Photos by Rosy Made Photography
Hey Everyone! I hope you guys had a great weekend. Ours was super productive and fun! My Dad got into town yesterday and is staying through the Holidays which will be a special treat! I’ve been wanting to do a Mom segment on the blog for a while but the Holidays have been taking over my content (per your request). I figured everyone was winding down with their shopping and work so today would be a good Monday to get this started! So where are we at with Griffin? He’s 16 weeks old now…holy CRAP. Similar to my experience with Coco, those first few months are sort of a blur. Add to that, three real estate transactions (we had a condo in Chicago we sold, then bought our new home and sold our current home) along with the Holidays and I pretty much don’t even know if I’m coming or going.
If you’ve been with me here for a while, you know my pet peeve is when people talk about how busy they are (usually because they’ve CHOSEN to be that busy and by the way, EVERYONE is freaking busy) but for this chapter of our lives I’m USING it. We’re busy and tired! But we’re also really excited. My point is, the first few months with Griffin have FLOWN because we’ve just had a lot going on. I know a lot of you (98% in fact on my insta stories poll) have requested a sleep post. I’ve actually got something exciting planned with our sleep trainer (who we used with Coco) for January so stay tuned for that. So here’s our update on Griffin!
Eat: We have no “schedule” per say as I breast feed on demand. Usually it’s every 2-3 hours but more during his witching hours of 6-8PM. He wakes up once at night (praise the Lord) around 3, feeds and then goes back down until 5:30 or 6 and is up for the day then. Bottles with him are hit or miss. Honestly, this doesn’t impact me too much though. We generally are home and when we’re out together, I can just feed him. It only gets tough if we want a life without kids after about 5PM. Which we do so this is a work in progress. We went to a Holiday party over the weekend and had to wait to go until he was down for the night (around 8PM). The hard part with this is that people don’t understand why you are late, why you need to leave early or why you just say no to plans all together (“sorry, I had to/need to feed the baby”). Even fellow parents I meet still don’t understand that I personally choose to prioritize this time with him over everything else. Heck, I nursed Coco to sleep for 2.5 YEARS. Imagine the stuff I missed out on/said no to. But to me, I was missing out if I wasn’t at home with her. I’m not saying how we do things is right/normal/healthy but it worked for our family. But, as with all things in life, doing something different than others is grounds for a landmine of judgement. Turns out (especially with parenting), people care a LOT about what and how other people do things! I was talking to a girlfriend the other day and we both decided that in 2018 we’re going to try to care a lot less about what other people think of our choices. This is hard though, am I right? For some reason, I care a lot about getting the approval of others and I’m learning that this is a super lame way to live. Note to self for 2018!
Sleep: Naps are all over the place. Unlike Coco, Griffin cat naps through the day whereas she would have these long, epic naps (probably because she didn’t sleep at night). He will doze in the car, in the bassinet and while being held. I nurse him to sleep or until he’s sleepy…one issue we’re dealing with is his lack of burps! He won’t burp despite my MAJOR effort. He’ll nurse and will fall asleep only to be woken with rage, large burps and spit up! Stay tuned on this but thank you to all of you who offered advice! He sleeps in our room at night in this bassinet and we probably will keep him in our room until he’s six months old.
Paci: Still a no-go and I’ve pretty much given up at this point! He has discovered his hands which he loves and I’m hoping for a thumb sucker!
Style: My babies LIVE in these jammies and these socks. Seriously, the gender neutral ones that were handed down from Coco are still like new and I can’t recommend them enough. The quality is amazing, they last forever and offer the cutest patterns. My babies were never in “outfits”…always just jammies…style sacrilege but I don’t care! Another bonus is that they zip so you don’t have to snap a million snaps for a middle of the night diaper change. PS- Stay tuned this week for a special giveaway with Hanna Andersson!
Play: Griffin is at the age where he will play and entertain himself a bit! While I get ready in the morning, he has tummy time on my bed or will play in the DockAtot. We got this attachment for it and it was a game changer! During the day he sort of rotates between this mat (which he LOVES) and this bouncy seat with this attachment. We stroll in this stroller with this bassinet attachment and if I wear him, it’s in this carrier.
Life with Two: I can sum it up as a shit show but a good shit show. I worry less about the laundry piling up, getting blog posts out on time, and washing my hair everyday. I focus more on giving them individual attention when I can because it’s harder to do that with two. It feels like I’m often telling Coco to hold on so I can feed Griffin and Griffin to hold on (as if he understands) so I can help Coco with something. You just do not have time to sweat the small stuff which has been good for me because I am a sweater of ALL the small stuff. I sleep GREAT because I’m so tired at the end of the day that I just pass out. But I wouldn’t change it for anything!
Below are the items we can’t live without and that have helped us through the first few months! Do you have any must have items? I’d love to know about them! Thanks so much for following along! xo
