Shiloh's First Couple of Weeks

What a wonderful two weeks it has been soaking up our adorable little girl, enjoying cuddles and just being in awe of how blessed we are!

John was able to take the week off after I came home from the hospital and what a blessing it was to have him home to help with the kids and also to have that extra time as a family and able to take the time to slow down and enjoy this phase. 

First time wearing something other than PJs…time to get fancy and accessorized!

We made a trip down to the doctor a couple of days after I came home to have a checkup as well as have my clips (staples) removed. Thankfully and huge praise that I was given a wonderful report and was told I was healing great! Other than that trip to doctor we enjoyed lots of sleeping and cuddling with Shiloh and then enjoying time with the big kids and watching them love on and adjust to have a new little sister.

I was so worried that with her being baby #3 and being so busy with the older kids that I wouldn't have as much cuddle time with her but with both kids being at school every morning I made sure that Shiloh and I didn't leave the couch and just cuddled every morning. That was my special time with her and I made a point to not do anything but cuddle! 

At the end of the week, John and I realized that it was our last morning to have together before my mom came and he was back to work and so we took advantage of that time and went to have breakfast at the Hobby Farm on camp and enjoyed some time to reflect on all the changes, talk about the summer and enjoy some time together as husband and wife. We have been so thankful for the brief moments at night after the big kids are in bed that we have had to sit down, cuddle with Shiloh and just spend time together knowing that John was home the next days and things can wait around the house. Such a great week of slowing down!

Her first breakfast outing!

Shiloh has been a wonderful baby and super easy going and peaceful. She is still eating wonderfully and has gained about 0.5 pound over her birth weight so is at 7 lbs 4 oz now.  I couldn't live without my baby feeding app that tracks when she eats, how long and what side she finished on. With three kids and less sleep than normal I can barely remember my name sometimes and have no track of what time it is during the day so having that to reference is very helpful! She is sleeping even better. I have been waking her up and sticking to feeding her every three hours during the day and then letting her sleep at night between 4-5 hour stretches before often times having to wake her up. As long as we make sure she has a couple of awake periods during the day she falls asleep really easily at nighttime and we haven't had too much of the wide awake late at night periods that most babies do. 

Check out those big feet!

We also have been working on the crazy long and complicated process of getting her a passport and then necessary visas and residency permits for living here in Saudi. After submitting a declaration of birth form to the hospital, picking it up two days later (in Arabic), then taking it to a government affairs office, we were able to pick up her birth certificate (in Arabic) which we then had to send to get translated and fill out another form and now we should have that next week hopefully before we have an appointment to go to the embassy and apply for the passport and then once that comes only 2-3 more steps left until we could leave the country! Complicated!

Her Saudi birth certificate….all in Arabic!

Shiloh reminds us so much of Peyton…lots of the same facial expressions and just appearance wise as well….besides her very obvious Graham nose! She had her first check up at the doctor and is doing great! When we were at the hospital I never met a pediatrician, never got a report on her and was told by the nurses that if I didn't hear otherwise…that she was fine. Very different from the other two and thankful she was my third and I had a better understanding on what to do when I got home and things to look for. So after 10 days or so of being home, it was nice to see a pediatrician and have him check her out from head to toe and give her a good report and say she was doing great!

We have an extra bed in Shiloh's nursery so that has become my mom's room while she is here so all of Shiloh's stuff is in our room for now. She would have been sleeping in our room anyways these early weeks! In our room however there is a large mirror over our dresser where I set up her changing pad and she loves to stare at the mirror and just look in that direction. Not sure what she is seeing but she likes it!

We have also been spending time sleeping outside while we watch the big kids play on the giant slide that G brought. She has some nice naps outside! We also did her newborn pictures over several days which was tons of fun and really nice to not have the pressure of getting all the shots in one session. I worked on them over three days and then still have to do the big kids pictures with her since they weren't feeling 100% during the week and I wanted to keep them away from Shiloh in case they had something contagious. Hopefully in the next week or so we can do some sibling shots and we will have  cooperative big kids and Shiloh!

We are very much enjoying this precious time with Shiloh! Life has been pretty easy adding her into the mix so far….but we have had my mom here and haven't attempted to do anything with all three kids! I am sure once we are out numbered after G leaves and we attempt to take all three to do anything things will start to get interesting! I think I will delay those outings as long as possible :)