Disney on Ice

We had a great time at Disney on Ice last Sunday. Katma said that her and Aunt Amber wanted to take Tia to Disney on Ice. Luckily for us, we were able to get some comp tickets from my good friend Cherri. Tia did great for her first time in that atmosphere. She was a bit overwhelmed at first, but enjoyed most of the Disney on Ice show.

Sweet Sisters

Tia kisses Lexi every chance that she gets. It is so sweet. I told Chris that I want to continue to encourage Tia to be as loving as she can to Lexi and vise versa. I want my girls to be the best of friends through life! They are off to a great start.

Baby Pics

This is Lexi's 8 week old baby picture:

Here is Tia's 8 week old baby picture:

Here is my baby picture:

Here is Chris's baby picture:

Cradle Cap

Lexi started to get cradle cap really bad on her head. So I scrubbed with baby oil, then shampooed her hair, it seemed to have worked. Let's hope it doesn't come back. I know Tia had it forever and being new parents, we were clueless on what to do. I'd sort of try to pick at it to loosen it and we'd wash her head, but it wouldn't go away. In fact, Tia has a little bit of it right now as a matter of fact. I'm hoping since we remedied it early with Lexi - we won't have to worry about it later.

Lexi and Bath Time

I remember giving Tia a bath and she'd scream the whole time. Not Lexi, she becomes super chilled and just hangs out while I'm giving her a bath. I am able to wash her all over, scrub her head, rinse her head, and do what I need. She just looks around and acts very content! Some times, I get into the bath tub with her. Hope she continues to love bath time. Tia sure loves it!

Lexi's Sleep Habits

I know I have been complaining an awful lot about Lexi's sleeping habits. I guess we were somewhat spoiled with Tia who was sleeping more than 5 or 6 hours at a time through the night and it seemed she napped better too. Both girls had a rough start, with having jaundice and having the bili bed for their first week of life at home. Then Tia always had ear infections, while Lexi had RSV. So it hasn't been convenient to work on their sleep habits. Regardless, Tia was doing a lot better by 8 weeks than Lexi.

But I'm going to shed some light on the topic and say that although Lexi isn't a great napper during the day unless you are holding her while walking the whole time, she is turning out to be a pretty good sleeper during the night time. NO, she is not sleeping more than a few hours at a time, but once we get her to bed at night, she does great with waking up, feeding, and then right back to bed. Actually, she never even opens her eyes from 10pmish until 6pmish. So I do have to say that I appreciate that. She still makes a ton of noise, which makes us laugh. It is so hard to explain unless you've heard it. I'm going to record it one of these mornings so you can see the extent of her loudness. Honestly, she is louder than anyone I've ever heard. Not sure why all the noise, but it is still somewhat cute.

To give you an idea of her schedule during the night, here was last nights feedings:
8:30pm feed, drank 3.5 oz, went to sleep at 9:30pm after a few attempts to put her in her crib
12:30am feed, 2.5 oz, right back to sleep
3:00am feed, 4 oz, right back to sleep
5:10am feed, 5 oz, right back to sleep
7:15am feed, 4 oz, right back to sleep
When I hear her start to move around about a half an hour before she eats, I'll make the bottle and have it ready. This way, she never has to cry out when she is ready. It takes about 5 or 10 minutes to make the bottle to get it ready usually about a half an hour prior, then I am sleeping but awake enough to hear her movements and noises change from normal sleeping ones to I'm getting hungry ones, then it takes about 20 minutes to feed and change her. Then I put her down and sort of watch her sleep for at least 10 or 15 minutes to make sure she doesn't spit up. And it always takes me a while to fall asleep anyways and hard to do with all of her noises. So you can see why I don't get much sleep ;)

During the day, the girl does not want to nap. She yawns, has sleepy eyes, but just does not know how to fall asleep. I will rock her, swaddle her, put her down sleeping some times, and nothing! She wakes up the minute she knows I'm not holding her. I do my best to put her down drowsy, but not yet asleep to sleep train her, but she has nothing of it. I some times have to put her down 5 or 6 times before she'll fall asleep and then within a half an hour, she's up screaming for me to come get her...I hope this changes!!! Regardless, she is my baby doll!

Taking the Girls for a Walk

My little sister Sam has been home all week for Spring Break. Since I'm on an exercise kick I suggested we take the girls for a nightly walk this week. It has been really nice. Tia loves it and Lexi seemed so alert. Lexi's face was so cute because she wasn't sure what to think - she just stared up at me the whole time. I always think it is a shame that we don't use our strollers more, but by the time we get home from work, it is usually dark out. Since I'm not back to work yet, we can take them out sooner and enjoy the nice weather.

Lunch Out

It was nice to get out of the house today. We met Leslie and Cassandra at Big Sky Cafe. My little sister Sam joined us too. We sat outside and Lexi seemed to enjoy the breeze. We also went by Chris's work since it was in the area! All of his coworkers loved meeting and holding Lexi. It was a nice day!

Long Eyelashes

I have to firstly admit that I have always been jealous of those with long eyelashes. I have such small eyelashes that you can hardly see them. In fact they are so short they aren't long enough to use an eyelash curler. I had fake one put on once and loved loved loved them but of course they only stuck around for a few days.

Tia has the longest, most beautiful lashes and boy do I envy her. I'm so excited for her to have long eyelashes! When Lexi was born, I said 'the poor girl takes after me and has such tiny lashes', but Chris said 'but they might grow later.' I have to admit I doubted him. I'm happy to report that Lexi's lashes are growing longer. They are literally as long as mine...and I'm not joking. I am thinking they are going to grow and look like Tia's. Yay!

My Aunt Linda has super long lashes, so long that they touch the lenses in her sunglasses. I think Chris has pretty nice lashes too and I think his Aunt Linda and Aunts on the Norris side have longer lashes as well. Not sure where they get them from but I'm excited for the girls!

Tia is Growing Up

It hit me pretty hard today when we called Tia at Katma's to see how she was doing and we had a real conversation with her. I asked her how she was and she said good...I was shocked. She said Hi mommy and talked as if she was so big. She did the same with Chris too. He even said, can you count in Spanish and she said uno, dos, tres. Gosh I just can't believe how big she is getting. I love it, I really do and I can't wait for Lexi to interact that way too. I'm excited to see them interact with each other and have their own conversations.

Sleep Training

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Now that Lexi is over jaundice and RSV, she is back to being a normal baby. I've had literally no sleep for the past 7 weeks and Lexi is not a great sleeper. She literally sleeps possibly 2 to 2.5 hours at a time. This kills me because I have a hard time falling asleep as it is, then by the time I feed her, change her and get her back to bed during the middle of the night, it is only an hour or so before it is time for her to feed again. Then by the time I actually fall asleep which sometimes doesn't happen because my mind races, I don't get that good deep sleep like I used to. During the day it is the same. She doesn't sleep that great and if I put a ton of effort into getting her to fall asleep, I don't have enough time to nap when she does. Every now and then she'll go down for a 2 or 3 hour nap, but then I'm working on house chores or trying to work out.

So I downloaded the Babywise book on the Kindle (on my iPhone) and I have read it front to back literally within 24 hours. I had the book and literally gave it to a coworker last week who is having a baby. I wasn't even thinking about it until I realized this week that something has got to give with my poor baby girl Lexi. I can't blame her for being a poor sleeper, I have to blame myself for not training her to sleep better. So I'm putting a plan into action today and over the next couple weeks, I hope I can report that I have some great success with using the principles of Babywise. I used it with Tia about 80% and she is a great sleeper once she is down. So here we go with Day #1. It will be some hard work, diligence, and a high level of patience on my part - but at this point - I'm willing to try just about anything. I need to get her sleep trained before she goes to daycare next month or else she'll sleep horribly during the day which results to sleeping horrible at night which means no sleep for mommy! SO here we go!

No Sleep

One thing is certain when you have kids and that is that the parents get no sleep for the first few months. Right now I've hit my breaking point. She is almost 7 weeks old and let's say that I haven't had a solid 3 hours of straight sleep since she was born aside from when we had a night away from the kiddos. It's been taxing to say the least, but I know that this is just a phase. Plus, she's had a rough start and I will of course give her some slack there. Now that the RSV has worn off and she is back to being healthy, I am ready to get her on a routine. While on RSV, we were feeding her on demand because of her trouble eating, sleeping, breathing, etc. So it was too hard to get her on a routine, but this week, we think she has been super snacking and not eating fully when it is feeding time. Because of this, she doesn't sleep as well and she overeats, gets bloated/gassy/constipated, and then is overtired. Last night I had a melt down. I've been pretty laid back this entire time and super patient, but last night I didn't get a wink of sleep because nothing I did would get Lexi to go to bed....nothing! It was wearing on my and after the 4th hour of trying, I just was getting so frustrated. Finally after 6 hours, I got her to go to bed and I got a couple hours at best, and then all day today it was the same thing - she wouldn't sleep for anything. So I read up on what we did with Tia and I remembered the routine we got her on that worked. I know it is going to take some work, but I'm ready to get her on a regular schedule. Using the Babywise principles of feeding, wake time, nap time in that order every three hours, I'm ready to get Lexi on that regiment. Tia did well on it and I remember it did take some time, but worked great. Lexi does not sleep more than 2.5, maybe 3 hours at a time, so any improvement to get her to sleep better at night is welcomed. So today, I started her on a routine and I'm going to work hard the next couple weeks to get her accustomed to it. I know it will be an adjustment, but we need to get her off the snacking, over eating, and feeding to sleep pattern. Before I go back to work, this is a must. I will have to be 100% dedicated to her 24/7 for this to work, but I am confident, I'll have success if I can stick to the routine. She is so sweet and I just love kissing on her so much - but I will admit my frustration and sleep deprivation has made that a bit blurry the past few nights. So best of luck to me and Lexi as we start on a new routine. I wanted to start this right when she was born, but her jaundice and then RSV hindered those plans. Now that she is in the clear, we can get to it!

Pacifiers & Swaddling

As they always say all babies are very different. We've tried to follow all the things we did with Tia now with Lexi. What we are realizing are some of their differences. For one Tia loved the binkie and it was something we had to ween her off of. Lexi hates the binkie, she spits it out and acts not interested. This might change but as of now she won't use a pacifier. Tia loved being swaddled and she slept great because of it. She also wouldn't sleep without it. Lexi hates being swaddled and we've actually stopped using it for now. She is not the best sleeper so we are still trying to figure out what is best. There are a ton of other differences which is pretty cute because I know they will have their own personalities. Lexi is super loud if she cries and seems to have a higher pitched voice while Tia has a more deeper tone but not as low as mine.

Manners

One thing we try to do with Tia is instill good manners. I believe in the please and thank you's as much as possible. I knew Chris and I wouldn't have a problem because we do it naturally. Never would I have guessed that Tia would do an amazing job. She says thank you every time and you're welcome. She says please and bless you. It is awesome! Lately I've been trying to get her to say excuse me when she wants to get by you or instead of pushing you out of the way. She's been doing pretty good. Also saying excuse me when she toots. All in all I'm happy with Tia's manners, for being two she has better manners than most ten year olds. She's a sweetheart so I knew she'd have good manners too. She is a sponge so we do have to watch what we say! She repeats everything! Ha

Babymoon

Chris and I were fortunate to go on a baby moon this weekend. It was something I had been hoping to do since before Lexi was born. My coworkers got together and surprised me with enough cash to stay the night someplace and so that gave me the perfect reason to plan a night away from the kiddos. I knew that Hidden Lake Winery had cabins so I thought how perfect. I invited some close friends and we all booked cabins and planned for a fun couple days. The scenery was beautiful and the weather was perfect. We were able to sit outside and have lots of wine. I forgot that my tolerance level is so low and drank like I did before I was pregnant. It wasn't the best idea, but it made for some entertaining comments at dinner from Angelina, my alter ego. It was so fun. Chris and I enjoyed the cabin which had a double jacuzzi tub and a very romantic atmosphere. This morning, we had brunch and then headed for home. I couldn't have asked for a better baby moon. All I have to say is that I'm super blessed with the best of friends who I can be silly with and of course drama free.

Chris's mom and sister were willing to watch the girls for us. They stayed over and took care of our babies while we were away. It was nice having the comfort of knowing they were well taken care of. I think Tia had a blast with her Aunt Amber and Meemaw. She cried when the left today. Lexi didn't let Meemaw sleep that much, but I'm sure she made up for it with being super cuddly and kissable. So thanks Mom Kathi and Amber for watching the girls - it meant a lot to us!

Lexi is Doing Better

I took Lexi to the Doc today for a week check-up after being hospitalized for RSV. Doc was super happy and saying she looks great, sounds great, and doing much better. She said she would say she is 100% better but to be safe, she is going to say she is 90% and we take another week or so for precaution. So she'll still have her heart/breathing monitor for a week or two just to make sure she is doing great still and then she'll be all better. They weighed her with her PJ outfit on just to get an estimate and she weighed almost 10 lbs. I was shocked. Last week, she was 8.5 lbs and just a few weeks before that she was 6 lbs. So she is getting big - yay! One thing with RSV is that babies lose their appetites and she would eat 1 or 2 oz every 1 or 2 sometimes 3 hours. It was rather exhausting, but I hated that she didn't eat much. I wanted to make sure she didn't get dehydrated and that she was getting enough fluids. On Saturday night she got her appetite back and almost seemed like she wasn't getting enough. It was great. She was eating 3 and 4 oz every 3 hours. So I can see why the recent weight gain. I am just so thankful for her recovery. I wouldn't know what I would have done if we would have lost her. I know that RSV is very common in kids, but in newborns it can be fatal. I would have blamed myself for the rest of my days. Luckily for me, she is alive and healthy. She is doing great and on her way to a 100% recovery from this awful virus. Thanks so everyone on Facebook who were cheering her on with thoughts and prayers - it made a big difference. And thanks to the Lord for giving me such a beautiful, amazing, and perfect baby girl!

Tia is Boo from Monster's Inc.

A few times now, Tia has been called Boo from Monster's Inc. and I can definitely see why. I remember at Tia's 2nd birthday party, her Aunt Amber called her Boo saying her pigtails were spot on. Then Leslie's son Kyle called her Boo saying she not only looks like her, but sounds like her too. So Tia is already a movie star! Love it!

Tia's a Great Big Sis

Tia loves her baby sister and I know she'll always be there to protect her!

Thanks St. Lukes' Maternity

My experience at St. Lukes having my babies has been wonderful. It is amazing to me how many people are involved when you are having a baby. I saw nearly 20 people i and out of our room from nurses to doctors to specialists, etc. And then there are all the people we don't see like the nursery workers and the ones who make our food. It is just great and such a blessing that all of them have such great bed side manner and have the craziest hours. Then there is the matter of what jobs they have to perform. Things I don't know if I could do like draw blood, look at areas of my body no one else has, helping you go to the bathroom, and then of course there is the matter of delivering the baby. The whole experience is great. I was so appreciative of everyone involved so I made this goodie bag that says 'I'm Here Thx 2 U!' and inside I put personalized water bottles and hand sanitizer that say 'I'm Here Thanks to You' and 'Lexi Adriana Norris' along with some chocolates. I dropped this off this week along with a thank you card. I hope they liked it!

My Diet Plan

So most of you know that I'm probably the pickiest eater you know. I don't eat fruit or veggies or really anything healthy for me. I am blessed with some good metabolism, but that hasn't been great since I hit age 30. What worked for me last time was using the Weight Watchers point system as a rule of thumb. I use an app on my phone called iWatchr and it is great for plugging in my food and it telling me how many points I have left for the day. If I have to report what I eat, you know I'll make sure I eat well. So for me, I portion size everything. It is all about convenience for me. If it is not convenient I won't do it, so if I do the leg work ahead of time then I have no excuse. For breakfast I eat a FiberOne Oats and Chocolate bar. For lunch, I tend to eat a can of campbell's soup or a turkey/cheese/wheat bread sandwich. I have some other things too like egg whites, baked potatoes, and other things. For dinner, I try to eat more chicken or eat something that has low points. For snacks, I buy wheat chex, peanut butter pretzel sandwiches, rice cakes, pretzel thins, cheese sticks, and other things that I portion size into snack bags and they are ready of me to grab and eat. It really works for me and so far so good for me. I really never have a problem not staying under my points for the day. When I go back to work, I do the same thing. I drink as much water as I can and I'm able to still eat yummy food, but just be sensible about it. So pick eaters can still diet, it just doesn't include fruits or veggies. I know first hand that part of losing weight is not just exercise, but it is the diet too. For most after age 30, you have to do both to see results!

Getting Back in Shape

On Monday, I started my diet and exercise routine. I am rather excited about it and I can't wait to see results. Of course, with babies comes the horrible body changes (all worth it, of course). I searched the net for a work out that I would not only like, but actually see results from. Last time, I bought one specifically for postpartum moms and it was mostly pilates moves. I just didn't see results and honestly, it was quite boring. I ended up having to do a three month biggest loser challenge with my friends to get the weight off. It was great because we'd meet at the park and walk together. Once I lost the weight and the challenge was over - I didn't work out since. In fact, I haven't worked out in months. I saw something called Insanity that looked like something I'd like. It doesn't use weights, it was more intense, it had a lot of track moves, and it seemed that everyone had nothing but great things to say about it. The name should tell you that it is insane workouts and it is, but that is what I need. As a former athlete and record breaking sprinter (in high school), I need something that was more intense than running at a constant speed. I'm on day four and I have to say that I love it. Yes, it is truly extremely hard, but it works. I never sweat - ever...but with this, I'm sweating just in the warm up stage. It is intense and I haven't been able to do the full workouts in its entirety, but it doesn't matter because I can feel the burn in every part of my body and I feel great with what I can do. There are 11 DVDs that range from cardio to abs to balance. I took a before picture that I'm too embarrassed to show here right now, but maybe when I'm done - I'll post a before and after picture. The Insanity workout is a 60 day program that guarantees results and I can certainly say that I'm excited about it. The hardest part for me is finding time. With Lexi, she requires about 95% of my daily attention for feeding, holding, entertaining, changing, etc. She doesn't like the swing, bouncer, playpen, boppy, or being on the ground for longer than a few minutes. I'm working on it though! So right now, she constantly wants my attention. She isn't the greatest sleeper, so she doesn't sleep for long periods of time during the day either. But I'm determined to get it in. She watched me for a portion of one this week - I had to stop the dvd a few times to pick her up or move her to a new spot, but I made it through. No excuses!