Sleep

Benjamin sleeps in the most strange positions and moves ALL the time. We can hear him in the middle of the night because sometimes he starts to cry when he can't find his fingers (it's not like he misplaced them!). Yesterday after work, he was so tired so I let him take a little snooze and this is the position that I found him in.

Butt straight up in the air, sucking on his fingers! He is so adorable.

Speaking of sleep/naps Benjamin still sleeps through the night (12 hours) like he has been doing since 8 weeks old. However, the little guy doesn't nap well at all. He takes a bunch of "cat naps" through out the day. The longest nap he takes is normally 45 minutes. I guess I can't complain to much since he does sleep through the night. We started feeding him twice a day hoping that would help, but no. Guess he thinks life is so exciting that he doesn't want to miss a thing.

Crawls?

A week ago Benjamin made his first "crawl". Side note, I have been trying for a week to upload the video and just can't get it to work and thought that I would post this anyway, sorry about that. However, since then he army crawls everywhere now. It is the cutest thing ever and he grunts the whole time doing it. My baby is growing up to fast.

 

Christmas Fun

I had the day off on Monday to do the family annual baking day and Benjamin had a blast. Here he is playing with some tubs.

We wanted to keep the fun going so that night we went to Tilles Park and rode a carriage ride through the park with his Mama and Papa. Needless to say Benjamin LOVED the carriage ride! We couldn't get any good photos becuase he was so interested by all the lights. We did however capture a phot outside the carriage when the ride was over.

Looking forward to more Christmas fun next week.

6 month photos

As promised, here are some of his six month photos

Meeting Santa

This past weekend Benjamin went to see Santa and was a really good boy! As you can tell, only his mother is the one would could get him to smile.

6 months

Where does the time go, I can’t believe that my baby is six months old! Benjamin had his six month checkup on Friday and it went really well. He weighs 15lbs 6oz and measures in at 28in for height. That puts him in the 15% for weight and 97% in height. Benjamin might look like me but he is growing just like his daddy. We asked about his weight and if it should be alarming and the doc said that is just how he is growing. He got four shots and one was the flu shot. Here is him reading up on the shots that he was going to be getting.


We did get the go ahead to feed him more food and that it can be stage 2 foods so we are really excited about that. Speaking of food, I make his own food which really is something that I have become obsessed with. Not only is it fun and extremely easy, but it is the best for him. He has tried barley, oatmeal, squash, peas, banana, and cauliflower and likes them all. His favorite by far is peas. When we feed them to him he just sits there with his mouth open for more.

He hit another big milestone in the past month which is sitting up on his own. He doesn’t care to lie on his stomach or back that much and LOVES to sit up on his own.

We got six month photos along with some family and holiday photos. As soon as I get them I will post them. 

4 months

Benjamin weighs 13lbs 7oz and measures in at 26in in height at his 4 month check up. That puts him in the 14% in weight and 85% in height. The doctor gave us the go ahead to start some stage one food so let’s hope that chunks him up a little bit. He still sleeps 10 -12 hours a night which David and I are very thankful for, however he doesn't nap well at all. He takes a lot of little naps through the day, longest nap he takes is about an hour on a good day, otherwise it is about 45 min. I will not complain more than that because he sleeps thought the night.

We got out a lot this month. We went to The Wabash Frisco and Pacific Railroad in Wildwood, MO. We also went to Rombach Pumpkin Patch for pumpkin picking. Here are a couple pictures of our fun.

Baptism

Benjamin got Baptized on September 16^th and so many people came out to see this special moment. Abbie Jokerst and Mike Lyman are his godparents and we couldn't thank them enough for helping guide are little guy down the correct path in life. We also want to thank both of his grandparents for helping with the little party we had after the Baptism. Here are so pictures from his big day.

3 months

What a great time we had this month! We made it to Eckert’s to do some apple picking and had a blast. Here are some pics of our fun.

Mommy went back to work this month and it was really hard on me since I have been there every day since Benjamin’s birth. I cried the first couple days back at work, but when I realized that my baby was in the best care that fear subsided. Benjamin goes to my mom’s house three days a week and then my grandparents on the other days. David and I very thankful that they all watch him and don’t ask for a single thing (they even buy their own diapers and wipes). We are also very blessed that Benjamin gets to have his great-grandparents around. 

2 Months

Oh how far we have come along. Benjamin weighs 11lbs 9 oz and is 24in long. That puts him in the 40% for weight and 85 % in height. Despite the heat here in St. Louis we still made it to Grant’s Farm twice this month. Once with friends and once with just our little family (minus Cocoa). We had a blast. We even tried swimming which Benjamin didn't like so much.

Benjamin also reached some great milestones this month. Not only does he hold his head up really well, but he also sleeps amazing at night. At the beginning of this month he started sleeping a good 7-8 hours a night. Now towards the end of the month he sleeps a good 10-12 hours a night. Let’s hope he keeps this up and it’s not just a phase he is going through. 

1 month

Survival. It was a blur. At his 1 month checkup he weighed 8 lbs 6 oz which is really good since he had lost weight before we left the hospital. He is in the 17% for weight and 90% for height. We stayed in a lot for the first month since it was a heat way outside but did get some newborn pictures. Here are a couple

Birth

Benjamin David Carlson came into this world on June 7, 2012 at 8:10pm. Weighing 7 pounds 7oz, measuring twenty and a half inches long. David and I eagerly anticipating his arrival as he was a week late and I had to be induced. The little guy still didn't want to come out so I had to have a C-section last minute.

He was perfect; he had ten little fingers, ten little toes, and a very healthy cry. He even pooped within a minute of being into this world (just like his daddy). We spent four days in the hospital and had many visitors and phone calls which was really nice. When the day came that we got to leave the hospital nerves and excitement ran through our body just thinking about how we were going to handle this little boy without all that help…clearly we survived.

The first couple weeks were hard adjusting to his schedule and getting little sleep, but thankfully David was home for the first two weeks which was a tremendous amount of help. I was very fearful of him going back and it just being me and Benjamin all day (I even cried the day David went back to work), but we managed and got on a good schedule and most importantly we survived.