Porter–3 months

 

Have 3 months flown by already??  It’s truly hard to believe.  At this stage of the game, Porter is weighing in at 12 1/2 lbs.  He is full of smiles for everyone, but smiles more for Lana.  She seems to be the favorite so far, I think because she is the one he sees the most.  Lana loves to play babysitter while I take a shower or clean the house.  Tanner is a wonderful helper, willing to do any jobs I ask.  He is a fast runner when Porter catches me unaware and I don’t have a burp rag at hand.  He even takes the dirty diapers to the outside garbage for me.  Porter is still a finicky little boy.  He will nap great for a week in one location and suddenly he will refuse to sleep there and I have to find him a new place.  Sometimes the bouncy seat, the swing, our bed, his bed, you just never know!  He has this almost constant expression on his face that when he looks at you, like he thinks you’re crazy.  Eyebrows up and creased.  I will try and see if I have a picture of the expression.  It’s pretty funny.  He is having a few days here and there where he is sleeping through the night (9pm-6am).  I am hoping he will make it a permanent thing soon, but really I am just thankful to be catching some uninterrupted sleep for more than 3 hours at a time!  Christmas Break has been lovely so far.  I am happy to not have walk to the bus stop in the chilly weather and to lounge around in our pj’s all day if we want.  We have been doing a number of crafts during the day, thanks Grandma!  The kids have loved doing them.

Well Visits

Today both Tanner and Porter had their well visits.  Tanner, bless his heart, had 4 shots in his arms.  He was so brave and a few times his eyes watered and I knew he was trying so hard to hold it in to be brave.  He did so awesome, I am so proud of my big guy (literally, check out his height!).

Tanner Stats
Age 5
Weight: 45 lbs (75th percentile)
Height 45 3/4 (97th percentile)

This was Porter's first round of shots.  I think it traumatized Tanner more than it did Porter.  Good thing we had Tanner's shots first!  He's actually been more smiley today than he was yesterday before the shots. 

Porter Stats
Age 2 months
Weight: 10.5 lbs (25th percentile)
Height: 22.0 (10th percentile)
Head Circumference: 35 1/2 cm (25th percentile)

T-ball

 When we first moved here I was excited to find out our city offers sports programs for reasonable prices so I asked Tanner what he wanted to do this year and his choice was T-ball.

 I was super happy because they only practice 1 hour during the week and then have a 1 hour game on Saturday mornings.

 He has absolutely loved it and he's not too bad at it either.  Tanner fun fact: he is 3 inches taller than any of his team mates.

It is bitter sweet that the season ends on Saturday but I'm looking forward to enjoying the holidays soon!

Halloween

The kids were super excited for Halloween this year and had a great time at all of our various Halloween activities.  Some neighbors made a haunted house in their garage and Paul put on his Gorilla suit and had a great time scaring all the kids! 

Porter - 1 Month

Holy cow, an entire month has just flown by and here I am looking back at it feeling a little windblown.  Adding Porter into our lives has been as easy as though he's been here the whole time.  My only complaint is I need more hours in the day.  Mostly to catch up on my sleep!

As of one month Porter weighed in at 7.6 lbs which is Lana's birth weight.  I have no doubt that this little guy will not be so little much longer.  He seems to be playing the catch up game quickly.  He is finally sleeping in longer stretches at night (last night he slept a 6 hour and 4 hour stretch, it was fantastic!).  His one downfall is he is still not nursing well.  He seems to make himself comfortable and falls asleep within a minute which makes the whole process long and frustrating for me.  However, when the bottle comes out he is alert, awake and downs it quickly so for now we are supplementing which is fine by me.  He is also a gassy little goober which the kids find absolutely hilarious.

We are looking forward to seeing Grandpa Jerry and Grandma and Grandpa for Porter's blessing soon.  It will be nice to have some company!

A girls day

For my friend Sara's birthday, she wanted to get a manicure so we took our girls with us and made a day of it.  It was Lana's first time and she LOVED it!  She picked a metallic sparkly blue color which kind of surprised me since she is all about the pink and purple.  We will have to do it again soon!

Tutu

 Our 3 weeks with Tutu flew by way to quickly!  It was so nice to have some help with the kids for a bit.  The kids enjoyed having her here and ask when she will come back often!  Thanks Tutu!  We love you and miss you!

Porter Kekoa

Porter decided he had other plans and came into the world when he was good and ready. I was scheduled to be induced on Wednesday.  The Saturday before I was having contractions but they were not consistent at all.  Very frustrating but at the same time I wanted to be able to play the piano for our Primary Program on Sunday.  Some friends of ours had wagers on if my water would break during the program, more specifically during the song "The Wise Man and the Foolish Man".  Thankfully that was not the case.  I ended up staying at church the whole 3 hours still having contractions and all.

5 lbs 10 oz, 18 inches long, 4:18pm

Once we got home, the contractions once again slowed down.  So frustrating!  About 3 am the contractions started to pick up again but nothing consistent.  I decided I would just wait until 8:30 to call the Dr.'s office and see what she wanted me to do.  They told me to go to the Assessment Center at the Hospital, so we went there and they checked me and I was only at a 1.  They would only be willing to admit me if I made any progress while I was there.  After the nurse checked me, the contractions started coming fast and regular (and painful).  90 minutes later I was a 3 and transferred to L&D.  I made sure the nurses knew I wanted my epidural as soon as I could get it.  My anesthesiologist was worth every penny.  He was there as soon as I was ready, he had the needle in my back in two minutes and I was resting comfortably in 5.  After the epi, I was a 6.  The Dr. came and broke my water.  About 90 minutes later and 1 1/2 pushes, out came Porter.  I was so shocked at how small he was but so happy he was here and healthy.

He is such a sweet boy.  We all cannot get enough of him.  The kids love to hold him and even just sit and watch him sleep.  Lana even pulled up a chair and read to him for her reading homework.  I am surprised at how well Tanner has taken to Porter.  He is always telling him how much he loves him.  He loves to feel his soft hair.  He loves to hold him as well, but only for about 25 seconds and then he tells me he's done.  They are both being really great helpers so far.

It's been a bit of a learning curve going back to the newborn stage, but it is so worth it.  It's been a long road and Porter was worth the wait.

Bayou Wildlife Park - Labor Day

 As a last hurrah to summer and probably the last outing we will be taking for a while with the baby coming, we decided to take the kids to the Bayou Wildlife Park in Alvin.  Which interestingly enough is in our backyard.  It's about 2-3 miles south of our house as the crow flies, however there is no straight road there and you have to go around which takes about 25 minutes.

 The kids had a great time.  They got to do pony rides for the first time and thought it was really cool.

 Then we hopped on the first tram of the morning and drove around the park feeding the animals and getting devoured by mosquitoes.  I'm convinced that I had contracted West Nile by the time we were done.  And sadly I had even brought bug spray.  They just kept coming and even were biting through our clothes!

 Imagine getting gored by those gigantic horns!

 The guide told us this guys horns weighed 60 lbs. each.  It gives me a headache just thinking about it.

 This camel was lonely.  She had lost a baby and her mate about 2 months previous.

 It was funny to watch this bison feed out of the small container.  Paul was struggling to hang on to the container.

There were these cute little deer who were wandering around the waiting area.  They were so soft and always willing to take a nibble out of containers.

Loved going to this place and the kids keep asking to go back.  A little heavy on the pocket book, but totally worth it!

First Day of School

 I think it was a toss up as to who was more excited about school amongst the three of us.  After an extra long summer (MS schools got out 3 weeks before TX schools), a big move and a mom ready for some schedules there was a big sigh of relief from all of us.

 Tanner loves his new preschool.  He is only going 3 days a week, but his school hours are longer (which I love, I can actually get things done while he is gone!).  Another major plus is he gets used to eating lunch at school and being in a school environment for a longer period of time.  The sad part is I get lonely eating lunch all by myself when he is at school.  Then I remembered that I won't be a lone for much longer so now I'm just enjoying it while I can. It took me a while to find a place for Tanner in a preschool, I cannot believe how competitive preschools are out here.  But I am thankful I found a place and that we are happy with how things are going so far.  I also just want to say though, how much we miss his old preschool.  I loved how organized and efficient they were, there are a few things with this new school that could use some of that organization and efficiency but I digress.

 Lana was particularly excited to start at a new school this year.  I took her with me when I went to register and her eyes were big the entire time we were walking around and she kept commenting on how new and nice the school was (the school is only maybe 4 years old).  Meet the teacher was an even bigger plus for her because her teacher Mrs. Marquez is FABULOUS!  She is upbeat, bubbly and a great student motivator.  Lana's last two teachers were closer to retirement and just weren't cutting it for her.  It's amazing how much smoother this year has started off just because Lana loves her teacher.  It also helps that school starts later and she can wake up on her own instead of me dragging her kicking and whining out of bed in the morning.  She still loves to ride the bus which other than having to walk 10 houses down to the bus stop (instead of the bus stop being in front of our house) it's totally worth it.  Her bus ride is only about 15 minutes instead of the hour in MS and the buses here have A/C which I still don't get about the crap buses they have in MS.

Love my little goobers!  So glad the start of the year has gone so well so far.  Hopefully it will last!!

Catch up

Since it's taking me forever to get the rest of Grandpa's visit up I'll just lump it all into one post to sum it up!

 I was really impressed with the Natural Science museum!  The dinosaur exhibit was really impressive and they do a lot of other things that would be fun to go to without kids.

 Tanner was so impressed with the dinosaurs that he talked about them for days.

 We took a drive down to Galveston to show Grandpa where Paul worked.  I got this brilliant idea that I wanted to ride the ferry to Bolivar.  It turned out to be an hour wait and then we either had to drive another hour the long way home or wait in another long line of cars to ride the ferry back.  We took the long drive home.

 Other than the long wait it was a pretty neat experience.  We even got to see a couple of dolphins swimming on the side of the boat.

 Saturday night we took Grandpa to an Astros game.  It was one of the few games the Astros have won.  Apparently they are last place in the league.  Well, whatever their skill level is, they have the best venue to sit and watch a baseball game it.  The pregnant me appreciated the closed roof and air conditioning.

 On Monday we tackled the Children's Museum.  Lots of fun things to do there and of course, being still summer, lots of kids there too.

We had a great time Grandpa!  See you next time!