Just Because

I haven't posted any pictures or anything for that matter about Miles in a while so I thought I'd just put up some more recent pictures of him. And then also I have some pictures of Rylan with her underwear on her head and couldn't resist sharing :)

Miles has his 2 month check up in about a week and a half when I'll do big update on everything in this crazy Eby family!

24 pounds in 24 weeks

So I gained a lot of weight while pregnant with Miles, A LOT. It came to about 40 lbs total, which was right in between what I gained with Jake and Brenden. But let's face facts, gaining that much weight at 34 is a little different than when I was 26 and 28. Back then all I had to do to lose weight was think about it and now......not so much.

At my 6 week postpartum check up I was at 152lbs, about 24 lbs more than my pre-pregnancy weight. So I decided that I would aim to lose 24 lbs in 24 weeks, a reasonable goal in my opinion. A pound a week for about 5 months, a slow steady weight loss so it will hopefully stay off. Now I am terrible at dieting so I'll be trying to do this by simply working out and just being a little more conscience of what I am eating. I also have the added incentive of trying to lose this weight for a trip to Jamaica in June for Chris's cousin's wedding.

So February 15th was my first workout. I've been working out 3-4 days per week and trying not to take more than 2 days off in a row. I've been doing running and walking on the treadmill, the elliptical, push ups, and teaching swim lessons. The swim lessons might not be that much of a workout, but somedays I'm in the water for an hour and a half and pretty tired by the end so I add it on. Anyway, I have to sign Miles up a head of time for the daycare at the gym so that has helped to keep me from making excuses not to workout and I have been writing down every workout to also hold myself accountable. I'm also hoping by putting it all out there on this blog that that will keep me going as well.

I did my first weight check on February 20th and plan to use Wednesday mornings before my workout as my weekly weigh in at the gym (the gym has a digital scale that should make it easy). So here it is:

2/20 - 151.4
2/27 - 149.8

Total loss for the week - 1.6lbs
Total weight loss to date - 1.6lbs

Not too bad! Now to keep it going, wish me luck!

Coming Home Outfit

So I found this very cute outfit online for Miles to come home from the hospital in and even had a E embroidered on it. But when it arrived it was much bigger than I anticipated. So I found another outfit and just held on to it for when he was big enough. And now he's big enough! :)

Bye, bye wall!

When we first bid on a house way back in March we had found a house with the same layout as the one we ended up buying, but the owners had done a few more updates. One update they had done was to have a wall removed between the kitchen eating area and the family room. And when we weren't able to get that house and got this one instead I insisted that we have that wall taken down ASAP. Well, we FINALLY had the time and money to get it done - YAY!

The guy we hired had done a couple of other wall take downs in our neighborhood. He started Monday and was done Thursday and the work he did looks great. The space is much more open and flowing now and you can't even tell at first glance which pieces of flooring were replaced and refinished. We are VERY happy with the finished product, but you can be the judge in the pictures below:

One Month

That's right, we survived the 1st month! And what a month it was....sickness, visitors, traveling, birthdays, it seemed like the madness would never end. But it did. And now we sleep, not really, Miles is only a month so sleep will still have to wait a bit :)

Miles had his one month check up on Monday and everything looked great. He grew a couple of inches, gained nearly 3 lbs, and his noggin expanded nicely :) This doctors office doesn't give me a nice print out of the growth charts like our doctor in Michigan did, but they did show me on the computer that Miles is out of the below 5% mark and into the good percentiles for all growth.

He's been eating like a champ so I would imagine he'll keep growing good. And even though he's not sleeping all night (not that I expect him to be at this point) he has started to do longer stretches. The past few nights he's gone 5-6 hours at the start and 3-4 hours in the middle. However, he is still having some trouble at times and needs some help getting comfortable and back to sleep, but I think we're starting to figure what is bugging him and what needs to be done to get him comfortable quickly. And hopefully he's on the same track as the others to be doing a 7-8 hour stretch around 8 weeks.

Jake, Brenden, and Rylan are still loving him lots. Well, the boys are, Rylan has more of a love/hate relationship with him - not surprising from a 2 and a half year old :)

Brenden is 6!

My sweet Brenden turned 6 on February 1st. Brenden often gets lumped together with Jake that sometimes we have take a step back and remind ourselves that Brenden is only 6. And then I say "Only 6???? Where did the time go?" He amazes me so much. He has an INCREDIBLE imagination and will tell you all about his stories if you let him. He is learning to read in Kindergarten and loving it. He is always asking me what a word is or asks how to spell a word and is always proud when he sees a "heart" word and can tell me. He is my sweet little man and he's growing up....(sniff, sniff)

Things were pretty low key for Brenden's birthday as well. He got start his celebration early by going to lunch and then shopping with my mom two days before. They both had a great time together. They went to Max and Erma's for lunch so Brenden could do the make your own sundae bar. After, it was off to the mall for new shoes and the LEGO Store. He got new Star Wars shoes that light up either red or green when you walk. And at the LEGO store he bought 2 Star Wars kits, one that he bought with a gift card he got from our neighbors and the other was his gift from my mom.

On his actual Birthday he had school in the morning where he took Avengers pens to give out to his class - no more bringing in treats for Birthdays at school. When he got home from school Jake and Chris were still gone so he had to patiently wait to do presents. Everyone was home by 5pm when we did presents, had pizza, and finished off with cake. He got lots more LEGOS and told me it was the best day :)

The day after he got to continue the celebration by having 5 friends over for a small birthday party. His friends were over from 3 to 6pm. They were all very well behaved and had fun playing with the wii and LEGOS and then enjoyed pizza and cake - that's right, Brenden who doesn't like pizza wanted it two days in a row. Brenden had a great time and it was really nice to see him play with all of his friends and be the center of attention. He proclaimed it another great day!

And now we get a break around here. In 40 days we had Christmas, New Years, Miles's Birth, Chris's parents visit, my Mom visit, my Dad visit, a trip to Michigan, Jake's Birthday and Party, and Brenden's Birthday and Party......I'm officially exhausted! 6 months until Rylan's birthday should be enough time to recover :)

 What he picked out with my Mom

 The Cake

 Self Portrait for school :)