16 weeks...

Caden is getting over his first cold =(. Poor little guy. It's no fun when you're baby is having a hard time breathing. He has also made a lot of progress in the last week. He is grabbing at stuff a lot now. He is mastering picking things up too. This is great because it has made him more interested in playing. He finally likes his play mat I got him. I can actually leave the room for a few minutes while he plays. He is also trying to sit up. Almost every time he is lying down now he tenses his tummy trying to pull himself up (like a crunch). He barely gets his head off the ground so we will hold him up and he will just sit there and chew on his hands. If we put our faces in front of his he will grab at them. He are some pictures from the last couple weeks...

15 weeks...

Last night Caden had a first and it was the first time I wasn't there to see it. He held his bottle all by himself for the first time. Luckily Erick was able to catch it on video. Sorry it's sideways!

Caden's First Date

Caden had his first play date with my friend Christy's 8 month old Katelyn last week and here's how it went...

Caden getting ready...

The beautiful Katelyn...

He stared at her...

She stared at him...

She wanted to give him a hug...

But decided to test the waters first...

Then she made her move...

Later they went swimming and hung out by the pool...

What can I say? Our son's a mack daddy.

I think my husband's in love...

Erick got a new truck today. He is very excited. It was hot off the delivery truck with only 12 miles. We would like to thank GM for the awesome rebate and our insurance company for the money from his old truck. We both really like it. With 4 doors, it is much roomier. Not looking forward to having a car payment again, though.

On another note, Caden has his follow-up appointment with the doctor today and he gained almost a pound in about a week, so he is doing good!

13 weeks...

Work went well. Just exhausted. Not looking forward to this weekend. Becky came for a visit Monday night. Here are some pictures she took of Caden.






Caden likes toys with eyes...


What is this big black thing you are sticking in my face?


As I mentioned before, Caden likes to stand and hold himself up, so we got the Johnny Jump Up out...




We took Caden swimming for the first time tonight. He seemed indifferent. He wasn't excited and he didn't hate it. Just hung out.

Tummy Time

I couldn't get this to load yesterday:


Also, some things I'm lovin' right now:

-At only 100 calories, these things are awesome! The only problem is I usually end up eating more than one.


- This is the new ABC show "Rookie Blue" and I am lovin it so far! There have only been two episodes but it reminds me a lot of Grey's Anatomy when it started.

Busy Bees...

So, first let me address- why the empty post "11 weeks..."? Because I had a whole long post finished and I accidentally deleted it. Thus, it is not my fault I haven't posted in so long. I tried. (you wouldn't have rewritten all of that either =)

A shout out to my nephew, Michael, who graduated from high school. We are very excited for him and very proud he will be joining the Air Force soon!

Tomorrow is my first day back to work. I am very sad about not getting to spend so much time with my little guy but at the same time a little relieved to have some time away. With us being here by ourselves I have spent pretty much 24/7 with Caden since he was born. I can use my two hands to count the number of times I've been away to even run an errand. I am cutting back to 30 hours because it is still full time with CVS. I will be working 5 days a week, so mostly my shifts will be short. My partner and I have a 2 week rotating schedule and I was able to work one out so it is pretty consistent:
Monday 4-10PM
Tuesday 8AM-2PM
Wednesday 8AM-2PM
Thursday-OFF
Weekends vary because I work every-other. I am not looking forward to my every-other-weekend. We are open 10 hours Saturday and 8 hours Sunday. I'm also apprehensive because of how tired I am sure I will be in the beginning. It has been a long time since I have stood for an entire shift. Near the end of the pregnancy I sat on a stool quite a bit because my ankles were so huge. Also, I have spent the most part of the last 3 months sitting on my butt rocking Caden. Needless to say I know I'm headed for quite an adjustment.

Rather than having Caden at daycare for a full day once per week, we decided to go for two short days. Erick goest to work around 10AM, so it will be about 10AM-2PM Tuesday and Wednesday. That way, since the day is payed for anyways, I can run errands if I need to do so after work. I have found it is very hard to get stuff done with a baby that likes to be held all the time. And, with no family in town I have to wait until Erick gets home which takes away from family time. He will start daycare in September. Until then my mom and sister will come over to help out.

Starting work has brought on another bought of "nesting." We are trying to get as many projects done as possible because we know there will be less time once I start back. So, here is what we have been up to:
-Installing new shelving in our closet because the old one fell
-Moving rocks...Erick did almost all of this, I can not take any credit because I only moved a couple buckets full. It was a very labor-intensive job!


-Cleaning, laundry, yard work
-Shopping- I needed new pants for work before the pregnancy anyways, but decided to wait until after incase my size changed. Also, I needed new shoes but waited so that my huge swollen feet wouldn't stretch out new ones.
-Car shopping- Erick was in a fender bender a couple weeks ago (everyone was fine) and it slightly bent the frame of his truck. Well, since his truck was older it was going to cost too much to fix, so they totaled it. We are now on the hunt for a new vehicle. This has been consuming much of our time since we have a time constraint with limited car rental time from the insurance. Erick was sad to see his old truck go so I took a picture for him...

-Cooking- Erick and his friend Mike from the Lucky Snapper made lunch for the men's and women's teams to try to get their business. Erick and Mike would like to start a catering business and do the teams' tailgates. The jury is still out on this end on this business venture due to the possible time demands.

And now what you have all been waiting for...



Caden is 3 months now! He is sleeping 8 hours after his 7PM or 8 PM feeding. He had spread his daytime feedings out to every 4 hours, but after a doctor's appointment last week revealed low weight gain, I now have to feed him every 3 hours. I am nervous because after a week my body still hasn't seemed to catch up with the increased demand. Hopefully it will work out. He has discovered his hands. He now uses them to push his pacifier back in his mouth. He will bring them together and push it up. It doesn't always work, but he tries.

Things he likes:
-Swinging on the front porch- He absolutely loves this. We don't know how, but he can tell the difference between this and the glider. He would spend hours out there if we would do it.
-Rocking- A close second to swinging. This is usually one of the only ways we can calm him.
-Standing- He really likes to hold himself up.
-The big black box (aka the TV)- We don't want him to watch TV yet, but if we are watching it he will bend himself as far as he can to see it. Then, if we move him so he can't see it he will get mad. We usually end up turning it off and he will continue to stare at the big black box. Sometimes we will just turn it to the CD music channel because it has a blue box with the song title and artist that slowly moves around the screen.
-Bath time- He likes bathes, he even likes it when you pour the water over his head. I think he will really like swimming in the pool if we can ever get it swim ready.
- Tummy time mat- This is the only thing that we will spend more than a couple minutes doing by himself. I bought a play gym, but usually as soon as I lay him down in it he starts to cry. It's hit or miss with the tummy time mat. The other day he spent about 15 minutes on it!

Lastly, this year was Erick's first Father's Day. I love him so very much and he is an amazing father. Caden and I are very lucky!