Flight to Washington and Settling In

We did it! We survived our first flight as a family of five!! Thankfully I didn't have to do it alone! Although I knew that with Shiloh being so little that it was the easiest time to travel with a baby, I also knew that it could be the worst time given the demands of two other ones and a gassy/fussy baby. Thankfully she ate and slept the whole way and we were comfortable thanks to a travel hoppy pillow which as a lifesaver! 

Overall it was a long but good flight. Shiloh was passed between John and I, the older kids are seasoned travelers and were great and we landed all in good spirits!

No matter if we have good or bad flights it is always such a nice feeling waking up the next morning in our house in Washington, having a cup of coffee and some bacon and looking outside at the beautiful trees in our front yard. We are so excited to be home in Washington for the summer, to enjoy family and the beautiful Pacific Northwest! 

Updates, Shiloh is 8 Weeks and Leaving for Washington...

We are well into the summer vacation for the kids and with the start of Ramadan earlier this month we have been pretty house bound and the affects of that are very much being shown by Peyton and Graham. They are getting restless, bored and I don't blame them. My well intentioned "activity jar" hasn't been much of a help because I haven't had a free hand to get everything together as Shiloh refuses to nap throughout the day at all…a 20 minute nap here and there but nothing substantial no matter what you do! However if you hold her you might be a longer nap but you get nothing done! Peyton and Graham have been great in entertaining themselves, working together to get things done and I am so thankful for their independence and understanding but they are still kids and I know it is getting to them…the boredom, mom's lack of time and staying inside which is why we are all ready to leave for Washington tonight!!! 

Although we would have made it through the summer if we had to and at times it has been overwhelming and a little stressful preparing to travel with our new family of five….I am so thankful we didn't have to stay here and that we are heading to Washington and that John will be with us the entire time! Such a blessing that he has as much vacation as he does and I am thankful for the extra help that he will be. Things always run smoother at our house on the weekends and now I get a month with every day being the weekend with him! 

Not going to lie….preparing and packing for an extended vacation with a newborn and staying at our house for the first time has been slightly crazy and overwhelming at times. Thinking through what we need for Shiloh and determining whether we should bring it from here, buy a second version to stay in Washington and then just preparing for our summer plans for our family and for house projects….we have been busy! But we are all packed and ready to go and have a really great summer planned! We are trying to be realistic on what we will be able to accomplish with the house with a new baby and picked easy, quick and not labor intensive projects such as finishing up the master bedroom (paint and bedding) and then painting a couple of other areas. Most of the house work this summer has been going already! We have a contractor who has been working on replacing the back upstairs windows, repairing the porch, replacing siding that has rot, patching up the siding, a new paint job and new gutters. We also have a new fence up, and are doing a new front door and exterior lighting. It is a lot of much needed work and I can't wait to see the end product. They have already started painting and I am sure it is going to be crazy to see the complete transformation when we arrive. It will be a major before and after picture!

Shiloh had her 8 week doctor's appointment last week and her immunizations. I was so looking forward to this appointment only so I could know how much she weighed and I was excited to hear she was 11 lbs 9 oz! She is also 22.8 inches long! I don't have the percentages and when I look them up I get varying numbers but she has an appointment later this week with our pediatrician in Washington (nothing is wrong, I just have all the kids see a doctor there when we are home) so I will get her percentages then. The doctor here said she looked great! 

Other updates and developments I want to remember about Shiloh are…

• She refuses to nap! I did Baby Wise with both of the older kids and she is following it as much as I can but Shiloh is having a hard time with the sleep aspect. Part of it I think is gas and tummy issues but other part is that she is pretty easily over stimulated and also just doesn't nap right now :( I was reading past blogs about both of the older kids around this age and Graham refused to nap anywhere but in my arms and Peyton only in the swing and I know they grew out of it by 12 weeks so there is hope…I just forget about all those details and it was throwing me for a loop this time why she wouldn't nap and I was getting worried! Probably because sleep is even more precious this time than ever :) It has been very time consuming trying to get her to nap and going in and out of her room throughout the day at 10-20 minute intervals which is why I am so glad John will be home for a month to help so one of us can continue to working on her naps and the other can be with Peyton and Graham
• Although she doesn't nap, she still sleeps at night from 8-10 PM, 10 PM - 3 AM and then from 3-7 AM. 
• She loves her bath time in the big tub and her bath seat. 
• When packing for Washington I packed all her 6 month clothes as she is just under the starting weight of 12.5 lbs for all of them but is long enough to wear them and she is pretty close to growing out of the 3 month clothes and I didn't want to bring them for her to wear for a week.
• Shiloh is smiling so much now and is cooing. She often tries to coo and smile at me during her 3 AM feed when I am swaddling her back up and it takes all my strength and energy not to look at her and smile back….I don't want to encourage her to stay awake and want her to go back to sleep easily. Yesterday she was on her play mat and cooing and smiling at the owl. 
• She is taking a bottle at either her 7 or 10 PM feeds and doing great. We went to a bottle for one of the evening feeds to give me a break. Mostly so I could go and spend time with friends and watch the Bachelorette during girls night without taking Shiloh and then with going to Washington so I could go have a drink of wine or go out for dinner with my family, just some flexibility. And since Peyton refused bottles I wanted to make sure that wasn't the case this time.  Often it is 3 ounces of breast milk and 1 ounce of formula. Even if I have enough expressed milk I still make sure there is just a little formula so that her body stays used to it in case I need to add more at some time. 
• Overall she is a happy, sweet and super easy baby. She rarely cries and is just smiling all the time. She is pretty easy to settle down even when she is super gassy. She just loves to socialize with everyone and doesn't want to leave the party!

I think that is about all happening around here. We leave tonight for Washington and although are not looking forward to the long flight with three kids we are incredibly excited about the rewards at the end of it! 

Six Weeks with Shiloh

Shiloh turned six weeks old last Thursday! Hard to believe but it has been six weeks since we welcomed our sweet Shiloh! What a busy six weeks it has been! 

























First some updates and developments on sweet Shiloh…

• She grew out of her newborn clothes several weeks ago and is in 3 month clothes filling them out nicely. Very hard for mommy to fold up and put the newborn clothes away :(
• No official stats from the doctor (she goes in about a week or so) but we believe she is right around 10 lbs based off of our very accurate weighing using Wii Fit. 
• She smiled for the first time just after five weeks and is smiling more and more! Probably the best fuel for a sleep deprived mommy! She smiled the other day for Peyton and it was great to see Peyton's excitement over it. 
• She is following Baby Wise pretty well and we are on a pretty consistent eat, play, sleep schedule during the day with her eating every three hours. Her "play" time is getting longer and she is more alert during the day. She is in the more alert stage of development and is watching people, looking around more and taking everything in. 
• She is sleeping from 10:00 PM to 4:00 AM and then again until 7:00 AM consistently which has been great! She started this schedule around four weeks on her own and it is working great!
• Shiloh is a very gassy and fussy baby. During the day you can tell she is gassy and she recently started spitting up and having bad hiccups but at night it is rough. We started giving her gas drops before her late afternoon feeding which helps get everything to start passing but she is still fussy. I have cut out dairy, have only a cup of half caffeinated coffee a day and cut out most other foods and it doesn't help, she is just a gassy baby. We are just waiting for time to pass and for this phase to pass. But in the meantime we have a very fussy baby from 7-10 PM. If she hasn't settled by 10 PM she is up pretty much all night and miserable which has been rough. Thankfully we have only had three or four of those nights. I am not sure if this fussy/witching hour, is worse than the other two kids because looking back they were fussy during those times but it feels worse only because when you have two other ones you are so much more exhausted.
• Thankfully as fussy as she can be from 7-10 PM she is super happy and easy going during the day. She follows her schedule pretty easily and will fall asleep relatively easily. She fell asleep on her play mat the other day! She is overall a happy baby. It will be interesting to see her personality develop in these coming weeks once we are out of the five-six week fussy stage.

Check out her cute leg warmers! So much fun!

• She has only slept in her crib (and her mattress is raised at an angle) once and sleeps instead in her rock and play bassinet thing that keeps her at angle. She falls asleep pretty easily after you swaddle her on her own but with her reflux and gas pains she likes the angle of the bassinet. Occasionally we still have time to get to have cuddles and she sleeps on mommy! 

• Shiloh loves her pacifier….just like her sister….and uses it often!
• Shiloh has taken a bottle of breast milk a couple of times and did great, we are trying to be better about giving her a daily bottle (but I can't find the time to pump) so we don't have any issues later on and so everyone can be involved in feeding her

• She is starting to "coo" and grunt back to you and in response to you which is always such a sweet sound
• Shiloh is such a loud sleeper! She grunts and moans and stretches so much in her sleep! I keep thinking she is awake and when I check on her she is sound asleep but just making noises. I thought Peyton grunted a bunch but Shiloh has her beat. She is so loud! She also loves to stretch and stretch when she wakes up….it is very amusing. 

As for me and my recovery, it has gone really well when I consider that this was my third c-section and I had two other kids to care for even if I had the best of intentions to rest and take it easy. I do feel like my incision is much more tender than it was the other two times which is different. I do feel better physically than I did with Graham probably because I was much more intentional about taking it easy and letting things go. Thankfully at six weeks I am physically able to do everything around the house in regards to house work, taking care of kids and am up and moving easily. I am exercising some by walking and doing light upper body workouts. I tried some more cardio based/plyometric/leg workouts and quickly realized it would be too much for me and so as much as I would like to do leg workouts and more intense cardio, I know it is best in the long run for me to stop and be slow in resuming exercise. And I am looking forward to being in Washington where we can do more walks/hikes! Thankfully I have lost a good amount of the pregnancy weight already which I very much attribute to me gaining much less weight this pregnancy (better food choices and chasing other kids around), breast feeding, making deliberate food choices post pregnancy and caring for the big kids!

All dressed for the day!

As for adjusting to having three kids…it has been a little overwhelming at times…sometimes easier than I expected and then often times harder. Mostly what has helped is living in the moment, focusing on the current day and not getting overwhelmed or consumed about future events or how far we have to go to get back to "normal." I am finding the days are flying by and often times I have no idea where the time went. Just meeting everyone's basic needs of getting clothed, fed, diapers changed/help on the potty, naps, referring playtime…fills my day. I feel like I go from one kid to the next meeting a need and then continue to cycle through. It is busy! I have also been much more overwhelmed than I thought I would about going places with her and with all three kids, even to a friends house and just the change in adjusting back to having a baby to care for instead of just two independent kids has been an adjustment. But after six weeks I feel like we are finding more of a grove and things do get easier each and every day. Our house isn't completely trashed although we did have to have a marathon laundry day of ten loads over the weekend and I am starting to make dinners at times (so thankful for our freezer meal stash) and we are getting back into a groove….we still have a long way to go though! But I am thankful for the ability to just sit back and enjoy this moment and this day and know that it will too quickly pass. 

Other big news for Shiloh was the arrival of her passport and other documents she needed to leave and enter Saudi! It was a pretty intensive process of getting a declaration of birth, then a Saudi birth certificate and then a translated birth certificate and then the passport and then applying for an iqama (residency visa) and then applying for a multiple entry/exit visa BUT six weeks later it all arrived and she is ready to travel! Such a huge praise that it all worked out and came in time for our flight back to the States in just a couple of weeks!

Shiloh has her passport and is ready to travel!

I will say that one of the biggest stresses and hardest things to not be in the moment about is our flight back to Washington in a couple of weeks. I have no idea why but the idea of flying with Shiloh overwhelms me so much! I would fly anywhere in the world by myself with the two older kids but the addition of a baby freaks me out even knowing that John will be with me. Part of it I think is that I have never flown with a lap child. And just the whole vacation/leaving comfort of home with a baby overwhelms me. I think I worry about it being hard like it was when we flew with Graham at ten weeks and moved here, although the flight wasn't hard the transition to being here was hard BUT I take deep breathes and remind myself that this is a vacation and we are not moving across the world with a ten week old baby like with Graham…this is a very different situation!

Our sweet Shiloh

It will be interesting for sure to see what these next six weeks bring and to watch Shiloh grow and develop! We will be in Washington for most of it and we are all looking forward to being able to go for walks and runs…..we will be ordering a new running stroller…a BOB….and it will be waiting for me when we get to Washington, hikes, the farmers market and enjoying beautiful weather and family time with our sweet little girl! 

Shiloh and Her Siblings

Both Peyton and Graham were so excited about Shiloh coming and having a baby sister and thankfully that enthusiasm continued once she arrived. Unfortunately though they both have been sick off and on since we brought her home. My kiddos are hardly ever sick but of course as soon as a new baby comes they have had runny noses, coughs, a vomiting episode, two 24 hour fever episodes and they have had to stay away from the baby. They have both been so understanding and great about not touching her, staying away from her completely at times and knowing that it is only so they don't pass their germs to her. Thankfully it seems like all that has passed and we can now have lots of sibling cuddles! 

I am so incredibly blessed!

I have been the most surprised at Peyton and how much she wants to help and how understanding she has been. She asks to hold Shiloh more than I thought she would and is so willing to help grab stuff and want to play with her. She has been really understanding that a baby takes a lot of time and often time away from her and she has been willing to sit with me while I am feeding and just read a book or talk, or just wait patiently while doing something else. She has matured significantly and has been a huge help. 

The other day, our house cleaner wasn't able to come that afternoon due to a scheduling conflict and I wanted to vacuum, Shiloh was being fussy and Peyton asked if she could try to play with her on her play mat and see if that helped. It did help and I managed to get away and vacuum the house while Peyton played with Shiloh. It was sweet and I loved walking by to check on them and seeing her playing, singing songs and Shiloh just looking at her in wonder. Sweet sisters!

Graham adores his sister and every day makes sure to tell her good morning and good night and all about showing Shiloh love. He often refers to her as "my baby," and always walks by saying "hello my Shiloh." His sisters are certainly lucky to have a brother who adores both of them! 

Many of my favorite moments these past few weeks have been watching the interactions between the kids and I am constantly reminded how blessed I am by these amazing kids!