My sweet baby boy Sylas is already 7 weeks old! *Sniff.  And with a new baby comes a lot of ‘stuff’.  But I like stuff…maybe a little too much, but I also like sharing info. about my stuff and why you need it.  Haha.  So here are a few items that I’ve been using with my second baby that have made my life easier over the past few weeks.  Most I didn’t have with my first, so if you’re a new mom, mom-to-be, or need a shower gift idea, these are my latest baby obsessions.  Enjoy!

a. Muslin wraps by aden + anais.  I use these for everything: swaddler, burp rag, blanket, car seat or stroller cover, etc. They’re huge and thin when unfolded, but fluffy and warm when folded up.  Plus they’re so soft and cute – obsessed!  I have the 4-pack with stripes, polka dots, stars and a white solid.

b. Nosefrida.  Yes, it’s a nasal aspirator that uses ‘your own’ suction with: i.e. you suck out the snot with your mouth.  It looks gross, but it works AMAZINGLY! Much better than those bulb thingies.  And no, there is no possible way you’ll get snot in your mouth, there are filters and a long tube in between.  It’s awesome.

c. Moby Wrap.  This is the only thing on this list that I had the first time around.  But it’s my go-to shower gift because every new mom should have one.  It’s the only truly hands-free carrier that I’ve found and Sylas (and Harper did, too!) falls asleep in it immediately.  It’s comfortable and I love having him close.  But I mainly use it when he won’t let me put him down and I NEED to get something done.

d. Miracle Blanket. Sometimes Sy is soooo tired but restless and this calms him down.  The boy loves to be wrapped up like a burrito. It makes it simple with the flaps and he can’t escape.  Beware of imposters – this one works!

e. Burpy Bib.  Another aden + anais product that I love.  It fits perfectly over your shoulder as a burp rag for now, but it has a button so that it can be a large bib for him later.  I love the muslin fabric and the print.

f. Fold ‘n Stow Swing.  Yes, we had a swing for Harper, but we hated how big and bulky it was and how much room it took up!  We specifically requested this one for him because of the fact that it folds almost flat and can be stored in a small space.  Thankfully he is starting to love the swing and will nap in it every day.  Not a fan of the bright animals, but I had to sacrifice form for function here.

g. COLIC CALM. Saved my sanity.  The boy cries.  A lot.  I don’t remember Harper being this way, but she didn’t sleep at night as well as he does.  It’s amazing how different babies, even siblings, are.  This apparently remedies gas, hiccups, upset stomach, colic (whatever that means), etc.  It’s a mix of herbs that is all natural and FDA approved, and has great reviews so we gave it a shot.  It seems to be helping so I’m not asking questions.  $19 is a small price to pay for a happy baby!  But if you’re going to buy it, beware – the liquid is BLACK (from vegetable charcoal), so keep your aden + anais muslin wraps away from it.  The black gummy smile is kinda cute, though.

h. Sleeper.  We had a bassinet that Harper used, but we’ve switched bedrooms since then and there’s no room for it now.  I’m too lazy to get up to Sy’s room in the middle of the night so he sleeps in this in our bed.  The nightlight is handy, too.  Hopefully within the next few months he’ll be sleeping in his own crib in his room, but for now this is nice to keep him close.

I always like to read these, so I thought I’d share how my sweet son came into this world!  It really isn’t that crazy, but it was quick and exciting! Now, this is my first real blog post I’ve tried to write with 2 kids, so I apologize if it jumps around and I repeat myself.  It took a lot of time to write this, holy cow!!  If it wasn’t one needing me, it was the other – phew!! I seriously debated giving Harper a Christmas present early so she’d play with something for more than 3 minutes, hehe!  And it didn’t help that WordPress, or probably my internet, has been acting crazy while trying to write this.  Okay…I’m better!

A little back story first: our daughter, Harper was unexpectedly born 6 weeks early, so I always felt like I was on high alert this time.  My doctor thought Harper’s early arrival was just a “fluke” but I couldn’t help but be worried.  So with this pregnancy, I was experiencing LOTS and lots of Braxton Hicks contractions.  They started at about 14/15 weeks and progressively stronger and more frequent.  One hot summer day I counted 30 throughout the day, and they sometimes would come every few minutes so I couldn’t help but be freaked out by them!  But by the time we reached 36 weeks I felt a ton of relief because I knew that if he came now we could avoid a trip to the NICU!

Sylas was born at 36 weeks and 1 day and in the few weeks before he was born I could tell my body was gearing up for his birthday.  Besides my insane need to get his room ready, get the hospital bag packed and get the car seat in the car (I literally put the car seat in the day before he was born!), I was feeling a lot of pressure in my hips, like someone was standing in front of me and pushing on each side, lots of mucus, and the day before he was born I could tell that my Braxton Hicks were ‘different’ than they had been.  I was telling Glenn and my friend Molly how ‘strong’ they felt that day at work – my entire abdomen was tightening and they just felt stronger, but still not painful, just different than usual.

So to birth-day; it was a normal Tuesday – November 15th.  Which was actually Glenn’s great-grandmother’s birthday.  I was up getting ready for work.  My dad had gotten to our house the day before for a visit (luckily!) and Glenn had just left for work at 7 am.  I was in the bathroom doing my makeup and my dad had to use the bathroom so I went into the living room and sat down in a chair.  I was watching the news and felt a slight ‘pop.’  I thought to myself ‘that was weird,’ so I stood up and then there was another ‘pop’ then a gush.  I couldn’t believe that my water had actually ‘broke!’  I didn’t know anyone who has actually had that happen without a single contraction.  I immediately went into my bedroom and called Glenn at work.  I told him my water broke and he needed to come home to take me to the hospital.  He of course asked him if I was kidding and I said nope – this isn’t a drill!  (FYI – as we living in a rural community my hospital is 70 miles away!)

I told my dad what happened and asked if he could keep Harper for us as she was supposed to go to preschool that day.  Glenn got home and we made sure to grab anything else we wanted to add to the hospital bag and I changed my clothes because my jeans were soaked.  I started feeling a few contractions by now, but nothing too serious.  I called Harper’s school and told them what was going on and that she wouldn’t be in, I called the hospital to have them let my doctor know my water broke and we were on our way, then at about 8:00 am that day Glenn and I left for the hospital!  My contractions were progressively getting stronger in the car ride up, and with each one the fluid was gushing!  I couldn’t believe how much fluid was coming out of there…I grabbed a towel to sit on but I soaked it and my passenger car seat.

At about 9:30am we made it to the hospital and the contractions were still bearable but more serious.  We walked in and a big pregnant woman with soaked pajama pants made the receptionists scramble.  They offered me a wheelchair but I wanted to walk…a few nurses from the other wing saw me and asked me if I was coming from Alturas.  We said yes and they brought me down to the labor and delivery wing.  I changed into a gown and they hooked me up to the monitors to check his heart rate, which looked great.  My doctor came in at about 10 and checked me and I was at 3cm, and 100% effaced.  He wanted me to stay hooked up to the monitor to get a good “strip” of at least 30 minutes…and of course as soon as he left the contractions really started to get bad and the last thing I wanted to do was lay flat on my back in the hospital bed.  We tried everything – letting me stand and lean against the bed, sit on the birthing ball or kneel in the bed while keeping the monitor going, but they couldn’t keep the monitor in the right spot because I wanted to move around.  We finally got a good enough strip and I was able to try to find some relief.  By this time my contractions were killing me…they lasted about 4-5 minutes and I’d have 2 back to back then a small break.  Not nice.  They had my doctor check me again and I was still only at a 3.5, which was discouraging.  I did not want to slow things down by getting an epidural so I did the only thing that helped which was kneel in the bed and lean on my folded arms which were against the back of the bed which was propped up at an angle.

I started to get nauseous and threw up twice so I knew it was time for the epidural.  I believe it was about 11:30 and they called the anesthesiologist, which always takes FOREVER once you want them there.  The lady was very nice and kept commenting on my contractions and how I must be progressing quickly.  And of course you have terrible contractions when you’re expected to sit on the bed and slump over, while holding still so she can put the needle in.  But once it’s in it’s amazing.  :)

I was still feeling some major pain in my left side so they turned me onto my side to get the the medicine pooling to where I needed it.  Aaaaahhhh…epidural bliss at about noon.  I decided now was the time to get some rest so we settled in to watch some TV and try to nap.

I was expecting to have things really take a long time as no one had checked my progress since before 11am and I had an epidural, but at about 1pm I felt ‘the feeling’ (if you feel like you have to poop when you have an epidural, that means it’s time to rock and roll) and told the nurse that she might want to check me.  Sure enough, I was fully dilated and ready to push! Now with Harper, pushing really wasn’t that hard.  She was 5lbs.9oz. and only took half an hour, and as this was my second baby I was assuming it would be about the same.  Sylas had a full 2 weeks extra to grow, but I was just hoping he was at least 7 pounds at 4 weeks early.  They got everything ready, the doctor arrived and at about 1:15 I was pushing.

Glenn decided to snap a picture right before we were all ready.  Nice, right?  Quick note: here is why epidurals are good – I’m smiling! I knew when I was having a contraction, but I’m happy, things are calm, and it’s a very peaceful and happy environment.  Of course, give it your best shot without, but there are some upsides in my opinion.

Okay, back to the story!  I pushed for an hour and a half and it was VERY hard work but at 2:43pm we had our baby boy!  Way harder than with Harper.  And by the end the epidural had mostly worn off so I could feel everything, but it wasn’t extremely painful, so it was kind of neat.  Now remember, I was hoping for a baby that was at least 7 pounds…and when he finally came out we all gawked at how huge he was!  Even the cord was HUGE!  His cry was weak and quiet, but he was crying.  They immediately started working on him as he was a preemie, and they wanted to make sure he was breathing fine.  He didn’t do so well on his first Apgars and they got worried because he wasn’t using his left arm at first and they thought maybe his collarbone was broken (which can happen during birth, not a huge deal).  He was just stuck in the birth canal for a loooong time, ha!  He had a little fluid in his lungs, so every time he breathed he was “singing” as they called it, trying to equalize the pressure in his lungs.  He started moving that arm and his color was good.  The doctor delivered the placenta and that was even huge!  No wonder I gained over 40 pounds at 36 weeks…

The nurse picked him up to weigh him and commented on how heavy he was and guessed he was over 7 pounds.  We were all astonished when she said he was 8lbs. 4.5 oz!  The doctor said “geez, what were you feeding him?” my response was “Halloween candy lately!”

Holding my baby boy for the first time.

Happy Mama (looking a little worn out).

Our sweet Sylas Glenn, just a few minutes old.

Proud parents.

Daddy checking on his little guy.

Super proud Papa.

He didn’t nurse at all the first day, but by the next morning he picked it right up!  He had to be on oxygen a little at first, but the respiratory therapist took him off of it after just a day.  He passed his car seat challenge with flying colors and we got to go home on Friday, the 18th.

He has basically slept the whole first month…so much that the poor guy got a terrible diaper rash from sleeping for so long.  Plus he screams bloody murder when getting his diaper changed, so I hated putting him through that!  He’s getting better, though.  His due date was on December 12th, so I weighed myself, then weighed myself while holding him and he was 10 pounds even – so it’s probably a good thing that he was born 4 weeks early!  I promise my dates weren’t off…I knew exactly when he was conceived and how far along I was.  :)

Now that he’s 5 weeks old he weighs 10.8 pounds and getting very chunky, he’s sleeping great at night, only waking me up once really quickly at 2 or 3, but then he’s up at about 5am for the day.  He’s also getting very strong and can hold his head up great – I have a feeling that he’ll be hitting those physically milestones early.

Harper loooooves him…but she isn’t without her moments.  Especially when I’m watching them alone and I can’t do something for her because Sylas is eating or crying.  But otherwise she’s adjusting great.  I just absolutely love my little family and am so happy my sweet little boy is here!  We are so blessed.

So I hope you can forgive me for neglecting the blog. I’ve been cuddling with this little cutie. And his big sister.

I’ll be back soon.  I promise.

So I’m obviously a little behind with these…but the pictures are just so special to me now, I promise I’ll try to be better about staying current. I still have 2 more weeks worth of pictures to post until that happens, though! And at 7 weeks pregnant, a baby is about the size of a little blueberry! Anyway, here they are!

And my lovely portraits.

Elaine’s photography website is here. My v-neck sweater and skinny cords are Lands’ End Canvas. My shoes are TOMS classics in Ash.  My necklace is from JewelMint.

This picture was taken a few weeks ago and the little bean was the size of a coffee bean! I don’t remember what Baby Center or The Bump said (as for the size of the little baby) but we used a coffee bean instead.  And I dressed in browns to match.

That was a fun one – and a really sunny day! I could barely see after I took my sunglasses off.

Elaine’s website is here.  My boots are from Target.  My jeans and tee are from Lands’ End Canvas.  The scarf is from Old Navy. And my hair is copied from A Cup of Jo.

I make people!

Yep…there is a bun in the oven over here at Casa Christensen, and we are soooo excited! And so excited for Harper to have a sibling!  (That graphic is via here – pretty clever!).

And to document this exciting time in our lives, I’ve enlisted the help of my photographer friend, Elaine. She is so awesome, especially as she has committed to spending so much time with me from now until December, but to be honest we’re having lots and lots of fun with this project already.

We’ve dubbed it “Growing a Baby Bump Maternity Series (aka Baby C. #2)” and it’s pretty fun so far! And basically what we’re doing is taking a weekly photo with the fruit or vegetable that BabyCenter or The Bump compares the size of the growing little baby to in the weekly e-mails that I get.  Or we’ll improvise based on the size…because I didn’t really want to take a picture with a kidney bean. 

We started at 5 weeks, because before that it was the size of a tiny seed.  But believe me, I knew at 3 weeks and I probably e-mailed Elaine a day or 2 after we found out!  But at 5 weeks it was the size of a little pea (or sweet pea!).  Crazy, right? It’s kind of amazing to see how fast it grows!  And it’s amazing how fast you grow with baby number 2! Seriously, the baby is the size of a raspberry now at 8 weeks and I look like I did at about 16 weeks last time!

Now, I want to clarify that I didn’t think this up all by myself.  If you do a little googling you’ll see lots of pregnant women posing with fruits and veggies.  I’m just lucky that I have my professional photographer friend taking the pictures.   My favorite is the pregnancy series by this woman (her name is Carolee), who is a professional photographer herself, so I am curious to know who is taking HER picture.  Maybe her husband or it’s on a timer.  Or an assistant.  But her photos (and her clothes) are really cute!  Congrats to her!

Anyway, to the photos!

She also takes my portrait each time. It’s pretty nice to have some good pictures of yourself, especially for your website, blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.            THANK YOU ELAINE!!

I’ll save the rest of the weekly photos for their own post.  Enjoy and thanks for all of your well wishes!! We are sooo excited to meet the newest member of the family…but as Juno says we’ll have to wait for him or her to “cook a little longer” and “get a little cuter!”

{I’m so crafty graphic via here.}

Well, that about sums this post up!  We had this striped brown and cream flatweave cotton rug from Target in our bedroom…but our dogs sleep on the floor in there and we have wwaaayyy too much traffic in that room for a flatweave cotton rug that you cannot vacuum.  Yes, we could go shake it out, but we’d have to do that every day, twice a day.  So we moved it.  I had it in my office, but the same deal; little pieces of paper from the hole-punch and random thread pieces would get stuck all over it.  Plus it kept bunching up under the desk leg and office chair.  So we moved it again.  This time to the laundry room to wash it, and that’s where it stayed.  Until my genius husband suggested it going in the bathroom.  If you’re anything like me you hate a cold bathroom, especially a bathroom floor.  It fits PERFECTLY in there from wall to wall.  And I love the graphic striped pattern it brings in.  *My husband, the decorator.*

It still gets a little bunchy, but that doesn’t bother me as much as it did in the bedroom because it’s easy to put back in its original location…and you might notice that we even took the bathmats out (and now they’re on either side of the bed) because we don’t need them anymore.  This is something I probably never would have thought of on my own – another piece of evidence to show that having someone to bounce decorating ideas off of can be very helpful!  A fresh set of eyes and opinions might be exactly what you need – and don’t discount your husband’s decorating skills – you never know, he might come up with something good a few times out of ten!

Sorry for the blurry webcam shot – I just don’t always feel like whipping out the nice camera, downloading and editing photos, uploading and formatting, linking and…well, you get the idea – quick and easy, that’s what I need these days – THANK YOU PHOTOBOOTH!  At least I am posting, ha! And yes, my daughter is trying to crawl out of her bath because she sees me fiddling with my laptop…

And no, my bathroom is dark brown, not black…but I am dying to paint SOMETHING black, whether it be a room or an exterior!  Will someone please let me pick a black paint for you??

Image via Apartment Therapy

Pretty, pretty please?  Okay, how about chalkboard paint?

Image via Apartment Therapy

Okay, back to the bathroom; I thought I’d point out that cute little green and white baby potty in my bathroom.  I can’t get over how cute my little girl looks while sitting on it.  She’d hate it if it wasn’t for that stack of Wild Animal Baby magazines we put right next to the sink – because of those she’ll sit there forever.  Nothing happens while she’s sitting on it (she’s only 18 months!), but it’s just for fun and for practice. 

She cracks me up…so I’m sorry if I over-talk about her potty, but it’s just precious (to me!).  Here she is, assuming the ‘reading a magazine on the toilet’ pose, with her baby blonde hair combed after a bath.  So sweet!  And I did wrap her in a towel so I could post this online. 

Anyway, the cute little potty, I bought it from Diapers.com because 1) their shipping is FAST! and FREE! and 2) I had a 15% off coupon sent straight to my e-mail because I have a customer account.  All great things when you live in Likely.  Plus the potty is too dang adorable and I thought it would look cute (and not take up much space in my teeny bathroom) sitting in its own little corner!  It’s the Hoppop Torro Potty in Lime. It also comes in blue (Aqua) and pink (Fuschia), but my bathroom is already brown, green and white so I thought it would look good.  Well, as good as a baby potty could.  If it’s going to have to be out, it might as well look good!  Right?

Fascinating stuff, right?    Anyway, this is another baby product that gets the thumbs-up from me.  It’s small, cute and was cheap!  But I also like it mainly because she actually LIKES TO SIT ON IT!  We’ll see how it goes after she actually learns to use it.

If you’ve been following my Tweets or the Likely Design page on Facebook, you might know that I have a fun new (real life) design project in the works — a daycare playroom!  So in my search for some inspiration for this project, I clicked my way over to HGTV and saw that runner-up Design Star Dan Vickery’s new online show has debuted!  It’s called “Kid-Sized Design” and there are only a couple of web-isodes up so far but after seeing Dan’s celebrity nursery design from Design Star I was curious.

Remember this room from Design Star? So sweet and cozy!  I really thought it was finished well.

Those boat-mobiles were very creative!  I could see why they decided to give him a show about designing for kids (well, really for adults, right?).

And here are a couple of shots from rooms from the show…

A little sparse (rug? more storage furniture? teeny tiny side lamp? they couldn’t change out that ceiling fan?)…but at least it errs on the side of not enough furniture instead of too much.  And the main feature of the episode was that storage valance above the window, not the room itself.

Better, but I’d like to see more.  There are a couple of 4 minute videos to watch, and you might come up with a couple of good ideas from each, but I’d love to see the floor plans, resource lists, etc.  The “Dan Cam” (which is right in his face) is a little strange, but it’s only the intro and ending.  Here is my favorite video from the bunch:

Dividing a Shared Kids’ Room

And here are links to the rest:

Boys’ Room Headboard Storage

Girls’ Room Window Treatment

Kids’ Room Design Tips

Nursery Design Tips

So, had you forgotten about Farm Boy Dan and his online show? Me, too, but I’m glad to see he’s back and working on something fun like kids’ spaces!  Plus he does have the design education that others lacked, so I’m sure he’ll bring it.  And if that doesn’t work out, he always has his modeling…

{images via HGTV.com}

Last December, Glenn and I (ok, mostly Glenn) painted our kitchen cabinets white.  It happened to be on the day that our daughter turned 4 months old, and so we decided to immortalize the day on our living room wall.  We rolled a little of the low-VOC paint on her little foot and stamped it up on the wall by the front door.  I love seeing it as I dash out of the door, and everyone likes to comment on it when they come to visit.

Strangely enough, later in the day my dad called to tell me that his mom had died that morning, so it’s also a nice way for me to think of my Grandma from time to time.  Miss you, Grandma M.!

So what did we do on the 1-year anniversary of that day?  Well paint another footprint, of course!  Now we have 2 growin’ footprints on our wall from when Harper was 4 months and 16 months old…and I’m hoping that this giant new footprint means that she’ll be tall – just like her daddy’s family!  But then again I’m only 5’3″ with a size 9 foot…I know…I’m a hobbit. 

I am so excited to share an adorable little nursery project with you today, not because I designed it (because I didn’t – I wish I could take credit for it!), or not only because it is darling, or hand-crafted with special little details, but because it is the bedroom of a sweet little girl whose mama is an old friend of mine!  And as you can see a very artistic and creative friend at that!  But if you knew Janet in high school, you would know what an artist she is!  A good example showing that whatever profession you choose, you can still be an artist (Janet is a nurse!).

A big thank you to Janet (and Reese!  And Matt!) for sharing her little nursery project with us – I absolutely love it!  My favorite part has to be the hand-painted details; two tones of yellow in two different finishes and don’t forget the hand-painted ‘R’ (yes, that is painted directly on the wall!) with glitter accents, a painted border and a wooden frame tacked to the wall.  I’m sure it is something that little Reese will be so proud of when she starts to learn her ABC’s!    Here is what Janet had to say about it:

“As for the “R” – I modeled it after a font I found at Pottery Barn, but I decided to draw/paint it free-hand since I wanted it so much larger. The brown and blue frame is painted as well, and Matt cut and nailed up the final white frame around it all.  The R is painted with the same color as the stripes, and has a few glitter accents. It was very fun!!”

And here’s the break down to make up a sweet little nursery, just like Reese’s!  Thanks for sharing, Janet!

Paint

• Primary wall color – Dutch Boy ”Honey Bear” – Flat finish
• Stripes - Dutch Boy ”Just Enough Yellow” - Semi-gloss finish
• “R” – Painted the same color as the stripes with glitter accents. Framed with blue and brown paint (color, brands unkown) used left-overs that a friend had.  Matt finished it off with the white trim.

Furniture/Decor

• Crib – hand-me-down from Reese’s four little cousins
• Bedding – Baby Martex CoCaLo bedding – Australian Animals (I think this has been discontinued) – From the Baby Depot
  • Note from Lindsay – it’s called Down Under and you can buy it here!
• Rocker- a baby-shower gift. From Target
• White Dresser – Bona Vita “Peyton” Dresser/changing table combo – from The Baby Warehouse in Petaluma
• Credenza – given to us from the Funeral Home where Matt works – Don’t worry – it was in the lobby – It fits in there perfectly and is decorated with all her favorite stuffed animals.
• Martha Stewart’s Tissue paper pom-poms – from Michaels
  • LOVE these!  -Lindsay
• Pictures (above dresser)- White frames from Aaron Brothers -a little collage of pictures we had taken at the house when Reese was two weeks old!

If you have a room you’d like to share, please e-mail me at lindsay[@]lindsaychristensendesign.com!

And P.S. – sorry for the interruptions throughout the background of the post – I’m tweaking the blog template and those boxes should be on the right – thanks for your patience!!