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that now when the Gilmore Girls theme song comes on…not only does Mason stop what he’s doing, watch, and smile…but he now also claps along to the song. Awesome. =)

Lauren has been taking gymnastics since she was 2…first in a parent/tot class and then in a class on her own when she was 2.5. Since that first class on her own, she had Miss Kristen as her coach, who we absolutely adore. Starting this last fall sometime, the days/times didn’t work out and she now has a new coach, who Lauren also likes, but always still runs to find Miss Kristen to give her a hug (and vice versa). Miss Kristen and Miss Carrie have both told me that Lauren is advanced in gymnastics for her age, which is nice to hear, go Lauren! There are 5 classes for 4-6 year olds, and Miss Carrie told me Lauren is ready to move up to the 3rd class, at only 4.5! Again, way to go Lauren! We are enrolling for summer gymnastics right now and I just got this email from Miss Kristen:

“Hey Ashlee. I wanted to talk to you about your plans for gymnastics this summer. I am starting a group of “hand picked” little ones that I think have some talent. Plus I want Lauren back with me…I miss her terribly.”

I’m so proud of my little girl:)

Mason had an ENT appt yesterday and it went just ok, a bit frustrating. The whole point was to do a hearing test to see if the fluid on his ears has affected his hearing (which of course it likely has)…well, they couldn’t get their machines and computers to work, so we didn’t get the test…after 20 mins of sticking these things in his ears over and over. I was pissed. So then we see Dr. Latz and after having to hold him down to get wax out of the way, he has fluid on both ears…one is “moving” and the other isn’t (not moving means lots of fluid). Urgh. So, she said, let’s recheck him in 3 months. I said, now wait a minute, he’s had fluid on his ears for 3 straight months and we’re going to wait another 3 months?? I’m not cool with fluid on his ears for 6 out of the 9 months of his life!! Latz said it’s not a question of *if* we’re going to do tubes, but *when*. She said she’ll do tubes on babies as young as 6 months, but really likes to wait until they’re a bit older (he’ll be 7 months on Thursday, can you believe it?!?) and that we’re hitting spring/summer and we should be able to squeak by until winter because she would hate to do them now and then they fall out in 6 months and we’re back in Nov/Dec putting in a second pair. I get that, I do. But I also don’t want him not hearing his first year of life and to spend the next few years in speech therapy as a result! She said that honestly, she’ll respect our decision and will do them now if we want. She then said that had the hearing test worked, we would have had a decision yesterday because if he has hearing loss, we need to do them and that studies have been done that prove higher IQ’s in babies that had hearing aids placed at 6 months over ones who didn’t (for those with hearing loss of course). So, with that, I told her I’m not quite ready to jump to tubes because he did have a bit of a runny nose yesterday and the fluid *could be* a result of a little cold (of course he’s fine today), but I want an appt sooner than 3 months. So, we go back in 6 weeks to get a hearing test and to check fluid. If there is fluid, I’m making the appt asap for tubes. With spring around the corner, if he still has fluid on his ears in mid-May when we go back, to me, there’s little chance he is going to clear that fluid over the summer, so I don’t want to jump now, but will be ready then and Dr. Latz agreed. Poor kid. I know he can hear us, he turns his head at his name and any noises, and the Gilmore Girls theme song of course!lol, but I just don’t know exactly how well he’s hearing…is he hearing muffled sounds or is he hearing the articulation he needs to be hearing? 6 more weeks and then we should have an answer and decision. Other than that, we have his laryngomalacia under control and we’ll continue status quo on that unless he starts choking on his voicebox when he starts running around or if he still has trouble when he’s 3, both of those scenarios would mean surgery. Fingers crossed!

Before I forget to post…here are Mason’s stats so far!

birth, length - 19.5″, weight - 8lb 10oz
2weeks, length - 21″ (50%), weight - 9lb 9oz (75%)
2months, length - 23.75″ (75%), weight - 12lb 3oz (60%)
4months, length - 25″ (50%), weight - 14lb 3oz (40%)
6months, length - 26.25″ (40%), weight - 15lb 6oz (15%)

It’s been awhile since I’ve typed something, so here’s a quick bit on how everyone is doing!

We had a wonderful Easter!! Friday was spent with Lauren at school and me at work while Mason and daddy had a “guys day”. Mid-afternoon, we all met up at Lauren’s school for a visit with the Easter bunny and an egg hunt. After that, we did a bit of shopping out the “outside mall” as Lauren calls it followed by dinner at T-Rex…Lauren has been before, but she still got a bit scared during the thunderstorms. Mason always waited until it was over and then cried for 20 seconds!lol He always is a bit late on the cries, but he rarely cries anyway…unless you take away the remote or try to wipe his face or nose!

Saturday we did our normal routine of the gym followed by lunch and then we took the kids to an Easter egg hunt in old downtown Overland Park…they gave you a “treasure map” of sorts and you found the local businesses whose signs matched the map and the kids got a treat. As Lauren pointed out, it was kind of like trick-or-treating! She loved it and was always wanted to be the leader, go figure! Late afternoon Mason took a nap while daddy mowed the yard and Lauren and I made a cake from scratch for Easter, she loves to cook and bake with me! But much like mommy, once it’s done, she’s kind of over it…the batter is enough for her! After that, we all died Easter eggs together, then we grilled and ate dinner followed by bath and bed.

Sunday morning of course the Easter bunny had come and we were awoken at 7am to Lauren yelling, “daddy I’m awake, come here, the Easter bunny came!!!!”. She had woken up to go to the bathroom (which she’ll do on her own now in her bathroom, yea!) and spotted a few eggs the Easter bunny had left in her room and her bathroom! Mason was waking up anyway, so we were all up and she did an awesome job of finding all the eggs and was sssoooo excited. After we’d found them all upstairs, we continued downstairs, where she spotted their Easter baskets full of gifts on the hearth of the fireplace and went running to grab the stuffed Bambi she’d been longing for forever!! She was sssssooooo excited!! So fun to live through their eyes!:) After we’d found all the eggs, we made pancakes and eggs for breakfast and then all got showered/dressed and headed out to lunch and then to the zoo for the afternoon! Mason LOVES being outside and Lauren loves the zoo so much! We joined last fall when I was on maternity leave and today we upgraded to the “gold” status giving us free train rides, tram rides, and carousel rides. Mason was so tired in need of his afternoon nap and after nursing at one point, passed out on me completely and I carried him for an hour or so through Australia and Asia (meaning he missed most of the animals we saw today!) while he slept. It was so sweet to carry him sleeping, it’s been awhile since I had held my sleeping baby! And, that mean Lauren scored the front of the sit-and-stand stroller, so she was happy! The weather was just wonderful, warm at times with a breeze that will cool us down every now and then.

When we got home, we played and made dinner (ham, green bean casserole, grilled asparagus, deviled eggs, and rolls) while playing with the occasional neighbors that stopped by (have I mentioned yet how much we *LOVE* our neighborhood and neighbors? AWESOME people!!). Then at Lauren request, we ate out on the deck. It was such a beautiful night, we decided to take a long walk through the neighborhood and after all the stops and chats with neighbors, we got home just in time for the kids to fall into bed. What an amazing Easter. We are truly blessed.

Quick updates on each kid:

Lauren
Oh Lauren. We love her, we do. But she is definitely pushing our buttons (namely daddy’s) lately. She likes to pretend she doesn’t hear you, or maybe she really doesn’t, but she’s certainly testing lately. She’s quick too…she’s listening when we don’t think she is, so we’ve resorted to spelling A LOT and when I did that with something today she responded with “did you just spell a bad word?”. Why yes Lauren, that is why I spell, so as not to say bad words in front of you!lol Of course, the “bad words” that she is aware of is stupid, ugly, and shut up. Thank goodness she has no concept of the “real” ones yet! =) It really bugs her that she can’t read yet, but she’s doing really good and has half of her books memorized. Her favorite game to play is anything where she is in charge telling everyone else what to do…usually “teacher” where everyone involved is her kids that she bosses around and takes their stars from. She’s extremely outgoing and is always yelling “hi” to every neighbor that she thinks might be within earshot of her. When we’re in public and she sees someone with a Wildcat shirt or hat, she always asks to go up and tell them she likes her shirt. Or today at Planet Sub, a grandpa was holding a newborn baby girl with a cute flower headband on and Lauren asked to go up and tell the man that his baby is beautiful. She’s also scaring the heck out of us with her interest in boys. She’s had a “boyfriend” since she’s known the word…whether it’s been Brayden, Thomas, Jack, or now Drew. Today, she took a fancy to the teenage train conductor at the zoo and whispered to me that he’s beautiful and that when she grows up maybe she can marry him. Daddy just shakes his head and then she asked daddy for his opinion…whether she should marry Drew or the train conductor…he told her whoever she wanted, but Drew might be a better choice:) Given, we know Drew and his parents and they’re good people!lol Actually, we went to Drew’s birthday party a month or two ago and of course, Drew had invited all of the boys, and Lauren. Too cute. They are serious too…he tells his parents that he is going to buy Lauren a ring. yikes. She is really excelling at gymnastics and at 4.5, is probably halfway through the classes that are intended for 4-6 year olds! Her coach just told me last week that she’s doing exceptionally well at her age and is ready to move up again! She has seems to really like soccer (she’s taken classes at school) and has been asking Billy to play with her lately, so we’ll start her in micro league soccer this fall. Anyway, Lauren is good, definitely smart, and miss popularity.

Mason
Mason is constant motion. I don’t think that child ever sits still. He started army crawling at 4.5 months (and within a month or so was crawling all over the house). At 6.5 months, he’s still army crawling, but will get up on his hands/knees to crawl over things that are in his path. Also, a week or two ago, he started pulling up on things. Lauren has a little Pottery Barn anywhere chair that he puts his hands on and pulls up onto his knees and then will sit down on his butt. Miss Lauren (his daycare lady) told me a few weeks ago he pulled up in his crib. He still wears a swaddle on his lower half at home at night, but today at nap he was just in his onsie and when I went to get him, he was on his knees at the front of the crib…time to lower the mattress!! He’s trying his hardest to pull up onto his feet too. Seriously, Billy and I keep telling him he can slow down on the milestones anytime now!! He’s eating 3 meals a day, kind of. He doesn’t always want breakfast and lunch, but will generally eat really well at dinner. He’s decreased his milk intake during the day as well, so we’re keeping an eye on it. He dropped in %’s at his 6month well baby visit from 75% weight at birth, to 15% (and actually weighed the exact same as Lauren did at 6 months, to the ounce!). I guess I never posted the stats, I’ll do that soon. So, his pediatrician wants us upping his food intake, but I don’t think we’re accomplishing that, we’ll see at 9 months. Of course, Miss Lauren tells me he eats more often and more at each setting than the other baby that is his age and she outweighs him by probably 7 pounds (15lbs vs. 22lbs) and she isn’t even rolling, let alone crawling (he was rolling at 2 months, rolling completely all the time both ways at 3 months)…so I think part of it is that he just NEVER sits still. It’s hard to even hit his mouth when feeding him because he’s always moving, even strapped into a highchair!! He’s such a happy baby. Nothing much makes him cranky at all. You just throw some toys on the floor and he’ll happily play for hours. If Lauren is in the room, he’s 110% happier though. He loves her so much and her him. They have a new game in the car where Lauren looks away and then whips back to him and says a color and he makes this sucking in of air/laugh sound that makes them both laugh so he makes it more and she yells more colors trying to figure out which one makes him make the longest/loudest sound and declares that one his favorite color. She was so happy the other day when “yellow” appeared to be his favorite, just like hers! And I love when I hear her yell, blue, yellow, rojo…mixing her Spanish and English so easily! I was speaking to her in Spanish this weekend and she *loved* it, I need to work on it more with her, on top of what she does in school. But back to Mason…we’ve taken him to the pool several times now (inside at the gym) and he really seems to like it. We’ll even take him under water and he comes back up and blinks and is fine. Man, Lauren screamed bloody murder when we did that to her at 6 months! We have a little float thing for him he sits in and he just hangs out in it forever. He’s going to *LOVE* this summer being outside and at the pools all the time (in our subdivision and the new one being built at our gym, yea!). The other new thing that Mason has been doing in the last few weeks is playing peek-a-boo himself…he grabs a blanket or his onsie or whatever and puts it over his face and then pulls it off and waits for you to say “peek-a-boo” and just grins and giggles! He loves to grin at whoever will look in his general direction and it’s such an entire all-consuming smile that it always makes you smile back:) Eating outside on the deck a few times in the last week has been pure bliss for him!! He’s not doing too good with Gerber puffs yet…I put a piece of one in his mouth a few weeks ago, right on the front, on his tongue and he actually gagged until he made himself puke his entire lunch all over himself at Panera! However, he’ll sit and eat an entire biter biscuit, which is much harder…I don’t really understand that!! And being a second kid he’s been introduced to some things sooner…he likes ice cream, go figure! We go to Jason’s Deli every week after gymnastics and always have ice cream cones at the end and he requests licks of mommy’s cone now:) He’s just a super chill, easy kid…as long as you can handle the energy he has!!

Us
We’re doing great! Work and kids and the house keep us 110% busy. We’ve really gotten back into the gym this year and have gotten healthy, again. I only have 5 pounds left until I’m at pre-pregnancy weight (yea!) and Billy is on his way back down the scale as well…gotta love a man that will gain sympathy pregnancy weight with his wife:) We’re so totally looking forward to this summer and lots of time outside…with neighbors, friends, at the zoo, at the farm (Deanna Rose), parks, walks, etc. Who isn’t happier when the weather is beautiful, right? We’re in the midst of trying to plan vacations for the year. We were thinking a combo trip of Disney/Sanibel in Florida in September for a week. Now we’re thinking we might keep that a roughly week long trip just to Disney and then in May/June take the kids to the Bahamas for a full week or so vacation. We need to decide soon as we need to get the kids passports and of course mine just expired so it needs renewed…will probably end up paying the “expedite” fees, oh well, we need to get them anyway since 9 times out of 10, we leave the US for vacations. Other than that, we’re really enjoying making friends with our neighbors. All the girls are great, we get together once a month for Bunco, but I’ve yet to play Bunco! Instead, we have some drinks and chat…it’s really fun! Last month, instead of Bunco, we went out to the Power&Light and partied like we were in our 20’s again! There were over 20 of us and we had an awesome time!! We also had a couples ‘hood night out and went bowling and then out to Johnny’s after to have a few more drinks. Then, now that the weather is improving, “Flamingo Friday’s” will be reinstated shortly…there is a pair of traveling yard decoration Flamingo’s…whoever has them for the week puts them out at in their yard on Friday after work and everyone has a BYOB driveway party there…kids run around, adults talk/drink, we got to do a few after we moved in and that was how we first got to know a bunch of our neighbors, so fun! Our builder jokes that our ‘hood should be called “Party Brook” instead of Prairie Brook! We are truly thankful and happy that we made the choice to move here, everyone has kids 6 and under and so many fun people we feel lucky to call our neighbors and new friends!!

I’ll get pic’s uploaded soon…need to get taxes done first. Never fun to do them since we always owe! Have a great week!

Mason had a great, happy weekend and then was up screaming every few hours on Sunday night, not wanting to lay down…I knew immediately it was his ears, again. And again, no cold. I don’t understand why he gets the infections before we see the nasal congestion, it’s always a few days later. Kind of like how Lauren starts coughing and having trouble with her asthma, and then we see the nasal congestion a few days later. Anyway, Mason had a follow-up appt his our ENT yesterday already, convenient, no?

There is fluid on his ears, but no infection, yet. Of course with the fluid there, it can be an infection at any time or it might never be. However, it is affecting his hearing of course. Two weeks ago there wasn’t any fluid at his ear recheck with the pediatrician. We have a recheck with the ENT in 6 weeks and we’ll be doing a hearing test then too. The hope is that we’ll get him through the winter w/o any more infections and then likely he’ll start having trouble next cold/flu season, so we’ll likely end up in tubes next winter…that is exactly what Lauren did…2 ear infections at 6 months and then spring came and we were good until October/November when the ear infections started and we were at the ENT and in tubes by January. The concern is if we put tubes in him now (if he keeps getting infections in the next month), they may fall out in 6 months and we’ll be putting tubes in again come winter (now, Lauren’s still hadn’t fallen out at 3 years, but that’s abnormal apparently). And our ENT told us that the ear infections and reflux go hand in hand…that when they reflux, that fluid comes up and ends up in their ears since all of those passageways are connected. So, both of my kids have fluid on their ears, both scheduled for rechecks, lovely.

She scoped Mason again (through his nose, down his throat) to check on his stridor and apparently it’s “impressive” is what she said…it’s touching his airway, all but obstructing it. She upped his dose of prevacid (doubled it to 15mg) to try to be able to get him off of the steroid (Flovent) (when I take him off the steroid, he starts choking on feedings…the steroid is helping to open the airway, but they really don’t want him on the steroid). She said if we can’t get him off of the steroid, he would be a candidate for surgery to correct the stridor (otherwise, he’d outgrow it by 3 years old or need surgery at that point). urgh. She said he also has that “allergy kid” look, just like Lauren always has, the red around the eyes, etc. She also said that she can refer us out to an occupational therapist who can work with us to give us thickeners to make his bottles more like nectar consistency so he can feel that the liquid is there instead of choking on it. So, I asked how that works with nursing and for some reason she thought I’d stopped breastfeeding him when I went back to work almost 3 months ago and I said absolutely not, he’s 100% breastfed and I thought she was going to do a dance for joy!! She said if there is anyone in this world that needs to be breastfed as long as possible, it’s Mason. She said to breastfeed him until at least a year (which is the plan anyway), and if I could do it to 18 months to get him through next winter, that would be the best. I already knew that, given Lauren’s history, but it was hard to hear that I will likely be pumping for another year. If I were a stay at home mom, it would be no big deal, but I really hate pumping. Oh well, now that a dr. has told me it’s really, really best for Mason (she stressed it I don’t know how many times including telling me if I have supply issues to go to my dr. and tell them to put me on reglan), I will do everything in my power to get him through next winter instead of until September as originally planned.

Last night he wasn’t up crying, so I’m hopeful the fluid will go away. The ENT said some people are really sensitive to the pressure from the fluid and that is likely why he was up crying, but she rechecked his ears a second time during the appt, just to make certain there was no infection. Poor baby.

I’ll say it again…if ear infections, athma, and stridors are the worst my kids have…than we’ll be just fine:)

The comment we hear almost every time we are out with Mason is “he is just the happiest baby” and that absolutely is the best way to describe him!! The girl that took care of him in the gym last Saturday came out to tell me that he is now her new favorite baby and she absolutely loves him and he’s the happiest baby she’s ever seen. I loved hearing it of course and told her he’d be back on Sunday and she asked when and I told her what time and she was like “oh good!!! I’ll be here!! I’m so excited!!”. How lucky are we?? Here’s an update on Mason at 5 months.

sleep - pretty much the same. He goes to sleep around 8:30/9pm and gets up to eat once sometime around 3am-6am and then is back down (very easily, we’re usually awake less than 10 mins) until 7:30ish. Naps the same…catnaps throughout the day (30mins - 1 hour) with one long nap at some point (2-3 hours). Still swaddled. Starts off with the paci, but usually spits it out once he’s asleep and might cry once during the night to get it back. When he wakes up from nap or in the morning, I usually hear him talking to himself, looking at his mobile, totally content.

teeth - he has his 2 bottom teeth and they are very evident when he smiles, they’re so cute! (he got them at 4.5 months) Miss Lauren (his daycare lady) thought he was teething and working on his top ones last week, but so far we don’t feel any bumps or anything.

sitting - he is now fully sitting up right, all on his own! He still topples over time to time, but it doesn’t seem to bother him, even he bonks his head a bit on the floor or something, not much ever bothers him! He rarely sits though, he’d prefer to be on his tummy.
Sitting and looking at his penguin (Lauren always runs to be in the pics too!lol):

crawling - Mason started army crawling at 4.5 months!!! Yikes!! Lauren started crawling at 9 months and never army crawled, so I totally wasn’t expecting it! He can zoom across the room pretty quick, too! It’s cute watching him do it, he pulls with his arms and pushes with his feet, spins one foot out to the side to spin around to go a different direction. It’s like he is doing everything he can to just move, so crazy! And we’ve learned to do a quick scan of the room before putting him down because he’ll make a beeline for Lauren’s drawings to rip them up or for her stuffed animals to chew on them (which she claims makes them not soft so she won’t let him touch them!), etc. He will happily play on the floor in the great room or in our bedroom or bathroom for a really long time with just a few toys spread out. So very different than Miss Lauren who didn’t move and wanted the 1×1 time with us, in our arms! Mason can get his knees under him and can also fully push up on his arms, but hasn’t figured out how to do it all at once to crawl the normal way, but we know it’s really not going to be long.

eating - Mason is still on 100% breastmilk (yea!) and eats every 2-3 hours. We had kind of backed off on the cereal because he really wasn’t interested. We tried again the day after he turned 5 months and now he LOVES to eat! Weird! So far he’s had rice cereal and oatmeal cereal. He’s also had mashed up banana’s and loved them, go figure! Well, and bites of my ice cream cone a few days ago, which of course, he loved! Three days ago we started carrots and he always makes faces, but keeps opening his mouth wanting more and grunts at us if we don’t keep feeding him! He’s doing so well, that last night, I gave him a bowl of oatmeal, a 1/3 jar of carrots (small jar), and a 1/3 jar of banana’s and he gobbled it all right up! He acted like he wanted more, but we figured it was enough since it was the first time he’d ate that much in one sitting! We gave Miss Lauren the go ahead to start cereal in the mornings today. Likely we’ll get him on a schedule where he has cereal and fruit in the morning and cereal, fruit, and veggie at night. At his 6 month well baby visit, we’ll talk to the dr. about adding lunch and meats. We’re just starting slowly as they recommend, give him one new food for 3 days to make sure there isn’t an allergic reaction and then move on to the next. It seems like he’s going to be a really good eater!
Lauren feeding him bananas:

we finally brought out the highchair…love his little faces when he eats, yet he wants more!

personality - As I said, Mason is just so happy all of the time! Huge smiles for anyone he can get to look at him! It’s funny because he will sit and stare at Billy until he looks at him and then gives him the biggest smile you’ve ever seen!! He absolutely adores Lauren and every time he sees her, he gets so excited with huge smiles and kicking his arms and legs! They “play” together all the time…she’s usually rolling him up in a “burrito”, pretending she’s the teacher and it’s nap time…her very favorite game to play. He has also learned how to get our attention and make us laugh with this grunt he does…I pick him up from daycare first and then we go get Lauren and all the way home, he’ll grunt at her and she’ll look at him and giggle while he’s smiling huge and then go back to watching tv, and then he’ll grunt again…and repeat over and over on the 5 min drive home! He also spends a lot of time blowing raspberries I think to entertain himself or to make us laugh. And he is totally ticklish, laughs out loud anytime you tickle his neck, arms, legs, back, belly, etc!
Such a happy baby!

size - he can still wear his 3-6 month clothes ok, and 6-12 are just fine too.

hair - it is almost completely gone except for his mohawk! A ton of new growth has come in too, but the mohawk is what you see! And it’s almost like a “combover mohawk” because the hair in the front half is gone, but the hair from the back half comes to the front, if that makes sense. Lauren prefers when we put a clippy in it and give him a ponytail on the top of his head, like Pebbles…of course we don’t leave the house that way, Billy would never allow it!lol
You can see the mohawk pretty good here:

And here is his pebbles ‘do (and you can see all of Lauren’s dolls put down for nap in the background, there are always dolls/animals all over our house this way…good thing grammy has quilted a million blankets for her!):

eyes - still blue and we do think they have actually gotten even more blue (but still a gray blue kind of color, very cool!). We are hesitant to say it, but it appears he may have dark hair and blue eyes! gorgeous!
Here’s a picture Lauren took of Mason in the new hat grammy knitted for him, love his eyes in this pic!

firsts - Mason is now sitting in a highchair at restaurants (if he’s awake, otherwise he stays in the infant carrier). Billy is now giving Mason his bath upstairs in his baby tub on the floor in the master bath while Lauren takes her bath (in our big jacuzzi tub of course!) and I think the kids like being together for baths…it won’t be too long until they can take baths together! We’ll see how that goes, Lauren likes her space to “swim”! We took Mason swimming for the first time last weekend and he really seemed to like it! Of course, there isn’t much this kid doesn’t like (except when you mess with his nose…don’t try to suction it or wipe it, he freaks!). He stayed in the water with us for about 45 mins and would even hold onto the side and we could let go and he’d just hang there! Lauren took lessons at 6 months and so we did some of that stuff with him and even took him under water a few times and not a single tear! I’m not sure he *liked* it, but he didn’t hate it either! (for the record, Lauren *hated* it!…she just let Billy take her under water for the first time last weekend!) Here’s a few pics!


and not to leave out Lauren (and yes, yellow is still her favorite color, and she is over the moon about her yellow tutu swim suit!):

We are so blessed to have such great kids!!

1. Took Lauren for her post-surgery follow-up appt with her ENT yesterday. Her ear has healed, but she has fluid on her ears. The ENT is hopeful that it’s because she had a cold last week, but we have to wait and see. What are we waiting for you ask? To see if she needs tubes, again (she had them put in at 15 months after a ton of ear infections, and then at the 3 year mark, 1 had fallen out on its own, the other was removed surgically in Nov09). We have a follow-up appt in 4 months to check on them unless she complains of hearing loss or pain. Poor kid.

2. Mason had an awful day at daycare yesterday, he was crying on and off all day which is so unlike him. He wouldn’t eat very well last night and slept horribly last night. Crying on/off, snacking all night, sleeping with me most of the night, running a fever in the middle of the night and gave him Tylenol (all of this we were attributing to teething). Seemed in good spirits this morning and took him to daycare. Left my office 10 mins from his daycare at 11, had just got to my client 40 mins away when I got a call from Ms. Lauren (Mason’s daycare lady) that she thinks he’s actually sick because he now had a runny nose and was sneezing a lot (neither at home this morning) and she was worried its his ears. Duh, his ears. All those ear infections with Lauren and the not wanting to lay down to eat or sleep and it hadn’t even occurred to me with him, probably bc he hadn’t really run a fever, she always had a high fever. So, I left said client, drove 40 mins to pick him up, took him to the dr. and sure enough, an ear infection. Definitely in his left ear, not sure about the right because there was a little ear wax in the way, but she didn’t want to bother him to take it out since we were going to start antibiotics and ear numbing drops anyway. Poor guy. Our ENT told us if babies have an ear infection by 6 months, 90% likelihood they’ll end up getting tubes. Maybe we can get a 2 for 1 this year?

Just a quick update of Mason at 4.5 months, I’ll likely come back and add more today as I think of it!

sleep - the 4 month mark started off rough when we transitioned him to his crib and tried not to swaddle him. We quickly learned he wasn’t ready and instead put him in a SwaddleMe blanket and except for the few times we have to go give him his paci back a night, he sleeps from about 8:45 - 5/6am, eats, and then sleeps again until 7/8am. He still naps between every feeding but takes one long 2-3 hour nap in the afternoon and we are very thankful it is at the same time Lauren naps! Sometimes he’ll lay in his bed and go to sleep on his own, other times he falls asleep on me before I get him there!

teeth - Mason’s bottom right tooth broke through right at 4.5 months and the left one is right behind it. He had a rough day yesterday and last night as it’s really bothering him and it’s also causing a little fever and runny nose. I can’t believe he has a tooth already! Lauren got her bottom teeth at 6.5 months!

sitting - He is doing really well at sitting on his own. He can be sitting with his arms down in a tripod of sorts, but then use his strong little abs to pull himself up to sitting up straight. He still topples now and then though.

moving - And the reason he really doesn’t like sitting, is because he prefers his belly (so unlike his sister!). If you lay him down on his back, he’s immediately over on his belly. It makes diaper changes and changing his clothes a huge challenge! I’ve learned how to dress him while on his belly really well! Either that or I have him sit on my lap. And of course he’s not crawling yet, but he gets to where he wants to go no problem. He either rolls to get there (yesterday he rolled 1/2 the length of his room to go check out the vent that caught his eye!), or he does an army crawl of sorts and just pulls himself with his arms and pushes a bit with his feet. He is crazy strong! And when we lay him down, we look again a minute later and he is nowhere close to where we left him! Miss Lauren (his daycare lady) says he’ll be crawling at 6 months for sure! yikes! I guess we’ll see!

eating - Mason is still on 100% breastmilk and is eating every 2-3 hours when he’s with me. He eats every 3 hours at daycare and takes 5oz. bottles. We started him on rice cereal mixed with breastmilk at 4 months (per pediatrician recommendation) and he really doesn’t like it. After a week we moved onto oatmeal and he’ll tolerate that better and eat it all, but he’s not happy about it while doing it! I’ve tried warming it up, tried it cold, it doesn’t seem to matter. I think part of it is that he doesn’t like to be confined to sitting in the bumbo for the 5 mins it would take him to eat, he wants to move! In a few weeks, we’ll start introducing veggies and see how he does. He was holding his bottle really well at 3.5 months when my mom watched him for a week, but I’m not sure how long he’d been doing it since he doesn’t get bottles at home.

likes - He loves to play in his exersaucer and jumperoo and is always entertained anytime Lauren is in the room. She always gets the biggest smiles from him! He’ll lay on his blanket and play with toys for quite awhile too. We have two bouncy seats, one expensive one with music, movement, etc. and one really cheap one upstairs that just has a bar on it with 3 toys hanging down. Every since he was born, he prefers the cheap one. So weird. He’ll usually sit in that for 30 mins or better while I get ready in the morning. He can spot a tv from a mile away and will watch it. yikes. He’s definitely seen more tv than Lauren had just because he’ll watch what she’s watching, even if we try not to let him! We have a dvd player in the Pilot and even though he’s rear facing, he’ll strain his neck up and back to watch.

personality - He is totally the happiest baby. Tons and tons of smiles. He’ll smile at anyone that will look at him, or watches them smiling at them until they notice him! He loves to do that to daddy…he’ll just stare at him smiling until he notices and then when he does, Mason gives him an even bigger smile! He’s definitely a mama’s boy and whenever he actually does get upset (not very often), he really just wants me.

other firsts - In the last few weeks, he’s discovered “screaming” and thinks its hilarious to scream just to do it…it sounds like he’ll lose his voice doing it! He also started blowing raspberries about a week ago. It’s really cute, until it’s bedtime when he wants to do it to play!

size - At his 4 month well baby visit, he was 14lbs and 25″. He’s still wearing his 3-6 month clothes, but some onsies are too short on him (he’s pretty skinny, so the width is always fine). He’s also wearing 6-12 month onsies just fine (some are a bit big) and pants (but those tend to be a bit big on him still). It’s made guessing what size he’ll be this summer pretty hard!

hair - He’s lost most of his hair at this point. He has a mohawk left in the middle and a few whispy’s on the side and then a bit on the top and a bit on the bottom in the back, complete with a rat tail!lol And if you comb over the top just right, it makes him look like Hitler! If he doesn’t lose the rest of it pretty soon, he’s going to have to get his first hair cut to not make it look so scary! He has a ton of new growth in though, so he’ll never be completely bald, and it also coming in dark, yea!

eyes - They’re still blue! They aren’t a really bright blue, but a more dark, sometimes gray-blue. It really depends on what he wears and the light. There is definitely no brown in them. So we have no idea what color they are going to end up! His pediatrician says she thinks they’ll stay blue. That would be great, dark hair and blue eyes! I don’t know though…Billy has really light brown, almost hazel eyes (there is a lot of green in them), so maybe they’ll end up like his. Who knows, maybe by his first birthday we’ll know!

Mason is just growing so fast!! I love this 4-6 month old stage!