Happy Monday

Benjamin

Benjamin has been a wonderful addition to our family. His delivery and hospital stay were both quick.

He had jaundice and needed some help from a bili blanket to get over it. Holding and feeding him while he had it on was a little tricky, but not hard at all. How lucky we are that the equipment was available for use to use at home.

He has always seemed so big to me but I guess he did have a regular newborn stage after all.

We love our new baby. He is so sweet.

Update

We have been so busy lately that I haven't had time to post. That, and I have acquired the special variety of attention deficit disorder that comes from never being able to complete a simple thought or activity before being interrupted with a crash or scream or "Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!" from the kids. Even more serious are the times of complete, eerie quiet when my spidey-sense kicks in and I go looking for the kids, only to find that Isaiah is eating lotion and splashing in the toilet.

Anyway, I digress.

The weeks since Benjamin's birth have been a mix of awesome, tired, crazy, sweet, chaotic, overwhelming, and fun. He is a fatty who loves to eat. He is a big kid and is wearing clothes that Isaiah wore when he was six months old. He is a fairly good sleeper, my first newborn who has ever just fallen asleep in his bassinet and on his back without any effort on my part. He is now starting to giggle and grab hanging toys. He is loved by his big sister and brother. So much that I worry he will be crushed when they hug and kiss him.

Having three kids is challenging. Our house is always messy and dirty. (There is a difference between messy and dirty. Messy was always fairly acceptable. Dirty I have learned to tolerate.) I don't sleep much, mostly because I try to play catch-up when Isla and Isaiah are asleep. I try and fail and eat a Haagen-Dazs (yeah I know how to spell that without help) and sit and watch West Wing or Freaks and Geeks or Pretty Little Liars (yeah, that's right, I like that show, ok?) or Revenge or The Bachelor/Bachelorette or anything else that happens to be on and I forget to put away the leftovers from dinner and don't bother doing the dishes and I go to bed too late and then Benjamin wakes up to eat and by the time I fall asleep it is 2 am and then I wake up the next morning and realize, wow, this place is a dump. All my fault for not using my time wisely. But man I love TV and Haagen-Dazs. 

Have three kids is also the best. I feel like since being married six years ago (six!) life has been perpetually in transition. Marriage, baby, graduation, job, no job, new job, moving, baby, baby, moving again. But each time we have a new addition or change in scenery, life goes on like it always does. Benjamin has joined our family seamlessly and I can't imagine (or really remember) life without him. 

Isla is so big. She turns four soon. It's so easy to forget that she is so young because she talks and acts like such a big kid. I couldn't have been blessed with a better first kid. She is smart and easygoing and kind and patient with me and her brothers. It's been helpful to have such a patient, resilient kid to teach me how to be a mom. 

Isaiah is a force of nature. His antics keep me running and breathless and take my emotions from one extreme to the other. There is no kid around who is sweeter, though. He loves to run around, play blocks and duplos, and read. 

Brett is a brave, brave man. With little sleep and great effort, he finished his Master degree. He works hard at a job that he loves. He comes home from work at the end of the day (and sometimes even at lunch) to save us from this crisis or that one. He helps me feed and bathe and put the kids to bed and after that he even finds the time to be my therapist so that I can unload a little of my crazy and be ready for the next day. 

We are getting ready to move at the end of the month. Brett's parents will be serving an 18-month mission for our church in Laos, and they are letting us stay at their house. Yay for a dishwasher and other modern conveniences. We will miss them a lot, though. I hope I can survive the short time without them. I know that I will definitely realize how much we rely on them once they are gone.

Yes, we are all doing well. Hopefully I can post more about the kids individually, maybe about Benjamin's birth, maybe even a coherent, comprehensive prose about a single event or idea (probably scratch that last).

Benjamin at 2 months

16 lb, 24.5 inches (7-31-13)

- Kind of a bad breastfeeder, as far as technique goes. Swallows a lot of air, has big belches.
- First of the kids to actually give me sore arm and chest muscles from holding him.
- Loves his bouncer.
- Makes cute goo goo and purring noises.
- Wears size medium gDiapers or size 3 Huggies.

Benjamin at 1 month

 

- Wears size 3-6 months, size small gDiapers.
- Sleeps on back or side in our bed. Likes a swaddle with a big muslin blanket or a swaddle up sack.
- Eats every 2-3 hours.

Benjamin at 2 weeks

Benjamin Romeo Singley

May 16, 2013 at 6:04 am

8 lb. 9 oz, 21 inches

Oh Boy

We found out we are expecting a boy in May! I was happily surprised. How can you be surprised, you ask? It turned out to be one of the two genders, and it is human. A real surprise would be, "Congratulations, he's a handsome little duckling." I was surprised because I just had a feeling it would be a girl. Plus, since I only have a sister and never grew up with boys in the house, even the fact that we have one boy is still amazing. I'm excited for Isaiah to have a brother so close in age.

Isla's reaction was a little different. Since she found out there was a baby in here, she has been calling it a she. She has been picking out girly outfits. She had been coming up with her favorite girl names. She has been dreaming about what she and her sister could do together. When I told her it was a boy, it's almost like she went through the five stages of grief.

A: Isla, I found out something very important about this baby today. We found out that it is a baby boy!
I: (With a smirk that says, "You're telling a funny joke.") Noooo. It's a sister!
A: Actually it's a boy. We have pictures.
I: Well, it's hard to see in there. It's all black and gray. Maybe it's a girl.
A: Nope, it's a boy.
I: Well I DON'T WANT ANOTHER BABY ISAIAH! Maybe we can just get a girl instead.
A: Well, we really can't change it. It's just going to come out and it will be a boy.

She then forlornly goes back to doing puzzles. I don't hear anything from her for another 10 minutes.

I: Well, we will see when he comes out of the cracks in your belly. (Stretch marks, I am pretty sure).

So she has definitely gone through the first four stages. When she gets to acceptance, I will let you know. Unless planning for the 4th baby to be a female counts as acceptance?

UPDATED: We finally got our scanner to cooperate and I changed the picture to my favorite one. He looks so cozy in there.

Family Photoshoot

Here are a few of our favorites. Thanks Grandpa Glenn for taking them, 

and Aunt Hayley for managing the talent.

Cloth is Back

So we cloth diapered Isaiah from the time he was two weeks until eight months old. It was surprisingly easy, and I really came to love cloth diapering. The benefits: 1) you don't have to continually buy diapers and wipes; 2) no pee leaks or poo explosions, ever; 3) no diaper rash, ever; 4) no harmful chemicals; 5) cloth diapered bums are so darn cute.

Caring for the diapers wasn't hard, especially once we got a diaper sprayer that attached to the toilet. I never dunked a diaper or anything sick like that, I found that cloth diapering really wasn't any more disgusting than regular diapering. After all, with either method your baby still craps in his pants and you have to clean it up. The difference was that I flushed gross stuff down the toilet rather than wrapping it up in a diaper burrito and putting it in a pail that I (ok Brett) had to later throw in the dumpster.

Well we were only able to make it for eight months. That is because all of a sudden, around eight months of use, the diapers would smell rank after just getting wet. It was positively, eye-watering-ly, disgusting. And Isaiah started to get the nastiest diaper rash I have ever seen. He had never had a rash prior, and this rash was much worse than Isla had ever had. The rash he was getting was actually more of a chemical burn. He had blisters that would peel. It almost looked like a sunburn, nothing like regular diaper rash. I tried stripping the diapers a variety of ways but I couldn't get anything to work. I researched and kept trying different things, but in the end I bought some Huggies and gave the cloth diapers a rest for a while. As it turns out we had an ammonia build-up problem. So after letting the diapers sit unused for months, I boiled them, soaked them overnight with the ammonia removal stuff you use for live pet fish, and then washed them again. And you know what? It worked. So cloth is back in our house.

Oh and in case you are wondering, I use primarily Bum Genius 4.0s. I also have Flip covers which I use with Flip inserts and Bumboo fitteds.

And on a different note, I finally gave Isla her birthday present from Brett and me. I bought it so long ago (can't even remember when) and I have been saving it in my closet, waiting to give it to her. I am so jealous.

Disney princess dress up set: five dresses, two pairs of gloves, capelet, light-up glass slippers, and Rapunzel hair. We have to invite her girlfriends over soon. Today she didn't want to wear regular clothes. She is currently dressed as Cinderella. I can see how this may save me a lot of laundry in the near future. But we may also die of glitter inhalation.