2 months

Dear Sloane,
You are two months old! The last month has flown by. We've had a beautiful Spring and have spent lots of time outside. You love being outside and otherwise out and about as long as I don't make you sit in your car seat. That is still pretty much your least favorite thing. You love to be swaddled. Anytime you are grumpy (and you aren't hungry), we can fix that by wrapping you up nice and tight. The Miracle Blanket has helped us to have a happy house! You sleep in your bed at night and in your bouncy seat for most naps. You go to bed at about 8; we wake you once before we go to bed to feed you; you wake about 4:30 or 5:00 am to eat and then wake between 7:30 and 8:00 for a while in the mornings. In the last month, you've even slept all night twice... Skipping that middle of the night feeding! Hurray! 
For the most part, you do a pretty good job napping as well. You take mostly short naps in the morning and evening and one loooong nap in the afternoon.

Egan is still smitten with you.  When I lay you down on a blanket and walk away for a minute, I can usually find him laying with you when I return singing to you, talking to you, or teaching you something.  His favorites are to get you to to give him "five" or fist bumps. He also likes to give you your paci, snuggle, and kiss you.  It is so fun being the mom to you two kids.

You've grown and changed quite a bit in the last month.  You are much more alert and watch us as we walk around the room following us with your eyes and even moving your head as we pass by.  You love being held, but are also typically happy  to lay in your swing, bouncy seat or floor for short periods of time.  Unlike your brother, you don't typically mind when we change your diaper or clothes.  For the most part, you are actually pretty happy during those times!  Like Egan at this age, though, you do a lot of studying of your environment.  You aren't quick to crack a smile, but I can tell you are taking in everything that you see.

Sloane, you've only been around for two months, but it already feels like you've been in our family forever.  You really fit in perfectly and I can't imagine life without you.  I think we are all growing and learning to be a better family because of you.  We love you and look forward to our next month together.  You are such a joy.

Love,

mom

Scrub a dub dub...

… two kids in a tub.

Sloane isn't super smiley most of the time, but the other night in the bath, she thought it was about time to practice. I thought it was too sweet to pass up.

The smiles soon passed, but she was still happy to hang out in her tub for a while longer...

… and be silly.  I'm not sure what's going on here.

Egan was being silly too.  He was all smiles.

My favorite thing… two clean jammied kids ready for a story. Egan laid down next to Sloane to sing and talk to her.  Melt.

Egan's pick: "The Mixed-Up Chameleon".  One of his favorites and one of mine too.  I'm so thankful for sweet family evenings

good "clean" fun

It's been fun times here in our back yard.  I picked up some cheap shaving cream at the store the other day and brought it out of my "basket o' fun" for Egan to play with a few evenings ago.   I sprayed it on the top and down the slide and he went to town with a couple of his sand trucks.  Who knew they'd make great shaving cream trucks?!

After the shaving cream on the slide play, I made a little bubble bath for Egan to play in.  Hello fun!

Earlier in the day he hit his eye on the play area at Chick-fil-a.  It hadn't quite bruised yet, but did end up looking a bit rough the next day.  All that to say his black eye didn't come from this...

… the large stick...

… or even no hands!  Hard to believe, I know.

It was good ole' fashioned summertime fun in our back yard. 

Water, cups, bucket, bubbles.

overheard

The other day I was in the kitchen getting dinner ready when I heard Egan talking in the living room. As I peeked around the corner, this is what I saw...

What I heard was, "Sloane, this is how you do boom." (As he bumped her fist gently with his…) "Boom!"

Then he did this...

"… and this is how you do Five."  (As he opened up his hand and patted it underneath hers.)

I'm sure this won't be the last thing he teaches her… good or bad, and one reason I'm so glad she's got a big brother like him.

just capturing a sweet afternoon with my girl

a first date?!?

Meet Spencer… or as Egan calls him… "Marshall's baby".  Last week they came over to play, and while the big brothers ran like crazy guys around the house, these two observed.  Life of a second born.

it's that time of year again

Where we need to dust the sand off before going back in the house. Its a season we love here.

a caption plus keeping it real

We were spending the afternoon playing legos (egan) and just hanging out (sloane) when I grabbed my camera to capture a few shots of the scene.  I'll get to that part in a minute, but I thought I'd share a few pictures of my two sweeties.  Egan actually agreed (for once!) to let me take his picture.  I couldn't help but giggle at the sight of this first picture.  It's got to have a caption.  The expressions are so telling of our life right now.

So, even though Egan has a grubby shirt and Sloane is just wearing a onesie, the sweetness shared between these two makes my heart so happy and full.

So, back to the typical scene from our day… Sloane lounging...

While Egan built with some legos… and Bo and Maggie (that's her foot up at the top of the picture) observe.
You know… the scene about 5% of the time when everyone has his or her needs met.  The other 95%, complete chaos.

dear sloane. one month

Dear Sloane,

Today you turn one month old and you are one VERY loved baby girl. It's been a busy month, but I'll try to catch you up on everything we've done.  We welcomed you into the world on March 14, two days after your due date. You came into the world screaming nice and loud and from the first second I laid my eyes on you, you had my heart.  You are a true gift from God.  When you were a few hours old, you got to meet Egan.  He wasn't quite sure what to think about you at first, but he loves you so much and even calls you "my baby".  I love seeing the two of you try to figure each other out. Currently you don't do a lot of playing with him, but he has figured out that he can give you "five" and "boom".  He thinks that's pretty fun!  We started going and doing things with you pretty much as soon as we got home from the hospital.  When you were one week old, you went to your first movie, "Blue Like Jazz".  You slept through the whole thing.  At two weeks old, we went to the arboretum.  You've also been to a wedding, church, egg hunt, various parks, grocery stores, out to eat, multiple trips to the mall and more that I'm sure I'm forgetting.  We go and do a lot.  Thankfully you are pretty flexible.  It gets a bit tricky with you going places because you despise your carseat.  For some reason you start screaming as soon as we put you in it and only rarely stop until you are taken out.  We don't even have to buckle you in for you to start screaming. This is pretty much the only habit you have that needs to change… for everyone's sake.  You are pretty relaxed about most other things.  You do really well in the bath.  Unlike your brother at this age, you already like it!  You also don't mind having your diaper changed or clothes changed for the most part.  We are all sleeping a fair amount.  You get up around twice at night and have for the most part since you were a few days old.  We've had a few nights where we only got up once, but so far those nights are few.

You are still wearing mostly newborn clothing, but are just about out of that size. You were 7 lbs 3 oz at birth and up to 7 lbs 10 oz at your 2 week doctor appointment.  We haven't weighed you since, but I'm sure you are up quite a bit from that.  You have changed so much… I just marvel at your little budding personality every single day.  I wouldn't say you are a smiley baby just yet.  You are very much like your brother in that you like to study everything very intently.  I'm ok with that though because I know with time you will think I'm funny.  (Ok, you may never thing I'm really that funny.  I can accept that.)

Little sister, we are so thankful for you and all that you bring to our family.  Our hearts have all grown immensely since you entered the scene and as Egan says when asked what his heart beats… His response is always, "Mommy, Daddy, Baby Sloane."  It's true.

Love,

Mommy

Here's a quick comparison… Sloane at one month...

Egan at about one month…  Yep, she's belongs to this family!

the PARTAY!

Finally!  The main event!  This year for Egan's birthday party we decided to combine forces with Marshall and celebrate all together.  Their birthdays are just one day apart, after all!  Marshall and Egan both have new little siblings as well, so we needed a pretty stress free party for all their buddies.  Enter Bounce-U.  It is two rooms of crazy bouncing and sliding for all the kids.  They had a blast.
Here are the birthday boys in action.

Egan had an interesting sliding tactic.  I'm pretty sure he did it to get maximum speed.  Instead of sitting and sliding like a normal kid, he took a running and jumping start.  I'm pretty sure he didn't touch the slide till the bottom.
The little ones… We call them Playgroup 2.0… not quite old enough to really play.

Egan and Preston taking on the big slide!
This is pretty much the whole crew.  I think they were all so tired from bouncing that they actually sat still!  WIN!
This is what you get when you ask a bunch of 2 and 3 year olds to make funny faces.


Sloane slept through the ENTIRE party.  Yay for the Ergo!
TThe monster themed double birthday cake.


Success!

And don't they look thrilled with themselves?
Cake eating time!  I think Egan took maybe one bite on his own.  He's not so much for cake.
He eventually settled on a monster lolly pop.
A family picture with the three year old!
Really, he's three… not four like his fingers say.
Finally, the right number of fingers.
It was a happy day with lots of fun friends!