Adventures at Harris Teeter

I decided to try taking Maddie to the grocery store today. This is only the 2nd time I've taken her. The first time, she was so little that she slept in the sling the whole time. After that, she was too colicky to ever consider taking her again, but I decided that she's been so great lately that I'd try it today.

There is no good answer on what to do with a baby that can't sit up in the grocery store. If you put them in a carrier, there's the chance that they'll get squirmy and start screaming/crying (that chance might be a little higher when the baby in question is Maddie). If you put their carseat in the main part of the buggy (that's right, buggy...I'm from NC), there is no room for groceries. If you snap the carseat onto the top of the buggy, it looks very precarious and if you're short like me you won't be able to see over it at all. However, last time I was at HT I noticed that they have buggies with built in infant seats. Genius! So I decided that was the perfect solution.

I bundled Maddie up in fleece foot pj's and a sweatsuit (it's COLD out there!) and when we got to the store, I parked far away so that I was right next to a buggy return to make it easy after shopping. I got Maddie out of her carseat and dashed to the front of the store with Maddie, her blanket, my cloth grocery bags, and my diaper bag all in tow. When I reached the store however, I realized that there were only about 6 of the aforementioned buggies, and they were all buried in lines of carts about 15 deep. Sigh.

I grabbed a nearby employee, and explained to him that I needed a buggy for the baby, letting my full arms indicate that I couldn't get one out myself. He shot me a confused look and reached for a nearby regular buggy. I stopped him, and let him know that Maddie can't sit up alone yet, and that I needed a cart from across the way, one with a carseat built in. He then walked across to another row of buggies, and again tried to offer me a regular one. At this point, I am wondering if he speaks English, as he has still not uttered one word, looks very confused, and continues to offer me the wrong thing. He finally understood that I needed a special buggy, and looked very annoyed as he started pulling out other buggies to get to it.

10 minutes later (and yes, we are still outside in the cold and sun- it is a true miracle that Maddie is not screaming her head off at this point), we have a buggy with a built in infant seat. I slung a blanket over it for germs and we were good to go. Maddie did pretty well in the store, until Mommy couldn't find the wine she was looking for. I guess I was taking too long, b/c she started shrieking. And these were good ones too, I'm surprised no bottles shattered. You know in a horror movie, when the bad guy pops out of the dark? That's the kind of scream I'm talking about here. So we decided that wine was something that Daddy could pick up later, and headed for the checkout.

All in all, a decent visit! By the time we got home, she was tuckered out from the adventure. I think next time I may try her Baby Bjorn if there are no buggies with infant seats readily available. Or perhaps I'll just continue shopping on the weekends until she can sit up!

Everything else is going well. Maddie was 12 lb 11 oz at her 5 month shots appt! She's getting some chunky little thighs, it's very adorable. We have switched to all formula, and unfortunately that's caused some major constipation, resulting in much crying, straining, and not sleeping. But we're trying ever remedy in the book to get that cleared up quickly so we can enjoy our happy little girl!

Happy New Year!

I can't believe Maddie is almost 5 months old! This past month flew by, as we were busy with Christmas and family fun. Maddie got to meet a lot of her extended family over Christmas, and she did really well despite all the noise and excitement. The Humphries family gathering is always one of my favorite days of the year, and this year didn't disappoint. Everyone kindly travelled down to Greenville so that Mike and I wouldn't have to make an extra trip (we were already in Greenville for the week). Lots of delish food, catching up and a very funny giftcard exchange. Everyone marvelled at Mom's awesome thousand foot tree, and Maddie had her picture taken a lot.

After just one too many pictures, lol!!!

The rest of the week was spent hanging out with my family, and it was great. Mike and I never understand how such a long trip goes by so quickly! Sarah got Rock Band for Christmas, and knew she was getting it, so we instituted a new "open a present on Christmas Eve" tradition, and all got to play Rock Band together on Christmas Eve, lol! Mike's pretty sure he's going to become a professional drummer now. We opened presents Christmas morning, and Maddie got lots of cute presents and books. She especially loved her Sophie Giraffe, although look how suprised she was to get stacking rings, lol!



After opening presents, we loaded up the car and headed to Lumberton to see Mike's extended family. Then we brought his mom back to Raleigh for a few days, and she loved spending time with the baby.

This past month, Maddie has really grown up a lot! The difference in her temperament is just amazing. She now pretty much only cries if she's hungry or tired, and we no longer have long afternoons of screaming inconsolably. She's almost always happy and grinning and squealing when she's awake. We can even go in the car and run errands without expecting a meltdown! Her new favorite noise to make is squealing/shrieking/screaming. For about a week, it was the only noise she'd make. Now, fortunately for our ears and glassware, she only does it a couple dozen times a day. Here's a video of her favorite noise....although this really doesn't do it justice. It's much more shrill in person, lol.

We finally took the infant headrest out of her carseat today! It made me sad, she looked like such a big girl in there! But I can't say I'll miss those first 3 months. I have some great memories, sure, but colicky baby= one stressed out mommy. I'm loving this stage we're in now though- she's still not mobile, but she's happy and very interactive. I'm looking forward to crawling, walking, etc, but I know I'll definitely miss these days!

We had some family pictures done right before Christmas by Lux Photography, and it was such a great experience! We had a great time and although I think Maddie only smiled twice the entire two hours, they still got some great pictures. Here's my fave- it's the only one of Maddie crying but it's just so her, lol! And a link to all of my favorites- sorry, I had a lot of favorites.

We have our 5 month shots appt next Thursday, so I can't wait to see how much my little peanut weighs now!

4 months old!

Stats:
Weight: 11 lbs 12 oz (10th %)
Height: 23.25 in (20th %)
Head: 39.5 cm (15th %)
Loves:
Monkey rattle
Activity mat
Bouncy seat
TV (Yikes! Taking after mom and dad already... trying not to let her watch it yet)
Minky blanket
Eating
People singing to her
Hates:
Swing
Tummy time
Getting out of the bath
Being strapped into the carseat
Riding in the car
Being held for a long time (she's getting better, but is still not a cuddly baby- very independent!)
Cold hands

I chose to put loves and hates instead of likes and dislikes b/c Maddie is very opinionated. She is generally either very happy or very mad (or very sleepy which leads to very mad).


Time for a much overdue blog update. Today my little girl is 4 months old!!! I can't believe 4 months have already gone by...and at the same time, I feel like I've been a mom forever now. Maddie is really starting to interact with us a lot, which is so rewarding. And the colic seems to be starting to go away too, which makes Mom and Dad VERY happy! She still has her days, and by no means is a laid back baby, but she now has entire days without meltdown hours long screaming fests- so there's improvement :). She's even started enjoying sitting in her bouncer some, which is nice- still no luck with the swing though.

She is just the smiliest little girl in town in the mornings, and loves to smile almost as much as she loves to cry- sometimes doing both at the same time! She's on the verge of laughing, she's got the motions down and just needs to add the sound. She is grabbing toys with both hands and shoving everything she can in her mouth, which I think makes her look like a very grown up baby :). Tummy time is still quite hated in our house, so she doesn't have the strongest head or arms yet, but she's working on it.

At 3 months, breastfeeding was still very painful, so I decided to switch to exclusively pumping. Unfortunately, my supply doesn't quite match up with her demand while pumping, so we have had to supplement with formula more than I would like. But she is still getting mostly breastmilk, which is important to me, as much as I hate pumping! We will try breastfeeding again in a couple of weeks. If successful, I plan to nurse until she weans or 2 years, whichever comes first. If unsuccessful though, I will probably start weaning at 6 months when we start solids.

Maddie continues to be a great sleeper, hooray! We had a few weird weeks where she was wanting to go to bed at 5pm, and waking up 2-3 times a night after that, but for the past week has switched back to once a night again. She sleeps from about 9/10pm to 5/6am, and then goes back to sleep until 8-8:30. Not bad at all! She usually takes a long nap in the late morning and then a couple of shorter naps in the afternoon too.

I've recently joined a playgroup so Maddie can start socializing a bit (and me too!) now that she's more aware of her surroundings. Obviously she can't really play with other babies yet, but she loves to sit on my lap or lay on the floor and watch the older babies play. And it's always nice to spend some time out of the house where a crying fit doesn't mean we have to leave :).

I'm really going to try and update this thing more often, I'll aim for once a week. But as always, I am pretty good about putting pictures on her shutterfly site on a regular basis. That's it for now- Mom needs to eat some lunch before Maddie's morning nap is over!

First Halloween!

Well, we couldn't find any costumes small enough to fit Maddie, but here are pics of her first Halloween anyway!

Her "little monster" t-shirt

Doing her best little monster impression

Time to go out for dinner!

Eh?

Alright, Halloween is pretty boring, I'm going to sleep!

Notice the My First Halloween rattle...we weren't going to get it, but then she smiled when we handed it to her....this little girl isn't going to be spoiled at all!!!

2 month appointment!

Maddie turned the big .17 on Wednesday! We celebrated by taking her to the pediatrician for her first vaccinations. She got DTaP, HepB, and Polio, but they were all combined in one shot, so she just got one stick. I'm one of those crazy granola moms who insists on spacing out baby vaccinations, so we'll be going back next month for two more shots. In fact, she'll be getting shots every month for about the next 7 months :(. She screamed when she got the shot (although I think she was mostly just mad that the nurse had to straighten her leg out), but immediately settled down after I picked her up, so it wasn't too bad.

Speaking of granola, I'm happy to announce that we are switching to cloth diapers! I'm really excited about it, and I'll be posting pictures of her in her very adorable diapers once we get the hang of them. And for those of you that haven't seen/heard of/used a cloth diaper in 10+ years, I promise I'm not crazy! They've come a long way and are much easier to use than the old fashioned cloth options.

Here are the 2 month stats!
Weight: 9 lbs 1.5 oz (10th percentile)
Height: 21.75 inches (25th percentile)
Head: 36.4 cm (5th percentile- pea head)
Her growth has slowed down since that first month, but she was still below the 5th percentile at 2 weeks, so we're happy with her growing!

Maddie has also started almost sleeping through the night! She now sleeps from about 10pm-4am, and then from about 4:30am-8am. Not bad at all for such a little monkey! Her mommy is thrilled to be getting such a long stretch of sleep, but her Daddy is missing that 2 am feeding a little bit. But I have a sneaking suspicion that he doesn't mind sleeping through the whole night again.

We are in Greenville for the weekend, and Kat is home so lots of pictures will be forthcoming!

It's October...where's my candy?

Long time no blog! Turns out this whole "having a baby" thing keeps a person really really busy. And tired. Go figure! Maddie is doing great. She is gaining weight like a champ- she's even starting to outgrow some of her newborn sized clothes (those preemie clothes are soo last month). She is still a hungry hungry hippo, but this week she has dropped a nighttime feeding, much to the delight of her mom and dad. Her nighttime "schedule" is now to nap from about 6:30-9 (very convenient for when we go out to dinner), wake up, bath, eat, then to bed for the night. She wakes up around 1am and 5 am to eat, but quickly falls back asleep after these feedings. Then she either sleeps until about 6:30 or 8 (Mommy prefers the 8am wake up call).

Breastfeeding is still pretty hard and we haven't quite got it down pat yet, but it's certainly gotten a lot better and hopefully will just get easier from here. Maddie recognizes our voices now and smiles when we come to pick her up after a nap or when Daddy comes home from work. She is also smiling at her favorite toys- a pink poodle, a mirror and of course her #1 fave- the ceiling fan. She has a little activity mat that she loves to lay on and look at all the pretty animals and colors. She's fascinated by faces and likes to practice imitating all the expressions she sees.

We think (and hope and pray) that we've gotten through the worst of the colic...this week she has pretty much been crying from about 3-6:30, but other than that she tends to be pretty well behaved. It's 3:15 now, so I better hurry up and finish this update! I think that's about it...her 2 month check up and first vaccinations are next Friday, so we'll find out how much she weighs/has grown then. And although this blog has been sadly lacking, I do post updated pictures to her picture site pretty regularly, so check there for your Maddie fix!

Hungry Hungry Hippo

I have a feeling I'll be seeing this face a lot in about 13 years.

I took Maddie to the pediatrician today to get her checked out b/c she's been acting a little fussy lately (and by fussy, I mean screaming and writhing in pain after every feeding). The bad news is the doctor thinks she has reflux. The good news is she may not be possessed by the devil after all. We have some meds to try, so hopefully she'll be feeling better soon. She weighed 7lbs today!!! This is great progress. Average weight gain for her age is around 1 oz/day. She has gained 21 oz in 13 days, so she really is trying to catch up to all the other babies! She gets the competitiveness from her daddy.

That's pretty much the only new news. She is having more awake periods during the day, and I can tell that she is getting a lot more interested in the world around her. I will catch one of her big grins on camera soon- they are ridiculously cute! In the meantime, if anyone has some extra sleep laying around, send it our way!