The title says it all

I really and truly am loving every minute of it.

Beckett is such a sweet little baby. I know it's only been two weeks, but if this is any indication of his personality, then we do have a Carson number two. He sleeps, he eats, when he's awake he's just looking around at all of us, he's great sleeping at night too (most often only wakes up twice to feed and then goes right back to bed). He's starting to like his baths more (except he doesn't like so much to get out). He's fussy right before bedtime, where he has this heart wrenching cry (in between wails it's like he has asthma and he wheezes), but then after he has a bite to eat he drifts off into dream land.

And Carson. Well even as I think about him my eyes well up with tears. He's SUCH a good little boy. He loves his little brother so much. He asks about him first thing when he wakes up. When we are out walking or at the park, anyone who comes within talking distance Carson tells them about his little brother. If Beckett starts to cry Carson runs to his side, pats him and says "it's ok Beckett, mommy is coming". His face gets full of worry is Beckett isn't happy.

I've taken the boys out places on my own and it's not even close to what I was picturing. I was wondering how to handle it all. But it's really easy when you have two good little boys like I do.

We booked our trip to PEI - Beckett and I are flying on August 27th and my other two guys are driving. The plan is for them to drive it in one day. We made it back in one day last year and Carson was just perfect, so we are hoping for the same this year. We are going to borrow a DVD player to keep Carson entertained when he gets bored of just looking out the window and listening to music. All 4 of us were going to drive, but if you figure in all the feedings and stops we would have to make with a 6 week old, we thought it would probably take us two days and then that cuts into our vacation time, so we booked mine and Beckett's flight on airmiles and we'll just meet the other half of our family there.

I'm so excited for Carson to see his family, to see the beach again and to experience cottage life!!

4 years and two adorable boys later...

It's our wedding anniversary today!

And here's what we have to show for it :)

It's fine

Apparently the hematoma was expected to get bigger before it got smaller, so it's all good :) He's almost back up to his birth weight so that's nice to know too.

Doctor's....

Headed to the doctor's now, he wants to check out the hematoma on his little noggin. Now I'm wondering if all the extra sleep is a result of it or something? See, this is what happens when it's pouring rain outside so I can't get out and walk, I sit at home and think about all the possibilities...

Jinxing it

I think by just posting about it, I'm going to jinx it, but it seems like so far Beckett is following in his brother's footsteps by being a great sleeper.

It's one good night, one bad night in terms of sleeping.

But last night he only got up ONCE to feed! He slept from 9:30 until 2. He fed from 2 to 3 and then went back to bed till 7:30.

CRAZY! But like I said, I'm most likely jinxing it right now.

It looks to me

Like the bump on Beckett's head is getting bigger - the doctor didn't say anything about keeping an eye on it if it gets bigger. So now I'm going to do the thing that I know will end poorly... I'm going to search the net to see what they say.

Second doctor appointment

Beckett gained the 100 grams the doctor was looking for - he's now 7lbs 12oz. It's hard when you are nursing to know how much your baby is getting, so even though I *thought* he was getting enough until he went on that scale today I really had no idea.

And the cephalohematoma is doing just fine - no further complications or anything.

His rash/whitehead issues are getting better - with the help of his ointment. He still has them, but they are getting fewer and further in between.

Doctor wants to see us again next Wednesday just to make sure he keeps gaining weight. Looking at him you wouldn't think his weight would be an issue!

Already?

I thought I had a good few years left, but apparently not.

Last night I was putting Carson to bed and after we read a book, I asked him for a kiss. And he said "I already kissed you downstairs mommy". I asked if I could have another one and he said "No - you already got one"

I got a brief image of dropping him off at school and him not wanting to kiss me in front of his friends!

Week 1

When Carson was born, I had a rough go.

This time around it's so different. I've only cried once, when he was born, and those were total tears of happiness. I'm happy - happy - happy. I'm not anxious, sad, confused, worried....nursing is going well, I'm not wanting to stay in bed all day - I'm getting lots of stuff done around the house. We've been out for walks, we've gone shopping, heck we've even gone to watch Daddy at the driving range! Jeff's back at work and I'm not counting down the minutes until he gets home at night. Maybe I am cut out for this mommy to a newborn stuff.

And, I had Beckett via c-section and the recovery is so much faster than the first time. I was reading my blog saying how I walked from my mom's house to the bank - about 3 weeks after I had Carson and that had been my first "real" walk. Well, already - look what I've done. I could hardly get out of bed by myself a week after my first c-section. Maybe it's because I exercised my entire pregnancy (or at least until 8 months, my last month wasn't so great - I blame it on the heat!) or maybe just the second time it's easier. Who knows, but whatever it is, I am loving it.

Today we are stranded at home so the windows in my car can get tinted. Which is good, there's a ton of paperwork I have to get around to doing - stuff like that is so HARD to do during the summer, isn't it?

And last night, get this, I SLEPT. I had about 6.5 hours of sleep between 9:30 and 6:30 this morning. For a week old baby, I think that's great!

And I just have to write about how much Carson loves his baby brother. Like LOVES. Every morning, the first thing he asks about is Beckett and he wants to see him. He sits beside me when I'm feeding him. He sits beside the bassinette all the time and brings Beckett his toys (but mommy the baby wants the truck), he was trying to convince me this morning that Beckett needed some juice. Yesterday Beckett and I walked to pick Carson up from care and when we turned into the driveway Carson started yelling to his friends "my baby brother is here, come see him". It's so adorable!

And of course, here are a few pictures:

Doctor appointment

We just got back from our first doctor appointment and poor bunny has lost almost 10% of his birth weight. He was fine upon discharge from the hospital but now he's 7 lbs 8 oz. Which is more than Carson weighed at birth, but it's all relative....

So I have to increase my nursing (which is going WAY better this time around so I didn't cry when he told me I had to feed more, which I would have done if they would have asked me to do the same with Carson, of that I'm quite sure). And Beckett already almost eats quite steadily (well, at night he does, not during the day. During the day he sleeps and at night he eats - he's got this whole living thing backwards!) So we are going back on Wednesday and the doctor wants to see at least a 100 gram gain by then. Come on Beckett, gain weight as easily as your mom does :)

Also he appears to have quite sensitive skin and he's got splotchy blotches all over him. And in some places they are like white-heads (ick, typing that word makes me sick). So we got a topical antibiotic and if it hasn't started to clear up a bit by Wednesday then we will go on oral antibiotics.

And he has a bump on his head! The doctor said it sometimes happens during birth and it's fluid trapped under the skin. In some cases it could calicify (calciumify?) and get harder - but should be gone by a year.

Now I'm off to feed, to bathe him and hopefully the both of us will go for a nap. Last night the only way I could get him to sleep was if I slept sitting up in bed and he laid on my chest. The things we will do for an hour snooze :)

We're home - the 4 of us!

Beckett Walker Raymond Gallant was born on July 15th at 11am. It was another c-section, this one was way smoother than the last one. It's not even 48 hours and already I'm feeling better then I was 2 weeks after I had Carson.

It took us over 24 hours to choose a name but we're quite happy with the name we chose.

He's gorgeus. He looks like Carson did when he was born but he has more hair and it's much darker than his brothers.

And Carson LOVES his brother. He stayed with Grandma for two nights and each time he came up to the hospital he had a huge smile and went right to see Beckett. Then of course, the helicopter landing pad directly outside my window was much more interesting. But tonight when we came home, we went to Grandma's to pick him up and he never left Beckett's side. He even gave him his holy Iggle Piggle.

So now I'm in bed, Carson's fast asleep, Beckett's asleep at the foot of our bed and I couldn't be happier.

Let me know if this album works!

Feeling guilty...

I'm absolutely shocked at the amount of guilt I am feeling about the soon-to-be diminished amount of attention that I will be able to give Carson.

Carson is my life. I live and breathe him. I think about him every minute of the day - Jeff and I are both consistently around him, playing with him, talking to him, entertaining him, taking him here and there. Soon, there's going to be a new baby and our time will be divided.

And Carson doesn't know it's about to happen.

I KNOW it will just be a phase. I have a sister. I don't have feelings of my parents not paying me enough attention. I happen to be the younger sister but I don't think Carrie remembers feeling like her parents all of a sudden ignored her once I was born. So yes, I know these feelings will pass but just I've been looking at him and devoting every minute to him lately and I just can't imagine having to split these feelings between two little boys.

I love you Carson and I promise, you are going to be happy that you have a younger brother. You are a wonderful, caring little boy. I know you are going to welcome your little brother into your life and that you will be as in love with him as I know I will be.

I do it by myself!

Tonight Carson jumped into the pool by himself! He had floaties on, but he stepped off the ledge and jumped into the pool (of course going under water) all by himself! Jeff was there, but told Carson he wasn't going to catch him and Carson still did it.

That boy LOVES the water. The heater in the pool wasn't working so it was a tad chilly (good thing I'm 39 weeks pregnant so I could easily justify not being the parent who had to go in the water) and Carson was shivering, his lips were blue, but he did NOT want to get out of the water.

He swam by himself too (again, with the floaties of course). Apparently he takes after both mommy and daddy as we were both water babies.

And here's the best picture I could get of his new haircut. Yep, he let me bring him in and get his haircut. He was so good and turned his head whichever way the lady asked. So very proud!

This is him in the pullout couch at Grandma's cottage, he of course had the bedroom and the kingsized bed all to himself but in the morning he got up and came out and got into MY bed!

Hansel and Gretel

My mom always used to say to me (probably still does) that she could tell exactly where I've been in the house because I was bad at leaving cupboards and drawers open, chairs pulled out.....

It's funny, this morning I went up to get the laundry from our rooms and I looked around my bedroom and I knew exactly what Carson had done! I've been sleeping with a pillow between my legs and when I get up in the morning it gets tossed on the ground. I went around to my side of the bed, saw my pillow with a little blankie beside it. I knew right then he had been lying on the pillow and covered himself in the blankie.

My makeup drawer was partway open and I could see a Thomas train stuck inside.

The mirror had little fingerprints on it.

The fan was already turned off (he loves playing with the fan, and I know I slept with it ON last night)

Like mother.... like son!

Bedtime

I know bedtime is different for all parents, but let me just recount ours from tonight. Carson had his sippy cup of milk and watched 25 minutes of TV like he does every night before bed. When the show is over, he runs over to the TV (ok, some nights like tonight he runs, other times he stalls and walks ever so slowly) to turn it off. Then he always says he wants mommy to take him to bed, but that's Jeff's job.

Carson - daddy is going to take you to bed, mommy is going to do some laundry.

Carson runs over to daddy - daddy you take me

Daddy says - take you where

Carson says to bed!

Jeff asked if he gave mommy a kiss good night, so he runs over and gives me a kiss and a hug and smiles and says goodnight mommy.

Up they go, two minutes later Jeff is downstairs and Carson is singing in bed.

I highly doubt we will get this lucky with number two :)

I love Sundays

When I don't have to work on Mondays :)

We decided to go to a little town outside Ottawa yesterday - Merrickville. We'd never been there before and it's such a beautiful little town. We walked around by the water, watched the boats go through the locks, went into some adorable little shops, ate lunch on the patio, watched the horse and carriages go through the streets, ate some ice cream, played on the grass and then took a short nap in the car and went onto Grandma and Nono's trailer where we went on the docks, played in the water, collected rocks, fed the chipmunks (COME OVER HERE AND EAT CHIPPY said Carson) and had some strawberries.

Picture of the nursery

For Carson, this is what the nursery looked like.

With a few changes, this is what the nursery looks like for baby boy two.

And this is one of the shirts I got for baby two - I found it rather appropriate, don't you?

38-39 weeks

Yowsa!

I've made up for...

The first two days of pure laziness on my maternity leave. Wednesday was of course, Canada Day - which we spent the whole morning at our community Canada Day celebration party thing. There were bouncy castles, slides, ride on jeeps, pony rides, obstacle courses, food, ball pits, car tracks.... and Carson and his cousins Ethan and Isabelle had a fantastic time!

Make a Smilebox postcard

After a much needed nap - we headed over to Carrie and Rob's for a BBQ. There were more kids, more food, a pool, a trampoline, water guns, big wheels, a big pile of sand dust with diggers to go along with it which kept Carson occupied for the majority of the afternoon and night.

Then yesterday I spent the day with my mother shopping - I got oodles of really really cute little clothes for the baby. Walmart for some baby necessities, Michael's for some crafts, Starbucks for a latte and Home Sense and Winners - well, cause I love those stores.

Then, all this morning my mom and I got the nursery ready - plus added some finishing touches to Carson's room. Then we went out for some spicy food for lunch, then I walked around looking at a few baby boutiques and got some really fabulous ideas for when the baby comes

I'm feeling WAY more ready now - did you see where I said the nursery is ready?!?! And it's really cute if I do say so myself. I'll take some pictures. Laundry is being done (I can't wait to put him in these adorable little summer outfits), so bring on the baby!!!!

I can't help but laugh..

At Carson's use of tenses.

Now a days he most oftens gets his now, later, after, soon right.... but just as short as a few weeks ago our conversations would sound like this

"Mommy I don't want to go to bed now" (saying this right before supper)

"Carson, we won't to bed until later"

"I want to go soon" (knowing full well he didn't want to go to bed soon)

Or, if he tried to bargain with you.

"Carson, you have 5 minutes to play until we have to go"

"Mommy I want one more minute" (again, knowing full well it's not like he actually wanted to leave sooner"

It's the addition of all these little words, getting past only using the absolutely essential words in a sentence that makes me smile and giggle at his little sentences.

Although now I just heard a conversation with his Daddy..

"Daddy's painting the room for the new baby when he comes"

"Where's the new baby Carson?"

"In mommy's tummy"

"yes, the new baby is coming soon and I'm painting his room so he can sleep in it"

"Not soon daddy, later"

And in this case, I think he knows exactly what soon versus later means.