James is Two Months Old

James is two months old today and will go for his check-up tomorrow morning.  I am sure that he has gained quite a bit of weight and length in the last four weeks, as his "3 month" clothes are starting to become both snug and short on him.

Edited to add:  James weighs 12 lbs. 3 oz (48th percentile) and is a whopping 23.5" long (73rd percentile).  That means that he grew 2 inches in the last month!  I questioned this with the nurse so another nurse came in and measured him, only to find that he was another 0.5" longer than that.  We opted to stick with the original measurement of 23.5".  While the method of measuring is not highly technical in the doctor's office, it is close enough to confirm that he is definitely getting longer.  And at a rapid rate.

At around 5 weeks of age (March 11th), James gave us his first (of many) intentional smiles.  Now, they are forthcoming on a regular basis, as he is truly a content and mostly happy baby.  He even fills those smiles with a laugh once in a while and I melt ... every single time.  It is music to a momma's ears.

There is no complete consistency with naps yet; partly due to the fact that our days seem to be too different to adhere to a schedule at this point.  It is clear that James likes to take a longer morning nap -- likely making up for the lesser amount of sleeping at night still.  He often falls asleep in the car seat on the way to/from school pick-ups and drop-offs and then I let him sleep there as long as he likes.  He also enjoys sleeping in the bouncy seat and his swing.

A mid-morning rest in the bouncy seat:

Snoozing in the swing:

 

In addition to the limited pattern with sleeping during the day, night-time seems to be the same way.  For the most part, we adhere to the same schedule every night: the three older kids are in bed at 8 pm.  Then, Steve and I work as a team to accomplish the bedtime routine for James.  Steve runs the bath water while I undress James.  One of us bathes him while the other sets out his pajamas and diaper.  Then, I dress him for bed while Steve heats a bottle in the kitchen.  (I have been pumping at least one bottle of milk each day to give to him before I nurse him to sleep.  That extra dose of milk seems to help fill him up even more and *I like to believe* that it allows him to sleep a little longer). 

 

Having his first bottle at six weeks of age.  He took it with absolutely no problems:

 

 

 

Hopefully, James is down for the night by 10 pm and can sleep for about 5 hours before waking up for a diaper change and feeding.  Some nights, he will only sleep for 2 hours though before wanting more milk.

 

James fell asleep in our bed after an early morning feeding, so I just let him rest there:

 

 

 

For the time being, he continues to sleep in our room in his pack 'n play.  There are a couple of reasons why we have not moved him to his own room upstairs yet.  The first is that he is still not consistently sleeping to the point where there is a limited number of wake-up calls for me in the middle of the night.  Also, Jack needs to officially move out of the room upstairs and down into his "new" room in the basement.  We haven't had a chance to move him yet and then set up James' crib in Jack's old room.  Hopefully, we will do that within the next two weeks.

 

James is starting to interact a little more these days.  He likes to reach for the toys hanging from his play mat.

 



And he has started noticing the moving mobile that is a part of his swing.

There are more and more periods of time during the day that he is awake, and during those times, he likes to be able to be a part of the action.  I often put him in his seat and let him watch all of the chaos taking place around him.

It doesn't take long before someone is over there "loving on him."

Jack is so proud of his little brother.  So proud.

 

And Samantha races off the bus every day to see him.  He is usually finishing up a feeding in my room so as soon as he finishes, she scoops him up and tells him all about her day. 

 



Sophia is not allowed to pick him up and carry him, so she settles with lying next to him on the bed and cuddling.  Priceless.

Those blue eyes just reel me in every time.  Right now, Sophia is my only blue-eyed child, but I strongly suspect that Jimmy is going to hold onto his baby blues.  And wouldn't that be something?  He would have blue eyes just like his namesake.

Keep growing, Little Man.  We are all wild about you!