Life As A Stay At Home Mom

Well I have been a stay at home mom for officially 7 weeks now. Although, I don't really count the first few weeks since Brett was home and we had the craziness of the holidays. Those first few weeks were tough and really flew by.  I would be lying if I said that I've loved every minute of staying home.  There have been plenty of tears and a few "what was I thinking?"s.  This job is the toughest job I have ever had. I knew going into it that I would be busy and it would be tough, but I wasn't prepared for how tough it actually is. There is no down time. There is no break. And you are constantly putting the wants of the kids before yourself. When i was working I decided when I wanted to do things and took breaks when I wanted to.  I even ate a whole meal of my OWN food. It seems if I'm not sharing my meal with the kids I'm eating their left over hot dog as my own. If I'm not running Riley to and from preschool I'm keeping Harper out of he pantry and off of tables while taking care of Cole.  On top of all the craziness Riley decided that she would start to cry every morning that I drop her off at school. We are going on 8 weeks of crying and sometimes screaming and running after me as I leave. Just now we are seeing some improvement. She will go a few days without tears and then we are right back to square one on the fourth day. It really sets the tone for how our day goes. I've learned that my hopes of having a cleaner house has gone down the drain. Maybe in a few more months when I'm a little more organized. I'm lucky if I get breakfast and lunch picked up some days!  The amount of laundry that I do seems to have tripled but I don't seem to get it done as fast. I try to do at least one load a day but that doesn't always happen. I rarely put on makeup these days. I'd rather spend my time taking a shower before Brett leaves for the day. It helps if we get out of the house once a day. This usually consists of preschool runs and then Friday play dates or trips to the library.  But really the more time I spend at home the more I enjoy it. I have noticed that things seem to run better when it is just me home during the days, but I definitely look forward to my alone time (with my pump) every evening when Brett gets home. I'm hoping by the spring I will have this whole stay at home mom thing figured out...just in time to start spending some time outdoors!

Cole Carlson: 7 weeks

I'm a little late posting Cole's one month update so 7 weeks will have to do. Cole is such a great baby and is a constant reminder that God truly knows what we need in our life. Brett and I thought we'd only have the girls but I can't imagine our life without our little boy. Although we have sacrificed a lot for our family of five there isn't anything I'd change.  I know that I always would have wondered what we'd missed out on if we didn't have our little Cole. Brett and I are so excited for our future with our girls and boy. Our experiences as parents doubled with the addition of the possibilities of football and hockey games and all that having a boy brings! So, here is what Cole has been up to these first 7 weeks of his life:

• He weighs in at 8lb 3 oz most recently. He's 20 1/2 inches long. 
• He is finally outgrowing his newborn clothes and is wearing mostly 0-3 now. 
• He still does the "newborn stretch" when he arches his back and draws his legs up when you pick him up. I can't get enough of it. 
• He is eating about 2.5-3 ounces of breast milk every few hours. Some days he's eating an ounce here and there when we are busy running around. He is the slowest eater. We tried breastfeeding but he would want to nurse for an hour or more at a time and I found it so stressful with trying to take care of the girls too. So like with the girls I'm pumping and it is working for us. 
• Up until this week he wouldn't really take any nipple other than the ones that go on the little bottles of similac formula. He will now drink from the advent bottles that we have. 
• He is sleeping pretty well. He's usually up between 2:00-3:00am. And then again between 5-5:30 am. 
• For the first 5 weeks he was only pooping every 4 days or so. Now he's pooping four (or more) times a day!
• He is smiling! And cooing! He has the cutest little smile. He loves to look at himself in his little mirror and smiles all the time. 
• He always stops to listen when I sing him songs. I like to believe that he recognizes them from when he was in the womb. 
• He had his first round of breathing treatments last week as he had a little cold. 
• He loves to be swaddled or bundled in a blanket and your arms. He is also now sleeping in his crib in his room and has been doing great. 
• He is rarely ever crying. He only cries if he wants changed, is really hungry, or has a little tummy pain. 
• His hair is lightening up some but it is still very brown. His eyes are still pretty dark but they are definitely blue. Part of me wishes that he will inherit some of my hazel genes. 

Harper Grace: 1 year 8 Months

Harper Grace is now 20 months old. She is still keeping us on our toes! She's a nice combination of sugar and a lot of spice!

• She weighs 22 pounds. She is wearing 18 month clothes and size 4 shoes. 
• Her hair is growing so fast. We can now get it in a ponytail in the back. It's still light brown. 
• Everything she does is done with great enthusiasm. She truly has a love for life!
• She loves to eat, or snack all day long. She has figured out how to open the pantry and seems to help herself to whatever she can get her hands on. She loves sweets and thinks that she should eat them for every meal. 
• She loves her big sister and copies just about everything she does...something Riley is learning isn't always so much fun. 
• She loves her little brother. She is constantly wanting to hug and "burp" him. We are constantly on the look out for her around him because she is not very gentle. 
• She is taking one afternoon nap when she doesn't fall asleep on the way home from dropping Riley off at preschool. 
• She is talking up a storm. She currently has an obsession with the word butt and thinking that everybody is stinky. She loves the word "no!" And screams it several times a day. 
• She is very hard to discipline. She thinks everything is funny and doesn't ever feel remorse. Only once when she hit her brother did she cry when put in timeout. 
• She is quite jealous of her brother. It usually only shows when I am alone with the kids and I need to feed Cole. She will often point to the swing or bed and repeat "baby" over and over trying to get me to put him down. 
• She is still sucking her fingers. I don't think she will ever give them up!
• Her favorite toys are her dolls. They never seem to have their clothes on, but she loves them. She does not like to share her toys. 

Cole Carlson Murphy

I'm way behind on my blog...mainly because this little guy: Cole Carlson. Born 12/6/12. 6 pounds and 18 inches. As good of a baby he is he sure gave me a hard time when coming into this world. Unlike the girls he took his sweet time and made me work to get him in the right position to deliver. Now that he's here we are in love.  Pictures to come...

Riley Update

Riley seems to be growing up so fast.  She seems to have really blossomed over the past four months and just seems so much older these days.  Brett attended her preschool conference (while she and I were home with a stomach bug. Yuck!).  She is doing wonderfully at school.  We couldn't be prouder.  All of our concerns at the beginning of the year seem to have washed away.  We were mostly concerned with her social skills.  At home she is loud, boisterous, and funny.  But when you get her around other people she seems to hide and shy away.  We found out the at school she is not shy at all. She plays with all of the kids.  She is a great student who listens, follows directions, raises her hand, follows the conversations, answer questions appropriately, and is overall just good. She great with rhyming, letter recognition, patterns, comprehension, writing, etc.  She still needs to work quite a bit on her number skills.  Overall, we were very happy with what we heard from her teachers. 

Harper Grace: 1 1/2 Years Old

Harper is 18 months old today.  Seems hard to believe that she's half way through this second year.  I lot has taken place over the past 6 months and she is showing us that she has quite the personality and temper!  Here's what she's up to:

• She finally had some more teeth pop through.  She has two bottom molars that have come through and two more top front teeth that have come through the skin. 
• She is officially egg free.  We've noticed that it is much easier to avoid egg than we thought.  Many things are egg free, but we're still learning what to look out for.  Seems that we really need to focus on baked goods, custards, and breakfast foods.  We went to our first buffet since the diagnosis and realized that we probably won't be doing many buffets again in the future.  Almost all breakfast foods or buffet items have some amount of egg in them.
• She's rocking a sweet mullet and hair is constantly in her face, but I refuse to cut it yet.  Soon enough she'll be in for her first hair cut.
• She is wearing 18 month clothes.  Size 4 shoes.  Size 4 diaper.
• We transitioned her to a toddler bed which has been interesting.  The last few nights she's been getting up and making her way out of her room or just crying. Like her sister, she's figured out that Daddy is the softy in the middle of the night.  Several nights in a row he found himself in her room holding her (sometimes up to 1 1/2 hours) as she slept.  Unfortunately, this has caused a couple rough nights as I've been refusing to get her out of her bed.  This is where her temper comes in.  She screams, clenches her whole body and sometimes bites down on the railing of her bed. But after night two we've made some progress and the screaming fit was much shorter!  I'm hoping we pass this stage before baby boy arrives!
• She loves to be naked.  She hates getting her diaper changed and will fight for a good minute before you can get her to lay still.  Once she has her new diaper on she's up and off to the races.
• She is talking a ton.  We've heard her say "nana, apple, kitty, up, please, help, eyelee, Mom!, Dad!, gama, cheese, wa-wa, poop, ilk..."  She calls most animals by their sounds.  She knows how to let you know what she wants and she's persistent.  We will overhear her singing sometimes and it's usually to the tune of the ABCs.  She's able to get the first few letters and then all letters that sound like "eee"
• She continues to suck her fingers.
• She continues to climb on everything.
• She loves to hug and kiss.  Lately she's been hugging everyone tight around the neck and then giving 5 or so sloppy kisses. She loves to lay on Riley.
• She loves to wrestle.
• She's been using her spoon and fork and really getting quite good at it.
• She seems to use both hands.  I'm hoping that she's right handed so that will distract her from the finger sucking!
• She loves to get out every board game we have and through the pieces everywhere.  She usually finds Candyland first and throws all of the cards on Daddy's lap.

Changes

There are a lot of changes taking place at the Murphy house:

• We've finally painted over the pink in Harper's room.  It is now cream and brown.  We have yet to add any "boy" touches other than some blue curtains that we already had. 
• Harper's crib has been turned into a toddler bed.  We took one side off and put a little side guard on it.  She has sheets, a comforter, and a pillow...all of which she wants nothing to do with.  We've had two nights in the "big girl bed."  She did pretty well the first night after about 5 trips back into her bed and Daddy sitting in her chair to make sure she didn't get out again. Then last night she spent the majority of the night in a pack in play in our room after a coughing fit that led to throw up and a promptu 1am bath.  We're hoping tonight is better than the last.
• Riley's room has two beds (bunk beds that we've separated).  She's excited for Harper to join her in her room. We've changed Riley's bedtime routine.  We are no longer reading two books, chatting in bed, and laying with her for a few minutes.  We gave her a "one week notice" that we were going to stop the long routine because baby brother would make it difficult to continue.  She took it like a champ and has done great.  Now if we can just get her to quit waking Daddy up two times a night to tuck her back into bed after a bathroom break we'll be great.
• Our deep freezer is up and running in the garage.  We're prepared to have lots of frozen breast milk and meat. :)
• Harper's closet is slowly filling up with tubs of hand-me-downs from Riley and baby boy clothes.
• We are fastly approaching my last day of work.  I'm down to three weeks with a little two day Thanksgiving day break in there. I'd be lying if I said that I was super sad to be leaving my job.  I'm very excited to be home with the kids, but also very nervous to be in charge 24/7.  Pray that baby boy fits into our crazy schedule as easily as we hope!
• The double stroller is bought and in the garage ready to go still in the box.
• My little Chevy Cobalt has been replaced by a sweet mom-mobile, Dodge Caravan.  I swore I'd never be that mom to drive a van and here I am.  I have to say that I LOVE it, though.  Lots of space and every option I could dream of.  I think I love the power doors the most and the girls love the DVD player the most.  It's a bad sign when Harper points at the screen and whines the minute she sits in her seat. 
• We've been cleaning the house like crazy.  I even bought a new vacuum which I'm in love with.  It hasn't made it's way into the closet yet.  I never thought I'de enjoy vacuuming, but when it keeps pulling up hair and dirt I just can't quit using it!
• We've been selling the girls' baby clothes, old crib bedding, and a few other random things on Craigslist. Making a little room for some boy in our house!
• Lastly, we've decided on our little boy's name.  But, we've decided to keep it to ourselves this time around.  For now, we keep letting Riley spread the news that we're naming him Ian. Although she may call her brother by the wrong name for awhile she puts on a good cover for us. :)