My Little Fox Cub

I realized that if I wanted to get anymore pictures of him in his fox hat I'd better do it soon since he's just about outgrown it already with his trademark giant Elkins/Anderson noggin.

We've had a bit of a rough last couple of weeks as this little guy has become a lighter sleeper.  His favorite place to nap is still (of course) in my arms but it's been impossible for him to nap as long as he needs while his brother is around since Bears is quite the active, boisterous little fellow.  So I realized that it was time for him to nap in his own quiet space.  This resulted in a dilemma since I couldn't soothe him to sleep while Bears was around and I couldn't just lock Bears away for the 5+ hours a day it was taking to keep Fox sleeping.  But I was determined to continue on this fool's errand because most of the literature I've read on the subject indicates that leaving this young of a baby to try and soothe themselves to sleep would result in them forever dealing with feelings of abandonment and also heightened cortisol levels leading to brain meltage.  Or something.  I found out that when you're trying to keep two babies happy who are each demanding 100% of your attention, it leads to them both pretty much constantly crying.  After over a week of this and a couple of meltdowns of my own, I decided to let little Fox cry a little in his swing to see if he could eventually put himself to sleep.  It just so happens that he actually can do it and cries for less than 2 minutes on average and sometimes not at all.  So I try to console myself with the fact that letting him cry on his own for a little has resulted in much less crying overall vs when I tried to do everything for both of my boys.  Plus, now that he's napping on his own, I actually have time for things like blogging and laundry!  Amazing.


I still spend a ridiculous amount of time trying to soothe him to sleep at night but so far it still works out because Bears is already asleep for most of it.  Right now the process takes an average of 2-3 hours.  Hopefully we can streamline that soon but for now I'm trying to enjoy all the extra baby cuddles.

 The above picture shows off his typical expression.  Ryan claims that Bears never made that face and thinks that Fox will have this expression well into adulthood.  Maybe we'll have to recreate this picture when Fox is 18 or so to see if he can still pull it off.

Here he is trying to act sophisticated and hoity toity. You'd never guess that this haughty-looking gentleman insists on spending just about all his waking hours cuddled up to his mommy.

This one is really similar to the first picture but I couldn't resist posting it as well.  I love his sweet smile.

2 Months Old

Fox is getting a lot more fun and interactive...and I'm not sure that "mellow" really describes him as much anymore.  When he's happy, he's usually very happy and when he's sad, he's very very sad.  Devastated, even.  I'm having more and more difficulty getting him to nap anywhere other than on me.  Thank goodness for baby carriers because there's no way that I'd be able to facilitate this otherwise with a toddler. Occasionally I can get him to take a long nap on the swing but 4 out of 5 times he'll wake up within 5-10 minutes of being put in it, which makes for a very sleep deprived baby.  I'm pretty sure that this was Bears' main problem when he was tiny and why he was so blasted fussy.  He just wasn't getting enough sleep because I was under the mistaken impression that he'd be able to sleep in his crib if he was tired enough.  He eventually learned the self-soothing skills to sleep on his own but I'd say he was consistently sleep deprived until about 5 months old. Hopefully I can get Fox sleeping all on his own by the time he's as old as Bears was when he learned.

Speaking of Bears, jealousy is really starting to rear it's ugly head.  I think it's because Fox is requiring more interaction and can no longer be seen as a sack of potatoes that I carry around.  Luckily he hasn't done anything too terribly serious yet.  Mostly just tender hugs/pats that gradually turn into rough squeezes or smacks.  Once he was smothering Fox with kisses and suddenly couldn't resist the urge to bite him.  It reminded me of when cats or bunnies have licked my hand in a frenzied fashion that almost always resulted in biting if I let it go on long enough.  Ah well.  Luckily Fox didn't seem to mind.  Certainly not ideal though.

My parents took Bears out this morning, giving me some time for a bit of a photoshoot with Fox.  He really outdid himself doing the various baby poses:

We'll start with the classic "Blue Steel" (or "cheerio face" to some) that they all know so well when they're tiny.  It's so sad that they eventually lose this crucial skill.

The "toothless old man" look that they get when sucking in their lower lip

The "brave-but-tragically-conflicted super hero who's boldly flying off to do battle with evil" look.  Okay, so perhaps this isn't a classic baby expression.  It just might be though.  I'm almost certain that I remember Bears doing it.

Happy silly baby face

And lastly (and by far the most important) we have "Sean Connery face." This is another one that I'm not quite positive is universal...but my heart nearly breaks at the possibility that maybe not every baby makes this face at some point or another.  No.  I can't believe that, so I won't.  They all do this.  Yeshshshhhhh.

7 Weeks Old

He is loving lounging on the new play mat from April. Little Fox is still a pretty mellow guy for the most part and usually doesn't cry as long as he's getting enough cuddles and snacks.  The only time he ever cries for a decent length of time is when he's in the car seat.  He is not a fan of that thing at all and will cry for the entire car ride.

He loves getting attention from Bears, even if it's in the form of getting his ear poked.

He's getting to the point where he'll have about 20 minutes of happy awake time after each feeding.  It's some good times.

Bears Likes To DANCE!

He's finally released his first professional dance video:

Fox Smiles and Tries To Talk

The little guy has been smiling since he was about 4 weeks old but today is the first time I've gotten around to filming it.

That Bears...

There's something critical that I forgot to mention in that last post.  While Bears is very affectionate towards his little brother, it's pretty much always accompanied by Bears begging him for more presents, to the point where I think it's safe to call harassment.  You see, back before Fox was born, I stock piled a whole bunch of cheap crap off of ebay and wrapped it into about 10 presents. The idea was that if Bears thought that his brother kept bringing him gifts periodically that it would endear Fox to him.  Well, it worked, in a sense.  As Ryan puts it, Bears now thinks of Fox as some sort of treasure goblin who will continue to bring presents so long as Bears keeps trying to engratiate himself towards him.  Every time I leave the two of them in a room together I hear the same phrases over and over again..."Bring 'nuther present, baby Fox.  Bring BIG preSENNNT!" Well. Just see for yourself:

 It's really nice that Bears isn't directly hostile towards his new brother but this has obviously been a tough adjustment for him.  I've definitely noticed a lot of pent up frustration that he usually releases on inanimate objects like the balloon that he's desperately trying to destroy in the above photo.  He eventually succeeded by savaging it with his teeth...and was of course devastated when I couldn't put it back together for him.

 He seems to be feeling a bit more insecure lately, which is understandable, and needs lots of one on one daddy/mommy time.  Lots of times this is spent sleeping, since both daddy and mommy are pretty exhausted these days.  Bears is faking it in this photo but Ryan's totally conked out and snoring here.

 Here he is with his about-to-bolt-or-make-some-sort-of-trouble face.  He makes this face a lot.

 Sharing his brother's toy.  He loves to do this while periodically giving Fox hugs.  Along with asking for presents, of course.

He insisted on putting on his winter cap and then proceeded to wander around outside on a very hot august day.

Did you notice his fashionable capri pants in the above photo?  He was running around the apartment all excited and it took me a minute to realize that he'd managed to cram himself into his brother's newborn-sized pants.  I thought it was pretty impressive that he managed to do it all by himself.  And that they actually kinda fit.  Blast it but he's a skinny little cub.

The other day he got into some creamer and couldn't say enough good things about it.  My favorite phrase that he came up with is, "this is...very good!" I'm guessing that it's something about the delivery because I notice that just reading the phrase isn't all that impressive.

Bears 'n Fox

I wanted to take a couple pictures of Sawyer in his little fox outfit and Bears decided that he wanted in on the action.  He insists on holding his brother (or kissing him, rocking him, feeding him, etc) all the time.  It's usually really sweet and only sometimes problematic, like when Sawyer is in the swing or being nursed or changed. Bears is still wrestling with feelings of devastation when he can't cuddle his brother right when he wants to.  I had been pretty worried about Bears being jealous and trying to hurt Sawyer but so far the only hazards are when he wants to jump around like a crazy man too close to his brother and throwing things too nearby.  I'm really hoping the lack of violence keeps up but I'm still feeling like it might be too good to be true.  Only time will tell but for now I'm just trying to enjoy how sweet they are together.  Bears has already gotten li'l Fox to smile at him a few times.

Bears Photoshoot

Ryan took bear cub out for some pictures the other day and came up with these.  Turns out that he's a professional photographer. Pretty sure all of these need to be printed.

6 Days Old

So far Fox is such a sweet and mellow guy.  Even when he's fussy he just sounds like a whimpering puppy.  It's the saddest, cutest thing.  He's turning into a pretty great eater and would nurse pretty much constantly if he had his way.  Bears is still really sweet with him although I can tell that the transition's hard on him.  Thank goodness for Diddum coming over every day to hang out or that poor little cub would probably be having lots of meltdowns.  As it is, he spends his mornings going to parks, the market, or wherever just having a blast while I get quiet time with little Fox.

What the toes??  This kid just about has fingers for toes and...I dunno what for fingers.  Whatever is longer than fingers but looks like fingers.  He's got those.  Ryan claims that we've gotta be super nice to him because he's gonna grow into a giant.  Only fools incur the wrath of giants.

Meet Sawyer Fox

This li'l bundle was born yesterday morning at 5:50.  His birth was everything I'd hoped it would be.  I was able to have him naturally and with no complications.  Such a dream.  I fell in love with him right away and feel great...such a different experience from last time.  But I guess that's to be expected with a natural 8 hour labor vs 44 hours then epidural/pitocin.  Bears is doing great with it and is so sweet with "baby Fox."