He's 5 months old

Last Friday, Oliver turned 5 months old. With Miles the months just flew by so fast. Every time I posted his accomplishments for the month, I could hardly believe it had been another month. Time doesn't seem to be going as fast with Oliver. I think with him being our second child (and probably our last) I try to savor each day more and enjoy his baby state. With Miles I was so anxious for him to move on to the next step that I don't think I fully enjoyed all the steps along the way. I'm doing things a little different this time, or at least trying!

I know I've said it before, but Oliver is such a happy little guy! He only starts to get cranky if he's extremely tired or if he's hungry. He can be easily distracted from that crankiness as well. All you really have to say is "Hi Oliver!" with a smile on your face and he'll flash his great smile back at you. He's such a cutie!

There was no doctor's appointment this month so I'm not sure where he is in the weight department, but he's a healthy "little" boy. His chubby thighs are so dang cute. You just can't help but squeeze them! He is wearing a size 3 diaper now and is in the 6-9 month clothing size. His short legs fit better in the 3 month clothing size, but his waist fits better in the 6-9 month size. 

He drinks 6 ounces of soy formula about every 3 hours during the day and will drink 8 ounces of formula a couple of times at night. It seems like every other night he'll sleep from 7 p.m. (his bedtime) until around 4 a.m. and then the next night he'll sleep from 7 p.m. until around 2 a.m. He gets up for the day between 6 and 7 a.m. depending on when he ate last and when his big brother gets up for the day. He isn't a fan of rice cereal so we've stopped giving it to him. We'll wait until he is 6 months old to start baby food.

His first tooth arrived on April 22nd (my brother's 40th birthday). It is his front bottom right tooth. It feels as if the left one isn't far behind.

He takes two naps that are about 1-1/2 to 2 hours long and a third nap in the late afternoon that is generally 1/2 to 1 hour long. He still loves to be swaddled and loves to sleep with his binky. Without the Woombie we would be toast. We keep trying to "teach" him how to sleep without being swaddled, but we end up giving in and putting him back in the Woombie because he will only sleep for 20-30 minutes un-swaddled. We also want to wean him from the binky sooner rather than later, but right now if he doesn't have the binky when he goes to sleep, he'll cry for hours. We'll keep trying to sleep train, but for now we are okay with how things are going. I guess with a second child we are more concerned about us getting sleep too that we haven't forced the issue like we did with Miles.

When lying on his back, Oliver will roll over on to his left side. He seems to favor that side. He won't go all the way over yet to his tummy, but he's getting closer. When on his tummy, he will tuck his knees up underneath him which causes him to face-plant sometimes. By doing this motion over and over and being the squirm-er that he is, he can move around on the floor to an extent. He definitely is not a fan of tummy-time though.

He still likes to sit up, but hasn't quite figured out the balance part of sitting up alone yet. We have to help him. The Bumbo comes in handy a lot, but it won't be long before his chubby little thighs won't fit in the leg openings!

He loves to reach for things out in front of him so we have to be careful if we are holding him while eating or drinking. If we are looking at our phones while holding him, he loves to play with it. He's helped me make some bad moves in Pet Rescue Saga a few times! Lol!

He seems to really love his older brother. Miles likes to play "hide-and-seek" a lot with him and it makes Oliver laugh and laugh. Oliver is also a big fan of his dad. When Dad gets home from work, Oliver is all smiles. Oliver is such a cute little guy! We love him SO much!

Click here if you want to see Miles at 5 months.

April

It's spring and boy do I love the spring! I love to see everything come back to life again and love the warmer temps. It definitely brightens my spirits after a long dark winter.

As mentioned in my previous post, I was laid off early in the month. The next "no-school day" for Miles we got outside and celebrated the fact that mom didn't have to work. Oliver takes about 3 naps a day so it limits our ability to go and do things, but we took the baby monitor outside and played around in our yard. Miles loves to blow bubbles and has his own unique way of doing it.

Miles blowing bubbles

Oliver while Miles was blowing bubbles

I thought since I didn't have to worry about work now, that I'd work on "sleep training" Oliver. My first thought was to teach him how to sleep un-swaddled and then work on weaning him from the binky later. Let's just say both Dave and I have tried multiple times to get Oliver to sleep un-swaddled and we've been very unsuccessful. After a LONG time he'll finally fall asleep, but then he'll only stay asleep for like 20-30 minutes if we're lucky! We've even tried to swaddle him but leave out his legs only or leave out one arm only and haven't been successful with that either. He definitely is going to be harder to sleep train than Miles was. But, if he's swaddled and has his binky he has turned in to a GREAT sleeper!

I decided this month that I'd go ahead and give Oliver his first "haircut" (more like a trim) instead of waiting until he was 1. He really has needed a trim since he was born. It's amazing what a little trimming can do. He looks so handsome!

Before (notice the hair over his ears)

After (I trimmed around his ears and his neckline)

On April 12th we decided to put all of our Saturday morning household chores aside and go do something fun! We've wanted to check out some of the hiking trails at the Colorado National Monument that leave from the base of the monument but never have so we thought it would be the perfect day to do that. We had so much fun and saw some VERY beautiful sites! We can't wait to go back and explore more trails.

Heading for the trail

Oliver came along too

Miles took this picture of the cacti. He wouldn't leave them alone and kept getting "poky things" stuck in his fingers!

Heading up No Thoroughfare Canyon to Devil's Kitchen Trail

Oliver fell asleep

Posing by the rocks

So pretty!

Miles looks so tiny

Dave climbing around

Family picture

My mom and her friend, Dale, found a better hiking backpack for Oliver to ride in at a garage sale this past week and have mailed it to us. We're excited to get it and go for another hike soon. There is a waterfall and a pool farther up the No Thoroughfare Canyon that we want to check out next!

The night before our hike, when we were putting Miles to bed, we were talking with him about how big boys don't need diapers at night and get up and go to the bathroom when they have to pee in the middle of the night. He's been wearing pull-ups overnight for quite some time now, but I was starting to wonder if he really needed them or if he was just using them because it was convenient. That night he stayed dry all night long. Before our hike we decided to reward him with cinnamon rolls for breakfast. The next night his pull-up was wet when he woke up so we decided to implement a sticker chart. When he collected a certain amount of stickers, we would reward him with a prize of his choosing. He immediately decided he wanted ice cream in a bowl with sprinkles and a cherry on top. The next weekend when he had earned all his stickers, we took him to Dairy Queen for ice cream. He was so excited on the way there. He even started singing songs. It was so cute. I just had to get a video of it! He's now half-way to his next reward. He's doing such a great job!

We were in the drive-through for those of you freaked out by his booster seat use!

Easter was a little stressful for us this year. I tried to keep it low-key, but that probably isn't my nature. Miles must've woke up on the wrong side of the bed too and was pretty grumpy all day which didn't help. We've learned from experiences in the past that it's best to do our own Easter egg hunt around our yard than to go to a public Easter egg hunt. Miles just doesn't have the patience and I don't like dealing with him and the crowds! After the boys opened their Easter baskets, we went outside and did an egg hunt with Miles. I've collected those little plastic eggs over the years and now have WAY too many of them for one child, but Miles had fun finding all of them. I'm prepared for next year when Oliver gets to find eggs too! We don't have church until 1:00 p.m. so we spent the rest of the morning getting our ham dinner ready so we could eat it when we got back from church and getting all dressed up for church. I had made all 3 boys (Dave included) matching bow-ties and was excited to see them in them. So cute!

Church was stressful since Miles' attitude hadn't changed so we actually left early and came home and gave both boys a nap. When they woke up we had our loverly ham dinner and a nice relaxing evening. We watched a wonderful video produced by our church about Christ and his sacrifice and resurrection and read a children's book about Easter. We are trying our best to teach Miles the true meaning of these holidays along with the fun stuff.

Their baskets

Miles was excited to see what was in his basket!

The new Tinkerbell movie!

Oliver got a Baby's First Easter Frog (and he loved the tags!)

Some new pajamas

And this was only the side yard

They're all over!

He even found one in the bush!

It took two baskets!

All ready for church

A pic with mom too

 

There's a first time for everything

I was typing away last Tuesday morning (4/8/14) while Oliver was sleeping and Miles was busy playing with his toys and watching movies when my boss called. What happened over the next couple of minutes felt like a bomb had gone off in my life. My boss had called to tell me that the main account that I type for (an internal medicine clinic in a small town in Kansas) had been bought by the local hospital and therefore no longer needed our services. I am trained on a few other accounts as well, but he proceeded to tell me that numbers are down across the board and that he had tried for a week to find me a new account to type for, but just couldn't. He said since I only had experience in clinic work and was only available to work part-time that there just wasn't a place for me. Apparently hospital work and acute care is where most of the transcription work is available these days. So, I lost my job. He gave me about another hour to work and then remotely got on my computer during afternoon nap time and removed all of their software. I didn't have much time to process it all before it was all done!

Some background information as well...

The company that I've worked for since right before we got Miles (minus the year I got to be a full-time stay-at-mom) sold last fall to a bigger company that is based out of Georgia I believe. It was a stressful fall for me waiting on Oliver and dealing with this new company. The owner of the original company still wanted to be involved so they made him the Regional Manager versus the owner. The managers pretty much remained the same for me except I now had a new HR department to work with.

Shortly after the purchase of our company, they required our accounts use their transcription program versus the one we had been using. It was a speech recognition program which meant that after the system learned the accounts, we would now become editors versus transcribers. The typed words would be there for us, but they probably wouldn't be 100% correct so we'd have to fix the report. In the process, they gave us six weeks to learn how to edit and the system six weeks to learn the accounts before they essentially cut our pay in half with the idea that we could now get more done in a shorter amount of time. Well, the system didn't learn the account I worked on in six weeks. In fact, when I was laid off we had been editing essentially since the beginning of January 2014 and I was still making all of the same corrections (which shouldn't have been the case). So, I was essentially working almost as much had I actually been typing the report, but getting paid half of what I had before.

This, obviously, led to some feelings of frustration for me. I started looking for other jobs, but just couldn't give up the flexibility that I had with this work-from-home job. So, I hung in there and tried my hardest to get faster.

Now I have no clue what I'm going to do. Colorado is way more expensive than we ever imagined. The utilities alone are enough to make you want to puke. I can't believe how much it costs to heat this duplex that we are renting. I don't want to see how much it's going to cost to cool it this summer! Electricity is high! In addition to that, everything else is more expensive too. We definitely need me to work in order to afford it here. I'm just so sad that I probably won't find another job with the flexibility that I had with working from home. I sure don't want to miss out on anything in those two precious boys' lives that Heavenly Father has given us! So, the search begins for that perfect job. Wish me luck! Ugh!

4 months old

On March 25th, Oliver turned 4 months old. At his well-child check he weighed 16 pounds 15 ounces, 84th percentile (he's a big boy!) and was 26 inches long, 88th percentile. He also had his 4 month immunizations at the health department. The nurse must've hit a vein when she was giving him one of his injections because he bled a lot. It also took him a couple of days to return to the Oliver that we know. He was pretty inconsolable, but Tylenol did help some.

He's in a size 2 diaper, but is almost too big for them. He wears 3-6 month clothing, but they are getting too tight so we are starting to bring out the 6-9 month size. He drinks 6 ounces of soy formula about every 4 hours during the day and about every 5-6 hours at night. He will occasionally go a much longer stretch at night, but not as often as Mom and Dad would like!

Oliver is such a happy and sweet little man! He still loves to smile at everyone. He has gorgeous blue eyes that make you melt as well. He is such a blessing to our family!

The major milestone that he hit this month was learning how to giggle. He has such a cute giggle too. Dad found a ticklish spot on his right thigh that can get him giggling every time. He also likes to giggle at his silly big brother (see video posted previously).

He has transitioned from sleeping mostly in his swing to now strictly sleeping only in his crib. Yippee! He was starting to lift his butt up out of his swing and it was becoming too dangerous to let him sleep in it anymore. It took a few days for him to get used to sleeping flat for naps, but now he sleeps in his crib like a pro and will take 1-2+ hour naps in it. At night he will sleep for about 5-6 hours. He still needs/wants to be swaddled for all sleep (we found two wonderful swaddle blankets that allow us to continue this even though he is such a big boy) and LOVES his binky. Our plan over spring break was to "sleep train" him to wean him off of the swaddle and the binky, but time got away from us. I think we'll start that process in the next month. It's getting to be too frustrating to wake up several times at night to replace his binky for him! We need to get rooms rearranged though so that he has his own bedroom before we start that process. He is currently sleeping in our room in his crib.

He has decided that the car seat isn't as bad as he once thought although he still doesn't like to be in it if it is dark outside! Now that it is staying lighter later, we don't run in to this problem as often.

He likes to reach for things out in front of him. He's even getting pretty good at grabbing my food or drink if I'm holding him in my lap while eating. We've had lots of close calls! He loves the bouncer toy thing that we got when Miles was little. It allows him to stand essentially and play with things all around him. There is a frog on it that spins and that is his favorite to play with.

He loves to sit up, but can't sit up on his own yet. He is always doing what looks like crunches to me if he is lying down. I'm assuming he's trying his hardest to sit up. He likes to look around and see what is going on.

We love him dearly and are so glad he's in our family!

Click here to see Miles at 4 months old!

March Madness

A couple of weeks ago I was thinking about my March post for the blog. I thought to myself, "It's going to be a small post because it's been a quiet month." After uploading all of my pictures to the computer I've decided I was wrong. It may have had "quiet" moments, but it was full of adventures like every month is for our little family! We wouldn't have it any other way!

Our month started out with a weekend trip to Utah. One of Dave's nephews was being baptized in to our church and one of his nieces was having a birthday party so we decided it would be fun to attend both family events. It was nice to be at the baptism. It was a first for Miles. He was so excited to watch his cousin get baptized. In our church we believe in submersion and Miles thought that was especially cool. I, unfortunately, didn't get any pictures.

Later that night Dave and I got to go on a group date with two of Dave's brothers and their wives. An older niece and nephew offered to babysit their brothers and their cousins so we could all go out and have some adult time. This boy and girl sibling pair watched two of their own siblings plus four cousins. They had their hands full! Our niece really wanted us to leave Oliver there too, but we figured they already had enough kids to watch...they didn't need a 3-month-old on top of that...so we took Oliver with us. We went out to eat at Firehouse Pizzeria in Smithfield, Utah (one of my favorite places to eat while in Northern Utah) and then went bowling afterwards. It was so loud in that bowling alley. I hope we didn't damage poor Oliver's ears. We had a good time hangin' out with Dan, Tonya, Jake, and Megan. Bowling is the only sport that I can beat Dave in so I rather enjoy bowling with him!

Oliver glowing at the bowling alley

The next day was Lily's 4th birthday party. She is one of Miles' favorite girls. He has even often referred to her as "my girl." He loves her so much! Lily is in to Jake and the Never Land Pirates which was the theme of her party. Her mom did an amazing job at decorating for the party and an even more amazing job at making a cake that looked like Bucky, their pirate ship. The party was late in the day on Sunday so we didn't get to stick around for the actual party (had to get back to Colorado), but we were able to spend a little bit of time with her earlier in the day. Miles had fun playing with her and was sad to leave.

THE cake, Miles, & Lily

This month we've gotten a couple of cute videos of Oliver. If you are friends with me on Facebook then you've already seen them, but just in case you haven't, I've added them here too.

He loves to talk

He loves to giggle

Dave and Miles both got a two week spring break this year! In fact, they are starting their second week of it right now. It's been nice having Dave around so much to help with the boys and get a few spring cleaning projects done as well. We've also managed to have a little fun too. My mom flew out for the first part of Dave and Miles' spring break. She was here for about 7-1/2 days. Miles was in HEAVEN having his grandma around.

We did a lot of shopping and eating out while she was here. She always spoils us! She even watched the boys a few times so Dave and I could have some time alone. We don't have a babysitter picked out yet in Fruita so time alone is a rare commodity these days. 

Dave feeding Oliver in Target so us girls could keep shopping!

We took her up on the Colorado National Monument because Miles wanted to show her the "mountains." She's been up there numerous times before, but it was a new adventure with Miles!

The boys standing close to the edge and giving Grandma a heart attack

Family picture

Grandma & Miles

On March 22nd, we thought it would be fun to take Grandma down to see Mesa Verde National Park in Southern Colorado. We took the scenic way down and probably almost gave her a heart attack. I had forgotten how narrow and winding that road is through the mountains. The road has HUGE drop-offs on the side as well. My mom is scared to death of heights. She was a nervous wreck. Miles also got car sick on the way down so that was fun! What should've been a 4 hour trip turned in to a much longer trip with all of the stops we made along the way, etc. We also decided to forgo seeing the park the first day and instead head to our hotel since Miles wasn't feeling well. We stayed the night in Farmington, New Mexico because it is only about an hour away from Mesa Verde and the room rates were so much cheaper. We got a nice little two bedroom suite. It was so nice to all be in the same room, but have our own space to sleep in! Miles and Dave spent some time in the pool Saturday night. Miles loves the water!

Sunday morning we got up and did some more shopping before heading off to Mesa Verde. It was a perfect sun shiny day! You can see a lot of the cliff dwellings from the car or from short walkways, but there was one hike that Dave, Miles, Oliver, and I decided to go on while Mom waited for us in the car. It was a 100 foot descent down a winding path to see this cliff dwelling. Miles had such a good time. I wasn't quite sure I'd make it back up to the car, but it actually turned out to be a bit easier than I thought. I'm glad the four of us could experience that up close.

At the top of the 100 foot descent

We made it!

 

Trying to get a selfie family photo isn't easy these days!

There is a 6 mile loop on top of one of the mesas that gives you a pretty good view of a couple of cliff dwellings, but it also contains several pithouses that you can get up close to without much walking. After our little hike we drove that loop so my mom could see more of the park as well. It's so amazing to learn about the Ancestral Pueblo people who lived in that area for over 700 years, from A.D. 600 to 1300.

An early pithouse or surface dwelling

Grandma & Miles

Reading the signs

Sleepy boy

Trying to find animals

Posing by the Sun Temple

Pretty cool if you ask me!

Christmas in March! We got a nice package from one of Dave's sisters in the mail yesterday. Apparently it was our Christmas present that didn't quite make it here in time for Christmas! Miles LOVED getting presents, but kept asking, "Why did she get this for me?" We were trying to explain to him that it was a belated Christmas present, but he wasn't quite understanding. He still loved it anyway! Thanks, Shannon, for such thoughtful gifts! Both of the boys love their loot!

Miles with all of his new Cars toys

Oliver got a new sock monkey blanket toy that rattles

...and new clothes!

Yesterday we gave Oliver rice cereal for the first time. There's debate over whether or not 4-month-olds should have solids yet or if you should wait until their 6 months old. We decided to go ahead and give it a try at 4 months. Oliver is such a chunky little monkey and is so hungry all. of. the. time. Plus he is showing signs of being interested in food when we are eating, etc. We had him sitting at the table with us today while we ate lunch and he got mad that he wasn't eating too so Dave got him some rice cereal. He did really well with it and seemed to know exactly what to do. We couldn't tell if he was a big fan of it though because he was still so mad at us and would cry between bites. He ate more than I thought he would. We shall see.

First bite

Reaction to first bite (you can see the tears in his eyes)

And that is how we spent our month of March.