month five

well, sammy, we started this month off with a trip to meet your great grandma tung and boy did you make us proud. :) it was a 5 hour drive each way. we decided to go while you slept and you did beautifully. you were a wonderful baby while we visited as well, taking your naps while we ate dinner and lunch, as though you knew those were the most convenient times for us, and being a total sweetheart while meeting so many new family members.


















great grandma tung adored you, of course, and you seemed to really enjoy meeting her and your great aunt delores and your second cousins, shirley and michael, and shirley's husband mark. and mommy and daddy had a BLAST relaxing and visiting with everyone. they were all so kind and supportive that it was like a little vacation for us, and i think for you as well.
















































































then on the 23rd, your dad and i got another break, thanks to your grandma. she bought us massages and we went to a movie while she hung out with you. it was super nice. then we came home and got you and went out to the mall just to walk around and have some family time. it was a fantastic day.

your auntie kelsie and uncle asa have been
helping me out a lot this month, which is
immensely appreciated. they hand out with you
while i make dinner, or come grocery shopping
with me and it makes things SOOO much easier.
and besides, you love those guys!

on the 27th, your grandpa's birthday, we had a bbq. that was a lot of fun. my favorite thing in the world is when our whole family is together. i hope you grow up knowing how important family is and never taking them for granted. they are the ones who will ALWAYS be there, even when it's difficult for them to do so. you can always count on family.

by the end of august you were getting crazy nutso at night! so very wiggly, waking more, needing lots of help to get back to sleep. so on the 28th i decided to start putting you to bed in your own crib (where you were already taking naps), thinking that perhaps you were starting to feel too confined in your bassinet. in the first couple of hours after putting you in there, we had to go in 3 times to comfort you back to sleep with butt pats. but then you slept great the rest of the night, eating only twice. i don't particularly love going all the way into your room to feed you now, but i think i'm sleeping a little better, so i guess it's give and take.
august 30th was a terrible night:
...and then he of course proceeded to wake up about fifteen minutes later and cry his butt off, refusing to eat (even though i knew he was hungry) until my third attempt at getting him to do so. then when i put him back down, he woke up and decided he wasn't going back to sleep because he was just too dang happy being awake. LONG NIGHT.
august 31st at 6:50am
a couple of nights later we discovered that the pacifier does wonders to help you soothe yourself back to sleep after a slight sleep disturbance. we've been popping it in your mouth before putting you down now, and it seems to be helping no matter where you're sleeping. you also seem to be asking for the pacifier a bit more during the day now...not sure if that's related or for some other reason.
on the 1st we had our first taste of family time in almost a month. your dad and i now have wednesday through friday off together every week, and boy has that been awesome. (up until then we hadn't had a day off together since the trip to california.) we try to squeeze everything we can into those days: projects around the house, errands, cleaning, time with friends and family, shopping, etc. and we've been having a lot of fun doing it. :)
on the 7th while we were at work, i came into the room where you were having tummy time, and saw you moving your jaw up and down without any sounds, as if you were miming "mama mama mama". so i started saying mama to you as you did it, and then you starting saying it back! ok, so it's kind of a mixture of mama and baba and some other letters that i don't even think can be found in the english language.....but they're some pretty cool new babbles!
also--holy crap are you trying to crawl! you don't quite get yet that you're supposed to stay up on knees and elbows, but you can sure get around with scoots and rolls! i realized recently that sometimes you just want me to set you down so you can practice this. being set on the ground and left there sounds pretty boring to me, but apparently to you it's bunches of fun. i also realized we need to get a rug for the living room ASAP, because it's all tile down here and you need to be able to stretch your limbs on BOTH levels of the house!
that same day after work we got you a booster seat/high chair thing, and i decided to let you sit in there and play with some toys to try it out (since you're not doing food til next month...HOLY COW!). you have been enjoying that seat i think. i just put some toys on the tray and you go crazy while i do some dishes or make dinner.

on a very cool side note, pretty much all of my prepregnancy shorts and pants fit me again now. totally stoked about that.
on the 10th we did not have a good night:

decided to put sam down to bed at 6:30 since he only napped a total of 80 minutes today and seemed really tired. then HE decided he would wake up crying 30 minutes later, and then again 5 minutes after i patted him to sleep, and then AGAIN 2 minutes after i patted him to sleep a 2nd time, and is now asleep after i let him cry it out with just my hand on his back for some of the time. OY. just stay asleep you crazy, tired little dude!

Saturday at 8:25pm

BUT, the sleep book we have been waiting for finally arrived last night! we technically started it when we put you down last night, but you slept like an angel so we didn't really even need to use it! until 5 am, that is, when you decided you wanted it to be playtime...the book says (and i've SEEN YOU DO IT!) that you will wake earlier and earlier as long as we're coming to you in hopes of making playtime start earlier and earlier. so, we aren't allowed to go in to get you until 6. you were not happy about that this morning, but i know it will all work out for the best.
then for your nap at 9 this morning, we let you cry it out completely:

naptime is going well. did our little soothing routine and then put him down about twenty minutes early because the timing seemed right (didn't want him to get overtired). just kissed him and walked away. cried for about 7 minutes (him, not me! haha), and then fell asleep for about 5. woke and cried a couple more minutes, much quieter that time, and has now been asleep for about 35 minutes or so and still going strong it would appear. :)

slept an hour and a half, then woke up and just chilled in there and wiggled about. :) i think i'm going to love this, and i think it's going to make me fall in love with this baby all over again.

i'm so excited for you to become a champion sleeper! good sleep is so important for your health, and i know it will also help you in so many other areas, like mood and focus. i want to help you create a great foundation for being well-rested that will carry you through your entire life, because i frigging love you and i want to give you all the tools i can to help you live your life to its utmost potential.
great things are going to happen this month, i just know it! and next month--FOOD!
i love you, mr. baby! thank you for your patience as i figure out how to meet each of your needs.
love,
mommy

month two

samson my love,

as i write this you are actually 9 weeks old. we had lots of family visiting during week 8, so we'll chalk my lateness up to that, and i'll try not to make it a habit.

boy was month 2 a rollercoaster of excitement and stress!! i guess we'll start with the good stuff. on may 21st, at exactly 5 weeks, you woke up and decided you no longer wanted to be a blob; you were ready to go full-blown baby. i remember the exact moment i noticed it. i was feeding you, you kept your eyes wide open and just stared at EVERYTHING. and eating? that was secondary at the moment. it was like all of a sudden you noticed that there were things other than boobs, SO MANY THINGS! you do this all the time now, and sometimes it can be frustrating, when you eat at such a slow pace, if we're in a hurry, but my god how i love to watch your eyes as you soak everything in. you're like a little frog with his eyes just above the surface of the water, checking everything out from the safety of your pond.

here's the post from that day:

so samson woke up at 7 asking to be fed, but then a funny thing happened. as i tried to feed him, he decided that that was the exact moment he was going to go from blob to baby and start to be fascinated by everything he sees--the clock, my hand, a book...it's been 4 hours now since he's eaten and he just couldn't care less. he just wants to LOOK AT EVERYTHING!

he's making these adorable smiles at everything he sees. :)

May 21 at 7:57am · ·

it was around this same week that you noticed the mobile above your swing, started making coos and gurgles, and began to smile at us on purpose. what an amazing time!

every day samson is done sleeping at 7 and i am NOT. so, i grumpily get out of bed with him, wishing i could have just ONE more hour of sleep. and every day, by the time i get down the stairs with him, he has once again melted my heart to mush with his ridiculously adorable noises and facial expressions, and i think, "who needs sleep? i just want to stare at you all day."

May 25 at 7:24am · ·

got your first cold at the beginning of june. just a runny nose and a bit of a cough. it thought you handled it quite well. i tried to get you accustomed to the snot sucker by using it a lot before you ever got a cold, but it still ended up being your least favorite part of having a cold. oh well. can't win them all i guess.

got mastitis on june 2nd after i took a nap with you sleeping on me completely horizontal. luckily i caught it right away and with some work it disappeared without antibiotics thankfully.

you're becoming more of a joy every day.

there is a real live baby somewhere inside this eating/pooping/sleeping machine. he's starting to notice things like his mobile, smiling more every day, and becoming quite adept in hand-to-mouth coordination. :)

June 6 at 9:29pm · ·

had a serious growth spurt on june 8th:

holy growth spurts, batman! samson had 2 feedings twenty minutes apart from each other before bed last night. then so far this morning, has eaten at 5:30, 7, 8, and 8:45. gonna be a looooooong day...

June 8 at 9:18am · ·

on the 9th and 10th, thanks to my awesome sister and husband, i was able to get a haircut and buy a couple of new shirts and dresses. what a difference that made! i may not have all my muscle back yet, and i may be covered in vomit, but at least my hair looks nice and those vomit-covered clothes fit right!

also on the 10th i finally got around to having my midwife check how i've healed. she gave me the ok to go back to the gym (finally!) which i was able to do on the 13th thanks to awesome babysitter extraordinaire, steph. that felt AWESOME. i was a little caught off guard by how out of shape i was, but it still felt great just to be there.

well, unfortunately it can't all be peaches and gravy. (that's a saying, right?) as you become more aware, you also become more opinionated. the more things you know about, the more things you can want. but alas, you still only know one word. so, we've run into a couple of snags in the past couple of weeks. on the 15th you were crying and fussing for what seemed like hours, and for what? i had no idea. finally i realized, as i tried to comfort you, clean up, and cook three pots at once, all while a movie played and family visited, that you were just as overwhelmed and stressed out as i was. so, we went outside and sat in a chair and stared at the grass....for looong time. and it felt GREAT. you wouldn't think it would take me so long to remember to take a break once in awhile, but my brain no longer functions the way it once did, and things like that seem to be answers to cryptic puzzles that take hours to solve. yesterday was even worse. you were inconsolable for 5 straight hours (starting as soon as your dad had to leave for work, of course). the only thing that stopped your crying for more than a couple of minutes was walking around while holding you--not in your carrier, of course, because that wouldn't have hurt mommy's back enough. then, finally, as i tried desperately to feed you and get you to sleep, and you cried as i did so, it hit me--you were tired as HECK, and you did indeed want something to suck on to help you go to sleep, but you didn't want any dang MILK to come out of that something!!! so, i popped a pacifier in your mouth, (which i rarely use, hence the 5 stinking hours it took me to think of the dang thing), and you drifted right off. sure i had to hold it there the entire time, since you've had no practice with the thing and can't manage to keep it in your mouth to save your life, but you were finally happy, and that was all that mattered.

now how did i fare through this struggle? not well, i'm sorry to say. there were some shouts of frustration, and i may have kicked a wall and thrown a couple of books. that 5 hours really took a toll on me. i lost my patience so quickly, and you deserve so much better than that. i'd like to say i've learned a lesson from that event, but it hasn't yet happened again, (and i know it will eventually), so i guess we'll just have to wait and see. i'm just so grateful to have the family and friends that i do. their unwavering support is so dear to me; i can't believe how lucky i am.

last week we had a familypalooza, with your great gram, cousin taylor, uncle ryan, and aunt carlee all visiting. it was during this week i realized that seeing you being held and loved by so many people is one of the greatest joys of my life. it makes me so very happy to know you have such a great number of people who love you, care about you, and will be there for you throughout your life, to comfort you, guide you, and teach you, and each in their own particular way. you don't know how very lucky you are.

it's been an eventful 5 weeks, that's for sure. it's been such a pleasure watching you grow this month, and i can't wait to see what next month will bring.

love,

mommy