A Few Random Pictures

A great picture Joe took of Emma while Grandma and Grandpa L. were here... just a random shot. I absolutely LOVE the way it makes her eyes look.


Emma at the PBJ & Jazz Concert a few weekends back.


Emma & Grandpa L. having a good time!

Naps

I just want to say that ever since we read about the 2-3-4 naptime schedule, naps have been fabulous here at home. What is it? Well... Emma gets up, and 2 hours later we offer her first nap. She's been going down VERY easily and napping between 1 1/2-2 hours. Then 3 hours after she gets up, we offer the second nap. Typically again, she goes down very easily and naps for about an hour. And then 4 hours (or so) after she gets up from that, it's bedtime.

We're flexible about half an hour around each time, but so far it's worked like a dream. It's just too bad that it doesn't work like that at daycare -- she's just too excited to be around her friends to nap there.

We Love to Swing!

Here's the video Daddy took at the Dayton Air Force Museum. They have an outdoor playground near the museum.




P.S. Last night didn't go as well as the night before, boo. :(

Oh, And...

She slept 4 hours solidly in the crib last night (7:30 - 11:30pm), then came to bed and slept solidly after eating for another 5 hours (11:30 - 4:30), and then slept solidly again until 5:45. We got up, Mommy showered, and I fed her. She fell back asleep around 6:30am and slept solidly until 8:20am. Not to mention she took an almost 2-hour nap at daycare today.

Too bad Mommy had insomnia last night and couldn't take advantage of any of it! I was up until 3am, wide awake. Finally went into the other room and let Daddy take over, slept for about an hour, then re-joined them and slept for another hour. Hopefully I'll get a good night's sleep tonight.

I think (knock on wood) it helps that she is ALL about eating right now! She's eating upwards of 12-13 oz at daycare routinely now, at least 2-3 meals of solids (not a lot, but more than ever before), last night she was ravenous and just kept eating and eating and eating plus nursed, and tonight she even took BOTH breasts before bed. And that was after supper and 3 oz of breastmilk in a cup.

Some other things I think really have helped are that the teeth are also almost through the skin, all 4 of them. That has to be more comfortable. It's cooler at night, so she's not sticky and hot. We're putting her to bed just half an hour later, and we're doing "active" play in the basement, then "quiet" play upstairs right before bedtime. We've got all the windows open so she can get lots of fresh air. AND I think we solved the leak issue -- I put her night-time diaper on the longest length, and no more leak. She's grown so much that our BumGenius are actually now at the longest length they can go. I hope they last until toddlerhood!

Overall, I can tell that before now, she just wasn't really ready. She wasn't eating solids all that enthusiastically other than 2-3 bites, and now she is. She's finally getting those bottles down at daycare. And physically, I think she's in a more comfortable place with those teeth.

It may not last, but I'll take it while it's here!

100 Balls

It wasn't as impressive as I thought it was going to be, but Emma had fun. LOL. 100 balls for $10 at WalMart.

More Fun Videos

Grandma and Grandpa Lewis brought Emma this fun walker that converts into a scooter. Last night we took it into the basement where there's more room, and this is what Emma did.

More 8-Month Videos

From the last few days....

Little Bears Fan

Thank you for the shirt, Grandma and Grandpa Lewis!

8-Month Videos

Emma loves it when we "pretend" to chew on her teething rings, and in this case she got so excited she attacked Mommy!




That same day, being VERY interested in the camera. You can really see her teeth!



Emma at the Topiary park yesterday, such a happy baby!



Emma in the walker that Grandma and Grandpa Lewis got for us, she gets really excited to "chase" Mommy!




And last, but not least, introducing Purple Ghost Baby!! She loves it when we put this purple blanket that Great-Aunt Janie made for her over her head because she can see out, but she's "hiding" from us. I think she looks a bit like those Charlie Brown ghosts from the Halloween special (remember that?).

PBJ & Jazz

We went to the Columbus Deaf Park today; there's a Topiary Park and the Jazz Arts group sponsors a "PBJ & Jazz" Concert series designed to introduce kids to jazz. We had a fabulous time. Emma loved the music and she loved watching all the kids and adults milling around. We definitely need to do more things like that.

As soon as I can get the video downloaded, I'll put it up here for sharing!

On a side note, despite one little rough patch around 11pm, Emma had a great night last night. Down to bed easily, nursed only twice through the night, and woke up in a FABULOUS mood. She got 12 hours of sleep. Add on top of that a 2-hour nap this morning, and what appears to be at least an hour nap right now, and we're having a great sleeping day.

Now if we can only get those teeth out. Yes.... there are 4 coming through at the same time. Poor thing, no wonder she was miserable before!

GREAT Night!

Really. I can't even believe it myself after the rough start. But I went to bed and brought her with me at 9:45. She nursed and nursed and nursed (made up for the rotten nursing at 7pm), and I think we fell asleep around 10, 10:15ish. Well, let me re-phrase that. She was asleep the whole time, I fell asleep around that time.

AND didn't wake up until 2:30 am! Seriously, almost 4 1/2 hours of sleep. Longest sleep ever!

We nursed, Daddy changed a wet diaper while I ran to the bathroom myself, and we went back to sleep. She nursed one more time somewhere in there (not sure when, I didn't look at the clock), and then she didn't wake up until 7:30am. Wow. We had a great nursing session before getting out of bed to start our day.

As much as I don't want to repeat the start of last night, I'd definitely repeat the sleeping portion. I feel like a new woman today. :)

Ok -- back to work!

Zoo Visit

It was cool this morning (45 when we woke up, 55 when we got moving) so we went to the zoo for a few hours to see how the animals were enjoying the nicer weather. They were all so active! Here's just a few clips of Emma with two of her favorite animals.

Yeah, She's Standing

Not just the pulling-up-on-stuff standing, but tonight several times she stood independent of holding onto anything, and the longest was about 5 seconds. I grabbed the camera, but all I got was the tail end of her standing up and then letting herself down.

Why is my baby growing up so fast?!

Sleep Success!

We figured out that Emma's recent sleep issue are directly related to (1) her recent MASSIVE growth spurt (a pound gained in less than 10 days folks!), and (2) teeth # 5 and #6 coming in, just starting to break through the skin today. Each and every time she teethes, the week to 10 days before hand she gets very cranky and doesn't like lying down, and is very fidgety. That, combined with AF showing up and tanking my milk supply this past week is the likely culprit.

Last night she went to sleep easily in her crib, slept for 2 1/2 hours, came to bed with me and I nursed her, and she only roused a couple of times to nurse. Tonight she took a 1 hr, 40 minute nap at daycare, and fell asleep in her crib without my help within 3 minutes of me putting her in there. She's been sleeping about 11-12 hours each night, with the sole exception of the day that she had a MASSIVE poo at 5am and just was so wound up that she couldn't go back to sleep. I believe it was Tuesday night that she slept for 4 hours in a row at one point? But I've been feeling a bit more rested, thank goodness.

We're all looking forward to the 3-day weekend. Work has completely swamped me -- I think I've had two 50-hour weeks back-to-back, and this week is shaping up to hit that mark also. I'll be glad when I'm done covering for one of our clinicians who is out with medical issues, although the extra work has been wonderful and I won't complain about the extra money. :)

Just a Few Pictures

From today, a VERY happy baby at the zoo!



And Emma with her Grandma and Grandpa Lewis last week.

It's All Good

Life is good!

Work kept me very busy these last two weeks and even though it means I'm working in the evenings after Emma goes to bed, it also means we have money to pay the bills and I'm not worrying as much. I'm very thankful I've got a good job and one I like.

After introducing and her finally "getting" the sippy cup, we're getting more milk into her! She gets a sippy cup with breastmilk with every solid meal now. At daycare today she drank 3 1/2 oz from a bottle, then an hour later drank 3 oz from a sippy cup, and then a couple of hours later, drank another 3 oz from a bottle. She got 12 1/2 oz of milk at daycare today! She's been averaging 10+ this past week, which is phenomenal and I'm very happy about.

She's also getting better at the chewing thing, and eating her solids with more vigor. Tonight we went out to eat, and she had bites of our chicken dumplings and pieces of avocado that were on my sushi roll. She LOVED the dumpling. Almost ate an entire one with our help. Then she nursed while we were still in the restaurant, PLUS she nursed when we got home.

Can we say "growth spurt?" LOL.

This also means more peaceful nights. We're giving her tylenol because with the amount of drool, I was suspecting a tooth and I was right. So she falls asleep quickly now again (tonight without even having my hand on her or me shushing her, I was just standing by the crib) and last night she drank at 11pm, 1:30am, and then not again until 5am! Oh, I'm so very happy. And she was so cute -- she farted a big adult-sized fart at 5am and woke herself up. So we all got up and while I got ready for work, she and Daddy played quietly in the front room. And then around 6am I took her up and nursed her, and we all cuddled together in bed. She fell asleep around 6:20am. I got up at 7 to leave for work, and Daddy texted me later to tell me they both slept until 8:20am. With that 2-hour nap, she got about 12 1/2 hours of sleep last night.

Naps at daycare are still not great, but it's all good.... we'll figure that out too. I'm feeling peaceful and fulfilled, and thanking God that life is so good.

Hopefully I'll get pictures up from Grandma and Grandpa Lewis's visit very soon!

8 Month Updates

At 8 months, Emma...

*Is crawling with ease, standing with ease and can squat without toppling over.
*Has now eaten chicken, beef and fish, in addition to numerous fruits and vegetables.
*Maybe has said Momma and Dada, linking to us (we're not 100% sure)
*Visited with Grandma and Grandpa Lewis!

I don't know how much she weighs, but I can tell you that she hasn't gained much weight over the last 2 months. I'm chalking it up to her moving more, but it appears she's going through a growth spurt right now. For the last two nights, she's wanted to eat every hour again. AND she's eating like a big girl during the day -- 11 oz of breastmilk today at daycare, a big chunk of banana and a big chunk of avocado, not to mention the banana, mango and cereal she had at breakfast and the hamburger and sweet potato she had at supper. She's drinking breastmilk with her solid meals, and she apparently LOVES the breastmilk cold, she's gulping it down like there's no tomorrow.

The reason I also think she's growing and maybe putting a tooth through too is that she's now fighting bedtime also. It's taken over 35 minutes for her to even settle down, when for over a month she'd been falling asleep within 5-10 minutes in the crib. I'm half tempted to give her some tylenol, since I wonder if she's hurting, but I don't want to give it unless I'm sure that's what is going on.

In any case, there are dishes to be done, diapers to be folded, and lunches to be made for tomorrow. Work has been super-duper-amazingly busy lately and I just can't keep up with the paperwork.

Yay!

Last night Emma slept from 7pm to 7am, and only roused to nurse twice during that time. The first time was at 9:30pm (and I knew she was going to need it because she was too riled up from the visit with Grandma and Grandpa Lewis to eat well at 6:30) and the second one was somewhere in the middle of the night. She had some restless times, but when I left her alone and let her crawl around in the bed, she settled herself back to sleep. I just kept myself on one side of the bed, watched her and made sure she didn't crawl under the sheet. It was really quite entertaining.

But that's not the only awesome thing. This morning we had our FIRST FORMED STOOL!! :) I know, I shouldn't be so excited about it but it was so easy to clean up -- I just plopped it into the toilet and flushed.

I wonder if there's a link between her digesting/processing food better and now sleeping better? She has been eating a few more solids this week too.

Happy 8 months old, my gorgeous Emma!