little at the same time!

The giraffe in the background (look through the glass)

is so tall I think I could stand upright under its belly!

The tallest one actually came out of hiding today, so we

had fun checking it out. So tall!!

Davey was so enthralled he wouldn't turn his head

for a picture.

The mandrill is another favorite of ours.

When I was uploading this picture, Davey was looking over my shoulder and asked, "What's that mommy?" As I tried to remember what it was called, Davey answered his own question correctly. I was amazed!

Charlie was happy in his car seat the whole morning,

sleeping most of the time.

Chubby cheeks!

We ended the visit by taking her by the water wall and a quick dinner at Lupe Tortilla.

This is one of my favorite things to see in Houston.

It's always impressive.

Thanks for coming, Lacey! We had so much fun and miss you already!

New Beds for Everyone!

When we moved into our new home, I told Dave that in order for him to sleep in the bed with this pregnant lady, we were going to have to get a bigger bed. There just wasn't room for me, my large pregnant belly, mr. body pillow, and Dave. So we bought a king size bed pretty quickly (thanks to some help from my in-laws - thank you!!) but were sleeping with flat sheets from our queen for a long time. We just couldn't agree on a new bedding set. I wanted something relaxing feeling and Dave wanted bright, cheery colors. So we went without for a long time. I am happy to report, though, that one day while not looking for bedding at all, I stumbled upon a set that was a great deal and I thought would satisfy both of us (since I told Dave he no longer had a say in the matter :). We finally have a nice, pretty room. And thanks to my mom for the gift of the pretty pictures above the bed!

And we aren't the only ones with a new bed...

Dave's parents surprised us with a gift of bunk beds and a dresser for the boys! They were a little nervous since they picked them out and ordered them without input from us, but we love them! It was such a generous and thoughtful gift.

The beds won't be bunked for a while yet (Davey needs to be older), but Davey is so excited and doing so well sleeping in his big boy bed.

I love the blue color of the beds. So perfect for 

a pair of boys!

The room is in desperate need of some decorating, but that always takes me a long time.... I'm not good at picking out patterns, colors, themes... anything to do with decor! But I am feeling more inspired about it now with these fun beds so hopefully we'll get it together soon. In the mean time, we have some adorable handmade bedspreads from when Dave was a child.

Davey laying in his new bed for the first time.

What a big boy he is getting to be!

Trains are making for a great bribe these days, so I had Dave take him to Toys R Us to pick out a train that would be his as long as he stayed in his bed. He chose and engine named Duncan.

As the delivery men put the beds together, Davey ran around the house, skipping and jumping, so excited about his new bed. I wasn't sure if that would translate into wanting to actually sleep in it that night, but at least it gave me hope. As I put him to bed, he started complaining and asking to go downstairs, which he rarely does. Eventually I got him to settle into bed after going back and forth between the new one and his old crib, mostly expecting him to want to sleep in his crib, but he really wanted the bed, so that is where he ended up. And he did great; stayed in the bed all night and stayed in it in the morning and called for us to come get him!

With Duncan; all ready to sleep.

What a big boy!

The next day he took his nap in his bed just fine and has done well ever since. He used to take all kinds of toys to bed with him and often play for a while before falling off to sleep; now he may take one train but he falls right asleep, staying on the pillow and under the covers!

A New 'Do

Dave has been dying to take Davey for his first "real" haircut (Dave doesn't count ones given at home) and he finally got to take him last week. I have some really nice clippers that I think I'm going to have to exchange when we head back to MI this summer. I can't give Davey a decent haircut with them because they are always pulling his hair and hurting him in the process. The only thing I could think of is that it needed to be oiled, but that hasn't helped.

Dave took him to Great Clips and paid an outrageous $16 for a child haircut, so I'm hoping I can get these clippers working well soon so I don't have to pay that again.

Davey apparently held perfectly still for the 

stylist. If only he'd do that for me!

If you look closely you can see not only 

his comatose look but also how badly

he needed this haircut!

My Little Bamboo

Charlie is now two months old and the time really has been flying by. I can't believe how fast this little child has grown. It seems like he was only small for a minute. I'm actually missing his little body and kind-of wishing the time weren't going by so fast... something I never thought I'd say about an infant. 

At his two month check-up on Tuesday, he weighed 11 pounds 8 ounces and was 23.5 inches. At his one month check-up the doc noted that he was the perfect textbook proportions: weight, length and head circumference all at the 25th percentile. This time, just one month later, he jumped up to the 50th percentile in weight and 75th in length! If only I could be shrinking at the rate he is growing...

Charlie - An Update

Just a quick update -- It took a few days to get ahold of the correct form of the medicine for acid reflux (he's taking a 10 mg dose of Nexium granules), but once I started giving it to him regularly (it took a bit of learning to figure out how to get him to swallow it) the medicine has been working. Hooray! We are back to enjoying having a newborn around. He has a generally happy disposition and is starting to extend his night sleeping periods, usually waking only twice per night now.

These pics are from when he was 7 weeks old... darling smiles!

Paczki Day!

In true Detroiter style, we celebrated Fat Tuesday by eating some jelly doughnuts! Mmm... well, they weren't quite as good as a real paczki (pronounced like poonchki), which is an extra-sweet, extra-fattening jelly- or cream-filled donut, especially because I forgot it was Paczki Day until about 5pm... and it's hard to find a good donut place open at that time. So we stopped by Kroger and got the ones left over from the morning. But we enjoyed them none-the-less! Davey especially liked the tradition!

Paczki Day was traditionally on Fat Thursday in Poland and they made these delectable donuts to use up the rest of their lard, sugar, eggs and fruit which were forbidden during Lent.

Smiling

Despite all the crying Charlie does and complaining I've been doing about it, Charlie did start smiling very early. He was smiling so much at Dave a few days ago that he made me go get the camera, though they were hard to catch. Here's one of the pics!

Davey just loves spending time with his little brother. This morning when Charlie was screaming and I heard him stop, it was because Davey was at his side patting him and talking to him.

I'm so happy you two have each other!

Our Date

Davey and I got to go on a date today! We went to the library to check out some books, though the first order of business was to watch some pennies to spin round in one of those charity wishing wells. We played with a couple puzzles (they have a fun children's area), picked out two Clifford books and two Thomas books, read some of them and then moved on to the second part of our date.

Then we headed to La Centerra to get ice cream and throw pennies in the fountain!

Davey loves to throw pennies in fountains.

We started doing it in Bakersfield when we 

were bored and needed to get out of the house.

He just never gets enough of watching them splash!

Davey got to choose his ice cream for the first time and knew right away when he saw the case that he wanted the blue one. Blue Moon was always my favorite as a kid, too! (Though Cold Stone just boringly calls it Cotton Candy.)

Thanks for being such a great date, Davey! I love you!

Life with Charlie

The last two weeks have been pretty challenging for me. Charlie seems to be getting progressively fussier lately and it is wearing me out. He still wakes three times a night to eat (though last night was the first time he only woke twice... I'll pray it continues) so the tiredness makes it much more difficult to be patient. When he is fussy, he seems tired but has great difficulty falling asleep, often staying asleep only while I'm holding him and then still often waking to fuss. Compounding all this, I haven't had any break in two weeks because Dave has been super busy at work, leaving before 6am and returning just before 8pm in time to say good night to Davey and I.

So I'm way behind on everything in my life. I'm trying not to let that bug me too much, but I hate being in a dirty, messy house and feeling like I'm not in control... 

I was so at my wit's end yesterday morning with the non-stop crying that I called Charlie's doc and made an appointment. My mom kept thinking there must be something wrong (my little sis Lacey was crying, crying and had a life-threatening staph infection as an infant), a baby his age should be settled and happy by now. I was finally convinced there could be something wrong. I kept taking his temperature and he didn't have a fever. But there had to be something causing all this -- or even if it was just normal, I needed someone to tell me that and to talk about it with me before I went crazy.

So of course the doctor examined him and didn't find anything wrong, but she did suggest a mild case of acid reflux. I had been wondering if he had it for a while now (and actually did bring it up at a previous appointment -- he doesn't spit up excessively, but he's always choking on the milk as it comes back up and it prompts crying), so I wasn't surprised. She also suggested doing a work up of his blood, but I decided not to have him pricked. We can always do that later if the Nexium doesn't help and there is still a problem. But now that I've had a day to think more clearly (Dave was actually home at 5pm yesterday and had the day off today :), I'm remembering having gone through a similar phase with Davey. My reaction to it was just worse this time since I'm busy with Davey and didn't have Dave around to spell me. Luckily Dave thinks he'll be back to normal work hours next week. 

Charlie has been sleeping better today and after all of the negative emotions of yesterday, I was overcome with love for him today as he slept and looked so sweet and darling. I couldn't resist taking a couple pictures...

 I love my boys so much even though I am finding this transition challenging; it has nothing to do with me loving being their mother and having them a part of our family.

I also have to share a funny picture of Davey. After I pumped to be able to add the reflux medicine to a bottle for Charlie, Davey grabbed it and tried to do the same...

He was so proud to be like mommy...

We didn't have to coax this smile at all!

Happy Birthday Kenzie!

Davey's friend, our neighbor across the street, MacKenzie turned 3 last Saturday and we celebrated with a fun party at Pump It Up. We just love that place! Kenzie is such a sweet girl and fun playmate for Davey. She and her parents, Charlotte and Shawn, are such nice neighbors.

Kenzie and Davey

I love having fun with him!

Davey loves playing basketball

Speaking of neighbors, we also have two sweet boys next door that Davey loves to play with. I am so happy to actually have him play with boys! (I wish we lived closer to all of his boy cousins!) They love to play sports, so he has picked up more of an interest in playing and even enjoys watching them on tv. I don't know what it is about it, but I absolutely love watching Davey play and explore with his buddies. I guess it just reminds me of how sweet, fun and innocent childhood is.