Brothers

It's been so fun lately having 2 boys. I'm sure this would be true if Porter had been a girl too, just seeing what a good big brother Connor has been. He loves to entertain Porter and make him smile and laugh, and it seems like Porter is really noticing Connor more lately. Connor being a goofball is finally paying off for him, and he has an audience who appreciates him. It's just fun to see the two of them interacting with each other. I hope they will be best buddies for life!






As for Porter, he has really started drooling and wanting to put everything in his mouth. I remember Connor doing this around 4 months and he didn't get his first tooth until he was nearly 8 mos old. I don't feel anything in his mouth yet, but he sure wants to chomp on everything.


We got his high chair out because he seems to get fussy during dinner time, and either Jeff or I end up holding him on our laps during dinner because he wants to be in on the action. He seems to be content in the high chair, and enjoys being part of dinner with us even if he isn't eating table food yet. He has his 4 month appointment with the pediatrician next week, and I'm sure she will say he can start with the cereal, so it won't be long. It will be interesting to see if he likes it, but I have a feeling he will.




Here is a photo of Porter sitting in the Bumbo. He really tries to sit up when he laying down. You can see him trying to crunch up those tummy muscles!


Here's Connor at hockey this week, and Porter all bundled up to watch his brother:
Connor has been skating well, and has improved so much from when he started in November. He was goalie yesterday and made some really good saves.

Porter's 3 month photos & more

So, all is going well with me being back at work. I feel like we are starting to get into a routine. Jeff is doing great with the boys on the nights when I work until 8pm. He's doing the drop-off in the morning, and the pick up at night, getting dinner ready and getting the boys ready for bed. I get home at 8pm and help out with bedtime. It's nice to see the boys when I get home! Porter is such a happy guy, and Connor has been doing better at daycare now that Porter is there with him. I dropped them both off today for a free day for myself, since I only work an 8 hour shift on Friday this week. Marylee and I negotiated that I would only have to pay her for 2 days instead of 3 during the week that I only work once. This way I get a day to run errands etc. Connor was totally fine today. No whining, no clinging. I think it just really helps that Porter is there with him.

Jeff & boys reading Horton Hatches the Egg:

Jeff and Connor asleep:

My cute boys:

Connor's new use for the Bumbo: (or as Jeff calls it, the Bimbo)

I had Porter's 3 month photos taken last week. They turned out really well. I need to go and order them tomorrow. I took photos of the proofs that she gave me. The quality isn't too good, and the big C in the photo is for Copyrighted. I will post the real ones later and I'm sure they will look better. He has just been so much fun lately. He is smiley almost all the time and has been laughing really hard too which is so fun! For the most part he is a pretty easy baby. He goes to bed much more easily than Connor did too. If only I had known when I had Connor, to just put him in his bed and let him put himself to sleep! Guess you have to be dumb the first time around.







Oh, and my friends Keri and Dean delivered a healthy baby boy, Griffin Dean today!! He weighed 9lbs 6oz!!! I will be working on Friday, so I will for sure see him then, but may try to get down to the hospital and see them all sooner. Congratulations Keri & Dean!!!

Update

Well, my breast ultrasound went well. They did see a fluid-filled cyst on ultrasound, but no intervention needs to be done unless it becomes painful, then they can do a needle aspiration if needed. So, I was hoping it would be nothing. I'm glad I went in to get it checked out, and am relieved that it's nothing major.

I am currently at work, and so far it is going ok. Jeff said getting them to daycare went fine today. I spoke with my daycare provider, and she said Porter has not taken more than 2 oz of milk yet today as of lunch time. Hopefully he will if he gets hungry enough. I'm sure there will be an adjustment period, and then he will do ok when he figures out that's the only way he will get food when he's there. She said he wasn't too fussy and was going down for naps fine.

So far I haven't been too emotional at work yet, but I did wear waterproof mascara just in case! I have had my emotions pretty close to the surface for the past 2 days and have been tearing up on and off. It's just so hard when you have carried a baby in your body for 9 months and then been with them pretty much 24/7 for the next 3 mos. I just felt pretty sad about being separated from him. Connor & I were both a little weepy last night at bedtime. He wanted to know why I was sad about going back to work, and I just said "because I'm going to miss you guys", but I could hardly get it out. I don't really want him to see me like that because then he gets sad, but I couldn't help it. Jeff doesn't get it, but I guess it's a mom thing.

Porter did well last night sleeping. He went to bed at around 9 and got up around 3 and then 5:40am which was fine because then I got a chance to feed him before going to work. I would have gotten a nice stretch of sleep but Connor woke up around 11 screaming. See, Murphy's Law of Mothers really does happen! He gets night terrors sometimes, and I think sometimes they happen when he has to go to the bathroom. He was only up for about 10 min though and then went back to bed. Hopefully I will get more rest tonight.

I hope the going back to work thing continues to go well, and that Porter starts eating normally at Marylee's.

Porter is 3 mos old

Porter was 3 mos old on Friday. Here is a photo of him:



I only have one day left of freedom before going back to work! I'm spending it taking Connor to preschool, then running downtown to have a breast ultrasound because I have a lump that I need to have checked out. I'm hoping it's just lumpy because of breastfeeding, but I'd rather be safe than sorry. After that I have to pick Connor back up from preschool, have lunch and then bring him to the dentist. Not too exciting, just part of our normal routine. Hopefully me being back at work will become routine for us too. I can help being sad about leaving Porter. I haven't really been separated from him for more than a couple of hours yet, so I'm sure it will be hard on me. I'm sure he will do just fine at Marylee's with Connor. When I went back to work after having Connor, I had to return on a night shift, and it happened to be my birthday that night. That was a big bummer. Now no more night shifts at least.

I've been feeling fairly reminiscent of my whole IVF experience lately because I am coming up on the one year anniversary of doing IVF when we got pregnant with Porter. Also, I've been doing a lot of thinking about infertility and just how lucky and blessed I feel to have Porter. Any misgivings or reservations I had about doing IVF (and there were many both financial, emotional, moral and probably others I can't come up with right now) they all go out the window when I look into my beautiful baby's gorgeous blue eyes and he bursts into a smile just because he sees me! Oh how that melts my heart and makes the whole horrible 2 1/2 years of infertility struggle, countless shots, ultrasounds, lab draws, heartbreaks, crazy emotions, procedures, a surgery and more appointments than I could keep track of, all seem worthwhile to me. It was hard to know if I would ever see then end of it, and I did come close to giving up on doing fertility treatments because I felt like I was hitting rock bottom emotionally. I ended up needing to see a therapist to help me figure out where I was going with everything and to help dig me out of depression after a failed IVF cycle. I needed to take some time off from trying to conceive, and that really helped me. I also switched doctors to get a second opinion since my previous doctor told us he thought another IVF cycle had a 50% chance of failing again, but couldn't really tell us why ours failed. Eventually I felt prepared to try again. We decided to do the shared risk program where you pay for 3 cycles and you would get 70% of your money back if you weren't able to get pg in the 3 cycles. Of course as luck would have it, we got pg the very first cycle with the new doctor. Not that I can complain about that! I feel more fortunate than I can even express, especially when I know there are many couples out there who may never be able to have a biological child, much less two. I'm fairly certain I will never undergo IVF or any other infertility treatments again. If I were able to get pg on my own I would be thrilled to have another child, but if not, I am certainly pleased to have two healthy boys. For one thing, I am not as young as I once was and might not qualify for certain treatments, and for another thing I just don't think I could handle any more emotional rollercoaster that infertility brings.

Anyway, just my musings on infertility since my positive pregnancy anniversary is coming up at the end of the month. Just think, a year ago I was injecting myself with hormones!

Here's wishing that my return to work goes well and is painless for everyone. I also hope my breast ultrasound is unremarkable. Will update when I have results.

Porter's Baptism

Porter's Baptism was yesterday, and we ended up having a really nice day and a nice party at our house. Porter was a very good baby during the baptism and hardly cried. Connor on the other hand was fairly naughty during mass and kept saying "I'm bored. Really, really bored". Of course we were sitting in the front row, right in front of the priest! To his credit he was very tired from all the hard playing he has been doing for almost the last week straight with his cousins. They all left to go home this morning. It's very quiet in our house all of the sudden! Hopefully they will have a safe trip back to Chicago today, and won't have as much snow and treacherous driving as they had on the way up here.

It's hard to believe that Porter is almost 3 mos old already, and that I am going back to work in just 8 days. I'm not sure if I'm totally ready for it. It would be nice to have another month, but what can you do. I don't have as much benefit time as I had when I had Connor. Somehow those kids just suck up your sick time!

Here are photos from Porter's big day:

Claudia & Grandma dressing Porter in the Ingham family baptism gown:

Godmother Claudia, Porter and cousin Daniel:

The whole gang around the baptismal font:

Porter being baptized:

Jeff, Nancy, Father Bob, Porter, Godfather Steve Dolan & Godmother Claudia Roberts:

Porter in his baptism gown:

Porter with his two Grandmas:

Porter with Papa Dan:

Big smile:

Christmas in Chicago

We survived our trip to Chicago. Actually the boys did really well on both the trip there and the return trip. The worst part was the fog on the way down to Chicago. The visibility was really bad at some points, but we made it there and back safely. We had a fun Christmas holiday with our cousins, aunts & uncles and Grandma Ginny. On Christmas Eve it was just Virginia, Jeff & I and Connor & Porter. We went to mass at 4pm at Claudia & Dave's church. We ended up sitting on the floor in the vestibule area. Connor was so tired he fell asleep in my lap! We then went back to Claudia & Dave's and made shrimp pesto pasta and had a nice meal together. We had Christmas Day dinner at Claudia & Dave's house. We had yummy Gumbo and appetizers courtesy of Steve & Virginia, and a great steak dinner that Claudia & Dave made. Yuri & Dave brought yummy desserts from Deerfield Bakery, and Virginia brought some cookies she made, as well as a cake that Steve & Angie made. Connor has so much fun seeing his Chicago cousins. They all had a blast together, even poor Allison who was the only girl there! There is a boy every 2 years from Daniel all the way down to Porter now, so 5 in a row. I'm sure when Porter is big enough he will be right in the mix.

So now Claudia, Dave, the 3 boys and Grandma are making the road trip here to Minnesota for Porter's baptism on Sunday. Hopefully they will have good weather and a safe trip. I'm sure the boys will continue to have more fun together.

Here are some photos of our Christmas:

Porter's First Christmas:

Grandma Ginny & Porter:

The boys opening presents together:

Mommy & Porter napping together:

Connor & Porter opening presents:

Jeff & boys:

Porter in Snowman outfit:

Tyler & his buses:

Claudia playing Guitar Hero:

Christmas craze

I don't know about the rest of you, but I am ready to just get on with the holidays! There always seems to be one more gift that you should buy, and it makes me feel nuts just thinking about it.

We are packing up and going to Chicago to spend Christmas with Jeff's family. Jeff said something about a snowstorm there on Saturday which is when we were planning on leaving, so I guess we'll play our departure by ear depending on the weather. It will be Porter's first roadtrip. I hope he does well.

He has been a champ lately in the sleep department, so I'm psyched about that. He has had 5 nights in a row where he has slept 5-6 hour stretches!! I think I'm safe saying that now and not jinxing myself since there have been several nights in a row. Of course a few of those nights I have been woken up by Connor during the big stretch, so I haven't gotten 5-6 hours. Must be some sort of Mommy Murphy's Law or something, that when your baby starts sleeping through the night your other child will awaken you! Anyway, I feel like we are falling into some sort of rhythm and getting a bit of a schedule, which I'm sure my daycare provider will appreciate!

After we return from Chicago, some of Jeff's family will be coming up for Porter's baptism on December 30th. So, we will have a busy but fun holiday season, and before you know it my return to work day will be here on January 8th. It's hard to believe. I keep saying that, but I feel like Porter's babyhood is going by so fast. I'm sure he'll do fine at Marylee's (my daycare provider), and I know Connor will love having him there with him. He's very proud of him and wants to show him to everyone when we are at preschool or daycare.

Here is our Christmas photo:


And here are a few cute photos of Porter in the shirt that my friend Keri gave him:



He has just been so fun and smiley lately and he is really getting "talkative" with all the cooing. It's fun to see his little personality emerge. I could just smooch him up!