Micah is 3 months old!

Where has the time gone?  I can hardly believe that my baby boy is already 3 months old.

I weighed him a couple of days ago, and he was up to 16.5 pounds!  He's also really long, though I am not skilled enough to measure his length at home.  The little outfit he is in above is size 6 months, and he fills it out!  He is also filling up his size 2 diapers...I think we'll be in 3's soon.  As you can see, Micah is starting to smile!  He especially likes to smile early in the mornings.  He also gives us a giggle now and then.  Micah is much happier on his play mat and in his bouncer than he used to be.  He is grabbing the rings hanging from his bouncer, so his hand/eye coordination seems to be developing.  He also is "talking" more and more.  His big sister has been teaching him by example.  :)  It's all baby talk, but it has sounded like he has said "hey" and "momma" more than once.  Micah is sleeping a little better these days.  For about the past week, we have only been up once during the night rather than twice.  I'm still hoping he might start sleeping through the night soon.  Micah is still our "high maintenance" baby as his daddy likes to say.  :)  Despite that, we love this cute little guy like crazy!!

Even though Micah is in the title of this blog entry, I think an update on Cora Leigh is also in order.  She is beginning to warm up to her baby brother.  Now, when Micah starts to cry, she will occasionally tell him not to be upset, "it's okay"; however, most often she either covers her ears or joins in the crying!  When we are in the car, Cora likes to give me the play-by-play and let me know if Micah is trying to get upset or if he has spit up.  She will still help me burp him on occasion and really likes to help give Micah a bath.  They were in the tub together the other day, and Micah was kicking and splashing the water.  Cora thought it was hilarious!  Good to see them having fun together already.  Cora still continues to amaze me in how smart she is - she does not forget anything!  We are trying to help her learn the days of the week.  I think she's starting to understand that Sunday is church and Monday is Moe's.  Friday seems to be her favorite day to talk about.  She told me after church one Sunday that she, Hayden, and Peyton were going to the beach on Friday!  If I ever tell her that we're not doing something today, she'll tell me we're going to on Friday.  :)  We have also made some progress on potty training.  Cora is showing more interest and usually pees in the potty at least once every day.  Usually she tries several times a day.  If she isn't able to go in the potty, she'll tell me, "it's not working" or that she doesn't have any pee.  I have been trying to work on getting her to poop in the potty - she could if she wanted to.  Instead, she always tells me she is going to poop and goes to either Micah's room or my closet.  Whenever she goes in Micah's room to poop, she stands at the window and looks outside.  We have been enjoying the warm weather, playing with Cora's new sand and water table and her new swimming pool.

In other news, Cora has a new baby cousin!  My brother, sister-in-law, and niece welcomed Harrison Cole Bramlett on May 24th.  Amye was induced the night before, and things seemed to be progressing very quickly.  Unfortunately, after hitting 7 cm, things slowed down a bit.  Once Amye was ready to push, she started getting very sick to her stomach - she couldn't push without vomiting.  Those of you who have birthed a child know that pushing is work enough without having to battle nausea!  They let her take a little nap and rest to see if the nausea would subside.  After one more sick spell, she felt some better, and Harrison was finally born at 3:10.  He was 8 pounds, 6 ounces and 21.5 inches long.  Big boy!  Of course, he still looks tiny.  :)  He had a hard time getting here and has some battle wounds to prove it.  He is just precious, and I look forward to getting to see him grow and know he and Micah will be good buddies like Cora and Hayden are.  Here are some pics of the cousins, the girls and the boys!

Micah looks like a giant next to his baby cousin!

Cute boys

Harrison isn't sure what to think about this giant next to him

The whole crew!

Life

How our lives have changed in the past two months!  Our addition to the family has brought so much joy to us as well as a lot more work and sleep deprivation.  It is amazing to me how Micah and Cora are polar opposites.  Our baby girl was always petite and a really good baby.  Now, I won't say that Micah is a bad baby, but he is more demanding.  There's also nothing petite about him.  :)

When Micah was a newborn, he was hungry all the time.  For a while, he was nursing every 1.5 to 2 hours throughout the day and throughout the night.  I was so relieved when he started spacing out his feeding to 2.5 to 3 hours.  It would seem that the reason that he was eating so often was the boy was growing like crazy!  At Micah's doctor's appointment when he was 3 days old, he weighed 7 pounds, 6 ounces and was 20 inches long.  By the time we took him for his 1 month appointment, he was up to 11 pounds, 11 ounces and was 22.5 inches long.  At 2-months old, he was 14 pounds, 12 ounces and 24.25 inches.  I absolutely cannot believe how big he is!!  No one expects me to tell them that he is only 2 months old when they ask.  The doctor says that he is growing beautifully and is perfectly proportionate.  He was also impressed with his head control and his social skills (smiling, cooing).

Life at home is much more busy.  We were lucky to have my mom stay with us for about a week after Micah was born to help with the cooking, cleaning, and baby consoling.  It was also wonderful that Jeremy had a full 2 weeks off from work to stay home and help with the adjustment.  He was only off for a week with Cora, and because we ended up back in the hospital, we were only home for a day before he went back to work.  Having two babies to take care of on very little sleep, I don't know if I would have made it without him!  After Jeremy went back to work, my sister, Mandy, came and stayed with us a few days.  We were also blessed to have friends from church, Jeremy's co-workers, Jeremy's mom, and my sister-in-law to bring us food in the early days.  Here we are two months into this thing, and cooking is still a challenge!

We think that Micah probably has colic to some degree.  Every evening, we can count on him to be cranky.  The good news is that he is usually consolable, but it is exhausting trying to keep him happy.  Most of the time, we have to eat dinner in shifts.  Cora's bedtime routine (Bible story and prayer) is much more chaotic now that we are trying to keep Micah happy.  Sometimes it is just not possible and either Jeremy or myself will do bedtime with Cora alone.

Even with all the craziness and difficulties, we love our little guy.  He may be demanding, but he is so cuddly!  He grunted like crazy when he was a little baby (as did his sister), but now the grunts have been replaced with adorable coos.  He especially loves to "talk" when he is laying on his changing table or activity mat.  He's also smiling now when he is awake.  It doesn't get much better than seeing a big, open-mouthed, gummy grin!  He really seems to love his sister.  It amazes me how closely he watches her.

Cora has done amazingly well adjusting to having a baby brother!  She didn't seem to know what to think about him at first.  She just kept her distance.  She seemed to instantly learn how to play on her own (she was used to Mommy always playing with her), and did not complain about the amount of time I was spending taking care of the baby.  She did discover that she could do whatever she wanted while I was nursing Micah since I could not get up and stop her...luckily, she's not taking advantage of that quite so much these days.  Cora has helped me with burping Micah, she likes to try and give him his pacifier, and she likes to do "this little piggy" with his toes.  She is getting to be more and more comfortable with him.  I can't wait until Micah starts laughing; I think Cora will love trying to get him to laugh!

We feel so blessed to have two beautiful, healthy children.  Life is crazy right now, but we wouldn't change a thing!