Bertie at 10 weeks old

Just like I start a lot of these blog posts, I can’t believe where the time is going. How is my son 10 weeks old already, the time is literally flying. It seems like yesterday that I wrote the little mans birth story and today he became 10 weeks old, that’s 70 days he’s been in our lives for. It’s been a crazy 10 weeks, but also the best 10 weeks. Here’s what life is like with a 10 week old baby boy.

• Feeding. Everyone asks about feeding, so I’ll start with feeding. It is going well, far better than what I thought it would be. He’s actually a pretty good feeder compared to his sister, and I haven’t felt that I’ve been feeding all day or binge watching too much Netflix as a result. He also quite happily takes a bottle of formula too, and we are keeping this up on a daily basis, so that when I have to escape somewhere without him, I can. We’ll be testing this tonight as I have a dentist appointment (vital little piece of “me” time).
• Sleep. Next up is the next thing everybody asks about. To be honest it hasn’t been that great but it hasn’t been that bad. It could be worse. I can honestly say that I have had no more than 3 hours solid sleep in the last 70 days apart from our first night in hospital as he slept through the night, but they always do that in hospitals. He is following a pattern, sleeping for about 4 hours and then waking for a feed, and then waking every 2 hours after that. So I’m up pretty much two, three or four times a night, but I’m not going to get obsessive over it for now. I’m just living permanently in a sleep deprived state, functioning on tea, coffee and cake.
• Smiling. Yes he smiles. In the last couple of weeks he’s been practicing to smile, and now he can actually smile. He smiles if you tickle his tummy or his feet, or if you make silly smiley faces in front of him. He also weirdly smiles when he’s about to have his nappy changed.
• Coo-ing. Just like smiling, he’s been coo-ing a lot over the past week, and starting to make nice noises compared to a grizzly cry. It’s like he’s trying to have a conversation with us, and tell us how he’s feeling which is pretty cute.
• Weight and length. When I had him weighed about 4 weeks ago he was just under 11lbs. He was on the 50th centile for weight and the 90th centile for length, so I think we may have a tall and slender boy. He’s currently still wearing size 1 nappies, and is still (just about) in is newborn clothing, although 0-3 months still fits really well.

In terms of how we are as a family, and how I am, we are all doing really well. It was a huge adjustment going from one child to having two children, and it certainly hasn’t been easy. However this time round I am a lot more relaxed about everything. I’ve not been obsessed with sleep behaviours and feeding/sleeping patterns through the day, although I am now trying to instill a routine. Nor have I been googling everything like I did with my daughter, but I did Google last week “Why do babies have their fists clenched all day” as that is what the little man seems to do at the moment.

The recovery from the c-section was tough, tougher than I imagined it would be, and only in the past three or four weeks have I felt 100% again. I guess it was slower the second time round as I had another child to look after. But now I look back on it and I can’t really remember the pain, it’s funny how our brain makes us forget, although at the time the pain did bring back a lot of memories from my first c-section.

We’ve also had some exciting adventures over the past 10 weeks including a trip to Wales where Bertie spent days on the beach with us, so he’s endured a really long car journey, and this was absolutely fine. He’s been to his first wedding, and was looked after by a baby sitter for the evening. He’s been to Birmingham and spent a few nights with us in Kent. So he’s already pretty well travelled and in a couple of weeks we are off to Spain, so watch out for the blog post on how to travel on a plane with a toddler and a newborn baby.

It’s been a fantastic 10 weeks, yes it’s had it ups and down especially when it comes to the toddler and her tantrums which seemed to come to life when we arrived home from hospital. But it has got a lot easier, and if anyone else is going through toddler tantrums with a newborn baby, trust me it does get easier.

So here’s to another 10 weeks, and if you fancy reading and seeing more of our adventures check out and follow my Instagram feed.

Claire x