5 Months old. Seriously?!

I feel like a broken record but I have no idea how Everett is 5 months old already!  The weeks are truly flying by.  The last 2 weeks have been pretty rough but I think we are back on track!

Everett has upgraded to 6 month clothes and size 2 diapers!  He is growing like a weed!
On Father's Day of all days our happy, good sleeping baby vanished :(  We went to the pool and then had a quiet day at home.  Everett got Andy a GoPro camera and some track time driving in a Ferrari or Lamborghini in August :)  I think he loves his daddy.

Father's Day family photo.  Everett is SO happy :)

Cute overalls

Pool time with Dad!

So, Father's Day was a bust because Everett got his first cold.  Poor little guy probably felt horrible and his nose was a faucet.  We also had his 4 month appointment and he got his 2nd round of immunizations which probably compounded the unhappiness.  We also thought he might be teething.  He couldn't breathe and wasn't sleeping at all.  The doctor said she didn't feel any teeth and at 18 weeks he weighed 15 pounds and was 24 3/4 inches long.  I also started back on my full time schedule which was hard with him not feeling well and not sleeping.  We put up with the "new Everett" for a week until it culminated into the worst Sunday ever!  More on this later...

18 week stuff

-It's been so hot here!  High 90's and 100's.

-Everett is changing so quick!  He is now reaching for everything in sight

-Still wants to stand 24/7

-He found his face in the mirror and loves to play with his "twin"  See video below

Upgrade to big boy stroller

Melting on our walk to the park.  

Only happy when he's outside this week

 
Poor kid is still feeling sick.  He's not sure if he's scared or if mom's being funny

Sleeping in the baby backpack.  He is still way too small but it worked!

At Jordanelle Resevoir

Chilling on the shore.  Andy had to practice swimming in a lake for his triathlon so we made a day of it and had a picnic

Hanging out with mom on Monday

Everett found out his foot exists and that dad's nalgene is fun to tip over.  Scared mom to death!

Cutest Hawkeye fan!  Sorry Uncle Wyatt...guess someone needs some Cyclones gear

Are we going to walk before we crawl?

Mom's $10 garage sale find.  He LOVES it!

Week 19 stuff...

-Everett is consciously reaching for things

-He gets frustrated when his hands don't do what he wants them to do.  i.e. put things in his mouth

-Everett found his feet

-He discovered that Mom and Dad have noses that are 3D and can grab them.  Pretty amazing to see the lightblub go off when he discovers something new.

-We've been dealing with some temper tantrums

-Not sleeping through the night

It's been a rough week which culminated with the Sunday from hell and a rough Monday.

Sunday from hell...

-Before 7 am I had cleaned up baby puke, cleaned up pooped through jams, dog pee on the floor, dog puke and a sleep deprived screaming unhappy baby :(

Cali ran and swam so hard at the reservoir that she was sore and wouldn't move without yelping.  We usually give her puppy aspirin.  She got 2 tablets that night and then 2 the next morning.  Although she should have been able to handle the dose she was struggling to keep food down and by Sunday night was shaking.  So, Andy took her to the puppy ER.  She was fine, just a slight overdosing...

By this time Everett was over his cold but still not sleeping so we knew we had to do something.  I got a great book recommendation which REALLY helped.  He had been going to bed at 10pm since I'd been back to work and every night was getting less and less sleep b/c of his late bedtime which finally culminated with him being unable to sleep because he was so overtired.  We moved his bedtime up to 7pm along with sleep training him (letting him cry and no pacifier) and he slept 10.5 hours uninterrupted!  The next morning I told Everett he slept 10.5 hours and this was his reaction...:)

Shut up!  I slept 10.5 hours?!?!  What? Kanye and Kim named their baby North?

  He started napping better at daycare and has continued to sleep amazingly at night.  Previously he would sleep at most 7 hours at night and we had no idea that this was NOT normal for his age.  Once I did some reading I found out that he needs between 12-16 hrs of sleep between nighttime and naps.  As of today our happy, fun, easy baby is back!  We NEVER have to use his pacifier and if he starts to get fussy he goes straight to his crib.  He'll cry for about a minute and then he's out and naps about 1.5-2hrs.  It's hard to listen to him cry but it's worth it.  This morning he woke up at 5am, cried for a couple minutes, then went back to sleep until 7am.  Gotta love it!  Sleeping until 7 never felt so good!  I know I personally feel like the world is right side up again now that we have his sleeping under control...until it isn't.

5 months old!

Everett is now getting 8 ounce bottles every 3-4 hours during the day.  We also graduated to the Medium flow nipples so he's back to puking 24/7.  With the slow flow nipples he was taking 30-45 minutes to finish a bottle and would squirm and writhe the whole time.  So he's eating better but now puking a lot again.  Kids...

Cali still is not happy about this...

We are taking our first road trip with Everett to Fort Collins on Wednesday to spend the 4th of July with Matt and Cassie.  Cassie is due with their first on August 1st.  Can't wait to find out if Everett will have a girl or boy play buddy!  Crossing our fingers the drive goes well.  Also hoping he'll continue to sleep well away from home.  I made a packing list and I'm fairly certain we are bringing the entire house...babies come with a ton a baggage!

 As Lexi noted above, I signed up for a pretty epic triathlon this fall, the Xterra.  Its a triathlon in every sense of the word, except the road bike ride is replaced with an 18 mile mtn bike ride.  It's hosted at Snowbasin ski resort, so there should be plenty of elevation change.  That is coming up in late September for Jarrett, Zane and I.  So we signed up for a few sprint and Olympic distance triathlons to get in shape.  My second ever tri was at Jordanelle reservoir this morning.  It was a 1/2 mile swim, 14 mile ride and 3.2 mile run.  The training that Jarrett and I did at Jordanelle did last weekend paid off, and both of us finished quite well.  It was a challenging course since the reservoir was so low.  After the swim we had to run barefoot about a quarter mile, in wetsuits, on a gravel road, and then up the boat landing to the first transition.  Definitely added to the challenge!

Jarrett and I crossed paths at both transitions, me arriving as he was leaving.  Like the clumsy dolt that I am, I dropped my water bottle at 0.5 miles into the bike ride, so I was dry for the entire ride.  The course was great, snaking us through the foothills of the Uinta mountains.  I did my best to catch Jarrett, but couldn't on the bike.  I did catch him about a mile into the run.  We ran together for a while, and then I pulled away and finished about 35 seconds in front of him.  I finished second in the 1-34 age group, and Jarrett finished third. It was a great time.  We might need to find another one before Xterra.

Outside of training for tri's, I was able to get my first round of golf in for a charity event sponsored by my employer.  We played a best ball tournament on the course that surrounds our office.  I played with my Intermountain counterpart and a few coworkers and our foursome tied for first at four under!  It was a good time, and made me want to get out more often.  Too much fun stuff to do, not enough time!

We're into the heart of summer and can't wait for more.  We're definitely looking forward to getting back to MN to see family and friends later this month.  Can't wait to meet those Herzan twins!  Life is good out here, and we would love visitors!  If you read this blog you are more than welcome to come join us for a weekend to enjoy the amazing scenery, and good beer here in Utah.  Frontier has cheap fares ~$210 available right now!  

Andy and I love Pixar animation movies and Despicable Me is one of our favorites.  One of Andy's co-workers is an aspiring illustrator and drew the most awesome gift for Everett.  His very own minion!!!

Thanks for checking in!!

Love, 

Lexi, Andy, Everett and Cali

4.5 months and Everett's first swim!

4.5 months and Everett's first swim!

Cali still dreads these pictures...poor dog

Mr. Smiles!

Our friends Brendan and Alyssa have pool access right by their house and they are nice enough to invite us along.  It's turning into a Sunday tradition.  Everett wasn't sure what to think at first but I think he had a good time!

Everett's first introduction to the pool!

It was quite the ordeal getting Everett "swim ready."  Babies under 6 months aren't supposed to swim?  I scoured every rack looking for his swim shirt and thank goodness for cousin Owen's hand-me-downs or Everett would be swimming in his diaper...the small size trunks I bought would probably fall off!  Disposable swim diapers aren't made in a size smaller than 3 and he is drowning in regular size 2 diapers.  So we had to go the reusable swim diaper route which are REALLY hard to find. But we succeeded in getting him outfitted and got to enjoy the pool!

All geared up!

Not so bad once you're in!

Dad playing motorboat

I finally got the most amazing video of Everett giggles :)  He is getting to be so much fun!

Loving the bumbo...until he gets tired of holding up his head :)

Big news this week...Everett rolled over officially!  He even did it twice when both Andy and I were watching so it wasn't a fluke!  He had done it once before with a small nudge from me but he finally did it on his own.  

Everett also LOVES to stand.  He is getting pretty good.  He just needs to be stabilized under his arms and he's just happy bobbing around.  His feet almost touch the ground in his bouncy seat.  He's really going to like that once he realizes what it can do :)

This is my last week on 3 days a week.  Wishing I could take advantage of it but unfortunately I have to go to court tomorrow...boo :(  

I (Andy) caught the triathlon bug.  I bought a used road bike a few weeks back so I could join a buddy in a local sprint triathlon.  I hadn't done much swimming or riding before the race, so i was a little nervous, but it went alright.  We started bright and early at 630AM.  I was wearing my down jacket and swimsuit while I was waiting to get in the pool!  It was maybe 45 degrees.  The pool was warm and the swim went well, just 400 meters, but that's a long way to swim!  The bike was next, and was lots of fun.  It was a tough but scenic ride between the two big canyons in the Salt Lake Valley.  Lots of elevation gained, but really fast.  The run went really well for me, and I passed quite a few people.  I finished 12th overall, with a time of 1h:13min.  Not bad for a first timer.  I signed up for another one in the end of June.  Moving up to the big time in the Jordanelle reservior with a 1/2 mile swim.  

To get ready for this next triathlon, and eventually Xterra Utah (another tri but with mtn biking instead of road riding); Jarrett and Dan I went out to explore a new mtn bike trail in Heber.  It was supposed to be a 24 mile loop with 2700 feet of climbing.  Its a brand new trail so there wasn't much info on it.  Turns out there was an endurance race going on the same time, so we had to contend with race traffic.  The trail was BRUTAL!  It was brand new, so it was really soft in the corners, and rough since not many people had ridden it.  After it was over I had 27 miles and 3500!ft on the clock.  It was tough, but the last few miles were fun.

We are getting excited for our annual trip home at the end of July!  We decided to not be crazy and drive with Everett all the way back to MN.  So, Everett and I will be flying home and Andy and Cali will be driving.  Tickets are booked and we can't wait!  We'll be at the cabin Saturday July 20th-Tuesday the 23rd and then in and around the cities until Saturday the 27th.  Let us know if you'd like to see us!

Everett will be 4.5 months on Thursday and we have his appointment next Monday.  He's 14.5 lbs and getting heavy!

Thanks for checking in!

Love,

Lexi, Andy, Everett and Cali 

4 months (16 weeks)

4 months old!

Looking pretty awesome in my sweet thermal :)

Getting so tall!

Fun stuff in the past 2 weeks...
-Everett started falling asleep and waking up by talking to himself.  So cute and fun to listen too.  Much better than crying :)
-Left and right hands are both constantly in his mouth, I thought he was going to be a lefty, but he might be favoring the right one.

Yum!

Hi!

Memorial Day Weekend and we stayed home.  Womp, Womp.  First holiday in my recent memory that we haven't had a trip scheduled or big plans.  We are trying to not be so busy and just enjoy being at home with Everett.  So of course we ended up tearing up the backyard and going to 3 Saturday BBQ's...  The previous home owners likely had some sort of RV pad that fell into disuse and we had been pretty apathetic towards fixing it.  But the time had come to do something about it.  So we rented a tiller from the Depot and went to work.  We mixed in some fresh soil, rerouted a sprinkler and planted some grass.  Hopefully it grows!

Our sprinkler never worked so we dug them up, put in new ones and planted grass

Watching mom and dad do manual labor was so exhilarating that he had to hold on for dear life :)

After all our hard work we had fabulous dinner on the deck

15 weeks and looking like a little man!

"Look at me, I got them all in!"

16 weeks and he finally fits into newborn size jeans

Dad's sous chef

Everett got his first lesson in grilling on Wednesday night.  He liked it when the chicken sizzled.

I've got my first triathlon coming up on Saturday in Cottonwood Heights.  I finally bit the bullet and bought a road bike, so I might as well test it out.  I can handle the biking and running, but the swimming makes me a little nervous.  I could run a quarter mile in a minute, but swimming that far won't be so easy.  If I can get through that part I should be fine.  Looking forward to it though.

3.5 months and loving life

3.5 months old and Everett is getting to be lots of fun and such a big boy!

I started work again on Wednesday, May 8th and Everett went to his first day of daycare.  We all survived :)  It was definitely hard driving out of the driveway but everyone did great!  Andy does the hard part and does drop off in the morning and I pick him up in the evening.  We absolutely love our daycare lady and she is smitten with Everett.  We were given her name by a friend in the neighborhood and are so thankful.  She does in home daycare and lives within walking distance.  It really makes it so much easier to leave him knowing he is in loving hands. I am also very lucky to have a cush schedule at work.  I usually work 10 hour days Tuesday-Friday and for the first 6 weeks I'm only working Wednesday-Friday for 10 hours a day.  Can't complain about that.  I'm loving having those 2 days at home with Everett especially now that he's awake most of the day and loves to smile, giggle and "chat."

Everett's first day of daycare (morning)

Everett's first day of daycare (evening) :)

"Mama makes weird faces at me..."

Big news of the week....Everett sleeps through the night!!!
E's first day of daycare tired him out and he slept 9 hours that night!  And it wasn't a fluke!  He seamlessly transitioned to a great sleep schedule just in time for me to head back to work.  My first week back he would sleep a minimum of 6 hours which is amazing.  We're still working on the morning routine but we're getting more efficient every day.  So far Andy does his nighttime routine.  We started doing the bath, bottle and bed routine and it's worked like a charm so far.  Then I get him fed and ready to go in the morning since I leave earlier.

13 weeks old and enjoying the 90 degree weather!

Oh ya...stylin in my muscle tee and shades on our walk :)

New stuff for week 14...
-We are routinely up to 7-8 hours of sleep every night :)
-He loves watching the other kids at daycare and probably only naps for about 2 hours during the day
-He is all smiles.  It's one of the BEST feelings in the world to come home to a huge smile when he sees Mom and Dad
-Everett is now grabbing toys-still pretty rare but he's getting better and better
-He can put his hands together and holds them up in front of his face to play with them
-Andy is convinced he's going to be a lefty.  Up until this week he would only put his left fist in his mouth.  This week his right hand is starting to make the long journey to his mouth.  So funny to watch him concentrate so hard and making the hand to mouth connection
-Giggles.  LOVE the giggles.  You can't help but laugh too.  The world could be ending and those giggles could make anyone smile.
-Everett's definitely found his voice.  He is starting to "talk" more and more.  So fun.  We heard goo's and gah's quite a few weeks ago, but now he's up to ah's, ee's and oohs.  This morning I put him in his crib wide awake and he just "chatted" with the animals in his crib for about 5 minutes and then fell asleep.
-The fam took a walk tonight and Everett got to ride in the Bjorn facing out for the first time!  He loved being able to check out the world.

Getting soooo much better on his tummy.  Still doesn't last long but good to see him with his head up so high

One of the daily pictures from daycare :)

Borrowed a bumbo from a friend and Everett loves it!

Back to the winter clothes...50's and rainy this weekend and today

2nd pair of socks ever worn.  We didn't even make it out of his room before one came off...

Everett doesn't stay swaddled long anymore and his hands always end up behind his head.  So cute :)

Upgraded to size 3 month jammies.  Still doesn't fit into newborn jeans though...not sure how that works.

Sending dad Monday morning smiles