Visitors, Caves and Falls

After the little man was mostly recovered from his yucky cold we had a lovely weekend with some special visitors! My cousin and her husband came to spend the weekend with us and we got to do some touristy things. Due to the timing of our move around the holidays and then me being hugely pregnant we haven't done much of the exploring we would like so it was great to have a reason to get out and see things! There was also plenty of porch sitting, and lots of catching up talking.

My cousin, my sister and I are all pretty close in age which was buckets of fun growing up. We didn't live close by but took advantage of holidays together often! And then as luck would have it my sister and I both ended up going to school near our cousin and her parents so we were lucky to spend a lot more time together in those years. Now we're back to living farther apart so we'll take advantage of the time we get together whenever possible! And I think it's safe to say JB has a new buddy! 

Saturday we ventured up to Lookout Mountain to see Ruby Falls. This is a waterfall that is actually inside of a cave. So you do a little cave tour and your reward at the end is this beautiful waterfall. It was crazy to me to learn about how this waterfall was discovered and to see the narrow, oh so narrow, space the original explorers crawled through before finding it. 

Little man did pretty well, with dad carrying him in the carrier for the first part of the cave tour. And then the lovely waterfall sounds lulled him to sleep and he slept in the carrier for the walk back out. 

Along with the cave tour and falls, there is also a pretty great overlook where you get a great view of the city! There's actually two levels and I imagine the top level has even more spectacular views but between the bright sun and the precarious looking (to a first time mom) railing, I decided JB and I would just hang at this first level while the others checked out the top. 

We finished off the day with a yummy lunch before heading back home to grill out and watch some college football. The weekend was full of yummy food, storytelling, some relaxing and lots of snuggles- both for the baby and our dog who was so sad to see his new BFF leave.It was definitely a great end to a not so great week! 

3 Months

Three months? Are you sure? Time is literally flying! This month was so fun because his personality is coming out more and more. I could watch him smile and laugh all day and not lose interest it is just the sweetest thing there is. And as he's settling in to himself more, it's becoming easier to be out and about with him too. He's a bit less fussy in the evenings and he's awake a bit more during the day so it's easier to be a bit more flexible with our outings. 

Three Month Stats:

Weight: He is now 15 lbs. We haven't been in for a well check but we did get his weight checked just a few days shy of the 3 month mark when we were in for a sick visit :(  But it was exciting to get to see his weight. He's growing, that's for sure

Likes: He loves his mat and is starting to interact more with the different pieces -grabbing at them and noticing when he kicks them. He also loves to just be outside and look around and enjoy the breeze. He loves laying on his back so he can kick his legs as fast as possible. He loves to "stand" and also likes to practice sitting up (with help obviously). He definitely loves to be part of the group, and still prefers to be held upright in a sitting position where he can check out what's going on. He likes music and making faces at mommy and daddy. He likes to chill in his bouncer while mom folds laundry or unloads the dishwasher and is also enjoying his carrier especially now that he can face outwards. 

Dislikes: He does not like to miss out on anything so he has started to fight sleep time a bit. He's too worried all the fun is happening during nap time.                               

Sleeping, Eating and Playing: He is still eating every 2-3 hours during the day and we're still getting longer stretches at night. We seem to have a hit a bit of a growth spurt so he's been waking up a bit earlier than usual in the night- after about 5 hours to eat. But I'm hoping that's just a phase and he'll be back to doing an 8 hour stretch soon. Daytime sleep still isn't his strong suit but he's been doing better, taking naps closer to 40-50 minutes instead of 30. He usually takes about 5 naps a day still since they're not super long. Lately he's been up for the day around  7 and he usually goes down for the night around 7:30. It's been great to have a slightly more set schedule although it's never exactly the same it's nice to have a bit of predictability. Usually he's awake, then eats and gets a diaper change before we play and then down for nap. Right now he's usually awake for about 1.5 hours between naps which has given us lots more time for playing in this phase. 

Favorite Moments: A few of my favorite things about this month have been the increase in smiles and the real, actual belly laughs we're getting. He also had his first trip to the pool and swim in the lake which while not his favorite was super cute for the rest of us. I also love that his nighttime fussiness is dwindling. The witching hour was tough and it's so nice to see that fading and have him be a bit more pleasant in the evenings. Dad loves this especially since it's the time of day that he's at home and gets to spend with him. 

Oh how I love watching him grow! 

Baby's First Cold

It's been a week over here. The little man has had his first little virus this week. On Monday morning, the little guy seemed to choke on some milk after eating and had this big ole' coughing fit. It scared me to death but he got himself together after a while and I was finally able to get him back down. But once he was up for the day, I noticed that he was still periodically coughing and his breathing sounded pretty junky to me. Being the over paranoid first time mom that I am, I was convinced he had aspirated some of the milk into his lungs causing the cough. So I called the pediatrician and after I shared my observations they said I should come in to get him checked out. So off to the pediatrician we went for their last appointment of the day! Hubby met us a the pediatrician which always makes me feel so much better. He is the absolute best dad, always wanting to be there for his little man. 

The pediatrician told us his chest sounded great, they looked in his ears and didn't see any cause for concern and gave him a little once over for anything else that might be the source of his troubles. She decided he was most likely coming down with something viral and it was just an unfortunate coincidence that it coincided with his little feeding episode but that the cough was probably unrelated to that. So to be cautious and since it's going around, she decided we should test for RSV. Y'all. He hated it and it was so so sad. The swab they use for RSV is basically a covid test. Now if you've had a covid test, you know they are not known for being comfortable. And our poor little baby boy did not like it one bit and made the saddest cry you've ever heard! But, the test was negative! Phew! So they sent us home with directions to watch out for a fever, and to let them know if the couch got worse or new symptoms developed. 

Well bedtime rolls around and we decided to check his temperature before starting our usual bedtime routine and were surprised and sad to see he had a little fever! I called the pediatrician after hours line (I mentioned I'm a bit over paranoid right?) just to get some guidance for the night. She assured me that now that he is a bit older a fever isn't the emergency that it can be when their younger. I was able to give him some tylenol and put him to bed. My pediatrician actually called me back about an hour and a half later..now that is some quality bedside manner if you ask me...and after we talked through what we were seeing at home she encouraged me to bring him back in in the morning to check a few other things. That night when he woke up to feed he had just the worst cough and it made it so hard for him to go back to sleep. It was positively pitiful. He did manage to get some sleep, although I don't think I did, and I was glad we were headed back to the doctor because he was pretty puny the next morning. 

This time we checked for the big C virus which meant another swab up the nose. He was much less upset by it this time thank goodness and it was negative which was a huge relief. They also ran a little blood panel just to be on the lookout for infections which came back clear. And his chest and ears still sounded/looked great so they reassured us it was most likely just a cold virus and would pass in a couple days. So him and I have spent the last few days, laying low, trying to take plenty of naps and stay hydrated. I'm hopeful that today might be a fully fever free day since up until now it has been coming and going throughout the day. It's weeks like these that I think having one stay at home parent isn't even enough, but I'm also so grateful that I'm able to be home with him when he needs me. 

Even sick he is the sweetest little guy and we've still been getting plenty of smiles and giggles. But I will be so happy for him to be feeling 100% better hopefully soon! 

Labor Day

We made the trek with our little man over to my parent's house for Labor Day weekend. They live on the lake and we were excited for little man's first lake experience. I did take him a couple weeks ago but he didn't get in the water and we were excited for him to test it out. The weather had other plans and it poured buckets almost the whole weekend! But we definitely made the best of it. 

September is birthday month in my family so we celebrated both my dad's birthday and mine while we were there. So there was a lot of cake and sweet nephews helping to blow out candles. 

I have the world's sweetest nephews and the oldest is the biggest snuggle bug. We are best buds and I loved the extra snuggles, secret sharing, casual chats and the sweetest unprompted breakfast hand holding.

 

They are also over the moon about their new cousin and were great at keeping him entertained over the weekend. And JB thought they were just the best. 

Sunday my in-laws came to join us as well so he got all the love from all the family. He's probably wondering why there aren't as many people just dying to hold him all day long now that we're home because he sure was loved on this weekend. He loves to be in the middle of everything and be able to see all the excitement that's going on. He's not so much a "hold me so we can snuggle baby", more of a "hold me so I can see better" baby and there were plenty of people to oblige that request throughout the weekend.

On Monday, the clouds finally parted for a few minutes and we made a quick trip down to the water to see what he thought. He was not a fan and was in and out pretty quickly. Hopefully next summer the ratio of getting ready for the lake and actual swimming will be a bit better. This year, we spent a lot longer getting all the gear on than we did in the water. But he makes the cutest water baby so we're all ok with that. 

As it turns out our chihuahua doesn't hate the water either! I wouldn't go so far as to say he likes it, but he tolerates it and got in more than once! The first time was against his will but he decided it wasn't so bad and he got back in himself. He, like his new little bro, does not want to miss a thing and if people were in the water well then so was he! 

Monday also meant JB's first game day! He's going to be a Clemson fan whether he wants to or not and while he didn't make it to kickoff for this game, I'm confident there is plenty of Clemson football watching in his future. 

After a fun filled weekend we made our trip home on Tuesday but not without making a few stops! We decided to take the long way home allowing us to swing by hubby's grandparents on the way who hadn't met our little guy yet. They were over the moon to finally meet him and he was equally as happy to meet them based on all of the smiles we saw. We were also able to make a pitstop at my grandmother's house and take her to dinner. So she was also able to squeeze in some snuggles. 

Before our final leg home we got buddy all snug in his jammies to hopefully encourage him to sleep on the ride and make for an easier transfer once we were home. The ride started out a little dicey and I thought we were about to have a very overtired baby on our hands but he did finally go to sleep and made the transfer to bed like a champ! 

Having a baby seems to make everything more exhausting, but it also makes it so much sweeter.