Berend: 10 Months

March 24, 2019May 25, 2019 nk3302 Comments

Berend, how are you already 10 months? This means only 2 more months until we have a one year old!

Age: 10 months on 15 March 2019
Weight: about 21 lbs 8 oz
Height: about 30 inches
Teeth: 6
Clothing Size: 12 months & 12-18 months
Diaper Size: size 3 in disposable (although we’re just trying to get through the box so we can move up to size 4) and one size in cloth
Milestones: saying “nana,” saying “dada,” saying “papa,” walking assisted by only one hand, sharing toys (handing them to us for a second or two… then taking them back), squatting while holding on, bending over to pick up a toy while holding on, clapping, responding to simple commands (“Give it to Mama, please”), signing “all done” (we think haha), giving kisses (the big open mouth kind!), climbing up and down stairs

Likes: playing with Gerrit, being carried around (he loves to be involved in everything!), putting everything in his mouth, tickles, baths, eating food, shaking noisy toys/instruments, being walked around (although we’re getting away from that), interactive books (touch-and-feel, puppet books, musical books), kicking balls, dropping toys solely so he can pick them back up or maneuver them with his feet, brushing his teeth, peek-a-boo type games, taking his socks off, balloons, blowing raspberries on people or furniture

Dislikes: being away from Mama, car rides, diaper change, clothing changes, getting his face washed

Sleep: Well, we’re down to 2 naps regularly. I thought when we dropped to two naps that his naps would lengthen, but there is never a guarantee there. He has had plenty of days with only two 30-35 minute naps, but he’s had some days with two 1+ hour naps. He’s definitely in a better mood when he takes decent naps. Night sleep is tricky. Sometimes good naps lead to better nights; other times the short nap days mean more solid sleep. We just roll with it.

In general, Berend is up every 1-2 hours at night. We occasionally get a 3-hour stretch, but most nights he’s up quite a bit. I consider it a good night if he nurses and goes back down easily. The nights that I have to keep attempting to lay him down over and over are the ones that frustrate me. On bad nights, I’ll bring him to my bed around 2am. It’s awesome if he stays in his own bed until 4am or so.

Berend gets 12-13 hours of sleep a day for the most part. A 13 hour day usually follows up a day where he only got 11.5 hours or so. He’s up for the day between 7 & 8 most days, and he’s in bed between 7:30 & 8:30 at night. Night wakings are all over the place. I don’t keep track of them as well as I did with Gerrit because there doesn’t seem to be a point. He’ll sleep longer when he’s ready. It seems like, once again, I can’t do much to get him to sleep longer or better.

Eating: I feel like nursing has picked up lately. Normally, Berend is not one for nursing during the day unless it’s right before a nap. But there were definitely a couple of weeks where he nursed almost every time I offered my boob. 9 month growth spurt? Teething? Who knows. In general, he only takes full feedings when getting ready to sleep (naps & bedtime) or when drowsy (during the night).

We’ve definitely gotten to the age where Berend is all over the place when nursing. He likes to stand and nurse, bend down to nurse, and when I try to nurse during the day… he’s popping off every few seconds to see what he’s missing out on.

Food wise? Berend continue to enjoy food! If he’s not in a good mood, a meal almost always cheers him up. I’m still not sure how much he actually eats. A fair amount ends up in his lap and on the floor, but I think he eats a good amount too. He always gets lunch and dinner, and occasionally he gets breakfast. If he doesn’t get a proper breakfast, he usually nibbles on a scone with me while I drink my coffee.

Mommy Update: Still trucking along! Some days are tough, and some days aren’t bad. This past month, Andrew went from his training squadron to his actual squadron. He still flies a couple of times a week (which means 13-14 hour days), but he has some normal days too, which is nice. Any time he goes in late, I take advantage and sleep in. Same for weekends. I’m so thankful Andrew never says a word about me sleeping in late into the mornings. He knows I need it.

My “me time” is still definitely just after the kids go to bed. I’ve been loving my work on my photo albums. I finished my 2011-2012 album, completed my pregnancy journal for Berend, and started work on my 2018 family photo album. It’s definitely not what I prefer with scrapbooking, but I’m surprised by how much I’m loving it!

Memorable Events: Before we started getting cold weather last fall, Berend was still in his infant car seat in the stroller. But we finally got some warm weather that wasn’t too windy, so we let Berend try out the main part of the stroller.

I wouldn’t say he loved it, but he did pretty well. He’d still definitely prefer to be carried.

I have been thrilled with Berend’s recent interest in books! Admittedly, he’s not very interested in books that aren’t interactive in some way, but I’ll take what I can get! He loves the “That’s Not My….” books and books with finger puppets.

We’re starting to have a bit of a naughty one here… he loves going after cords and looking right at me while he does it! He also likes to shake the floor lamp and throw clothes out of the laundry basket. Anything to get a reaction… and then he just smiles.

Berend loves brushing his teeth! For some reason, I completely wasn’t thinking when he started getting teeth… he needed to start brushing! This past month, I got him his own little toothbrush and training toothpaste, and he brushes before bedtime every night. For now, I pretty much just let him brush and play around, but I do try to get a few brushes in myself while still keeping it fun for him.

Berend also started using his walking toy! He still doesn’t love it, but he will push it around for a bit.

Here is Berend’s March photo:

Berend, I cannot believe how big you’re getting! Not just your size… I can see day after day how you are getting closer to becoming a full-fledged toddler and not my baby anymore. I’m not going to lie… it’s hard on me as your mama. I feel like once you’re walking on your own, you’ll just be off and running! I’m so in love with your love for me: the kisses, the snuggles… I wish I could just bottle it up. I love seeing your personality grow and how you fit perfectly into our family. You are just the cutest, and we love you so much, little bear!

Baby Update · Crafts · Daily living · Holiday · Parenting

Berend: 9 Months

February 18, 2019February 24, 2019 nk330Leave a comment

Can you believe we’re 3/4 of the way through Berend’s first year?? Sometimes I feel a little sad when I see photos of when he was itty bitty, but I definitely enjoy him getting to be more independent and playful.

Age: 9 months on 15 February 2019
Weight: 21 lbs 3 oz
Height: 29.88 inches
Teeth: 5
Clothing Size: 12 months & 12-18 months
Diaper Size: size 3 in disposable and one size in cloth
Milestones: soooo close to crawling (he has done one knee forward, then back down to his belly), pincer grasp, perfecting his mouth sounds (tongue clicking, popping sounds with lips, spitting), plays “peek-a-boo,” can get into sitting position from laying down (but only at night in his crib), turns pages in board books, figured out the 360 cup

Likes: being carried around, putting everything in his mouth, bouncing (in his jumperoo, in our arms, while sitting), playing with Gerrit, tickles, baths, eating food, grabbing our faces and hair, banging on toys, sleeping in bed with Mama, the laundry room, trying to pull over the garbage can, being walked around the house constantly, playing in the kitchen, touch-and-feel books, playing with the springy doorstops throughout the house, pulling his socks off in the car

So I don’t actually have a picture of Berend looking at a touch-and feel book, but this past month is when he really started noticing and enjoying the different textures. I think his favorite book is “That’s Not My Monkey;” he actually giggles when we get to the page with the monkey with the hairy eyebrows. I love it!

Dislikes: getting his diaper or clothes changed, sitting down, long drives in the car, when Mama walks away/not being able to see Mama, getting his face washed

This particular moment was Mama-is-not-picking-me-up-immediately dislike. But I’m using it to encompass all of them.

Sleep: Ah sleep… what is sleep… More of the same here, really. We’ve had really rough nights where Berend is up every 45 minutes or so, and we’ve had better nights where he’ll throw in a 3 hour stretch of sleep. He has restless nights where I have to try over and over again to lay him back down in his crib, and then he has nights where he goes back to sleep easily. On restless nights, I usually just give up around 2am and bring him to bed with me. On good nights, he’ll make it until 5am in his crib until I bring him to bed… and that’s usually just to try to keep him from trying to wake up for the day before the sun rises. And speaking of… I think Berend finally actually enjoys snuggling with me in bed. I haven’t had to get out of bed and bounce him back to sleep in weeks! Sometimes when I bring him to my bed, he’ll look around for awhile, but then he just goes to sleep. It’s great for both of us… SLEEP!

I think the earliest Berend has woken for the day is around 6:30am, and he has maybe made it until almost 8am once in awhile. I can usually count on him waking between 7 and 7:30am though. Bedtime is anywhere between 7pm and 8:30pm depending on how naps went that day. I prefer a later bedtime so that he can eat dinner with us, but his bedtime really fluctuates lately. Overall in a 24 hour period, Berend averages 12.5 hours of sleep a day, which is on the low end for a baby his age.

Naps… Berend is still definitely bouncing between 2 and 3 naps a day. I thought he was going to be solidly down to 2 naps a day by the time he was 9 months old, but he still has pretty frequent short naps. For Berend, a short nap is about 35-45 minutes long. He very rarely naps longer than 1.5 hours at a time. He often will have days with three 35-minute naps, which is tough on all of us.

One point of progress: right before 9 months, Berend started once in awhile letting me rub his back to get him back to sleep in his crib instead of picking him up and swaying with him or rocking him in the glider. I don’t think I got to this point with Gerrit until after he was 2 years old, so it is a big deal! I hope it means he’s getting to the point of being able to put himself to sleep, because this mama really needs some more sleep at night.

The hardest thing when it comes to sleep is that we can do the exact same thing every day, and we get very different results. We keep looking at wake times, trying to get the “perfect” time to attempt naps, and what works one day doesn’t work at all the next day. It’s pretty frustrating! It’s so hard to make plans when there’s no set schedule.

Eating: I’d say this is an area that I just don’t worry much about. Berend breastfeeds pretty well, although he won’t take a full feeding unless he thinks he’s going down for a nap. So I have been known to fake a 3rd nap just to get him to fully empty a breast. He would probably nurse at every night waking if I offered it, but I try to hold off on feeding him unless it’s been 90 minutes or more.

Berend continues to love food! I’m often unsure of how much he has actually eaten (I find a lot dropped in his lap and on the floor), but I don’t worry about it as much as I did with Gerrit. I’m pretty good about offering two meals a day. I usually offer lunch and dinner, and when Andrew is home he usually gets breakfast and dinner. I need to get better about offering 3 meals a day next month, I think.

Mommy Update: Just trying to roll with everything lately. Andrew’s schedule is always changing. On days he flies, I can expect him to work a 14 hour day. On days he doesn’t fly, he’ll often just go in for a few hours to prep for his next flight. On flying days, he could be gone from 6:30am-8:30pm or 11:30am-1:30am… just depends when he’s scheduled. So some days I get to sleep in, some days he’s home so I can get Gerrit to preschool without bringing Berend… and on those days I’m often on my own when trying to get dinner cooked and on the table, getting the boys bathed, and getting through bedtime routines. Sometimes it’s tough.

I have started getting back into scrapbooking though! I’ve been itching to get back into one of my hobbies, and I remembered that I had all the supplies for my Project Life/365 scrapbook. This was a project I started 7.5 years ago. I took a photo a day (more or less) for a whole year starting when we packed up to move to England back in August of 2011. So I started printing photos from that year, pulled out the supplies I had for this specific project, and started working on the scrapbook in the evenings.

Having my own project to work on again definitely helps me. I need “me time” to be in a good place. And having something specific to work on is good for my mental health. Plus it’s been so fun looking through photos from our first year in England and our first year as a married couple. It really makes me want to go back!

Memorable Events: One memorable thing from this month was combining bath times! We decided to try out giving the boys a bath at the same time after Berend turned 8 months, 1) because Berend seemed very stable sitting in the tub, and 2) because Gerrit was resisting baths. I asked Gerrit if he’d like to take a bath with Berend one night because Gerrit was starting to never want a bath (“Can I just take one tomorrow?”), and he was thrilled about it. I only bathe Berend every 3 days to avoid drying out his skin, so now Gerrit is on the same bath schedule. And for winter, that works out fine! I think Berend enjoys his bath time no matter what, but Gerrit really likes having someone else in the tub with him, I think. So bath time almost always happens after Berend’s dinner but before Gerrit’s (and our) dinner, and it’s working out just fine.

Another memorable event was our “38 weeks in, 38 weeks out” photo. If you’ll remember, here I was at about 38 week pregnant:

And here we are with Berend 38 weeks out:

I can’t believe how much has changed between those two pictures! Gosh, I miss that pregnant belly. My pregnancy was definitely less comfortable the 2nd time around, but I loved feeling my big rounded belly and those baby kicks!

Berend also celebrated his first Valentine’s Day! Nothing too eventful for him, but I did try to get some cute brother photos. I wasn’t too successful…

And here is Berend’s February photo:

Berend, gosh we love you so much! Some days are hard, and some days you are so smiley… we love you no matter what. You are such a little bear cub… you want to just wrestle and tumble around with your big brother, and you legitimately growl when you are disgruntled or excited. We love you so much, B!

Baby Update · Daily living · Holiday · Parenting · Travel

Berend: 8 Months

January 25, 2019January 25, 2019 nk3302 Comments

Happy 2019! Our new year started with illness… early on New Year’s Day, Gerrit started vomiting. We’re thinking it was a 24 hour bug, but it took him a few days to fully recover from it and get his appetite back. Right after that, he and Berend both started coughing and having a runny nose, which they passed on to me. We probably got a bug from being with family right after Christmas (several people weren’t feeling great). I always get nervous when one of my babies is sick, because there’s just not much you can do for a baby besides let a virus run its course. Thankfully, Berend didn’t seem to feel too bad.

Age: 8 months on 15 January 2019
Weight: about 21 lbs
Height: about 28.75″
Teeth: 2… with another coming soon
Clothing Size: 9-12 months and 12 months
Diaper Size: size 3 in disposable and one size in cloth
Milestones: army crawling, pulling up to standing, cruising around furniture, saying “baba,” developing his pincer grasp, standing unsupported for several seconds

Likes: being carried around, chewing on everything, playing with Gerrit, tickles, kisses, baths, eating food, grabbing peoples’ faces & hair, growling/grunting, head banging (he likes to bop his head into our heads or chests), and smooshing his face into my face

Berend wants to be involved in everything… which means he pretty much wants to be carried everywhere.

Chewing on a prize from a game at Christmas in Missouri

Berend terrorizing his big brother already.

Trying some French toast

Dislikes: getting his clothes or diaper changed, when Mama walks away, car rides, being told ‘no’, getting his sleep sack put on (he knows what comes next ha), bananas

I generally don’t take photos of Berend upset, but here’s one of us returning from our trip to Missouri. Holding his hand from the front seat helped a tiny bit.

Sleep: Fighting sleep continues! I don’t think we had any great nights this month, although Berend did have 4 days around Christmas where he slept in 2 hour stretches, and didn’t wake 5 minute after I put him back in his crib.

Berend handled sleeping in the Pack n Play pretty well while we were away from home. He didn’t sleep any worse than in his crib, but he didn’t sleep any better either.

Although Berend can’t/won’t stay asleep to save his life, he’s pretty consistent about going to sleep between 7:30 & 8:30 and waking between 7 & 7:30 for the day. Once in awhile we get an early morning, or he’ll surprise us and sleep until 8am, but he’s a pretty reliable alarm clock if you need to be up by 7:30. He sleeps roughly 12.25 hours a day.

Berend still takes 2-3 naps a day. Once in awhile we are surprised with a good nap day, and we’ll stretch his wake time so he can just have 2 naps. But most of the time he takes short naps (30-60 min) and ends up needing 3 naps. He’s getting increasingly difficult to get down for a third nap, so I suspect we’ll be dropping it completely by 9 months.

Eating: Berend continues to do well with breastfeeding. In the last 6 weeks or so, he has pretty much stopped choking during letdowns, started emptying the breast during feedings, and generally just made nursing fairly stress-free. He nurses every 2-3 hours during the day and all the time at night.

Berend continues to do well with solids too. He makes me nervous putting too much in his mouth sometimes, but he’s getting pretty good about maneuvering food around so he doesn’t gag too often. I think he still enjoys meat the most, but there’s not much he won’t eat. Sometimes it’s just hard to tell how much is actually getting consumed.

Mommy Update: I’m hanging in there! The holidays were a bit stressful, our trip to Missouri was a bit stressful… let’s just say I’m glad it’s January and things are getting back to normal.

It was really great for me to see my family after Christmas. The actual traveling to and from Missouri was not pleasant, but actually being with everyone was amazing. We all stay in touch pretty well through phone calls, texts, and social media, but nothing beats getting together as a family. I loved catching up with my sisters, playing card games with everyone, and watching Gerrit have so much fun with his cousins. It really makes me envy people who have their family nearby, and I tried to soak it all in as much as I could.

Memorable Events: It was a busy month! Berend got to see some Christmas lights at St. Bernard farms:

It was a drive through Christmas lights show, so Berend was not a fan, of course, haha. Since we were driving about 5 mph, I pulled him up into the front seat with me so we didn’t have to listen to him cry the whole time.

Berend got to experience his first matching family Christmas pajamas:

Andrew’s mom got us these, so we wore them on Christmas Eve! They were really cute, and it’s too bad the boys will outgrow them so quickly.

Berend’s first Christmas Eve… and both of my boys’ first sibling gift exchange! They got each other bath toys.

Berend also got his first Christmas Eve gift from Andrew and me: a Christmas book and new pajamas.

And then of course Berend celebrated his first Christmas!

The day after Christmas, we packed up for a road trip to Missouri. It was Berend’s first big trip since we moved to New Mexico when he was only 2 months old. He did slightly better than he did in July. We were all thrilled to be out of the car though! And then Berend got to meet a LOT of people for the first time: all of his aunts and uncles (other than his Aunt Becki), his four cousins, and one of his great grandmas.

Berend had a pretty uneventful first New Year’s Eve (we were on the road), but he sure looked cute!

Once we were back in New Mexico, we had a nice day and Berend enjoyed his first time swinging! He loved it, especially when Gerrit pushed him.

And last but not least, here is Berend’s January photo:

Berend, you are something else! The older you get, the more we see your stubborn, strong-willed personality. You are very vocal about what you don’t like and full of smiles and giggles when you’re happy. You push me to my limits with your sleep-fighting stamina, but then I see your sweet sleeping face, and all is forgiven. Everyone comments on your adorably big cheeks — they are irresistible! You constantly keep us on our toes, little bear, but we love you so very much.