The Joy of a Chunky Baby

As you all know, Nora was a big ol' baby from the get go...but since her birth, while she's still BIG, she's not AS big as one would expect. By that, I mean that she hasn't been gaining as much weight as her Dr would like her to have, and that's been the case for the past several weeks.

I wrote at one point that her initial weight check, 2 days after being released from the hospital, was excellent, but since then her progress has slowed. She isn't LOSING weight by any means, and has actually been gaining a consistent 1oz per day (At her last appointment she actually gained a little MORE than 1 oz per day, gaining a total of 17 ounces in 13 days). Babies all lose weight after they're first born; anywhere up to 10% of their total body weight is considered normal. By their 2 week check up, Dr's expect the baby to have gained enough weight to be back at their birth weight. Nora did not do that. She did it by week 3, but by being slow to that first weight check, she's basically been 1 week behind in her gaining. Because of this, we've had to supplement 2 bottles a day with formula. So that means I've been breastfeeding her on demand as she needs it, but then twice a day I give her 4oz of formula when she's not asking for it (One in the afternoon and then one at night before bed). Even with all of that, she hasn't gained enough to satisfy the dr. This week I took Nora in for her third weight check and the dr still wasn't happy with her progress, so we are now on a new kind of crazy plan. I'm still nursing her during the day every 2-3 hours and then after every other feeding I give her a bottle (however much she will take - I always offer her a 4oz bottle) and then I also do the 2 additional formula bottles as we were doing before. It is a LOT of food to be giving her. Holy cow...I feel like all I've done all day is feed, feed and FEED her. It's kind of crazy. But, if this will get her up to where the Dr wants her to be then we'll continue to do it.

I decided to take a picture of her today and I'm going to try to do this every day until Thursday so I can see if there are any obvious physical changes in my chunk-o-munk.

Is that the face, and are those the thighs, of someone who isn't getting enough? The jury is still out...

Just wanted to keep you all updated on her!

Nora Lynn: 1 Month!

I can't believe it's been 1 month since our chunky nugget entered this world! It's flown by but we've really loved (almost) every minute of it!

Just like I did with Logan, I will be taking photos of our little lady each month with an adorable onesie one that pronounces her age (Though this time around I ordered stickers from etsy instead of doing iron ons).

1 Month; smiles, "laughter" and good times with Belle the Bunny

There are a few things I've begun to learn about our lady:

1. She does not like a lot of people around. I've noticed on a few occasions (Our first attempt at newborn photos, a few playdates we've had with multiple people) that she gets VERY fussy when there is a lot of noise, commotion and people about...the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, eh?)

2. She likes to sleep...a LOT. The first night home she slept 6.5 hours and scared the CRAP out of Jason and I...we were worried she would lose too much weight by doing that, but I had a weight check appointment the next day and it turned out she was ahead of the curve. But, cut to her 2 week appointment and she was 4.5oz away from her birth weight (which was 9lbs 6oz) which the Dr wasn't too excited about. The Dr wasn't CONCERNED, but wanted me to start feeding her extra times throughout the day to try to chunk her up. So I've had 2 more weight check appointments since then and have at each one she's gained a great amount of weight; 1 oz/day each time which is phenomenal, however, she's still about 1 week behind on her weight gain. So basically, I somehow have to get her to gain a full POUND in 1 week...I'm seriously not sure how that is going to happen. She's an amazing eater, and always wakes up to eat it just happens to be every FOUR or FIVE hours instead of every TWO or THREE. In my heart of hearts, I know that she is 100% healthy. I honestly believe that her birth weight may have been off a bit. I was pumped full of fuilds the WHOLE time I was in labor and I've read reports that say that can directly effect the baby and their size. So while I'm taking my doctor's orders seriously, I'm not stressing about her "lack" of weight gain becaues HULLO, she's gaining an OUNCE A DAY!!

3. She's pretty impressive...I feel like she'd already doing things she should NOT be doing at this point. For example; she has managed to place her hand in front of her binky to keep it from falling out on several occasions, she can stop the flow of a bottle with her tongue (the dr suggested I supplement with a bottle because she won't be able to refuse it at this age...apparently she hasn't met Nora very well) and while yes at this point smiling is perfectly normal, she started doing it a week ago which is a little ahead of "Schedule" so I'm bragging about it!

4. The skin around her eyes gets red when she's tired

5. She'll make you believe she doesn't like to be swaddled, but it works on her EVERY-SINGLE-TIME.

6. She's a sucker for a swaddle, some white noise and a dark room...we use our powder room for this purpose every night...I like to call this space "The Bath-Womb" because it's basically just like the womb when we rock her in there

As the days and weeks go on she seems to be getting more and more settled into life with our family. I can KIND of start to plan things around her schedule now; she eats when she wakes up between 5 and 6 and takes about an hour to finish, then by 8:30 or 9 she is "DESPERATE" for more food but only wants a little. Then she's up until about 11 and then sleeps until about 2. Eats again, is up for a bit and then down for another nap. We feed her again around 5 and then again around 7 or 8. Then she's down until about 1 or 2 then up again at 5 or 6. It's been maneageble but having 4 weeks of interrupted sleep, even if it's in longer stretches than most Mom's get at this point, is ROUGH on the body. Jason gave me a HUGE gift the other night by offering to take on the Nora duties all night so I could get some sleep. I went to bed at 8:30 and woke up at 5:30 - it was AMAZING. I haven't gotten that much sleep in YEARS...literally.

I would say all in all, we're adjusting really well as a family. Better than when we added Logan. Speaking of the worlds best big brother, Logan LOVES his baby sister. He is always kissing her and telling her how cute she is. It's pretty awesome. So while he's loving his sister, he's not loving life at home with Mommy and Baby. There's a lot more "Don't go over ther with that Logan" and "Please be quiet right now Logan" and definitely a lot of "I can't play right now, I need to feed the baby" which is starting to take it's toll on him and it breaks my heart. He's fighting back with attitude and sass-mouth which I cannot tolerate.

He insisted on taking a photo with HIS stuffed animal too

Tonight, for example, homeboy was sent to bed at 7am (a good hour, hour and a half BEFORE his usual bed time) for giving me some pretty ridiculous 'tude while I was telling him to head upstairs for a bath. It'd been going on all day and none of my "talks" with him work working so my final step was to give him a real consequence - he was upset about it for sure, but I just checked the monitor and 90 minutes after being sent upstairs, he is finally asleep. Surprisingly, he only attempted to "escape" once - and the rest of the time he stayed in his room talking with his stuffed animals. I know life at home wll get more exciting for him as we venture out more and more to do things, so right now it's a transition period that hopefully he will forget in the coming months.

In the hospital

Logan holding his baby sister!

COZY (I know I know, no loose blankies around baby...we've sinced stopped doing this)

Proud papa

Thumb!

Our first outing at the park...it only lasted 10 minutes, sorry Logan!

First bath...her face KILLS me

Mommy snuggles!

Making friends!

More Mommy snuggles

Binky's are a girls best friend...especially bright purple ones

The Nora Story

As many of you all probably know, NORA LYNN has arrived!! We could not be more thrilled as a family to welcome this precious, beautiful and amazing little girl into our clan - she fits so well into our lives I already can't remember what life was like without her.

I'm going to give some "brief" details of the birth so if you just want to see pictures, keep on scrolling! haha :) I say my description will be "brief" in quotes because those of you who read this blog regularly, know that I am not capable of writing something quick or short - everything is long winded, so settle in to your chair and get ready for a story!

With Logan, we did a scheduled c-section because the doctors suspected he was so big. Jason was 9lbs 12oz when he was born and given the size of Logan's head and body in the womb, the doctor was worried he would be 10lbs or more at birth. So having him at 39 weeks, I never experienced any sort of labor - no contractions, he never even dropped and in fact he was so comfy where he was in my body that they had to vacuum him out during the surgery! With all of that, my surgery recovery was amazing and we were planning on doing another c-section with Nora because it just seemed like the way to go.  But at my 24 week appointment, my doctor had other plans. She suggested we attempt a VBAC (Vaginal Birth After Cesarean) at first, I laughed at her and said I'd think about it, but I had no intention of thinking about it. But over the next week it's all I could think about - there seemed to be a lot of benefits to a vaginal birth; I'd be home quicker (1 or 2 days in the hospital as opposed to 3 or 4), I'd be up and moving around quicker, I could pick up Logan whenever I pleased (I wouldn't be able to do that for a couple of weeks with a c-section) and I could walk up and down our stairs whenever I wanted (again, that wouldn't be possible for a couple of weeks with a c-section). Aside from all of the recovery reasons, there were also some health reasons to do it; I'd avoid major surgery, I'd be more capable of carrying a third pregnancy if we did a VBAC, if I need to have abdominal surgery in the future for some reason there would be less risk. So with all of those reasons thrown into a hat, I made the decision to go for the VBAC and after a little convincing, I had Jason's full support which was great.
Cut to 40 weeks and I'm more pregnant than I've ever been and showing no signs of delivering Miss Nora any time soon. At my 40 week check up, I was only dilated 1cm at the most - bummer. That was on a Wednesday, so on Friday Jason suggested we hit up a local pizza restaurant that had an item on their menu called the "Prego Pizza" and legend has it that whatever is on that pizza somehow kick starts labor for women. At that point, I was up for anything as I was feeling pressure to get this baby out the way we had intended rather than via a c-section which was scheduled as a backup plan for Wednesday 4/10.

The description of the Prego Pizza is this; The masterpiece had thirteen different toppings including extra onions and extra garlic. The pizza was loaded with fresh vegetables and six types of meat. Those of you who know me, know that being experimental with my food is NOT my forte and that the maximum amount of toppings I have on my pizza at at any time is TWO - Canadian Bacon and Pineapple! So to say I was hesitant about trying this pizza is an understatement. But much to my surprise (and delight) it was SCRUMPTIOUS! I ate over 1/2 of the pizza easily! So we headed home that night and just waited. Around midnight, I headed to bed, disappointed that the prego pizza obviously hadn't worked (I was expecting immediate results). Cut to 4 hours later and my disappointment was proven premature!.

That's right, I was woken up around 4am by some odd pains - it felt like Nora was head banging against my pelvic bone - awesome. I headed into the bathroom and googled "Rhythmic Pelvic Pain contractions?" because I had no idea...I couldn't find a definitive answer so I went back to bed. But 45 minutes later, I was awoken again and this time I was 90% sure what I was feeling was contractions. I headed downstairs, and pulled up my "Contraction Tracker" app on my phone (Yes, there's an app for that) and sure enough, what I was finding was that I was having very consistent contractions 5 minutes apart. I waited about 30 minutes before heading up stairs to let Jason know what was up. We couldn't call the hospital until I'd been having contractions for at least an hour, so after telling him I thought I was in labor i told him to go back to bed until I called the hospital. 30 minutes later I was still having contractions and decided to go ahead and call the hospital. I was told to wait until my contractions were 2 minutes apart before coming in. So we waited. We both took showers, I (against doctor's orders) ate some cereal (I was STAAAARVING), and hung out with Logan once he woke up. It didn't take long until my contractions were getting VERY strong and were quickly approaching the 2 minutes apart mark. I told Jas we should head out as soon as possible to get Logan to Auntie and Uncle's. By this point, my Mom had already purchased her plane ticket to come down and was scheduled to arrive in Oakland around Noon.

We dropped our little man off, said our goodbyes and then headed to the hospital. At this point my contractions were pretty unbearable and Jason and I started joking about how we were probably already at 6cm given how much pain I appeared to be in and my high tolerance for pain. I remember thinking almost immediately "What is wrong with women that do this without drugs? I want that epidural NOW"...yes, those were my thoughts before we were even IN the hospital.

Once we were in the triage area, the nurse hooked me up to the monitor and was immediately impressed with how strong my contractions were. He did an internal exam and then delivered some bad news; we were NOT 6cm along...we were barely 1.5cm. Not-Good. He said that he wasn't sure what would happen next; either I would be sent home or I would be sent outside to walk for 2 hours...I looked at Jas and told him I couldn't do either of those. I was ready at that point, to demand a c-section if they were going to send me home. The Dr told me that if that's what I wanted to do, they would support it but they did not want me to head in that direction strictly based on pain because they would begin to manage my pain once I was admitted. Luckily, because I was going for a VBAC the Dr wanted to keep me close and decided to admit me so I could be monitored. However, because I was a VBAC they didn't want to give me an epidural until I was 3cm along because they saw that as meddling and with a VBAC situation they want to stay out of it for as long as possible until Mother Nature has a chance to progress things. So what they were able to do was give me some pain meds - oh glorious pain meds (it must be noted that I do have a very strong pain threshold, but that I have NEVER known pain like these contractions. This was the worst, gut splitting, made me want to vomit, couldn't get comfortable pain I'd ever known  it was UNBEARABLE). The meds only lasted for 30 minutes and basically made me feel like I was drunk; which was actually NOT how I wanted to be feeling during contractions because I felt totally out of control. But the pain meds did something and by the 2nd dose, I was dilated to 3cm - EPIDURAL TIME! YAHOO!

Next, the nurses moved me to my final labor and delivery room and told me that the anesthesiologist was just outside my room ready to give me an epidural (I was expecting to wait an hour at least for this!) so in came Jeremy and did his magic quick quick quick and I was feeling almost perfect...I say almost because something went wrong and my right side wasn't completely numb. They rolled me on my right side and said that by doing that, the epidural would gravitate to that side and numb me up. Within 2 hours my left side was totally numb but I was feeling contractions on my right side - feeling contractions that were TWICE as intense as they were when we first arrived (Please re-read that section above where I note that those initial contractions were the worst things I'd EVER felt in my life!). I called my nurse in to see what was going on, and he immediately looked at my face and said "Umm...ya, you look very stoic right now. You aren't even pronouncing syllables...I'm going to get Jeremy back in here..." and that's just what happened. Turns out, the epidural didn't work the first time. When they put it in, there was something blocking the catheter so it kinked down and didn't supply any  medicine to my right side - yikes! they redid it and I immediately felt AMAZING. Seriously, I felt like I was sitting in cloud of lovely and got a kick out of people looking at the contraction monitor and saying "Woah! That was a big one" as I sat there pain free. Seriously, I have to say it again- WHY WOULD YOU GIVE BIRTH WITHOUT DRUGS?! THEY ARE AMAZING!

At that point, I was dilated to 6cm and my water had broken so it was just a waiting game - a comfortable waiting game. I tried to take a nap a few times, but I just wasn't feeling like sleeping! We had the most amazing nurse who would come in our room and hang out and he was just hilarious and so much fun. At one point, Jason and I felt bad because he was spending so much time with us, we were certain he was neglecting his other patients! Haha - but he was so great and definitely made the day that much better.

Around 7pm we got a new nurse, Kourtney, and she began to tell me what should happen next. She said I was at 7cm at that point and that soon I would start feeling like I needed to go to the bathroom (#2). She said when that sensation began to call her because it would mean pushing was just around the corner. Even though she told us these last 3 cm go the quickest, we still figured we had HOURS of time before anything happened. So Jason and his Mom headed across the street to grab some dinner. I didn't say anything at the time, but from the moment Kourtney was telling me what I was going to start feeling, I had started feeling it. I chalked it up to me being a head case and just THINKING I was feeling what she was describing rather than actually feeling it...but I KEPT feeling like I had to go to the bathroom and it wasn't going away. So I called Kourtney, she came in and sure enough, I was at 10cm and we were ready to go! Just one problem...the hubs was NOT IN THE ROOM! She told us to call him and to have him come back ASAP - she said he had at most 10 minutes before we started pushing. So my Mom called Jas, they had just sat down and she told him to come back NOW! Omigosh, that was the LONGEST 10 minutes of my LIFE waiting for him to walk back in the room! The minute I saw him I think I shouted "I NEED TO PUUUUUSH!" so that was it, it was GO TIME. According to the doctor's notes, I started pushing at 7:45 and omigosh, pushing is no joke. Someone told me earlier in the day that for a first time vaginal birth, pushing can last up to 2-3 hours...within 1 minute I knew THAT was not going to be ok with me! There was no way I had the stamina to keep that up! It was so intense and exhausting. And for someone like me, who is very goal oriented, it was beyond frustrating to have no definitive end point of the whole process. I had no idea where Nora was, how close she was to coming out or when I could stop pushing! I wanted to hear someone say "We see her head!" or hear Kourtney call the doctor and say "She's coming, get in here" but none of that was happening. So what did I do? I gave myself a goal. I told myself I was going to push 12 more times and then I'd be done...luckily for everyone involved, that's what happened!

At 8:09, 24 minutes after I started pushing, Nora had arrived! She came out HUGE and purple but cried soon and her color evened out. I could NOT believe how large she was. I kept asking "How much does she weigh??" my dr had convinced me she was maybe at most 7lbs and when I saw her, I KNEW she was way more than 7lbs! Once they got the scale working, the final numbers were in:

Weight: 9lbs 6oz (5oz bigger than Logan!)

Length: 21" (1/2" bigger than Logan!)

Head: 14.5" (1/2" SMALLER than Logan, but honestly, she came out vaginally so her head may have been shaped a bit differently and therefore measured smaller)

I was in total and utter shock that she was that large, it was crazy! When they brought her to me it was amazing. I didn't get to hold Logan for over 2 hours when we delivered him so being able to cuddle with and feed my daughter within MINUTES of delivering her was pure heaven. Though, with that said at some point after delivery, I looked at Jason and said "Umm...ya, Bbay #3 is coming out via c-section!" I've since changed my mind about that, but in the moment I was so over the VBAC.

What is most amazing to me is that within MINUTES of pushing like crazy, screaming like an animal and going through the craziest physical act I've ever been through, I look like a totally normal person in all of our pictures. Not sweaty, not red faced; just a totally normal person eating dinner, talking with people and holding a baby - whaat?! The human body is AMAZING. In all of our post delivery pictures with Logan I just look out of it in my opinion.

So THAT is our story of how Nora entered this world! We had a successful VBAC, had an amazing SHORT stay in our hospital (Delivered Saturday night, discharged Monday afternoon) and then began our life at home as a family of 4!

Nora is just a little over 1 week old and she is doing awesome. We went in for a weight check on Wednesday (4 days after birth) and she was up to 8lbs 12.6oz (all babies lose weight after birth and are "allowed" to lose up to 10% of their birth weight which would have put Nora down to 8lbs 6oz - so to say she's doing well in the weight dept is an understatement). We have her 2 week appointment on Monday and I wouldn't be surprised if she was up to 9lbs 12oz if not more. Homegirl is an EATER and has already gone through one growth spurt (we think) which is crazy.

Aside from her weight, she's just an easy baby - I thought Logan was easy but so far she is redefining easy. She currently wakes up once at night because she is on a 4 hour eat cycle - so she's been going down between 10 and 11, then up between 2 and 3, down again between 3 and 4 and then up again between 7 and 8. It's crazy. I remember with Logan getting up every other hour for weeks. He would stay awake for hours at night - so to have her not be doing that is just weird to me (But I am NOT complaining!).
Big Brother Logan is adjusting well - he has his off days but I feel that's more because of his age rather than the fact that he has a sister. He adores Nora and is so sweet with her, I love it. He always kisses her head, pats her back when I burp her and is just really loving and amazing with her, it's great.
Jason's back at work as of yesterday and while i was very nervous about trying to manage 2 kids without him (He was an awesome help with Logan - they would go to the park, out to run errands; poor Logan is probably hating his lack of activity these last 2 days more than anything), it's been going quite well. Both kids have gotten up between 6:45 and 7 each morning which is helpful (There was one night when we first got home where I had just gotten back to bed at 5:45 and Logan came in at 6:30 and since Jason and I had already agreed he could sleep in that morning I was a mess until nap time). We've just laid low - watched a lot of TV while I'm feeding Nora, but played a lot withOUT the TV when she's sleeping. We ALMOST went to a park this morning but it's "really" cold here right now and SUUUPER windy so park time isn't too much fun for us.
My Mom arrives on Saturday for a week to help out which will be great. I'm hoping she can help me with meal planning, maybe cooking some meals to freeze and letting me do some trial runs of making dinner while having 2 kids and hopefully provide me with some tips on how to do it better and faster! She did it for years with 3 little ones, so I'm sure she'll have some tips on how to manage it all with 2!

So that's our story - here are some photos of the day and days after!

The Prego Pizza - Where it all began

Trying to rest after the epidural started working

Our amazing nurse Michael

Grammie, Baba & Great PawPaw

All smiles thanks to the drugs!

Ready to meet my girl!

She's here!

And she's huge!

Seriously, the thighs!!

Her weight!

Pure bliss

All of our stats

Food! Glorious food!

So happy to have his baby girl in his arms!

Happy Grammie

Our glasses say "It's A Girl!" a gift from the hospital

 

Happy Papa Laub and Baba Blakeman

Our little laubster showing us how big he can be!

So cozy!

Proud Papa

Smiling Baby

Out!

Everyone says Nora looks like Jas - but here she is holding a picture of ME when I was a newborn

Logan showing off his big brother skills

Nora Laub - Fashionably Late

So here we are...OVERdue....Homegirl's due date was Wednesday and while we're only 1 day beyond that, from my Dr appointment on Wednesday, it doesn't look like our little lady is coming home any time soon. So we're waiting...we do have a C-Section scheduled for next Wednesday if I don't go in to labor on my own before then, HOWEVER, that doesn't mean that Jas and I aren't prepared to take measures into our own hands.

Exhibit A: The Prego Pizza.
Oh yes, you read that right, a PREGO PIZZA. There is a local pizza parlor in Walnut Creek that has something they call a Prego Pizza. Legend has it that if a pregnant woman orders this pizza she will go into labor within hours. Worth a shot!

Exhibit B: Long Walks
We haven't started these yet (I've been sick and I'll get to that in a moment) - but assuming I get healthy soon, I plan on walking a lot this weekend.

Exhibit C: Being Induced
Technically this CANNOT happen unless I'm at least 3cm dilated by my Tuesday appointment. Something about there is a lot of research showing that women who are trying for a VBAC delivery that get induced before they are at least 3cm dilated have a higher risk of uterine rupture (Doesn't that sound delightful?). So, I will go in at 10:30 on Tuesday for another check and if I'm at least 3cm then I'll be sent upstairs to get induced! If I'm not that far along, then it's back home to to prepare for surgery. Woo!

All of these things are contingent upon the need for me to feel a whole heckofa lot better than I do now. Since last Saturday I've been sick. It started with a nasty sore throat, then moved to my sinuses and is now resting uncomfortably in my ears and chest...it's awwwwesome. So, while I would love to meet Nora, I'm actually pretty ok with her staying put until I'm better. I can honestly not imagine going through labor feeling the way I'm feeling.

So for now, it's a waiting game...aside from being sick, I actually feel really good pregnancy wise - which is weird. I would think, most women at this point are screaming "GET THIS CHILD OUT OF ME!" but I'm not there yet...I'm not overly swollen, I can still get around relatively well and ya, I'm feeling oddly ok. I'm kind of hoping something will change in the next 72 hours; either I start feeling better, or I start feeling SUPER uncomfortable so that I have some motivation to get this baby out, because right now - having her safe inside is fine by me!

Here is a pic of me from tonight -40 weeks and 1 day prego and then 1 comparing tonight with what i looked like at 38 weeks with Logan...I can't tell if I'm bigger in one pic over the other but my belly is just different.

Dreaming of a Dwellable Getaway

You know you've found a good app when it makes you think of doing things you had no intention of doing before you opened it. Enter the Dwellable app for iPhone and Android...it's got me dreaming of far away lands, crystal blue pools and making me completely forget that in 2 weeks time I will be housebound with my newborn!

To give you a little background, Dwellable is a great website that helps you locate rental properties in destinations all over the US to stay at on your next vacation. The Hubby and I have always preferred to stay in rental properties because it can save you so much money! Once we had Logan, then it was a bit of a no brainer as we always needed just a little more room, needed to save just a little more money and needed certain amenities that hotel rooms just don't have like a full kitchen, bathtubs and separate bedrooms.

App Icon with Mr. Logan peering at you from the background

I was asked by Dwellable to do a review on their new app which is free (yay!) and available in both iPhone and Android markets (Double Yay! As Jas has an Android and I have an iPhone, I love that we can both use it separately). So last night as I crawled into bed at an hour that was much too late for my mental liking, and continued to just lay there in a state of uncomfortable pregnancy insomnia, I decided to turn on my phone and wander through the delightful dwellings available on Dwellable. What I found was, in a nutshell, my dream vacation home. Sigh. I was just trying to peruse all of the available properties, and happen to start looking in Austin, TX (a destination Jason and I have been talking about visiting for years!). Who knew my dream home was waiting for us in the Lonestar state?! While I love this app, I'm beginning to hate it because it's forcing me to dream of vacations that cannot be taken for several months (Have you traveled with an infant and a toddler much? Ya, I'm guessing it's NOT the most relaxing!).

The Dream Vacation Rental: It says it sleeps 3, but I'm pretty sure it can accommodate a cowboy party of 50!

Anyway, enough about my findings, let me walk you through this clean cut and awesome app so that you can all head over and find YOUR dream vacation homes as well! The first easy feature I like is choosing your destination; you can type in where you want to go if you already know, or you can choose to search all of their listings which are organized by state. Currently on the App, they only have listings available for all 50 states - no international rentals or US territories (Puerto Rico for example), but I'm sure it's only a matter of time before more properties all over the world are added. Another feature I was impressed with was once you choose your state destination (again, this is great if you don't have a specific location you want to stay at) the app then takes you to a new screen which divides the state up into several different areas. In my home state of Washington, for example, you can choose to look for properties in Eastern Washington or Western Washington, the Cascade Mountains or Puget Sound etc. This is a great feature because not only does it narrow down where you want to stay but it also informs the unaware traveler that there are that many different areas to stay within one location.

Once you've chosen a more specific area you can filter your search by dates available, price of unit, number of beds, fun amenities available (Pools, hot tubs, pet friendly etc). The photos that are shown for each property are awesome as well. Each are clear, bright and of the properties I sampled, it appeared that every single one had at least 5 photos which is very helpful for a visual person like myself. If you are less visual and instead rely on written descriptions to find out where to stay (Like my husband) each property also includes a lengthy description of what the property offers, certain highlights and in some situations, area highlights which are always helpful.

Once you've landed on your dream property, you now have to contact the owner to finalize your stay. How do you do that you ask? Thanks to the ease of this app, you can do it all with the push of a button...or the tab of your screen. Each property either has a "Email Owner" button which doesn't require you to leave the app at all to email which is brilliant. Or the owner's phone number and/or website is available for you to start up a conversation.

The only real con I found on this app to counter all of the amazing Pro's seems to have been fixed in the 6 hours I was sleeping! Last night the calendar filter wasn't working, but as of this morning it's functioning just fine!

So there you have it - a FREE app that can show you a vacation you NEED before you even knew you needed it and it has ZERO Cons! Haha! Seriously though, I encourage you to download it and check it out, it will certainly be worth your while! And hey, maybe the 4 Laubsters will see you in Austin soon...anyone want to babysit?

Update on Our OTHER Baby...

I know our last few posts here have been all about me and my growing baby bump, so I thought I would give everyone a little glimpse in to our first born, Mr. Logan and all of the awesome things he's been up to!

Homeboy is growing like a weed, let me just put that out there right now. He's over 3' tall and looks more and more like a BIG BOY every day (Breaks my heart a little, not going to lie!). And let me be honest, when I say he's OVER 3', he's over by 1" but hey, over is over, right?!

He shocks us every day with the new words and sayings he comes up with. His personality gets stronger each day and we love it. He keeps Jason and I rolling in laughter every day. Some of the great things he says now are:

1. "Two R's...whaaaa???!" This came about when he was looking at a Trader Joe's bag and reading the letters off to us (those that he knew at least) when he got to the 2nd R in "tRadeR" he exclaimed "2 R's? Whaaaat?" it was hysterical

2. His own twist on the Alphabet Song. Most people know that the end of the ABC song goes 'And now I know my ABC's, next time won't you sing with me" but Logan sings it like this "And now I know by A,B,C,D,Eeeeeeee....next time won't you sing with me?" We've tried correcting him a few times, but I secretly LOVE this new version and kind of hope he keeps singing it.

3. No-Filter...we were at the Dr's office the other day (Poor boy has a double ear infection!) and when the Dr realized their birthdays were 1 day apart she got excited and I said "Buddy! You could have a birthday party together" and he looked at me, and at the Dr and said "Umm...no...that would be weird" True...very true Logan, it WOULD be weird.

4.  "Where's Logan" is a faaaavorite game right now! He'll hide anywhere and everywhere...under couch cushions, in the pantry, shoot he'll hide right in front of you because when he covers his eyes you OBVIOUSLY can't see him - did you know that?

5. Giving Raspberries to Miss Nora...poor lady in my belly must be wondering "What in the HECK is going on out there?!" haha - but it makes those of us on the outside of the womb laugh hysterically!

Last night Logan spent his first night in his new big boy bed (Just put a rail up on his crib and converted it to a day bed) and he did great! He woke up at 6:30 and got out of bed himself, had a nice conversation with Earl and Chase (Both of whom usually wait outside his bedroom in the morning until he is awake and then they enter to claim their stake on Logan's changing pad for the next several hours; Lazy bums!), and then walked into our bedroom and said "good morning Mommy" it was pretty great :)

He's also been making excellent strides on the whole Potty Training front! We aren't going into full on potty training mode, but we are encouraging it as much as possible and there have been a few times when he's initiated going which is AWESOME.

In terms of prepping for his baby sister's arrival, he actually seems pretty excited. He'll hug and kiss my belly and he knows that her name is Nora and will tell people about her when they ask. He does get a little confused about what's going on inside my belly and has on more than one occasion compared me to beings with large belly's (an orangutan was one example and a family friend who has a little junk in the front was described as someone I look JUST like the other day...thanks buddy) he also mistakenly told Jason that Daddy had a bigger belly than Mommy - don't worry babe, that is absolutely NOT true - we will have a talk if it ever is! haha!

I think that's about it for Logan! Here are some photos to let you see our little man in adorable action!

Posing for a photo in his big boy bed just before bedtime

Hanging Tough at a new local park

As Logan would say, he's "Just Loungin'" in this photo

Telling Mommy to go downstairs (ALLL THE WAY DOWN Mommy) so he could have some "Privacy" (Code for going #2)

Practicing how to rock bay Nora to sleep

Proud Big Brother!

Sweet kisses for baby sister (Let's hope Nora is a big cuter than Mr. "Tomato" head)