What a whirlwind the last 4 1/2 months have been! We went from one baby to two and I don’t think anything could have prepared us for the change that would mean. It seems easy when you make the decision to try to have another baby, you think well we already have all the stuff the baby needs and so far the first child seems normal so we must be doing something right, so yeah let’s have another one! Oh how I laugh at our naivete now :). I’m convinced that the second pregnancy made me lose half my brain cells because I can barely remember what Will was doing at this time last year. It’s like I never had the first kid and I know nothing about the stages Rob is going through. I actually had to ask the pediatrician the other day when to start Rob on solids and what to give him. With Will I was totally on top of all of that!
Have you seen the Luv’s commercial with the 2nd time around mom? The first baby she is preparing to leave the house and she has the stroller overflowing with bags and stuff and forgets the baby on the living room floor, lol! Second baby and she is now baby wearing the little one and holding the big ones hand and as the head out the door she stops and shoves a diaper in her back pocket. This leads you to believe that she is much more experienced and she’s good with just a diaper. I thought wow I want to be her, totally cool and calm with two kids. Yeah I’ve come to realize that she is not cool and calm, nope she is totally unprepared! I know this because I am her. I walk out the door after spending 20 min packing the diaper bag just to realize when one of the kids blows out their diaper I don’t have a change of clothes for them. Or I have diapers and clothes and snacks and juice and formula and toys but no wipes. Seriously the list is never ending!!!
All of that to say we are still adjusting around here. When Will was born I felt like we just made a few adjustments but we didn’t have to change completely. Going places revolved around nap times and hanging out with friends involved baby sitters and bed times. Running errands was where things started to get really annoying because getting the kid in and out of the car is a pain in the butt. Now that we have two it has been a complete change to our daily lives. From the moment we get up in the morning which involves hurrying to get a shower before they wake up around 7:15. David tackles getting Will up and dressed while I do the same with Rob, breakfast is also a tag team effort. Once David leaves it is them vs me and they make sure any alone time I try to manage is punctuated by screams and yells. As soon as one goes down for a nap the other wakes up. Errands, forget it! I’m now an avid Amazon shopper and anything else I can get delivered to the house. I’m probably in danger of becoming a hermit if I didn’t make an effort to take the boys out at least 1x a week to do something fun with their aunt and cousin.
I’ll talk more about working with two under two in a follow-up post to my pregnancy posts. That is a whole new topic 😉
Would I trade any of that for my two boys? Not on your life!!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE my little guys and I feel incredibly blessed to spend my time with them. It is just so crazy how adding a second baby feels like more of an upheaval then having the first baby. Enjoy some photos of my guys, there are so pre and post surgery photos of Rob. It’s amazing how quickly he has healed from his cleft lip surgery!!!
Melissa Arlena is an award winning lifestyle newborn photographer in Charlottesville and Richmond, Virginia who has earned her Master Photographer Certification from NAPCP in maternity, newborn and family photography. Her natural and simple work has been featured in magazines and online blogs worldwide. She has been named Best Maternity and Newborn Photographer in Richmond and Charlottesville, VA in 2023.
So nice to hear that I’m not alone in this! I could have written this post word for word. Your boys are adorable!
Oh Claire you make me feel so much better! I’m so glad I’m not the only one :). Your girls are super adorable too!