3 Months

My baby is growing way too fast!  How is he already 3 months old?!  Here are some things we noticed about Beckett this month:

• Beckett loves to laugh and smile.  It doesn't take too much effort to entertain him and get him to crack a heart warming smile.  He has a super cute laugh, too.  If you laugh at him, he will laugh right back.
• He is starting to grab at things when he plays on his mat.  I have hung some rings from his activity center so he can swing at them and grab onto them.  He can't really hold things yet but he's getting close.
• He can roll to his side and this morning he rolled from his front to his back for the first time.   
• He does a great job of putting weight on his legs when you hold him up to stand.
• Beckett can hold his head up really well when you lie him on his stomach.  
• He is strictly a formula baby now.  I had intentions of breastfeeding until he was 6 months but it just became too much.  I was worried about how well I could keep up with it when going back to work so I began to wean him over the Christmas break.  So far he has done really well on the formula.  It was a hard decision to make but I know he will be fine.  
• Beckett started daycare this month and he seems to really like it there.  All of the teachers absolutely love him and tell me regularly how cute he is and what a great baby he is.  They send me photos of him throughout the day and he always has a smile on his face.  
• He is still in size 1 diapers but wearing size 2 at night.  Once we finish this last box of size 1, we will make the full transition to size 2.
• He is starting to wear 6 month clothes.  Some of his 3 month outfits were getting alittle snug.  It's not so much his weight but his height that has caused us to move up a size.
• Weight: 13lbs
• Height: 25 inches

Beckett is a good 2lbs lighter but a half inch taller than when Gray was 3 months.  He's going to be a tall, skinny kid.  Doing a side by side comparison really shows how different they are.

Beckett (left) and Gray (right) at 3 months

Beckett did have his first sick visit to the doctor this past week.  We noticed he felt warm one evening and the next day daycare called just after lunch to let us know he had a fever.  Luckily Shane was able to go pick him up since I had some meetings I needed to attend.  They went to the doctor and said he was possibly on the tail end of a virus.  His fever broke that night but I spent the next day home with him since school would not let him come back for 24 hours.  

 Sleepy baby fighting a fever

Home sick with mommy

 Having so much fun at school

Beckett has won the heart of Miss Beth, too.

She stops by every day on her break to snuggle with him.

The day he was sick, she held him for an hour in the lobby,

where it was quiet, until Shane could pick him up.

 Holding up his head so well

Helping mommy with laundry

We are all slowly adjusting to our new routine now that I'm back at work.  Getting the boys out the door is getting easier each day, but every evening is different since Shane may work late with tutorials one day, and I may have a meeting after work another day.  Shane has to head out of town for a few days next week so I'm hoping I can handle these two on my own.  

This weekend we had a nice visit from my friend, Nikki, and her family.  They moved back to Houston from Miami in November so I was hoping our families would get to see more of one another.  She was in town visiting family members so we arranged a play date.  She has two daughters; Rylee is 3 and Payton is about to be 2.  Gray was extremely shy at first, but eventually they all had a great time playing and interacting with one another.  

 Rylee

Payton

Apparently both girls love horses

 This was right before the first lovers quarrel.

Gray was trying to clean up and Payton was pulling

everything out.

 Gray was giving Payton a mean look

 Holding hands!

I'm saving this photo for the slide show at their wedding.  :)

 All four kids together

Aspen doesn't like to be left out

I love this girl!  We met playing soccer at Texas A&M

our sophomore year (1999) and have been the best

of friends ever since!

Back To The Grind

Yesterday was my first day back at work and Beckett's first day at school.  It wasn't too bad actually.  Getting ready in the morning and getting both boys out the door is a feat in itself.  Luckily Beckett decided to get with the program and started sleeping through the night again after an awkward week of waking up between 1:30am-4:30am.  The last two nights he has slept until 6am so I have been able to get up and get showered before giving him his bottle.  I go up and get Grayson dressed right before we walk out the door.  He has been pretty good in the morning lately so I don't have to spend too much energy wrestling with him.  I think his thing will be carrying Beckett's bottles and my water bottle while I grab Beckett and my work bag.  My biggest challenge is making sure I have everything when I'm headed out the door.  I figure as long as I end up with two kids at school, I'm doing pretty good!

Beckett did really well his first day!  Naturally all of his teachers loved him.  I remember dropping Gray off two years ago and having some anxiety, but dropping Beckett off yesterday seemed like part of my routine.  It's definitely easier the second time around when you have built those relationships with people.  The teachers did a great job of sending me photos of him through our Tadpoles communication.  I'm not sure I've ever mentioned this, but it's a really neat system they have.  Instead of keeping track of meals, naps, diaper changes, etc on paper, they have tablets they input all of the information into and then they electronically send us the information when we pick up each child.  They can also take photos and send them directly to us as well as notes or reminders for the parents.  The app stores all of the daily reports and photos, too.  I can go back and look at Grayson's photos and reports from August 2013 when they first moved over to this new system.  Here are a few of the pictures they have sent me so far:

 I put him in his crib when we got to school

and he slept for a short while.

 Smiling for Miss April

 This daycare thing is exhausting

He looks alittle freaked out in this picture.

We love how he holds his hands.  

Grayson still does that when he's shy or 

scared in a new situation.

Starting to warm up to this new place on day 2

He seemed alittle tuckered out last night which we can only assume was from a day filled with extra stimulation.  The first week or two after Gray started, he was always so tired from school that he slept most nights when we came home.  We would beg for him to wake up so we could interact with him.  I'm just looking forward to getting back into a normal routine each day.  It will be good for all of us.
On New Year's Day the boys cheered on Oregon for their Aunt Sandee.  She had sent some Oregon stuff for the boys so I made sure they were decked out for the game.  I guess we will have to wear it again next Monday when they take on Ohio State here in the Big D.  We were hoping Aunt Sandee could come down for the game so she could finally meet Beckett but it looks like we will have to wait alittle longer.

 Go Ducks!

Gray gets excited to hold his brother now.

This makes mommy happy so she can finally

take pictures of both her boys together.

Although I wish Beckett would warm up to the idea...

he always looks so scared!

I also snapped a couple of quick photos of our game room and bathroom remodel.  I went with a gray paint from Benjamin Moore after testing 6 different samples in both rooms.  I had to make a decision fairly quickly so luckily I was able to pull some ideas and paint colors from pinterest, then head to Home Depot to get the samples mixed up.  We love the new color and think it makes both rooms look brighter and bigger.  The photos look alittle odd.  I had my wide angle lens on to get as much of the rooms as I could in each shot.

These are the 6 paint samples.  The one we went with 

is the third color from the left on the bottom section.

I'm always amazed at how much variation there is in gray 

paint colors.

I definitely like the gray in the bathroom better than the original meadow green.  I had painted it that meadow green after we moved in and was not motivated enough to try and paint it again when we moved Gray up there this summer.  Being 7 months pregnant will definitely take the motivation out of you to do anything.  :)

I hope everyone is having a great 2015 so far!  It has been ridiculous cold the last couple of days and looks as though it's only going to get/stay cold for atleast another week or so.  The entire nation seems to be cold right now.  Everyone bundle up!