Second Child Syndrome

This is what the pediatrician said to me as I explained to her Friday morning that Rane was sick and Ella Ann, unfortunately, was to blame. Poor little guy caught Ella Ann's nasty cold that she's been nursing for over a week now. I knew it was bound to happen when last week she was leaning over Rane in his car seat and let out a huge sneeze all over him! His cry sounds more like a croak and he's stopped up, but otherwise the doctor said he was okay...just a head cold that should clear up in 1-2 weeks. Great. He's still his sweet self and I even managed to capture a smile on camera this weekend!! On a side note, I have to tell you another Ella Ann funny. When we were driving to the pediatrician's office Ella Ann informed me that her husband was not sick. So I ask, "Who's your husband?" She responded, "My husband's at work." Again I ask who her husband is and she gives me this matter-of-fact response, "Daddy."



I went ahead and had the doctor do Rane's 1-month check up since that was going to be another visit on Tuesday. I knew he had gained some weight but I was shocked when the scale read 9 pounds 10 ounces! He gained a whopping 2 pounds 6 ounces in less than 1 month! Rane also grew 2 1/2 inches! He is in the 50th percentile for weight, 75th for height, and 25th for head circumference. Atta boy! He's even grown out of his newborn clothes!


Meanwhile, Spencer headed off to Toccoa this weekend to work so the three of us had to occupy ourselves. I went to a great consignment sale on Saturday morning at a church down the street. It was half-price day so I expected it to be picked over but it was not! I put Rane in his sling so I could shop a little easier. Well in the first 3 minutes I had already found two very cute outfits for Rane and then he decided to pee all over himself, the sling and me. So I carried him around crying for a few more minutes and got Ella Ann ready to go home and change because I was determined to find more bargains...I was on a mission! On our way out Ella Ann is trotting to keep up with me so she falls down and skins her already-skinned knees again so I have her screaming and Rane as well and I can do absolutely nothing. Such fun. I managed to get everyone taken care of when we got home and I raced back to the sale to dig around some more. I was glad I made it back because I ended up getting several things for Rane, books for both of them and a guitar for Ella Ann (50 cents!). See below for pictures of my loot! We just played around the house yesterday afternoon. Ella Ann and I played doctor and while she held the stethoscope up to my heart she told me she heard animals and they sounded fantastic. It was good to know they are alive and kickin' in there! :)

This morning when I was feeding Rane at 5 in the living room I hear, "Mommy!! I'm all wet!" So I have to interrupt Rane eating which is terrible in itself because it takes him forever to eat sometimes, especially in the early morning, and I go in Ella Ann's room and she's completely soaked herself, bobbie/horsey, blanket and sheets. So I have to strip her down and throw some towels down in her bed because I was way too lazy to change the sheets. It was quite a morning before dawn today.


It's super nice here so we went for a walk on Saturday afternoon and again on Sunday. We are very much looking forward to when Spencer gets home later this evening. I honestly don't know how single moms do it with two or more kids. It is work!

Rane's new outfits....

a few closeups. I spent $.50-$5 on each item! Not bad at all!

A long time ago at Mandy's house I saw this idea displayed on her refrigerator. Carter's teacher at school writes a letter and then beside it makes it out of dots for him to connect. We've been doing this for a while in finger paint and she LOVES it. So when we were playing school yesterday (one of her new favorite things) I decided to do it with markers...much easier on me but Ella Ann of course prefers the finger paint. She is singing the completed alphabet in the above picture and showing her work off below.

The letters I wrote are in gray. I didn't help her a bit and she did so well!

Rane relaxing in the swing, which we do not move because each time he gets going in it he vomits like crazy!

Not a good picture but it's the beautiful smile!!!!!!!! That was work to get that too!

I took this at 6 a.m. this morning because he didn't want to go back to sleep so I brought him to bed with me to watch the news. Mandy let me borrow this Miracle Blanket and a miracle blanket it is! It looks similar to a straight jacket (honestly it does) and he sleeps like a champ in it!

A Good Week

Well we are back to our usual routines...thank goodness! We managed to get out and about every single day and I am proud to say I have conquered the grocery with 2 kids! Rane is still doing great...no crying and he's up only 1 time at night! Yeay! He started smiling and cooing earlier this week and it's soooo cute! He's so different from Ella Ann and I expected everything to be exactly like it was with her, i.e., frequently up at night, spitting up..err...vomiting on me like crazy, and feeling like my world was collapsing! Fortunately I haven't experienced any of that..yet! Ella Ann is back to her old self and I have figured out how to successfully feed Rane while still sitting on the floor playing with Ella Ann and her beloved doll house.

Papa and Nana also came down this weekend for a quick visit. They got up beyond early Saturday morning and drove down here to see us. While they spent some quality time with the kids, Spencer went to watch a ballgame and I made it to the gym...alone! We ordered in dinner Saturday evening and mainly just sat around and enjoyed each other's company. They went to church with us this morning and left after that. We will see them again soon so it was an easier goodbye. Ella Ann sure enjoyed having them here because of the extra attention she received!


A friend from church took pictures of the kids last week. HERE is the link to view them if you haven't seen them already.


Here are some pictures from our week:

Rane's favorite sleeping position...sprawled out like a cat in the sun!

I bought this sling in hopes of carrying him around in it so I could run errands a little easier with two kids. Well after watching a very complicated video on how to operate it and several efforts of putting Rane in it only to have him scream because he hated it I took it to Ruth's house (queen of slings) on Friday to have her show me how it works. Well duhh...I was doing it sooo wrong! Now when I put him in it he's as happy as a clam...and pretty darn cute may I add!

Rane is ALWAYS arching his back until he forms a backwards "C". It's hard to tell from the picture, but he's doing it. He also folds his little hands under his chin while doing this move and I could swear he's posing!

Relaxing on the rug in his room. His Aunt Mandy gave him this adorable outfit and it was the very first boy item of clothing I received...way back this summer. It's hard to believe he's here and already wearing it!

Playing with Papa on Saturday....

Nana getting her grandchild fix...

Before church on Sunday.

On Our Own

My Mom left us in tears on Saturday morning and we were left to fend for ourselves from now on. Sniff...sniff. I think we can manage, though! I am looking forward to getting into a new routine with the kids and resuming our usual activities, including school, Bible study, and playdates. It will feel good to feel "normal" again. Our meals from church, thankfully, start on Sunday and we are really looking forward to that...especially me since I won't have to cook for a while! Yippeeee!

The weather has been nice here lately so while my Mom was here we ventured out and about in the new ride (see below). I'm loving the double stroller, although I feel like I'm trying to navigate a bus through a mole hole at times! I still haven't figured out how you are supposed to open a door to a store, home, restaurant, etc. AND push the massive thing through...maybe some nice soul will have mercy on me and open doors for us! We went for a couple of walks and got ice cream....Ella Ann's new favorite is a strawberry ice cream cone topped with rainbow sprinkles! Boy was she grinning from ear to ear with that thing yesterday! She is such a clean child...probably the only kid I know who can take 30 minutes to eat an ice cream cone and not spill a drop! I know, I know....I have it in for me with a little boy! At least I have one child that is a neat/clean freak like myself! We also swung by the playground for Ella Ann to play a little while on our way back to the house. We bundled Rane up even though it was 65 degrees! He looked so cute!

I have to give myself a pat on the back because I got Rane, Ella Ann and I dressed, fed and out the door by 8:50 this morning to head to church. Spencer had to work this morning but did manage to make it to church and help me home. All went very smoothly and I was proud I made it out alone, easily, for the first time! Yeay!

Well that's really about it. We sure enjoyed having my Mom stay with us for a week and we'll miss her a ton. Ella Ann did NOT want her to go! Thanks again, Mom, for driving down here and taking such good care of our family and our house AND sleeping on an air mattress for an entire week!!!! Thanks, too, Dad for sharing Mom! We love you!

Off to school.....

Rane checking out Ella Ann....he's always watching her, in fact he probably sleeps with one eye open! :)

Sibling bonding!

Awwww!

I couldn't resist! He looks like an Eskimo!

The new ride! We all love it!

Sweet Jana made these beautiful door signs as a gift for the kids. They match perfectly and we love them! Thanks SO much Jana!!!!

Can you believe she painted the ballerina????

I will post pics of the nursery as soon as I get some things on the wall, but his sign matches his bedding. Very cute!!!!

I frothed Ella Ann's milk this morning and you should have seen the joy on her face! She said to me, "I'm drinking a cappuccino!!! I want one everyday!" Me too, Ella Ann, me too. She also insisted that she use one of my small coffee spoons so she could eat the foam! I've created a monster!

Spencer snapped this picture of us napping this afternoon. I think he kinda looks like me...or maybe I'm just willing him to resemble me!

Two Kids?

Wow, we have KIDS now! ha! I have to admit that life with two, so far, has been easy going....well, maybe that's because I've had helping hands since I got home from the hospital! Rane is a breeze and I'm praying that it lasts and it's not just a newborn thing. He is a fantastic eater...keeps me tied to the couch every two hours on the dot but I think he's ready to go some feedings with 2.5 hours in between. At night I am up only two times and he goes right back to sleep. He usually wakes again between 6 and 7:30. It's really not bad! Ella Ann has eased up on her hovering and dearly loves her little brother. She is quite a big help to me and loves to fetch me things when I am occupied feeding Rane and enjoys watching me change his diaper and his clothes. I let her pick out what he wears for the day and she always helps give him a washcloth bath.

I had their picture made yesterday morning by a friend from church who took Ella Ann and Mara Kate's pictures last year at Piedmont Park when they turned two. Ella Ann loves Bobbi Jo so she was very cooperative and we all had a good time. Bobbi Jo gave us a sneak peak of the photos so HERE is the link to view them.

Also here are some pictures from our week so far with Mimi:

Mom brought Ella Ann a tea set and as soon as she opened it she put up her animals at the table and we helped her get it all set up! Now all she wants to do is "go have coffee!"

And to top it all off she put on Belle yesterday and had tea! Now that's a princess!!!!

Our dear friends, Emily and Paul, sent us some YUMMY chocolate covered strawberries! Aren't they so pretty? I had to take a picture of them so Spencer could see them all nice and pretty before I tore into them!

Some friends of my family sent Ella Ann this adorable outfit (you cannot see the coordinating belt and flowers on her pockets) and Rane an outfit for when he is a little older. I took a picture of her when she got home from school this afternoon because she looked so cute...too bad she decided not to give me a cute smile! :)

Some rare cuddle time with Rane.

Lunch with Mimi.

He sure loves the paci already and Ella Ann is on constant paci police duty and is obsessed with shoving it in his mouth 24/7! We now put them up high in his closet so she cannot 1) reach them and 2) suck on them herself which we have found her doing!

He's almost 2 weeks old!

Photos Finally

I don't have much time to type (guess I better get used to that) but here are TONS pictures of Rane! We are doing fantastic, by the way. He is such a great baby! Ella Ann is still adjusting, but doing fine. She loves her baby brother and is quite a little helper. She pulls a stool up to the changing table every time it's time to change his diaper! She is the pacifer police and wants to insert that thing...very roughly may I add...every 5 seconds. If he becomes addicted to the paci it will be all her fault! :)

Again, I linked the photos from Facebook because I have so many. So click HERE to view them.

Rane Simms Jensen

Yeay he has arrived! Rane was born at 12:01 a.m. on January 9th. He weighed 7 lbs 4 oz and was 20 inches. He has a head full of spiky, dark brown hair...which we love! He was due January 7th, which obviously came and went. I had a doctor's appointment the next afternoon and I had mentioned to my doctor that he wasn't moving very much so they sent me down to labor and delivery to be hooked up to the fetal monitor for 30 minutes. By the way, Ella Ann was with me and Spencer had come home very sick that morning so he was in bed. After being on the monitor for just a few minutes, I started having contractions 2 minutes apart that grew stronger and stronger. I called Spencer and he came to the hospital and our parents started the long trip down from Kentucky. Poor Ella Ann, she was such a little trooper. Her and I had already been at the hospital for over 3 hours and she just sat on the bed with me the entire time without complaining, except for when she dropped her guinea pig in the trash can and I couldn't get up to get it out for her! Jana came to the hospital to pick her up and she stayed at her house....had a BLAST....overnight. Ella Ann went to her first sleepover at the age of 3 and did fantastic, but she was with her beloved best friend so I knew she would much rather be there than with her Mommy and Daddy! Jana was so kind to keep her....her sister and her two kids were visiting as well so it was a packed apartment that night! To see some pictures of Ella Ann's big night, click HERE to view Jana's post. Thank you again, Jana!!!!!!
After being in triage because of a full house for over 5 hours, they finally moved me to a delivery room and that's when things really got going. I had asked for my epidural around 9 when I was 6 cm. dilated and the anesthesiologist just so happened to have 3 emergency c-sections at the same time so I was dropped to the bottom of the priority list! Great! By the time he arrived with the medication (oh and I had asked my nurse at least 50 times when he was coming and she kept telling me he would be there soon and I WOULD get my epidural) it was time to push. I was in SO much pain. I don't see why in the world anyone would voluntarily skip the epidural and want to go through childbirth naturally! No way! The anesthesiologist did start the line for the epidural and managed to shoot in a bit of some kind of pain medication to get through the pushing but I was not fully numb whatsoever. The good thing was that since I could feel everything I was able to push really well and get him out in 5 minutes. Ahhhh such relief! I felt like a new person! Thankfully Spencer was able to rally and help me out even though he felt miserable.

Our parents arrived shortly after only to be shocked that I had already had him! It passed so, so fast! I was able to get up by myself and walk around as needed after having him because I wasn't numb, so that was another plus to no epidural. Spencer went home that night because he needed to rest in a bed and not on a couch but none of us got much sleep because we were too excited. The next day big sister Ella Ann came barreling through my hospital door and was ready to hold her baby broder! She is in love with him, to say the least. She is his mother hen and wants to hold him every waking minute and has a very hard time "letting" anyone else hold him! We are going to have our hands full with her....poor Rane!

Spencer and I actually enjoyed our time at the hospital because we had lots of alone time to talk and spend time with our new baby. We loved having our parents here, especially since they took such good care of Ella Ann. She was spoiled rotten!!! We got home from the hospital Sunday morning and have been trying to get back into the swing of things. Spencer has this week off and then my Mom is coming down next Sunday to stay the week so I'm so thankful to have 2 full weeks of an extra pair of hands!

Rane is doing well, by the way. He is one good baby so far! He never cries, really he doesn't, just smacks his lips and roots when he wants to eat. He wants to eat every 2 hours so that's kind of hard but other than that he's a breeze. We'll see how the next few weeks play out, though!

I only have a few pictures to post at the moment because we accidentally left the cord to upload pictures in my father-in-law's laptop case so he has to mail it back to us. Once I get that I will post a ton of new pictures!!!!!

He already found his thumb....must be a genetic thing at this point!

So Bored

Yes I am SO bored waiting on this baby! Ella Ann and I have exhausted most of her Christmas toys last week, or at least I am so over them! Her favorite thing to do every single day, and I mean EVERY SINGLE DAY, is dress up as either Tinkerbell or Belle and play in her dollhouse. Favorite phrase: "Mommy, play with me!!" Ahhhh yes, school starts back on Wednesday...hallelujah! I have resorted to taking pictures of Ella Ann dressed up and playing with one of her other favorites, her bilibo. We have found all kinds of uses for that thing! It's fantastic!

Here's Tink taking a spin in it this afternoon!

Her best Spencer Jensen face. :)

She also loves to stand on it and jump off, or use it to get a better view out of our windows!

Beautiful Belle

Well I couldn't resist posting a few more pictures of Ella Ann dressed as Belle. She has refused to put on the costume since she received it for Christmas but yesterday I talked it up and she was ready to transform herself into a princess! She looks SO cute in it and I just love it! I told her we need to go to a ball and find her a prince! Of course her response was, "What's a prince?" Then I had to go into a big long explanation about who a prince was! She loved wearing the princess costume and stayed in it all afternoon. We have played with her dollhouse every waking hour pretty much since her birthday and since she received several more rooms to go in it for Christmas that's all she wants to do. Yesterday she had a really hard time playing with it because that massive hoop skirt kept getting in the way and knocking over everything! She even would loose her people under her skirt! Furthermore, my house has been covered in green glitter from Tinkerbell but now we have a big dusting of gold glitter from Belle that is everywhere! I have to indulge, though, because what little girl doesn't want to be a princess??? I'll suffer through the glittered house for it!

On a side note, I have to tell you all what Ella Ann said yesterday. I posted last month about Ella Ann and her really getting into the "real" Christmas spirit with learning about the birth of Jesus and the days leading up to it. Yesterday she put all of her dollhouse people in their van so I asked her where they were going. Her response, "To Bethlehem." I laughed SO hard and then asked her why they were going to Bethlehem. Her nonchalant response was, "To see Baby Jesus in the stable." Gotta love it!

Belle making her grand entrance! She has to pick up the front so she doesn't trip over it!