Saturday, June 7, 2008

Sleepy Sophie

The other day Sophie and I were coming home from having lunch at Amy's house and Sophie had gotten particularly fussy from the heat and being overly tired. She cried and screamed much of the way home in the car but as soon as I got her out of the car and into the sunlight, she fell asleep. I was so excited that she was sleeping that I left her right outside the backdoor (in a shady part of course) and watched her sleep from inside the house. It was pretty darn cute!! Later that afternoon, she also took a three hour nap (which she hasn't done since the early days when we first brought her home). She was a really sleepy little girl!!




Thursday, June 5, 2008

A Day in the Life



[except for today because Sophia woke up for the day crying at 5am]

5:30 am - 1st wake up of the day, nurse a little, go back to sleep
6:30 am - 2nd wake up of the day, nurse a little, go back to sleep
7:30 am - wake up for good. Sometimes wake up crying. Sometimes wake up happy. If crying, mommy tries nursing me or anything else to get me to stop crying. If happy, I lie in bed and coo at the ceiling fan and curtains and "talk" to mommy and daddy.
8:00 am - Mommy takes me into my room and changes my diaper. We look at my pictures (photos of me in mommy's belly and of mommy and daddy when they were my age and of my dee ree and nanny and grandpa and poppy). Sometimes if I'm feeling happy, I will lie on the changing table a while and smile and flirt with daddy and talk to mommy.
8:15 am - Depending on my mood and when I last ate, I will either nurse again with mommy in the rocking chair or else I will do "twinkle twinkle" time. "Twinkle twinkle time" is when mommy puts me in my crib and turns on my mobile which has pretty spinning flowers and plays the song "twinkle twinkle little star." If I nurse, mommy reads some books to me while I'm nursing. If we read, we always read The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Sometimes we also read Goodnight Philadelphia or The Napping House or The Red Barn.
8:45 am - We go downstairs and look out the back door to see what the weather is like for the day. Sometimes we will play a little or mommy will sit me up in the boppy and talk to me or try to cut my fingernails.
9:00 am - By this time, I'm usually sleepy again but since I don't normally take long naps mommy has to bounce me (either standing up or recently on the new exercise ball) or nurse me (or sometimes both at the same time!) until I fall asleep. If/when I fall asleep mommy will try tp put me in my vibrating papasan chair. Then, if she successfully can put me down in the vibrating chair without waking me up, I will sleep a little. This is usually when mommy will try to sneak a shower in. I know this because many times I will wake up and not let her get one yet. Eventually, she does get one (usually) even if it's only a very, very quick one or even if I'm awake by the time she gets out.
10:00-11:00 am - Depending on what day it is, we either go to mommy's breast-feeding supprt group or we go to Aunt Amy's house or Aunt Amy comes to our house with my friends Max, Charlotte and Trey. Or, if my Dee Ree has a day off, she comes over to help mommy take care of me. Sometimes, we have a special outing to the zoo or to New Jersey. Sometimes, mommy and I just hang out here at the house (but usually that makes for a very long day).
3:00 - 4:00 pm - By this time in the day, I get a little more cranky and tired depending on how much sleep (or lack thereof) I might have gotten during the day. Mommy tries all sorts of tricks to try and get me to sleep and/or to stop crying including taking me out for a walk in the stroller or putting me in the baby bjorn and taking me outside to water flowers or just walk around. What can I say, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
6:15 pm - Daddy comes home. Sometimes mommy is so excited by this she and I are waiting in the driveway for him! Mommy likes to let Daddy hold me as soon as he walks in the door. She figures he must miss me so much since he hasn't gotten to hold or kiss me since the morning. And, he does miss me and can't wait to hold me. Usually, it's not very long that he is holding me or playing with me that I'm crying again because I'm getting very tired by now. So usually Daddy will get dinner together (either by cooking it or putting out whatever Dee Ree brought over). Mommy holds me and nurses me while she eats dinner and lately I've been falling asleep by about 7:30-8pm in her arms. Up until about a week ago, mommy and daddy had to take turns bouncing me while the other ate dinner. Also up until about a week ago, they would take me upstairs and mommy would nurse me or they'd take turns bouncing me to the soothing sounds of a hairdryer or vaccum or other white noise until I fell asleep. But, recently I've been just falling asleep in mommy's arms and she carries me up to bed around 8:30-9pm - She puts me in my co-sleeper bed and I stay sleeping until about 12:30am usually.
12:30 am - At that time I wake up and mommy nurses me. I go back to sleep, usually next to mommy in bed now, until I start waking up again around 4am or 5am when I'm hungry again.
And, the day starts all over. It's a pretty exciting life and lots of changes happen every week. Of course, throughout each day mommy and I sing some songs and play with some toys. Sometimes, we will have a photo shoot. Sometimes, she tries to put me on my tummy but I don't quite like that yet. Sometimes, she will try to give me a bath but I don't like that yet either. Each day we try some new things. Each day I do something new or like something new or don't like something new. It's all very exciting, don't you think??

Monday, June 2, 2008

Friday, May 30, 2008

Thumb-sucking, kimonos and more...

Thankfully, Sophie has actually taken a liking to one of her many, many baby items - the baby papasan. I can actually put her down sometimes now for stretches of anywhere from 5-30 mins without her getting upset. When she is asleep in it, she doesn't slide down but when she is awake, all of her moving and kicking cause her to slide down if I haven't strapped her in. (Note to Grandmas - please don't worry... I will be strapping her in more now that she gets so wiggly.)

I was bouncing her on the new excercise ball and looked down and she was sucking away on her thumb!! Of course, when I took the camera out and snapped a photo, she stoped. Sorry, Sophie!

You may recall that Jim and I bought her some fun clothes back in January from a store called Lucky Wang in NYC. Well, here she is sporting her kimono!! Look at those thighs!

Kimono, jeans and a smile - what a great look!

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Stinking cute, 2 month well-baby, first vaccines








Jim took some really wonderful photos of Sophie over the weekend. Here's a sampling of them above.

Today we had Sophie's 2 month check-up. She got her first vaccines today - DTaP and Rotavirus. I was very nervous about it. I really would prefer to not give her any vaccines because they contain so many chemicals and other ingredients that we just don't know the long-term effects of fully yet but it seems somehow not fair to not vaccinate her and increase risks to her and other babies because of it. We have decided to follow Dr. Robert Sears' alternate vaccination schedule as opposed to the AAP schedule to at least minimize possible risks and side-efects. She did great and screamed when the shot went in her leg but then was fine after I held her. She did much better than I did with it! She weighed in at 11 lbs, 11 ounces and 23 inches long. Her bigness is astonishing!

Monday, May 26, 2008

Happy Memorial Day and 2 Month Birthday

Sophie smiles

Happy 2 Month Birthday, Sophie!!

DeeRee and PopPop love you!

Happy 2 Month Birthday, Sophie! We celebrated very informally by having Pop Pop and Dee Ree over for dinner. Together we all sang to Sophie (while she was sleeping) and then took some photos of her with her strawberry shortcake out on the deck (though she was sort of in night-time meltdown mode by then).

Sophie had a good weekend with a whole extra day with Daddy! We all enjoyed the extra time together. Sophie is doing really well and had many milestone moments this weekend. She went to the Lansdowne Farmers Market for the first time and mostly slept in her stroller. She also went in the Baby Bjorn several times and even fell asleep in in a few times! I wish I had her in this for our zoo trip on Friday but at least we know we can bring it for our next zoo trip this coming weekend. We also got an excercise ball from Target on Sunday (while Dee Ree watched Sophie so Jim and I could run several errands) and Sophie loves being bounced by someone sitting on it. This is a nice break from the standing up bouncing we've been doing for the last two months since previously you could never sit down and bounce her. Finally, she is really spending more time in her Baby Papasan (vibrating chair) and even has slept in it a few times! This is great progress! She is still um, shall we say "challenged" when it comes to taking naps during the day but her night sleeping is going really well so we really can't complain. She is definitely crying less than before though she still has tough patches. She is so huge and I can't wait to see how much weight and length she has gained in the past month when we take her in to the pediatrician for her two month check-up tomorrow.

Saturday, May 24, 2008

1st Trip to the Philadelphia Zoo



Sophie and I had our first trip to the wonderful Philadelphia Zoo on Friday. We went with three other moms and their kids so there was quite a big group of us there. Sophie did ok. She started to cry as soon as I got us in line to buy tickets. I basically had to hold her the entire three hours there and she refused to go back in the stoller. I think she was pretty overwhelemd by all the sights and sounds because the Zoo was incredibly packed with field trips and families (being a holiday weekend and all). Still, we did it and had a nice time overall. We're actually going back to the Zoo next weekend with Jim's cousins Chris and Judi and their kids CJ and newborn baby Madeline Rose. So, we joined as members! It's official - we're part of the "people who have kids and take them to the zoo as members club" - woohoo!