Lillian Mary, you turned 1 month old last night Little Love! 

Lillian Developments: As of your appointment this morning, here are your stats:

Weight: 9 lbs 10.5 oz (60%)
Height: 22.5″ (96%)
Clothes: 0-3 months
Diapers: We’re finishing out our stash of Newborn diapers then moving to Size 1 this week. 

Lillian it is such a (heart-wrenching) joy to watch you grow and develop each day. You are spending more defined time awake and asleep and we love staring into your big beautiful eyes while you’re awake. They are still a deep, dark blue – almost a navy or charcoal blue. I am so eager to know if they will stay this color or change! 

You have a little baby acne and slight flaky-baby-face but it isn’t too bad.

Your eyelashes and eyebrows have grown in a lot the past couple weeks and it seems like your hair is getting a little longer too, although you are rubbing off a little in the back where you sleep. You head is still a perfect little shape though! 

You sometimes like tummy-time but it depends on the moment. 

Eating: You’re a great eater. You nurse for 5-10 minutes / side and typically have a few good spit-ups each day. I love the sweet little noises you make while eating. You are easy and nurse anywhere from in bed with me to the playground to the church pews to the parking lot… such is life! 

You’re still 100% mama’s milk but we’ve given you a bottle a few times just to expose you to it and make sure we have the option. The goal is to give you a bottle around once/week. I am still not pumping (I hate it!!) but using these guys as milk catchers I have frozen over 250 oz already. 

Sleep: Praise the Lord for a great sleeper! You nap well in your carseat and do some short naps in your bunny seat but you sleep the best swaddled up in your bassinet or our little Moses basket (OR in someone’s arms!). 

You are pretty reliant on having a pacifier to fall asleep (especially if you’re not being held) but you are getting better at keeping it in so getting you to sleep at night or fall back asleep after your night feed is getting faster. In the beginning I was up about 1.5 hours with you for the night feed but you’ve gotten easier and lately you’ve been closer to 45 minutes start-to-finish. I’ll take it! 

Schedule: We are on a similar schedule as we were 2 weeks ago but, little by little, you are pushing your middle-of-the-night feed later and I am really hopeful that in the next month it will merge with your morning feed so we will be done waking up in the night! For now we are pretty regular:

7:30 am Morning Feed 1
11:30 am Feed 2
3:30 pm Feed 3
7:15 / 7:30 pm Feed 4
9:30pm Feed 5 then change diaper, get wrapped and go to sleep (asleep by 10:30pm)
4:30am Night Feed 6 (on demand)

Here is a screenshot from my nursing app (Baby Connect).

Notes: We have had a wonderful first month with you. When you were two weeks old (right after my last blog post), we celebrated Easter as a family of 5. It was special that your first church service was Easter Sunday. Our celebrations were very simple – just church, an egg-hunt in the backyard and brunch with Gigi and Pasha – but very sweet time together as family celebrating the Risen Christ. 

After two glorious weeks of paternity leave, Dad had to return to work. He said that he wasn’t ready to go back and I know that the rest of the family wasn’t either but it was funny how quickly and naturally everything felt normal again. You came right along for all of our everyday routines: drop-off and pick-up from Colt’s preschool. Trips to the park. Play dates with friends. Dinners in or out. You’ve just fit right in. 

Your brothers have been VERY sweet with you – always talking to you in sweet voices, rubbing you very gently, making sure that people wash or sanitize their hands before holding you, giving you soft kisses… – but more of the time they’re just busy doing their own thing or playing with each other. Your arrival seems to be a positive in their worlds but also kind of a non-event (sorry!). 

You’re a lucky little girl to have such sweet, fun big brothers. 

During Dad’s first week back at work Nana Harper came to visit! She was here Wednesday night – Sunday morning and we had such fun with her. She did a lot of playing with your brothers but also loved snuggling you. She couldn’t get over your beautiful dark hair. 

Then last weekend she was in town again for some meetings and spend another couple days with us. She watched Colt and Finn one afternoon while Dad and I took you with us for a little day-date. It was a beautiful day so we strolled to Clarendon, sat outside, had white wine and oysters and just fully enjoyed ourselves. 

We’ve taken you to church the past 3 weeks and you’ve hardly made a peep. Since you eat at 11:30 am (and the past couple weeks we’ve gone to the 11 am service) I’ve just fed you right in the sanctuary during the sermon. We sit towards the back and try not to be distracting but you’re just so easy!

This past Sunday Dad took off for a week-long work trip to Brazil (he’ll get back Saturday morning) and that was hard for all of us. He was not ready to leave you for that long and I cried for a solid 5 minutes after his car pulled away. You are so easy and your brothers are good too but the logistics of it alone – even when everything is running perfectly smoothly – is exhausting. Thankfully my mom came Monday evening and will be here to help us throughout the week.

Mom: In some ways, my adjustment with you has been the easiest. My physical recovery has been easier, less painful, faster. Nursing was second nature. I feel like I know what I’m doing with you and am not stressed out, reading books or worrying. I’m already a stay-at-home mom and have an existing structure and routine that you have melded into (versus a baby completely altering what daily life looks like). Colt and Finn have each other and are such great friends that they continue on in their normal as well. I’m certainly tired – doing everything I was doing before but now with less sleep and one more person to care for (who I literally sustain with my own body), and the days are demanding, but none of that stuff has felt like a huge adjustment.

And yet, something about your arrival has really hit me hard. You have such a special place in my heart. I was holding you yesterday and was just in tears with the joy and the heartbreak of it all. It’s almost too much for me to handle.

The JOY and the BLESSING of YOU, sweet one, just as you are. Of your precious little body and head and eyes. Of your perfect, funny sounds and amazing baby smells. Of all that we can see and know of you today and of all the mystery that we have yet to discover.

And the HEARTBREAK of experiencing that joy within the relentless passage of time. Of course there is so much joy in that as well but for me, there is something different about it with you. Watching you grow hurts a little more. Seeing days tick by on the calendar constantly reminds me that I can’t freeze time and keep everything just as it is. I feel it in my chest and it feels heavy for some reason.

Maybe I’m just getting older or maybe it’s still the hormones but it reminds me that, ultimately we were not created for this world where we are so bound by time and an eventual end. No – we were created for timelessness and life eternal. And that, Little One, is my prayer for you. That God would excite your heart by His HIGHER offer of life through Him. That you would see that there are limits on what this world can provide but through Christ there is MORE. I pray that you would be captivated by the beauty of Jesus, the power of the Holy Spirit and the worthiness of our Father.

I love you Lillian!