11 weeks

Superbaby!
I love to eat!
...as you can see:

Ezra was 11 weeks old yesterday. Time is flying by! Everytime I think I am really getting to know my baby, he throws me for a loop. Take yesterday for example. Lately, he has been wanting to go to sleep around 6:30 and will sleep for 5 or 6 hours before he wakes up. Yesterday he took a little catnap at around 5, then woke up. Chad and I decided to go to dinner at Roadhouse, so we fed Ezra right before we left and he was fussy to say the least. I almost suggested that we stay home, but Chad was adamant about getting me out of the house. So we went. As soon as I put Ezra in his carseat, he stopped crying. We drove to Roadhouse and waited about 10 minutes. He just stared at us the entire time through dinner. I really thought he would either fall asleep from tiredness and the loud roar in there, or fall apart--most likely the second one. He did great! As soon as we came home, he started crying, but who could blame him since it was after 8:00 at this point. He is still waking up about twice a night to eat, and last night it was at 11 and 4. And speaking of eating, he decided to go on a nursing strike the past couple days. He was just getting too impatient and was too hungry, so we just gave him bottles and I started to think that we were done with the nursing thing. Well, it seems like we are back as we were because he has nursed fine all day today. I really think he was going through a growth spurt because he was super fussy too, and today he is super happy. That little unpredictable kid.

I think the best lesson I have learned in the past 2 1/2 months is that everything changes constantly with a new baby. Now I have learned to tell myself "It's just a phase," and not get so down if something isn't going the way we would like for it to. Another thing I have learned is that the minute he yawns or his eyes start looking sleepy, put him down for a nap. This is usually around 55 minutes after he wakes up from his last nap. If I wait too long, he wakes up constantly or is awake after 45 minutes, then of course he is sleepy and cranky. If I put him down at the right time, he sleeps for 1.5-2 hours, and then of course he is hungrier when he wakes up so he eats better, and the cycle continues. The third lesson I have learned is to never, ever tell anyone with a newborn to enjoy every minute. Having a newborn is hard, and I would say that we even have a pretty easygoing baby. And even with a baby like Ezra, not every single minute is enjoyable. The vast majority of the time, yes, but all the time, no. I'm just sayin'.

This week's recipes and weekly weigh-in

Easy chicken cordon bleu...Chad made this. It was good, easy, and a great way to use up leftover croutons.
Chicken with balsamic bbq sauce...this was good and super easy.
Chicken tacos with mango-avocado salsa...I made this yesterday. It's a recipe from my Cooking Light magazine and it was really easy and Chad said it was good. I wish they had put a recipe with mangos and avocados in a summer issue instead of an October issue because it's not as easy to find good produce now and it's more expensive.
Herb-roasted pork tenderloin...this has become one of my favorite recipes. It is easy, I always have the ingredients, and it turns out good every time. It's in a previous week's post if you're interested.

I lost 1.2 lbs this week. I am trying to take it a little easier with the exercising and eating, meaning I am exercising maybe 3 times a week now instead of 5 or 6 like I was at the beginning, and I am eating more calories. I weighed myself on Friday and I had already lost 2 lbs in 4 days, which is not good if I'm nursing. So I am trying to be a bit more moderate about it, and still hoping to lose around a pound a week. I am glad I'm blogging about it though, because it helps me to think that if I make bad choices I'll have to tell everyone who reads my blog that I gained weight.

Happy Thursday!

Ezra has perfected his "deer in the headlights" look:

10 weeks

Ezra is 10 weeks old today! So this picture isn't in focus, but I just love his big smile. It lights up his whole face, and we love our sweet little boy so much.

Some videos

Ezra's first road trip from Lesley Montandon on Vimeo.

Cabin tour from Lesley Montandon on Vimeo.

Ezra in the morning from Lesley Montandon on Vimeo.

The first video is of Ezra on our road trip, 4 1/2 hours into the trip. The second one is a tour of our cabin, for our family and friends who have not gotten a chance to see it in person yet. The third one is of Ezra when he first woke up one morning. He is really trying to tell me something. I love how good of a mood he is in when he first wakes up for the day...it makes all my tiredness worth it! On a sidenote, I hate it how I always tell Ezra to "say bye." Then I wait for him to say bye. Obviously, he can't. Why do I do that?

We've gone fluffy

We have officially started cloth diapering. I am using the Grobaby system, and did a trial run about a month ago, and I really like them a lot. Ezra has really just grown into using them, and as you can see they are still a little bulky because I have to snap them down to the smallest setting so there's some extra fabric, but I am anxious to get started. Doesn't Ezra look excited too? As you can see, the new cloth diapers out there are not your mom's piece of folded fabric and safety pins. Yes, those still exist, but I am going the more high-tech route. These have a snap-in system and are also one-size diapers, so they should fit him on the larger setting until he's ready to potty train. Even Chad said he is ready to start cloth diapering--he didn't like the "chemical" smell of the disposable diapers. So now that the husband is on board, I feel like it's a good time to start. Wish us luck!

Weekly weigh-in

This week I lost 2.2 lbs. I was surprised because I ate out three times, only did the shred once, and ran twice. I wasn't as good at keeping track of my points because we went to the cabin this weekend, but I was aware of it. Oh well, I'm not questioning it. This means I am over a third of the way to my goal weight. I am only 16 lbs away from my starting weight, and less than 20 toward the goal. It feels good to know that something I am doing is paying off...probably eating less and exercising more, whodathunkit. Since I went out to eat so much this week, I started looking up nutritional information for the restaurants. Most of them have their nutrition facts online and I have to say I was pretty surprised at how few healthy choices there are. My goal is to just find one or two healthy things at each restaurant I go to on a regular basis, and these days most restaurants are pretty good about having at least a couple healthy options. All I have to say is I can never eat a plain jane baked potato from Jason's Deli again.

We're home...in one piece!

We are back. The trip went great--as great as can be expected when traveling with a 2-month-old. We left as soon as Chad got off work on Friday morning. I drove, and Chad stayed in back to tend to Ezra's every need. Turns out he does pretty good when someone is back there with him all the time feeding him, putting him to sleep, sticking his pacifier in his mouth, etc. He actually slept a lot of the time there and almost the entire time home, except between Ft. Sumner and Clovis. I'll explain in a bit. We didn't bring any toys to the cabin with us, but Ezra was quite enthralled watching a slideshow of pictures of himself on the laptop. This is how Chad kept him entertained both mornings when the boys woke up earlier than I did. We took a couple hikes while we were there, just down the Blue Canyon, Rippling Falls trail, etc. It was chilly while we were there, and I thought Ezra looked so cute in his little fleece outfit. I will really miss the days when I can't decide what my child wears.
Family picture with self-timer--this was the best one we could get where Ezra wasn't completely covering his face. (I woke him up for this picture. Bad mom.)
We looooove fall in the mountains. This was the first trip to try out the Ergo carrier. Ezra hated being put in it--once again the claustrophobia thing I guess. But once he realized he wasn't getting out, he stopped putting up a fight and fell asleep quickly.
Hiking down Blue Canyon Road

View of the cabin and the new deck railing that Chad, Talin and David built a few weeks ago
When we first got to the cabin it was COLD inside...glad we brought those heavy-duty space heaters that kept us comfortable the rest of the weekend. I bundled Ezra up and he was all too happy to take a nap in his pack-n-play after being in his carseat for 6 hours. And what would a trip through Ft. Sumner, NM, be if you didn't stop at the Billy the Kid Museum? Don't answer that. Anyway, I thought it would be a good idea to let Ezra out of the carseat for a little bit to give his bottom a break. In hindsight, I wish we had just kept going. He was fussy for the next hour and a half.
Not the best picture of our little one, but funny nonetheless. So, overall the trip went well. It took us an extra hour either way just for stops and to get Ezra out of his carseat, change his diapers, etc. He did well at the cabin except he woke up more often, and so did we since we were all sleeping in the same room. I think he had a bit of a time adjusting to the altitude. He was a little bit fussier than usual all weekend...I'm sure from lack of sleep during the night and with the car rides. Last night we got home about 9:00 and I brought Ezra in his room, changed his diaper, and laid him in his crib and he went to sleep immediately--it's like he knew he was back home in his own room. And now I'm awake blogging after his one and only feeding of the night--he slept for a 7 hour stretch. Tired boy. Anyway, we are glad we got to go up there one last time before next season, and we are glad to be home. One thing this trip taught me is that I am so glad I will not have a tiny baby at camp next year.

Weekly weigh-in later today. I don't have such a good feeling about this one.

Dr.'s appointment and fair

Ezra went and saw his doctor today for his 2 month well check. He now weighs 11 lbs. (30th percentile, he was 6#14oz and in the 10th %ile at birth) and is 23 inches long (50th %ile, he was 18" at birth) and is in the 50th %ile for head circumference. His doctor says he is doing great. Poor little baby had to get 3 shots while we were there and he didn't like that one bit, and neither did I, but we both did great. Ezra only cried while he was getting the shots and as soon as I was able to pick him up, he calmed down. After the doctor's appointment we went to the fair, you know, to reward Ezra for being so good at the doctor. As you can see from the picture of us at the fair, he was very impressed. I was just glad that he was happy to get back into his carseat and take a long nap. He slept the entire time we were at the fair and woke up to eat while we were driving home.

Overall it's been a good day, and I am hoping we don't have to get any more shots for a while.

2 months

Look! We have hair!





Ezra is two months old today. It doesn't feel like it's been two months since we brought him home from the hospital--it really does seem like the time has flown by. Although, in those first few weeks when he was waking up every two hours day and night to eat, I wondered how I was going to make it through with such little sleep. I guess that is what God gives us adrenaline for. Here are a few things about our baby boy that mark his two month birthday:

-He is pushing up really well when he's on his stomach and has very strong legs and neck muscles. He is almost ready to hold his neck up on his own.
-He has been sleeping in his own crib for about a month now. He seems to sleep best when he is in a dark room, swaddled up, with some white noise. Most of the time we lay him down awake and he is so tired that he sacks out. It is getting harder and harder to put him to sleep when we are at church or out at all really because he is too interested in what is going on, so Wednesday nights are especially hard when he would like to be at home asleep for the night. We are working on getting him to be a little bit more flexible. :)
-He loves to play in his swing and on his play mat. He is starting to enjoy the bumbo more.
-He has discovered how to bat at things with his hands and becomes pretty amused when he actually hits his target. He has also discovered his hands and loves to stick them in his mouth.
-He smiles with his whole face...his eyes squint up, he cocks his head back, and his mouth is wide open. It is the cutest thing.
-He loves to talk to anyone who will listen, or better yet, talk to him in return. He has discovered how to fake cough.
-He loooooooves Chad. Chad can usually calm him down when I can't. I love watching them play together and watching how Ezra looks at his daddy.
-He is getting better and better at sleeping at night, not waking up so much, and not eating so often. This makes me extremely happy. I thought I was going to go crazy for a while there. Maybe he picked up on that and didn't want a crazy mom.

The past couple of days have really been a turning point for Ezra. It's like has turned into a baby and not a newborn anymore, if that makes sense. Anyway, we are enjoying it, and I love the interaction we have now that he is becoming more aware of things. We just love having Ezra in our lives and know that he will continue to be such a special part of our little family.

**There will be more pictures on my facebook page later today, for those of you who are friends with me. :)

Weekly weigh-in

I lost 1.6 lbs this week.

The only new recipe I tried was the cottage cheese chicken enchiladas. I know it sounds weird and kind of gross, but it was actually really good. The link is a few posts down if you're interested. I made the potato bacon torte again and the salmon cakes and changed some things up in both of the recipes to make them healthier.

Maybe there's hope! (Mom, you can read this)

More carseat talk...skip this post if you really don't care about this. Weigh-in tomorrow.

Is this the same baby I was just talking about in my last post? I took the picture below around 7:15 this evening, after we came home from our small group. Ezra was being quite fussy at small group because it was his bedtime and his tummy was hurting. So I decided it was time to leave, and put him in his seat, thinking it was going to be a long 15 minutes home. Well, I put him in his seat, we got in the car, and he didn't make a peep. I looked at him in the little mirror we have in front of his seat, and he had dozed off. WHAT?! When we got home, I went to get my camera, he was awake, and he even gave me some smiles! Maybe I should back up...this morning before Bible class a few of us were brainstorming what else I could do to help this situation. One of my friends suggested I take off the little newborn head rest thing that goes around his head. I had thought of that, but thought he still needed it so his head wouldn't flop around. But I tried it. Then I realized, the kid can pretty much hold his head up, so no, it was not flopping all over the place, and apparently he didn't like that cushiony semi-circle around his head. Claustrophobic maybe? Couldn't see the world around him enough? You guys actually did pray for me? I don't know, but I'm just hoping that was the problem and that it's fixed and not another fluke. This might also be why he took a 3-hour nap this afternoon when I didn't swaddle him up, as opposed to his usual 1 to 1 1/2 hour nap that he takes when he's swaddled up. It never ceases to amaze me how babies develop opinions and preferences so early in their lives. This next picture is for Paul and Carolyn. Ezra wore his John Deere boots for the first time tonight, and he got so many compliments on them! He did look pretty cute if I do say so myself.
That's all for now.

Anybody have some advice?

So. We are about to embark on our first road trip with little Ezra, 5 hours one way to be exact (well, 5 hours was before children, so add on the appropriate amount of time here). Here's the deal: Ezra still hates being in the car. It has gotten significantly better if I roll down the windows and put "Blessed be your name" from my Encore's greatest hits CD on repeat (I'm not kidding: if we let it go to the next song he starts crying), but most of the time he will still start crying within 10-15 minutes of being in the carseat, most of the time sooner. I'm not talking about whimpering and fussing, I'm talking about screaming inconsolably, to the point where when we get him out of the carseat he is all sweaty from crying so hard. I'm not sure what the deal is. We have tried singing, mirror in front of him, shade on the window, carseat shade down, carseat shade up, sitting back there with him (worked for a little bit), and I'm sure some other stuff. One of the main problems is Ezra won't fall asleep in his carseat. Yeah, I know this works for every other kid that ever existed, in fact I've heard of people doing this when their kids are fussy at night to GET them to go to sleep. Also, he loves both of his strollers. He falls asleep almost immediately when we take him in the jogging stroller around the neighborhood, and we use the stroller that came with the carseat to go shopping. We get him out of the carseat, put him in the stroller, and he falls asleep. He just doesn't like sitting so upright, I guess.

A few years ago when we first moved to Lubbock, we visited churches. One Sunday morning in a Bible class we were visiting where most of the attendees had young children (not the class we are currently in, in case any of you are reading this :), they were taking prayer requests and one lady raised her hand and requested prayers for herself and her husband because they were taking a trip and her son hated her carseat. I am pretty sure I rolled my eyes. If I didn't roll my eyes, I thought about it. To me it was ridiculous that someone would request prayers because their child didn't like his carseat. Oh silly, naive me. Of COURSE I got a child that hates his carseat.

Help me. Better yet, pray for me. Seriously though, if anyone has any suggestions, I will gladly take them.

Here's a video for your Friday enjoyment. Yesterday we discovered that when we blow air in Ezra's face he tries to suck it through his nose. Chad and I were obviously amused.

Fresh air from Lesley Montandon on Vimeo.

Happy fall!
I just had to share this picture. Yesterday morning after I got Ezra up and ready for the day, I put him in his swing so I could eat breakfast. A few minutes later, I look over and see the most tired little baby I've ever seen. He was sitting so still, with this expression on his face. Of course, being the wonderful mother I am, I had to take a picture before putting him back down for a nap. When I stopped the swing to get him out, his hands were down at his sides and he was totally limp he was so tired. He proceeded to take a 2 hour nap, and this was right after he woke up for the day. More playtime with his daddy

Ezra loves his daddy

My Little Eskimo

Last night it got down into the 40s here so it was chilly this morning when we went on our walk. Actually, we went around noon, and it was still chilly. I decided to try out this thing I got while I was pregnant that's lined in some kind of fake fur and it basically covers the carseat or stroller to keep your baby warm. I put it on the jogging stroller this morning and Ezra seemed not to mind it. He could still see out, which doesn't really matter because all he does is sleep when I put him in the stroller anyway. It did block the wind though which is very handy in west Texas. Here are some pictures of our little one all bundled up. It's hard to know how many clothes to put on a little baby when the weather is chilly, but he seemed comfortable.

Before:After:Yes, I realize he is wearing a wintery outfit with a snowman on it and it's only September, but we got it on clearance months ago at Old Navy and he is about to outgrow it. He is pretending like he is asleep in this picture but he's really awake. I limit myself to taking one picture per day of my child while they are trying to sleep. (see above)

8 weeks!

Look...he's smiling! I guess I caught him at a good time.
This would have been a great shot if I hadn't been using flash. Wanted to include it anyway because it was one of the best smiles he gave me today. Hey, who's that girl in these pictures? Oh yeah, it's the kid's mother. I haven't shown up in any photos lately on this blog (none since the one our nurse took the day we left the hospital), so Chad snapped a few of Ezra and me together. In the first one especially you can see that there is no doubt that he is my child. I prepared this whole post thinking it was exactly eight weeks since Ezra's birth, then realized that it's Monday and he was born on a Tuesday, so tomorrow he'll be 8 weeks. Oh well. I think last week I posted a day late so this will make up for it. Hmmm...what's new about our baby boy this week...well, we went through a bit of a rough patch over the past week where he was being really fussy in the evenings, eating all the time, etc. but that has mostly passed, knock on wood. He is taking longer naps now and not eating every single minute (at least it felt that way to me). He is still waking up a couple times at night to eat, and I'm hoping that he starts sleeping in longer stretches soon. My favorite time of day is in the morning when he wakes up at around 5:30 and then again around 8 to eat, and he is so happy and smiley it just makes my day.

Weekly weigh-in and recipes

First up...I lost 1.4 lbs this week. Isn't it funny that when you're trying to lose weight and the first week you lose a big number, then you "only" lose 1.4 lbs the next week, you're all disappointed? Classic Biggest Loser syndrome (for those of you who don't watch the show, the second week everybody gets all sad because they worked just as hard the second week and didn't pull numbers near as big as the first week. Which makes total sense when you think about it, but just watch tomorrow night. I bet at least one person cries because they worked so hard and didn't lose very much weight.). Anyway, I worked out almost every day this last week and 1.4 lbs is fine with me. I'm still doing weight watchers but I used more of my extra points for things like wedding cake, sonic tater tots, food at a baby shower, etc. So I am not surprised at all that it wasn't another 5 lbs. And that's okay. I'm pretty sure a healthy rate of weight loss is 1-2 lbs a week anyway. So enough about that.

Recipes for the week:
Pan-fried pork chops and applesauce...these were fine. Nothing to write home about. I made cinnamon apples instead of applesauce.
Baked sweet potatoes with warm black bean salad...really liked these. I wasn't sure about them at first because we usually do sweet stuff on sweet potatoes like butter, cinnamon, brown sugar etc., but they were really good with the black beans. I used this black bean recipe to start out with (had leftovers) instead of a can of black beans, then added what the recipe called for. I also added a little plain vinegar to give it a little bit of tang. It turned out really good, and very healthy and filling.
The rest of the week we had stuff like fajitas, cooked out hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill, stuff like that. This week I am doing a couple of recipes I've done before like the potato bacon torte (substituting half and half for the heavy cream and using less cheese), salmon cakes (using the salmon in the vacuum packs that have already been de-boned and the skin taken out instead of the canned kind--it's about 4 grams of fat and 40 calories less per serving), and spaghetti, and trying a couple new recipes: cottage cheese chicken enchiladas (using reduced-fat cheese) and chicken with balsamic barbecue sauce. Side dishes will be basic stuff like fresh green beans sauteed with shallots, regular side salad, roasted baby carrots, using the rest of those black beans I made last week to go with the enchiladas, etc.

One thing about being on weight watchers is I really hate having to cook certain "healthy" recipes. I find Chad doesn't really like them and neither do I. I also hate using ingredients that are supposed to be good substitutes but really aren't, like ground turkey breast. I'm sorry but that stuff is not good if you are trying to substitute it for ground beef like in hamburgers, meatloaf or spaghetti. I would much rather cook my regular recipes, substitute some of the ingredients for healthier ones (like reduced fat cheese, half and half instead of heavy cream, etc) and just watch portion size. And, I like to put all my "points" into the main dish and serve side dishes that are 0 or 1 points (which is easy to do if I am getting my 8 fruits and veggies a day like I'm supposed to). Then, to me, it really doesn't feel like I'm on a "diet."

Is anybody still reading this and interested in the recipe thing? It takes some time to go through and find the links and I'm not going to do it anymore if nobody cares. Won't hurt my feelings.

Have a good week everyone.

What do you want to do today?

Untitled from Lesley Montandon on Vimeo.