Big brother and baby sister

Life with two children has been interesting, busy, amazing, frustrating, fun, tiring....I could use so many more adjectives to describe how life has been since the arrival of Miss Avakins.

Justin has taken on his new role as big brother with a lot of enthusiasm and I'm happy to say that the novelty hasn't worn off. He is continuously showering Ava with kisses and giving her cuddles and telling us how cute she is. Justin loves it when we give Ava a running commentary on what he is doing and often dictates to us what we have to say: "Tell Ava Ka-Heng is eating sausages", "Ask Ava what is Ka-Heng is doing", the commentary list goes on and on. Justin's love and affection is sometimes to Ava's detriment as he is always waking her up or pulling on her to move her or lift her up so we have to watch both of them like hawks. He likes to think he can hold her like we do, with her head on our shoulder but that's not feasible as Ava is longer than Justin's torso. Justin loves to be involved so we try ask him to do little things to help like getting a clean nappy or getting a nappy packet for the dirty nappy or help bath Ava.

Some days we think Justin is getting use to sharing his things and other days not so much. It's quite sweet when he gives his blankey to Ava cos she's crying or she's cold and that is a big wow because Justin doesn't let anyone have his blankey. But then he'll see a toy that was given to Ava and he'll claim it as his own until the novelty has worn off. Justin also likes reminding us that things use to be his, he'll say, "Put Ava in my old chair" or "Put Ava on my old play mat". I don't think it's necessarily out of selfishness, merely his way of showing that he cares and loves his sister and is willing to share. 

Ava is almost three months old - how did that happen?!?!?!?! In some ways she is easier than Justin was at this age, and in other ways, Justin was easier. Justin would feed on one boob, burp, then second boob, burp and done. Ava likes to suck on one boob, have a rest, perhaps a catnap, a little look-around and then half an hour later, she's ready for the second boob...it feels like I'm constantly feeding her. Having said that, she does have a good appetite and feeds well and the scales will prove that, I reckon she weighs close to 6kg now. Justin would feed on the boob and from the bottle without any problems, as long as he got food he was happy; Ava was taking the bottle but the last couple of times she has absolutely refused and would rather starve. She's wasted our reserve of expressed milk so I've stopped expressing. Justin loved his dummy whereas Ava has shown no interest in it but rather likes sucking on her fingers. Ava's already giving us smiles and has recently started laughing and she loves to chatter away. Her neck muscles are also quite strong, she can hold her head up for long periods of time.

We're still trying to get into a routine; for now we take each day as it comes and see where the day takes us. Some days are easier than others but I look forward to the weekends when Row is home to help out and I can do some of my own things like updating the blog and baking. 

Life with two is busy but fun! We're looking forward to see what comes next and to see how the relationship between Justin and Ava will develop. 

Justin loves holding Ava

Justin reading The Gruffalo to Ava

Rocking Ava to sleep

More cuddles for Ava

Practically squashing Ava in his quest to show her some affection

More brotherly love