Baby Sullivan | Week Forty Two

Sullivan has been living his best life the past few weeks. Everything is new and ready to be discovered. Family vacation was a whirlwind of fun for him as well. I'll blog about our trip to Estes shortly but for now, I wanted to to write about week 42 of Sullivan James. 

He still is not crawling. I've been trying to work with him as much as possible. We are attempting lots of tummy time, which he still really isn't a fan of. He will sit up and play for a long time but once he's on his tummy, he fusses and whines. Poor dude. If only he knew what adventures await once he is mobile. We are going to keep at it and I know one day it will click. I just don't want him to fall behind milestone wise. Crawling is also an important step in his development. Babies that skip crawling can face issues later on and I do not want to face that. He will be 10 months old next week and I'm ready for him to start moving around. It's time. 

He spent his first night out of town with us in Estes and did such a great job. I realized when we were there that he has only ever slept in the hospital when he was born and then in his crib at home. Marin has sleepovers with the grandparents fairly often, but we haven't tried that with Sullivan yet because he still wakes up pretty early to nurse. 

He slept in a pack n' play in our room where we were staying. He was pretty wiped out by the time he went down at night and slept decently well. The first night he woke up quite a bit though. He woke when I came in to go to bed. I picked him up to change his diaper and he was pretty confused as to where he was at. He realized that he wasn't at home. It was pretty cute. The second night he slept through the night without waking. 

He ate all sorts of fun stuff on the trip. He tried pizza. He had grilled cheese sandwiches and broccoli. He tried a little bit of pie. He was living it up, that's to be sure. He has been taking less and less formula and breastmilk lately. I know a lot of that has to do with how much actual food he is consuming. 

He had his first dentist appointment this week as well. He has four teeth and three more are swiftly on the way. We are now brushing his teeth as well. We found out that he has an oversized labial frenum which is an extra piece of gum flesh that comes down between the two front teeth. Once he is older, he will probably have to have it surgically cut so it doesn't cause issues later on with spacing and gum recession. It's pretty common in kids and a lot of time it causes the infant to not be able to latch well when nursing, like a tongue or lip tie. Luckily, we have had no issues with nursing from day one and I'm super thankful. 

Here's Marin at Week Forty Two. 

Baby Sullivan | Week Forty One

Week Forty One. As of today, Sullivan is 292 days old and every day with him is a new adventure. I see a new piece of the puzzle in terms of his personality and the little boy he is becoming. I'm starting to see this little boy slowly coming to the surface. Soon he will no longer be our little baby but our little boy. I try to not think about that too much because I love the age he's at but I also know that time passes so quickly and he is growing up so quickly. 

We are not planning on having any other children so this is the last era of diapers and sleepless nights, of baby giggles and teething. In many ways, I am alright with living life beyond that season but in other ways, I am slowly starting to mourn the loss of that season. I'm soaking it in while I can. I am trying to soak in the moments when I am still nursing him, in the early morning hours or right before bed time. I can feel those moments slowly falling away. 

Sullivan has been loving all food lately. He is such a good eater and I am sure that he will pretty much eat us out of house and home when he hits the teenage years. Seriously, we will buy so much food! Just yesterday for lunch he had turkey, half of a grilled cheese sandwich, peas, carrots, and a mum mum. Good gravy. The kid loves to eat! He has been slowly taking less and less breastmilk and formula. 

He's definitely working on some more teeth. His nose has been running, his cheeks have been rosy. He's been gnawing on anything he can get his hands on and drooling like crazy. I can see three more teeth, one on the bottom and two on the top, just waiting to break through. He has his first dentist appointment next week with big sis. He has gotten teeth so much earlier than Marin ever did. 

He still is not crawling, not even a little. He is not a fan of being on his tummy. He will sit and play to is his heart's content. He will stand and lean on things for an extended period of time. But crawling, not so much. I know it will happen when he's ready but I'm ready. 

Ryan is on vacation this week and I'm excited to spend some time together as a family. Since I started my new job, I feel like our weeks move so swiftly and we don't really have any days or extended periods of time to spend together as a family. We have some fun stuff planned and I am so looking forward to it. I will still be working a bit but overall, we get some time together and it's much needed. 

Here's Marin at 41 weeks. 

Baby Sullivan | Week Forty

I spy Sully. 

 My mind hasn’t quite wrapped around the fact that in 12 weeks, give or take, we will have a one year old son on our hands. How did this happen? I was just waddling around, pregnant as can be, awaiting the arrival of Sullivan James Hollen. This time last year, we were getting new kitchen appliances. I was on a rampage to get the house ready for his arrival. We replaced some closet doors. I touched up some paint. We hung the decor in the nursery. We got a new furnace and had air conditioning installed in our home. Nesting was kind of expensive but well worth it.

Now he’s here and I can’t imagine not having him in our lives. He is a little tank of awesomeness. He could pretty much eat most of us under the table. He sleeps pretty much through the night. He’s napping like a little champ as I write these words. Most people comment on how they hardly ever hear or see him cry. He’s a pretty great baby and I am thankful to be his mama, over the moon even. For the second child, he has been very easy. Marin wasn’t really a difficult baby by any means, but Sully has been a part of a seamless transition to having a family with two children in it. With Marin, everything was so new and unknown. Nursing her was always a bit of a battle. She was such stinker with eating solids and still is. She now is a feisty preschooler that pretty much runs this home, at least as far as she’s concerned. Every child is different, that’s for sure. Both of ours have been so different but wonderful in their own unique way. They both keep us on our toes. 

I took Sully to his 9 month old appointment on Monday. Luckily, this appointment didn’t have any vaccinations to speak of and I am super thankful for that. Most of the time, Ryan is by my side for all of these appointments, along with Marin. But, now that my work schedule has changed and we don’t have a day off together as family at the moment, I had to fly solo. Marin was a great helper and Sully did a great job.

He weighs 23lbs, 1 oz. He’s super tall and his head is also large. He is in the 95th percentile and above for everything. He mostly wears 12-18 month clothing and currently is in size 4 diapers.  When Marin started potty training she was in size 4 diapers. Sully is 9 months old and is not tiny to say the least. Sully even wore his first pair of jeans this week and I can't believe how old he looks. He still isn't mobile yet but the doctor wasn't too concerned. She told me to just make sure he gets plenty of floor time and he will move when he's ready. 

His little jeans. They kill me. 

The past few weeks have been pretty nuts with a job transition but I feel like everything is slowly falling into place. Working for 3 days straight, from 7:30am-5pm, is a long set of days. But, now I have four days off of freedom. Not having to work during naptime has been a wonderful addition to our lives. I’m not glued to my phone or computer anymore. Granted, I still have to clean the house and catch up on loads of laundry, but I’m with the kids and that’s what counts. Too bad we can’t afford a house cleaner right now because that would be so awesome. Also, if someone wants to come fold and put away the mountain of laundry that continuously resides in our home, I would be grateful. 

Here’s Marin at 40 Weeks.

Baby Sullivan | Week Thirty Nine

 

This week has pretty much been super crazy. Today is the first day I’ve actually had a moment to sit down on the couch and try to not do a whole lot of anything. I started my new (old) job this week back at the dental office. I have been staring at spreadsheets and Quickbooks for days until my eyes pretty much are ready to give up all together. It’s strange being back at a place where I used to work. A lot has changed in three and a half years but at the same time, hardly anything has changed. I know only a few people from when I was there before. 

Overall though, I think I’m really going to love it. It’s a nice new challenge and I’m ready to actually know what I will be doing day in and day out. The one thing that I absolutely love about this switch is the fact that I no longer am working from home. It is so refreshing to not check my email constantly or work like a madwoman during naptime all the while praying that the children sleep just a little bit longer so I can accomplish something. Working from home was an amazing thing at one point in our lives but I’m ready to be done with all of that. I’m ready to just focus on our family when I’m home and then go to work and actually just work. Hallelujah. 

Sullivan has his 9 month appointment coming up this Monday and I’m curious to see how much the little chunk weighs now. He’s still eating great. I feel like he’s slowly wanting less breastmilk from me or the bottle. He just loves to eat solid foods and is just content as can be eating meatballs and broccoli to his heart’s content. 

We have been trying to do a lot of floor time lately because I feel like he’s a little late on the whole crawling and becoming mobile thing. I know I should eat my words because before I know it...he will be unstoppable and the baby gates will have to come out. I think part of it is because he’s not tiny by any means. I also think that being the second child, we are so focused on both kids. With Marin, it was constant encouragement to crawl, walk, talk, etc. It was just her at that point. I know I shouldn’t worry and he will move when he’s ready. 

Pumping at work is pretty much the bain of my existence at the moment. I’ve slowly been dropping pumping sessions. As of today, I will have only nursed before 7am and at bed time. We will see if I can make it through the afternoon without the insatiable desire to pump. I’m not ready to give up nursing entirely but having to pump at work or during the day just isn’t working any longer. I’m hoping I can get my body to respond to only nursing during the early morning and at night. Hopefully, I won’t lose my supply entirely. It’s such a process and since I’ve been ever so slowly getting rid of feeds, I’m hoping I don’t go all or nothing.