Tuesday, October 22, 2013

The best three weeks

I am in complete awe that I've been a mama for three weeks. Time was absolutely standing still the last few days that I was pregnant and waiting for my baby to arrive and now it's moving so fast I'm afraid to blink. These past three weeks have truly been some of the best times of my life. Even through the exhaustion, endless stream of visitors, and roller coaster of emotions, I just can't stop staring at my sweet baby and feeling so lucky that she's mine. I love watching her make faces and watching her sleep. I love watching her Daddy interact with her. I love that Rocky takes his role as big brother very seriously and already loves her so much. I love snuggling up on the couch with my little family and knowing that all I ever need is right there.


At our last doctor's appointment, when Noelle was one week old, after losing a bit of weight she then surpassed her birth weight, going from her birth weight of 8 lbs 4 oz to 7 lbs 12.8 oz to 8 lbs, 7.4 oz. I still can't believe that I had an 8 lb baby! As chunky as she seems, she's also such a peanut, and getting good use out of her newborn clothes, that I wasn't sure she would fit into. She is such a good baby! She hardly cries and just makes little noises when she wakes up. She's so alert when she's awake and her awake time is getting longer and longer. Although, the past few nights she decided that her awake time should be from 9pm to midnight. As sweet as she is, this sleepy mama's not a fan of that time frame. She does sleep pretty well, going for 3-3.5 hours at night and she goes right back to sleep after eating. During the day she seems to sleep better when she's being held, so now I move the Rock & Play downstairs with me so I can get something done since she sleeps well in that and I just wake her every 2-3 hours to eat. The hardest part has been breast feeding. She nurses well and has right from birth but the first week and a half I was so sore and I feel like all I do is nurse her. Especially during the day when she goes every two-ish hours between feedings. Breast feeding deserves a whole post of its own but that's been the biggest challenge.

Jeff went back to work after about a week and a half and it definitely takes a lot longer to get anything done without him home. He has been such a huge help and has made it very easy for me to just focus on loving on and feeding Noelle. Now that he's not home in the morning, I've been trying to go back to sleep after Noelle's 7am-ish feeding so that I can catch up on sleep but it's hard starting the day at 10am. Especially trying to eat breakfast, feed and change her, and throw a shower in there. We're doing lots of laundry, too, since her newborn clothes are limited. It's amazing how short the day becomes when you're taking care of a newborn. I am on her schedule which doesn't leave time for much else, besides staring at her. I do a lot of that.

As for me, I'm feeling really good. After labor, I was pretty sore all over, like I just ran a marathon, but that went away pretty quickly. My belly went down much faster than I thought it would, it's just kinda mushy. I thought it would be weird to not have a big belly anymore but it is nice to be getting back to my old self, which actually only took less than a week. I can bend over again! My body definitely needs some work but seriously, the breast feeding diet is the way to go. I am down about 30-32lbs, which is 8-10 lbs less than my pre-pregnancy weight. I definitely had/have weight to lose but it was amazing how it just melted right off. This was the last thing I expected, especially after struggling with my weight for the past couple of years. I'm trying to get walks in but that's easier said than done, especially by myself. I do plan on doing a post completely dedicated to weight loss so that it will motivate me to keep going.

There are so many things I don't want to forget about this precious time.
  • The way that Noelle scrunches up her face like a pirate right before she starts nursing.
  • The way that the top of her head smells and even her little piggies.
  • The way that she looks into my eyes like she knows exactly who I am.
  • How sweet her Daddy is with her and how natural fatherhood came to him. There is nothing more precious than watching him interact with her.
  • How she wraps her little fingers around mine when she's nursing.
  • How she fits in the teeny space in my lap.
  • Her sweet little smiles while she sleeps.
  • How she crosses her little hands under her chin when she sleeps on my chest.
  • The little humming noises she makes when she's nursing and wide awake.
  • How sweet my Rocky is with her.
  • The way Jeff suddenly has 10 sets of eyes when he's driving with with a baby on board.
  • How my heart skips a beat when he says things like "my girls" when he asks about us.
  • How many times a day we both look at her and say, "Can you believe she's ours?" or "Look at her now!" when she moves slightly, or "Isn't she the most precious thing in the whole world?"
  • How complete I feel when I'm snuggled up with my little family.
Motherhood is everything I thought it would be and more.



As much as I want to document and share everything, I am trying to soak up every moment with my sweet girl and usually don't have both hands free at the same time. (I actually started this post a week ago!) I am taking a bajillion pictures but I'm suddenly having a hard time with the idea of putting my baby's pictures on the internet. I haven't decided what I'm going to do but in the meantime, I'm going to be limiting her pictures on the blog. I know I'm not a huge blogger but it's just weighing heavily on me. I do hope to get her birth story written and may post monthly updates with regular family stuff but for right now, it's really just hard to post anything with one hand :)

Thank you for your sweet comments, texts, and emails. We are so blessed to have so many people who are already so in love with our little girl. I also feel so lucky to have so many sweet friends that I've made through blogging who are genuinely excited for us and check in with us to see how we're doing. Thank you! Thank you! xoxox

12 comments:

  1. Love the family picture:) And love that picture of Noelle and Rocky - he is DEF taking the big brother thing seriously, lol! I am so glad that you are breastfeeding - I truly believe it is the best, healthiest way to drop the baby weight. I lost every pound plus some within just a couple of weeks after giving birth, and am still 8-10 pounds under pre-pregnancy weight now 5 months later!

    I completely understand not wanting to share your baby's pictures online. I'm glad it's not something you are taking lightly! I choose to share some of my photos of Caleb so that I can look back and remember when things happened and what he looked like at different milestones. But there are certain ones I will never share - him nursing, taking baths, and things like that. Whatever you decide to do will be what's best for you and your family, and that's all that matters!:)

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  2. I'm so happy that you are adjusting well to your new role as a mama. My little girl is arriving in a week and while I am impatient and can't wait to meet her, I'm also getting nervous about adjusting to those sleepless days and learning how to be a mom. I loved getting a glimpse into your first weeks and it is so reassuring to know that even if it's hard, it can still be beautiful.

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  3. You look absolutely beautiful!! So happy to see this post!

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  4. You are looking soooo amazing post baby - not that you weren't pre and during baby!! My heart is so happy for you guys!! I can't wait until the day we can meet up with our babes!!! You are rocking this motherhood gig!!

    I am trying to decide what to do about pics when Mav is born going private is a huge possibility for me and only allowing those I know to read.

    LOVE that Rocky is such a great big brother!! I showed Trav the pic you texted me of him snuggling him....we hope Murphy is just as great!!

    XoXo

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  5. This is THE sweetest post, Sarah!! Ahhh, it just gets me SO excited for our time coming up here soon!! ;-D Glad to hear that things are going well for you and very exciting about your weight too! Yay, mama :-)

    Noelle is just the SWEETEST name too. Congrats to you all!

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  6. Love love the family pic - you look amazing! Glad to hear you're enjoying motherhood - such a sweet girl!

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  7. She is beautiful! I'm glad you are all doing well!!

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  8. I'm so glad that everything is going well! The first month is definitely hard and exhausting but I promise it gets better! And breastfeeding gets easier too! It sounds crazy but one day it'll just stop hurting! I promise!!

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  9. Adorable :) Glad things are going well..

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  10. Soak up your time with that little girl!! The newborn stage goes by so so fast! I'm kind of with you on the how much to share about the baby- I've really cut down on posts about Miller b/c I'm just not sure what I want to do yet. You all look so happy! Breastfeeding is so hard and draining but it gets easier as the weeks so on.

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  11. You and I are the same! Big babies, feeding schedule, the whole sleeping til 10am thing. Everything! And losing the weight so fast too!

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  12. Awwww, congratulations!!! I just found your blog and love it! I'm expecting a girl in March :)

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