Here is the best of the best from December I hadn’t gotten around to posting.
{I am not sure how I missed Decemeber so completely, so I am going back to that. I also have both January and February scheduled to post, so I don’t miss them this time}
Two years ago I was lucky enough to have a ton of time on my hands, a passion for photography and countless fun times. So when I participated in Ashley’s Memories, Dreams, Reflections, there was a lot to reminisce about. The next year that followed was all about my pregnancy and, honestly, I couldn’t even think about anything but the upcoming birth, so I skipped MDR.
This year, however, is perfect! It was simple, different, somewhat uneventful, but at the same time HUGE when it comes to our roles as parents and our baby girl. So here is a look back at what 2012 had in store for us, based on the prompts provided by MDR 2012.
While at Disney we booked a reservation at a Garden Tea Room at Grand Floridian resort, the fanciest resort at Disney World.
It was our one chance to do something special and princess like with Alexis that wasn’t too extensive since she was only 7.5 months.
Like I described in the recap post, we didn’t want to put her into an uncomfortable and hot princess outfit until she was old enough to want it, but did want something special for her to wear. The dress she wore c/o of Baby Beau & Belle was utter perfection! It’s kind of funny but it turns out a friend of mine had bought their dress for her little girl’s christening a few years ago. What a small world! Really their dressesare meant for events like weddings, birthdays, christenings, but I can’t think of a more fitting place at Disney to wear such a fancy silk dress than the Garden Tea Room at Grand Floridian. Feel free to check out their website and Facebook and Twitter for frequent contests and giveaways.
When little Lexi is old enough, we will do Garden Tea Party at the same place with Princesses and Disney characters and tiaras and many special girly things, but for now we had our own PARTY. If anyone is planning on visiting Disney, I would say it is almost a must that you visit the tea room. If you have older (loud) kids, then probably the tea party is best, but if your babies/kids can stay quiet or you’re coming on a adult only trip, there is no better place to relax and feel all “pretentious” and pampered than in a fancy room overlooking (you guessed it!) a garden, sipping the tastiest teas you’ll ever drink in the smallest cups with your pinky out, while savoring mini deserts and mini-sandwiches which are a part of 4(?) courses. Actually, I loved their tea so much, I asked if we could buy it and sure enough, at $12 per box Princess Tea was ours!
I am way behind on posting photos and blogging about things, because I get 10-20 minutes every nap to blog which is not even close to enough time to write a post, let alone prepare photos for it.
I read somewhere recently that the best gift you can give a mom blogger is 2 hours of uninterrupted time to blog. This couldn’t be more true and that’s the luxury I don’t have even when I ignore dishes, cooking and cleaning.
About 2 months ago, we went to visit some of our friends and introduce them to Lexi. We hadn’t seen them for a long time prior to that, so we were all looking forward to the visit.
As expected, when we arrived they were already 3-4 drinks into the “party” and were having fun with their other friends preparing for a fishing trip they were taking off on that evening. Alexis was sleeping ( exhausted after a huge meltdown in a car) , so my mom volunteered to stay with her while we went in.
When my baby girl was up, my mom brought her out, all sleepy and disoriented and the whole gang just started “oohing and ahhhhing” and I am sure scared her a bit. So I picked her up and J. walked up to her to say hello. She kept looking at me, like “Is this ok?” and then he takes her in her arms and she just breaks down in tears (broke my heart). She wouldn’t calm down for a while regardless of what I did and I felt so bad.
J kept repeating “My sons never cried. I’d put them on my shoulders and we’d go places”
Yeah probably not at 2.5 months, J, not at 2 and a half months.
So I kept her away from “loud voices” and “beard” while Andrew and I took turns walking around with her
Honestly, that was my first experience with someone getting into her face and next time I’ll know to just shut it down or warn the “new person” to take it slow and smile at her from some distance before taking her into their arms. By the end of the evening, our pouty and quiet Lexi warmed up slightly to both men and actually smiled at them with a very tentative smile.
But what I really appreciated is that one of them stayed back the whole time, watching, being careful, not scaring Alexis. By the end of the evening, he gently walked up to her, gently smiled at her and she just lit up.
We’re going back there for a nice 4th of July party that J holds every year and this time I am guarding my Lexi until I see she’s totally fine with all the people. These 2 months might have made a difference because she absolutely loved Leeka who visited on Father’s Day and spent most of the time being carried and kissed by her. I’ll post pics in a week or so, but she had so much fun with her and a smile never left her face.
I am so excited to know that my baby girl is now officially out of her fourth trimester. She is no longer a newborn, she’s a baby! A cute, smart, adorable, inquisitive, serious, challenging baby. There has been so many changes that I honestly haven’t been able to keep track. All I’ve been doing is enjoying our time with her and holding on as tight as I can on this rollercoaster ride called LEXI.
TODAY is also the day that Alexis is really 1 YEAR OLD. She’s been out in the world for 3 months, but alive for 1 year. Last year on May 5th, she was conceived. {I am not a Pro-Lifer. I am Pro-Choice. But for us, Alexis was our baby the second those two cells joined}
These are the new things she’s been doing since the last time I updated here at 2 months, but most of them happened at around 2-2.5 months mark. There has been little change from 2.5-3 months. So here we go.
Our baby now belly laughs. They aren’t long or frequent, but the first time I heard it on April 23rd, I couldn’t believe it. She laughs in response to games and infant massage (someone is obviously ticklish). The first time she laughed, she sort of surprised herself, because she proceeded to make herself cough and squeel to repeat the sound she just made. I cannot wait till these laughs are more frequent. But for now she laughs about once every couple of days.
Speaking of coughing, she does that on purpose. She likes how it sounds or feels, so she’ll stick her tongue out and cough and smile.
Remember that video of her cooing at 3 weeks? Well, the second she hit her 2 months mark, it exploded. She would coo and agoo non stop to any stimuli. We’d have full blown conversations with her. It sort of subcided by the end of this month, which I read is common when they are focused on mastering other skills.
She now yawns like an adult by making a “yawn” sound. She usually agoos while yawning which is sooooo precious. “Aaaaaaggggoooooouuuuu!”
If we’re basing her future performance on current achievements, this girl will be a social linguist or an artist, but not a sporty one. She’s been way ahead on social and visual development, but her motor skills have stayed behind ( behind her other skills, not behind the norm). She’s not a fan of rolling over or even attempting to roll over. She did it twice on her own and have really kind of given up on the whole thing.
The same can’t be said about head control and her incredible need to be sitting up at all times. I honestly believe it’s only that good due to the fact that she is UNBELIEVABLY curious about her surroundings (and has been since day 1). She HAS to see things, which brings me to….
We’ve been having a bit of a problem with over-stimulation lately. She won’t stop looking around (her head whips side to side like she’s watching a tennis match) with a super serious expression. She gets very excited looking at toys and sky and trees and books and humans. She starts getting tired every 50-60 minutes, but will refuse to go to sleep. So there’s a lot of crying every time she has to go down for a nap, which is hourly. A lot of frustration for mommy and daddy. Putting her to sleep earlier doesn’t help, so I just try to do my best not to let her get too excited about all the sights she is seeing and put her to sleep at first signs of tiredness.
She loves reading books. We’ve been reading mostly Dr Suess and a few russian books and you should see her face and the legs kicking. It’s so cute! She stares intently at every illustration until the book is over and then follows it with her gaze as it gets put away as if saying “Is that all?”
Breastfeeding has been absolutely wonderful. This is what they refer to as the “reward period” and it’s a very fitting name. It has become a breeze to feed her any time anywhere. The most heartwarming moments occur during breastfeeding when she stops nursing to smile the widest grin at me and then playfully chomp back at the boob. Or when she grins and sticks her tongue out while panting and looking at me with a face full of adoration. For a while there, she’d coo with a nipple in her mouth. That’s actually how she squealed for the first time- while nursing!
Her sleep patterns have not changed. She still wakes up 2-4 times a night to eat and naps poorly here and there with an occasional 2 or three hour nap once a week. Sometimes when she sleeps for too long without a feeding, she wakes up outright crying, which breaks my heart into a million pieces. Otherwise, naps are hard. The second you put her down, her eyes pop open. Sometimes she’ll sleep for 5-10 minutes. On good days, she will have 30-40 minute naps, but she ALWAYS wakes up as soon as she cycles back into her REM sleep.
She is yet to be interested enough in toys to reach for them, but daily household items? Fascinating! She will grab anything that touches her hands, be it my necklace (forget about those now), my hair or the railing of the changing table that she attaches herself to with a death grip and pushes whoever changes her with her foot. Funny girl!
Sophie is her best friend, as well as the Lifefactory’s silicone teether ring that she just can’t get enough off. She has learned to grab onto it with two hands and shove it in her mouth, and then gum, gum, gum. If she misses her mouth and instead shoves a fist into it, you can hear her discontentment in an array of angry aghoos and screams she produces. Any time anything touches her hand, she grabs it or lightly touches it with her fingers. It’s so sweet when she runs her fingers along whatever part of our body she comes in contact with, pinches it, strokes- so sweet.
If you read the bath post, she is a major soccer star with her baby wash bottle. She has so much fun taking a bath now. Just today, she was laughing her little butt off at a dancing wash cloth courtesy of me. I’d shake a wet wash cloth over her naked belly and she would just smile and laugh non-stop. I’ll try videotaping it next time, if she still has the same reaction to it.
I think her hair is slowly falling out and blonde hair is growing in. I’m not sure of it, but that’s what it looks like. If it does fall out, I know I will miss her dark hair. She was born with it and it is very dear to me.
Her hand sucking and drooling is out of control. It’s gotta be her favorite thing – suck on her fingers. She hasn’t shown any preference to her thumb, she just puts her whole hand in her mouth and sometimes both.
It’s still really rough. Every time we go somewhere, she cries. Since she doesn’t sleep for long, she tires out quickly and she can’t fall asleep on her own (she’s not of those babies that just drifts off ), especially outside of home. So there’s usually a lot of crying when we go out and it’s time to sleep (it’s every hour, so I can’t even time outings around her nap time). I am hoping it’s a phase and as soon as her daytime naps even out, she’ll be a happier camper :) {I will write a separate post about this whole issue}
I am so happy to say that it almost subsided. She still has some spitting up and milk coming back up occasionally and but it doesn’t seem to bother her at all. She doesn’t wake up much from it anymore either. YAY!
;
So this is as much as I can remember. I gotta say that even with the fact that Alexis is a challenging baby, we are having a great time. As cliche as it sounds, we both can’t imagine our life without her and feel that life didn’t exist until Alexis came along.
{cute organic cupcake onesie is by My O Baby}
The first week was rough. Not normal newborn rough or “adjusting to lack of sleep” rough but “what is going on” rough.
Alexis started off as what you expect a day old baby to be- alert, crying at times, breast feeding around the clock. Once my milk came in on day 2, she spaced out her feedings to every 1.5-2 hours.
Everything was going right as I expected and have been told.
Then around day 5, something changed- she started waking up every half an hour and the only thing that would console her was my boob.
In my mind I’ve gone through every possible scenario from “I don’t have enough milk” (slippery slope) to growth spurts.
For those 2 days we literally had zero sleep. When people say “oh I’ve had no sleep because of my newborn baby” rarely do they mean literally no sleep. Generally newborns wake up every 2-4 hours to feed, that in between time IS sleep.
When I say zero sleep I mean I was able to close my eyes for 0-30 minutes each night for two nights.
It seemed like this is what it’s going to be like for weeks.
We asked around and were told that no, getting no sleep at all isn’t normal.
I love when people say “Well what did you expect? That it was going to be easy”?
Oh darling, you can’t compare a baby that gives you an hour or two at a time to sleep to a baby that wakes up every time you put her down. And no, giving her formula so that she was sleeping longer stretches at night isn’t even remotely an option.
I kept thinking something must be wrong (she’s in pain) and trust me that’s the worst feeling.
Our pedi suggested we keep her awake for longer feedings- that way she’ll go longer stretches without waking up to feed.
The next night Alexis had a huge screaming fit- like “I’m in pain” fit. I’d calm her down, put her in the cosleeper and a few minutes later she’d wake up screaming. Again only boob would console her. We had to call the doctor at 1:30 am because we simply didn’t know what was wrong.
After talking with her we agreed that it’s most likely reflux. She has been gagging and making chocking sounds every time we’d put her down regardless how many times we burped her.
The poor girl was suffering from acid burning her throat.
We broke down and gave her gripe water. It had completely sent me into a break down. I had been resolved not to have her take anything but breastmilk cuz anything else would change the flora of her intestines potentially exposing it to infections. But when it came to my baby girl hurting I just had to try any form of relief.
After another visit to our pedi, we decided that those longer bigger feedings might have made her reflux so bad she was actually in pain.
So we were trying everything and anything: 30-45 degree elevated beds, more frequent smaller feedings, prescription of Zantac in our back pocket that we gave a thought and instantly dismissed as an option at this moment, all possibly offensive foods banned from mommy’s ration.
One night after discovering that no swing or elevated bed does it, I spent the whole night holding her against my chest in a recliner- because that’s the only way she’d sleep.
{cute organic cupcake onesie is by My O Baby}
I was starting to get myself mentally ready for a baby that just doesn’t sleep at night. “We can do it for a few months while she matures… Whatever it takes to keep her comfortable, we thought. We’d take shifts holding her, I’d wake up to nurse whenever she wants.”
Then something happened. One night when she was screaming and fussing, we soothed her, put her to sleep and lay her down next to us in bed.
That was the first time since being home that she slept soundly for 2 hours, woke up to feed and slept another stretch and like that till the morning. No gagging, no crying, no reflux, no spit up.
Now don’t tell me babies aren’t supposed to sleep with their parents/mother, because since that day we’ve had 0 issues. She sleeps 2-3 hour stretches, she has zero reflux. As soon as her Moro reflex wakes her up, she instantly settles down by feeling me next to her.
And the amazing thing is she’s a different baby during the day- alert, quiet, happy. She won’t go down for a nap on her own- she has to be in our arms or next to us, but she’s rested. Day time is a different story, since she feeds every 30 minutes, but she’s happy, a happy little girl and that means we’re happy.
It’s funny how while considering ourselves AP parents, we still blindly followed the no bed sharing advice. We have a co sleeper set up , a full nursery but the only way our girl is happy AND healthy is if she’s in our arms.
Obviously the stress of being away from us was what caused the spit up problem to worsen, the lack of uninterrupted sleep caused her screaming fits. It was a cycle she was too immature to be able to get out of on her own. And I felt like it took us 2 days too long to figure it out. (update: lol people, I don’t think bedsharing “cured” reflux. She had minor reflux that was possibly made worse by stress of being away from mommy’s body which is what most newborns need in the first weeks)
Blindly follow what your baby needs in the very beginning. Screw the “well wishers”, the unsubstantiated cry it out methods, the second guessing yourself that comes oh-so-easily. Only your baby knows what it wants, and if it wants constant contact, then that’s what it gets, especially in its 4th trimester.
Talking to friends and reading blogs, sleeping with your baby is a pretty common occurrence early on. I’m not sure how long it lasts (maybe till they are able to sleep in a deeper state), but it’s very obvious that some (most?) babies need close contact to thrive. I’d like for her to sleep in the co-sleeper at some point and then in her crib, but we’ll see how it goes.
So I’m incredibly happy we figured it out and now our little girl is getting 150% of what she needs and we are getting what I’d call normal sleep: waking up every 2-3 hours to feed/change with occasional hour long stretches.
Coming up: Breastfeeding and its challenges post, 1 week postpartum and Alexis update, 2 weeks postpartum and Alexis update, just random thoughts on our changed lives, final nursery reveal (that we don’t even use lol), breastfeeding products that I’ve been using. I only get to write posts right now while nursing Alexis. I pull out my iphone and type away. She nurses every 30 minutes during the day so I get plenty of time to type, but the challenge is adding photos, since I can’t work on my laptop right now. So you might see a week of no posts and then a cluster of them another week.
And yes, of course the Birth Story- that’s kind of a given! :)
Also something came up workwise that only I can do, which really sucks because right now I can’t get away for longer than 30 minutes – I have to breastfeed. I really hope it can be postponed due to me just having had a baby or I am pretty much screwed. I love how everything always comes in at the same time. I can’t even get a handle on my life with a newborn when I have to deal with something urgent, important and a bit upsetting. Bleh! :(
Oh and also, I’ll probably won’t be proof reading most of these posts due to lack of time, so ignore all typos and such, please. Thanks :)
