Moose visits the 'rents

Today we went up to Grandpa and Granny KP's. We haven't seen them in a while and we wanted to show off how cute and interactive Brennan is. He really showed off his winning personality today and how social he is.


*thanks to Dad for these photos, your camera takes way better indoor pics than mine.*

He is very cute and sweet and I can't wait until he gets a little older so he can romp and run through the 'rents garden and fill up on grapes.

In other news, Brennan has started sleeping 5-7 hours at night. If he goes to bed at 9 or 10 p.m. sometimes he makes it all the way through the night until 5 a.m. If he wakes up it's usually at 2 or 3 a.m. and he eats and stays up for only an hour and is ready for bed again. I really haven't minded getting up with him just once a night. I think by 3 or 4 months old he'll be sleeping through the night just fine.

The trade off seems to be that he does not take a long afternoon nap anymore. I've been putting him in his swing while Sara naps because that seems to be the only way he can sleep. I tried leaving him in his room and rocking him back to sleep and letting him sleep in our room but he just wakes up every 20 minutes or so. He does really need his afternoon nap though. If he stays up he's so drowsy and cranky and he just ends up crying a lot.

Mr. Moose eats so much we can't believe it. He is most certainly 13 pounds already he has a really solid waistline. I discovered that Dan has been double scooping his formula on accident which might be contributing to it. He usually eats 2 oz of breast milk and then 2-4 oz of formula every hour or two. I'm thinking of starting him on baby rice cereal, if his stomach can take it, at 3 months just to get him some extra food.

He has given me a hard time during the day. He's really demanding of me and he expects me to be feeding him constantly and if I don't he cries. Also he hates it when I put him down so he'll scream then too especially if I'm anywhere in eyesight. It makes it really hard for me to get anything done or to spend any time with Sara. Sometimes we let him cry a while while I take care of Sara. I'm hoping as he gets older he can entertain himself more. He seems so fixated on me that he does not even look at his toys. His eyes are always glued to me to see where I am.

I think he's just really intelligent and he knows what he wants, he's not content to look at toys that don't feed him or hold him. I think he's really sensitive too. I often wonder and probably always will wonder, if not being able to hold him the first 5 hours after he was born has made him needy and afraid. I still feel a little upset about that and probably always will. Also not being able to room in with him and him spending 4 days by himself in the nursery. If I had it to do over again I would raise hell until they let me have him the whole time.

At night when Dan gets home he holds him and it's a relief for me. I get to take a shower and eat and clean the house and sometimes even read to Sara and play with her some. Dan and Brennan love to sit in Dan's chair and stare at each other, mimicking sounds and cooing at each other. It's really cute and I love watching them together.

Overall, I feel so happy with Brennan and more relaxed even though there are challenges. I can remind myself that Sara made it through her baby-hood just fine and so will Brennan and it takes some of the stress out. I also feel like Brennan is easy to figure out and his needs are pretty simple so that makes it easier for me too. Also it seems to be that he does not get sick very easily and that has been a huge relief. It really stressed me big time when Sara was sick. Hopefully our luck won't run out on that. We've had 2 major illness with no more than a snotty nose from him.

Something cute that Sara does is she tells this all day about Brennan, either "Mom he likes it" or "Mom he don't likes it". If Brennan is crying she says, "Mom he don't likes it". It really cracks me up. She's always letting me know what he likes and what he doesn't, sometimes she even makes stuff up that he don't like. She also alerts us instantly when Brennan cries and if I can't get to him right away she will stand by him and talk to him or get his pacifier to calm him down.

She has been such a great big sister. I think the thing I'm most impressed with is that she's able to watch us spend so much time with him and watch her Daddy hug and coo with Brennan and not get terribly jealous. She is being very generous to share her Daddy. She has a big heart and she genuinely does seem to love her little brother.