Sunday, December 15, 2013

We have a tooth!

There is one thing my 2 kids are exactly alike in: when they teethe, they are exactly alike.

After one night of Lukey waking up 4 times, and the next night Lukey waking up every 20 minutes-1 hour and only sleeping if being held, we woke up Saturday morning (December 7) to a tooth. It was a beautiful tooth.

Teething is the worst. Seriously.


Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Aryn's 3rd Birthday - The Ice Cream Party!

*DISCLAIMER: Aryn's birthday was in September. It is now December. I am fully aware that I am 3 months late writing this blog. But better late than never, right? RIGHT??

Aryn loves ice cream. Ok... who am I kidding... she loves all sweets. There's not much in the junk food 'food group' that she doesn't love. But ice cream... ohhh this kid loves ice cream.

Her party was a toss up between a strawberry theme and an ice cream theme... and ice cream seemed much more fun. The kid loves her some strawberries... but if she had to choose between an ice cream cone and a bowl of strawberries... ok, I don't exactly know what she'd choose but I would suspect she'd go with ice cream.

So I set off looking for ice cream theme ideas. Pinterest is my new best friend, and many of my ideas were taken from there. I am partially hoping to find some of these photos on Pinterest!

First, the invitation. I made it in photoshop, from scratch, taking ideas from a few other invitations I found on Google. It took a few weeks to make, and I was extremely happy with it!


We had water bottles with flavour water squirts available for everyone. We decided not to buy pop or make punch for many reasons (extra expense, would need too much variety, takes too much time to make punch, punch is really messy, etc.) and this way I got to use up some of the flavour squirts in our pantry!


Instead of giving kids a bag with breakable toys and loud whistles (which all kids love, but let's face it - parents do not haha!), we decided to give ice cream cookies that I had made by a lady here in town (Out of Chaos Comes Cookies). They were $1.25 each, which I thought was good considering anything from the dollar store would end up being more. They were 2 cookies baked together, with icing made to look like an ice cream cone, the 'waffle cone' was icing as well, and a number 3 in icing. There were 4 different colours of ice cream cone, and they were seriously delicious.

Frames from Target. 4 for $1!!



We had an ice cream toppings centre. Unfortunately, it was really warm that day and the chocolate chips melted, but everything else worked great! They were a huge hit.

Again, this frame is one of the 4 for $1 at Target!



We had bowls, ice cream cones, and waffle bowls for the ice cream. The waffle bowls were apparently disgusting... I didn't taste test them first. Whoops!



One very happy 3 year old!!
Hair clip & tutu made by my amazing friend at AnnaLuv Designs.
I made the shirt... just a regular white shirt, green tule made into ice cream, and fabric paint making the cone.


Borrowed a bouncy house from a friend. Yay!


Lots of toys for the kids outside to play with.


The very interesting ladybugs came free... there were a billion of them, and really stole the show.




Ok... please keep in mind that I had just had a baby... this is not my best look. Seriously... 

And for the birthday girls' birthday cake, we took ice cream cones, baked cake mix in them, topped them with icing, and a Smartie on top. We had vanilla and chocolate cake, and they really were delicious.




I forgot to grab a "before" photo! 


Then it was present time. All the kids helped Aryn open her many gifts. She was so spoiled by so many people who love her. It made my heart happy. 



We had messages left after the party saying it was one of the most fun birthday parties they'd ever been to. That made my day! That's all we ever want - for people to come, celebrate our little girl, and have a great time. It really was an extremely fun day. Aryn zonked out quickly afterwards! We were so grateful that her great grandma, grandma, aunt and 3 cousins were able to make the trek out as well for the party! More people to celebrate our special girl!!

Lukey's birthday is in 5.5 months... I'd better start planning... ;)

Lukey update & kid comparison

As Lucas gets older, I find myself going through every old post on this blog from when Aryn was the same age and reading up on what we were going through at that time. And with every post I read, I am left with 2 prominent thoughts:

1. How different both of my kids are.

2. How I have written down NOTHING about Lucas.

With Aryn, we knew we'd have another kid, and I wanted to document everything about her growth for reference purposes, and to one day make a little book for her that wrote out everything she did as she grew up.

I haven't done the book yet. And I haven't written down (hardly) anything about Lucas. So... here we go.

As of today, Lucas is 6 months and (almost) 3 weeks old. Last week he got his 6 month shots, and he weighs 16 lbs 13 oz and is 27" long.

Both kids at roughly 6 months... wearing the same shirt... in the same chair!

For those of you keeping track, Aryn was 17 lbs 11 3/4oz and 26" at 6 months. So Aryn was about 1 full pound and 1 inch shorter than Lucas at the same age.

Lukey is pretty much the exact opposite of a baby as Aryn was.

Aryn loved to eat - both milk and solids.
Lucas needs to be forced to eat sometimes. He does not particularly like solids, and he'll shut his mouth tight after a couple spoonfuls. You cannot shove more food into his little mouth. When those lips close, you're done. Even if it's only after 1 small bite. This is strange because he's constantly reaching for food. He just doesn't seem to want 'baby' food. He wants grown-up food. But I'm just too nervous that he'll choke or react to it so I keep trying to give him puréed food!


Aryn loved bananas.
Lukey HATES bananas. He even gives me the ol' fake gagging face.

Aryn had a little eczema at this age, and I rushed her to the pediatrician to get it looked at and taken care of. She was given minor steroids and I remember being so frustrated that the doctor said that "it was nothing to be worried about."
Lukey has the worst case of eczema the one doctor I took him to has ever seen. Ever. I don't know what sets it off, but as of today, he has been off grains for a couple of weeks (no oatmeal or rice cereal) and I still don't know if that's the culprit. I am waiting to see a pediatrician.

 

Aryn didn't really "roll". She rolled from her stomach to back, and she spun around to get closer to things. Like... she'd be on her stomach and she'd spin... on her stomach... to slowly reach things. She did this for months.
Lukey rolls. He rolls like a crazy rolling machine. He goes from one end of the room to the other. It's insane watching him. Nothing is safe. He never stops moving.


Aryn was a hilarious character. She was giving us the cheesy grin at 6 months.
Lukey is very serious, despite his constant smiles. He has an "old soul." He smiles for everyone, seemingly all day, but it's a sweet loving smile. Not a joker trying-to-make-you-laugh smile.


Aryn was solid. Rolls, chunk, solid.
Lukey is slim. And extremely long, with short little legs.


Aryn had a bright red mohawk.
Lukey has a full head of very light blonde hair.


Aryn needed a bib all day to keep her clothes dry.
Lukey gnaws on things, but no drool yet!

Aryn got her first tooth at 6.5 months.
Lukey HAS to be getting one soon, because he's been sleeping nonstop, his cheeks are bright red, and he is miserable.


Aryn was happy. She was just generally happy. She was a very happy little girl. Especially in public - strangers would come to us and tell me how sweet and smiley she was everywhere we went.
Lukey is very smiley. He will smile for anyone. But after his afternoon nap, he whines. And he doesn't stop whining until he goes to sleep. I even knocked his bedtime up an hour because the whining got too much haha!! He doesn't cry - he just frets and whines, like he's annoyed that he's awake or not being taken care of the way he really thinks he should be!



Aryn slept. She went down at 7pm, I dream fed her at 11pm, and she slept until 7am the next morning.
Lukey doesn't sleep as fantastic. He wakes up anywhere from 1-3 times a night. Which really isn't bad. Sometimes he wakes up once at 1:30am. Sometimes he wakes up at 11pm, then 4am. He really hated being dream fed, so that didn't last longer than the week I allotted.


When Aryn was this age, she had gotten hives from a few things already. We had even been to the hospital like a dozen times by now!
Lukey doesn't *seem* to be allergic to as much, except for whatever is causing the eczema (if that's an allergy...). And we've only had 1 trip to the hospital for croup. Turns out both of my kids are susceptible to croup! (Aryn got it a total of 4 times in her little life!)

Lukey has already had a surgical procedure done!! After 5 months of painful and frustrating nursing, it was discovered (by a friend of mine) that Lukey had a lip tie. Upon further investigation, it turns out he had a tongue tie too! We saw a specialist in Calgary who has been doing this procedure for 35+ years, and she was amazed that we were nursing as well and for as long as we were. The procedure took 5 minutes, and she cut both his tongue and lip (the lip was classified as "prominent"). He cried a lot, but fell asleep about 10 minutes after the procedure and it didn't seem to bother him again after. A month later, he's a nursing champ, and really put on more weight since getting it done.

Before

Aryn was sitting up on her own at 6 months on the dot.
At 6 months and almost 3 weeks, Lukey has just started sitting up... and is very wobbly! Obviously every child does things at their own time, and Lukey


What else... Lukey seems to want to crawl right away. Aryn didn't start crawling until 10 months, and Lukey is already getting up on all 4's! Aryn was very cautious about things - Lukey is constantly kicking his toys over, opening doors, rolling under the Christmas tree... he's going to keep us on our toes!!

We have thoroughly enjoyed the last 6.5 months of little Lucas' life. He's ridiculously sweet, always holding my face in his hands and snuggling his face in my neck. He is definitely a mamas boy, whereas Aryn has always been a daddy's girl. You know those pictures of kids with food everywhere, on their face, their hair, all over the high chair? That's going to be Lucas. He's an animal and definitely much more adventurous than his older sister.

One thing they have in common? They both love each other. Ohh how they love each other. The first thing Aryn wants to do every morning is to "say hi to Lukey Pookie Man!" and whenever he sees his big sister - he gets so excited and squeals with delight. It's my favourite thing in the world.


Quick story: on Saturday, Ryan and I went shopping (with Lukey). Aryn stayed with my parents, and stayed over night at their place. We went to their place on Sunday at lunch to get Aryn and have brunch there. Well, when Lukey saw his sister for the first time in over a day, he reached out for her, gave her a big hug, and squealed with delight. He was so excited! This went on for about 5 minutes, of him just giving her hugs and snuggles and her giving him little hugs and kisses. I regret not videotaping it! But I hope that image is engrained in my brain forever.

And that's about the life of Lukey as of today...