Gentle Giant

What a couple of months it's been!  Back in April, we got the crazy idea to put our house on the market and see what happened.  Well, what happened was we sold it very quickly and moved to Decatur.  There were days during the moving process that I thought we were insane, moving with an infant and no family in town to help.  In the end, it all got done and we couldn't be happier in our new (100 year-old) home and our new neighborhood. 

I'm obviously not doing a very good job with the blog these days.  Life is so busy right now that I just don't take the time to get out my camera or edit photos anymore.  If I get a good photo on my phone, I'll take two seconds to upload it to Facebook or Instagram (lgbrown216), so that's the best place to follow us now.  I'll keep the blog around for periodic updates, if anyone is still reading it.

Ryan had his six month appointment on Friday.  He is still our gentle giant, weighing in at 20 pounds (90th percentile) and 29 inches (off the chart).  The doctor told us that we're going to have to move him to a bigger car seat soon, which is obvious any time I try to pick that thing up to lug him around.  He is now eating baby food three times a day and absolutely loves it, save rice cereal, which we abandoned after a week.  He is starting to back off formula, and for the first time in awhile doesn't always finish his bottles.  He is thisclose to being able to sit up unassisted.  He still hates tummy time and will immediately roll over onto his back, so I'm just trusting that he will eventually learn to crawl somehow.

One of the most fun developments this week has been his new interest in Elizabeth.  She is the most adoring, attentive big sister, but until recently, the feeling didn't seem to be mutual.  Now, Ryan beams whenever he catches sight of Elizabeth, and laughs at pretty much anything she does (even things that seem more annoying than anything else).  It makes us so happy to see the two of them enjoying each other's company.

2 Months-ish

Ryan's two month appointment was actually more like a two and a half month visit since Dr. K was on vacation the week before.  Not too surprisingly, he is till at the very top of the charts for weight (98th percentile) and height (100th percentile).  Over the past two weeks or so, we have moved his bedtime back to 9pm and I think we could probably go earlier.  He sleeps until I wake him up at 8am, but since he will start going to school shortly, he will need to get up closer to 7am.  He currently eats 7-8oz five times a day, but I'm working on dropping a feeding so we have four 8oz feedings a day.  We also need to start thinking about graduating from the swaddle to the sleep sack. It took us weeks to make that transition with Elizabeth since we are so hesitant to do anything that will interfere with sleep.

Ryan has outgrown his bouncy seat and the swing, but he loves spending time on his play mat.  He spends a good amount of the day on it.  His head control is getting better but is still a work in progress.  He is very smiley and even giggles a little bit. 

Elizabeth continues to be the sweetest, most attentive big sister.  She calls Ryan "buddy" and "honey" and loves to "keep an eye on him."  As a reward for her helpfulness and great behavior, I took her out to lunch and to the Fox Theater to see Scooby Doo Live.  We had a great girls' afternoon out.

Uncle Peter and Aunt Lindsey

Peter and Lindsey were in town this weekend to meet Ryan and spend some time with Elizabeth.  It worked out well that we had beautiful weather here, which was a nice change from Philadelphia.  We spent most of the weekend eating and playing outside.





































We are encouraging Elizabeth to be more independent and do things for herself.  Although this will surely cost us some time, we hope it will free up some hands now that we have the little guy to take care of.  Elizabeth came up with her own list of chores.  Some of these she can already do herself and some will take some work, but we like the way she's thinking.

Yes, the first chore on this list is "wipe," as in her bottom.

Ryan is still doing well.  We are waiting for smiles but only see them sporadically at this point.  His days continue to consist of an eat-and-sleep routine with some playtime on his play mat.  We are spacing out his feedings a bit more now that he is eating more at each feeding.  He sleeps anywhere from five to seven hours at night.  We are working on moving his bedtime back a bit so he is in bed before 11pm. 

One Month Stats and a Mimi Visit

Ryan had his one month appointment with Dr. K this week.  Here are his stats:

Height: 23 inches (98th percentile)
Weight: 12 pounds, 15 ounces (98th percentile)
Head circumference: 14 3/4 inches (75th percentile)

As a point of reference, Elizabeth had almost the exact same stats at her four month appointment.  He's such a chunk!  The doctor noted that Ryan was off the scale when he was born and now he's back on it.  We were given the OK to stop waking him up at night for feedings.  Some nights he sleeps from 11:30pm until 5:00am and some nights he wakes up between 3:30 and 4:00am.  We're hoping that he starts sleeping for longer stretches in the next few weeks.

Mimi arrived for a visit on Thursday.  Elizabeth was up all night on Wednesday with a stomach bug (and we were up with her), so we were particularly excited to have some extra help.  We also got to go out for a date night on Saturday, something we haven't done in months.  Mimi and I went shopping for a new wardrobe for Ryan since he has already grown out of his three month clothes and needed six month sizes.  Elizabeth and Ryan both had fun spending time with Mimi.

Joint Celebration

Today was a special day not just because it was my 30something birthday, but because Ryan is one month old today.  The time is flying by!  The sleep situation has improved greatly over the past two weeks.  He doesn't wake up between feedings anymore, and a few days ago we made the executive decision to drop one of the middle-of-the-night feedings since we were having to wake up him for both.  Now, he eats at 11pm and then we let him sleep until 4am or whenever he wakes up, whichever happens first.  After eating somewhere between 3:00am and 4:00am, he sleeps until about 7:30am.  This is a vast improvement in our quality of life. 

Weak attempt to pose a one month-old

This is the picture of a baby who doesn't know that the dreaded one month appointment (complete with his first round of shots) is this Wednesday.  I've got the infant Tylenol ready to go. 

In other news this week, we clearly did not move far enough south.  We had ice and snow and were stuck in the house for three days.  I know that our friends and family up north have no sympathy for us, but this is just not part of the deal in Atlanta.  We put up with the month of August so as not to be iced/snowed in for days on end.  Elizabeth enjoyed seeing the snow, although it took longer to bundle her up to go outside than she actually spent outside.

Up this week: warmer weather and a visit from Mimi!

Three Weeks and a Performance

Ryan turned three weeks old this week and had several visitors, including Kristi, Becca and the Berardis.  I am terrible about taking photos and need to kick that into gear.  Ryan still sleeps a lot of the day and eats every three hours.  Some nights we have to wake him up for feedings and some nights he lets us know when it's time.  His internal clock is pretty accurate.  John worked from home this week so the three of us ventured out for lunch twice.  I managed to take both kids to the playground by myself on Saturday, which was exponentially more complicated than taking one child.  It took about 20 minutes to get out the door.  I quickly learned that I'm going to need to utilize the baby carrier rather than the stroller when I'm trying to chase Elizabeth around.  We'll get it down eventually.

Three weeks old

Short-lived tummy time

We spend most of the day like this

This morning, John took Elizabeth downtown to his office.  They made a stop at the amphitheater in the building.  Elizabeth took the opportunity to perform her favorite song from her favorite movie.  She's seen Frozen three times and knows every word to every song, but we hear "Let It Go" about a hundred times a day.  We are counting down the days until it comes out on DVD (March 18, in case you were wondering).  You'll need to turn up your volume for the video although Elizabeth's vocals tend to crescendo throughout the performance.

Ryan Robinson Brown

We are so excited to welcome Ryan Robinson Brown to our family!  He arrived on Thursday, January 16 at 5:05pm, at 38 weeks and one day.  Ryan is named after John's godfather, Mike Robinson.  The week he was born was a tough one - I was so huge and swollen that I could barely move, and I had stopped going in to the office because I was so uncomfortable.  On Thursday morning, at my OB appointment, my blood pressure was unusually high and the baby wasn't moving as much as he should have been during my non-stress test.  My doctor sent me over to the hospital to be monitored for a few hours and John left work just in case this was going to be the day.  By coincidence, once they hooked me up to the monitors at the hospital, I immediately began having real contractions that were just a few minutes apart.  After a few hours, my doctor decided that it was time for Baby Brown to arrive, and we happily agreed.

We knew that the baby was going to be really big and had already determined that it was best for him to arrive via C-section, so they wheeled me down to the operating room and started my epidural.  Once that was done, John joined me in his scrubs and RRB was born about twenty minutes later.  We couldn't believe our ears when the nurse announced that he was 11 pounds, 1 ounce!  We had expected a big baby but not that big.  Thank goodness for C-sections!

Ryan had a few issues immediately after being born that caused him to be admitted to the NICU.  He was "grunting" (labored breathing due to fluid in his lungs), had very low blood sugar (common with big babies with gestational diabetic moms), and he has a minor heart murmur.  The breathing sounded scary but quickly got better.  The cardiologist checked out his heart murmur and thinks it will go away by itself in a few months.  The blood sugar issue was another matter.  Although common, it's a problem that is very slow to resolve itself.  Ryan's body had to figure out how to regulate insulin production so that he didn't have too much.  He was put on a dextrose IV and his blood sugar numbers went up and down for several days.  Once they finally stabilized, he was moved to the intermediate nursery while they slowly weaned him from the dextrose.  He was finally discharged on Friday, January 24.

Now that he is home, we are having so much fun being a family of four.  Mimi and Grandpa are here to help and G. Jill and Papa Charlie will arrive in a few days.  We are lucky to have family to help out while we get adjusted to having a newborn in the house again.

Here are a few photos from Ryan's first week and a half.  He is the sweetest little guy and has the chubbiest cheeks you've ever seen.  He's a good eater, and although the first night home was a little rough, last night was much better.  We're all in love with him!

We are also lucky to have great friends who helped take care of Elizabeth for the first few days after Ryan was born.  Elizabeth had so much fun at her best friend Ella's house and loved playing with the boys at Benjamin and Carter's house, where she discovered their new Christmas present: