Months 2 and 3

Smiley Baby Lex

Dear Bobble-Head-Baby,

I haven't written about you lately and I haven't written much about you at all, which is a shame because you are a beautiful little baby, with all sorts of record-worthy, developmental milestones that I hope to get down in this post and many others. I thought that having a second baby would make it twice as hard to meet my blogging obligations but the fact of the matter is that it seems to have made it fifty times harder, but I will do my best to improve, I promise.


The Lex - My Baby Bear xxx

Although I will always do my best to capture every month for you, it is likely that when you are old enough to read you are going to look at your blog and realise that your baby days have not been written about with the regular devotion to your developmental minutiae that was lavished on your sister. Before you feel too aggrieved about that I would like you to consider seomthing: think, if you will, about all the things you are getting that we could not give your sister i.e. the benefits of experience with babies.


Lexi The Blue-Eyed Reindeer
NCT Xmas Party 2009

Retrospectively I can see that poor little baby Georgie had to go through a lot so that you might have an inordinately more comfortable time of it - this is the lot of the elder child - and I am one myself, so I know this to be true.


Lexi & Nanny

She suffered through acid reflux without the benefit of a diagnosis for her crying and feeding problems, and without medicines to manage the problem and there are a host of other trials, some larger than others, that we have learned from and that you do and will benefit from.


Playmat Fun (Thanks Gran & Gramps!)

What I'm saying is that Georgie is your personal ground-breaker and smoothe-ride-maker. People often say that a second baby has an easier temperament because he or she has to just 'fit in' with activities that are based around the older, more active first-born. I think there is something to that but I know that in our case, your good nature also has a lot to do with what we learned while looking after your sister.



But don't misunderstand me, little Lex - you are an entirely adorable baby - the last couple of weeks we started getting great big smiles, and those silent baby laughs, where you open up your mouth in a vast, jolly, toothless grin to express your mirth. Two nights ago you rewarded Daddy with your first laugh (Elizabeth got Georgie's first laugh - I was gutted that it wasn't me). This time I was just glad to hear you laugh - until we had your reflux diagnosed and sufficiently medicated you were becoming a sad little soul, losing weight, hardly eating and crying in pain and hunger. Now we have the right formula and medicines in place, we can deal with your digestive ills until you outgrow them (it should be all better by the time you are about six months old, if not sooner). I'm taking you to be weighed in a few days and now that you are drinking more than twice what you were the last time I took you (when you had lost over 2lbs), I am hoping that you will have regained those pounds and maybe a few ounces extra.


Lexi & Spencer

You are sleeping and eating pretty much on a good routine. Steve and I take it in turns to be on baby night duty. We put you down at 7, wake you to feed you for a 'dream feed' at 10 or 11, and then you tend to wake somewhere between 3 and 5 for another feed and then we start the day at 7. Now that you are back on track feeding-wise I could go back to Gina Ford and see if we can get you sleeping through the night but to be honest I can deal with the early morning feed as long as I know it's coming and as long as it's only once. Also we should be moving house soon and the last thing we need is more upheaval, so if you want to wake for a night feed, that's ok by us x

You can be quite hard to put down sometimes - I bought you a little device that clips onto your cot and it plays music and projects moving pitcures onto your ceiling. You seem to love it - you smile and gurgle at it, and tap on it, following the winking lights with your little baby fingers. You still spend most of the night in the moses basket downstairs, where we don't have the music and light show, and you still go off to sleep ok (for the most part) so I don't think it's becoming too much of a sleep crutch. It does mean I don't have to stand in your room for hours, trying to get you to go to sleep, which with Georgie "the Devestation" Harris left all alone downstairs, is probably a good thing!

You like to sleep in the Baby Bjorn sling - this was very popular with you when your reflux hadn't settled down yet, as it meant you could sleep upright. It did lead to 'I eant to sleep on mummy' syndrome, however, and so it was nipped in the bud pretty sharpish. Hence the aforementioned music and light box.

I spend a lot more time holding you than I spent holding Georgie. I think this is because it's not a hot, sticky summer, as it was when Georgie was born. Instead it is a pretty cold winter, and so it's more comfortable to cuddle. I'm also much more adept at holding you with one arm - and so I can carry on doing stuff while I hold you, something I didn't get right away with your sister.

Your are a pretty relaxed, happy little girl. You have no problem being passed around and you are happy to share your smiles and gurgles with whoever happens in your direction. Of course like most babies, you have your preferences and you're not afraid to voice your discontent (I wonder where you get that from!)

You hate hats, snowsuits and carseats, and so at the moment, almost every time we go out, you get very cross, as I wrestle you into a snow suit with either a hood and/or a hat and then into a car seat! You're not overly fond of the pushchair either, but at least now you can see where we're going, as I decided you are big enough to sit in the doubles kit rather than ride in the dark in the cocoon. You still like to sleep in the cocoon (in the moses basket).

You like your playmat and the hoopy loopy monkey, which belonged to Georgie and probably technically still does. Luckily she's pretty generous with her toys (so far, and only with you). Long may it last...

So don't feel sad if your early blog entries are only half as many as Georgie's because it doesn't mean we love you half as much, but rather than we have less than half the time to write about love for children we love a hundred times more than we love ourselves, and a million times more than anyone could ever record.

Love from Mummy xxx