Asher: three months old

As I type this post, Asher is screaming his head off in his car seat on the way to the airport. If there is one thing he hates, and I think there is only one... it's the car seat. We keep thinking he will get used to it, or cry himself to sleep, but he doesn't. He can scream for over an hour in that thing, especially if it's dark and he can't see what's going on around him. Ugh, driving with him is the worst part of life right now. 

Otherwise, our boy is an absolute delight. He grins and coos and watches the world with serious concentration. He is mellow and engaging and beyond adorable!!

 

Growth/ development: we don't know Asher's exact weight, but I would guess it's between 14 and 15 pounds. He has outgrown his three month clothing and is firmly in the 6 month camp right now. He is tall and strong and very solid. Also- his round belly gives me all the heart eyes!! 

Sleep: Something that revolutionized sleep in Asher's life this month is that we started putting him to bed on his belly. After watching him nap that way for a couple of days, and being confident that he could turn his head to breathe, we tried having him sleep on his tummy at night. He sleeps SO SO SO much better. He can soothe himself by wiggling around, rubbing his face on the mattress, and eventually settling down peacefully. Two thumbs up for more sleep! 

Asher's schedule is becoming a bit more predictable lately. He usually goes to bed at 7 and gets up for the day around 8. He wakes up once or twice at night, nurses, and goes right back to sleep. He takes a long morning nap and either 2 or 3 shorter naps throughout the day. He nurses about 8-9 times, on average, but not at any specific times. 

Asher loves: watching his sister, nursing, being worn by momma and dad, laying on his back and kicking his legs, cooing, taking baths with Charlotte, smiling at himself in the mirror, looking around, and waving his arms. 

Asher doesn't like: the car seat, being awake for too long, taking a bottle, the car seat, and pacifiers. And the car seat ;)

Asher: 2 months old

As of two weeks ago, Asher weighed twelve pounds, one ounce. I'm guessing he is closer to thirteen pounds, now, but we didn't have a two month check up so I'm not sure. He was way above his "peers" in height and weight, and is significantly bigger than his sister was at this age. (She weighed about eleven and a half pounds at two months!) 

He just started smiling and is bringing great joy to all of us. We can't get enough of his little coos and that gummy grin! 

When people ask, I say that Asher is a better eater than Charlotte was, but a worse sleeper. We were much stricter with sleep training Charlotte and it really worked well! 

Just this past week we started making Asher go to bed in the travel crib instead of the swing. There were some tears, but not too many. :) He takes his naps all over the place, since he has to live his life around his sister's activities. If he got to choose, he would always sleep snuggled up against momma or dad in the Ergo or ring sling. 

Though he doesn't have as consistent of a routine as Charlotte, there are patterns to his day. He typically gets up for the day between 7 and 8. He is awake for about 1.5 hours before taking a long nap (2 hours, sometimes!) He has a good awake/ play time around lunch and then often naps after nursing while Charlotte is napping. In the evening he naps in the carrier while I play with Charlotte, make dinner, and then eat dinner. He is almost always awake for about an hour, but then is ready to nurse and go to sleep by 7:15pm. He is definitely getting some calories in during the night. He rarely goes more than three hours between feedings, especially now that he is sleeping flat on his back and doesn't feel as snuggled. 

I would definitely say he is easy going. He cries if hungry or tired, or if his sister throws a ball at his head. Otherwise, Asher is a content little boy and we are crazy about him. 

Happy two months, sweet babe.

Chats with Charlotte 1

Our big toddler girl is soooo chatty these days. She cracks us up with her running commentary and has a million opinions about everything. 

Some of my favorite things she says, at 22 months:

Oh, my! 

Alpacas! Okay! 

Mom. Dad. Asher. Charlotte. 

Airplane! Sky! Wow! 

Snails. Okay! 

Asher. Toot. Asher. :)

Okay? Okay. 

Stool. WaWa. Stool. WaWa. (This series of statements gets repeated over and over until I get the stool out of the closet and put it near the sink so she can play in the water.)

Nigh night. 

Cougar. Bear. Lily. Play. 

Spin, spin, spin, dip. (These are her dance moves ;) )

Up! Up! 

No, no, no, no, no! (Okay, I hate when she says No, but it must be included because many many many of her chats these days involve that two letter word!)

Pease. Okay.

Asher: 1 month old

We don't know how much Asher weighed at one month but he was 9 pounds 13 ounces at three weeks. 

He wears size one diapers and 3 month onesies/shirts. His 3 month pjs are too short already! What a tall guy! 

He doesn't have much of a schedule but there are some consistent patterns to his life. Each day he has a long-ish time awake in the morning and after dinner, and sometimes in the middle of the day, too. He is also consistently fussy early in the morning- often nursing every hour or so from 5ish until about 7am. #wearetired 

He is a super patient guy in terms of putting up with his big sister's rough housing. He is not patient about waiting to eat, though, and complains loudly if he doesn't get to nurse the second he is ready :) 

He is often content to lounge on his playmat and kick his feet while looking from side to side at whatever catches his little eye. 

We love this little guy so much!! 

Dear Charlotte, 18

My big toddler girl, 

You are the best girl in this whole entire world. You make my heart sing. 

I am so proud of the ways you have grown in the past couple of months. You've become a big sister and have handled that difficult transition with grace, patience, and a sense of humor. 

When I watch you hug your brother, or snuggle up to him on the floor, I melt into a puddle of mush and want to have a million more babies. 

Tonight was totally nuts-- your daddy was unloading some stuff from our POD into the new house two doors down. Asher was tired, but couldn't settle down by himself so I filled the bathtub and plopped you in. Without any protest, you played happily

 in the tub for over 30 minutes while I got your brother to sleep by bouncing him in the Ergo in the dark bathroom. Thank you, little love. Good teamwork. Fist bump. 

Lately you are super interested in filling cups with water and dumping it into something else. 

You are OBSESSED with alpacas and snails... You wake up talking about the animals that live nearby-- goats and horses and alpacas, oh my! 

Charlotte Adeline, I love you so much!! 

Life with two

I can't even believe how much love and how much chaos are filling our house right now. 

Life with a newborn and a toddler is totally insane. 

There have been moments when both children are screaming and it's all I can do not to join them. And sometimes I do join them ;) 

Most mornings Charlotte wakes up just as I have gotten Asher back to sleep after his 5:30/6:00 feeding. Joel and I are unbelievably tired. 

Mealtimes are loud and frenzied. We are  watching too many episodes of Daniel Tiger on Netflix. 

But then Charlotte kisses her brother, or she asks where Asher is, or she brings a book to show him. 

And then my heart turns to mush and my tears are so happy and I'm bursting with joy and gratitude. 

Asher's birth story

One of my favorite pastimes during this second pregnancy was reading old blog posts- mostly about my pregnancy with Charlotte, her monthly updates, and her birth story. And though we didn't have anyone present to take good photographs at Asher's birth, I still want to record the details of my labor and delivery with him, for my own memory and for him to read some day. 

Joel took most of these photos immediately following his birth, so sadly, we don't have any of the three of us together. This post will contain a few details that aren't neat and tidy, so just skim over if birth stories aren't your thang ;) Here goes...

Since my 37th week of pregnancy, I had been having a lot of uncomfortable contractions. Just before I turned 38 weeks, we went in to the birth center because I was contracting and also because I wondered if my water had broken- it broke naturally at the end of my labor with Charlotte and I never felt it, so I didn't know how to identify what it would be like. At that check up, we determined my water hadn't broken and my contractions stopped overnight, so we carried on. Or I should say, we labored on... For about two more weeks!! It was a very tiring and stressful and confusing time; my body kept tricking me into thinking delivery was imminent but things never progressed enough to be true labor. 

I had a midwife appointment on Wednesday, September 30. For most of our appointments, we had been seeing Brianna, and she told us at that appointment I was 5cm dilated and could have a baby any time. I said that my friend Melissa would be arriving the next day and that since I had already waited this long, I hoped baby would wait for her to come and be our doula. Brianna told me I could come in whenever I wanted the next day, or over the weekend, and she would break my water to get things moving. She could tell I was just DONE being pregnant and was anxious to meet our guy. 

That night I gave Charlotte a bath while Joel went for a run. Around 7pm as I was kneeling next to the tub, scrubbing down our big toddler girl, I noticed some fairly strong contractions. For kicks and giggles, I found and downloaded a free contraction tracker app on my phone. I'm really glad I did that, because it helped me realize that they were actually coming fairly consistently (finally!!). 

After Charlotte was in bed I went to sit on my exercise ball and noticed Joel using the iPad- still in his sweaty running clothes. I said casually, "Babe, you might want to go take a shower. I'm having some pretty serious contractions." 

"Oh", he replied. While he took a shower, I made sure all our bags were packed and labored by walking around the house through each contraction. They were coming about four minutes apart and lasting just under one minute. I called our neighbor to be sure she could come stay with Charlotte, then picked up my phone to call the birth center. As I started to dial, I noticed, for the first time, that I had a missed call and new voicemail from earlier in the evening. The message was from Brianna, saying that she would be on call that night, but if I went into labor the following day she wanted to be at my birth so I should call her directly even though she wouldn't be on call. I was blown away by the generosity of her offer, but also pretty sure I would NOT be waiting until the next day to have my baby. 

Once I called Brianna, she said to come in around 9:30 or 9:45. I was still managing my contractions pretty well, so I called our neighbor again and asked her to come so we could get the car packed and hit the road. 

We arrived at the birth center around 9:45. I was 5cm dilated and my contractions were picking up. I labored in the jacuzzi tub for about an hour, at which point they checked me again. My contractions were still intensifying but I hadn't dilated much in that hour, so Brianna offered to break my water. I remember asking, "that will speed things up, but also intensify them, right?" 

Brianna said yes, and I told her to go for it. I stayed in the tub and she used an "amnio hook" to break my water. I felt this intense relief for a quick second after my water broke, but then almost immediately the contractions came harder and faster. From about 10:45 to 11:45 pm, Joel stayed with me and used counter pressure on my back while I labored in the tub to manage the pain. He also massaged my back during contractions with a little plastic massage tool, but it didn't seem to help quite as much as the strength of his hands pressing inward on my hips. 

The timing of everything is blurry, but I remember distinctly the feeling of calm in the room. Joel was helping me and encouraging me and the midwife and two students kept coming in to check on us both. Probably around 12:30 they told me I was fullly dilated and were getting ready to help me start pushing. Joel said, "Kell, do you want to have him in the tub?"... 

"No," I replied. And Brianna immediately said, "Well you better get out right now!" :) 

On the bed I had the freedom to move however I chose. We remembered that pushing on my hands and knees was very effective with Charlotte, so I started out that way. I also laid on my right side for a few contractions and then did some pushing in that position as well. Joel continued squeezing my hips and rubbing my back hard during each contraction and the midwife/ two assistants held me hand and guided me and gave verbal encouragement. At one point they gave me some oxygen which was startling because I got nervous that something was wrong with the baby. But it really helped me focus on breathing deeply, which in turn helped me relax and give conscious effort to pushing effectively. 

They told me after Asher was born that I only pushed for 12 minutes. Of course I believe them, but pushing a baby out of my body is the absolute hardest thing in the world, so to me it felt about a million times longer than 12 minutes. 

When Asher's head came out, my entire body was on fire, but then barely a second later his whole little  self came flopping out and the pain was completely over. I can't believe how fast the ending went, and I was speechless with happiness when they brought my son into view. 

He was screaming and flailing wildly but stopped the second I turned over and brought him to my chest. I cried, of course, and marveled at the precious gift of Asher Patrick Alberts. I am unbelievably grateful to have had another healthy, beautiful child come from my body. 

I'm overwhelmed with joy, too, for such a positive, safe, and quick natural delivery. Giving life to my children is undeniably the hardest thing ever, but also one of the best. Also- my husband is amazing. The end.