Monday Photo Dump + Update

Better late than never right?
I'm not very good at time management at the moment (Can I blame baby brain still?)
A lot has happened since my last post- First and foremost I am feeling considerably better and
a lot more in control! Noah has turned a massive corner and is (I dare say it) 100x more settled than before! It is actually rare now that he cries at all. He is easily entertained (Usually by me making ridiculous faces and noises!) I am really enjoying his company and talking to him.

Andrew and I have started a list of books that we loved while growing up and are going to start collecting them. It's made me really think about my own childhood and realise how blessed we were to have such involved families that really invested in our futures.

Noah is growing so quickly! Almost in 000 but still comfortably fitting 0000 :) He is now 11 weeks! I just wish my pregnancy had gone this fast! While in Brisbane Noah had his needles, he was such a brave little man! In Brisbane we also met up with some mums from our December bubhub/facebook group. It was so awesome to finally meet them all in person and meet all their bubs!
Since we got back from holidays we have also moved Noah into the big cot and into his own room. It's made such a difference to our routine and he has such excellent sleeps now!

In the past few weeks Noah and I headed to Brisbane to see Adam get his school captain badge. I would like to blame the hormones but I cried the entire ceremony! It was amazing to see him up there! It was lovely to see my family but I missed home and Andrew so much it was great to get home again (How things have changed!)

Andrew and I also had our very first date and very first alone time since having Noah. Our friend Bess who is a teacher in Proserpine, looked after Noah so we could go to Cactus Jacks for dinner. Although it was incredibly hard to leave him, he did great and we had a lovely night out.

We have had a change in plans- moving house wise. We were offered a house further out of Mackay for alot cheaper and on a much longer lease. Only catch was it is still being built! We decided to go for it and hopefully it will be finished by the last week of March.
Also in house news, our current house in Laguna Quays is situated on a resort, back in the hay day it was a huge resort with golf course etc. For the past few years they have just been running the golf course, a few units and the pool (my favourite place while pregnant).
On  Thursday we were told that the resort had closed it's doors for good. It is such a beautiful place and I really hope a serious investor takes on the project and gets it back on it's feet.

I think that is everything on the "news" front. Now for some super adorable pictures of my little man!

Asleep at Nanos in his penguin beanie and Dr Who shirt :D 

In Nanos car after his needles :) 

All the gorgeous babies! 

Our view from our table at cactus jacks :) 

Cute Noah bear! 

Noah in his cot!! 

This is strangely one of my favourite photos. 

He wasn't even really that upset
just didn't want his hat on. 

Love to you all xx 

With a smile on my face.

I think the hardest things in the world to say is...
I'm not coping.
I'm not okay.

I can't do this. 

Noah is ten weeks old now and up until this point I have been doing great.
Going through the motions but then all of a sudden the days got longer, the
screams got louder, nothing seemed okay. 

Everyone always says "your such a great mummy" My mum says that i'm doing
fine. But why do I feel like i'm doing something wrong?

I love and adore Noah, he is amazing, such a blessing and nothing could beat being his mummy. 

But when he cries, when he screams, when he's hurt, I feel at a complete loss of what to do!

I feel completely helpless when it comes to him. I know what he loves, I know how to fix it. 

Long walks, long drives, standing in the shower for hours on end or having him feeding for hours.
He loves to be held, He loves the sound of incredibly loud white noise, He loves to breastfeed!

It is the hardest thing in the world for me to say but I HATE breastfeeding, I hate it.
Noah loves to feed, but not to eat. He uses my breast as a dummy and he is not gentle!
He then doesn't have enough of a full feed in order to settle! 

The only break we get from feeding is the 5 hours after he has a big formula feed at night and it breaks my heart to have to give him formula! 

I have never judged another mother as harshly as I judge myself. 

Am I letting him scream for too long

Am I feeding him the right food

Did I dress him warm enough, Did I dress him cool enough 

Am I using a dummy because I am too useless to figure out what is really wrong?

I am just weak when I give in and give him formula at night. 

I feel like I am not good enough to be Noahs mum.

Thursday Photo Dump

I have found that since having Noah every memory card, every mobile phone, camera and computer is incredibly full of photos. 

Babies are such captivating creatures that you just want to capture every smile, every frown, every yawn. I have decided to do a weekly photo dump and add some photos onto the blog from that week! 

So here we go :)

Thinking of ideas for mobiles at 2am! 

Noah trying out the Calma Teat! 

Daddy looking after Noah! 

Noah at 8 weeks and 3 days. He loves tummy time! 

Another mobile idea! I'm in love with the very hungry caterpillar! 

Noah in the hugabub 

The most amazing thing to wake up to! 

An easter basket idea.

Fast asleep on the couch :) 

A very sleepy Noah ready for bed at 8 weeks!

Where life takes you.....

Andrew and I love to travel, we love road trips especially. We have this thing with driving around and checking out nice houses, discovering new parks and so on. We are fairly strange in this way but we love it. So the idea of having a baby screaming in the back of the car and driving around to places that may or may not have a mothers room really scared me while pregnant. I thought that our road trip weekend would be gone and we would be forever more stuck at home.

How wrong I was!

We realised from pretty early on that Noah preferred moving around, he loved the car and hated just sitting home all day doing nothing. *hooray!* Ever since we have been on so many trips. At just 8 weeks old he has done almost the entire east coast of Queensland. We have flown from Brisbane to Mackay twice and are going again on Saturday and last week we drove from Mackay to Cairns :)

I could tell you about every trip but Noah is stirring so I will give you a quick idea of our adventures through photos!

This photo is of Noah on our bed at The Sebel in Cairns :) It makes him look alot smaller than he is

Noah and I on his first flight ever! We flew from Mackay to Brisbane and he was excellent! Slept the entire flight!  

Hideaway Bay- Just North of Proserpine. Our favourite place to go for a drive and grab a drink :)

 At the top of CastleHill at Townsville with Magnetic Island in the Background. Noah was hungry by the time we got to the top :) 

Most photos of this trip (Mackay to Cairns are of Noah feeding!) 

And then last but not least! WE ARE MOVING!!! again..... :)
We have been in our current place for 6 months and finding the drive from Laguna to Mackay a bit much so went on the lookout for a house in Mackay. We found a home close to work and are so excited to move!

A new beginning

When pregnant with Noah I knew my life was about to change in a big way. I knew that children were an incredible and sometimes challenging blessing. I knew that I had the love and support of family and friends. I had read every book, every article, listened to everyones advice but there was one thing I did not expect.

My heart grew... The moment I met him and every minute since, it continues to grow.

Noah is now eight weeks old! The most intense and fulfilling eight weeks of my life so far! Andrew and I are learning new things ever day. I never thought Andrew could add expert swaddling to his CV but after eight weeks of swaddling, soothing and rocking. I think we have mastered the skill of calming a baby!
The first two or so weeks of Noahs life, our focus was surviving. It sounds a bit harsh but the first two weeks are very trying. It is like the newborn telling you that up until this point in time you lived a purely selfish life and now thats over. Noah struggled in the beginning to gain weight, he was a very sleepy baby  and within the first two weeks had lost over 10% of his birth weight. He was very unsettled and miserable. We powered on, got sleep when we could. Tried every trick in the book and started formula top ups at night.  Around 4 weeks he opened his eyes... He had opened his eyes before but never like this. He was awake and aware and it was beautiful. We discovered things that he loved that helped us through the tough times.

1. Cars/Planes/Trains put Noah to sleep in seconds! I believe the car seat has magic powers that I will never understand!

2. The shower is a baby whisperer. Noah loves the shower. He will stay in my arms wide awake but totally blissed out. Its also incredibly relaxing for my to stand under the shower with my amazing little man!

3. The saying "This too say pass" At 2am when your trying to feed a screaming baby while your husband lays there snoring that is the only thing that will get me through.

4. Understanding that I cannot be the perfect "mum" but I am the perfect "mum for Noah" has helped me so much! After deciding to give him Formula at night and breastfeed during the day I waited for the criticism but not one person questioned our decision. It was evident that we were doing the best thing for Noah and he is now thriving. And I realised that as Mothers we will have to make decisions for our Children, for our families that we may not even agree with but it is what is best.

Breastfeeding is seriously empowering. I don't know what it is but it just makes me feel like i'm a mother. Although our breastfeeding journey hasn't been the smoothest I am not ready to give it up just yet :)

Anyways In my next post I'll write about our adventures. Noah is a very chilled out kid and we are so blessed that we can still do things that we like :)

xx