Soren’s 2 Month Update

Soren turned two months old on January 19! We can’t believe how quickly time flies by!

Soren’s 2 Month Update

Nicknames: Buddy, Little Man, Buddy Boy, Soren Oakenshield (haha), Guy, Buster, Baby Boy, “Baby Brudder” (that one is from Sophie)

RELATED: Introducing Soren! (+ his birth story + his name)

Size: Soren is over 10 lbs. by now (hooray!). We love seeing that he’s growing because it’s a great sign that he’s healthy and that he’s eating enough (and not spitting up way too much)! He was 6 lbs. 9 oz. when he was born.

Soren has graduated out of newborn sized clothing and now exclusively wears size 3 months. (And honestly, I may even move him up to larger sizes before long because he’s a tall little guy and I don’t want his sleepers to get tight in the toes!) Soren’s a lanky guy, and he feels sturdy around the middle when you pick him up. And he has the most kissable cheeks! 🙂 I have a feeling that he’ll be a tall man like his daddy someday – even though I bet Sophie will be pretty tall herself, I could see Soren being even taller, and he’ll definitely be Sophie’s “big little brother.” 🙂

Fun Milestones:

I just love it when babies get more and more alert! Of course, there’s something so sweet and special about cuddling up with a tiny baby who sleeps all the time…but I sure get excited when they reach a more interactive stage! Soren definitely is more aware of everything going on around him! He loves sitting in his bouncy seat – which we move around during the day, from living room to dining room to kitchen – and these days, I’ll be washing the dishes when I’ll glance down and see that instead of sleeping, Soren’s just watching me with his big blue eyes! 🙂

Whether he’s laying on his back or on his tummy, Soren can wiggle himself around a bit so that when you look at him again after a minute or two, he’s in a bit of a different spot! This happens during the night – when he wakes up to eat, I usually find him “scooched” down to the other end of his bassinet! I’ll be interested to see when he rolls over. Sophie rolled over for the first time (front to back) when she was ten weeks old. Soren definitely acts like he’d like to during some tummy time sessions; he’ll just need to figure out what to do with his arm and then he’ll soon be able to flip over!

Soren has had a very strong neck basically since day one! It’s amazing. I noticed this even in the hospital! If you hold him upright or on your chest, he’ll be eager to lift his head up – and then he’ll rotate his head back and forth, too, as he looks around the room!

Soren has deep blue eyes – I’m still wondering if they’ll lighten more! It’s so fun, though, because these deep blue eyes are gorgeous and I wonder if he’ll get to keep this deep blue color forever! 🙂 He doesn’t have much hair yet, but it is definitely still brown!

Soren smiles now! It’s a different smile than Sophie did when she was 2 months old (see her 2 month update here). She had a darling goofy grin, and at this point, Soren’s got this awesome little smirk, which always starts at the left side of his face. As Pam says in The Office, “I like to think he’s very ironic.” 😉 He definitely does smile, too, but that smirk is always part of it as well. I love seeing his personality blossom. He seems serious a lot of the time, but he’s oh-so-content and anyone who knows him or has held him exclaims that “he has the SWEETEST personality!” Boy, does he ever. This little guy melts my heart every day.

A few of my favorite things about him in these past couple months: Soren is a “yell-sneezer” just like both of his parents, haha! But oftentimes, he’ll think he has to sneeze and then suddenly he won’t have to anymore…but it’ll be too late so he’ll just do a little “Ahh!” yell (and no sneeze). It’s hilarious and charming. I love it! Soren also hums in his throat when he is most content while cuddling or sleeping. It’s one of my favorite noises ever! Just a soft little hum in his throat on each exhale. When I hear that coming from his bassinet or from him when he’s sleeping on my chest, it relaxes even me!

Soren has officially been sleeping a 5 hour stretch of time almost every night for the past week! It’s wonderful! He’s been sleeping 5 hours initially, followed by 3 more hours. I’m so proud of him! And while it’s not about me, it sure makes me feel great! I do so much better when I get my sleep! 🙂 Soren has been totally different from Sophie with his sleeping behavior. He has been super loud since he was born! We’ve discussed ways to help him with our doctor, because there’s a chance it’s because of some reflux, but as he has improved in that area, it also seems he is just a loud little guy!

He hardly made a peep all day, and then our nights (especially the first 6 or 7 weeks) were filled with snorting and grunting and squeaking and snuffling! I’ve had many other moms tell me that their kids were also just plain loud sleepers! While that may lead us to move Soren to a different room eventually, right now we’ve kind of caught our stride and we’re all able to sleep pretty well. Sometimes when he’s loud, he does spit up so I like being able to sit right up and help him immediately. He sleeps in a Halo “Bassinest” bassinet and we are huge fans of it! According to our doctor’s recommendation, we do prop up his mattress by 1-2 inches to help him with his noise and spitting up during the night. I’m a very light sleeper myself, so sometimes I do allow myself to rest with him in my arms for only about an hour, and with no blankets, etc. (So, if I do that, I make sure I don’t sleep very deeply and my arm falls asleep, but it’s such sweet cuddle time AND it calms him down if he has gotten extra “squeaky.”)

I’ve had a good number of people say he looks a lot like my dad! I can see that; I also see Sophie similarities and I like to do comparison photos of the two of them at the same age. Either way, it’s obvious we’re related! 🙂

Likes:

• Being on his tummy
• Mama 🙂 He sure loves his mama!
• Sophie’s voice – it really calms him!
• Being around people and hearing their conversations
• Cuddling
• His bouncy seat – as much as he loves cuddling, it sounds silly, but he really does like sitting in his bouncy seat in the kitchen or living room near all of us.
• Staring at ceilings, ceiling fans, windows…anything near the top of a room!
• Baths – at least, he is calm and quiet and thoughtful during them. 🙂

Doesn’t like:

• Being swaddled with his arms down (he’s so different from Sophie this way!) – thank goodness for the Love to Dream Sleep Sack!
• The bulb syringe for his nose. 🙁 He has a cold and a little cough right now and having a cold has made him a bit more sad.
• Being removed from someone’s arms after cuddling!

These past couple months, Soren got to:

Frankly, he has gotten to do a ton of things! We’ve been going on outings, doing errands, hanging out with family and friends…it’s been so fun!

• Celebrate Thanksgiving (at home with Mama, since he was so new then) and celebrate Christmas (with family on both sides!).

• Go to Family Day at Bjorn’s army unit

• Attend CBS (the Community Bible Study chapter that Sophie and I attend in our area). He gets to sit with me in my discussion group and in the lecture while Sophie has her children’s program downstairs. 🙂
• Attend church

• Come to MOPS with Sophie and me
• Meet my dear friend Jordan
• Celebrate New Year’s Eve at our annual party with friends. It was fun for me to bring Soren this year because we brought our new baby Sophie to this same party exactly two years ago!
• I’m sure he’s done a lot more so I apologize if I’m leaving out anything important, but he’s had a very busy past two months of life, just jumping into our everyday schedule with us! It’s been such fun having our sweet little boy join our family.

We are:

• loving life as a family of four! It’s definitely been a transition in some ways; in other ways, it feels oh-so-normal and Bjorn and I love doing life together with our two kids! Overall, postpartum has been really good and we’ve been able to launch right back into our normal day-to-day life! I did take a nap every single day for almost the entire first two months, and even though I’m not a nap person, I’m glad I forced myself to do that because I think it really helped me physically and mentally to be more “with it” as I learned to juggle life with two kids.

• sick of being sick. Our family has been dealing with a cold since around Christmas time! (I actually think we somehow caught a second cold so we jumped straight into another cold right as our first one ended!) It’ll be nice to get healthy again and to feel like we’re in a good, healthy routine with a little less sadness & sniffles. Overall, we’ve been able to stay relatively happy, though! Soren is a content baby and seems to be taking things in stride! 🙂

Life with Soren is SUCH a blast! He’s a joy to be around and we can’t wait to see how he grows and how God will use him.

PS – if you liked the photos in today’s post, then definitely make sure you’re following me on Instagram! I post all kinds of sweet little everyday moments of the kids and more. 🙂 Thanks for reading!