20 Months old & The weekend

Elli is 20 months old today and growing like a weed! It is hard to imagine that she will be 2 in just 4 months. I wish time would slow down a bit! Elli continues to be a great sleeper for us and has been averaging 12 to 12.5 hours a night. She still takes 1 nap a day for about 2 hours or more sometimes. We have finally noticed some progress with her hair growth; however, it is not quite long enough for a ponytail or pigtails. She is definitely in the awkward stages with her hair, as it doesn't lay flat, but is relatively curly. In the mornings her hair looks as if she stuck her hand in a socket and we generally have to be creative when trying to tame it!

Elli seems to be into everything and continues to enjoy all her girly things- make-up, purses doing hair, jewelry, etc. Elli loves all animals, enjoys sesame street, and has shown favoritism towards "Snow White." She is also into trucks, buses, planes, and tractors! Speaking of trucks, we took her to "Touch A Truck" this weekend. We went to a place where there were various kinds of trucks, tractors, and buses. All the kids were able to get up on the vehicles and play in them. Elli's favorite was the bus as you will see in the pictures below. She didn't want to wear her fire hat, so she made Scott.

This is what Connor did during "Touch a Truck"

Enjoying the bus.....

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We ventured out to a different park on Sunday and I had to get a picture of Elli before we left. She insisted on wearing these things.....

What can I say....this girl likes to accessorize. We were able to convince her that she didn't need the dog, sunglasses, or purse at the park, but we had no luck with the apron. Yep, that's right....she wore the apron the whole time at the park.

And after the park.....

she wanted to hold "Bubba" which we gladly let her.

Just a few more random pictures....

Our friend Kelli came over to play on Monday afternoon. Notice the earrings in the above pictures. Elli has been really focused on earrings lately. Don't worry....she won't be getting those ears pierced for quite some time.

Connor hanging out while we play.

Did I mention in my last blog that he is out of his newborn clothes and sleepers. He is wearing 0-3 month and 3 month clothes and sleepers. Growing so quickly, but he is back to not sleeping much at night...booo

1 Month Connor Pictures

Connor is growing so quickly these days and I can't believe he is already over a month old. He had 2 doctor appointments this week and both of them went really well! Connor is now weighing in at 9 pounds 9 ounces (25th-50th percentile) and 21 inches long (25th-50th percentile). His head is in the 50-70th percentile, but I can't remember exactly how big it is. Dr. Tyler, his pediatrician thought he looked great. He does think he might have a bit of reflux, as Connor gets pretty antsy towards the end of his feedings...but doesn't think it is significant enough to put him on meds. Mylicon seems to be working okay at relieving some of his discomfort.

Connor's cardiology appointment was on Thursday and I was really pleased by that visit as well. Connor got an EKG and saw 3 different cardiologists at this appointment. They are optimistic that he won't need any surgery and are thinking that his hole has gotten a little smaller. They were impressed by how much weight he has gained. The cardiologist told me that typically cardiac patients don't gain that much weight following birth. Originally they had told us we needed to go back at 2 months of age, but now they think we can hold off until he is 4 months old. We have an appointment on Dec. 22nd- we're hoping for a good Christmas present this year 3 days early-finding out his hole is completely closed! Connor slept through all the poking, prodding, and testing. The nurses and doctors couldn't believe at how mellow he was! (Side note- although the appointment went great, it took FOREVER. We were there for hours....good thing Elli was at daycare)!!

Connor is starting to smile and coo more these days- generally when he wakes up. I hate to jinx it by writing about it on here, but the last 3 nights haven't been horrible. We've been going to bed around 11:00 and Connor doesn't usually want to get up to eat until around 4:00am. It does take him some time (occasionally an hour sometimes) to get him back to sleep after his feeding, but he will usually go another 3.5 to 4 hours until he wants to eat again. Although we aren't to the point where we are waking up feeling refreshed, it is nice to have more than 4 hours of sleep a night. He really is a sweet little guy and I know I'm biased, but I think he is the most handsome little baby. He loves being held and is beginning to take his pacifier when it is offered. Yesterday, the nurses told me he had an angel face and I couldn't agree more (again...biased, but what do you expect?) :)

Big sister, Elli, is definitely coming around to this little guy. She wants to pick him up different times throughout the day and I've caught her trying to give him some toys to play with. I often tell her to help me by talking to Connor while I'm getting something ready and its so funny to watch her bend down, tilt her head, and say "Hi" (she says it in a high pitched voice with enthusiasm) repeatedly. Although this week I've seen her open up to the idea of him more, she still occasionally requests that we put Connor down and give her all the attention :)

Enjoy the pictures (I uploaded them in the wrong order....the pictures at the bottom were taken first....Can you see how much better he was holding his head up in the bottom pictures as opposed to the pictures at the top!)

Well....my "break" is over....time to go feed the little guy and Elli will be up from her nap soon!

Weekend in Indiana

Get ready for quite a long blog. As you can tell, I took a bit of a break from updating the blog, as we've been pretty busy here in the Lindvall household. In addition to this blog, I still have more pictures that need to be posted on here and I will do that at a later time. Also, I'll update the blog later about some recent decisions we've made that have contributed to a busy month!

Most pictures below are from Connor's first visit to Indiana, which we did this past weekend. Connor got to meet some more family and friends of the family. Elli got lots of attention and was on cloud nine as she got many tractor rides and got to play with her cousins. She was exhausted when we got home and gave us quite a good nap yesterday and a great nights sleep last night! I'm hoping for another long nap today (going on 1 hour as of now) because I have many more things I need to get done before she wakes up. Writing this blog wasn't on my to-do list, but I've been wanting to get some pictures on here.

So....here was our weekend....

See the above 2 pictures...tractor rides with her necklace on, stuffed animals, and the neighbor dog, Misty. She is still talking about that dog :)

Connor spent time sleeping (something he does great during the day, but hasn't quite mastered this skill at night...grrr)

Connor got to meet Grandpa Zurcher...

And the rest of the Zurchers

More tractor rides with cousins and other Papa.

Enjoying time outside....she spent most of her weekend outside!

Connor got to meet his other 2 cousins and Uncle Ross.

Vander holding his newest cousin!

I tried to get a picture of all 4 of them together and this is the best I could get. I'll probably try here again in a couple weeks when we see them!

Kisses for cousin Vander

"Who likes football?" Yep, Elli got in on the action while playing football with Vander and Dane. She was one of the boys that day!

Connor turned 1 month old on Friday! Happy 1 month birthday, Bubba!!

Connor and I drove down to Indy early on Saturday morning to have breakfast with Sarah and Landon (Landon would be that little baby bump)!!!! Landon is due to arrive on January 28th. I'm pushing for the 26th, as Landon and Elliana would then share a birthday :) Make it happen, Sarah!

We then went to Amber's house to surprise her for her 30th birthday. We took the girls to Monkey Joe's and they loved it; however, they were a little timid at first. We will definitely be visiting that place again! I'm pretty sure this wasn't the 30th birthday party Amber had in mind and she might be the 1st 30 year old to ever celebrate a birthday at Monkey Joes.

Kisses for cousin Kensley

Going down the slide at Monkey Joes

The 2 youngest cousins on my side of the family....Notice Connor's half smile! Today and yesterday he was quite the smiley little guy!!

Elli enjoyed jumping in the baby toys! I headed home to Ohio on Saturday and it was the most peaceful trip home. Elli jabbered for about an hour and then fell sleep. Connor slept the whole way!

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Below are random pictures from a couple weeks ago....

Elli became obsessed with wearing Nana Brauchler's glasses around. They fit her quite nice, don't you think?? She kept them on so long. We laughed because we said they were actually probably helping her see better seeing as how we haven't yet taken her to the opthamalogist for her astigmatism (bad parents, I know!)

Bathtime with Connor!!

*More pictures to come when I have some more time.