My Growing Girl

The past couple days have been pretty routine- nothing much to report, but here are a few tidbits and some pictures for you to enjoy...

**Most everything I've read says you can't spoil a baby this young, but I'm pretty sure we've created a high-maintenance child. If you're not holding her, she's not happy, which is why NOTHING is getting done around the house lately.

**She's been having a hard time napping during the day because the moment I try to put her down, she wakes right up and then I've got an irritable baby on my hands. I tried to follow one book's advice by continuing to pick her, wait until she's asleep, then put her right back down again- thereby 'teaching' her that she can sleep without being in my arms, and all supposedly without tears. But after doing this for an hour and a half without any success, there were definitely some tears...from me.

**I'm amazed by how quickly she's growing! I swear, she looks bigger every day. It makes me happy to see her growing in good health, but makes me sad because she'll be going off to college before you know it. I'm trying desperately to savor every moment, even the times when I feel like I'm delirious from lack of sleep and I've got a cranky baby to boot, because I know it'll all pass much too quickly and I'll miss these little moments one day.

See what I mean? Doesn't she look like such a big girl?


A playdate with my friend Julie's daughter, pretty little Gracie. Unfortunately, my Grace slept right through it...


Trying out the Hotsling- again. Because she hates being in her carseat/stroller, I'm trying to find other means of toting her around. But she'll only tolerate the Hotsling under two conditions: she has to be in an extraordinarily good mood and can only be in it for 10 minutes at a time.


I've read conflicting opinions on the use of pacifiers, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

I just realized after reviewing the pictures that most of them are of her sleeping, and this after I told you how much trouble she has sleeping. But remember that pictures can often times be very deceiving. It's just like when Mike calls to check on us during the day and I'll complain that she won't go down for a nap, but then when he gets home from work, she's happily sleeping (for the first time that day).

"Ughh- That's Disgusting!"

I'd been looking forward to this weekend because I knew I'd get a chance to sleep in a little with Mike on baby duty. It was wonderful!

And then this morning I woke up to loud exclamations of "Ughh- that's disgusting!"

I immediately jumped out of bed to find out what was going on and was greeted with Mike in the bathroom holding the baby over the sink. Apparently she had the biggest diaper blowout ever while sitting in her bouncy seat and there was evidence of the event all over the seat, her onesie and nightgown, and up her back.

I was planning on giving Grace her first real bath Sunday evening, but we had to move it up by several hours. My morning routine was completely thrown off by the unscheduled bath and cleanup so I had about 10 minutes to get myself ready for church after taking care of her. She looked adorable. I, on the other hand, need much more than 10 minutes to look decent. I'm starting to realize that I need to pad my getting ready time for any unforeseen baby events if I want to prevent the 'mommy who's let herself go' look.






Here she is after church with Kim, my wonderful Nurse Midwife who took such great care of us throughout my pregnancy, and her sweet daughter, Rosie.



Despite her early morning shenanigans, Grace was such an angel during church that we decided to risk an outing to Chili's for lunch. She did fabulously there too- she slept the entire time so that we even had time to enjoy some dessert!

Uncle Josh's Lullaby

Uncle Josh called this morning to check on his baby niece, so I set her in her crib and let them chat away. He even sang her a sweet little lullaby. And as you can see by her reaction, she absolutely loved it! Thanks, Uncle Josh, for making Grace smile.

Baby Blues

I've heard a lot about the baby blues and was fully prepared for the tears that I thought would inevitably come. My baby turned 3 weeks old and still nothing, other than when my mom left. But that wasn't caused by baby blues, that was just me missing my mama and all the comforts that she provided while she was here.

Turns out my baby blues were just delayed until I was sufficiently sleep-deprived.

I was so proud of Grace because although she is nowhere near sleeping through the night, at least she was going right back to sleep after being nursed. I don't know what happened but the past 3 nights, she has decided she doesn't quite like that schedule and has stayed up for at least an hour- leaving me with literally 2 hours of sleep each night.

And where I used to be able to recoup some of the lost sleep during her naps, she has had a difficult time napping too. Every time I put her down, she wakes up! The only way she'll sleep is if I hold her.

It also doesn't help that Mike has been going to work at 4 in the morning and coming home at 8 or later. That gives me about an hour and a half or so of 'me' time.

So with all this going on, I completely understand what the baby blues are. Now many times when Grace is crying, it's all I can do not to join her. And when Mike 'scolded' me for throwing out some cookies, I couldn't help but cry (while trying to rock the baby to sleep too). And when Mike called at 7:45pm tonight, not to say he was on the way home, but that he still had more work to do, the tears came again.

Thank goodness it's the weekend. Mike is officially on baby duty. My plan is to nurse the baby whenever she needs it and then hand her off to her daddy so I can hopefully get back some of the sleep I lost these past few days.

No matter how many baby books you read or the stories you hear, there isn't anything that can prepare you for life with a newborn.


Trying out her high chair- doesn't she look like a big girl?


This ceiling vent doesn't look like much, but to my 3 week old baby, it's the most fascinating thing in the world. She will stare at it forever.


I just love her tiny feet!


I finally found the courage to cut her teeny fingernails so she's been going without her scratch mittens and finally discovered her fingers.

A Better Day

There were less tears today so I guess we amateurs are learning.

The only other thing to note today was that Grace's belly button finally fell off. I was wondering when it would happen since everything I've read said that it usually happens after a week or two and she's already celebrated her 3 week birthday. Now she can get a proper bath!

Lola, Come Back!

If Grace could talk, she would beg Lola to come back so she wouldn't be stuck with these two amateur parents.

She was really missing her Lola yesterday. No amount of consoling from the amateurs could soothe her. She wanted what only Lola could give- the special bouncy dance and 'bonjing' song. Grace would not accept any imitation no matter how hard the amateurs tried. By the end of the day, we were all missing Lola desperately.

Thankfully she slept peacefully through the night, falling asleep immediately after her nursing sessions.

Today I spent every free minute searching all my baby books for any tips on how to soothe a baby. Like I said, amateurs...

A Special Valentine's Day

February 14th has always been important to my family, but not because of Valentine's Day- it's my parents' wedding anniversary. We can now add another special reason to celebrate the 14th- Virginia Grace was baptized today.

She was baptized on the USS George Washington because that ship is very important to both Mike and I- we were both at her commissioning, my dad is a plank owner, and we were engaged and married while Mike was stationed on the ship. So having our first child baptized on the ship seemed very fitting. And she'll get her name engraved on the ship's bell!

All dressed up in her christening gown.

It never fails, a last-minute diaper blowout...

She's officially a part of the Catholic church now!

With Lola at the reception

And finally later that night, Mike and I exchanged Valentine's Day gifts. Here's mine- a Cricut machine to help me in my scrapbooking endeavors. I know it doesn't sound romantic, but I've been wanting one for a while now so I was super happy he got me one.

Because I've been pretty preoccupied these past 3 weeks, Mike will have to make do with this Valentine's Day gift...

Sushi Night!

Although I don't want to think about my mom leaving in a couple of days, her visit is inevitably coming to an end. It's hard to believe she's been here for three weeks now- three weeks was an eternity when we were waiting on Grace to be born, but now that she's here with us, the days are going by at an unbelievable pace.

My mom hasn't had a chance to see much of Japan because we've spent our days at home enjoying the baby. We rarely ventured out except for mandatory doctor's appointments and I feel bad that she didn't get a chance to do anything touristy while she was here. So last night we took her out for sushi. If there's one thing Japan is known for, it's their sushi so if nothing else, mom can at least say she had sushi in Japan.

We tried to tell mom that the seaweed wrapping is what makes it sushi, but she tried to take it off anyway.

Apparently my daughter feels the same way about sushi as her mama- not a big fan.

One of the reasons I'm not a sushi fan...yummy???

And finally, these last couple pictures have nothing to do with sushi night. They're for the grandparents back in Virginia Beach...

Weekend recap....

Sorry for the lack of updating the last few days. Truth be told, not much has happened that was blogworthy each day. So, here's a quick summary of what happened over the entire weekend.

Here we tried out our Hotsling...it's this sling that you wear around your shoulder and it carries your baby. It's supposed to negate the need for us to carry her in her carseat. However, she didn't like being cooped up in there much more than the time it took to snap this picture. I suppose it's a lot like being in the womb all over again - and since we've taken her out of that environment, why tease her again? As a side note, I originally took another shot of this, but it was a bit wider of an angle, and it showed too much of Cicely's cleavage for the blog, so I zoomed in. The original picture, will however, work well as the 'wife and daughter' picture in my office.

We had visitors again on Saturday nite - Jackie (who is due in April), and her husband, Jack. I want to apologize to Jack, as when Cicely showed Jackie Grace's Nursery, I may have inadvertantly caused more work to pile up on her husband. Sorry dude.

This Sunday was the first time we took Grace to church - we were curious how that would turn out. Although we always told each other that our kids would behave in church no matter what, at this age, it's hard to control. Our prayers were answered - Grace was a sleeping little angel throughout the entire Mass. When the loud and annoying little kids behind me kept interrupting the sermon, I felt completely justified turning around and giving their parents 'the look'. After all, I kept my kid under control. Those amateur parents could learn a thing or two!


After Church, we went to brunch at the Officer's Club. I figured eating and holding the baby might be challenging, but as you can see, I am a master at ensuring all my food is consumed and not wasted by falling off the fork before I get to it. And yes, that waffle was very fattening. That is whipped cream you see on top. My mother will be calling shortly to berate me for it, I'm sure. Sorry Mom, I'll still love you after you tell me I'm getting fat again. Hopefully, Mom will recognize that the shirt I'm wearing is the one she got me this Christmas.

I wasn't able to get a picture, but eating and holding the baby simultaneously proved to be too much for Cicely, as her lack of coordination caused her to drop food on my daughter. I will cut her some slack however, she was nursing her under her hooter hider blanket.


Finally, today was Grace's 2 week appointment. Here she is waiting under a blanket because it was cold in the exam room, and we had to keep her in just a onesie. We were thankful that she has grown over an inch and gained a pound! She's doing us proud already!

Stretches

Grace's routine consists of eating, sleeping, and dirtying her diapers. We go through diapers like you wouldn't believe! But when she is awake, one of her favorite activities has got to be stretching. This girl loves to stretch.






The only other thing we did today was a rare venture outdoors for me to go to a doctor's appointment. I ended up with an allergic reaction after drinking some herbal tea and now I've got painfully itchy rashes on my hands and feet. I'll be fine, but I did want to share a picture of Grace in her carseat/stroller. She looks content in there, but don't be fooled. The 30 seconds or so it took me to snap this picture was the only time she wasn't crying or complaining about being in there. She does NOT like her carseat and she'll only barely tolerate it if the car is in constant motion. Heaven forbid we hit a red light and have to be still for a minute. She'll let you know she doesn't like it at all.



And finally, some Grace Face shots...

A Nap, a Bath, and Dinner Guests

Mike sometimes feels like he doesn't do as good a job at comforting Grace when she's crying like her mama and Lola can, but one look at this picture shows you that his fear is unfounded. She looks so cozy with her daddy, doesn't she?



Grace took her first semi-bath today. Her belly button hasn't fallen off yet, but I just had to wash her hair. She didn't enjoy it very much though. She screamed bloody murder the whole time and complained while we tried to change her. We are getting a lot faster at changing her, by the way. Instead of our 5 minute 45 second time, we're now down to about 2 and a half minutes. We still have a ways to go, I know, but it's progress...


We ended our day with dinner with the Estoesta family. James was our labor and delivery nurse and his adorable baby daughter, Jasmine, is Grace's first friend. They live two floors above us so we hope to have many playdates for the two of them as they get older.



And finally, another shot of 'The Grace Face'- we still have no clue what it means, but it cracks us up every time.