Chameleon

I think Carter is a chameleon. He has been extra fussy the last couple of days and has discovered a new type of crying. He lets out an awful scream and doesn't breathe. He'll take a small reloading breath and scream again. He turns almost purple in seconds. Usually I can calm him from this in a minute or two and a few seconds after this his color is back to normal. It's amazing how quickly he changes color.

Carter is having trouble "just chilling". If he's not sleeping, we're almost always having to hold him and be walking around so he's not crying (too much - he's still crying a lot of the time). He's also getting upset as soon as he's done eating, which is new. Generally he had been content for awhile while being burped and held upright. He's been like this for the last few days. I did reintroduce dairy into my diet almost a week ago with no change initially in his temperament. But maybe the dairy is the problem so I'm going to take it out again and see what happens.

But Carter did take 2 long naps today so I did have some time to get a few things done. My arms and back are getting stronger from holding him so much and bouncing him!

Some Pictures

Here are some pictures of Carter we took the last few days.

Carter chilling in his swing.


Sleeping with his pacifier barely staying in.


I like the one leg over the side of the sling. He always does this.


Carter looking content during bath time.


Carter bonding with his dad.

Go Pack

Carter got all dressed up for the PapaJohns.com Bowl today. All his NCSU clothes are still too big for him so it looks like he's wearing a dress!


Woohoo! State is winning ...


What do you mean our quarterback got hurt? The other two guys always throw lots of interceptions ...


NCSU ended up losing to Rutgers 29-23. At least we got a bowl game this year.

I had my 6 week postpartum appointment today. Everything looked good and I've been cleared to exercise. Now I can start my half-marathon training!

Smiles

Carter is starting to smile more and more. I haven't gotten a picture of him doing it yet because he's usually being held when he smiles and it's hard to take a picture of him while you're holding him. It's very cute though.

Carter's neck is getting stronger and stronger. He can somewhat hold his head up on his own, but you still have to be ready for it to flop back.

Carter's favorite sleeping spot is on someone's chest. Here's a picture of him taking a snooze on his grandma.


Carter isn't consistent with sleeping yet. For the last week and a half he has done one 4 to 6 hour session between feedings at night. (An hour of this is the actual time to feed, the 30 minutes of holding him upright afterwards, a diaper change if necessary, and the time to settle him down once he's mad about being put down in his playard.) Sometimes he'll go back to sleep easily for another 3 to 4 hours between feedings. Other times, he'll be wide awake and not want to sleep. He still doesn't like sleeping on his back in his playard. If we'd let him sleep on our chest at night, he'd probably sleep through the entire night. Carter isn't consistent during the day either. Some days Carter naps a lot during the day and other days not much at all. He's eating about every three hours. Some times he'll doze off right after eating, some times a little later, and some times not at all.

Brian and I are going to try to work on figuring out a schedule this week since he's taking another week off. We may also try to get Carter to sleep in his crib.

Aunts

Here are some pictures of Carter's aunts ...

Aunt Karey with him at Thanksgiving


And Aunt Shannon with him at Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!!!


Carter celebrated his first Christmas last night with us, my mom, Brian's parents, and his sister, Shannon. We had a nice dinner and opened tons of presents - mostly for Carter! He got a bunch of cool stuff - lots and lots of toys, books, and clothes.





Carter's Aunt Shannon is living in Melbourne so she got him lots of cool Australian stuff, including a book that is the Aussie version of "The Night Before Christmas" (which is really funny) and some Hawthorn Hawks apparel. They are the Australian rules football team that Shannon supports.

I'm Sick

Somehow I caught a cold. I haven't been out much this week so I'm not sure where I picked it up. We took Carter to his one month exam on Tuesday at the pediatrician's office, then Carter and I went to Lowe's, Old Navy, and Walmart on Wednesday, and Brian and I went to dinner and a few places to do some Christmas shopping Thursday night. I started feeling a little bad on Friday afternoon and it got bad last night - I had a lot of trouble sleeping. I wasn't sure what, if anything, I could take and still feed Carter. Brian called one of our friends who is a pharmacist to get some suggestions. What I'm taking is helping some but not as much as what I would normally take. But at least it's something!

Brian's parents and sister are coming in tonight to stay for a few days. Hopefully I don't get them sick!

Christmas Gifts

Carter has gotten some more really cool Christmas gifts. Brian's parents got him a cradle swing. It arrived a little early so we went ahead and put it together last night. Here's a picture of him in it for the first time ...


Carter seems to like it. He's in it right now and is fast asleep. So far he's liking the swing more than the cradle motion (supposedly newborns like the cradle motion better, but not Carter!). He's been fussy and extra hungry over the last 24 hours (we're thinking a growth spurt?) and it's been helping to calm him down.

Carter also got an Exersaucer from my mom for Christmas. It also got here a bit early, but Carter is still too little for it. He has used the playmat that it comes with a couple of times.


Carter got some really cute winter-wear from my grandma and aunt. I really like the hat - it makes Carter's eyes look a really deep blue.

Night Out

We left Carter for the first time last night. Brian's boss, his wife, and three kids came over last night to watch Carter while we went to dinner and did a little Christmas shopping. It was a little weird at first leaving him, and I was a little nervous having all the kids around him, but we both relaxed during dinner. I had my first beer and sushi since before I got pregnant and both were very good. We stayed out two and a half hours and were told that Carter did really good while we were gone. He got lots of attention and wasn't very fussy. Charlotte was really freaked out at first when everyone showed up, but I think she relaxed eventually as well and enjoyed getting some attention. So we all made it through Carter's first evening without us!

Carter is starting to smile now in response to things. He even let out a little coo while smiling at me yesterday.

Feeding Carter less seems to be helping some with his spitting up. There are still a few feedings a day when he's throwing up a lot, but it's getting even more manageable.

Carter is making up for his good night last night with a very fussy afternoon and evening so far. Hopefully he settles down enough to sleep some tonight!

$72 Worth of Diapers

In case you're wondering, this is what $72 worth, or 400, diapers looks like. We had a coupon for diapers.com so I ordered two jumbo packs of diapers. Hopefully these will last us awhile!


Our new permanent line for our cable got put in today. It rained all day so I'm not sure how much they tore up the yard because I haven't gotten a chance to check it out yet. Hopefully it isn't too bad. We had a really dry summer again, but now it's raining more days than not. I'm still getting the hang of taking Carter out to run errands when it's raining. He didn't get too wet today!

One Month Exam

Carter had his one month exam today. He weighed in at 9 lb, 10 oz which puts him in the 46th percentile. So he is now 2 lb, 5 oz heavier than when he was born. He put on 20 oz since he was last at the doctor 12 days ago. The pediatrician we saw today implied that he may be putting on a little too much weight. I don't think I'm feeding Carter too often because I've been sticking to the recommendation of feeding him every 2-3 hours. But it's obviously difficult to know how much I'm feeding him each time. So he may be getting more than he needs at each feeding. And this may be contributing to him spitting up so much. The pediatrician recommended me ending his feeding session before he stops on his own. Also, we need to try to soothe him back to sleep at night instead of feeding him when it's only been 2 hours since his last feeding. Supposedly breast milk is most plentiful at night so Carter's probably getting too much at night and this is contributing to the extra weight he's been gaining. At the same time, it's good that he's still gaining weight instead of losing it!

Carter measured in at 20 7/8 inches which puts him in the 27th percentile for height. And his head measured 37.5 cm.

I guess this all explains why Carter's newborn sleepers have started to get too small. Though the 3 month size are still big but are getting closer to fitting. Soon he'll have lots of fun clothes to wear instead of just sleepers. Sleepers were all we really had in newborn size. I've started putting a bib on Carter all the time and this is helping us not have to change him a few times a day due to spitting up so much on himself and soaking his outfit. I bought some heavy waterproof bibs and they seem to be doing a great job.


Carter has a mild case of seborrhea, or cradle cap, which is a flaky scalp. Other than that, everything else was normal at his exam.

Right before we left to go to the pediatrician's office, I had my most fun diaper change yet! I had put a fresh diaper under Carter and was going for the diaper cream when Carter started passing gas. I quickly grabbed a wipe to put under him and hopefully save the fresh diaper when poop shot out of Carter. There was so much force behind the poop that it shot out several feet. It hit everything on the end of the changing table, the diaper pail, and the wall. While in shock from this, I didn't notice that the burp cloth I was using to guard against a pee accident had slipped away. So then pee was shooting through the air getting all over the carpet. On the bright side, I somehow escaped without getting any poop or pee on me.

Carter Update

In the last few days, Carter has started seeing and watching more things. We have a little mobile above his changing table that has a mirror and a lions head and legs hanging down. When we're changing Carter, he has started looking at the mobile on his own. We had been able to make him glance at it before when we moved one of the lion's feet that has a bell in it, but now Carter is looking at it all on his own.


Carter is also paying more attention to the characters that hang above his bouncer. He doesn't purposely reach out for them yet, but he'll hit the snail and turtle often when he's throwing his arms around.

We're still working on managing Carter's acid reflux. His one month check up is tomorrow so hopefully we'll get some more advice from the pediatrician. He has some good days and some bad days. Even when we do things the same during and after feedings, Carter doesn't always react the same way. But we're trying different things and trying to be consistent while testing them out. We're having the most trouble with nights right now. Because we can only slightly incline Carter's playard, he ends up throwing up a good portion of each night feeding no matter how long I hold him upright. He's waking up and getting fussy about every two hours, and I'm guessing he's hungry because he's not keeping much down. Since I have to hold him upright for so long after a feeding and because he still doesn't go right to sleep when I put him down, there isn't much time to sleep between feedings - maybe an hour.

Visitors

My dad and Jan came to visit this weekend. Here's a picture of them with Carter ...


Carter got some cool books for Christmas from them and a neat airplane piggy bank for his birth.


Brian and I finished setting up the treadmill on Saturday. The builder had run cable up to the attic so Brian was able to hook up one of our old TVs. Now it won't get too boring running on a treadmill instead of outside. I'm excited about starting to use the treadmill this week, even if it is for an insanely slow single mile right now.

4 Weeks Old

Carter is 4 weeks old today. It's hard to believe Carter has been around for this long already, but this has also been the longest four weeks of my life.

I tried introducing Carter to a new toy this morning. This is generally how he felt about it ...


Brian went to the office today to catch up on some work so Carter and I brought him lunch. Here's Carter sitting at Brian's desk ...


Carter got his first bath in his bath tub today. He did really well. He only started crying some at the end when we were washing his hair. He spent most of the bath checking himself out in the mirror.

Bigger Diapers

I think Carter has outgrown the newborn size Pamper Swaddler diapers. They've been great until last night when he leaked from three diapers in a row. The first time was while I was feeding him so I got soaked as well. I guess we'll be moving up the the Size 1 Swaddlers now. I got one pack of these as a gift so I put one on Carter this morning. It seemed huge going half way up his chest. But it didn't leak!

I'm looking forward to starting to work out again soon. We got our treadmill up to the attic last week and now just need to roll it to where we want it and set up a TV. I'm still losing weight with no effort, but I'm sure that won't continue all the way to my pre-pregnancy weight unless I exercise some too. However, cutting out dairy has really limited my diet, and I haven't been eating as much lately which may be contributing to the weight loss. When we got pregnant, I weighed 127 lbs (I was already about 10 lbs over what I like to be at - I worked way too much last year and never had time to work out). Right before Carter was born, I was at 170 lbs, so I put on 43 lbs while pregnant. Carter will be 4 weeks old tomorrow and I'm down to 144.5 lbs today. So only 17.5 lbs left to get to my pre-pregnancy weight. I'm still setting a goal for myself of running the Knoxville Half Marathon on March 29th.

Giant Pacifier

The pacifier that a nurse gave us in the hospital was huge, but this is the only one Carter has been willing to take so far. We don't use it often, but it does help to calm him down sometimes so he'll take a nap. However, Carter almost always notices when it falls out and starts moaning and then crying so it can be a major pain when he keeps losing it. I occasionally try to use it at night when Carter won't settle down after a feeding, but I pretty much have to hold it in his mouth because he'll lose it every 30 seconds because he's on his back with his head to the side.

The one we're using is the First Year Soothie. It is kind of cute how it covers so much of his face.


Chillin' before bath time this afternoon ...


Yes, I'm still giving Carter sponge baths. I plan to use the tub this weekend when Brian can help me give him his first real bath.

If you look real close, Carter has a mini-mohawk in this picture ...

First Bottle

Carter had his first bottle last night. He finished off 3 oz and slept like a champ after eating. Carter had no problem taking the bottle from Brian. We're going to try to do a bottle at least every other day so that Carter will be used to taking them. That will mean I can leave the house for more than an hour or two! Which is good since I have a dentist appointment on Monday.

Much Better Day

Yesterday was a much better day. Carter only fussed for a few hours, like a normal baby. He didn't sleep well last night, but we made it through.

Carter hasn't been throwing up as much lately during the day. Holding him upright for half an hour after feeding seems to make a big difference. The times that I don't do this, Carter tends to throw up more. We're working on figuring out the best way for him to sleep at night because he doesn't seem to like it when his bassinet is tilted up on one side. And he's still throwing up a lot during the night.

It used to take a little while to get Carter settled after feeding him during the night, but then he'd sleep until I woke him up for the next feeding. Recently he's wanting to be fed every two hours (or sooner). Carter still takes a long time to settle after feeding and then is half awake making lots of noise and moving around most of the time that he is "sleeping". I'm getting better at sleeping through some of this though so I can get some rest.

I can't wait until we get on more of a schedule. From everything we've read and been told by our pediatrician, schedules don't really work until around 2 months. But I think we're going to try to go ahead and start Carter on one as much as we can. I'll still feed him "on demand" and not force things too much, but we'll see what we can do.

The weather was really nice here today - in the 60s! It's generally been really cold since Carter was born and the days that aren't so bad have been rainy. So I took Carter and Charlotte for a mile walk today. It was super windy and Charlotte was drafting behind me part of the way!

Here are a couple of pictures I took of the little man that did not make our Christmas card ...

This Weekend

This past weekend was really rough, especially Sunday. Carter would not nap. Aren't newborns supposed to sleep 18 hours a day? He may have slept 10 hours with his few short naps. He just screamed most of the day. I'm not sure if this was because of the GER or something else. Carter did stop having a dirty diaper with every feeding this weekend so maybe this change had something to do with the fussiness.

I've cut out all caffeine, carbonated drinks, and dairy from my diet to see if it makes any difference with the GER. This isn't easy since cheese is my favorite food. And a little caffeine goes a long way when I'm so tired. So far, no change, but I'm going to give it a couple of weeks.

The one thing we managed to get done this weekend is putting up our Christmas tree.

GER Sucks

This is what most of this weekend has consisted of ...

Gastroesophageal Reflux

It looks like Carter has gastroesophageal reflux (GER), which is essentially infant acid reflux. He has been spitting up / throwing up a lot the last few days both during and after his feedings. Sometimes it seems to be the majority of the feeding. He'll soak my shirt, his outfit, and the pillow I'm using to hold him up. And he'll do this three times in one feeding. It's not this bad every time, but he's spitting up more than is normal at every feeding. This has been making him a lot fussier. And hungry more often since he's not keeping as much down. A few times Carter has thrown up so forcefully that it's come out his nose. Poor guy!

Because of all of this, I took him to the pediatrician's office yesterday to try to figure out what was up. The doctor was a little concerned that he might have pyloric stenosis so we went down to Children's Hospital this morning to do an ultrasound on his tummy to rule this out. Pyloric stenosis affects the pylorus, which is the opening at the lower end of the stomach that connects the stomach and small intestine. The muscles of the pylorus become abnormally large and this prevents food from entering the small intestine. It is corrected by surgery. Luckily we were able to rule this out and determine Carter "only" has GER. There's nothing we can do to fix it, but we can try to make it more manageable by keeping him upright more often.

Carter had his weight and length measured at the pediatrician's office. His weight was up to 8 lb, 6 oz (he gained 1 lb exactly in 9 days) and he measured 20 1/8 inches (that's 5/8 inches longer in 9 days). So it seems like he's still getting enough food!

Belly Button

Carter lost his umbilical cord stump this morning. There's still a little bit of scabbing, but his belly is much cuter now! Right now he sort of has a flattie but it looks like it'll be an innie eventually.

Before:


After:

First Trip Out

Carter made his first trip out of the house today to some place other than the doctor's office. We went to Target and Walmart for a few minutes this morning. He slept the entire time. I really like the stroller and car seat combo that we got. It's super easy to use and very functional so far. It's the Chicco Cortina Travel System.


Another thing that we have that I really like are the Halo SleepSacks. We put Carter in a sleeper and then one of these at night and he seems to be pretty comfortable.



Carter is doing well. He slept a lot today so hopefully he'll still sleep well tonight!

Little Grunter

Carter has turned into quite the little grunter. When he first wakes up, he doesn't cry, but he'll grunt a whole lot. Often, he'll go back to sleep for a few minutes and then wake up grunting again. He also grunts for awhile when he's put down to sleep at night. Then there is all the random grunting he does when he's awake during the day. And the major grunting he does when I'm trying to feed him. I guess he's just finding his "voice"!

Carter seems to like his mobile. I put him in his crib for a little bit last night when he was fussy to try something different to settle him down. He contently watched the characters move around. There are little pieces that slide and make noise as the mobile rotates and that noise seemed to entice him as well.


It's been snowing here today a little bit. We've had huge flakes come down for about five minutes several times today. Nothing is sticking, but it's pretty to watch. Carter's first snow was actually the day he came home from the hospital (Monday, November 17th). We had light flurries for about ten minutes. We had some flurries a few days after that and then sleet last night. Maybe we'll finally get some accumulating snow this year. We've never had anything that lasted more than a couple of hours since we've lived in Knoxville.

Am I a Poodle?

There are a couple of companies that will test a dog's DNA to determine what breed it is. Since Charlotte is so unique, we thought it might be fun to have hers tested. We got the results the other day and we think we wasted our money. Or that the lab mixed up Charlotte's sample with that of another dog. Here are the results:

• 37-74% Poodle
• 10-19% Pug
• 10-19% Siberian Husky
• Less than 10% Bichon Frise
  

The database for the testing company we used has 63 dog breeds including Australian Shepherd, Golden Retriever, Border Collie, English Setter, and many others that we thought we might see in Charlotte. I'm thinking of sending the company a picture of Charlotte and either asking for a retest or for our money back.

Beating up the snail

Carter doesn't like snails. Or he has figured out his hands and just likes punching the one that hangs on his bouncer. At first, Carter would just accidentally hit the snail when he was moving his arms around. But today he seemed to be hitting it on purpose to make it move.


Carter is also randomly smiling more and more over the last few days. I think it's just a new facial expression he's learned, but it's still really cool to see.

Grandparents

Here are Carter's grandparents each holding him for the first time the day he was born ...

Brian's Mom:


Brian's Dad:


My Mom:


My Dad: