It's Official

I do believe, even after last night, that I can declare that we have a baby who sleeps through the night! She's been sleeping for at least 5 hours in one stretch for quite awhile now, but we have made it a week now with only two nights of waking in the middle of the night. At most, she's slept 10 hours and at the minimum, 8.

Last Saturday night she woke up after only about 5 hours, but she slept a bit more during the day than she does at daycare.

Yesterday she woke after about 6 1/2 hours, but she had wiggled her fist out of her swaddle and was sucking on it and woke herself with that. That's just a problem with a faulty swaddling :) Of course now whenever she wakes in the middle of the night, though, she thinks it's morning and wants to play. So last night DH spent almost an hour rocking her back to sleep.

I was previously a firm believer in that whole sleep begets sleep concept, but now that she's at a sitter's and only sleeping a little bit there (maybe 3 hours total in the 9 1/2 hours she's there?) she's sleeping like crazy at home. I think it also has to do with the fact that she's a bit older and doesn't get overtired quite as easily, which is SO nice. In the first few months if she slept as little during the day as she's sleeping now, she would be a screaming mess in the evenings. Now she just passes out after eating.

Our nighttime routine has changed a bit since she's started daycare as well. We now get home around 5:30 and she usually snoozes in her carseat for about 20 minutes. When she wakes up, she eats, then we play and hang out. If she seems extra tired, we'll let her take a 20 minute lap, unswaddled. Then she'll get up, play a bit more, eat, then pass out for the night. We haven't even really had time for massages, books, or anything. She's just so tired from all the excitement of the sitter's.

As much as all this sleeping is nice, we both really miss our little girl.

She did it!

Last night (Oct. 27th), baby girl rolled over on her own!!! Mommy, Daddy, and she were laying on the floor. She lifted her head up and started to lean. All of sudden, she just rolled over onto her back!!!!

I have some more philosophical posts to write, but no time....but I had to write this down. We couldn't be more proud!!!

Heigh Ho, Heigh Ho

And off to work I went.

Today was rough. But at least I was distracted by seeing my coworkers and showing off pictures of my beautiful baby. Tomorrow has the possibility to be even worse.

I worked 6 hours--8-2:30 (with a half hour lunch....sort of). The drop off was pretty painful. I couldn't believe I left my baby in someone else's arms. Ugh.

Pumped three times--8:30, 11:30, and 1:30. Got 5 oz. at 8:30, but only 5 oz. combined between the other two feedings. Very frustrating.

Picked up just after 3:00. The sitter and baby were snoozing together in the rocking chair--precious! I will say I was a bit disappointed by how little detail we received about how much she slept and ate and when, though. It felt like she didn't want to tell us how much she cried. We knew she would cry and, honestly, I wouldn't be phased by that. She did eat 14 oz., which scares me when I realize I need to pump enough to keep up with that. I'll just have to be pumping over the weekends and in the evenings, too, I suppose. I'm hoping, too, that the sitter didn't just pump her full of food because she was upset. Baby normally only eats twice in the time she was there today.

Hopefully she's just getting used to the way the baby is and it will all get into a better routine next week. And hopefully tomorrow isn't harder--I'll have less to concentrate on at work and I'll be more anxious about pumping enough to meet her needs (which, of course, could decrease my output...can you say vicious cycle?).

The return

In all of my wildest dreams about my last day of maternity leave, I would never have imagined sitting downstairs with a baby who won't go back to sleep at 5:30 a.m. with spit up down the front of me. DH took the day off to spend with us. I thought we'd all nap together, go take a walk (it's supposed to be beautiful today), and just spend time with our baby before we abandon her (my feeling) with a stranger (again, the way I feel about it).

Every time I begin to think about returning to work, I break down sobbing. I am dreading it more than I've ever dreaded anything before in my life. I don't want to leave her. Of course, there's lots of things that no one wants to do as adults, but we have to suck it up and do it. So I'll be sucking it up, but I won't like it.

First Overnight Trip

Saturday we made a trip to DH's parents' house to spend the night. Both the drive up and back were fairly uneventful--it took the baby about 20 minutes to fall asleep, slept for about 30-40 minutes, then she was awake for the remaining 40 minutes or so. If DH hadn't been in the backseat to entertain and pop in a binky when necessary, it could have been ugly.

Of course the weird location threw off the baby's sleeping. Her sleeping hours had been on the decline anyhow (8 1/2 hours one night, then 7, then 6, then Saturday night we got 5 1/2 and last night another 5 1/2). We still did her bedtime routine, but didn't rock her until she was fully asleep. Of course that meant she woke up in the playpen unhappy. I picked her up and she snuggled in and fell asleep. I just laid on the daybed with her to get her into a sound sleep, then she slept those 5 1/2 hours for us in the playpen. She got up to eat, then didn't want to go back to sleep. DH hung out with her for an hour and she fell asleep, then woke up. I went in and picked her up and she promptly fell asleep on my shoulder. We then slept together on the daybed for two hours. Whatever you have to do, right?

Generally, the trip was a good one, though. I was paranoid about germs the whole time. Asked DH's cousin to wash her hands before holding the baby.

She also, of course, needed to eat at dinnertime on Saturday, so I fed her while everyone else ate. *sigh* I suppose it's a hazard of a breastfeeding mom, though.

We were all very glad to be home and back into our own routines yesterday, though!!!

Baby Poop?

I will never be able to look at the fall leaves the same again. On our drive back from out of town this weekend, DH and I were looking at the leaves and how pretty the colors were. Then we both remembered that our pedi told us that baby poop can be any color that you find on leaves. We looked at the trees, remembering the different colored diapers we had changed.

Sleeping Progress!

I didn't want to jinx us by posting yesterday, but at 10 weeks of age, the night of October 7th, DD slept through the night!!!

This was written yesterday (Thursday):

This child never ceases to amaze me!

She napped well yesterday morning, took a restless nap (but still a good length) early afternoon (both on me or grandma), then only took two half hour naps from 2:30 until 8. She wasn't overly cranky, but had her moments.

At 7:30, I looked up baby massage and had DH do a pretty lengthy one (ended up doing it 1 1/2 times since she seemed to really like it). Paused the TV, turned off the lights besides a lamp on dim. We then put her in her sleeper and I read her a book (well, most of one). I then popped in her binky and rocked her to sleep (took about a half an hour, as she fought it for awhile--she fell asleep at 8:30). We sat in the chair until 9:30, to be sure she was in a deep sleep, then DH put her in her crib. She stirred a bit, but went right back to sleep. Next thing I knew, it was 4:00 and she was making noises in her sleep. I laid there waiting for her to wake up and finally fell back asleep. She didn't wake until 5:00!

I also gave her gas drops at 4 p.m. and then at her 6:30 p.m. feeding. Not sure if they helped, but we're going to keep trying. I forgot to give them to her at her 5 a.m. feeding, though.

She was up for a bit after eating (had one big spit-up--might have been b/c I was so engorged that she got the milk fairly forcefully), but generally fell back asleep pretty easily. She's been sleeping since then and still is at 9:30 (edited to add: she woke up at 9:45).

I hope this is the start of something good...and that she isn't getting sick. I'm also hoping that I can replicate this with her snoozing in the swing some. I don't think I can really have her napping on me all day long. Even if it just happens once for now, I know it CAN happen!

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Yesterday I tried to replicate the day and did so fairly well (and she did do some snoozing in the swing). We did a bath after her last short evening nap (maybe this is going to be her normal?), then moved onto a massage (she didn't like it for too long), then rocking with a pacifier. She pooped after 15 minutes of soothing (started at 9:20), which meant we needed to start over again. She fell into a good sleep around 10. At 11, DH put her down and she slept until 5:15. Yay for over 7 hours of sleep!!!

I hope this is the beginning of something good. I also hope we can vary the day a bit and still get the same results...we'll find out this weekend, as I think we may be taking a trip out of town.

Normalcy

Tonight I regained a bit of normalcy. I put on makeup for the first time since baby was born (prior to her birth I wore it every day unless we were just laying around the house). I kept my hair down for the first time since baby was born (and it had been awhile before that, too, I think). DH and I went out to dinner in a restaurant for the first time since baby was born. We still haven't gotten brave enough to try to take baby to a restaurant, so it was the first time at all. Spent time with DH without a baby around for the first time since she was born. If she's sleeping now and we're awake, she's typically sleeping on us, while when she sleeps in her crib we're either sleeping or DH isn't here.

It was weird. And not normal at all. But it's nice, too. I've missed my husband (and, really, still do). I felt really guilty that I didn't really stress too much about leaving the baby or being away from her. Maybe because I have been so overwhelmed and stressed being *with* her that it was nice to get a break. Also, she was with my parents, who I knew would do just fine with her. DH promised he was stressed enough about leaving her for the both of us, though.

Or not

Making her warm didn't seem to do a darn thing for her yesterday. Of course, it probably didn't help that she didn't sleep more than 30 minutes at a time (did this twice) between 12:15 p.m. and 1 a.m. She finally fell asleep with Daddy on the couch. He brought her upstairs at 4 a.m. to eat, then I put her down. She slept (fairly restlessly) until 9 a.m. Yes, it was nice to sleep in, but what a rough evening! Not sure what to do with her now. Am starting to think those two good nights of sleep might have been because we had vaccines on Tuesday...can we get more of those???

Two Months Old

I'm a few days late on this one, but finally have some time at the computer to write it up!

At two months old, baby:

• Holds her head up (unless she's tired--then she slouches forward a bit)
• Supports her weight on her legs for at least 10-15 seconds
• Stands flat-footed
• Smiles big toothless grins in response to smiles
• Nurses 10 minutes to a side 6-8 times per day
• Spits up a few times a day
• Poops anywhere between twice and five times a day
• Gets the hiccups one or two times a day
• Has very thin hair except underneath the nub on the back of her head
• Rubs off the hair on the back of her nub
• Follows objects (especially her favorite ducky toy) almost 180 degrees (limited a bit by the torticollis)
• Pushes off with her legs when laying on her tummy, but ends up just skidding along her face
• Sleeps in her new (hand-me-down from a friend) papasan swing during the afternoons
• Still loves sleeping on Mommy or Daddy
• Is struggling to find a good sleep routine and fights sleep at night
• Has the most beautiful dark brown eyes that still have a bit of a ring of blue around them
• Has gorgeous, long eyelashes
• Holds her toys if you put them in her hand
• Plays with her tongue almost constantly
• Has started chewing on her tongue
• Tongues your shoulder as you hold her
• Will latch onto a finger, a cheek--anything, really
• Loves being around people--even the doctor
• Is starting to reach for toys
• Is calmed by being outside, feeling the sun and the breeze
• Sucks on her fists anytime she isn't eating or sleeping

Even though her lack of sleeping can be very frustrating, we are in love with this beautiful little girl and can't wait to see what the future months bring!

Solution?

Had another really rough night last night. We started bedtime routine and trying to get her to sleep around 9. By 10 DH had had enough rocking and I took over. I got her to fall asleep around 10:45 and took her upstairs. Within a couple of minutes, she was fussing again. DH and I both spent lots of time in her room until 11:45 when I decided to bring her back downstairs to rock some more. By this time, of course, she's overtired and starting to get hungry, I'm sure. But I got her to fall back asleep by 12:45. Took her back upstairs. Woke back up within 15 minutes. *sigh*

DH brings her in the bedroom (whenever I deal with her, I keep her in her room or take her downstairs so DH can sleep, yet when he's got her, he brings her in the bedroom...ugh) and asks, "What should we do with her?" I got upset (irrationally, exhaustedly so) and told him that if he just thought she needed to eat, I could have gotten up and taken care of it my (insert expletive here) self. I sat up, started feeding her, told DH to go to sleep. He stayed sitting up, but not doing anything useful. Told him to go to sleep again. 15 minutes later, she was sleeping.

DH took her to her room, laid her down, and she slept until 5 a.m. Not bad, but not great.

DH brings her back in the bedroom, I flood her with food (we only used one side the last feeding, so the left side hadn't been used since 8:30 p.m.), then once I finish feeding her, DH took her back to bed. She started fussing before he made it back to bed. Thankfully, he took care of her. Apparently she ended up staying up until close to 6:30 (when his alarm goes off at 6). He told me that he was getting in the shower and I would need to deal with her if she woke up. Luckily she didn't, but she didn't sleep soundly, either.

He left at 7 and I slept very lightly, listening to her squirming and groaning.

She was up for good around 8:45 and is now swaddled in her swing.

While I was feeding her this morning (at 8:45), I started trying to figure out what was different about last night as opposed to Tuesday and Wednesday night (as she had slept beautifully Tuesday and Wednesday nights--went down easily, slept for a good length of time, and went back to sleep after waking). All of a sudden, it dawned on me. Tuesday and Wednesday nights we had put a short sleeve onesie under her sleeper, but since the heat had caught up and her room was 72 degrees (and because everything I read says that overheating is a risk factor for SIDS), I didn't put anything under her sleeper. I think she might have been cold. We didn't think in the middle of the night to check her temperature, of course.

We'll be layering a lot from now on.