Night sleeping and other random thoughts

It looks like we may have hit the sleeping through the night stage. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday nights she has slept for at least 6 hours. Nevada informed me today that babies get to a point where they sleep for 12 hours. We're not there yet but even the 6 hours stage is helping Nevada and I to get some much needed rest.

We're trying to get in a routine of putting her down at 10-10:30 which means we hit the hay right after that. That's been a big change for me. I'm 2-3 am kind of guy but now I can't even last past midnight. My eyelids close whether I like it or not. I'm a regular Joe now, up at 7 am and off to bed at 11 pm.

Gemma has definitely hit the barfing stage. About one out of every three meals comes back up. Nevada and I both get shaken up everytime she pukes. It looks like there is so much and that she'll for sure choke or something. It dooesn't seem to bother her much though. She just explodes and continues on with whatever she's doing. One of the fun things about all the spit up is that Gemma gets to display her whole wardrobe every couple days. Gemma likes to keep daddy busy doing laundry....anything for my little girl.

Lately I've been noticing that I'm becoming pretty skilled at doing everything with one hand. Gemma is often in one arm and that leaves only one hand to work with. I can coook, do laundry, make coffee, talk on the phone and take notes, write e-mails etc. But there are things that need to get done that I can't do while holding her...namely taking a shower and going to the bathroom (#2). Any advice out there, how can I do these things without Gemma feeling abandoned?

Lastly, Baba and Great Grandma are 4 days away...we're getting so excited!

A letter to Mommy

Dear Mommy

I am not quite ready to give up our all night playdates, but I am willing to make the following concessions:
1) I will nap with you for two hours after work
2) I will not howl and scream so Daddy can hang out with me more at night and you can rest
3) I will only stay awake from 1-2:30am

Deal?

Love, Gemma


(and Mommy was SOOO happy!)

A letter to my daughter

Dear Gemma

I just want to check and see if we could move our playdate up a few hours, lets say 6pm-10pm, instead of the usual 12am-4am. Poop once for yes and twice for no, thanks!

Love, Mommy

(If only it were that easy.)

House Dad Day One

Nevada went back to work today and Gemma has done her absolute best to ease the transition for mommy and daddy. We weren't sure what to expect but luckily for me Gemma has decided to have a sleep day. We woke up at 9:45...hung out until 10:30...had a little bottle snack. Nevada came home to feed at 10:45. Then we played for a few minutes and Gemma got sleepy. She's been in an out of sleep for the last two hours and she doesn't look eager to get up. I'm not saying that I want her to sleep all day everyday but during this adjustment period it'll be a good thing. Well, I just wanted to update you guys...now it's time to start on the laundry.

New Friend!

Another couple from our church had a baby on December 27 named Noah. We had a couples shower for them yesterday at our place and the two of them were so cute, amazingly both awake at the same time. This kid is soo adorable, he has got more hair than any baby I have ever seen. It covers his ears and is thick thick thick. The beginnings of the Sunday School at our church!

First Bottle

Here is Gemma's first bottle, and let me tell you what pain in the butt pumping is. Well, so far at least. Now I need to spend 15 minutes feeding her, THEN assemble the pump and spend 15 minutes pumping. Then the pump has to be washed and sterilized, bottle dealt with, etc. Pumping success varies each time. The first two times I got two ounces, then I had a super pump and got 5 ounces in less then ten minutes but then this morning only got 3 ounces. I hope it gets easier, and as I replace feeding times with pumping maybe I'll have more to give up to the pump. And what is the deal with sterilizing? We have the fancy bottle sterilizer, but I sterilize the pump and then have to touch it all to get it together. And the bottles and everything are sterilized but then they sit on the counter; is that ok? Hopefully this gets easier; three more days and then back to work!

Cutesy Wutesy

Baby clothes are soo adroable and one of the funnest (good english, eh?) things of having a baby is picking out little outfits. It's too bad she is a winter baby and can't wear all her little short sleeved onesies, but we still have fun. We were given a tonne of clothes from two familes who are done having kids and passed on all their baby girl clothes to us and I found this little bonnet in the hat drawer yesterday. She looks more like a doll then ever. She was kinda grouchy during the photo shoot, but the effect is still there, I think.

Winner!

You would have heard the Hallelugiah chorus in our house two nights ago; She slept for 5 straight hours, from 1am -6am. We are on our way. Last night was not bad either, only up twice but awake from 3:45-5:00am.

She started smiling this week and it is so cute. Its still a little sporadic but we'll try to catch it on camera. She has also really begun spitting up. Yesterday after a feed it was like a tidal wave of milk, it just poured out of her mouth and soaked her arm, the pillow, her clothes (which, by the way, were the third set of clothes we had put on her). Yesterday I was at the store and I had set my purchases on her tummy and then she barfed an arc that landed on her chest and splattered them. Yummy!

Meow!

I have met the dreaded colic monster, and lived to tell the tale... barely. Friday night and Saturday night were terrible, starting at about midnight with fits of unconsolable howling (from Gemma; Mommy's howling came later), the poor girl cried until she was gasping and hoarse. She would scream for 20 minutes until I comfort fed her, then sleep for 40 minutes. Repeat. Repeat. Saturday night was the worst, I didn't crawl into bed until 7am. Sunday night was good. Yesterday night she was awake a lot, from 1-5am, but no screaming so that was good. The Meow title of the story comes in from Saturday night about 2am. She was in the middle of a screaming fit, and I was holding her in her bedroom which backs onto a lot. She was howling so loudly that this cat started howling too. Then another. Then another, until there were about 6 cats in a serenade. Then the dogs started barking! It was like a creepy horror movie, I was waiting for them to claw at the windows or something. I know I shouldn't be embarrassed and I'm not really, I just know we are not making any friends in our building. All of you raising your babies in four walls of your very own be thankful!

We at our first bath in the big tub with mommy, and it was so fun. She likes the water so far, I think she is just interested in the new sensation. The funniest part to me was that she almost floats. I tried to hold her under her armpits and dunk her body down into the water (remember our bathtub is short but super deep) and her little bum and abdomen kept rising up to the surface. The second most funny part is that after we were done and Daddy was holding her in the towel and cuddling, and I was thinking to myself, we should get a diaper on her soon...(you an all guess where this is going, right?) You got it; pooville! Fortunately it was all contained bu the towel :)

She fell asleep all by herself just now on the boppy pillow. She usually sleeps by herself in the afternoon; I don't know why she is so restless at night. Maybe we need to turn all the lights ON at night and trick her.

What's new...

Generally she is just busy being cute and growing. We've been working on sleep lately, and how she only will go to sleep on one of us. Ooops... We've been putting her in her crib when she does fall asleep, but it usually takes a few tries to get her to stay down. She is kicking and moving so much that in the freedom of her crib she just balls up, and flails and her arms move all over. In our arms she is more contained. The book I read is Secrets of the Baby Whisperer, and it had some good ideas, but its just so hard to apply them to a real life baby. Like it says that she should fall asleep on her own in the crib. Which is a great idea. But Gemma just won't. She'll lay in it for 10 minutes then cry. So I pick her up, soothe her, put her back down, and then she cries. And on and on. We did this for an hour yesterday and I was like This is so stupid. She is exhausted and needs to sleep, I'm not going to keep doing this for another hour. So I held her for ten minutes till she was out and then put her in her crib. And she was fine. She is so little yet that by the time we get done with all the book shenanagins and finally get her down its 20 minutes till meal time and she is up, so whats the point? The irrational overtired part of me knows she needs to learn to fall asleep by herself, but the normal practical side of me is more like, she'll learn eventually, why spend all this time fighting with her? Things will work themselves out, I'm sure. She made the move from our room to her room though, sleeping in her crib last night. Well, for two hours at a time, in between meals! We had a nap on the couch this morning, her in her boppy pillow and me beside her. I am hoping sleeping through the night comes soon, but we'll see. She is only 8 pounds and so I can't imagine her tummy is very big yet.

We went to the doctor yesterday. She had a little scab on her left bicep that was getting worse and worse; yesterday it was really big and red and hard, like a huge pimple. So I took her in, and the doctor said it was completely normal, the result of her vaccination she got when she was born. If there was no reaction that would be bad and mean it didn't work. You would think they would've mentioned that before I left the hospital; "your baby will get a big sore in about 5 weeks and don't worry about it" but what can I say besides lost in translation. She also has her baby acne this week, and her head is all pimply and her neck and chest too. Buut we quit using lotion and it is clearing up. More good news in the looks department; she is getting new hair on her bald spot. She has lots of hair in the back but the top of her head is pretty sparse. Well, today I noticed a new fuzz, just the smallest sheen like a new peach. What a doll!

I've included some Christmas pictures, we've been delinquent this week in the photo department. But the flicker site is all up to date, so check it out if you haven't been.