1 month!!

I can't believe my little man is 1 month!! It's so surreal to me how fast it has gone! But at the same time, I feel like he has been a part of our lives forever. It's hard to imagine life with out Liam. He is doing so good too!

Up until about a week ago, he would eat every 3 hours night and day. He was like clock work waking up to eat on the dot. Then he decided that he wanted to eat every 2 hours during the day but I am totally fine with that because he started going 4 hours every night which I love! And last night he went from 12pm until 5am and then woke up at 9! It was so nice that he did a 5 hour stretch! So I got a total of 8 hours of sleep! I hope he continues this trend! Breastfeeding has gone really well. I really love to breastfeed.

The only scary part of breastfeeding is it's hard to know how much he is eating. So you can tell if they are eating enough by how much weight they gain. As you all know, Liam was born HUGE. So in the hospital he had a hard time getting full from my colostrum. One of the nurses told me to let him nurse as long as he would and after 2 hours (seriously no joke...not good advice) of feeding him and he still was acting REALLY hungry we knew that my colostrum was just not enough for our little chunk. They had us supplementing with formula until my milk came in about a day after we got home so that he would get enough food. Needless to say, when we went to the peditrican for a jaundice check (he was a little jaundice after being born) the morning after we got home he weighed 9 pounds and had lost 9 ounces while in the hospital. The doctor said its totally normal for most newborns lose up to 15% of their birth weight and he had only lost 10% so it wasn't anything to be worried about. Well, when we went in a week later for a routine weight check he had gained back all that he had lost which the doctor said was really really good. He had gained more than an ounce a day since we had come home from the hospital. Well, we went and had him weighed again for another routine weight check Friday when he was 3 1/2 weeks old (which was 2 weeks after the last time we weighed him) and he weighed 11 lbs 2 oz!! That's a gain of 1 1/2 pounds in 2 weeks!! The doctor said that was AWESOME! And today we went to an appointment and he weighed 11 lbs 11 ounces which puts him in the 95th percentile! So he is still gaining more than an ounce a day since we brought him home. He sure has never had a problem gaining weight thats for sure! It's so nice to see him so healthy!

Seeing as most newborn clothes only are for babies who weigh 5-8 pounds, he is DEFINITELY growing out of them. Technically he outgrew them a couple weeks before he was born! LOL! I think it's funny that my 1 month old baby is way too big for newborn clothes. So I have been squeezing him into some of my favorite newborn outfits to take pictures of them before I pack them away. There are some adorable sleepers, but he totally can't fit into them anymore. He's too long and too big for them. He can't stretch his legs out at all and I can hardly button them closed! Here are some of my favorites...

This is his "cool kid" face! haha

I love his serious face!

He has been smiling lately and I LOVE IT!! I have been trying to catch them on camera but its hard! So these are some of my tries. Hopefully I can get one on here that really reflects his adorable smile! But I think these do pretty well...

LOL!! I had to include this picture! I burst out laughing every time I see it! I lovingly call this picture his "fat kid" smile! So funny! He was smiling so big and cooing while I was taking these pictures and I caught him doing a really funny smile! What a goof!

At 1 month Liam can...

--Smile in response to others smiling or talking to him (aka: social smile)

--Lift his head up to a 45-degree and sometimes 90-degree angle when on his tummy and hold it there for a long time (this kid is so strong! He was doing that in the hospital! It shocked all the nurses)

--Respond to sounds (his hearing is crazy good)

--Stare at faces

--Follow objects with his eyes

--Staring to coo

At 1 month Liam likes...

--Eating

--Sitting next to the window staring outside

--Riding in the car/being in his carseat

--CUDDLING

--Being all wrapped up in his blanky and being rocked

--When we talk to him...he seriously will just stare at us when we talk to him

--Hearing people sing

--Having his bum patted while he is rocked

--Laying on my chest and looking around

--Staring/smiling at our wedding pictures on the wall behind the couch while I am burping him or holding him over my shoulder

--Sleeping on me after eating

--Taking baths (but not having his hair washed)

--Playing with Daddy

--When Daddy talks to him (he smiles and coos whenever Richard talks to him...melts my heart)

--Looking at things with a lot of contrast or black and white (so much so that it can distract him while he's eating haha)

--The 5's of "The Happiest Baby on the Block! Best book! He melts as soon as we start doing them.

--When I read him books

At 1 month Liam dislikes...

--Being hungry even in the slightest (I don't let him get to the crying stage of hunger so this hardly happens)

--Having his hair washed

--When we hold him with cold hands

--The initial shock of changing his diaper

--Pooping

--Doing tummy time on the floor. He loves doing it on my chest though!

As for me, I feel back to normal! I am so happy to say that I am out of recovery which is a nice place to be. I also found out while we were getting Liam's weight checked on Thursday that I have lost 30 pounds in less than a month!!! YAY! That means I only have 10 pounds to lose until I am back to my pre-pregnancy weight! SAWEET! Yeah yeah...if you did the math I gained 40 pounds! BUT, I started pregnancy lower than my doctor wanted me to be and so he said I needed to gain at least 35 pounds. Gotta say it was so nice to have to eat as much as I could doctors orders! ;) The neat thing is that breastfeeding is what has made me lose all that weight. I am not allowed to exercise for 2 weeks! Breastfeeding is awesome. So I am hoping that once I can exercise I will lose those 10 pounds...if I haven't already in the next 2 weeks!

As I was taking his 1 month pictures, I decided to video him. At the beginning he smiles really cute but you have to pay attention to catch it because it doesn't last very long. He had been smiling a lot before I started taping so I caught the tail end of his smile session!

p.s. We got the pictures from his newborn photo shoot and I will post them another day. This post is already too long! :)