Warmer weather brings outside time

Yesterday morning Joseph's umbilical cord stump finally fell off. There's a little bit still left in his belly button, but all in all it looks like it's healing nicely. He and I had a very lazy day, trying to recover from the rough night. I napped when he napped for most of the morning, and then got up in the early afternoon to do some cleaning before Jill and Gary arrived.

Joe picked them up from the airport mid afternoon, and they got to the house around 4:15pm. After spending some time enjoying Joseph, Joe and Gary ran to get dinner while Jill enjoyed holding Joseph. We had a nice dinner (and actually ate at the dining room table!) and then decided to go ahead and take advantage of the warmer (50ish) weather we are starting to enjoy. We leashed up the dogs, who were thrilled at getting to go on a walk, and Joe put Joseph in his car seat in the running stroller, having installed the car seat adapter the night before. Joseph had been hanging out in his swing while we ate, and we had to wake him somewhat to put him in the car seat. This was a slightly risky move, as we were within the "witching hour" for him wanting to eat, but we figured we could probably get through a quick walk, and could always head home if he woke up crying.

We bundled up and headed out, quite the group! As soon as Joe started pushing the stroller, the baby was out. We didn't bring a separate blanket, relying on the BundleMe to keep Joseph warm. I'm not sure that it worked entirely, as about halfway around the block he started fussing. Joe covered the entire car seat up, and that seemed to calm him down for a few minutes. I'm sure we probably should have added more layers, but since we're so used to the freezing temperatures, the slight chill in the air didn't feel as cold to us as I'm sure it did to him.

We managed to get about 20 minutes in before hurrying up to get home to feed Joseph, who was growing fussy. Of course, once we got home, he was sound asleep again...

Once we got him out of the stroller, though, he woke right up and wanted to eat. Afterwards, he fell back asleep, and gave Joe and me the chance to let Jill and Gary babysit so we could run to the grocery store and Wal-mart... such exciting times!

Joe fed Joseph a bottle around 10pm after we all finished watching The Office and Grey's Anatomy, and we headed to bed. Jill was kind enough to stay up with the baby and volunteered to put him to sleep when she was headed to bed, and we quickly took her up on the offer. Luckily, the growth spurt seems to have subsided, as Joseph was back on his "old" routine, eating about every 3-3 1/2 hours through the night.

I woke this morning feeling much more rested, and managed to get more cleaning done, ran a few loads of laundry, and even baked Joe's peanut butter cookies for the first time in a while! The weather is still gorgeous, so I'm hoping that once Jill and Joe get home from his office and Gary gets back from Clinton, we can take another walk, hopefully longer this time. If the weather holds out tomorrow, we may spend even more time outside - spring is going to be here soon!