Life with Two Kids

Oh boy!!! It has been an insane six weeks. The transition to life with two kids has been a challenge. That is why there have been few pictures and posts. It is a rare moment when I can sit down and type or edit photos without neglecting a child or falling asleep on my keyboard. Adam shoot 5 weddings in October on top of our personal chaos. Yes the Nyholt household has shifted to survival mode. So here is an update on what we’ve been doing. It is long, mostly because this blog is a documentary of our family and I know I will forget if it isn’t recorded. Which may be a good thing

Mostly we’ve been sick! In general we are very healthy people but not this month! Caden has his fair share of the kiddo stuff, but Adam and I are rarely sick. Of course Kennedy was delivered because of my severe pre-eclampsia and I was pretty sick most of my last trimester. So I started out the month dealing with high blood pressure and oh yeah, a 6+ inch abdominal incision. Thankfully my blood pressure has all but returned to normal. Just this week I am stopping my blood pressure medicine altogether which is amazing. My doctor thought it would take until March! I have lost 35 lbs since delivering by a combination of a low carb diet, breastfeeding, and becoming unswollen (thats 10 lbs lighter than I was pre-pregnancy!). Recovering from surgery this time around has been much more difficult. After having Caden I started running again at 6 weeks. This time around at 6 weeks just grocery shopping leaves me sore for days. Taking care of Caden has made it impossible to take it easy and follow the “pick up nothing heavier than the baby” rule.

Our first week home Caden got a stomach bug that lasted about 4 days and then diarrhea hung on for an extra two weeks (TMI ). He really rarely gets GI stuff, this is the first time since our whole family got the stomach bug on vacation last summer. But of course it happened with a brand stinkin’ new baby in the house. Despite our best efforts to keep Kennedy away from it she still got a mild GI thing although I didn’t really figure it out until it was over. She was so new we hadn’t established a normal with her yet. She had about 15 poopy diapers a day for 4-5 days in a row which I now know was diarrhea. In the middle of that Adam got an upper respiratory thing which he then gave to me which I then gave to Caden. Before we were all well from that Kennedy and I got thrush. That took 3+ weeks to treat. Last week Adam got another upper respiratory thing which he passed to Caden and I. Kennedy has had mild congestion and a sporadic cough all month. Caden now has an ear infection that isn’t responding to antibiotics and Adam is getting a root canal tomorrow. Kennedy has been uncontrollably crying hours a day for weeks so we have started medicine for acid-reflux and I am on a dairy free diet. This is all just insane! So everyone is thrown off, Caden missed Mothers Day Out half the month, and Kennedy has no routine or schedule to speak of. Like I said survival.

It hasn’t been all bad though. Kennedy is growing like a weed. She grew almost 2 lbs in her first 3 weeks which is awesome! She weighs 9 lbs 7 oz now and is starting to outgrow her newborn clothes lengthwise. My due date was just 2 weeks ago. I do have to mention that Kennedy is now almost as big as Adam was at birth She is thriving, much more so than Caden did, but girls are just supposed to be tougher in that way. The thing I am most amazed by is how alert Kennedy is! Even in the NICU she was staring at us with these gigantic eyes. She just stares as if she is taking the whole world in. Some days she will have several hours at a time of being alert. She wants to be held in an almost sitting position and then wants to change her view often. She also has already started tracking me which I don’t remember Caden doing until he was several months old. She has amazing head control and from two weeks on has been picking her head up probably 4 inches or so when doing tummy time. She has also started reaching for things already. I swear I’m not making it up I have multiple witnesses from several occasions! She acts like a much older baby than one month in activity and she most definitely doesn’t act like a preemie. Lets hope this doesn’t mean she will be trying to break Caden’s record for early walking We feel so blessed that she is doing so well. So many people were praying that she would be ready to enter the world when the time came and God most definitely answered our prayers. As for her temperament, it is hard to tell since she has been sick. As of now she is not the easy baby we were hoping for. Hopefully this is a short lived stage. At least I know how to cope with a baby that cries a lot after Caden. It doesn’t make it any easier though and it upsets Caden when she crys. So much for everyone promising me that no one has two babies that don’t sleep and cry all the time Luckily I have Caden who appears to be perfectly normal and well adjusted despite a very difficult first year. So as my mother tells me everyday, “This too shall pass…”

Caden has become very interested in Kennedy. He is always asking to hold the baby. Although he doesn’t appreciate our rules about sitting on the couch next to one of us. He is always pushing our hands away when we try to help him hold her. He often wants to go wake up the baby when we are playing so she can join in whatever we are doing. He also is very quick to tell us when she is crying. He tries to sooth her by saying “Don’t cry baby, don’t cry.” In the car he wants to hold her little hand. The other day her hand was inside her sleeve and I had to stop the car and pull her hand out because Caden was so insistent about holding it. So sweet! He also likes to tell us all her body parts and help burp her. He told both his MDO teachers and his Sunday school teachers all about his baby sister with no prompting. He says he “loves baby.” He just has a lot of interest in everything she does. We were sitting at the table the other morning and I was nursing her while we ate breakfast. He told us that “Mama, Daddy, and Caden eat eggs.” I asked him what baby ate and said “baby eats mama” which I thought was cute. He has shown some jealousy particularly when the grandparents hold Kennedy. I think he is unprepared to be only one of the grandchildren since he is used to being the center of their universe I’m not too concerned since Caden is pretty hard to ignore. This morning he wanted me to go get baby so she could watch Wall-E with us. He also likes to lay down next to her on the play gym, help her swing high in her swing (eek), and give her lots of kisses (more sharing of germs). I think as long as he doesn’t injure her accidentally he will be a good big brother.

Keeping Caden safe and under control while taking care of Kennedy has proven to be my biggest challenge. He is too smart and cunning. He knows when I am nursing her (which as I mentioned is often!), I am not able to watch him as well. He regularly uses this time to go find trouble. I have been posting some of his adventures on Facebook as they happen so watch my status updates if you need a good laugh at our expense I plan on doing a whole post on Caden and the crazy things he is doing and saying soon. His verbal improvement is amazing. He is now speaking in full sentences (although they are not always grammatically correct). This has made communication so much easier and has allowed us greater insight into his little psyche which is fascinating.

I think that is enough words for now. Lets get on to some photos…