Celebrations of life.

6 weeks-

It really is remarkable watching Autumn's developments week-by-week.  I know we're new parents and every little move she makes truly astounds us, but she is already growing so fast!  It seems as if we have blinked our eyes and she's already practically sitting up on her own in her Bumbo chair and gripping things like she's superwoman.

We have yet to have Autumn on a specific routine and it seems to be working for us.  She does typically eat every two hours as of right now but her sleep is fairly sporadic.  Her personality is blossoming and in order to keep up with her visual and tactile demands, we make sure that she gets plenty of activity and play time throughout the day!  She is completely thriving and we couldn't be more proud.  She is rolling over, standing up with assistance of course and she is still rocking her tummy time.  Most days she loves it.  She can practically turn her head completely around at the moment, taking in all that she can in this big world.  Every sight and sound is still so incredibly new to her and watching her take it all in is something that Chris and I spend the majority of our 'newborn filled' days doing.  Just watching her in amazement and awe has become one of our favorite pastimes.  

Last Friday we celebrated Chris's 27th birthday! We kept it low key and ended up going out to eat to Gugliamos (which was a feat in and of itself with a 5 week old!) and finished with cake at my sisters house.  The whole evening was a surprise for him (or at least an attempt at me to surprise him which is incredibly hard to do) and even more of a surprise when he opened up his gift from all of us, a new handheld drill!  Chris had been eyeing Andy's for some time and anxious to get one of his own to work on all the 1,000 or so household projects that we have on our plate.  They had been put on hold with the addition of miss Autumn to our family, but day-by-day Chris has found time to accomplish small projects here and there.  He is a multi-tasking master and some days I envy all that he seems to get done.  This was his first birthday celebrated as a father and I would say that fatherhood completely suits him what do you think?!

 ~here comes the airplane Chris! (pretty soon we'll be feeding Autumn like this!)~

~Mama sneaking in some baby love!~

My multi-tasking abilities on the other hand are something to be desired but I am working on catching up to Chris!  It is all I can do some days just to make sure I have had 3 meals and taken a shower, but I know that 'this too shall pass' as my mom so lovingly reminds me constantly.  While it is frustrating for two adventurers to slow their life down, take things one day at a time, and have more patience than has ever been required of us, we are reminded each and every day when we hold little Autumn that every second is worth it.  We cherish even those moments that we are completely exhausted, holding her snug in our arms, because we know those moments are fleeting and will be gone far too soon.  With every blink of our eyes she is growing and becoming even more amazing than the day before.   

Sunday besides being my love's birthday, the power decided to go out on our block.  Quite the shock to both Chris and I as I woke up to feed Autumn at 4am and then put her back to bed to a flickering nightlight and the eerie playing of the white noise that soothes her to sleep.  Needless to say I was a bit terrified and called for Chris right away.  He promptly went into 'fireman' mode, gathering wood by headlamp outside and building us a glowing fire.  We spent the morning playing cards, cuddling with Autumn and just enjoying spending time as a family fireside.  It is amazing how the simple things feel so good.

That afternoon the ladies at the yoga studio had a Meet-N-Greet for Autumn and I must say it was so wonderful to see all the fellow instructors that I had not seen in months!  My mom and Lauren joined as well and anytime I get to spend with them lately I cherish.  They adore seeing their grand-daughter and niece!   The time spent at the studio was lovely and I can't thank the ladies enough for welcoming Autumn the way they did.  She was so content being passed off to each one of them that I knew she was definitely feeling the positive yoga energy that was present.

One thing that was so special was a 'good wishes' box that they created.  Each person wrote on a rock one wish that they had for Autumn.  We passed around the box as each person recited their wish that they had for her and dropped their rock into the box.  It is a treasure box that Autumn, Chris and I will truly cherish and I can't wait until she is old enough to understand just how precious each one of those wishes are for her.  It is so important to Chris and I that she is surrounded by love and positivity and that she always dreams big.  Her wish box will serve as a constant reminder of all of those things that she should hold near and dear to her heart.  Thanks again ladies for such a wonderful afternoon full of good vibes and positive energy!

Up All Night.

5 weeks old-

It's hard to believe that we have a 5 week old on our hands but somehow the days have been cruising by.  Chris and I have had a hard time distinguishing between them and if you asked me on any given day what the date was I probably couldn't tell you the date nor the day unless I look at my phone.  Autumn's newest development has been an upset tummy that has broken our hearts to hear her cries and broken our sleep schedule to the point that we are operating on zombie mode at times throughout the day.  At least we are trying to catch our winks here and there when we can.  Some of the best advice that we received from friends was to 'sleep when she sleeps'.  While it is hard sometimes to ignore the house chores and the list of things to do that grows daily, we have tried to at least go into relax mode when she is sleeping knowing that if we don't catch zzz's during her naptime we may not get them at nighttime like we are used to.

Our big discovery this week was white noise.  It has been a remarkable tool that we have used to get Autumn to sleep during the night and we can proudly say she has re-adopted her old ways of sleeping in the crib on her back after a brief period of only wanting to sleep on our chests which made for some very long nights that we would like to put behind us.  We downloaded the 'Happiest Baby on The Block' soundtrack of white noise and calming sounds and have been pleased with the results that have put Autumn in a trance during bedtime and naptime.  Needless to say we are forever grateful for stumbling upon these tracks and dare we say so is Autumn!

Workouts have been progressing and at only 5 weeks post-partum I know that continued patience will have to be on my radar.  Chris has been extremely patient with me as well heading out on my 'slogs' with me and getting in some good sprints and lunges when my slow jog turns into a fast walk.  He's been progressing quite amazingly actually tackling Crossfit workouts on his days off from running. Right now I'm doing a 2-3 minute run, 1 minute fast walk for about 3 miles.  My legs remember the 3 miles from when I was running and pregnant with her so I'm sticking to that distance for sometime until I feel a bit more recovered and ready to up the mileage.  I am looking forward to my 6 week follow-up appt. where I anticipate being cleared for all activity but right now I am still being cautious of my stitches as well as the recovery from my kidney infection.  I don't want to re-injure myself and be set back even more.  Talk about being a potential detriment to the self-esteem, I want to be sure not to let that happen.

One project we were proud to complete this week was the addition of a dresser to Autumn's room.  I had purchased the dresser for $89 at a local antique store, found knobs at hobby lobby for $18 and paint at Lowe's for $3.  The make-over ended up being better than I had imagined and while we don't have a before shot, here's a few of progress in the making as well as the finished product!  Soon I will post a full tour of Autumn's nursery once we complete a few more projects that we are working on.  Here's to hoping they get completed sooner than later. (Thanks to Grandpa for sharing some of his photos with us!)

We had a visit from a family advocate nurse from Hurlburt who gave us a plethora of advice on all things Autumn related as well as did a weigh-in for the little sprite.  Can you believe she's weighing in at close to a whopping 9lbs. 15oz.?  Almost a 10lb. baby so far and she's only just over a month old.  We've tried to hold our thumb to her head but it's not working!  She continues to grow and amaze us as she thrives.

Falling in love with Autumn Rose.

1 Month Old-

I can hardly believe that it has been so long since I last recorded an entry on here.  So much has taken place since January 1st, to include the arrival of what has become Chris and I's pride and joy...Autumn Rose.  I will take this post as an opportunity to dive right into parenthood and what week 4 has held for us thus far.  As far as what has happened since my last post, I know I have MUCH to catch up on and so much I want to record (to include her 'Birth Story'!) but will save it for a rainy day, or several days for that matter when I'm in between feedings and entertaining the little sprite.

After some unanticipated recovery time post delivery, I am finally back to society and loving every waking (to include very tired, but still awake) minute spent with Autumn.  I heard from several friends that your child will become your greatest teacher and that couldn't be more true.  While Chris and I spend time attempting to 'perfect' certain methods that we have read about or heard about, Autumn is busy switching up her game, throwing us a few curve balls and teaching us that she is the one that is in control and I have had to stop and truly smirk at this factor.

I was reading on another mom blog that she has spent 11 weeks coming to the realization that they enjoy the natural flow that their little daughter Ada has come into on her own and it is something that I already feel with Autumn.  No need to force things on her, have expectations of certain things that she should be doing at certain times or truly try to dictate every waking moment of her life with what she 'should be doing'.  I like the idea of letting her just 'be' and figuring her out as the days go by.  I found myself nose first in the pregnancy books looking up every single thing that was happening every week she was in the womb and since I have delivered Autumn I have found that I hardly pick up a book.
 Chris has been Superdad and truly has a knack for fatherhood so much of what I have adapted into my motherhood style has stemmed from watching him with our gorgeous girl.  As the saying goes you take all advice with a grain of salt but eventually you come up with your own recipe and I can safely say that's what we have done with Autumn.    

So what is Autumn doing as a brand new 4 week old baby?  She is doing remarkably, if not stunningly well.  She can recognize voices like a champ.  Chris and I love getting close to her face and just talking to her as she sits there wide eyed listening to our words and seeing our faces.  She is also incredibly visual and gets bored pretty easily with things like the mobile, so she's progressed to staring at other objects like her wall mural in her nursery, ceiling fans (which she loves), and even her activity gym which has contrasting black and white toys on it that she is completely digging.  At this age their eyesight reaches about 12 inches and the more the contrast of dark and light the better they are able to visualize.  The faces she is making at this age astonish us both sometimes as well, just check this one out for instance! 

She is digging tummy time more lately because of how well she can hold her neck up.  Her outer strength is just as good as her inner strength (she inherited a very strong will so it seems) and so being on her stomach just gazing away at her toys has become a favorite past time and thank goodness it has because Chris and I were running out of ways to entertain a 4 week old in between feedings while she was awake!

Her sleep patterns are fairly predictable and she typically eats about every 2 hours, plays for a little while, naps and then repeats.  We have been pretty fortunate in that most nights she goes for two 4 hour sessions of sleeping so that Chris and I are able to switch off feedings and both get in our beauty rest.  We thank her dearly for this time and realize that it could be fleeting! (she is loving her boppy pillow at the moment too and it's a favorite place of Chris and I's to put her just to have her 'chill' time. And to snap some photos in several of her many styling outfits she has.  We're all about the hats and leg warmers right now!)

She LOVES her carriers.  While I want to post more about babywearing down the road, Autumn definitely enjoys being snug in her Moby Wrap and Ergo carrier.  No matter who wears her as long as she is being worn she is happy as a clam.

And in terms of our cloth diapering, our dreams have already been answered and she can officially fit into both the Fuzzibuns and Bum Genius All-in-ones that we got her!  While we still have some newborn disposables left from my one Amazon purchase, it's reassuring to know that we won't be needing to make anymore disposable diaper purchases after they are gone. Talk about a relief to the wallet!

In terms of post-partum exercise, week by week I can feel myself getting stronger and back to my 'normal' self. I'll go into detail later what I've been up to in terms of getting back to my pre-pregnant self but it has mostly included running, trekking, plenty of yoga and tons of patience!  I realize that there are only so many hours in my now shortened days but I hope to find time to catch up on all that has been happening with our lives these past few weeks just for the sake of my sanity.  I want to be sure to document those first few precious weeks that you never get back!

And when we're not entertaining the little sprite, we have found a few spare hours to get our room looking put together.  We finally found some decent nightstands on Amazon that we could both agree on, we love them! (the wall mural is coming along but is still half finished.)

Sigh.....she is already 1 month old as of today-Happy One Month Birthday Autumn Rose!  While Chris and I love to watch her development, a small part of us just wants her to stay this size forever...but then again doesn't every parent want that?!

Here Autumn is rockin' out in one of her 12 onesies that were made especially for her at the Welcome Autumn Party~she decided to be extra good for her photo shoot this morning which was amazing! P.S. How fricken adorable is that owl hat that my sister made especially for Autumn Rose?  We can't get enough of it on her!

 ~Fist pumps!~