Lydia - 2 months

Lydia is two months old! I've always been so surprised by how much faster time seems to pass by once the baby is born. Two months before she was born still felt like a lifetime before we would meet her.

Lydia has started to smile and chuckle. She has the sweetest little smiles! She is also finding her voice, making adorable cooing and squealing sounds when she's happy. She had already found her not happy voice a long time ago. She loves to nurse, and that is still going very well. She eats every 3 - 4 hours now.

Speaking of her being happy, she's finally happy when she is awake!!! That was a LONG two months of constant crying, I tell you what. One afternoon/evening last week she was completely inconsolable. She cried for three hours straight and at the end of it she was quite upset, crying harder than I had ever heard her cry. She seemed to be in pain, or at least extreme discomfort. Ryan was holding her and could just feel the gas bubbles moving around inside her belly. He spoke to me in a very loving and sweet way (I was pretty upset myself, and my emotions were starting to get my face wet), and suggested that I try to change something with my diet. He figured the easiest thing to quickly change was for me to stop taking prenatal vitamins. It sounds weird that it would effect her, but we had found it helped Brianna and Dallin when they were nursing once I stopped taking them. I haven't taken them since then and she is a such a different little creature. I don't know if it was a coincidence or not, but I am so grateful that we reached a turning point in her demeanor. I was really struggling, and I'm so glad to know she isn't in pain anymore!

Lydia takes 3 or 4 naps every day, and they aren't the greatest, but we are managing. She likes to sleep for 20-30 minutes on her own and then, more often than not, requires me to wear her in my lillebaby to finish her nap. I will say that this morning she napped for an hour and a half all on her own!! We will see if that continues throughout the day, but I'm not holding my breath. 

At night she goes to bed around 8 PM and wakes up once, usually 4 AM, to eat and then goes back to sleep, waking around 7 AM for the day. I think she will start sleeping through the night on her own, but again, not holding my breath. Her long stretch of sleep gives me my own good 5-6 hour chunk before I have to get up with her. I won't complain about that!

She is now 9 lb 14 oz (15%). She is staying on par with our other babies - they're all little! We love this beautiful baby and are so glad she is in our family.

April Awareness

April was not too crazy! Maybe it's just that I didn't take as many photos as normal? Who knows. Anyway, here goes.

I caught Dallin being a sweet big brother. He loves Lydia so much.

Cool hair!

Brianna says she's like a lion in this picture.

Lots of time with all the kids around. Lots of time.

See? All the loves in his heart for his little sister.

Whenever Brianna holds Lydia she tells me take a picture of them together.

I like this one a lot.

Sorry if it's a little too graphic (is it really though?), but this is my life!!! Ryan had gone somewhere and I had to put all of the kids to bed by myself for the first time. This was story time. This sort of scenario is not rare. I am climbed on quite often.

We went for a walk and stopped by the pool. It's almost time for it to open!

This particular morning Ryan said, "Do something quick, like a braid." Okay. Will do! *wink wink*

Lydia won't sleep anywhere for very long unless she is strapped to my body. Exhibit A. I get a good 20-30 minutes before she's up if I put her in a bed to sleep (which I do every time hoping that things will be different). I hate that it's a habit I created but man oh man if she doesn't sleep and I can't get anything done then there is not a happy mama in this house. In fact, she is currently strapped to me after taking a 30 minute nap and I wanted her to sleep another 90 minutes. 

I might be smiling in the picture above but this one more accurately depicts my emotions about this situation.

Oh look. A crying toddler! Right after Lydia was born he started throwing tantrums over ridiculous things, such as a toddler does. I often take pictures of crying children and send them to Ryan at work so he can see what my day is like. 

Lots of crying over here in the recent months. It's been a rough one.

After preschool drop off, more than once, I had to sit in the car and nurse Lydia because she was crying super duper hard and I didn't want to make her wait another 15 minutes to get back home. Dallin was an absolute angel when that happened and would just hang out in the car with me.

One day a magical thing happened! Both Dallin and Lydia took a long nap, and neither one of them was strapped to my body! I took the opportunity to make Swig cookies while they slept. It was a great use of time!

Dallin was coloring in the kitchen while I nursed Lydia on the couch. He started whining and came over to me expressing distaste at all the marker on his skin. I laughed at him and told him he's silly, and that helped calm him down. I think it's so funny when kids get annoyed by some mischief caused by themselves.

Maya attended a birthday party for her friend, Emma. They went to The Butterfly Pavilion. I made sure to make her hair match the day!

Coyote Ridge had a fundraiser called a Fun Run. Maya ran laps around a small course to help raise money for her school. I love watching her run, but I couldn't make it to the event. Ryan was able to be there to cheer her on, which I was so grateful for!

And that is it!

As I was writing this post I realized that I was making it "real". Not covering up what life is truly like for our family sometimes. There are good and bad days, and I guess in April there was a little more bad than good with  having to adjust to life with a new baby, and that baby being #4. We are getting a hang of it, one day at a time!

Easter!

This year Easter was ..... Easter. Nothing special other than the fact that it is the holiday celebrated to remember Christ's resurrection - which is of course VERY special.

The day before Easter we took the kids to City Park to the Easter Festival and Egg Hunt put on by Antioch Church. It was pretty chilly, but the kiddos didn't complain, even in their shorts and sandals (whoops).

After the egg hunt we went to eat lunch at Al's Burgers. Yummy!!

Easter morning included the discovery of the Easter baskets left by the Easter Bunny himself! (side note...the magic died for our two oldest this year because Maya is too smart and asked....so that's cool.)

Dallin got a new book and some Hot Wheels cars. He was very excited about both!

I think the girls forgot that there was going to be a basket with goodies in the morning because Dallin had to go in their room and show them his before they came out to find their own. Maya got a new book and Hidden Figures. She admires the women in that story and had been asking for the movie for a couple of months.

Brianna also got a new book and an L.O.L. doll. 

Lydia got nothing but the gift of life one month previous.

Then of course we had the mandatory egg hunt in our backyard before church that morning. 

After church we took some photos of the kiddos. Well. We tried. It was a massive fail.

I think the best photos we got were of the three older kids enjoying this ladybug that Dallin found in the grass.

Then we added Lydia to the mix and it got even worse. By the way, this was her face for the first two months of her life. Quite a joy.

Dallin decided he had enough and was outta there!!!

This year we did not dye eggs. I'm 100% okay with that and might continue that tradition, the one of not doing it, for several more years until doing it doesn't fill me dread because of the ensuing mess. Thumbs up for as little stress as possible.

Happy Easter!