Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Disastrous diapers

It seems somewhat first-time-parent of me to share a diaper story with you, but I just can't get over this one. I think it especially amuses me because I was so shocked by this occurrence on round 3 of newborn gastrointestinal issues. Lanie had not had a dirty diaper in several days. I was definitely paying attention, but she didn't seem bothered by it at all. So we just waited. We gathered our crew to go eat at Chili's, (where our family ate quite well for under nine dollars, thank you!), and I gave Lanie her bottle toward the end of our meal. I propped her on my shoulder to burp her, and I could tell that she was, well, working. I just continued to pat her and hold her while assisting Ellie in eating her chicken and eating my own french fries. Things started to go south with the older two quickly, nothing major, but it was definitely time to get going. I decided I should probably change Lanie's diaper before we went home. I stood up and realized that I was kind of wearing the contents of her diaper. This was definitely a first for me. I am not talking just a little bit of something that I could discreetly cover; this was like she was trying to add a large graphic to the front of my shirt. I could get really graphic to explain why I was so shocked, but suffice it to say that Lanie left wearing her new diaper, and I was really glad we had just finished our meal! She must have lost a pound or two!

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Naptime these days


Back in the day when Joshua and Ellie had separate rooms, we could easily count on a 3 hour nap time. They didn't necessarily both sleep that long, but both kids were happy and relatively quiet in their rooms... often asleep! Then, they began sharing a room. For a few weeks there was very little sleeping. We figured out that some sleep might occur if Ellie had a chance to fall asleep before Joshua joined her. Enter Lanie into our family... and add a couple of months and some more awake stamina to Ellie. Now, I put Ellie in bed, return to remind her to put-her-head-on-her-pillow-and-don't-touch-the-curtains, and EVENTUALLY send Joshua into bed. While we wait for Ellie to fall asleep, Lanie is usually awake for a little while. Joshua creates a nice little set-up for her with toys surrounding her, and he sits and reads to her or flips through cards with her. In the picture, she is playing with Elmo while she learns the alphabet. So sweet!

Friday, March 16, 2012

Sibling love


All ready for bed! Joshua and Ellie are great with Lanie. For the first month or so, we never could quite time the evenings, so Lanie often fussed through our entire bedtime routine. Ellie and Joshua are pretty patient with her. They like to pat her and give her toys to make her happy.

Smile!


Just to get a couple of pictures out there...

We had been having trouble getting Ellie to smile for the camera, when it dawned on me that she might not know what "Smile!" means.