North Dakota and Father's Day

June 19th-21st John, Elsie, Evelyn, and myself headed to Grand Forks, North Dakota for Chris and Laura's wedding.  The week prior to the trip we ended up buying a minivan-a 2012 Chrysler Town and Country.  The tipping point for us was so that one of us could sit in the third row and tend to Evelyn because she had not been doing well on the car rides.  She cried and cried the weekend before coming back from MN.  

We ended up leaving our place Thursday night and staying at my mom and dad's house and then got up and left early Friday morning.  

Friday Donut Date! 

I was excited to get back to my old stomping grounds-where I went to college.  It had been almost 9 years since I had been there. We got up to North Dakota around 1pm.  

Crossing the Border

Once arrive in Grand Forks, we checked into the hotel and got our keys but did not go up to our room.  Instead we took a little drive through campus.  The hotel that we stayed at, The CanadInn, was attached to the Alerus Center which is UND's football stadium.  This is also where the wedding reception was going to be held.  

Alerus Center

Entering Campus.  Boy this had really changed over the years.  

My old House. Delta Delta Delta-Lots of good memories here! 

After driving through campus we headed out to the Ralph Engestad Arena where the UND Hockey team plays.  The Sioux Shop is there and I wanted to get my family decked out in UND apparel.  Back a few years the NCAA forced UND to retire the Fighting Sioux nickname and logo.  So now the are just called North Dakota but will sound have a new nickname after almost three years.  This also means that is is impossible to find the original Sioux head logo on anything anymore but here it is-still up on the side of the arena. 

After checking out the store and not finding what I was looking for we headed into town to the mall where there is a Scheels which carries quite a bit of UND stuff.  They had this goalie photo op and just had to have Elsie do it :)

Future UND star?  

After shopping we headed back to hotel, checked in, met up with my college friend Krystle and her two boys.  They live in Devils Lake and since we were so close (2 hours), they met us up there for the night and hung out the next day.  

Our hotel had a waterpark and the kids had a blast playing around.  

Fearless Elsie-this girl loves water slides and her and John went down the toilet bowl water slide numerous times.  

Josh and John

That night for dinner we ate at one of the hotel restaraunts and then hit the hay early.  We were all in and asleep before 10AM.  The girls also slept until at least 7AM that morning which was wonderful!  We got up and at the hotels breakfast buffet, ran to Target to get a few random things, and then headed back to the hotel to play at the water park again with Krystle and the boys as well as Ashley, Jason, Hunter, and Boyd.  

Hunter and Elsie-Hunter wasn't so sure about the slide-apparently he doesn't like to get his head wet :)

Little Baby Boyd!  He was a little over a month old.  

Krystle and Evelyn

Coming down the toilet bowl slide:

Johnny, Josh, and Elsie

Waving from way up high!

Slide Races-Looks like Daddy Won!

This girl didn't swim much but enjoyed rocking her new swimsuit.  

Around lunchtime Krystle and the boys took off and we got the girls down for a nap while John and I got ready for the 3:00 wedding.  We ordered pizza for lunch and it was pretty yummy.  

The wedding was at 3:00 in East Grand Forks.  It was a beautiful wedding!  The Bride of course looked beautiful.  Unfortunately, Evelyn wasn't having it and Elsie was distracted by Finny.  John took Evie to the back and then Elsie wanted to join them so then I finally was able to enjoy the ceremony.  We headed back to the hotel after the ceremony so I could feed Evie before the reception.  

Hanging out between ceremony and reception.  

We had a great time at the reception.  Elsie especially.  She danced on the dance floor from the minute we walked in the receptions.  There were SO many kids there and Elsie was loving it!

Doggy Pile on Jason!

And she LOVED dancing with Laura who "Looked just like a princess!"  She even chased Laura down after the dollar dance because she didn't get a change to dance with her because we danced with Chris instead.  

She danced a lot with Daddy too!

This is how Ashley and I spent most of our night.  Evie slept through most of the dance.  

Elsie totally latched on to Erin that night too!  She had fun dancing with Erin on the dance floor and Erin tought her some new moves like "raise the roof" and "Hand on your knees"

At one point Elsie went up to the DJ and requested the Hokey Pokey.  The DJ said he was going to play it but never did.  Elsie kept holding out telling us they were going to play it and she wanted to wait to dance to it.   Finally at 11, we decided to leave after waiting over an hour to see if they would play it.  That girl was wiped out but she had so much fun!!!

Waiting for the hokey pokey. 

The next day we packed up and hit the road back to Elk River to celebrate Father's Day with my Dad.  

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Whew!  What a busy, wonderful weekend! 

Dakins Lake

This past weekend our local county conservation board hosted a dedication of a local county park.  Over the past couple of years, they have been updating this park to include a new campground, shower house, picnic area, and natural playscape.  I had never been here before so I can't say how it was compared to what it used to be but it is just a beautiful little park.  

When we arrived we headed straight to the playscape so Elsie could run around and she just LOVED it!!!  I definitely think we could have spent much more time there.  

After playing there for awhile we made our way down to the lake.  IT isn't very big but it was SUPER clear and clean!  I was impressed actually.  The also recently stocked it and I could tell John was getting excited about bringing Elsie here in the future to fish.  We didn't bring our fishing gear with and Elsie was bummed about that.  

Butterflies Everywhere!  

When we got back to the back pond area we immediately heard the frogs.  I pulled up the sound on my phone that a Green Frog makes and it was fun to have Elsie hear it on my phone and then point it out when she would hear the real frog make the call.  

We also spotted a few turtles on our hike.  

Elsie kept wanting to step on her shadow-this is something she is really taking notice of-her shadows :)  She thought it was pretty silly to step on her tummy shadow.  

After our hike we enjoyed a little BBQ that was provided.  They had hot dogs and hamburgers, beans, chips and either ice cream or strawberry shortcake.  It was delicious.  We also ran into our friends Kedra, her two kiddos, and her mom who was there camping for the weekend.  

After lunch we made one last stop for minnow races.

And Evie was there too :)  

Evelyn Jo - Two Months

It's almost time for her three month update so I figured I should post her two month update first!  

It is amazing to me how much these little babes develop in just a few weeks.  She has changed so much from month one to month two.  We did have her two month well visit which I will update at the end of this post.  

In Evie's month one post I hinted to the fact that this girl was much more fussy than Elsie was.  It was just starting to get bad-well into the second month she became SO fussy.  I would have said she met the rule of threes when it comes to colic- Crying for three or more hours, three or more days a week, for three weeks or more.  I would say she met all those but right around the three week mark we made a change and it totally turned things around.  Evie would cry so much in the evenings that for a few weeks I was scared to leave home between the hours of 5PM-11PM.  She would cry and cry and nothing could make her stop.  John and I would switch off.  She would fall asleep from exhaustion for about 5 minutes and then wake up screaming again.  I felt so bad for her-we would try everything.  The only thing that seems to help was getting in the warm bath with me.  And that only worked some of the time.  One thing that we have learned with Elsie is that everything is a phase and it will pass at some point.  So as frustrating as it can be, I was pretty calm about it all. 

The big change that we made was switching for Similac Advance to Similac Senstive.  When I called the pediatrician, the nurse didn't think it would make much of a difference.  I still thought I would give it a try-it was like night and day-her evening fussiness pretty much stopped.  Of course, there was fussiness when she would get tired or hungry but she pretty much quit the inconsolable crying which was such a relief.  Thank goodness!!!

FEEDING:

Evie is still breastfeeding and getting supplmentation from expressed milk and formula although I would have to say things are going way better than in the beginning and way better than with Elsie.  Most nights we can go without giving her a bottle-she just nurses and then falls back to sleep.  I am pumping twice a day-once in the morning and once before bed.  Between these two times I am getting 3-5 ounces each time which is wonderful.  We can almost go until the afternoon before she has to have formula which feels so great-and even then it is 1-2 ounces at most for each feeding.  I definitely feel like we are throwing away more of the 2 ounces.  She is eating about 8 times a day.  

SLEEPING:

For the most part, once we got the fussy thing taken care of, Evie has been a pretty good sleeper. She has had quite a few 5-7 hours stretches which are amazing!!!  She is still sleeping in the travel size pack and play next to my bed.  Her naps are still all over the place and she still doesn't go down for the night until sometimes between 9-11 which means John and I really don't have the evenings to ourselves yet-someday I hope ;).  I think the amount of sleep is dependent on if Elsie is home.  There is so much commotion I think it is hard for her stay sleeping.  

GROWTH: 

Evie is growing up so fast!  I would say she was about 11 lbs (at least that is what I thought before we went to the Dr!).  At her official two month appointment she was 11 lbs 13 oz (Elsie was 11lbs .5 oz).  She is slowly entering into wearing 3-6 months clothes, espcially her onesies which I think has a lot to do with her bulkier cloth diapers.  

We are in cloth full time and have gotten into our routine with them.  She has yet to have a diaper rash or had any rash cream put on.  

Evie is very vocal and is cooing all the time now.  It is so fun!  And I just can't get enough of her smile-unfortunately she didn't smile for any of these pictures-I think the camera distracts her a bit.  

She is getting stronger and stronger and can hold her head of for long periods of time.  She is following us with her eyes and has discovered her hands.  

Some other things to note about this past month: 

Evie went on two long road trips-once up to MN which she did great in the care and slept most of the time and once up to NW Iowa to visit John's grandma.  This ride did not go quite as smooth and she cried almost the whole way home on our three hours drive-which almost took five hours!!!!  Evie got to met all of her Great Grandmas this month too! 

Evie also had her first trip to the emergency room and had her first cold. Poor girl!!  She developed her cold on Memorial Day.  Her symptoms never really got severe or warranted a trip to the doctor even though they said that with babies things can turn bad really quick so to keep and eye on her.  On Saturday May 30th, three times during thee day she turned really pale while in her carseat.  This had us concerned and called first nurse which eventually led us into the ER to make sure her oxygen levels were okay.  They were also concerned that it might be a cardiac issue.  

After a chest x-ray and blood work all turned out to be okay and to follow up with our Dr. which was on Monday for her two month appointment.  

We had her two month appointment on June 1st with a new Doctor.  Our normal pediatrician was out of the country so they scheduled us with someone new-and I am so glad we did!  I changed Evie's primary care physician to her.  She was friendly, thorough, and seemed to take a more natural approach to care which I appreciate.  

Evie looked good and healthy-well besides her cold.  

Her Stats:  

Weight-11 lbs 15 oz (66%)

Height - 23.25" (84%)

Head Circumference - 15.55" or 39.5 cm (85%)

We ended up getting all scheduled vaccinations.  I asked her about this and she said that they have had many conversations about this and they all agree that at this young age they just don't have the immunity to fight off any of these illnesses and the risk is too high not to get them.  I was okay with that.  

I also asked her about some upcoming summer issues like . . .

Is swimming in pools okay?  Yes, it is good for her to play in the water with mom or dad

Sunscreen?  Do your best to keep her covered, in shade, under an umbrella, etc but this is real life and there will be times you are outside enjoying a picnic or something and there is no shade and mineral based sunscreen would be okay.  

Insect Repellant?  I would avoid DEET and use one if you have to that is more natural like Skin so Soft or something like that.  She also said that there are some great recipes online for natural insect repellant.  (This topic was one I brought up with our previous pediatrician who said we should use some with DEET which really concerned me since last summer he told me that DEET can cause seizures on small children). 

Boating? Cruising around should be okay but if it is especially rough or skiing, tubing and going over waves hard she would avoid that.  She also said to make sure that while we are out there to have a plan in case the boat stalls because being out on a boat in the hot sun for a long time would be hard on a baby.  

I also asked her about a drink I had recently purchased that had vitamins in it along with a bit a caffeine and was supposed to give you a little energy throughout the day vs the rise and fall that coffee can bring sometimes.  She said that the vitamins were okay and the caffeine were okay but she would avoid the drink because it contains sucrolose which an had negetive impact of Evie (since I am breastfeeding).  Instead she recommending making a smoothie and adding a little cayenne pepper powder and said this can give you a little extra pick me up.  She also said that many times when you are lacking energy you might just be dehydrated and to drink a tall glass of water first.  

At the end of the appointment she had the nurse check her oxygen levels while in her carseat.  They were having a bit of trouble and she decided just to have us come back in for a followup the next day to check her lungs and oxygen levels again. 

Later during the day Evie was pretty fussy from her vaccinations.  And then around 10PM that night she spiked a fever of 100.6 (anything over 100.4 is an instant trip to the ER or doctor) so we were back in the ER.  We were seen by the same ER doctor as on Saturday night and she was awesome.  She attributed the fever to vaccines and actually thought that her lungs sounded better than two nights before so that was good news.  This night I actually went into the ER by myself which I think was the first time that not both John and I went with our children.  Thankfully, we were sent away with no issues.  

I just had to include one picture of Evie crying :).  She definitely had enough of pictures which always seems to be the case near the end of our little session.  

We just love this girl and are already seeing some of her little personality shining through! 

And a couple of comparison shots

Evie on the Right, Elsie on the Left