Easter as a Family of 5

Happy Easter!!!  Crazy that last Easter we were celebrating our first Easter as a family of 4 and had no idea that another boy was in our future!! It is such blessing spending Easter with these 3 amazing boys!!  Don't let this first picture fool you, there were a lot of out takes including this one...

Yikes!!! 

We started out Easter weekend with coloring eggs.  I just have to be honest here and say coloring eggs is overrated.  Who had the bright idea to give the kids something very fragile and then have them dye it??  The parents end up doing all of the work.  After one broken egg and no spilled dye (thank God) I think the boys still enjoyed it.  It did make for some cute pictures!!  

Andrew and Lucas were pretty excited to see that the Easter Bunny made a stop here!!  

Checking out the goodies 

After a quick look through our baskets we got ready and went to church.  This is the first year Andrew seems to fully understand the Easter story.  I love listening to him talk about Jesus.  It is so fun to see things through their eyes.  After church we went to our neighbors house for an Easter egg hunt.  The boys had a blast finding the eggs.

Quick family pic

The boys!

Eli 3 Months

So...I am only 12 days late this time!!  It is so hard to find time to update the blog.  Eli turned 3 months and he was a busy boy this past month!!  He did not have a doctors appointment this month so I weighed and measured him myself.  He was 15 pounds and 25 inches exactly.  He seems to have caught up with Andrew's measurements.  He is wearing 3-6 month clothes and is using the last of size 1 diapers.  He is ready for size 2 but I am not going to let these size 1's go to waste.  Eli is now in one of my favorite stages.  He has started smiling and cooing!!!  I love it when they can respond to your face but they still can't move :)  I feel like Eli is such a smiley and happy baby!!

The biggest milestone from this past month was that Eli decided to sleep through the night starting in mid March!!!  I put him to bed around 11:00 and he sleeps until about 7:30.  It is amazing!!!  When he wakes up he is ready to eat.  After he eats he is up for a little bit and then goes back to sleep for his morning nap.  He usually sleeps a lot in the morning and then is up more in the afternoon and evening.  He is definitely awake more now than he was last month.

So peaceful in his bunny pjs

Love me some Eli cuddles!!

Hanging out at church

Trying to start a new bad habit...

Another highlight in the last month was that he got to meet his Papa!!  Papa came out to visit for a few days.  That is actually when Eli decided to start sleeping through the night!  It was so fun having Papa here and watching him interact with Eli.  There were lots of Papa/Eli snuggles.  Papa also got to join Eli on his first trip to the zoo!!  Eli spent the majority of the trip to the zoo sleeping.  I forgot to take a picture of Eli at the zoo!!  I guess that is the first sign of him being the 3rd baby.  I did take a lot of pictures but none of Eli :(  

Three generations of Creason boys!! 

Watching some basketball with Daddy

Eli is still a breastfed baby!!!  Happy 3 months to us!  He still hasn't had any formula.  I have heard a few people say that breastfeeding starts going well around 3 months.  I think I agree because after pain, weight checks, breastfeeding groups, 1000 questions to my breastfeeding friends, tongue tie, and thrush here we are!!  I am happy to report everything is going great!  I am so lucky to be able to breastfeed Eli.  He eats 6 times a day about every 3 hours.  He usually eats about 10-20 minutes each time.  It is nice not to have to deal with preparing bottles before going out.  I have become pretty comfortable feeding anywhere...with a cover.  I am not embarrassed to feed him in public, but I am worried about making others feel uncomfortable.  I do hope that I can continue to breastfeed him as long as it works for him.

Lucas and Andrew still adore him!

Love these boys so much!!

Sick Spring Break

Andrew has been on spring break the last two weeks. On his last day of school before spring break he was sent home with this...

I was a little worried because we aren't traveling anywhere but when I looked at the calendar I noticed we DID have a few fun things on the calendar!  I went into spring break thinking about our fun activities we had planned and maybe a few other things we could do.

We started spring break with a trip to the treehouse at church.  We met a few friends there and the boys ran off a little energy because the weather was no good!!

Their faces crack me up!!
It's almost like they are thinking, "that Mom better not have just brought her sick kid to the treehouse!!"

After that we went to the local cupcake store for a little tour and some cupcake decorating.  The kids had a lot of fun.  We went with our friends that are from our original playgroup.  The older ones were so excited to see each other.

Reflecting on the experience...

Attempt to get a picture

Lucas is a lover!!
This may be his first official kiss because both parties went for the kiss.

The next day our exciting spring break came to an end!!  Andrew started with a high fever, was achy, and looked awful.  I knew something was wrong and it was more than just a virus or cold.  On Friday he tested positive for the flu.  He got his first hospital bracelet because he had to go to the hospital lab to be tested.  It kind of made me laugh because they still had him in the system as "Boy" Creason.  He hasn't been to the hospital for anything since he was born.  Lucas on the other hand has a frequent flyer card between a trip to the ER and swallow studies/chest xrays.  When I got home from the Dr with Andrew, Lucas had a fever!!  The flu claimed 2 victims!!  The boys have been miserable and I have been guarding Eli like I'm a Navy Seal.

After one whole week Andrew seems back to normal with a cough here and there.  We were able to get tamiflu for Lucas.  Not sure it did much, but he is getting better.  He still has a cough and runny nose.

My Mom did come to town this weekend.  Just in time for the flu!  So far Andrew and Lucas are the only unfortunate ones.  Hopefully she didn't catch it while she was here.  I guess our spring break resumes tomorrow.  We do have Easter still and a couple other fun things we can do before it is over.  Hopefully we are past all the sickness!!

Eli was his happy self through it all :) 

Eli 2 Months

Two months has come and gone just like that!!  Little Eli is growing like crazy.  I think I am getting adjusted to life with three. We are starting to get out more and getting back to our normal routine.  The Dr warned me to stay away from public places until Eli was 8 weeks.  We made it to 8 weeks with no sickness and hopefully it continues!!

He wasn't really into having his monthly picture taken this time.

At his 2 month appointment he was 12 lbs 9 oz 60th percentile and 24.75 inches 98th percentile!  We all know my boys top the charts in the head department.  As of right now Eli is hanging out in the 50th percentile for his head so we will see if it stays like that.  He is in size 1 diapers and 3 month clothes.  He did get 2 shots and ended up getting a fever from the shots that night.  The Dr said that some kids just have that reaction.  The fever was about 100.9 and it didn't seem to bother him.

Eli decided to show his adorable smile when he was 6 weeks!!  He first started smiling in the middle of the night during feedings.  Now he smiles all the time.  He usually smiles a lot when he has a full belly.  He also rolled over this month!!  He rolled from his belly to his back 3 times when he was 7 weeks!  He is a little overachiever.  He hasn't done it again but I can't say I am good about giving him tummy time everyday.  He does love his activity mat but isn't a huge fan of the bouncy seat.  He likes to nap during the day in his swing.

Working on his smile!

Breastfeeding is still going well.  We had a little run in with thrush...I think.  I had a lactation consultant that thought we had it so we were both treated.  When I went in to see the Dr he said we didn't have it, so who knows.  Either the medicine took care of it or we never had it.  He said his tongue was white from milk residue.  I was going crazy trying to figure out why it wasn't going away with the meds.  I feel like the breastfeeding may be here to stay.  I am getting much more comfortable feeding him on the go and he still seems to be gaining weight just fine.  He is eating every three hours during the day and he has two long stretches at night!!  He usually goes about 6 hours at night.  He is doing such a great job sleeping and I only have to get up once with him.  He is sleeping in his crib and he seems to love it.  I have been putting him down awake and he is doing great falling asleep.  We are swaddling him in a sleep sack for now.  I heard that babies don't sleep as well at night when they are breastfed, but that is obviously a myth!  He still naps a lot during the day too.

So peaceful!!!

All dressed up for church

Daddy got to give Eli a bottle

Hanging out with my brothers!!

Love my cuddles with Eli!!!!

Eli got to join us on our date night for our 9th anniversary!!  He was so good and pretty much slept the entire time.

This little guy is such a blessing to our family!!  Mark and I were talking the other day about how weird it is to think that I was just pregnant a couple months ago.  It's hard to remember life without him.

Eli's Nursery

I finally finished Eli's nursery!!!  As you all know we left the sex of Eli a surprise.  I had to come up with ideas for a boy nursery and a girl nursery.  I wouldn't recommend waiting to do the nursery because it is hard to find time to finish the nursery after the baby arrives.  We painted the walls grey so it could go either way.  The only other thing I finished before Eli was born was the crib skirt.  I knew I wanted an airplane theme if we had a boy.  I found the perfect sheets at pottery barn kids right before Eli was born and I kind of built the rest of the nursery around that.  After having Andrew I realized that you really don't need a bumper or fancy quilt.  I stopped using Andrew's bumper as soon as he started moving around and I never used the quilt.  I have used Pottery Barn crib sheets for all three boys now.  They are super cute and great quality!!

We did have to buy a new crib and mattress for Eli because Lucas is still sleeping in a crib.

I used this tutorial for the crib skirt.  It was pretty easy and I love that it is adjustable.  I decided to make one because crib skirts are so expensive!!  

For this name sign I wrapped a canvas in the same fabric as the crib skirt.  I used this tutorial to paint the letters and it worked out pretty well. 

My boys love their mobiles!!  I didn't want to spend $50-100 on a matching mobile and I ended up finding this awesome tutorial on etsy.  I used Lucas's old mobile and cut off the elephants.  This cost me about $7 to make!!!  I bought the felt and tutorial.  

His nursery is simple, but I love it!!!