Louis is 2 Months Old

Louis is 2 months old today! He is becoming much more fun with his frequent social smiles! His first smile was at 4 1/2 weeks and they have become more frequent ever since. Now he can be found sitting in his cradle swing and smiling at himself in the mirror above his head! He also smiled like crazy at our friend's Rob and Stephanie's baby Caroline in Maine - he is already becoming a lady's man! Lately he has been much less fussy in the evenings and even been known to smile after 4 pm! Louis has started sleeping longer stretches at night - on Christmas eve night he slept 7 hours!! I had to check on him in the middle of the night to make sure he was alive! His norm is about 4 1/2 to 5 hours in a row - and then 2 1/2 to 3 hours after that. Louis becoming stronger every day and getting pretty good at holding his head up (although he has no trunk control). He continues to disappoint his mother in that he hates his tummy time and as soon as I place him on his tummy he starts to cry. I am sure I will have a child who never learns to crawl -but what can I do? - It's not worth letting him cry on his tummy!

I am in the process of looking for day cares for Louis. The first 2 in-home day cares I ruled out right away - they seemed dirty and he would have to be in the car 2-3 times per day to pick up the school age kids. I am only working part time (4 days/week) and Mike will most likely work 4 10's and have Friday's off so day care centers are out since they only take infants full time. I have some more places to check out though! It is going to be really hard to leave him at any day care. But I just have to keep reminding myself how long the days can get staying at home all day and that a little day care with an opportunity to interact with other kids will be good for him! At least I still have one more month to enjoy with him at home!

More Random Pictures from the Month

Karen Comes to Tacoma

Karen arrived in town Monday December 15th for a visit. I picked her up at the airport Monday night and arrived home just in time to jump into bed as Louis was sleeping and I must sleep when he sleeps (at night at least!) The next morning I called Louis' doctor as I was concerned that he hadn't pooped in over 4 days. The doctor told me to bring him in so Karen, Louis and I went to my 6 week post-pardem doctors visit and then to Panera to kill some time before Louis' appointment. The doctor poked and prodded Louis before deciding that if we wanted to we could give him a suppository. He said that around one month of age it is normal for the frequency of pooping to decrease and sometimes it is dramatic. He also said that you don't want the baby to get used to a suppository and he needs to figure out how to go on his own. Karen and I were trying to keep a straight face at the thought of us giving Louis a suppository but we bought them anyway just in case we got desperate. Well, it was a good thing we DIDN'T give Louis the suppository as he had the biggest blowout I had ever seen that same evening. Of course he had to do it right as our Spicy Chicken Pizza came out of the oven. By the time I got his clothes off he had poop all over his legs, hair and face! Karen and I promptly put him in the bath tub. Let me tell you though, he was in the BEST mood all evening!!

The next day Karen and I went to the Tacoma Mall. Karen helped me find an outfit to wear for Christmas - I was bummed to find out earlier that day that none of my black pants fit anymore! We went to a Mexican Restaurant in Tacoma for lunch afterwords! When we got home the three of us watched a movie in order to work up an appetite for dinner. We went to dinner at the neighbors house who live behind us. They are from Iran and made us and awesome traditional dinner of kabobs and rice! We have gotten to know these neighbors well and they have 2 boys a 6 year old and a 1 year old and they have given Louis lots of clothes!

That night it started to snow and in the morning there was about 2 inches on the ground, but the snow had appeared to have stopped which was a relief as Karen had to leave this afternoon (Thursday). Mike, who works near the airport said that the weather was supposed to get bad again and that he was on his way home. He suggested I leave Louis at the neighbors until he could get home and I did just that. He also offered to drive Karen to the airport but it wasn't snowing here and I thought I would be fine. Well, It started snowing right before I got to the airport and it took me an hour just to get out of the airport! I was almost home (1 hr and 45 minutes later) and traffic came to a halt, in fact many cars were u-turning. I thought I would be smart and take the back roads. I realized this was an awful idea as I slid on the ice and bumped into a parked truck. There was no damage to the truck but my little Corolla just crumbled! I was so so made at myself. I dreaded making the phone call to Mike, just about as much as making the phone call to my dad after the last car accident I had about 7 years ago. Mike took it well and was glad I was okay. I had such a great time hanging out with Karen and it was great to have help with Louis (and Karen got some good mommy training in) - for someday when she had kids!

Since I didn't have car this weekend I was pretty much home bound, which is just as well as it started snowing Saturday afternoon and continued all day Sunday. We got over 6 inches of snow which is unheard of for this area. Mike, however, was in heaven and managed to make it to Crystal Mountain Saturday morning for some awesome skiing in fresh powder snow and was able to make it back home just as the snow started to fall Saturday evening.

Amber Comes to Tacoma

This past weekend we stayed around the house and prepared for Amber's visit (mainly cleaned the house). It did snow a little bit on Sunday so we loaded the baby up in the stroller and took a walk on the BPA trail! Amber arrived in Tacoma for a visit on Tuesday December 9th. We spent the afternoon catching up and making white chicken chili! Wednesday we ventured out to the SuperMall with Louis and Mike. We did a little shopping but the main reason for the trip was to take Louis' picture with Santa. They took about 10 pictures of him before finally getting one with just one eye open (better than nothing!) We ate lunch at Panera and headed home for some leftover chili for dinner and a movie. (Well, Mike and Amber watched the movie and I slept). The next day, Amber, Louis and I headed to downtown Seattle. I was a little nervous taking Louis downtown (fearing he would have a crabypants day) and also driving my stick shift on the hills of Seattle but it all worked out. We started at my favorite restaurant in the Fish Market the Soundview Cafe and then toured the rest of the market, had coffee at Caffe Darte, walked to the bookstore in Pioneer Square and then headed for home. Louis did well, and had only one breakdown - due to the fact that he insisted on being on his own feeding schedule instead of eating when I tried to feed him at lunch. Imagine that! We made it home safely and spent the evening organizing pictures for Amber's wedding album (finally!) We took a break from the pictures to go out to dinner at the Rock for pizza and beer! It was great spending the week with Amber but it was very sad to see her go. Hopefully she can come back out here with Troy in September!!

Louis is 1 Month Old

This has been a long time coming but Mike had to finish his video of Louis during his first month with Mom and Dad. Louis had his 1-month birthday on November 30th! I can't believe how fast this first month went by! His "accidental" smiles are becoming more frequent and last week I swear I got a real smile when I was talking to him! Last night while having tummy time he actually lifted his head off the floor and turned it from the right to the left - he did it while very mad though (he doesn't like his tummy time) and hasn't done it since! He is becoming more attentive to faces and sounds and starting to make eye contact which is very fun! He is also gaining some head control and likes to hold his head up when I carry him over my shoulder (but we still have to keep our hand behind his head). We had to steal Cousin Laura's idea to take a picture each month to see how fast he is growing... and Mike put together a really cute video to go along with the occasion.

Thanksgiving Weekend

We left last Tuesday to begin our journey to St. Louis for Thanksgiving! We flew into Kansas City since plane tickets were much cheaper than going directly to St. Louis. My dad and Anne met us at the gate and we drove to St. Louis arriving at 1 am!! Louis did awesome and didn't cry one time!! Wednesday morning Mike, Kate, Louis, and I met Kate's boyfriend, Jared for coffee on South Grand. It was great to finally meet Jared and yes, he is as great as Kate tells us he is : ). We got back home in time for Laura to come over with her baby Drew who is 3 months old! It is amazing to see how much babies grow in only 3 months! After Laura left my friend Elizabeth came over with her little girl, Julia, for a visit. Next we went over to Karen and Travis' house and met Jennie, Lindsey and Bryan, Emilie and John, and Katie and Jim. We ordered take out and chatted for a few hours.

Thanksgiving morning we went to church and then Louis and I went to the Orbin's and got some great pictures with Katie and Emily's babies! Around 3 pm the craziness started with my entire dad's side of the family coming over for dinner! It had been years since everyone was in the same place at the same time - Steve took all the family picture including the big one with all 31 of us! It was great to see everyone and see all of the new great grandbabies!

On Friday morning part 2 of our trip began. We drove to Kansas to visit my grandpa. Saturday morning Louis got baptized in St. Rose church in Columbus which is the same church my parents were married in! Aunt Marcia was right, as the priest forgot that he was supposed to do the baptism but my mom called him and he came right over! We had lunch afterwards and spent the afternoon hanging out with Aunt Marcia and her kids and Janet, Tyler and Crystal and their kids. Amber and Uncle Brian were at the KU football game but came by later in the evening. We were getting stir crazy in the house all day so in the afternoon we all drove to Pittsburg for some Starbucks! Sunday was very hard to say goodbye to my family - there were definitely tears involved. Kate and Anne drove us to the Kansas City Airport where we flew back to Seattle.

It was so great to have help with the baby - Louis even slept in grandma and grandpa's room on Saturday night (Mike and I complain that he makes too many noises to sleep with us and my mom didn't want him to have to sleep in the living room!) Taylor LOVED Louis and we couldn't believe her patience to hold him and sing to him - she wanted to take him home with her!! One night, I fed Louis and went right to bed. Kate and my mom then took him and gave him a bottle when he woke up and put him back to bed - I got 5 hours of sleep!!!!! Thank you family for all of your help we really appreciate it!!

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