No really….. how do you survive being a family of 5 on a sailboat because we have NO CLUE! We thought our days would change once we got the babe home from the NICU but ground hog day has grown to a new level. Carl returned home from Massachusetts and the girls have been all over him like a rash. It was fun for the first couple of days and now they won’t let him out of their sight. Talk about clingy.
On the baby front all is well, it turns out that we baked a grazer. All he does is want to nurse ALL – DAY – LONG! This puts me out of commission and couch bound. The girls don’t seem to be jealous yet but I’m waiting for that little green eyed monster to come out. My nights are pretty daunting. He takes one real good sleep at the start (last night it was for 5 hours) but usually for only 2.5 to 3 hours and then after that he’ll wake up every 1.5 hours to be fed. Honestly he should be the size of a house by now and my poor boobs are getting a beating. He was sleeping in the bed with us but has been moved to the shelf because Carl is worried he will hit him while sleeping. I bought a little co-sleeper as a last minute purchase and it’s suppose to last him until 6 months but I’ll be surprised if we get another month out of it. He has about 1” to spare.
Having a baby on board has been a little challenging and I see now why people rent an apartment for the first month. It’s hard getting up and down the stairs and it’s hot hot HOT! I think I’m sweating a lot due to my changing hormones because really it’s not that hot here but I’m a sweaty mess day and night causing a crazy amount of laundry. I am missing all my gadgets I had with the girls like the swing and bouncer. If he’s awake he wants to be held but just for a second because then it’s food time. I read that he falls into the category of “cluster fed” baby. Yikes, not cool.
We took him to the beach yesterday and he really didn’t like that, too much sun and wind. But he was ok because he nursed the whole time – of course. Getting in and out of the dingy with a newborn is also a challenge. He definitely needs to be in my Ergo carrier or wrap for those transitions.
I’m counting down the days until he’s 6 weeks old. From what I read online it’s when he’ll get more into a routine with nursing and napping. It’s been almost 3 years since Wags was a newborn and how quickly you forget how hard it is. The lack of sleep in a killer. For the past couple of days I give him his morning feed then Carl will take him and allow me to sleep another 2 hours. Because he’s a constant feeder he’ll usually give him a bottle of expressed milk while I’m asleep then I get up and pump. It’s been working out so we’ll probably continue it.
Other than that all is well. My sister flys in from Rome tomorrow and we’ll be heading out to the Exumas for 7 days. Yippee! Don’t know who’s more excited me, Carl or my mum. We are so sick of sitting at the dock. We’ll be without internet pretty much all that time so I’ll post some pictures when we get back.