Nineteen Weeks!

Weight: Baby girl's becoming a bit of a heavy weight (at least to us, anyway, since she started out so tiny)! I'm guessing she's around 12 pounds now.

Sleep: As mentioned last week, baby girl has hit that four-month sleep slump. I've read quite a bit that it's very common for babies to have this change at four months, even after being good nighttime sleepers previously. Anyway, Lizzie continues on this sleep slump track, typically waking up two to three times each night. I've tried to just give her her pacifier and help her go back to sleep, but she is really genuinely hungry... so we're eating throughout the night. I keep wondering if she's having a brain-growth spurt right now (physical growth spurts usually happen at four and six months, so I'm not anticipating that's what's going on right now, but you never know). Daycare has mentioned that her napping has shifted, and we've noticed that at home over the weekend, too. She's now taking a cat-nap for her morning nap (as in, 15 minutes!), but then taking a very hefty afternoon nap, as well as another cat-nap (about double her morning nap) one other time in the late afternoon/early evening. Regardless, she's one happy baby, even in the morning without much of a nap.

I will also mention that Lizzie is still sleeping in our room in her bassinet next to our bed. Initially the purpose for this was because she was just a little babe... and then it was because I wanted to wait to move her until four months because that's when the SIDS risk decreases -- but at this point, I have no excuse :) I know I'm just prolonging her time there and that it's probably more for me than it is for her at this point. But she still fits in it! And she's still waking to eat at night, so it's perfect for us right now.

Buuut I know I'll shed a few tears when she does finally move out.

So prolong it, we will :) At least for now.

Medical Issues: Nada :)

Clothes: Still in our 0 to 3 month clothes. She doesn't look like she'll be growing out of them any time soon, though when she does, I know it'll be because of her length.

Socialite!: Aside from hanging out with her daycare babies, baby girl got to hang out with grandmas, grandpas and even a great grandma and grandpa last weekend to celebrate her daddy's birthday last weekend! Too bad the party didn't start until around 8:00, so that was just about the time she checks out for the night and goes to sleep. We tried to keep her up, but poor baby's eyelids were just too heavy :) She also got to spend an afternoon with Great Grandma earlier this week when daycare closed early due to an issue with construction nearby. From what I heard, she was a sweet baby (no surprise there, of course ;)) and had a great time!

Diet: Still nursing Lizzie exclusively (lucky mommy -- even after I've gone back to work!).

Baby Gear Love: Lizzie girl loves her O-Ball, as mentioned over the past number of weeks. She's also loving books, especially a black and white book sent to us from the Dolly Parton Imagination Library. She gets ridiculously excited and kicks her legs whenever we read it :)

Crying: She is one sweet baby. She's only fussy if she's hungry or tired :)

Mommy News: Not a whole lot to report. I'm still getting used to shedding hair again (my poor bathroom floor!) and I'm trying to ramp up my eating a bit again, as it seems I'm losing weight, which isn't what I'm wanting to do. I continue to research how we'll start solids with Lizzie girl. I'm pretty sure we've made a decision about it, but it basically omits using baby food altogether -- and I'm still adjusting to that idea, because I always thought that could be kind of fun (though I know it can be a struggle, too).

Milestones: Baby girl is starting to sit pretty tall in her Bumbo seat and obviously feeling more and more confident in it! She's finding her toes more and more, but seems to lack caring about those silly things attached to her legs :) She's also starting to reach for things on her left side with her right hand (or vice-versa), which results in her rolling onto her side -- which means she just might get the hang of rolling from back-to-front coming up (though who knows if it'll be soon!)... she's already got the back-to-front roll down :) Her giggles seem to be easier and easier to elicit (all it took over the weekend was to touch those little feet!), but sometimes it seems she's less smiley and less chatty than others -- my mom and I think it's because she's busy working on developing another skill, so she's preoccupied, because I know I've read that.

My favorite thing that she's been doing lately has been what I honestly believe is singing along with me. At night, we rockabye to sleep, and I sing Lizzie different songs. It seems her most favorite recently is one based on John 3:16 that we sang last year with the kids at school during the Lent season, because whenever I sing it, she smiles wide (no matter how sleepy she is) and her little voice chimes in at just the right pitch at certain times in a little "aah". It's beautiful, and I believe she's trying to sing along. And I wish, I wish, I wish, I could just keep those moments in my pocket forever. She is a sweetie.

Eighteen Weeks!

Weight: I'm guessing Lizzie girl is right around 11 1/2 pounds right now, based on her official four-month weight a week or so ago.

Sleep: For much of the past week, baby girl has been doing an awesome job sleeping. She's been waking up only at 4:00 to eat, which is perfect, because we wake her up for the day and to eat at 6:30 -- which is close to being a perfect "duration" between feedings (when she wakes at 5:00 and wants to eat, I need to feed her again right away at 6:30 for daycare/school reasons since I'm still nursing her, and since it's only been an hour and a half, she's not really all that hungry again). She went through a streak of waking only at 4:00 a.m. all week until we got to the weekend. Friday night into Saturday morning, baby girl woke at both 2:00 and 5:00... and then last night, she was up to eat at midnight, 2:00 and 5:00! I let her know in the morning that she was a little piglet overnight :) I've heard rumors that at four months, babies can "regress" in terms of sleeping through the night, so maybe that's it. Or, maybe she's having a brain growth-spurt, so she needs her food! Either way, I'm happy to oblige. I know these middle-of-the-night dates won't last forever. Some of my favorite moments are when I burp her after she eats in the quiet darkness and she snuggles in, falling fast asleep over my shoulder. I could sit in those moments forever.

Medical Issues: Nada :)

Clothes: Still in our 0 to 3 month, and lookin' good!

Socialite!: Sweet girl has just been hanging out with the daycare kids for the most part, and seeing her grandparents here and there, too :)

Diet: Still nursing Lizzie exclusively (lucky mommy -- even after I've gone back to work!).

Baby Gear Love: Our O-Ball is slowly coming to the front of the pack in terms of favorites. She loves that it's easy to grab (which she does with two hands now! Very coordinated ;)), and it's so cute to watch her try to eat it because her tongue just goes right through it :) She's also slowly becoming a big fan of her Go Baby Go 1-2-3 Snail -- she likes his light up face, and he gives her something to do during tummy time :)

Crying: She is one sweet baby. She's only fussy if she's hungry or tired :)

Mommy News: Not much in the "Mommy" department, really. I've noticed again just how extra emotional I've become. A few days a week, I go to the Y after work and walk. I flip through the channels, mostly spending my time watching the Food Network -- but I've happened upon Extreme Makeover: Home Edition a few times. All I mostly care to watch is the big reveal at the end -- which is, of course, very dramatic. Anyway, I found myself watching it today and the family who was given a new home had children around the age of two with very severe physical and mental disabilities. I was struck, over and over, at just how much they reminded me of my sweet girl and how much I love her. The love a parent has for their child, disability or not, is so overwhelming in such an amazing way. So there I was, walking on the treadmill, blinking back tears because of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Seriously? Sadly, the episode ended with the news that their youngest child passed away two weeks after the episode aired, followed up by a montage of home video and photos of this precious girl. You can just about guess what ensued as a result: I was sniffling and had some of those "can't-catch-my-breath" cries. Oofsch. Can't let me watch a darn thing anymore.

Also: we celebrate this day with big cheers! September 23rd will always be a special day for us. It's the day I took the pregnancy test that told us we were expecting a sweet baby. It's the day I stood in the bathroom, shaking with disbelief. It's the day that was one day after Andy's 24th birthday, the day I put that little stick in a gift bag and presented it as a "belated birthday gift" to let him know he'd be a daddy. It's the day we started this journey, only hoping it would end up being half as good as it is today. It's the day that I thought nothing would be sweeter than -- but the days only got sweeter from there. It's a good day to celebrate.

Milestones: This week, baby girl started something new: using her jumperoo! I came over to daycare to feed her one morning, and I found her sitting up like such a big girl in a jumperoo they had -- I was so impressed! I thought she might be ready to use the one we have at home, but didn't think her head and neck control were quite there yet. But apparently daycare did, so they threw caution into the wind and put her in it -- and she did great! So that night, I unpacked ours and put it together... and though she has pretty much no  reaction to it yet (aside from chewing on the seat in front of her), I still think it's pretty cool that she's able to sit in it at all. She's also sitting in her Bumbo now for short periods, grabbing at things with impressive skill (and utilizing two hands, coordinated flawlessly :)). She's pretty awesome!

Seventeen Weeks!

Weight: We got the official stats this week at Lizzie's four-month (!) appointment. Lizzie Bear is now 11 pounds, 6 1/2 ounces and is 24 1/2 inches long. This means she's up six pounds, two ounces from her birth weight and up 5 1/2 inches from her initial length. I find it insane just how fast she's grown (especially in length!), as well as the fact that she's just three feet shorter than I am. Weeeird.

Sleep: Lizzie is an awesome sleeper. She still varies from  night-to-night, in terms of how many times (or I should say if) she wakes up. Some nights, she doesn't wake at all until 5:00 a.m., and then goes back to sleep again after eating. Others, she'll wake up at 2:00 and 5:00 to eat. I've noticed that if the bedroom is cool, she'll wake more often, so I'm going to start adding another blanket to her at night. One night, she slept clear through the night, from 8:00 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. -- and we had to wake her at 6:30 that time. The thing we're blessed with is that Lizzie girl always has no trouble going right back to sleep after waking in the middle of the night. According to daycare, as well as our own weekend observations, her naps continue to be short and sweet, unless someone is holding her -- then she'll sleep the day away! :)

Medical Issues: Not a one :) We're so blessed. Lizzie's doctor said she's looking fabulous at her four-month appointment this last week!

Clothes: Hanging out in our 0 to 3 month clothes right now, and not showing any signs of growing out of them any time soon.

Socialite!: Lizzie traveled to Fargo with us last Sunday for my Uncle Dave's birthday party, where she met another Lizzie (who will be joining the DeCock clan in the future, as she just became engaged to my cousin... yahoo!), and saw relatives that she hasn't seen since she was just a few weeks old! She also saw her aunts, uncles and cousins, of course :) Otherwise, she's just hanging out with her daycare kiddos. Apparently she enjoys watching all of the action that the older infants give :)

Diet: Still nursing Lizzie exclusively.

Baby Gear Love: Loving our Taggies blanket, as well as the play gym and the Bright Starts Activity Bar on our carseat :)

Crying: She's a sweet girl! Only cries when she's hungry or tired basically :)

Mommy News: I've returned to teaching Pilates again for the fall schedule at the Y. I was a little uneasy about adding something else to my schedule, but it's great because I pick Lizzie up right after school on Fridays, head home and play for an hour, and then Andy comes home from work and I take off to go teach, so I feel better leaving her because she's getting some Daddy time. Anyway, I'd taken a few weeks off and my glutes, abs and thigh muscles could definitely feel it the next day.

In other Mommy News, I think I've finally hit the stage where the hair that didn't fall out while pregnant is now falling out. I don't notice that it's excessive, as I have heard from some people, but instead more typical of what it was like before I got pregnant. Plus, I have lots of hair, so I don't think I'll really notice a change in thickness because of it.

Finally, on the daycare front: I'm still uneasy about the whole "working mom" thing, in all honesty. But I do love my job and my third graders, so that helps during the day. And really, I can't complain: baby girl's across the street, so I still nurse exclusively for all feedings except for one the entire week. Still, it makes me sad that I only get to enjoy her awake for a few hours. It is getting better, though -- less tears than there were those first few weeks.

We're also starting to get serious about buying a high chair and about deciding how and when to start solids. I'm intrigued by "baby-led weaning" and am doing some reading on it for the time being. I'll keep you posted on what that is and what we decide in the coming weeks.
 

I'm just loving every moment I have with this sweet babe. She loves to dance, and she loves to be sung to. She's getting bigger now, heftier. When I rock her to sleep at night, I wrap my arms all the way around her and rest my head on hers and sing her to sleep with songs I've sung her since she was in my tummy. Sometimes I wonder if she'll start singing "Imagine" by John Lennon, or "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (amongst others) and know all the words when she's a toddler. I hope she can remember my voice and how I used to sing to her every night. Some nights, we sit in her rocker, long after she's fallen asleep. And while I have buckets of other things to do, I don't really care. Because I want to do that instead. And in those moments, I pray my prayers of thanks, for every giggle, every dirty diaper, for each finger and toe, for this little snuggle bug to cuddle. And I pray that God will help me remember just what she smelled like, what she looked like while so peacefully asleep, and especially, what it felt like to hold her in my arms. I wish I could bottle those moments up.

Milestones: I am continually blown away with how much our sweet girl is changing. She is babbling like nobody's business, and her giggles are getting easier and easier to elicit and more and more common all the time! Love it. Her head control is also very impressive these days, getting better and better all the time. She's just started to find and grab onto her feet, which has been so sweet to witness! She's tracking with impressive accuracy now, and doesn't mind tummy time anymore. She's also just started to reach for toys on her tummy a teensy bit.

Sixteen Weeks!

Weight: Andy took Lizzie to his work over the weekend while I was gone and found out that she's weighing around 11.25 pounds right now, but we'll get the official stats this week at her four-month appointment.

Sleep: Sleep continues to be very good overall.  This last week she's slept until 5:00 a.m. a couple of nights (mornings?). The strange thing is, some nights she reverts back to waking up twice at 2:00 and 5:00, rather than just the one time. I haven't found a connection between anything in particular and her nights when she wakes twice, but I'm not too worried about it since she just eats and goes right back to sleep when she does wake.

Medical Issues: None! She does seem to have a little bit of a stuffy nose this week, but nothing major.

Clothes: Filling out our 0 to 3 month clothes nicely these days :)

Socialite!: Lizzie's just been hanging out with her daycare buddies these days, though my third graders have already been begging to meet her!

Diet: I've been so blessed to still be nursing Lizzie exclusively, even after returning to work. There is only one feeding each week that I think I'll need to have her take expressed milk in a bottle. Her being across the street has worked out so wonderfully for this purpose so far.  She eats every two to three hours right now (except for at night).

Baby Gear Love: We're LOVING our toys this week. She's got her O-Ball, which she loves, but even more than that, she loves another neat red and white ball with little beads that slide around on it. She's also a huge fan of her Taggies blanket with a puppy on it. She grabs him by the ears and brings him to her mouth and gnaws on him while she jabbers at us :) Still a popular item is the activity bar that we put on her car seat that my parents gave her -- she loves chit-chatting with the tiger on it on the way to daycare in the morning :)

Crying: She's a sweet girl! Only cries when she's hungry or tired basically :)

Mommy News: I'll admit it: daycare and school are getting better. I'm lucky that I have a job I love, because while I'm there, I am enjoying myself and my mind is completely occupied. But it's the nights that are tough -- I just feel like I don't have enough hours in the day to enjoy her. I want to spend as much time as possible with Lizzie girl, so we play and play and play all night and push bedtime back as far as we can until Lizzie is either too tired to play or too fussy to have fun anymore. And once she goes to bed, it's time to make lunches, pack diaper bags, pick out clothes (for mama and baby girl), and then it's time for bed. But I do think we're falling into more of a routine, which helps.

I also went to the Taylor Swift concert in Fargo on Friday night. The original plan was to have Lizzie and Andy come with, but after some discussion, we decided it would be best if Lizzie stayed home and didn't make the four-hour round-trip because it wouldn't be much fun for her. So I might have shed a few tears about hardly getting to see her at all on Friday, aside from seeing her when I fed her during the workday and for a half-hour after school, but it was the right thing for her. Baby girl didn't need to spend time in the car seat just because I wanted to hang out with her. Plus, she got some quality time with Daddy... and it was probably good for me to experience that separation for once (but not again!).

Milestones: Lizzie girl is changing so much these days! She talks and jabbers non-stop... no sound is sweeter! And she's been laughing! Another sound that's so sweet! She's given a few really good belly laughs -- usually once or twice a day for the past few days, which I'm sure will only increase from here. So sweet! Her head control continues to improve, and she's been able to keep her head in-line with her body a few times when I take her hands and slowly bring her up to a seated position from lying on the floor, which she hadn't done before. She's also been grabbing things with both hand and taking them to her mouth more easily lately. I think we're on the brink of rolling over from back to front, as well. She gets her legs up super high and rolls onto her side, which I assume is what starts the roll-over process. Another thing we've noticed is that she is turning very easily during tummy time. If I lay her down on her tummy facing me, it won't be long before she's turned herself a quarter-turn away from me :)

Fifteen Weeks!

Weight: My best guess is somewhere around 11 pounds.

Sleep: Sleep has been awesome as of late. Her naps are slowly getting longer (according to daycare [insert sad face] anyway) and at night, she's only waking once around 4:00 a.m. like clockwork. I'm still feeding her when she wakes rather than just trying to pop her pacifier in and letting her "soothe" back to sleep on her own because she's still a peanut, so I figure she could use an extra eating session anyway :) After that, she goes back to sleep until we wake her to get ready for daycare (again, insert sad face!).

Medical Issues: None!

Clothes: Though we have a few items that are still working in newborn sizes, most of what we're wearing these days are 0 to 3 month sizes... woohoo! Our jammies that we were swimming in a few weeks ago that are 0 to 3 months are now fitting pretty well, specifically in length.
Socialite!: Since Lizzie's gone to daycare now, she's kind of a little socialite every day! I've also been showing her off around school here and there if/when I bring her over to feed her (daycare is across the street, and since we've been having work days without kiddos, I've been able to bring her to my room to feed her), so she's had lots of opportunities to see some faces she hasn't seen in awhile :)

Diet: Milk -- still nursing exclusively. We'll see how it goes when I go back to school -- as mentioned, she is daycaring across the street. This gives me the amazing opportunity to feed her throughout the day on a prep in the morning, at lunch time, and after school. I'm not sure that I will nurse her during that morning prep (I have a few days where my prep doesn't line up, too), but if I don't, I'll pump in its place. I just feel like it's a little hard for me to feed her during that time -- so she may be getting a bottle of expressed milk for her morning feeding, which I'm completely fine with. I've been storing up over the summer just for this purpose.

Baby Gear Love: This week I'm going to give a shout-out to Tommee Tippee bottles, since we've had to use them a few times since Lizzie started daycare this week. She's had no trouble taking a bottle even though I nursed her exclusively all summer. They say those style of bottles are "closest to nature" -- I have no idea if that's true, but I do know that Lizzie girl has had no troubles switching between bottles and nursing.

Crying: She's a sweet girl! Only cries when she's hungry or tired basically :)

Mommy News: It's been a rough week emotionally. I went back to work for good on Monday of this last week, and it was tough every day. On Tuesday, baby girl cried when I handed her over :( Obviously there were plenty of tears from both mom and baby that morning. Mostly, I struggle at night, though. When all's said and done and we were finally home, it was 5:00 -- almost time to start making supper. And after supper's been made, eaten and cleaned up, it's not too far off that she needs to go to bed. We try to squeeze in every last minute of play time, snuggle time and reading book time that we can before it's bed time, but it just doesn't feel like enough time. And it breaks my heart.

What's also hard is that when we get home, I unbuckle her from her seat and lay her on the floor on her blanket so we can giggle and talk and play -- and all I can think of as my sweet girl babbles and smiles at me, is "Has anyone really looked at you today? Has anyone tried to make you laugh? Has anyone really talked to you today, and tried to get you to talk back?" And not that I'm faulting daycare -- if they don't do those things, it's probably not because they're neglecting her,  but rather because they just don't have the time with all the other kids around. Plus, I'm her momma -- so I'm probably over-the-top about those things when I'm home with her all day anyway and my expectations are maybe a bit high. Regardless, I can't shut out those thoughts each day, and those break my heart, too.

So then I started thinking that going back to work was a mistake. Not that I don't like my job -- I do, in fact, I love it. But I love my baby. And would I regret not staying home with her during these years? Ah! The torment. But after a lot of thinking, praying and talking to lots of good people, I've decided that I need to give it some more time and let us develop a routine. My goal is to be out the door in the morning early enough to be at school by 7:00 a.m. (which means waking up before 6:00 to get myself ready and to get Lizzie fed and ready, too... yikes!) -- this should allow me to get a good chunk of work done before school, so I don't have to stay so late after school. That way, I can pick her up with what feels like plenty of time to play. And after talking with my principal about it, maybe a better solution for all of this is to quiet those nagging thoughts by having Lizzie spend some time with her two grandmas a few afternoons a week. That way, I'll know someone is talking to her, making her smile, making her laugh. So I feel good about things right now as I head into the first day of school in a few days.

Milestones: This week, we really noticed that Lizzie girl is using both of her hands more. She'd seemed to favor looking to the left and using only her left hand (to which I reacted by being afraid that she'd be a lefty! Oh no! Terrible! Yeah, I'm crazy) prior to this week. Anyway, using both hands more means that she's been putting her hands together, which is a big milestone for babies! She's also exhibiting better head control all the time and is continuing to babble more. We're hearing more consonant sounds now, rather than just vowel sounds. She's also let out just a few legit laughs in the last few days :) We've also noticed that she kind of hums to herself when we put her down if she's not fully asleep, which is amazingly cool. I always sing her to sleep when I rock her, so it's probably the sweetest thing we've ever heard. Her little voice is our favorite sound!