4 Months

I haven't blogged in forever! I fully intended to do so, but there always seems like there is something else I should or could be doing...imagine that!

School is going well, and even better since this semester is almost over. I did really well. It's nice to have something in my life that doesn't have anything to do with babies.

Layla is doing great. She's still sleeping through the night from 8:30-7:30am, and I can tell you, it made me see motherhood in a whole new light. I've always loved my baby and loved being a mother, but when you are rest broken, you can get too caught up in the "maintenance" part of being a mother. Now that I'm well rested and the sleep deprived fog has been lifted from my brain, I can really really enjoy my child in a way that I couldn't at first.

She had her four month appointment and vaccinations last week. She is 25 inches, and a whopping 13 lbs 11 oz! She is in the 50th percentile for both height and weight. Not bad considering she was 4 lbs 10 oz at birth. She has already tripled her birth weight and the pedi is so happy with that. She is moving along on track developmentally and her pedi is not using any special preemie considerations or charts for her. Her pedi says she is a normal 4 month old in all respects. That made me very happy needless to say.

She has developed quite a few new skills since I last blogged. She can sit unassisted for a few seconds. She's still very wobbly, but she knows to put her hands in front of her between her legs to support herself. She babbles, squeals, laughs boisterously at the smallest thing.....she's basically an...er.....pretty noisy baby. She loves to stand and is giving my arms a workout by forcing me to hold her in a standing position for minutes on end. I was tempted to run down and get an exercauser or jumperoo right away, but decided to wait to see what she gets as gifts for her first Christmas.

We also started her on rice cereal last weekend because we got the go ahead from the pedi. As expected, she LOVED it. She is such a piggy. The only problem is that she is used to the immediate gratification of sucking all of her meals, so she gets frustrated because we can't seem to spoon it up for her fast enough.

She also does the cutest thing. She discovered her hands in a new way at 4 months old. She makes them into fists, as if she has something tasty inside of them. Then she stares at them back and forth all day. Then she turns them ever so slowly, as if looking for the most savory part, and takes a few nibbles at it. When she gets tired of tasting that one, she goes to the next one to see what that one tastes like.

Here is a 4 month photo! She'll have professional ones done in January when she can behave, as Tim calls it. :-)

Brief Update

It occurred to me that I haven't blogged in a while. I think that is due in part to me suffering from tennis elbow. I've had it mildly before in the past, but what I have now can be described as the equivalent to submerging your arm in a bucket of fire. Some days its hard for me to even clench my fist. I think toting Layla's carrier around has accentuated the condition. She's 11 lbs now, and there is no telling how much the carrier weighs.


The little piggy is doing great! She's sleeping 10 straight hours at night, and takes two naps during the day. She is so alert and observant of everything when she's not napping and is quick to flash a goofy smile when she's happy. She loves riding in the truck and going out and about.

Speaking of which, I almost turned into Chun Li today at the Dollar Tree. Some well intending grandma came over gushing about how pretty Layla was in her dress and proceeded to rub her cheek. I assumed a karate stance to deliver a kung pao blow that would instantly disconnect her feeble hands from my child's cheek...in my mind .
In real life I smiled and scrambled away from her as fast as I could manage.

Hello....uh......H1N1?
Eczema flare up?

We're going to go shopping for a Halloween costume tomorrow. I'm bringing my sister as protection against the grandmas that may be lurking on every corner.

I'll post pics of the costume soon!

Layla pooped in her tub again last night. How did I feel about that? See above expression. I didn't think lightening could strike twice in the same place, but I was wrong. This time around I was able to keep my composure. Well sort of. I snatched her out of the tub and bolted for the nursery to put a diaper on her before she ruined everything. Too late of course. Of course now I am trying to mastermind a plan to prevent this from ever happening to us again. At the rate she's going, we'll need another baby tub by the time she's six months. Seriously, when it happened last night I debated on hauling the whole tub out to the garage to add it to today's garbage pick up. I changed my mind seeing as how they pick up enough poop with all the diapers I have for them each Monday and Thursday.

About an hour ago I put Layla on the couch so I could run to the kitchen to get her another ounce of milk. I put her on her back and left for less than a minute. When I got back she was on her tummy. How did I feel about that? See above expression. She had an arm trapped under her, but she was fine. I would like an explanation as to how she has become so mobile in such a short period of time. Tim doesn't know yet because he was sleeping when it happened. I don't think he'll be as shocked as I am though since he's constantly referring to the mounds of baby fat on her arms as muscles.

Each night since the first night she did it, Layla has been sleeping for 5-6 hour stretches at night. How do I feel about that? See above expression. You would think that with all those hours of consecutive sleep added to her repertoire, I would take advantage and run for the bed as soon as she's down. I don't. I watch t.v. I blog. I browse. I take a long shower. It's wonderful.

She's growing up!

Three nights ago I was awaken by the feeling that I was over sleeping for something. I looked at the clock and the bright red numbers read 2:35. I laid there and let the digits sink into my sleep fogged mind. 2:35? How could it be 2:35? I had put Layla to bed at 10 pm after a fussy 2 hours and hadn't been up to tend to her since. Had she cried and I not heard? Had Tim gone to take care of her and I didn't notice? That couldn't be possible because I'm a light sleeper and hear everything. I looked at the monitor and didn't hear or see anything. I tore the sheet off of me and bolted for the nursery. I put my face close to hers and immediately heard the reassuring sighs and baby grunts.

She was asleep.

She had slept 4 hours and 35 minutes and did not call for me once. I replayed the night's events over and over to make sure my timing wasn't off. I reached the same conclusions and calculations over and over again. It was really 4 hours and 35 minutes.

I sat down in the glider to contemplate what to do. Was it possible she was sick? Do I wake her up and feed her? Take her temperature? Say hello?

Ten minutes later I decided to leave her be and go back to bed.
She finallly woke up to eat 15 minutes later , yielding a grand total of 5 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Wow!

My life for the past 8 weeks has been segmented into three hour blocks. Since the time she was born she was waking every three hours from the start of the last feeding, and now she is able to do five in a row!

She's growing up.

I've also had to start the inevitable task of packing away clothes that she has outgrown.

Time has wings.

From the beginning....

Make a Smilebox slideshow

The Horror!

Yesterday we made it through our first appointment without daddy. I made an appointment for Layla on Wednesday for Thursday afternoon because she was exhibiting some signs of re.flux. She had been gagging, becoming agitated at the end of feeds, and spitting up a little bit more than usual. I consulted Dr. Google first, and Dr. Google said that it may be re.flux so I called the nurse after hours and had her set us up for an appointment.

More on that later, but first I’d like to record what happened before the dr’s appointment.
I got dressed first, then woke Layla up for her bath. While I was getting ready my sister called me so I chatted with her while getting prepared. I put the baby in the tub and started to bathe her. I diverted my eyes for a millisecond to put more soap on her washcloth.

Nothing on God’s green earth could’ve prepared me for the horror I was about to witness. My heart dropped into my stomach. I stifled inappropriate language—I’m a mommy you know—so consequently what escaped from my mouth was a strangled scream. My sister yells, “What happened? What’s going on??!”

I tried to focus and my mind started to process the scene before me.

She had pooped in the tub.

I could not articulate to my sister what had happened fast enough I guess, so she proceeded to ask over and over what happened.

Layla starts to wail, as if the poop fairy had snuck into her restroom and flung a tablespoon of poop into her bath water just to sabotage her day.

I explained to my sister what happened, and explained to Layla that she had done it; it was her poop.

I didn’t know what to do. My sister calmly explained the steps I should take to make things right, then we hung up so I could get to work. Over the next 10 minutes I was in a swirl of diapers, baby wipes, Clorox wipes, and plenty of hot water.
By the end of it all I was covered in either bath water or sweat. I couldn’t tell which was which.

I was so afraid we would be late to our appointment. I HATE being late, especially for appointments.
*Mommy lesson numero uno. Babies are not like regular people. NEVER bathe a baby right before leaving the house. See, I’m pretty obsessive and I know it takes 7 minutes for Layla’s bath, and 9 minutes for a bath+shampoo. I only allowed that amount of time, which was silly of me in hindsight.
All in all the day was salvaged.

Here she is at happier times.

She likes to try to catch the water in her mouth when I use her "shower" on her. He he!

Ok, so back to the dr’s appointment. Dr. Wal.lace listened to my concerns, examined the baby, and determined that she did have some early signs of re.flux, but there really isn’t much we should do just yet. We have to wait until her symptoms are more significant.
She also said that she has a little bit of baby acne, which most babies get and will clear up in a few weeks on its own, and a little bit of ecz.ema on her chin. I was horrified when she said ecz.ema. I had already suspected that’s what was on her chin because I had a 30 minute consultation with Dr. Google a few nights ago, but I was hoping for better news. My nephew had it bad and it made him miserable. He was constantly scratching, and it ruined the color and texture of his skin. It doesn’t always get that bad, so I’m hoping it stays localized on her chin and then goes away. Dr. Wall.ace says to keep it dry and put Vaseline on it.

We’ll just have to wait and see.
The waiting. The horrible waiting.
Anyway, she put on another lb of baby fat in about a week. She is currently 9lbs!

Mommy

Next week Layla and I will go visit a real school. We are visiting my old school and coworkers after our dr's appointment.

Layla and I do "school" every day. We have circle time. We read books. We do songs. We play games. We do tummy time.
We are a classroom of two.
Tim says, "Rae, isn't it a little too early for school?"
I say, " A little."
He says, "Hmmm. You miss teaching."
I say, "Hmmm."
It's official. I miss work. I think about work and my thoughts are nostalgic. I miss my school, my coworkers, my kids, my classroom.
I miss being a person responsible for instilling education, values, and love for life in a child times twenty. I miss being involved, intertwined, mingled.

But.

I look into the eyes of my daughter and I know that I am instilling education, values, and love for life in a child. She smiles, and I know that I am loved -- times twenty.

We are important to each other. We give each other meaning; life.

In the words of a woman from my due date club, "At the end of life, no one ever wishes they had worked more."

Nor will I.

Insightful.