Summer photo book

I received an offer for a free photo book from shutterfly and so I got my act together the best possible and made a book of our vacation photos. I still need to make one of Diego's first few months but life is so busy I never catch up.

Anyways I figured I would share and if you want to order one use code Book4Free and your total will be just over $8 for shipping, that's a deal! Of course you can make your own free book if you wanted too. This deal is good until Wednesday the 10th.

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0AcNnLduzYuWj5A&emid=sharepbsharer&linkid=link5&cid=SHAR-PBAPP

Sweaty Sunday

It was a hot day today, over 90 degrees. I spent the morning trying to keep both kids happy. Callie was overtired and crabby all morning. However at one moment they were both peacefully watching Mickey Mouse club from their highchairs. Nice!

Also Diego learned to play with his elephant and can pull it and make it wiggle which he really enjoys.

And I snapped a photo of him today sucking his thumb. This is a first as it's usually his fingers but not his thumb. I hve a similar photo of Callie somewhere but she's younger. I'll have to start a comparison side by side of some similar photos we have soon.

I'm hoping to be in bed very early as I have to get both kids ready and off to Grandmas before 6 am tomorrow for work. We hope daddy is having fun in his football trip but we sure miss him at home. Bedtime tonight was two screaming children. I literally just left CLlie in her room to go take care of screaming Diego. Luckily she put herself to sleep quickly. I'll still have to check to make sure she is in her bed. Hoping the night cools down as it's still hot even with all the fans and windows open. I swear each year it gets hotter. One of these days in going to need AC. But we enjoyed it for the afternoon visiting grandma and Grandpa and wishing them a happy grandparents day or as Callie calls it, grandma day! I don't know what we would do without them. Love all our grandparents near and far.

Pool Party!

My friend Doris belongs to a swim racquet club that has an awesome pool area with 4 pools and 2 hottubs. Today she threw a end of the summer pool party for some friends (all PTs at CCS) and our kids. Not only did she have us all over for the afternoon but she even ordered kabobs and Mediterranean food to be catered! Wow did we have a good time. I was nervous as Callie refused to nap today and after 2 hours in her room I decided we would just go without a nap. Luckily since she was having fun she was really well behaved, actually like an angel. Diego even was very cooperative. He swam in the pool for the first time and really liked it. D and I swam for almost an hour with Callie and the other kids. After that I dried off to be with D but Callie swam all afternoon, literally. Everyone was impressed that she swims by herself with the puddle jumper. She was jumping in an swimming to the stairs to get out and go again.  They also have a wading pool for little kids that they all enjoyed together. I had my hands full with two kids by the pool so I didn't snap any photos but Amy and Kristen sent me some. We had a great day, good food, fun and awesome friends.

Four month checkup

Today Diego had his four month check up. He weighed in at an even 16 lbs and 25 inches. That's about 50% for height and 60% for weight. Mostly the visit was about deciding how to treat his reflux. We decided on zantac for the first week. 50% of kids respond to zantac. If after a week we don't see improvement we will switch to a proton pump inhibitor, Prilosec or prevacid. The goal is less crying and more sleeping  but this can take time to heal. I'm hoping this really helps him as I'm desperate for some rest after 4 months. We picked up his medicine and started tonight but it takes days to start working.

Callie behaved through the appt, I gave her lollipops so she wouldn't talk while the dr was and it worked. We were planning to go see a kids band after but the appt took too long so instead we had a picnic and played at the water park.

D was fussy today probably from his 2 vaccines and now we have to go back 3 more visits to finish those up. All that's left is splitting up the one he had a reaction to the first time. Hopefully he doesn't have a reaction again.

I went to have a massage this afternoon since my back has been killing me. I had way more knots than anticipated and now I'm sore from my massage! But it was relaxing for an hour to listen to peaceful music and lay in the dark. Hopefully she worked some knots out and I feel better tomorrow.

Four Months Old

So this is one day late... But yesterday was a rough day. I didn't even post about the allergist until I was up

In the middle of the night, hopefully it made sense because I didn't read over it again.

Anyways without further ado.. Diego at FOUR months!

He's awfully cute... And I call him "pita" and more often just D, you probably already know that. He's a real handful and not an easy baby by any means. He's a complicated soul that I just can't quite figure out. He cries sometimes hours a day because his belly hurts or he just can't fall asleep. I've never met a baby who has such a hard time going to sleep. I bounce and walk as shoosh and give him the pacifier and play the vaccuum and sometimes still he can't just close his eyes. He pukes probably 20-30 times a day... We will be working on that with the pediatrician this week. And hopefully that will improve a lot in his life. The only food sensitivities we have isolated for sure are dairy and onions.

He can laugh and smile and coo and I swear on occasion his sounds come out like mama. Diego is a mommy's boy for sure and prefers to be laying right on my boob over anywhere else in the world. He's happiest just sleeping on me and nursing and sometimes at night he even drools all the milk out in a puddle because he's not hungry. He's never been without me for more than 10 hours and never overnight. I had left Callie way sooner ;)

He eats on average 2.5 ounces every 2 hours. This is a pretty small amount and I can only assume he doesn't want more because he is more likely to puke. I also think he eats so often because he pukes up quite a bit of every meal.

Diego can hold a toy, bat at hanging toys, and today he just learned to make Sophie the giraffe squeak. He can lift his legs and touch his toes but he doesn't hold them yet or roll. He can lift his head when on his belly but doesn't support himself on his elbows yet. His preferred position is upright at all times, probably again because of the puking. Diego loves loud white noise and dark places, he is known to be on his best behavior in a busy restaurant.

He changed pacifier preferences this month from soothie "baby" kind to MAM after falling in love with a borrowed pacifier from Lincoln on our CT trip.

We stopped swaddling D this month and instead he sleeps on his belly.

He loves to watch and play with Callie although I think he is genuinely frightened of her and flinches when she gets too close. Just this week though he started fighting back. When she kisses his face he grabs and pulls her hair! It's the beginning of their sibling rivalry.

Four months in and not much sleep for us but we still love him dearly and somehow I remain relatively patient and collected despite the crying and lack of sleep. Diego is officially our last baby and so I'll enjoy all the little moments even if sometimes I want to pull my hair out because we won't have another baby again. Happy Four months little D, mommy and daddy love you!

Allergy checkup

I was prepared for D to have to redo all his allergy tests and be miserable all afternoon. But then his allergist decided he didn't need to redo any. Since he had no new symptoms; rash, eczema etc and an elimination diet improved his reflux but didn't eliminate his issues, she felt he doesn't have an allergy but more of a dairy sensitivity that causes his reflux to be worse. He's cleared to begin solid foods and doesn't go back until 1 year old unless he has any new issues.

I guess this is good news that he's not likely methicillin to anything but that also means here is no fast fix for his reflux and crying. So now we visit the pediatrician Friday and come up with a plan to treat the reflux and see if that helps.

I was exhausted from a night with terrible sleep and then go figure D is a crazy nightmare screaming all afternoon for no apparent reason. I took a screaming photo so I can remind him one day hoe much he owes me for being a difficult baby!

Happy Labor Day

For Labor Day we spent the morning recooperating from two kids who didn't sleep well the night before. After nap time we wentto Grandma and Grandpas house for a fancy BBQ feast. Diego was fussy most of the day, for one of his unknown reasons. Callie had lots of fun playing on her playground and just being around her whole family. Even though it's a day home from work I'm exhausted anyways and ready for bed at 7:30pm.

Tomorrow D is going back to the allergist for his four month check up before we start with solids. I don't have a prediction on whether he will have any allergies. I haven't been able to pin down anything too dido notice with food except that dairy makes him cry more and have worse reflux but I'm not sure it's an allergy. Either way we will get some guidance on what, when and how to feed him to avoid any food allergy issues. Then Friday he goes to the pediatrician for his four month visit and we can follow up on if we need to treat his reflux.

Nearly four months in and only 3 hours of sleep at a time at the most for me, typically it's 2 or less. I guess that's why I'm so tired all the time but I'm still functioning and catching up whenever I can. So I'm off to sleep before 8 pm tonight.