One Month

I can't believe a month has passed already. Time flies when you're learning to be a parent!

Charlie is one whole month old and in that month, he has changed SO much. I swear he gets bigger by the day; I'm pretty sure his hair even gets longer by the day, especially in the back. It's crazy.

One Month Stats:

Weight: about 8.5 lbs (based on our bathroom scale)

Height: about 23''

Clothing: NB size pants (because he's so darn skinny!), 0-3 & 3 month in everything else

Diapers: Pampers Swaddlers Newborn, but we'll switch to Size 1 by the end of the week since we're almost out of NB

We're still working on getting each other figured out.. well, I should say I'm trying to figure HIM out, he has me (and Daddy!) trained already! Everyday is getting better and we're finally starting to get into a little groove. He likes to throw curve balls at me though and change things up, mainly at night.

During the day, he's pretty much like clockwork this past week. It's nice, but I'm trying not to get to used to it since it could change at any time. At night is where things are always a little different. Some nights he's up every few hours, but then once in a while he'll throw a 4 or 5 hour stretch in there - which is AWESOME when it happens.

Before Charlie was born, I never understood why parents wanted to keep their baby in the bedroom with them. I had originally planned to put him in his room right off the bat. Well, that went out the window! The first 2 weeks he slept in the rock 'n play next to our bed, now he's in the pack 'n play next to our bed.

This weekend is going to be the big night. We're going to try to transition him to the crib. I won't lie, the idea makes me nervous! I have a feeling I won't get much sleep the first night he goes in his room, I'll be too anxious. He'll probably do great, I'll be the one having a rough time.

For the first few weeks I could not for the life of me get this kid to nap during the day. We're definitely getting better with that, but still working on it. He wants to be held while he sleeps during the day, so I'm trying to break him out of that habit.

I took all of his newborn size sleepers and onsies and put them aside to be packed away last week. The newborn size pants still fit him, but the one piece things are too short for him. It made me a little sad to know that he'll never fit into those clothes again, he's just growing so fast!

He's breastfeeding like a champ and things are going really well with that. I'm extremely happy that we made it this far, especially after the first week was so difficult. We introduced a bottle when he was about 2 weeks old. That has been going well from the beginning. Right now he's getting two 3oz. bottles of pumped milk per day.

Charlie has some funny facial expressions - I'm hoping for a real smile any day now, I can't wait for that! He has a pout that's bound to be trouble in years to come.

Everyday we've been doing tummy time, playing with his play mat and his seahorse. I read him several books everyday while we rock in his room. One of these days we'll make it all the way through "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" without him screaming by page 27 - I'm starting to think he doesn't like that a Nook that can't read is trying to cook ;)

His head control gets better everyday. He'll have control of that big noggin in no time!

Charlie had his first real bath when he was about 9 days old. He really seems to enjoy the warm water! I'm grateful for that, because it breaks my heart when he screams. Right now we're doing bath time every three days. That way we don't dry out his sensitive baby skin in this dry winter air. I can't wait until he's big enough to start playing with bath toys, that should be interesting!

We've been blessed with a good, healthy baby. I'm doing my best to soak up every second of time with him that I can before I have to return to work. I'm already dreading his first day at daycare - I don't think I'm going to handle the separation well. Luckily we have until March before I have to worry about that.

Everyday is a learning experience with this little guy and I'm loving it. It's been a big adjustment going from having too much spare time and sleeping whenever I felt like it to having none of that.. although we're getting better on the sleep. Either that or I'm just adjusting to the lack of sleep.

On an exciting note - my recovery went much faster than I expected. I feel great, aside from the tiredness :) AND I'm down all of my baby weight and then some. I can't wait to get the go ahead to work out so I can tone everything back up!

A few random photos from the last month...