Asher has been with us for a month already! I would say it has flown by but honestly, I think I’ve felt every single exhausting minute of it all 😂. This stage is so hard because there is no reciprocation on his part. No purposeful smiles, even, to make it seem like he likes you-just sleeping, eating, and pooping on a constant loop with some crying thrown in. Really though, things are settling down now that we’re back into our normal routine. Philip went back to work this week and I am getting back into the swing of things with Quinn, with the added challenge of also tending to a baby. Get up; change diapers; pump while feeding Asher; make coffee; encourage Quinn to eat before the hanger sets in; load the dishwasher with pump parts from the night and morning and run it (yay for a new dishwasher 🙌🏻); activity mat/tummy time for Asher, play time with Quinn, which may or may not include a bath, depending on the day (every other day for Asher, the mood he’s in for Quinn); change and feed Asher again; put Quinn in time out for not cleaning up/being mean to the girls/yelling at me for the nineteenth time because we didn’t suppress the hanger; get a snack and try to entice the toddler; attempt to do some housework; pump again; eat breakfast/lunch; get Quinn down for a nap. All while potentially having a baby in my arms. Wake up (on the off chance I get them coordinated into a nap at the same time and I get to sleep) and repeat, substituting different chores. Fun times 😜.
I was working on tracking with Asher one day. I didn’t even notice what Quinn was doing until I saw him in the background of this pic 😂.
Quinn vs Asher at 1 month. Quinn was so bald 😂
Big brother, Spider-Man.
The outtake 😂.
One of the hardest parts of this Motherhood Take 2 is feeling a disconnect with my first baby. He’s trying really hard to find something to feel in control of and that usually entails many things he can’t be, turning him into a little volatile volcano of emotions. Having to threaten him with time out every 10 minutes and then follow through when he finally crosses the line is exhausting. For both of us. The silver lining to this emotional toll is that he is learning and seems to understand when he has behaved in a mean way. Thank goodness for the bedtime sleep snuggles that he always wants, regardless of how shitty our day has been. He becomes very chatty at bed time and will often say things like, “I wasn’t being a good boy when I did XYZ.” That opens up an opportunity to discuss the situation again and explain things to him. We’ve been struggling with getting him to brush his teeth at night. He wants me to do it but then knocks the toothbrush out of his mouth with his hand. I got so frustrated with him one night that I threw his gummy bears away and told him he’s not getting anymore until he starts letting me brush his teeth correctly. He has asked every day since but is still pulling his stunt. We’ll see how long it takes for him to stop.
Since he loves play doh so much, I found a set that lets you make teeth and has a mouth to put them in. I wanted to use this as a tool to talk about teeth brushing. He won’t let you make enough teeth to fill the mouth before he closes it and squishes them all 🙄.
One day he was insistent that he wanted to go in time out because he didn’t want to clean up. I explained that he even if he did that, he was still going to clean up when he was done. He said, “Put me in time out.” I put him in time out and 2 minutes later asked if he was ready to clean up. He said he was, got up, and cleaned up 🤦🏻♀️. I guess that was still a way to be in control. Toddlers are weird.
Another way that he has been exploring his need to make choices is with his clothes. He is constantly changing his outfit, and 95% of the time, it isn’t something I would choose 😂. So if you see him out in public at 3pm wearing mismatched pajamas, mostly likely with his shirt on backwards and possibly inside out, just know it’s a battle I won’t fight. He wore jeans to sleep in the other night and then woke up and changed into pajamas 🤦🏻♀️. We try really hard to coax him in the right direction but he refuses and I don’t care. What’s bad is how much attention babies attract, especially ones with hair, and I can’t imagine how many people notice his outfit when they’re stopping to ogle Asher 😂. I forgot how much people love to look at babies. I just hope that the past two years have made people more aware of germs and no strangers try to touch him. I have never in my life felt the need to touch someone else’s baby who I don’t know, but it happened several times when Quinn was younger. I truly don’t get it. Even some men get all gaga over Asher. Philip said he feels like being in public with a baby is comparable to being in the Jeep Wrangler club but instead of a wave from a stranger he gets like a head nod or a “Hey, how’s it going,” from other dads as they give him a look of camaraderie 😂.
It’s funny to take Asher in public though because we always take a bottle of breast milk with us, but we have pink bottles. This, for some reason, confuses people. He was literally dressed in all blue, with his blue car seat, and car seat cover, but had a pink bottle so someone remarked that “she” was very cute 😂. We don’t care about colors and the pink set of bottles was $5 cheaper than the blue set and that’s absolutely stupid so I bought the pink ones.
Before Asher was born, we took Quinn to the mall and told him he could get a toy. He chose to get a tea cart.
He got to push it through the mall since it was too big for a bag.
Tea carts double as examine tables 😉
I took my first solo trip out with both boys this week since Philip went back to work. It wasn’t too complicated getting everyone out the door, I just have to make sure Asher has either just been fed or to take a bottle with me. I’ve actually gotten him to latch on one side a few times now but it’s not going so well that I would count on feeding him straight from the breast while away from home unless I absolutely had to. We went to the center and I realized how much I miss having all my old coworker friends around during this phase. It was great when I first had Quinn and had all those other moms around to help out.
It’s nice to be able to go out without the boys but the downside is being without a baby but still looking pregnant 😂. I’m still 10 pounds from this pre pregnancy weight and 20 from my pre-Quinn pregnant weight. Ugh. I’m feeling so much better physically though. I can sleep on my stomach now, I pee a normal amount of times in a day, and my night sweats have subsided. My incision is still slightly tender but Quinn told me, “You have a boo boo on your belly but I still love you,” so I’m glad that hasn’t influenced our relationship 😂.
We had a conversation about someone else he still loves one night. It ended on a completely different track though 😂.
*Laying in bed with Q*
Q: I had fun playing with Lilly. And Kiki, too.
M: that’s good
Q: I love the real Kels. He’s at Kiki’s house.
M: Yep.
Q: and Nala’s there too
M: …..uh huh (I haven’t told him yet that Nala has been re-homed)
Q: Mimi has Dutton (that’s her puppy’s name).
M: Yep, she does.
Q: Mimi had the real Chloe but the real Chloe died (as opposed to his stuffed animal Chloe).
M: yeah, she did.
Q: why?
M: because she was really, really, really sick.
Q: I still love her though.
M: I love her, too.
Q: Mama, you rode a roller coaster before?
😂😂😂🤯
He wouldn’t stop talking. I eventually had to tell him it was time to get tired.
He’s going to miss Nala. I’m pretty sure she won’t miss him 😂.
Quinn and Dutton FaceTiming 😅
Quinn is such a good big brother. He still tells me daily that he loves Asher and marvels at his small body parts 😂. I was in the shower one day and had taken Asher into the bathroom with me in his bouncy seat. He lost his bink and was losing his mind. Quinn came in to see what was going on so I asked him to give Asher his bink. The crying stopped a few seconds later and I told Quinn what a good helper he was. He’s constantly asking me where Asher is if he doesn’t immediately see him. Granted, sometimes I’m holding him when Quinn asks 🤦🏻♀️🙄 (he definitely has inherited his father’s “husband” eyes, as I like to call them). He’ll even help feed Asher for about 7 seconds before saying he’s done 😂. He likes touching Asher’s belly when I’m dressing him. I’m not sure why he’s so enthralled with it but he asks if he can do it every chance he gets. The one thing Quinn doesn’t like is for me to turn away from him while laying in bed so that I can check on Asher. He likes for me to snuggle up to him, on my left, and Asher’s bassinet is to my right. If we’re laying down for nap and Asher starts fussing, I’ll turn to try to put his bink back in his mouth and Quinn will grab my cheek and say, “Turn your face around.” It’s annoying but endearing at the same time because I know he just wants my attention.
Giving him a kiss 🥰
He also wants my attention on the 46 times a day that he tells me to “watch,” as he throws a ball in the air over his head 🤦🏻♀️. I told him one day that it wasn’t necessary for him to tell me to watch if he could see my eyes, because that meant that I was looking at him. You know what he said back to me? “Stop looking at me!” 🙄🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
Speaking of annoying phases, W-H-Y do all toddlers go through a ‘why’ phase?? I try my best to answer him but eventually I can’t take it anymore. He gets particularly inquisitive at bed time and notices when I stop answering and will say, “I’m just gonna ask you why, why, why!” 🙄
We went to Target a few weeks ago and Quinn was feeling left out of the conversation so he kept asking me what I was doing. I eventually started making things up, saying I was mowing, flying a plane, driving a boat, etc. he would laugh and say, “No,” indignantly. When I asked how he knew, he said, “Because I can see you!” We explained what lying was and told him that’s what I’d done. We’ll see if that backfires anytime soon 😂.
Asher got to meet all of his cousins this past month. He and his big cousin, Austin, are birthday buddies, born exactly 11 years apart. Lincoln was excited to hold him because he’s the first baby he has ever held. He was three when Quinn was born and didn’t want to hold him. Haleigh and Coen fight over holding him. Asher started fussing the other day while Haleigh had him and Coen said, “Give him to me.” I said, “You’re the only teenager I know who WANTS to hold a crying baby.” 😂 We’re so lucky to have nieces and nephews who love our boys so much ❤️. They all really need to stop letting Quinn wrestle them though because he doesn’t know that not every child is okay with that 😂🤦🏻♀️. We went to our first playgroup since Quinn was 8 months old and we weren’t there for more than five minutes before Quinn tackled a child. We didn’t know that child 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️.
Eagleson cousins
Asher and his birthday buddy 🙂
Quinn being a leach on Austin 😆
Giving Haleigh the stink eye
Lincoln 🙂
Coen, the baby whisperer 😉
Kate got mad that Haleigh kept hogging Asher so she found her own baby to hold 😂😂😂 Poor Willow.
Quinn torturing Kate. She’s so good with him 🥰
Playgroup. Listening to Mimi ❤️
With his buddy, Micah.
Asher had a good time, too, obviously 😝. Poor kid is always stuck in my ridiculously long hair. I need a hair cut.
We’ve had some rough days but Asher is sleeping for about 4 hours at a time through the night, only waking up once, and I need to pump then anyway, so that makes life easier. Granted, he’s sleeping so well because he’s in our bed 😑. Our previous arrangement that included Philip tending to him half the night and me the other, ended when he went back to work. He asked a few days before he went back how long it would take before I put Asher in our bed with us and I said, “Not long!” He sleeps great with me and I need to sleep. It’s not like when Quinn was a baby and I could sleep during the day whenever he did. I fought to use the bassinet much longer with him. But once Quinn wakes up, there’s no more sleeping until nap time and they may not sleep at the same time, making my nap optional. It’s not the ideal situation but it’s working and I’m not completely exhausted this way. Another perk is that I can finally have some time for myself again. Before Asher, I was used to putting Quinn to bed around 9 and then having a few hours to myself before I went to bed. Tending to Asher from about 3am on with him waking up every 2 hours to eat and fussing in between, I had to try to sleep as soon as Quinn was down so that I could ensure at least 4 hours of sleep. I’m much more rested this way. The downside is, after snuggling with him all night, keeping my arm around him to make sure he stays on his back, and then tending to him all day, I get a little touched out. Baby snuggles are great but a break is nice, too.
I got a 20 minute nap with Quinn before Asher started fussing. I got him to sleep but then I couldn’t anymore 😩.
As if there aren’t enough things in our bed 🤦🏻♀️😂. That’s his pal, Clifford.
Quinn has been waking up during our nightly feeding/pumping sessions and coming into the living room. He fell back asleep sitting up the other night 😂.
Even though it’s been crazy, we’ve still managed to do some fun activities for the month of March, focusing on the start of spring, gardening, and the colors of the rainbow.
We searched for bugs and planted flowers and carrots in our box of lentils (dirt)
I made a rainbow theme sensory box for St. Patrick’s Day and put the letters of Quinn’s name on gold coins for him to find.
Eventually we had to get the rainbow bears and trucks involved. Quinn likes to put the bears in the ice cube tray and call it a bus and drive it around 😂.
We went on a color hunt using ‘Color Finders’ I made with cardboard and duct tape:
We made some cool shamrock art with shaving cream and food coloring.
We melted some rainbow ice cubes that were leftover from an art activity. He mostly just wanted to eat them though 🙄. They weren’t flavored.
This didn’t fit with our theme but I thought it was funny. He wanted to be a construction worker and he got out the shape roads and his drill so he could work on them 😂
I made a flower number matching game
We read the Very Hungry Caterpillar and searched for the pieces as the caterpillar ate through them in a chocolate cereal “dirt” box.
Of course, he couldn’t resist eating it 🤦🏻♀️
We got to see a real rainbow 🌈
Sometimes we just go outside and hunt for dinosaurs 🤷🏻♀️.
Sansa’s nose isn’t improving. Her appointment for a follow up isn’t until the end of the month as they’re extremely busy at the doctor’s office so I’m thinking of getting another opinion from a vet we saw for Pretzel. The one Sansa saw for this said the treatment would be a steroid whether this was an injury or a tumor and I’m curious to see if there aren’t other options. Her nose constantly scabs and then bleeds when she inevitably hits it on something. She’s always sticking her nose somewhere 🙄. The doctor gave her a steroid pill and a cream that I’m instructed to “Please apply to affected area for 5 minutes before licking off.” I read the directions to Sansa but she said no 🤷🏻♀️. How in the world they expect me to put cream on her nose and keep her from licking it is beyond me. Unless a tranquilizer is also involved, that’s not happening.
😍
Is Quinn helping walk the girls or is Philip walking the three of them? It’s hard to tell 😉.
Philip was venting the Instant Pot and Sophie got scared of the noise so she hid in Quinn’s dishwasher box “house” 😆. It’s really a jail though because that’s where he tries to put people who come to visit. And his Dad 😜.
