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.

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

 

 

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!

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.
 

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...

 

 



 

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!

 

 

 



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!