Recent Pictures

This is Elijah's new favorite nursing position. He's so relaxed!

I know we may be months away from a tooth, but teething has begun making me all too aware that my days of toothless grins are numbered.

The big talker in action

The boys chillin' out in the knoxville hotel room. Who's closer to the remote?

He's a charmer, just like his daddy

Bradley Get together

Our Bradley Birth Class had a cook-out/reunion a few weeks ago now that everybody's babies are here. The babies' ages range from about 5 months to 6 weeks. Some people had their babies at home, others in hospitals or birth centers. For most of us this was our first baby, but it was all of our first attempts at a natural child birth.

We learned so much together in our Thursday night classes. Much more than any of us expected, I'm sure. But so much more than learning how to work with our bodies to birth our babies, we learned a way of parenting that has helped shape the parents we're learning to become. I feel like our group has gotten hit a little hard as pretty much all of us have had some sort of scare or trauma surrounding our new babies. But equipped with the knowledge from our Bradley classes, we learned how to work with the medical community to achieve the best outcome possible for our young families. I can't recommend the Bradley method enough!

It was such a sunny day and so great to get together. We shared birth stories, ate hamburgers, talked about hitting and missing milestones, ate hot dogs, and introduced future best friends and spouses.

From Left to Right: Kelly (one of the most influential people in my new mothering endeavors), Eli (looking for lunch), Danielle (a few more gray hairs than last summer, but all in all looking pretty good after 4 months of motherhood)

Look at all those babies! In no particular order these are the fruits of our birth class. Evenly divided- 3 boys, 3 girls

Husband and baby. Looking good guys.

Eli's 4 months

This is our growing boy on his 4th month-abirthday.

Eli loves being with his people. He likes watching Rob and me and making sure we're watching him! Elijah smiles on cue, enjoys silly songs and will rotate his body if he's playing on the floor so that he can watch TV, too. He likes being outside and looks for birds if they're singing because they sound like his mobile. He's got awesome head control and enjoys "telling stories". Rob and I have noticed a funny thing lately. Elijah is scare-able now. You'll know when you've scared him because he will throw his arms back and his bottom lip will pout out and quiver. It's the saddest thing you've ever seen.

Rob discovered this by accident and I've never seen him feel so guilty before.

My First Mother's Day

Rob and I were lucky enough to get to share my first mother's day with family. My mom and aunt met us in Knoxville, TN and we spent an awesome weekend together. They spoiled all 3 of us and we enjoyed being with them immensely.

Eli gave me a card for mother's day which he amazingly signed. Rob's original plan was to put the card in the car seat so that I'd find it when I picked Eli up. Good thing he didn't. Elijah did unmentionable ugliness like never before. Seriously, the diaper must have malfunctioned. I'm glad Rob went with option 2 so that I don't have to keep my 1st mother's day card in a ziploc baggie.

Proper Motivation

Elijah has ALWAYS hated tummy time. I know it's good for him and helps him develop muscles, but he hated it and after a few pathetic waa's I'd roll him over on his back and promise to try again another day.
We recently visited our new pediatrician. He gave Eli a mini baby physical and noted that his upper body strength was still developing. "That's okay," he said, "I wouldn't expect to see more until 4 months and besides he may be a little bottom heavy."

Bottom heavy? Oh no, doc. Wait till you see us next month, we'll have upper body strength out the wazoo. I decided then and there, we were going to stick to tummy time. No pathetic waa's were going to deter me.

The next day we began. About a minute in, Elijah cried and quickly face planted into the mat. No more tummy time. His upper body would just have to develop another way.

I told my mom about this while we were visiting in Knoxville. She suggested letting him watch cartoons on a boppy.

Ahhhh! The little stinker just needed the right motivation. He's been a happy tummy-timer ever since.