Estelle's Room finally finished!

Sweet Success

Last night Estelle slept for a full 7 hours! I couldn't believe it when I woke up and it was 5:30 am! We'd gone to bed at 10:00 and Estelle finally fell asleep around 10:30. I still can't believe she slept that long without nursing. I have no idea if this is going to last or not, but I'll take it while I can. This was night five of the ban on nightime nursing. Hopefully she's realized that waking at night isn't worth it and she'll let me get my sleep at night.

Night Progress

The second night that I refused to nurse Estelle when she woke up went much better than the first. Estelle only woke up 2 times and both times her crying with brief. She did have a little trouble with her stuffy nose though. Poor thing couldn't keep her binkie in and breathe at the same time.
On night 3 Estelle hardly woke up at all. I fed her at 11:00 and she woke up once at around 1:00 but only for a few minutes. I didn't nurse her, but soothed her back to sleep. After that, she slept until 5:00 am! That's quite possibly one of the longest stretches of sleep she's ever given me.
So last night, night 4 of no-nursing, we had a bit of a relapse. Estelle woke up more often again. I finally gave her water in a bottle and she took it quite willingly. She's normally not one to take a bottle so I guess it surprized me. Perhaps she was just thirsty and not really needing to nurse. After that I rocked her and sung to her until she fell asleep and she slept until around 4:00 in the morning. I would have liked to hold her off until at least 5:00 am, but it was a rough night so I let her eat a little early.

Nightime is for sleeping, not eating

Estelle is old enough to sleep though the night, but she doesn't. I've been far to generous in feeding her at night and she's come to take advantage of that. At nearly 9 months old, she still wakes up two or three times a night to eat. And it's time this came to an end. She has to start sleeping through the night. Or, if nothing else, at least learn how to get back to sleep on her own without nursing.

So last night was the first night withtout nursing. She woke at around 1:00 in the morning, hoping to nurse and I didn't feed her. The little stinker spit her binky out every time I put it in. She proceeded to cry and kick her legs in frustraition for the next 7 minutes followed by sniffling for another 40 minutes before she finally went back to sleep...only to wake up exactly one hour later. Fortunately her second night waking was a little easier than the first. Her fit was shorter and she fell asleep more quickly. I plan on continuing the nursing-free nights, so I hope she does better tonight.

Ladybugs and Toilets

Estelle ate a ladybug the other day! She was on the floor playing while I was getting some work done there at the table next to her. I looked down and saw that she was chewing on something, but my attempts to remove the offending object failed. Whatever it was that she put in her mouth was swallowed before I could get to it. And then I smelled her breath....ladybug. The distinct smell of ladybug is unmistakable...strong and earthy. Upon a quick inspection of the area, I found a couple lady bug shells on the floor by the window. Darn critters were all over the place last fall. And then yesterday, I was made certain of my theory. Estelle pooped out a ladybug shell. Yep. She ate a ladybug.

If that's not enough to gross you out, that very same day I caught Estelle splashing in the toilet...clean of course, but still gross. She's only recently been able to pull herself up on things, so I didn't think anything of her playing the bathroom. Then I heard the splashing. The stinker was having a jolly ole time splashing in the toilet. I guess I'll have to remember to shut the toilet lid when I'm done from now on. Lol.

At 8 Months Old...

I noticed Estelle has teeth coming through on the bottem. She's also started pulling herself up to a standing position when she can get ahold of something strong enough to support her. It's cute.

Emilie and Estelle

Update at 7 months

I have been terrible at updating this blog, and I appologize. Things have been so busy lately and I keep intending to update, but never getting around to it. So, I figure a brief update is better than no update.

Estelle is 7 months old now. She's adorable as can be, can sit up on her own, and has recently started the army crawl. She's close to crawling like normal, but can't figure out how to lift her arms and move them forward one at a time. I'm sure she'll learn soon enough, and then what will I do? I'm not sure I want an entirely mobile baby.

Estelle enjoyed her first snow on Saturday. Her snowsuit left her somewhat immobile so she couldn't exactly crawl around or play, but she did seem to enjoy looking around and tasting the snow.

Sleep Baby Sleep

Estelle is almost 6 months old now; the age at which I planned to start getting her into her own bed and sleeping through the night. I didn't mind the co-sleeping while she was younger because she nutritionally needed to eat at night and it was so much easier for me to nurse her with her right there in bed with me. But now she's old enough not to need to eat at night and so I'm gonna start the switch. My plan is to first train her to fall asleep unaided at naptimes using the ferber method... letting her cry for 5 minutes before reassuring her, then 10 minutes and reassurance, then 15 minutes and reassurance... and so forth until she falls asleep. The idea is not to pick her up because that will train her that if she cries long enough she'll get what she wants. I will be keeping a journal/log of the process and we'll see how long it takes before she's sleeping through the night in her own bed. I do not expect it to be easy or fun, but it must be done.

Day 1:

Mid-day Nap
11:41 About 20 minutes after she ate, I put Estelle down for her nap, awake. Crying immediately insued.
11:46 I patted her on her back. Gently told her I love her. Kissed her head and left the room. She started crying the moment I left.
11:56 Now she's whimpering and hiccoughing from her sobs. I again, assured her I love her and patted her back before leaving the room again. This time, she paused a minute before resuming her crying.
12:16 It's only been ten minutes and she's quiet. I peeked in on her. Still whimpering and apparently awake, but her eyes are closed. I hear the occasional whine as I sneak out unnoticed.
12:20 She's awake and happily cooing at the teddy bears on her mobile. So much for sleep.

Estelle's first veggies

She's been eating rice cereal for a couple weeks now. This is her eating something new...carrots...

Update.

Things have been a bit crazy lately. We found a new house, put an offer on it, and have listed our current home for sale. We're signing on the new house in 5 days.

In other news, Estelle ate baby food carrots yesterday. I wasn't the one to do the feeding, but according to mom, she liked them. At first she made a funny face, but after a few bits was opening her mouth for more.

Last weekend, TJ and I photographed a wedding in Chicago. Estelle did quite well on the trip. She cried a little in the car, but slept most of the time. At the wedding, she was an angel. Slept a lot and even when she was awake, she was content to play with her toys. At the reception she decided to practice her vocal skills and spent 10 minutes squealing at rediculously high pitches. Everyone thought it was cute. TJ and I got to practice our dancing at the reception too. We waltzed through an entire song before we realized everyone else had stopped dancing and was watching us. When TJ dipped me at the end of the song, we were appluaded. And we weren't even that great! Lol.

Vaccinations - Round2

Monday 3:00 - Got her shots. The nurse was better this time and put the shots a little lower on her leg so it wouldn't be pinched everytime she pulled her legs back. She was also quick so Estelle didn't even realize she was in pain until all three shots had been administered. I was thankful for that.

Monday 3:10 - Estelle fell asleep on the way home.

Monday 5:00 - She's been whining a lot... just a low groan really.

Tuesday 8:15 - She's been crabby since she got up.

Tuesday 9:00 - Has a temp of 100. I gave her some tylenal. She's napping now.

Bottlefeeding

Before I had Estelle, I never imagined it would be a struggle to get her to drink from a bottle. Last Friday, she refused to take a bottle the entire 7 hours that my in-laws had her. So, we've decided we need to get her used to taking the bottle.

Day 1

*My first attempt at feeding Estelle with a bottle. She refused and cried... a lot. After a while, I handed her over to TJ where she cried some more while he tried. Clearly, she did NOT want a bottle and was mad at us for trying. We did not give in. She managed to swallow an ounce or so between all her crying and fit throwing.

*For our second attempt we were at Jame's house. She still refused and fussed quite a bit. Since it was getting late and we were with friends, I went ahead and nursed her a little to calm her down.

*Before leaving James' house, I tried to feed her one last time. This time she drank a little before fussing and managed to get about an ounce, just enough to keep her happy until we got home and I could nurse her to sleep.

Day 2

*After a couple sucks and swallows, she realized I had given her a bottle and began to cry. She cried and fussed for 15 minutes or so. It got to the point that she was too upset for me to even try anymore. She was kicking her legs and screaming. I simply could not get her to sit still so I laid her in her crib and let her cry for a while. When she'd calmed down a little, I picked her up and tried again. This time, the same as before she sucked for a second before realzing it was a bottle and then began the crying again. After an hour and a half of crying occasionally interrupted by short breaks she finally managed to drink about an ounce and a half from the bottle. Afterwards, she slept for almost three hours.

*This time I caught her when she was just bearly waking from a nap. She was not fully awake but obviously hungry so I got her bottle ready and gave it another try. This time she cried as soon as she saw the bottle, but shortly after I put it in her mouth she gave up crying and began drinking... gulping really. She finished the bottle off in less than a minute and cried when it was empty. I quickly pumped some more milk, but by the time I finished she was no longer interested in eating. I saved the new milk for later.

*TJ managed to feed her a little when he got home from work. She took an ounce or so, with a little fussing.

*At my parents house she fussed a little when I tried to feed her. I got her to eat just enough to keep her happy until we got home where I nursed her to sleep.

Day 3

*I nursed her for her first feeding of the day because I wasn't home and didn't have a bottle with me.

*She took the bottle without even a whimper this time.

*Nursed her again because I was at work and didn't have a bottle.

*Brought a bottle along to church in hopes that a nursry worker might be able to feed her. The nursery worker could not get her to take the bottle, but when I tried, she took it right away. She might have been upset that it wasn't me giving it to her.

Grabber

Estelle has recently begun to figure out how to use her hands. She's starting to grab things we put in front of her. The other day as I was laying in bed next to her, looking at her smiling face, she suddenly reach out and grabbed my nose!

Hot, hot, hot!

We're in the middle of a heat advisory and our AC broke. The repairman is supposed to come out later today to look at it. Until then, it's hot, hot, hot in this house.

Rolling

At around 2 months, Estelle managed to roll from her tummy to her back a few times, although probably not intentionally. Now, at 12 weeks, she's beginning to actually work at it and can roll from tummy to back and back to tummy. Yesterday she spent twenty minutes just going back and forth.

Almost 3 months.

Things have been going pretty well for us so far. Estelle has been the most talkative little thing, babbling all the time. She's always smiling and cooing at people.

Her neck has gotten considerably stronger, so she's now able to hold her head steady when in the sitting up position. She likes to practice sitting up in her boppy. It's cute. I don't think it'll be long before she'll be able to sit up on her own.

We've also found that when we hold her with her feet on the ground, she mimics walking by lifting and steping forward with one leg at a time. It's cute because she doesn't just lift the leg a little... she pulls it all the way up to her chest before stepping forward. Very cute.

TJ has found that, if he stands Estelle up on his lap, he can let her go and she'll support her own weight for a couple seconds.

At nighttime Estelle is still getting up every 2-3 hours. Occassionally giving me 4 or 5, but not often. Her daytime naps seem to be getting shorter too and she fights sleep. It's a chore getting her to take a nap at times, but at least she's taking naps in her crib or playpen now... instead of the middle of my bed. We'll have to work on the sleep thing a little more.

Hair

Estelle's hair has been growing nicely. She is no longer completely bald and now has a nice covering of thin dirty-blonde hair. I, on the other hand, have been loosing my hair. Literally, handfuls. I've heard this happens after pregnancy. If I keep loosing hair at the rate I am, I'll be bald in no time! Aaaaahhhh.

Estelle and Emilie

Estelle at 9 weeks with Emilie at 7 weeks.

Vaccinations

Estelle just had her 2 month checkup at the pediatrician and had to get her first set of vaccinations. Not fun. I felt terrible when she cried while getting the shots. Poor thing sounded so pathetic. On the way home though, she fell asleep and napped for a few hours after we got home. I thought maybe I was lucky and wouldn't have to deal with a crabby baby as I'd heard many do. After she woke up though, it was a different story. She nursed as usual but suddenly started screaming. Not her normal crabby cry but an "i'm in pain" scream. Her poor little leg was all red and swollen. After 10 minutes of her screaming, I called the pediatrician and asked if this was normal. They said it was, but that if she were to continue crying for a full hour, that I should call them back. The poor thing cried for 30 minutes before I was finally able to calm her down by laying her on my bed and letting her nurse. That was the only position I could get her in and hold her legs down so she wouldn't pull them up and irriate the spots where she got her shots. As long as her legs were securely down she would calm down, but if she moved them it was back to the screaming. For the rest of the evening she didn't have much of an appetite and would cry anytime she moved her legs.

Then I made the mistake of reading scary vaccination stories on the internet. You know, the ones that talk about babies dying the day after they got their vaccinations. NOT a good idea! For the next 24 hours I wouldn't let Estelle out of my sight. If she so much as whimpered, I was there to soothe her. Who cares if I might be spoiling her. At least this way, if something terrible were to happen, I would have no regrets about what I did. I can't imagine the guilt felt by those mothers who let their babies "cry it out" only to find them dead in the morning. Even though the crying isn't what killed them, just to think that the babies last moments were alone, crying in a crib is enough to bring tears to my eyes.

I've decided that since Estelle is in the age bracket the most at risk for SIDS, I'm going to love on her as much as I can because there's no guaruntee that I'll have her tomorrow.