Road Trip :) ...and diaper rash :(

What have we been up to this week???

Well Mills took his first road trip...to the exotic destination of Dillon, and to NC to meet Nicholas' 82-year-old Nana! Here are a few pictures we took!

With Nana...she gave him his first Bible and wrote him the sweetest letter.

And in Dillon, Mills also got to meet Aunt Betsy and cousins Madison and Dylan...they both wanted to hold him :)

Madison playing with Gray and Dylan playing with Mills! :)

(oh, and a very pregnant Aunt Jennifer - any day now!!!)

And the kids had to give some special attention to the dogs...it's hard to come by these days!

Mills did fabulously with the traveling, and enjoyed all of the love and cuddling (even though it was a quick trip)!  Unfortunately, his sweet little demeanor has been overcome by a bad case of diaper rash today. :(  It has gotten worse and his little bootie is just raw. :(  He screams bloody murder when you change his diaper, and beginning this afternoon has pretty much become inconsolable except for when he eats. It's so very frustrating and we feel so bad for him. We've been using Desitin on every change, and I bathed him again this morning and let him hang out for a bit before I put his diaper back on (of course he peed twice and pooped once, haha), but any other tips would be greatly appreciated! Nicholas and I have been taking shifts with him. I guess we'll be calling the pediatrician on Monday if it doesn't get any better. :(

I'm ready for him to be back to his content, happy, little self!

Now it's time to watch the Miss America Pageant - at least for a little while!

Splish Splash I Was Takin' a Bath...

Just wanted to post a few pics of Mills' first tub bath today!

(i look quite rough, but it was early in the am with no makeup and little sleep, so give me a break on this one and just enjoy how cute he is, ha!)

Success - no peeing or pooping in the tub!

Now trying to get dry and warm!

Airing out a little bit!

Harley checking in on the little guy!

Warming up and getting a little tummy time in!

"And then I spent the rest of the day relaxing with mom and watching tv with dad...pretty productive little day if you ask me!"

Whew, well it's well past 1am and after catching up on two posts in one day, I better get some sleep while I can! Nighty night!

Visitors!

Mills turned 3 weeks old yesterday!!!
The past few nights of sleep have been much better, but I don't want to jinx us, so that's all I'm gonna say about that, haha! In the past few weeks we've had lots of fun visitors coming to meet our newest addition, so I thought I'd add a few of those photos!

Aunt Calee came to meet Mills as soon as she got in from Birmingham! She brought him a cute little fleecy outfit he can't wait to wear in this chilly weather!

And Robert joined her, too, during our first weekend at home

(do nicholas and i look tired or what?!?!?!)

Aunt Anna came down from Myrtle Beach over the weekend, too, and brought some delicious chicken bog - yummy! 

And of course Aunt Leah came to see us! The Stills came to meet Mills, too, and brought him another fabulous swaddling blanket and a cute outfit for when he gets a little older!

And of course this pretty little face came to see her younger man!

Auntie Sara came down from Columbia for a visit!

And of course the grandparents came to see me again...last weekend, Pappy and Lulu

And Gammy and Philly came in this past weekend...they actually babysat for us for the first time (Mills was 2.5 weeks old to be exact) while Nicholas and I went over to the Yoe's for a birthday party for Robert! We took it easy the rest of the weekend, and went out for dinner at Fleet's Landing Saturday night.

And of course Mills has also been hanging out with his super cool parents! :)

And his Aunt Kelley stops by the house all the time to see him!

The girls in my Bible study started bringing dinner over last week, and what a help it has been! Soups, salads, pizza, chicken spaghetti, delicious cous-cous, desserts - yum! You have no idea how much it helps out!
Liz and Andrew brought dinner over and hung out for a little while last night!

AND, in other news, at 3 weeks on the dot we also introduced the first bottle to Mills. Nicholas gave it to him (b/c the mother is not supposed to, as it can confuse the baby...who knows!), and he finished all 3 oz of it...and was still hungry! So after Liz and Andrew left I fed him and he thankfully latched right on - so it seems as if the bottle didn't cause any major confusion to him. It's nice to know that I can pump and we have the bottles as another option when we need/want it!

And one more of that sweet little face!

We're so thankful for all of our visitors!!!

Sleep, birthdays, and smiles!

First off - SLEEP...that's something I need more of! ha! The past few days have been a little rough in terms of rest. As Nicholas told someone at the hospital when they asked how the baby was doing yesterday, "He's great, but he just forgot how to sleep!"  Luckily yesterday afternoon and last night were better, but the night before that he only slept a total of one hour ALL day long, and then we couldn't get him to sleep at night until 3:30am, after which he woke up every hour and a half! Talk about TIRED!!! Maybe he just wants to make sure we really appreciate those 3 hour stretches of sleep in the night a little bit more! :) (I only thought I was tired last week!)
Yesterday we took a walk to the grocery store (have I mentioned again how much I LOVE the BOB stroller?!?!) and I picked up a few things, and we enjoyed the gorgeous weather! After we got back, the little guy got fussy again, so this was the only way I kept my sanity...

God bless the Baby Bjorn!!! (And thank you, Danielle!!!)

He fell asleep in it and I was able to eat lunch AND tidy up a little bit before one of the girls in my Bible study brought dinner over - which we were SO thankful for! And then Mills took a nice, long, late afternoon nap, which was fabulous! And of course I thought he looked cute so I thought I'd take a picture! Nicholas teases me that I'm gonna have a picture from every day of his life, haha!

And this is also from yesterday, although the flash scared him a little bit, hence the funny eyes!

Today, the weather is SUPER nasty outside, but thankfully my sweet friend and neighbor, Katie, came down to help me get Mills in the car without getting him soaked to go downtown and celebrate our January birthday gals - Katie and Calee - at Sermet's Corner! It was great to visit, and soooo yummy!

Of course Calee and I had to get a group pic with our new cameras! :)  (And yes, I'm wearing the same sweater from Monday, but the sweet baby boy decided to practically projectile spit-up on me 10 minutes before we walked out the door, so I went to the closest top in the closet!)

By the way, I think Mills does have a bit of reflux going on, or something like it...my mother-in-law told me when Nicholas was a baby she used to have to carry around a towel instead of a burp cloth for his spit-up...uh-oh, I'm afraid he's going to take after his Dad...so it appears my new perfume will be Eau de Spit-Up
 ...Mmmmmmmmmmm!

AND, last but not least I had to share this picture from when Mills was just 5 days old, but I love it! Even if it's not consciously, he has the cutest smiles! Especially right after he eats or when he's falling asleep!

"Smiling's my favorite!"

Or maybe he's smiling because Auntie Elle booked her flight and is coming all the way from Boston to visit us the first weekend in February - wahoo!! :)

Well I suppose I should try to get about a 30 minute nap, if possible, before he wakes up! I had hopes of getting to the Verizon store to get my phone fixed today, but it's not gonna happen in this nasty weather! I'll try to update again when I get a spare second...keep us, and our sleeping habits, in your prayers! Hope your Thursday is wonderful!