Life with a newborn

Word on the street is that Elijah looks like his mama. He looks completely different from Sydney, which is funny to us...the only features they seem to share at this point are the inherited height from daddy, mama's long fingers and the blue eyes from their grandpas. Sydney loves the role of big sister, always asking to give him smoochies and begging to hold him. (This request is punctuated by cupping her hands together in front of her face, as if Elijah's a handful of Cheerios I can pour into her palm.) Adjusting to the spotlight being stolen has certainly been rough on her, but luckily most of that negative energy has been directed our way and not toward her "liggle brudder."

Just latch on already... Our big struggle is that Elijah's been a very "inefficient" eater. As in he'd take in half an ounce every ten minutes. If he was drinking 3-4 ounces, well, you do the math. Not pretty. At one point, we learned he'd only gained 2 ounces in three weeks (newborns should gain more like an ounce per day). SO frustrating - I felt like all I was DOING was feeding this child and we weren't even making any progress. And all the while poor neglected Sydney would be crying at my bedside, pulling at my free arm and whining "No more feeding the baby. No more pumping milk." Break. My. Heart.

So after several visits to the lactation consultant and weeks of using an industrial strength breast pump to keep up my milk supply, he's finally getting the hang of things and I'm no longer spending an hour out of every three just trying to feed the kid. We're finally off bottle supplements - he takes full feedings from me and everything I pump can go straight in the freezer. My world is looking up.

"Maybe I'll take a shower today..." As mentioned, it took me some time to reenter the land of the living. A couple weeks after Elijah was born, I ventured downstairs and Sydney looked at me in surprise. "You do your hair today, mama? You come downstairs today, mama?" Sheesh. A two-year-old is telling me how it is?

About Elijah. Mister man is very easygoing, just a sweet cuddly boy. He has proven to be a great sleeper, just like Syd was (he's now only waking up once around 5 a.m.) He self-soothes really well, took to the Babywise feeding schedule great, doesn't spit up, and really only cries when he's hungry or when he wants to sleep. And we discovered around seven weeks when he started smiling: he's got dimples! At least one on the left side, we think maybe on the right side too. He's got this adorable little asymmetrical goofy grin that I can already see will be hard to resist.

Growing boy.

At two months old, Elijah's stats are as follows:

• Height: 24.5" (93rd percentile).
• Weight: 11 lbs, 2 oz (33rd percentile).
• Head circumference: 39.5 cm (39th percentile).

We grow 'em long and lean around here.

Hmmm, and let's give Sydney's stats a shot.

• Age: 2 1/2 (right smack in the middle of the terrible twos, which are living up to their name).
• Fits thrown per day: numerous.
• Naps taken per day: on average, less than 1.
• Number of times she has attempted to hit her brother and promptly got her bottom whaled on by her mama: 1.
  

Welcome to the new Coleman family.