First Family Day Trip

Aaron has been gone a lot with work lately. We have missed him SO much! It has been so amazing to be a family this weekend for the first time in a while. Yesterday, we went on our first family outing to Northwest Arkansas as a family of Four. When Korben was a baby, we have memories of taking him up there for the day. Most memories are good, some memories are bad, but we laugh about them all now!

We woke up early yesterday (I had to WAKE up Klaire at 7:30 after sleeping ALL night-read previous post!), and headed to Fayetteville. We got there by 9:30 and did a little shopping at Old Navy, and then bought a wedding gift at Bed Bath and Beyond. Then we headed to Dillards to get Korben some shoes for Easter. We found the cutest little Sperry's that would look good with his dress pants for Easter but would also look cute with shorts all summer. After purchasing them and getting to the car, I started to change Klaire's diaper in the front seat, and Aaron put Korben and the stroller in the car. One of us (we honestly don't remember who...doesn't matter) put the Dillards sack on the ground and never put it in the car. This didn't dawn on us until 10:00 last night when we were unloading the car. We bough thought the other person put it in the car. That was the most sickening feeling to know that we just threw money down the drain! I really hoped that the mall security or Dillards would have it, but they didn't. I'm sure someone already returned them and used their store credit! Ughh, so sickening!

Other than that, we had a FANTASTIC day yesterday. After doing some shopping that morning, we went to eat at Kosmos greek cafe. It was so delicious! Korben couldn't wait to go to the restaurant (he thinks restaurants are so cool!), and was just pumped about our "day trip" in general!





































Then I had a hair appointment. I had been greatly anticipating this because I was in despereate need of a change. I got a few inches off and some hilights and I feel so great. My hair is so bouncy and easy to fix right now. Definitely important to a busy mom of 2! Even though my hair appointment took almost 2 hours, it worked out great because it was nap time for the kids. Aaron just drove around and let the kiddos sleep in the car. He actually even drove to find the Duggar's house in Tonitown! Ha! When he came back to pick me up, we took Korben for a surprise at Bliss...a CUTE store of wonderful cupcakes! Korben's favorite things in the world! Fun, fun times!

We decided to head up to the Promenade in Rogers. It was a gorgeous and warm day and we knew it would be a great day to shop up there since it wasn't a Saturday. We let Korben play on their playground, and Klaire was just as thrilled as she could be doing everything with us! Aaron and I split up a few times, each taking a kid, and I really liked it! This one-on-one ratio is totally working for us! I don't know how parents do it with 3+ kids! I'm not even going to think about that yet, and just enjoy our one-on-one time for now!























































































We really had a phenomenal day, but it wasn't over! It was Parent's Night Out at our church, so we drove back and dropped our kids off at 6:45, just in time for the 7:15 showing of "Limitless." VERY interesting movie. We liked it a LOT! Then we picked up our babies from church. Korben had a great time (and GREAT report from his teachers, which always makes me happy) and Klaire was more than ready to see her bed! Korben slept until 7:30 this morning and Klaire slept until 8:30!

Our first family outing as 4 was a SUCCESS, and so good for this stay at home mommy's soul. (A stay at home mommy whose husband has been gone and has had a crying baby who has just happened to have recently gotten over a week's bout of rsv....Ha! Okay, to say I was grateful to get out for the day (and night with my husband) would be an understatement!

SLEEPING BEAUTY!

This has been a HUGE, MONUMENTAL, and FANTASTIC week at our house! Overnight, Klaire went from being a "Colicky" baby who cried and cried before every nap and especially before bed time...to the PERFECT baby who goes down for naps in her bed without a peep, happy as she can be while she is awake, and willingly ready to go down for an ENTIRE NIGHT'S sleep. Do you see the contrast here? I've made no bones about these last three months being very tough, and then all of a sudden, its like a switch was flipped and she is a new baby.

Let me give you a play by play of my week.

Monday morning: Scheduled an appt. for that day with our doctor because I was so worried about letting her "cry it out" any longer in her bed. She was crying so much that I was convinced she had an ear infection. Doctor examined her and confirmed that she was probably just spoiled from being held so much the previous week when she was sick. He encouraged me to keep doing what I was doing and not worry about letting her cry in her bed if I knew all her needs were met and she was tired.

Tuesday: Posted as my facebook status "Dear Klaire, I know you really liked all the extra snuggling you got last week while you were sick, but you are all well now and you are going to have to sleep in your bed again. I wish I could hold you 24 hours a day, but it is just not possible. Please don't cry about it. It makes me cry too. I love you, Mom


Wednesday: She actually went down for naps in her bed without thinking the world was coming to an end! I still had to put her in the swing to get her to go to sleep that night because she was so fussy, but after her middle of the night feeding, she peacefully went back to sleep in her own bed for the rest of the night.

Thursday: Wakes up the happiest baby I've ever seen in my life. Cooing up a storm. Goes down for THREE naps that day without shedding a single tear. Put her down to bed at 6:30 p.m., she goes down without a peep. I'm pretty much thinking this was the greatest miracle ever, until she started crying at 7:30. Turns out she just needed to burp and went RIGHT back to sleep. THEN....THEN....THEN....I didn't hear a PEEP from her until 7:30 the next morning when I WOKE her up.

Friday (yesterday): First family "Day Trip." She was the Perfect BABY. Napped at all the right times, even though we were out and about. She was happy the entire day. As soon as we got home last night she went straight to bed and slept until 8:30 this morning.

THANK. YOU. JESUS.

You know, maybe it is worth having "hard" babies at the beginning because it sure makes it mean more when they get easier! She seems SO EASY right now! Who knows how long it will stay this way, and it could all change tonight...but I have to give credit where credit is due.

Interesting theory. No doubt that Klaire and Korben were "colicky babies" in every sense of the word. A lot of doctors talk about the 3 month colic. I was really discouraged 2 weeks ago when we passed Klaire's 3 month birthday and she was still having such a hard time most nights. Colic is supposed to peak at 2 months and resolve itself mostly by 3 months. Well, Klaire's resolved at 3 months and 2 weeks. Theory is...Klaire was born two weeks early. Could it have taken Klaire 2 extra weeks for the "3 month colic" to resolve itself since she was 2 weeks early? Something to ponder...Ha!


Sincerely,

A grateful mommy

3 Month Birthday-March 26th

Look who is 3 months old! (I am keeping with my tradition of writing these posts 10 days late) I'm loving her St. Patrick's themed onesie for March. God bless Rudda Ward for these awesome monthly outfits! Wait until you see the 4 month one. It's adorable too!






















(Everything you are about to read regarding her sleep, I wrote about 10 days ago...before she got sick last week and decided she didn't want to sleep in her bed anymore! I write more about this at the end of this post! Hoping we will be back to the sleep schedule I wrote about by her 4 month post. )
This has been a big month for her. About 3 weeks ago, after some encouragement from some friends and my favorite book, I allowed Klaire to "cry it out" for a little while in her bed at night to go to sleep. She was getting to where she wouldn't sleep unless I was holding her, and the habit had to be broken immediately. I was not getting any rest, and desperately needed some unattached time. I'm so glad I did that because it has made life so much better for me and for her too! She and I are much more rested, and I'm actually excited when I hear that she is awake because I'm eager to see her!

She has settled into a 3 naps a day schedule, with a fairly consistent bed time of around 7:30 or 8. She usually wakes up around 2:30 a.m. for a feeding an goes right back to sleep until morning. She only has small windows of happy/play time during the day before she gets tired. Right after I feed her, she usually has about 20 minutes of happy time before she starts to fuss. It basically goes: 20 minutes to feed a bottle, 20 minutes of playtime, and 20 minutes of winding down before she falls asleep for another nap (Give or take a few minutes on each). She is usually always back down for a nap within an hour and a half of waking up. Like I said, the windows of happy wakefulness are very small, but as we learned with Korben, they will get larger over time. I felt like all I was ever doing was putting Korben to sleep, but that was the key to having a happy baby for us, and once we got Korben's sleep rhythm down we were all happier. I feel like we are right on the brink of that with Klaire and it is so exciting. I'm honestly thrilled to have these past 3 months behind us. The best is what is going on right now, and what is yet to come.


Klaire weighed 14 lbs 15oz at her check up this month. (She weighed 14lbs. at her 2 month check up, so she basically gained 1 lb. this month). She is still in the 95th percentile for her weight, but what surprised me is that she was in the 95th percentie for her height! She had grown 1.75 inches in a month! Crazy! She was 25 and 3/4. Tall baby!

She is in a size 3 diaper now and wears 6 and 9 month clothes.

She has become so generous with her smiles! I seriously can't WAIT to look over her crib when you she wakes up and see a smile that lights up the whole room. I love to watch her smile at her Daddy and brother! Thrills my soul! However, I've yet to get a good picture of the smile I'm talking about. It ruins the moment for her when I pick up my phone or the camera. I'll catch it soon!























She LOVES to sit up in her bumbo seat and her rainforest jumperoo. She likes being able to see what is going on. She still likes her bouncy seat because she likes to look at the toys that hang over it, but she would much prefer to be in an upright position.



















Her eyelashes are getting long and dark! They make her look even girlier and I love it. I can't tell what color her eyes are going to be. Sometimes I am just sure that they are going to be brown, and somedays they look like a greyish blue.


She changes and learns so much every day. She is starting to focus in on everything and is attempting to pick up toys. It is the cutest thing ever to watch her grab at things. Sometimes she successfully gets it in her hand and sometimes she misses. She just shakes all over with excitement when she sees a toy she likes. She tries to hold her own bottle and every time Korben sees her he yells "BayKlaire is holding her bottle...isn't that SO CUTE?"

Korben still calls her BayKlaire, but he has also picked up on her little nicknames we call her. I call her KlaireBear, Sister Bear, and Baby Girl the most and he calls her all of those things at random times too.

She was sick for the first time last week and it was horrible. It was some sort of viral sickness that caused fever, congestion and terrible cough. The doctor said her cough sounded just like RSV when he listened to her. However, it only lasted 6 days and RSV usually lasts 1-2 weeks. Either way, it wasn't fun at all. She is just now getting back to normal as far as wanting to drink her bottles again, but sleeping...well, that's a different story. I held her constantly or she slept in the swing and now she does not want to sleep in her bed. Desperately wanting to get back to the somewhat-schedule we had before she got sick!

I have no doubt that the sleeping thing will get better and better each day. What I can't emphasize enough about Month 3 is the joy that it has been to see her smile, begin to interact, and learn to play. It is just so fun that we can interact with her now, and we're starting to get to see her little personality come out. She is really the sweetest thing ever, and my heart is fluttering just typing about her. I could really just eat her up she is so sweet. I'm so in love. She is asleep right now in her swing, and I'm honestly excited about my middle of the night feeding because I look forward to seeing her! Although, I would be even MORE excited to see her if it was in the morning!

I'm going to TRY to blog more. Ha! Too much is going on to just do this once a month.

Korben Stories

I'm so exhausted right now, and have no desire to blog...but for accountability purposes I'm going to write down a few things I want to make sure I don't forget to blog about. These things will jog my memory.

1. Bullskie and Spooky Spice

2. BayKlaire

3. "Our God is Greater."

These are three Korben stories. This boy is so special. I promise you, he could have his own reality show he is so funny. I could not be more proud of this little guy. Okay, Stories to come later...gotta go sleep while I can!