Freedom!!!

As many of you know Julia has been swaddled when she sleeps basically since Day 1.  She had a very strong startle reflex that caused her to flail her arms and basically slap herself awake whenever she tried to sleep.  So we swaddled.  At first we swaddled tightly with a regular muslin blanket and I have to say that Andrew was much better at this than I was.  I would cringe as he cinched the blankets around her but inevitably she would stop crying and calmly (relatively speaking) go to sleep.  Then as Julia became more active and stronger we had to up the ante in order to keep her swaddled.  Who knew what a market exists for different swaddle blankets promising to keep your little one wrapped tight?!?

We began using a SwaddleMe blanket which uses velcro to keep the flaps secure and tight.  Then, as Julia learned to wiggle her hands out of that, we used the SwaddleMe and a regular muslin swaddle blanket on top of it.  We drew the line at using a blanket that is basically a straight jacket for babies; especially since the one time we did use it, we picked up Julia to discover that her attempts to escape had ended in her arms at very strange angles that would have caused permanent damage if babies weren’t made of elastic. 

Well, our swaddling essentially ended last Friday night when Julia expertly escaped every attempt we made to keep her wrapped.  We would wrap her and within 30 seconds there would be a hand peeking out the top of the blanket, her little fingers making a beeline for her mouth and her eyes looking at us with an expression that clearly said, “I win.”  We tried again on Saturday and Sunday to get her swaddled believing that there was no way she would be able to sleep soundly without it.  Especially as we had both done a lot of reading of others’ horrifying experiences of trying to unswaddle their babies and ending up with many, many sleepless nights until success was achieved. 

But on Monday we decided to bite the bullet and attempt “free sleep” that night.  We reasoned that we were just putting off the inevitable and at least, if we had a week of not sleeping, we are going to Charlottesville to visit Andrew’s parents this weekend and could at least get a few hours of napping in while Julia visits with her grandparents.  So we began.  Monday morning the nap was a complete failure.  I tried for 2 hours to get her to sleep and it resulted in a total of five minutes of nap time.  Monday afternoon I had more success, it took a half hour to get her to sleep but she slept with all her limbs free for 45 minutes (a long nap for her!).  Then came Monday night; the initial getting to sleep process took about an hour and a half and then…. silence.  She slept.  We heard her wake up a couple of times and were on eggshells waiting for the crying to start.  Instead we heard slurping – she found those fingers!  She nursed at midnight, had a brief period of wakefulness at 2am when she was flailing around and couldn’t get her fingers into her mouth and needed to be soothed and then slept again until 5:30.  Last night was similar, two nursing session and a little bit of settling required but that’s not different, and in the case of many nights, better than her previous sleeping. 

So we are cautiously calling this a success!  And all the grandparents should be delighted that all of Julia’s fingers and toes will be on open display for all sleeping periods going forward!

Our active child

Julia has had a busy week.  The biggest news is that she rolled from her tummy to her back for the first time this weekend!  It was very exciting for all of us.  She hasn’t been practicing that too much though because she is too excited about standing up. She has been doing this for the last week or so.  Before that when you took her hands when she was laying down she would pull herself to sitting but about a week ago she discovered that if she straightened her legs she could stand instead.  Like this:

So now that is all she wants to do!  Including at bath time.  This along with her fascination with looking at herself in the mirror has made things a little more complicated for her Dad (the official bather).  But they both seem to have a lot of fun during this part of their nightly routine.

On Friday, since she was enjoying standing so much (and because my arms got a little tired), I decided to put together her exersaucer for her to play in.  That was a big hit!

It is really amazing how Julia has developed in the past couple of weeks.  She was already very interested in the world around her but now she is starting to interact with it and it’s incredibly fun to watch!

First Mother’s Day and our RI Adventure

It has been a very exciting week for us.  Julia had her first plane ride, her first visit to Rhode Island, met lots more family (including her grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, uncle, and cousin), saw the ocean for the first time, and is in the full swing of teething!  I celebrated my first Mother’s Day and was thrilled to be able to spend it with my own stepmom and mom as well as my daughter.

Andrew’s gift to me for Mother’s Day was a book he made chronicling my journey to becoming a mom.  It was incredibly thoughtful and he accomplished his goal of making me cry.  I think it took me a good five minutes before I could even read the first page!

Our trip to Rhode Island was wonderful.  It was very nice to see family and have additional sets of hands to help with Julia! She loved spending time with everyone and taking in all the new sights and sounds.  She is incredibly alert and aware and really did not want to close her eyes the entire time we were there.  She especially liked watching her cousin Alex.  I’m sure she’s eagerly anticipating the day she can run around and explore to her heart’s desire.  Given her spirited attempts to roll over and sit up and her penchant to always be on the move I’d say that day is not too far away!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the week.

Four generations with the middle name “amy”

 

The twins and the “birthday twin” cousins

Hanging out with Auntie Kate

Playing with cousin Alex

 

The adorable Alex and her “beautiful flowers”

 

Eating lunch at the beach with Gramma Les

Saying goodbye to Grandma Laurie at the airport

Julia’s Favorites and Yoga, again

So if Julia could talk I think she would tell me that she’s really trying to appreciate yoga but that it doesn’t quite suit her style right now.  She’s not really one for relaxing and meditating… or for staying in one spot for more than about 5 seconds if she’s awake (and sometimes when she’s asleep as well)!  However, she was incredibly good during class today and I was able to do most of the poses.  It was great as I got quite a workout since I was holding her the entire time.  She makes a very cute free weight! :)

But as good as she was I think there are a variety of activities that she enjoys much more.  Such as:

Bathtime:

Practicing rolling over:

Practicing crawling:

Making faces at Mom:

Just being silly:

Playing with the baby in the mirror:

and the best, sleeping with a full tummy!

The First Daddy-Daughter Day

Yesterday was my first daddy-daughter day with Julia.  What is daddy-daughter day?  Well as you might expect it is a day that Julia and I get to spend together without Alyssa (aka Mom).

So I have to admit that I was a little nervous about my first daddy-daughter day.  Why you ask?  Well mainly it was the feedings, so far Julia has not been happy taking a bottle.  There tends to be a lot of crying and screaming, some of it even from Julia.  I was also a little nervous because she and I haven’t spent that much time alone together.

Alyssa headed out for her day around 9:30 officially starting daddy-daughter day.  When Alyssa left Julia was taking her morning nap.  Julia slept as peacefully as she ever does until about 10:30am.  Then the moment of truth, would she take a bottle?  I had it already to go and to my great surprise she gulped it right down!  There was very little fussing and no crying.  After that we played for a while doing some tummy time and other games on her blanket.  Then it was off on our adventure.

First we went to target to pick up a fan for her room.  She picked out a small black fan that would really help make her room more comfortable.  Once we had that we headed out to lunch.  She decided that she really wanted a good Rueben.  So we headed to Pat Troy's in Old Town.  It was such a nice day we sat outside and enjoyed our sandwich.

From there we headed down to water to find a quite spot for Julia’s mid-afternoon snack.  We found a great little spot right by the water where we could watch the boats pass.  We stayed there for quite a while and even got to see one boat tow in another boat that had run out of gas.  All in all it was a very exciting day.  By this point it was starting to get late around 3pm so we decided it was time to head home.

At home Julia decided she was ready for her big meal of the day and ate about 4.5 oz of milk from the bottle!  This was on top of the 1.5 oz she ate an hour before watching the boats.  I had no idea she ate so much.  Once she finished this we played a little more followed by a short nap until Mom came home around 5pm.

All in all it was a very fun day so much so that we have decided to do it at least once a month.  It was very rewarding for Julia and I.  Oh and Alyssa and fun out doing her own thing for the day too.

Yoga, Take 2 and Sleeping Update

It is kind of nice to be in room with 6 other infants, 3 of whom are screaming and have your child be the one who is blissfully unaware of anything, sleeping peacefully (sort of) in her carrier!  All in all it was a very successful day at yoga.  Julia slept through almost the entire class and I was able to get in 50 minutes of yoga for the first time in 8 weeks!  So while we may not have mastered the “happy baby” pose I will gladly take “sleeping baby.”

On the nighttime sleeping front we have also tried a new tactic.  Julia is now going to bed between 7:30 and 8:00.  This has helped us in a couple of ways so far. 

1)  Julia is no longer crying uncontrollably from 6-9pm every night (although that may change today as apparently the nap at yoga was so good that she hasn’t felt the need to take one all afternoon!)

and

2)  Andrew and I are able to have a few quiet minutes before we drag ourselves to bed at 9pm… if we can make it to 9pm.

Mom and Baby Yoga Take 1… and sleeping antics

Julia and I went to our first Mom and Baby yoga class on Wednesday.  The instructor is someone that Andrew and I have been taking classes from for a couple of years and both really like.  So I felt pretty comfortable that this would be a good activity for us.  Unfortunately, Julia did not feel the same way.  I don’t think there’s a pose called “crying baby” but if there is Julia has it mastered!  There is a pose called “happy baby” – our goal is to work on that one this week. :)

On the sleeping front we have had a few great nights this week!  Julia has had a couple days where she slept for 4-5 hours at a stretch which both I and her dad really appreciate.  What is hilarious though is the going to sleep routine that she and Andrew go through every night.  Our typical routine is that she gets pjs put on and then is swaddled, nurses, and then Dad burps her and puts her to sleep by reading a couple of bedtime books and doing quite a bit of rocking/bouncing/swaying (this is usually accompanied by some tears – mostly from Julia but occasionally from Andrew as well).  When she finally appears to be out for the count Andrew puts her down in the co-sleeper next to my side of the bed and then makes his way over to his side of the bed ready to put his head on the pillow and get a couple of hours of sleep.  However, for the past couple of weeks Julia has been playing a game with Dad and as soon as his head hits the pillow her eyes pop back open and the routine has to start again!  It’s been pretty amusing because Andrew has started standing by the co-sleeper or sitting on the edge of his side of the bed reading for awhile after he puts her down just to make sure that this doesn’t happen and that she’s really asleep.  But without fail no matter how long he tries to wait her out she will open her eyes right after he lays down!  I’ve been getting quite a few laughs from these little antics.  (These types of things become considerably funnier when you’re sleep deprived.)

Well it became much less amusing at 4:00 this morning when Julia started playing a similar game with me.  She was grunting and groaning in the co-sleeper and I kept sitting up to look at her and make sure she was okay.  But every time I sat up her eyes were tightly shut and she would quiet down.  I would lay back down and then the grunting would start again.  Then one time, as I was sitting up, I caught her pop her eyes open, look over at me, and then quickly shut them tight and lie quiet and still again.  I think we’re going to have to keep a close eye on this child!  :)