A special day

It might just be wishful thinking, but as Emma and I watched the Inauguration this morning, I swear she started paying attention to the television as President Obama spoke.

I don't have words to describe how amazing today feels for me.  Watching Emma sort of focus on the television while our new President spoke was just a little too much for me to handle.  I'm filled with so much hope for her and for the world that she will grow up in.

Photos!

Back by popular demand...

Miss Emma!

Playing with her baby "gym"

Wearing her adorable froggy suit

I'm a big kid now

JMT and I have now reached adulthood.  No, it wasn't the birth of our child that got us here.  It was finally purchasing a set of matching dining room chairs.  They even match our table!

I ordered them on sale from West Elm, and they arrived today.  In a fit of domesticity, I assembled the chairs, cleaned the upstairs extensively (I even mopped!) and carried three loads of cardboard and bottles down to the city recycling dumpster parked down the street.

Hooray for daycare!

Clean bill of health

Emma had her two-month appointment with the pediatrician yesterday.  After a thorough once-over, she was deemed a perfectly functioning two-month old.  We talked about Emma's recent fussiness, and the ped gave us this knowing smile and said something about as comforting as "Yup, that's a baby for ya."  

Her height and weight are progressing okay, as are her developmental milestones.  Emma showed us up after I told the doc that she only occasionally pushes her whole top half up off the floor when we're having tummy time.  The doctor rolled her on her belly, and Em immediately did her little baby push-up, making me look foolish.  But that's okay.

The worst part of the visit was the shots.  She got three shots in her little meaty thighs, and one oral vaccine.  John had to hold her down on the table for the shots, while I sat on the bench and tried not to cry.  She rebounded beautifully though, and within a minute was happily nursing like nothing ever happened.  No sign of reactions to the shots yet, but keeping an extra watchful eye.  Not particularly difficult since I had to work until after midnight last night!

Dear Mr. Graco

Thank you for inventing the Graco Silhouete infant swing. Its 2 speed soothing vibrations, removable deluxe body support and fabric covered motion mobile were a life-saver last night.

JMT and I had been avoiding purchasing a swing because we'd heard that it was an expensive item that would only be useful for a few weeks. Then Friday night happened. Emma could. not. be. consoled. She screamed at max volume, flailing and making herself hoarse for two hours on JMT's watch before he passed the baton. I was only able to get her quiet by nursing her, which I did constantly from 2 am to 8 am.

After a little reading, we realized that Miss Emma fits the textbook definition of colic to a T. Three or more hours of fussiness/crying a day, three or more days a week, for three weeks. Damn. Thats us.

Saturday morning, I re-read all of my sleep books and realized we are doing everything that's suggested... except a swing. So off to Target we went. And as it turns out, every other parent of an Infant in Southwest C-Springs must have had the same night we did, because they were completely out of swings. Not one left in stock.

Under normal circumstances, I would have taken that as a sign that we should give up, but yesterday I was determined. So I took JMT to Babies R Us, and we struggled for quite a while, trying to decide between the Silhouette, and a $40 cheaper model that appeared to be no different except without the 2 speed soothing vibrations. We discussed the merits of each model for a good while, but realized that if the cheaper swing didn't work, we'd always second guess our decision, thinking that maybe the vibration mode would have been the secret.

So, long installation story later, the swing was up and running last night. Emma fussed for exactly one minute when we put her in it, and was asleep 11 minutes later. I had resolved that it would be okay for her to sleep in the swing at night, but tried to put her to bed in her crib just in case she was soothed enough to get over the fact that every night for the past month, she's reacted to the crib as if it were electrified and shocking her every time we laid her down in it. It worked! She slept in her crib for four hours last night! She woke up to eat twice between midnight and 7, and is calmer and more composed this morning after a good night's sleep than she's been in a while.

Thank you Mr. Graco!

Things I love

On a nearly daily basis over the past month, I've thought to myself that I should get on the ball and post some updates here. But then every day, life takes over and I don't get around to it. Today I read a post on A Little Pregnant that summed up my dilemma well.

I had a moment of utter gratitude this morning that my life has turned out the way it has. So I thought it would be a good exercise this morning to make a list of things that I love.

-Most obviously---my family. JMT, Emma, our parents and siblings, and our friends. I am blessed to be surrounded by so many amazing people who love me and who I love.
-Those moments where Emma is standing in my lap, looking over my shoulder at something thoroughly fascinating, and then her knees buckle and she's just a tiny pile of baby in my lap looking up at me like "What just happened?" (yes, I'm supporting her weight with my hands under her arms--no worries)
-My new mac. I'm typing on it now. It makes me happy.
-Emma's bouncy chair. G-d only knows why it makes her so happy. But anything that makes her that happy (and quiet) makes me happy. Very happy.
-Wearing yoga pants on maternity leave. My jeans fit (about which I'm very happy too) but there's nothing as cozy and versatile as these yoga pants! And I got the ones that are made for "tall" people, so they're actually long enough and don't look like ill fitting high water pants.
-The movie WALL-E. JMT and I watched it last night. It was precious. As far as animated movies go, it's one that I won't mind hearing a thousand times from the backseat of the car when Emma is at that stage.
-Emma's gummy smiles. At first I fell into the "It's just gas" camp when it came to Emma's smiles, but now she smiles with her whole self, and you can tell that she really means it. If you could only see her eyes during one of her smiles, you'd know she was truly happy.

There are a thousand other things I could mention in this post. But right now something else that I love just happened. Emma just fell asleep! I'm going to take the opportunity to take a short nap. But before I do---I'll pose this challenge. Whether it's in print, a comment to this post, or just in your head, take a few minutes today to think of a few things that you love too. And then take a nap.

Ooh!

This afternoon, I was spending some quality time bouncing Miss Emma on my lap when she looked at me and said "Ooh!" clear as day. Then she looked surprised as all get out for a moment. Up until now, her only noises have been varying volumes of cries, hiccups, and an occasional "pip" in her sleep. It was such a touching moment!

Here's a photo of her today in her monkey jumper:

Emma Update

The past 2.5 weeks have been busy ones. My mom came for a week and helped a tremendous amount while we were first getting settled. JMT had to work like a fiend that week, and having mom here was so helpful--both for me and for John's peace of mind.

This last week, JMT's family was here for Thanksgiving. It was great seeing the whole family, and they all loved seeing Miss Emma.

Here are some photo highlights...

Our first walk in the park


Daddy's Lap


Mom never wanted to let her go

Before and After

I am a little late in posting a final "holy cow, you are ROUND" photo, but here goes anyhow:



And here is the end result:



Our Miss Emma was born a week ago today, on November 11 at 9:44 pm. She was 7 pounds 9 ounces and 20.5 inches long. One of these days, I'll write down the whole story of her birth (14 hours of labor, and then a C-section) but I'll save that for another day.

In case you had forgotten that I'm round...

John took this photo of me this weekend when we were on our way home from Vail.  We would have liked to take more photos there, but unfortunately between the weather (cold rains) and having to get an early start home due to highway closures, we didn’t spend much time exploring.  We did get to see the last of the gorgeous Aspens in their golden splendor, the first snow of the fall, and spend some great time together.  It may well have been our last trip to the mountains without a mountain of baby gear in the trunk, so we did our best to enjoy it.

 

Baby Shower Photos

I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to post these, but a few weeks back, my friends threw me the best baby shower!  It was a gorgeous day, gorgeous setting, and so many lovely gifts.  Thank you all.

 

 

It's a....

Nursery!

With some help from Patty this weekend, I finished assembling the crib and moving furniture around in the guest room this weekend.  It’s now officially a nursery!  I keep finding myself sitting aimlessly in the easy chair we put in there and staring at the peaceful, uncluttered room.

A true mark of adulthood--this room is the first I’ve put together where all of the furniture matches!  Now that the room is all put together and organized, I’m starting to feel like this is all so much more real.  And like I might actually be approaching “ready”.  We’ll see!

 

I don't think that was very nice

The last week or so has been a little dramatic on the baby front. Last week, I had my first trip to the hospital after my routine OB visit revealed that all of the Braxton-Hicks I've been having had led me to be about 50% effaced. JMT and I went up to the fanciest of the hospitals here in town--it just opened last month--and I had a fetal fibronectin test, a non-stress test, and an ultrasound. All three showed that I'm not progressing into "real" labor yet, but in the mean time I'm taking it very easy and taking procardia to limit the impact of my contractions.

Last week also marked the first of our birthing classes at the public hospital near our house. The first week was fine. We practiced relaxation exercises and JMT fell asleep. Last night we had our second class, which led me to the title of this post. After we watched a video on relaxation techniques, we spent a half hour with the mamas doing relaxation exercises while our partners gave us shoulder and neck massages. It was heaven! Then the nurse who runs the class had all the partners go get bags of ice. I figured we were all goign to practice sucking on ice chips or placing the ice bags in the various places demonstrated in the video.

No.

The masochistic nurse lady had the mamas simulate contractions by immersing our hands in the bags of ice for 60-90 seconds so we could "practice our relaxation techniques in a stressful situation." It was torture! I swear my hand is still tender this morning. All told, we did about 10 "contractions" that way. I don't think this was very nice. At all. I had been stress-free for the first time in days in my blissful, massaged, happy place after the first 30 minutes of the exercises, and then I Had My Hand Submerged In A Bag Of Freezing Cold Ice. No. Not very nice at all.

The upside of the whole ice experiment is that JMT got a good chuckle. He's been having one of those super stressed-out weeks where he could work 100 hours a week and still not be done, worries about me having the kid early, and a variety of house projects that aren't finished. Watching me squirm and curse over the ice business drew him out of that for a little while. Now he's on a plane to DC for the rest of the week, and I'm going to try to finagle it so that some of his house worries are taken care of when he gets home.

29 weeks--in Portland

Home and settled from our last pre-baby vacation.  JMT and I had a great weekend away, but we could have used an extra day or two to really see everything we wanted to see.  As it was, we focused on some of the funky neighborhoods in and around downtown.  Downtown Portland reminded both JMT and I of an exceptionally walkable Boulder/Denver hybrid.  If we’d had another day, we would have driven out to the coast.  Next time!

Since it was only a three day trip, we still had Sunday and Monday to do work at the house.  Work on the nursery has begun!  Someone hauled off the guest bed on Sunday, and I did a major downstairs reorganization on Monday.  I probably overdid it a little, but I have a prenatal massage scheduled for tonight after work, so the timing was just right.

 

I can't help myself