3 months

Whoa there. I can't keep up. You're three months already and I don't think I took any pictures of you what so ever since your last post a month ago. So I tried to make up for it today (four days after) by taking a bazillion. You don't seem to find my camera very amusing though, so it was really hard to get a shot where you didn't look bored. You would only turn on the charm when I moved the camera away from my face. Or maybe you just prefer my hair down instead of in a bun like the rest of the kids. They've been trying to make that point clear to me for a while.

Don't feel bad, it's not just you. I'm not ignoring you really, not very much. I have so much going on between trying to pry my eyes open in the morning, fixing meals, cleaning the kitchen, fighting a losing battle with your siblings to clean up their toys (by the way -you will not have any toys; toys were invented by the devil), nursing you, changing diapers, wiping butts, putting people to bed, potty break, take my twenty minute walk, more fixing food, more cleaning up, more nursing, diapers, etc. etc. THAT, I totally forgot my friend’s birthday in April and just realized it like a week ago. Just in order to snap some pictures of you today, I had to ignore Sofia calling out for help on the toilet and Marcelo, inevitably doing something boy-like, throwing an empty toilet paper roll in the toilet. I think that happened before Sofia went to the bathroom so I called daddy in for an assist. I feel it's kind of like karma for him. Look, he needs to pay back the universe for all the badness he did as a boy. But hey, look at what a scrumptiously beautiful shot I got of you up there! It was worth it.

Speaking of which, what is up with this generic and beautiful baby face with crystalline blue eyes and ridiculously long fake eyelashes model-look you have going on? You look like you should be in one of those parenting magazines. And why am I not making any money yet? No, seriously, those eyes require a double-take sometimes and no one can miss the eyelashes. It's the first thing people comment about you --right after they look at me and then question me about your blue eyes, like I stole them from some other baby or something. Why do people think a brown-eyed parent can't have a blue-eyed baby? Seriously, is that the only part in genetics anyone was paying attention in? We don't know if your eyes are going to stay blue anyway. And just for the record, I think your hair is going to turn auburn red and you're going to look like a leprechaun. The cutest leprechaun in the world.

In fact, I just recently came to the conclusion that instead of looking nothing like me, you actually might look exactly like me. Like me as a baby that is (in honor of which, I've given all your photos a bit of the 70's effect). Now, I only have exactly one photograph of me as a baby, and I can't even find it now, but I swear I may look just like you do now at three months.
-o-o-o-o-
Now for the mundane, but still interesting to me, everyday stuff concerning bodily functions and other signs of development.

You have settled into a nice routine of sleep, feed, awake time, and sleep again. You don't require as much pleading to fall asleep and many times I can leave you to it on your own. As long as you are bundled up in your little flannel blanket, and I don't know how much longer I'll be able to do it -usually three months is the max, you feel warm and secure and drift off to sleep with your binky.

Taking pictures of eyelashes is not as easy as I thought

My hormone changes are causing my hair to fall out by the bucket full’s and I think are making your hair fall out a bit more too. You've changed your hairstyle from last month’s rooster top to more of a claw, but no majorly embarrassing bald spots at all. The hormone stuff is also drying up my milk, so I've been supplementing you with formula here and there usually just 2-4 oz a day. Now, I'm not sure if it's the formula or my wonderfully healthy diet that has made you a bit constipated sometimes. This makes for some frightenly loud and explosive fart bombs that really give us quite a scare at night when we're trying to watch TV. Really not appreciating that.

Sorry, I didn't have time to clean the toe jam

You still sleep in the moses basket on our bed with us over night. You've been waking around 4:30 - 5:30 am to feed. Getting better, but you need to make it a bit longer so we can put you to sleep in your own room. I'm aiming for four months probably.

This past month has been about controlling the movement of your arms and trying to bring your fists up to your mouth. Sucking the thumb is rarely successful, although you did manage to get a pinky in there one day. You also like to produce little bubbles and drool down your chin.



I can tell you've gained a bit more weight. You look like you have a healthy amount of chunk on but I don't think you are as chubby as Marcelo at this age, and nowhere near Sofia, the chunk-master. You still remind me more of Sofia then Marcelo as babies.

2 months

Don't the other ones' heads look gigantic!?(During this picture, Marcelo misinterpreted contact with baby Peter's flaling arms as a hostile show of violence which he immediately recipricated with a punch to the shoulder. Luckily it wasn't forceful enough to even register except with Sofia's alarmed eyes.  And we thought she was the brute in the family.)

Wow, those first two months sure go by quickly. In your second month, you have come out of your little newborn sleep-all-the-time routine into more of a oh-I-like-it-when-you-hold-me-all-the-time routine. No, not really. It's not like that all the time, but you certainly prefer to fall asleep cuddled in our arms more than by yourself. And, the binky game is starting to get a bit old. Yes, I appreciate that you find the binky soothing, but for Pete's sake, if you want it, then keep it in your mouth, man! Stop popping it out and then getting upset because you want it back. You think I have nothing better to do all day. Believe me, I wish I had nothing else to do all day. I'd be happy to sit on the couch and play the binky game with you for hours, but unfortunately, you are the last in line and there are others that are also making their demands --mommy, I want more milky, --mom, I went poop; I need help, --mommy, celo is playing in the toilet again, --mommy .... Yes, the joys of parenthood.

So, you started spitting up and vomitting. I made you some new burp cloths (2) and bibs (3). Yeah, that's all I could churn out in my spare time (that's a joke, the thing about the spare time). This isn't even making a dent in your copious supply of spit up. I need about twenty five more of each, but you may be twelve before I have time to make any more. Sure, I could buy some, but only my baby terry cloth / flannel bibs can absorb what you're dishing out. Plus, I don't like it when you look like a rodeo clown between the outfit, bib, blanket, and burp cloth that adorn you each day. So, I've only been feeding you on one side for a while which seems to have helped the spit up a little. Except now, sometimes it seems like you might still be hungry so we don't have a very good feeding/sleeping schedule established. I'm not looking for a big commitment here. If you would be willing to give me a consistent five hour stretch of sleep during the night though, I would really appreciate it.

At six weeks, you started smiling. This I'm very happy about. Sofia was not a smiler, I think her smiler was broken (maybe it was part of the thing where she wouldn't cry when she got vaccinated and I thought she had no feeling in her legs until she was eighteen months old). Your smiler works quite well. It only takes a little bit of ridiculous high pitched voice talking and it's activated. Sometimes you just do it by yourself. Imagine that! It must mean you're happy. Your cooing is not as strong but I have heard it here and there a few times.

You've discovered that your hands and arms may have more purpose than you originally thought. You love to grab onto the top of my shirt while you're nursing and also wack the cover up blanket out of the way or throw the burp cloth on the floor. I love this part! When you're tightly bundled in your swaddling blanket, you practice your leg kicks as it is the only form of protest available under the circumstances. Well that and spitting out the binky only to cry over it after. But just you know -we're going to keep swaddling you up mister until you start sleeping through the night. I'm giving you one more month to get on target here. Keep in mind you will be judged, scored, and compared to your previous competitors in this event. And they were quite good at this event, even with handicaps like Sofia's projectile vomitting and Marcelo's allergy induced rashes and itching.

The classic bath photo, cross-eyed and naked with the rubber ducky

The initial discomfort over bathing and diaper changing is well over now. In fact, when you decided you hated Ikea more than any other place on the planet and wouldn't stop crying in your infant carrier for two hours, I took you to change you and placed you on the hard plastic changing table in the bathroom where you were immediately soothed and halted the crying and whaling instantaneously. I guess you don't like the infant car seat as much as most babies do. You're usually ok in it when we're driving but it's not an automatic sooth-all like it has been with prior clients.

Sofia jumps at the rare opportunity to feed you a bottle. She was so proud of you and, I think, of herself when you finished it off.

It also appears that you may have gotten a bit of a cold. It probably came through Sofia from preschool although she had no symptoms (she's kind of a freak of nature that way). Marcelo got a fever, runny nose, and coughing, and then of course, Daddy bit the dust with all the symptoms and the ridiculous cracking fat lady voice. You're handling it pretty well though, just an occasional cough here and there, not enough congestion to interfere with nursing. But for no apparent reason, you've still decided you'd like to be cranky in the morning to noon time, going in and out of sleep and demanding to be held or to play the binky game. Hopefully this doesn't last too much longer. But being that you're a man, I guess we can count on you being cranky and demanding attention for pretty much the rest of your life, right. I get the feeling you will take after your daddy more than anyone else. And, I'm not just saying that because of the matching web toe either. We'll see, so far I've been pretty right about my predictions on the others.

You're just an infant and already you're giving me the look --mom, do you really have to take another picture of me?-- Actually, you were just quite tired and fell asleep a few minutes after this. But, I had to take a picture of your beautiful eyes during the only time of day when enough light comes through the window. I hope your eyes stay blue so we can have a varied assortment of eye colors. Sofia's eyes were like this for a long time and eventually they turned green.

First Real Outing

I haven't made much of an effort to take you out since you were born. I mean, newborns really have no business going out anyway, most people would agree. Since we brought you home from the hospital, you have gone to the audiologist's office for a hearing test a few days after you were born; you went to Tia Marcela's house for her birthday a couple of weeks later; and you went to Aunt Becky's house for a play date at about one month. Today, we decided to go to the mall to return some nursing bras to Nordstroms. I know -how exciting. But when I say, we, I mean the whole family, double stroller and everything. And guess what -we made it without even pulling our hair out.

You were very well behaved of course and luckily your older sister and brother didn't give us too much grief. We went to a few stores, the eatery for lunch, and stopped to let the kids play in the tree house area while I fed you. Thank you for not vomiting on me in public. I didn't bring an extra shirt and frankly, I'm still suffering post traumatic stress from Sofia when she was a possessed baby vomiter.

Look at that smile!

I'm only including this one because you look so very cute. Me -not so much. But it's either you or me and I was tempted to post the one where I looked better. When I try to get a picture of the two of us together so you will know that I existed in your infancy, they just haven't been turning out. Apparently, we are the two least photogenic people on the planet. And like a typical man, I suppose, you're either looking up at the ceiling behind me like in the previous photo or down at my chest like it's snack time.

1 Month

Yesterday, you marked your four week milestone by blowing out your diaper while we were out on a play date. Thank you. That was nice.  I changed you before leaving. I fed you as soon as we got there. I judiciously went to change you immediately following your feeding and what do you do to me --you blow yellow poop all over your furry pants and out onto your coordinating onesie with footprints from the Gap.

Today you are one month old and you have marked this important milestone by staying awake from seven this morning to three in the afternoon, fussing, and spiting up A LOT.  I guess the honeymoon is over.

Up until the past few hours however, you have been a model newborn baby.  You have spent the past month, mostly sleeping, alerting us occasionally that you might want to have something to drink with only the smallest gesture of fussing. You have breast-fed well and you have taken the bottle with breast-milk and formula without complaint.  You sleep well during the night, sometimes so well that we forget we still have to wake up to feed/change you.  Being changed and bathed is the only thing that you have protested but you're getting quite used to it now.

Here are some photos showing what you've been up to your first month in the world.

On your changing table with fresh band-aid from heel prick. Unlike the two before you, you like the binky and can actually manage to keep it in your mouth most of the time.

Sustenance

chunky face - skinny frog legs
the 4th day phenomenom: it takes about four days for my milk to come in during which you lose body fat apparently from the bottom up

You're not fond of the baths until I wrap you up and wash your hair over the sink

You look so tiny in Daddy's hands

At 14 days you broke out in a rash of acne but it cleared up almost instantaneously after your circumcision. Must have been the adrenaline.

I tried to get a picture of your webbed toes but they're pretty well camouflaged most of the time. You're like Sofia and the opposite of Marcelo in that your toes are all sprawled out like fingers on a hand.

You must have thought your sister was here to feed you

After thirty shots trying to get you NOT to look up at the ceiling or try to grab a free snack, we settled for this very serious portrait

2 Weeks

Today was your two week checkup and circumcision appointment. We made special arrangements so both daddy and I could be there with you. I was considering sitting this one out because I didn't think you would do as well as Marcelo, if the past two weeks are any indication. You cry pretty much every time we change your diaper. There have only been about three diaper changes without crying. We make every effort to meet your high demands by warming up your wipes and even putting a heating pad under your changing pad cover.

As suspected, you started crying as soon as we undressed you to check your weight. And although, I thought I was making every effort to hold the diaper above you while you lay on the scale, you managed to pee all over my sweater sleeve, the counter, and some children's books. Then you went for a second round on daddy and the assistant, finishing it off with a final round on the wall and floor for good measure. At that point, the three of us couldn't stop laughing and we were hoping you had a bit more left for Dr. Arnold, but I guess you had pretty much emptied your bladder.

You cried again for the heel prick. I let you recover with some comfort milk. And then, despite the sugar water and anesthetic, you cried heartily for the dreaded procedure. After that, you got some more mommy milk and then you kept having short little bouts of crying. In fact you're still whimpering in your sleep several hours later.

I tried to see if Dr. Arnold would separate your webbed toes, but I guess he didn't take me very seriously. Everyone seems to be quiet fond of this little anomaly.

But enough about the pain and the crying. Let's talk about your stats. You managed (barely) to gain back your birth weight at 7 lbs. 8.5 oz. (20th percentile); your head circumference was at the 50th percentile and your height, 21.5 in. was at the 90th percentile. Apparently, you grew 3 inches in two weeks. I don't think so. Clearly, they didn't measure you correctly when you were born. I never thought you were that short. We surmised that you were probably 20.5 inches when you were born.

Well so far, what we know about you is that you don't like to be changed, you don't like to take baths, you don't like the light in your eyes, you enjoy sleeping 99% of the time, and you like to pee every where. You've peed out of your diaper several times now. Oh yeah, the first time, it caught me so off guard, I couldn't stop screaming because you were hosing me down all over the place and of course daddy did nothing to stop it. That's OK, he's gotten hosed down a couple of times since.

--
How much you've grown:
Weight 7 lbs 8.5 oz (20%)
Length 21 1/2 inches (90%)
Head 37cm (50%)

Birth Day - Hospital Pictures

See photos on Flickr

I have a name!

After much deliberation and list making, we finally came up with a name for the new baby brother that would meet all of our stringent criteria: must be easy to pronounce in any language, must be easy to spell, must not be too common, etc.  There were lots of candidates, some liked them, some really disliked them.  You can't please everyone.  Sofia also helped come up with many suggestions, among them: Scooter, Skater (as in ice skater), Christopher Robin, Hashel (a one of kind name), and many others I had a hard time pronouncing due to their multiple syllables.  So, here it is:

Peter Rowan Fitzgerald

I hope you like it.