We’ve had a baby for 2 whole months! It has both flown by and I can hardly imagine life without her.
C at 2 Months
It’s been so cool to watch C wake up from her sleepy newborn self and become an alert little baby. Much like when she was in the womb, she’s about as active and wiggly as can be. Her hands are always moving and grabbing, she loves practicing standing, and her head control gets better every day.
She loves looking around, especially at lights, ceiling fans, your mouth when you’re talking, and Ben and other high-contrast things. Tummy time is fun in the morning, and she tolerates it less as the day goes on. She doesn’t mind being in the car seat as long as she’s moving, but always gets at least a little mad when we buckle her into it. She reeeally likes milk and isn’t the biggest fan of baths, except the part where we run water over her head. I pulled out her 3-month clothes early last week because she’s now too long for all her newborn stuff.
C wakes up happy most of the time and has been giving smiles freely for a couple weeks. It’s so fun to chat with her and get smiles and baby babble in return.
And then when she gets crabby, we try for a snack or a nap.
Sleep
The first thing everyone asks when you have a baby is how you’re/they’re sleeping. Having not had any other babies to compare C to, I think we got pretty lucky in this department (so far).
For the first 3 or so weeks, we would go up to bed with C pretty late – 1am or 2am, usually – due to my breastfeeding schedule. I’d sleep on the couch for a while in the evening and Jack would take baby duty if she needed anything. Sometimes she slept in the pack ‘n’ play bassinet while I slept. Others, she was up and fussy. Then, once we were upstairs, he’d usually wake up around 4 to eat, and then I’d get up with the dogs around 6:30. Once they were taken care of, I’d get her up and feed her, and then she’d usually fall back to sleep.
For the first month, she’d nap anywhere, anytime, no questions asked.
And then around 4-5 weeks, she developed opinions about sleep. As babies do. When we made the transfer upstairs after midnight, she’d often be up for a couple hours crying. She stopped napping easily. That’s when we started getting into a more normal routine. The survival mode that helped us through the first month of baby life wasn’t working anymore.
She often nursed throughout the evenings, so I thought she might be the type to accept a later bedtime. We started trying to put her to bed around 10pm, and then I would sleep on the couch till 1am or 2am to ensure a few hours of uninterrupted sleep. This worked beautifully for about 3 nights and then resulted in similar 1-2 hour crying fits as when we’d transfer upstairs after midnight.
So, we moved onto a 7pm-8pm bedtime, and that mostly works as long as she isn’t over- or under-tired.
From there, she usually wakes up once or twice a night. I feed her, and then we both go right back to sleep. I try to go up to bed around 9pm-10pm, but I still sometimes fall asleep on the couch and don’t make it upstairs till much later. Depending on when I went to bed and how tired I am, I get up around 5:45 to work out before C or the dogs need anything, or around 6:30 to take care of the dogs. C is usually up for the day between 6:30 and 7:30.
So, I’m definitely tired, but not miserably so most of the time. I’ve lost the ability to nap that was so nice to have during pregnancy, but I sleep pretty well at night.
Dogs
Everyone also kindly asks how the dogs are adjusting. I think they’ve mostly adjusted. They started off curious but cautious, and now they’re a little less of each. We’ve basically established that they can sniff C, but not lick or nudge her, and they mostly respect those boundaries.
Willis gets extremely concerned when she makes pretty much any sound. He gets anxious when she cries and comes over to make sure Jack and I have everything under control. We just got baby gates so he can’t run up to check on her during naps and early mornings. Not that he actually can check on her, and his nails on the floor are loud enough to sometimes wake her up when she’s in a lighter stage of sleep (we’ve started taking the dogs’ collars off at night for the same reason). He likes to come sniff her when she’s laying on the couch, but mostly leaves her alone.
Ben is protective of C and also very interested. It took a few weeks for him to get comfortable enough to cuddle with me while I’m holding her, but now he regularly sits curled up on my hip while I nurse her. When she sits in the Podster, he rests on the edge of it. When she’s not sitting in it, he still rests on it.
He gets a little jealous of the attention she’s getting sometimes, especially from my mom, but we try to invite him to sit with us in those instances and love on him, too, if he’ll allow it. He’s still a different, more high-maintenance dog than he was pre-seizures and pre-medication, but he’s doing a lot better than he was even a few weeks before C was born. And I love seeing how sweet he is with her.
Schedule
I’ll do a 2-month day in the life pretty soon. But as an overview, right now, C eats about every 2-3 hours during the day and is awake for 1-2 hours between naps. Most of her naps are 40-60 minutes, with one in the 1.5-2 hour range. Sometimes she naps easily in the crib, others she insists on cuddling. We try for at least one nap a day not on me or Jack, but if that isn’t happening, we respect the baby’s requests. If she’s refusing a nap and needs one, I usually take her for a walk or put her in a baby carrier/wrap around the house, and that helps her sleep.
We try to leave the house in some capacity every day, often for a walk. About once or twice a week, C and I go on an adventure or run errands with my mom. One of her grandparents watches her an evening a week while Jack and I go out to dinner. Jack had a surprise long weekend Army drill last month when my parents were out of town, and my aunts, Jack’s mom, and a friend came over on different days to help me out. We’re so lucky to have a lot of help and flexibility. Everyone wants to hang out with C.
I’m sure all this will change a hundred times. Jack goes back to work later this month. Apparently, I’m supposed to be scared of Daylight Savings Time. We’ll have to stop swaddling C once she starts rolling, which I suspect will mess with sleep.
But we’re going with the flow and figuring it out as we go. To say it’s wonderful would be a massive understatement. I love our little girl so freaking much.
Things We Use and Love
- Copper Pearl swaddles, burp cloths, crib sheets, and knotted gowns. All these are so soft. And we have found that a lot of swaddle blankets don’t have much stretch, which does not work for our wiggly baby. She needs to be able to kick and squirm without the whole thing coming undone, and these allow it (most of the time).
- Leach Co Podster. I almost took this off my registry and I’m so glad I didn’t. It’s been so nice to have a place to set C down on the couch, or put her briefly while I shower or we cook. Obviously meant for use with supervision, etc., but it has been great for us. As she’s gotten bigger, she’s less crazy about being in it, but sometimes she’ll allow it.
- 4moms breeze plus playard. I didn’t think we needed a pack ‘n’ play type thing. And then we brought C home and were like, “Where do we set her downstairs? Where do we change her so we don’t have to go up to the nursery all the time?” We have hard floors and dog hair everywhere. So, we bought this the night we brought her home. It’s where we change her most of the time, where she napped a lot for the first month, and a safe place to put her down if we need to take care of dogs or run to another room or whatever.
- Yoga Sleep Rohm Sound Machine. We have two of these. I try to remember to pack one when we go out, but more importantly, we use one at night and during any naps C takes in the bassinet. Having two helps ensure there’s always one charged and ready to go.
- Hatch Rest Night Light Sound Machine. This is the sound machine we use for C’s room, where we do her bedtime routine and some naps right now. The nursery is inconveniently the one room in our house where you can hear a good bit of noise from downstairs, but this does a good job blocking it out.
- Colugo Baby Carrier & Cozy. These have been awesome for walks, and I use the carrier around the house sometimes, too. It’s supportive and comfy, and easy to get C in and out of .
- Solly Baby Wrap. We use this around the house mostly, and it’s especially good for encouraging a nap if C is fighting it.
- Mockingbird stroller. This stroller is awesome. It’s lightweight, has good storage, opens and closes with one hand, and has adapters for different car seats.
- Wubbanubs. Pacifiers are hit or miss, but C does take them sometimes, and she really likes these. Sometimes I think the animal makes it easier for her to knock these out of her mouth than just a pacifier, but they’re cute and helps make these easier to find.
- JolyWell nightlight. I use this to nurse C in the middle of the night. Since she sleeps in the bassinet right next to me for now, I keep it on standby, so all I have to do is tap it to turn it on and then double-tap to turn it off. It lasts at least a week without charging for me, and since it’s small and portable, I’ll also use it for trips into her room once she moves into the nursery. I used to use my phone flashlight, but this is way dimmer and I try not to mess with my phone when I’m up with her in the middle of the night since I’m trying to keep us both as tired as possible.
