Wednesday, July 31, 2013

wake up

i must have had some anxiety about having a new baby.
i didn't really feel it during the day,
but it would come out at night.
she is all mine.
and sometimes that can be scary.
 
for the first 3 weeks
i had night terrors.
i'm not sure if that's the right terminology,
but that's what i call them.
i had 4 or 5 of them.
 
i would wake up and think that brette was in our bed
and we were smothering her.
it literally freaked me out.
you have to understand that louie and leia are 8lb little cuddle bugs.
the lay right up next to me,
so in the middle of the night
i would wake up confused between having a baby in my arms or a dog.
 
the first one was the worst.
i grabbed poor louie,
thinking it was brette.
i was shaking and she wasn't crying.
i don't know how his hair and legs didn't register with me,
but i thought i killed my daughter.
its a sick feeling.
 
i learned with the other ones to automatically look to the basinet
first so i could reassure myself that she wasn't next to me,
but safe in her own bed.
i was still panicked, but i could understand fast that she was ok.
it also saved me from scaring my dogs to death.
i'm pretty sure i gave louie a heart attack with that first one.
 
 after a couple weeks, it stopped happening altogether and
i guess i got used to having her in our room.
 
i just wanted to share
my "new mom" experience.
the good and the bad.
 
but enough with that.
here's brette.
7 weeks old today.
 

 
 

Monday, July 29, 2013

over the river and through the woods... then she loses it

i thought i got really lucky with an amazing sleeper
and a good car rider.
but after about the second week,
brette found a certain disdain for her carseat.
sometimes she is a perfect angel.
she'll stare out the window or
she'll fall asleep.
 
but the other times,
she will lose her damn mind.
ronnie and i have definitely had to pull over
numerous times to get her out and calm her down.
and when i'm by myself, there's not much i can do,
the poor thing.
 
we have, however, find her kryptonite.
the jeep.
she's just like leia.
i think since she rides up higher,
with more sound
and more vibration,
she actually enjoys herself.
 

 
 
i would like to say that i've taken over the jeep
as my everyday car, but no.
it's not very practical for me.
so if anyone has any suggestions
on how to help with our carseat situation,
please share.
 
right now we have toys hanging,
a mirror so she can see herself,
the noise machine going
and (when i have ronnie with me) i'll ride back there with her.
 
am i missing anything?
any tricks?
 
 

Sunday, July 28, 2013

a week in pictures

i have had a busy week.
i didn't even know those were possible
when you take a 40 hour work week out of the equation,
but its true.

tuesday i spent at brian and jaime's because
my mom was watching their girls.
i left the house at 10 and got home at 7. 

 

on wednesday, ronnie's sister and her two kids came to visit,
then my mom came up to sit with brette in the waiting room
while i had my 6 week check-up.
my doctor got called in to emergency surgery so i was bumped to next week.
instead, we went out for lunch and shopping.

my long lost friend from high school came back into town,
so on thursday we spent the day at her pool
meeting each others daughters.
brette passed out while i was changing her diaper.
 


and finally on friday, i had most of my girlfriends
and their kids over for a playdate.
 









so i really was too busy to blog,
but busy doing really fun things,
so please forgive me.
i'm back on the couch this week and ready to share.

Monday, July 22, 2013

and another

i added my latest picture and
thought this little project was finished,
but now i'm thinking it would be super cute
to have brette sit on my lap on her first birthday
and add one more photo to this collage.
... finally get her smile into the mix.
super cute idea, right?
[mickie, remind me...again :)]
 
october 2012, june 2013, july 2013
 



 

Friday, July 19, 2013

down the rabbit hole

these pictures are two weeks old.
sorry, for not getting them up sooner.
i want to try again when i can get her smile.
but we had to have the classic photoshoot of baby wrapped in her snuggly towel.
aww, baby rabbit. bunny brette.
 



 
 
do you see redness under her eyes?
those are pimples.
yes, brette got a case of baby acne.
wah wah
but i'd rather her have it for 3 or 4 weeks now
than 3 or 4 years when she's a teenager.
[i'm hoping for her sake it will work out like that]
it started on her cheeks and moved down to her chin,
but i think it's already clearing up after
i finally talked ronnie out of putting lotion on it.
i don't know why he thought that would help.
here's pictures of her from today:
 


 
her face has mostly cleared up.
and yes, those are the same pajamas she wore in the hospital.
my peanut is still pretty little.


happy friday!

Thursday, July 18, 2013

its always boobie time

after 5 weeks
i feel like i can have an opinion on breastfeeding.
i plan on doing this until next spring so
things might change and i might have to update this again,
but for right now,
this is how it goes.


breastfeeding is a huge commitment.
huge.
i love it
and i hate it.

i love the time with her.
(haha - no one can take her from me for at least 35 mins at a time. she's all mine.)
i love the contact.
(i think the skin to skin time is good for both of us.)
i love the peace it gives her.
(if she's losing her mind because she's hungry, i can instantly sooth her.)
i love that its free.
(hello, no big grocery receipts yet because of formula.)
i love how fast and easy it is.
(no heating up water or washing bottles.)
i love how healthy it is for her.
(everyone knows the studies for why nursing is better for their immune system, etc.)
i love that it makes packing pretty easy.
(if i needed to leave quickly, i just need a diaper and wipes and i'm good to go.
but let's be honest.
i don't leave the house without SEVERAL other things as well.)

you can see why i love it.
but there is always a downside.

i hate that its a full-time job.
(especially at first, i felt like its all i did. and you are definitely on-call 24/7.)
i hate that it started off painful.
(it wasn't super bad but there was some cracking and bleeding and soreness. 
i think it just comes with the territory.)
i hate that i'm the only one that can do it.
(it would be nice to hand her off to ronnie if we're in the middle of dinner
 and she decides she's hungry. but no, i'm the one that eats later.)
i hate that it can be secluding.
(unless you're super comfortable whipping out your boob in front of anyone
[and some people are] you have to excuse yourself to another room for feeding time.
for me, i take my phone and catch up on facebook/twitter/blogger)
i hate that its hard to do in public.
(sometimes you don't have the option to "go to another room" so you might
even have to go sit in the back seat of your car.  that's the worst.)

i think what helped me the most was being able to do it from day one.
brette never had any latch issues or confusion.
i think this would be a totally different conversation if i had
struggled through it.  but for us,
it came relatively easy.
and it is only getting easier the more i do it.
since brette's bilirubin scores was high and getting worse once we left the hospital,
the doctors had me supplement after every feeding.
(the more she pooped, the better)
this got brette really used to nursing and taking a bottle.
i don't have to do that anymore,
but i still give brette one bottle a day right before her bedtime.
and right now she is still nursing every 2 to 3 hours a day
and then goes 6-8 hours at night.
 
also, for those of you that might one day try nursing,
here's a tip that made it 100 times better for me:
the doctor told me that babies get most of their milk in the first 5 to 10 minutes.
i did not know this, no one told me.
(hopefully that is not a well-known fact and you all think i'm retarded right now.)
so for the first week i was literally feeding brette for an hour or more.
try doing that every 2 hours.  no wonder i started hating it.
when i went to the pediatrician and i told her i felt like i spent my whole day nursing
 she told me to only do 10 to 15 minutes on each side.
this made a HUGE difference.
now, i do 15 minutes on each side,
with a 5 minute burp break. 
this gives me a lot more free time.

so there-
an update.
my thoughts.
and a little tip for future mammas.
 




Monday, July 15, 2013

strike a pose

these were taken a week apart.
apparently, ronnie and i assume a similar
position when putting brette down for a nap.
a day in the life of a newborn.
is she still a newborn when going on 5 weeks?
hmm...
 

 

 

Friday, July 12, 2013

brette: one month

its already the 12th
one month of her little life has passed
and its time for an update.
 
 
 
growth:
she weighs 8 lbs (according to our home scale)
which i think is right on track.
she's still in newborn diapers
and is still only sporting newborn clothes.
we actually got through every piece of newborn clothing this week
and are now wearing repeats.
she has a ton of cute 0-3 months summer clothes
hanging in her closet just waiting to be worn.
i tried her in one of the smallest outfits yesterday and it was still too big.
wah wah.
i plan on buying cardigans and leg warmers so
she can still sport her wardrobe into the fall.
 
sleeps:
on july 5th she slept through the night for the first time
and hasn't had a night since where she wakes up.
i don't want to jinx myself, but so far,
she's an awesome sleeper.
this is what works for us:
we have a little nighttime routine that starts around 8:30.
we either have a bath or a washcloth wipe-down.
then we put on a fresh diaper and
rub her down with aveno calming lotion.
next come the jammies.
then i nurse her and she gets her one and only bottle for the day.
by this time she is so tired and its around 10:00.
i hold her for about 10 minutes just to make sure she is passed out
and lay her in her bassinet.
(within the next week we are going to try to transition her into her crib -
cross your fingers that she likes it just as well.)
she sleeps to about 5:00 or 6:00.
i changer her and nurse her and put her back down and she's normally
 down again to about 8:00 or 9:00.
its so nice. i'm getting plenty of sleep.
 
eats:
right now she is on the boob diet.
she normally nurses every 3-4 hours
except in the morning and it's every two hours.
i figure she's pretty hungry after her long nights rest.
we had to give her bottle in the first two weeks because of her bilirubin score,
so i still give her a bottle everyday just so she doesn't forget how to take one.
hopefully, this makes it easier when i have someone else watch her,
she will be completely comfortable with a bottle.
 
plays:
we don't exactly "play" yet but
i do sing to her and read her stories. 
she is actually awake quite a bit of time.
especially in the evening hours.
she loves being outside or by a window.
i like to put her in her lounger and take her on the deck.
it gives me time to layout, read or get out my laptop.
we also put her in the swing everyday,
sometimes she falls asleep in it and
other times she will just sits there and stare into space.
either way, i think she loves it.
 
 
firsts:
right now, pretty much everything is a first.
besides her first nights sleep
she also had her first bath
her first trip (to warrensburg)
her first jeep ride. (ronnie was dying to take her)
her first pool day. (she didn't get in, but looked good laying out)
her first time without mommy. (my mom and i went to hobby lobby and left her with my dad. i was nervous and we were only gone about an hour. she slept the whole time.)
and was invited to her first birthday party.

so basically, she's doing really well
and we're enjoying watching her grow.
happy one month, baby B!
 


 
 




Tuesday, July 9, 2013

the cool parents

even though we're parents,
we can still party.
 
leave it to me to think it would be good idea to plan a get-together
a couple weeks after brette was born. 
i knew it would be a little stressful on me,
but i really wanted to do something nice for ronnie.
he celebrated is 34th birthday on the 7th,
he just had his first father's day
and he graduated his apprenticeship program. 
lots of reasons to celebrate.
plus its summer, which is reason enough.
and people want to see brette.
lucky for me, brette had a sleepy day the day before
so i was able to clean house and prepare food.
not so stressful after all.
so last saturday, we invited 30 people over to our house for dinner and drinks.
this gave ronnie an excuse to use his smoker and drink some beers.
it was a really fun night.
our friends and family all got to enjoy a nice evening on the deck.
 
and one of my besties, marge, came in town.
i got to see her baby boy again and she got to meet brette.
loved it.
 
plus we were able to introduce brette to cohen.
future romance?!
 
 
 
while the boys and girls partied outside,
some of us mammas had ourselves our own little nursing party.
doesn't this make you want to hold hands and sing kumbaya?
i can't believe this is my life now (in a good way).
sorry for the lack of pictures, but
thank you to everyone who came and helped celebrate my mister!


Monday, July 8, 2013

another 365

my mister survived another year.
to celebrate yesterday we had a family day.
we started with lunch with his side of the family
and ended with dinner with my side.
 
basically, i ate way to much food.
AND, i don't know how ronnie got so lucky
but kathy and my mom ended up making him THREE types of pies.
say whaaa?
 
lucky bitch.
 
 
happy birthday, ronaldo!
i hope year 34 is the best one yet. 

 

Friday, July 5, 2013

her first fireworks

 
somehow ronnie went from having to work the holiday and all weekend
to having four days in a row off.
it was a nice surprise and
we got to spend our first holiday together as a threesome.
brian and jaime invited us over for a bbq and fireworks.
the park area that surrounds their house has a little festival and fireworks display,
and it can all be viewed from b&j's backyard.
it was nice to have a relaxing night only 10 minutes from home
with all our little girls.
eden was passed out by 8:00
brette exited the party at 9:00
and madeline fell asleep during the fireworks show at 10:00.
but we all had such a nice time.
 
i would like some sort of award for getting brette into her carseat,
back home
and then out of the carseat
and into the bassinet without waking her.
seriously, round of applause?
 
i hope everyone had an amazing day off with lots of food, fireworks and family.
happy independence day!
 
 
ps- i forgot to take ANY photos (something is wrong with me)
so these are all courtesy of jaime
 



 
 

 

Wednesday, July 3, 2013

another week under our belts

happy three weeks!
 
 
 
we've been changing a lot of diapers.
we spending a lot of time in her swing and lounger.
we love to hang out outside on the deck.
but i feel the majority of time, we are nursing.
(which i have lots to say about it - on another day)
 
right now, ronnie and i are just trying to figure her out
and learn the secret to having a happy, healthy baby.
 
so far, she seems to be both.
i just want to keep her that way.

we had her two week check up last
thursday and she is growing.
baby B now weighs 7lbs 6 oz (25th percentile)
and is 21 inches (75th percentile)
she's officially bigger than her birth weight,
just what we wanted.

 
 
 
ps- i meant to weigh myself this morning to see
 if there has been any change there too, but i was too busy eating cookies.
 
so... i'm waiting another week.