Zoe at 1 Month

November 30, 2017 3 minute read

Zoe at 1 month.

So here’s the thing about having two kids: it’s hard. Aaron and I basically laughed then cried the first night home with Zoe when she started crying at 2 am followed 5 minutes later by Max waking up and crying. Needless to say we were all sleep deprived that first week, especially Max. Luckily, Max has amazing teachers at school who understood how hard it is to have a new sibling around and were extra loving with him (thank you Ms. Erin, Ms. Amie and Ms. Raven!).

Being at home with Zoe has been so special. Since we are not planning on having any more kids, I’ve been soaking up our one on one time together. With Max, we made the rookie mistake of putting together a to-do list of home projects we wanted to get done (most of which did not get done). This time around we have just been focused on relaxing and getting to know Zoe.

We’ve been living with an active toddler for so long, we forgot how much a newborn sleeps and how little they do. The challenge comes on the weekends when we have two kids to entertain and feed. We’ve more or less adopted a man-to-man defense where Aaron and I trade off caring for one child at a time. Other days we love bringing Zoe along with us to the park, where she happily sleeps in her stroller while Max runs around. But if we thought getting out of the house with 1 kid was tough, 2 kids is so much crazier!

Here are some stats from Zoe’s first month. If you want to compare (which we do) check out Max’s first month here.

Zoe stats

Zoe took a while to get back to birth weight, (8lbs 3oz at birth) but now she is eating like a champ.

Weight: 8lbs 11oz (30th percentile)
Height: 21″ (30th percentile)
Head circumference: 14.5″ (57th percentile)

Memorable moments:

We are thankful that Zoe can literally sleep through almost anything, including Max enthusiastically shoving toys in her face and yelling “Look Zoe”!
I’m not sure if this is “memorable” but at one point Aaron and I did a quick count of how many pictures we took of Max his first month and the number is much bigger than what we’ve taken of Zoe so far…
Zoe is an embarrassingly loud grunter. She puts her whole body into it, waving her arms and legs, and generally drawing a lot of attention to herself—especially in public.

Memorable Interactions with Max:

One of our biggest concerns with bringing a new baby into our home was how it would affect Max, but so far he has been great. Here are a few memorable interactions between Max and Zoe:

He loves helping us change her diaper.
As soon as he gets home from school he always asks, “where is my baby sister?”
When Zoe cries, Max tells us “Mama, pick her up.”
One time when my mom (Ama) was talking to Zoe, Max said “Ama, she doesn’t talk yet.”
Before Max goes to bed he always wants to give Zoe a kiss.
He tries to gently cover her with his favorite blanket and sometimes just plops it right on her face.
A few times Max has told us “I don’t think Zoe wants to go to the playground, she can stay here,” which we think is code for “I need a Zoe break.”

Things we think Zoe likes:

Pacifier - At 1 week old Zoe was holding the pacifier better than Max ever did.
Sleeping for 4 hour stretches at night (Thank you, Zoe!) - I’m sure this won’t last forever.

Things we are pretty sure Zoe doesn’t like: