appleton

elenora and i went to appleton farm today with k. for a long walk. she was a dream baby--looking around at the birds and cows and dogs and trees. it felt so good to get out and exercise in the sunshine and mud.

ella was pushing herself around a lot today. she goes in circles and backwards, but sometimes she kind of inches herself forwards, too. she'll be crawling soon.

she tried carrots today. liked them plenty.

here are some photos of appleton:

"she was that good"

we had a family outing today. we went to the mall to replace j.'s glasses, which have been mangled time and again during basketball games. elenora could not have been a more precious, wonderful baby. she smiled at everyone and was jabbering away. everyone kept stopping to tell us what a good, happy, beautiful girl she is. we were there for three hours, right when she usually naps, and she didn't cry a single time. she even fell asleep sweetly in my arms when we stopped in the food court to eat and give her a bottle. then she slept in our arms as we carried her around and picked up j.'s glasses.

we stopped by momB's on the way home. ella loves her gramby.

then we came home and had a tubby and bed, and ella fell asleep again without any crying.

it felt so good to get out with the family. elenora isn't a dice roll anymore. she's such a social person, which momB says she gets from j. i don't doubt that, as i'm such an introvert.

i love my family.

peas and things

she slept through the night again. amazing baby. 12 hours of sleep. she's so pleasant and such a happy girl.

also, elenora has been eating peas. Loves them. in fact, she gets kind of impatient while i get the next spoonful ready. it's tricky feeding her, though, because she likes to help out by grabbing the spoon (right where the food is, of course, so it squeezes out onto her hand). also, she likes to suck on the spoon as if it were a bottle, or she blows out when the spoon full of food goes into her mouth, sending cereal or peas sputtering all over the place.

it's super fun.

one of my coworkers miscarried yesterday. i can't imagine the heartache.

last night i went out for the evening now that i have so much freedom to leave the house. k. and i went to tj max so i could find some clothes to flatter my lately slightly more curvy figure (a nice way to say i need to lose ten pounds). i found two shirts and some gray slacks, and a bunch of 9 month clothes for elenora. cute little summer things that i can't wait to put her in like a green polo shirt and purple striped pants. then k. and i went to royal orchid, a thai restaurant, for some delicious dinner and a glass of new zealand white. mmm. it's so fun to get out now. and when i got home ella had slept the whole time.

tonight j. and i might head out for dinner together while momB babysits. after an afternoon of babysitting myself i sure can appreciate a date!

here's some video footage of the peas. ella likes to talk with food in her mouth.

whoo hoo!

SHE SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT!

we put her to bed at 6:40 pm and she slept until 6:30 this morning.

hurrah!

night waking habits.

last night was brutal. elenora slept from 7:20 until 1:45, but then she kept waking up and crying and i'd wait awhile (maybe ten minutes...they felt like loooong minutes) and then go in and hold her or nurse her or rock her. i was up for an hour and a half before 4:00 and then j. was up with her for an hour before 6:00. i put her to bed by 7:00 and she was still sleeping when i went to work...but what a screwy night.

okay, so how do we get her to sleep through the night? really just let her cry? i feel so bad for her. and she rolls over onto her tummy and then doesn't know what to do. poor baby. and her nose has been so stuffy and runny.

can she really go all night without nursing?

the good news is that again she went to bed without any crying last night. that's the fifth time, and a couple nights in a row.

now if only i can get her to stay asleep until morning.

j. and i are pretty drained. between the night waking and this illness we are just a mess. sometimes i fantasize about one day all to myself. it's difficult to take care of someone else when you're sick and just want to curl up in bed and rest.

yesterday was easter, and for the first time in my life i stayed home instead of going to church. i missed it so much. i kept thinking of all the songs they usually sing on easter and the lilies and the scripture...and then i missed out on the family dinner, too, since elenora was napping and we didn't want to wake her. i finally put her in her easter dress around 3:30 and took her to momB's for dessert, but it just wasn't the same.

the "no cry sleep solution"

so tonight elenora was laid down in her crib while still awake and for the fourth time this week did not cry as she fell asleep.

also, i tried the rice cereal again tonight and she liked it! yay! she kept bringing the spoon up to her mouth and i think more went down her throat than out on her chin.

(i have observed my mom feeding yogurt to my niece in such a way that lorien's face remained completely clean... i have yet to learn that technique.)

here's the classic picture of a baby with food all over her face:




she looks like me in this picture. nobody can tell me she doesn't.

fever

wednesday afternoon ella woke from her afternoon nap with a low-grade fever. later at night she woke up and her fever was up to 102.9 degrees. we were up pretty much all night with her crying. thursday i stayed home from work to bring her to the doctor. j. was already gettting a sore throat, but elenora had no fever by the end of the day.

yesterday i worked six hours to make up for some of the time. i, too, could feel my throat getting hot, and thick. last night i made some homemade chicken soup. mmmm. here' s the recipe i made up:

3 cloves of garlic and half an onion, finely chopped.

4 carrots, four celery stalks, one fennel bulb, three large yellow potatoes, a can of diced tomatoes (with the juice) and a package of chicken breast that i diced.

2 large boxes of chicken stock.

saute the garlic and onion, then add the chicken and cook the outside.

add the chopped veggies.

add the chicken stock and potatoes.

add the can of tomatoes.

salt and pepper to taste.

cook until the potatoes and veggies are the desired temperature.

(this makes a huge pot... i think it's safe for luke to eat.)

today j. and i are pretty sick. it's a day i'd like to just stay in bed for, but i have to take care of elenora still.

elenora has been such a good little trooper. she's still been taking good naps and going to bed well and sleeping well at night. the only thing she really hates is the nasal aspirator. but if i don't use it she can't breathe while i nurse her. that girl sure can squirm when i get out the nasal aspirator!

i'm still getting up with her around one in the morning and rocking and feeding her, but she always accepts being put back in her crib after. early in the morning, like at five or six, she always wakes up and i go get her and bring her in with us. that way we all get to sleep some more.

but should i be feeding her at night still? other babies her age are sleeping through the night. should i not go to her and let her cry for however long it takes? i only go to her when she cries for more than a few minutes and when the cries are getting louder instead of softer. but am i reinforcing a night waking habit? should i not go get her in the morning and instead let her figure out how to get back to sleep?

in the middle of the night

at about four in the morning j. heard ella talking in her crib, so he went to check on her. he found her sitting up and chatting away.

sitting up! i would love to have video footage of this. i have no idea how she got into that position, as she's never put herself in a sitting position before without help.

what a peach!

this morning as i got ready for work elenora got tired. i usually then have to spend about a half hour putting her to sleep, or i pass her to j., who tries semi-successfully to keep her happy for awhile longer. this morning i just put her in her crib and she cried for three minutes and fell fast asleep for an hour and a half!

our afternoon play time was so sweet. we listened to some books on tape and i let her grasp onto a mango i was about to slice up. then i let her touch the fresh fruit to her lips and tongue. she made a face, but wasn't rejecting it if i offered it to her again to "taste."

now if only i could get her to eat rice cereal.

her morning nap went well, too. and she only cried about ten minutes on-again off-again just now as i put her down for her afternoon nap.

oh here's a question: what do you do when the baby moves all around her crib and gets stuck up against the headboard? do you go in and move her back down? i can't seem to keep ella in her sleep positioner very well any more. also, what do you do if she rolls over? i've been repositioning her and turning her over, but i think that delays her sleep. should i just let her learn how to put herself to sleep on her tummy? is that okay?

scooting.

so last night ella went to bed with two minutes of crying. then she slept eight hours before i brought her into our bed for the rest of the night.

she went down for each of her naps today with under 12 minutes of crying. she had such fun play time and we had so much good mommy time since i didn't need to run around trying to get stuff done while she was awake (since i had two hours of free time in the afternoon).

i made her laugh again. she was sitting in her boppy and playing with her toys and i walked past her and noticed her looking at me. so i did a little turn and said something clever like "bop!" and she started laughing so hard! that's the most precious sound in the world.

i put her on the kitchen floor today with a toy and a multi-patterned apron and she spent forty minutes just figuring out how to slide around on the smoothe laminate. by the end she was pulling her feet up under her and almost inch-worming forward.

she'll be crawling so soon!

palm sunday

last night ella slept until three a.m. then i heard her crying and went in to check on her and she'd flipped over onto her belly and didn't know what to do. also, her hands were cold. so i scooped her up and brought her into bed with us and we all slept just fine.



we made it to church today. this is the third time since ella was born. the first was christmas eve, and j. ended up walking up and down the side aisle throughout the sermon. the second time was about two months ago, and i ended up downstairs pacing around and then we left early because ella was falling apart. this time we went to a church close by and got there early enough to check out the nursery. there was a really nice woman in there and none of the other children were as young as elenora, so she could be held as much as was needed. i was a little concerned that they didn't have any kind of a pager system, but in the end elenora had a pretty good time and j. and i actually got to sit together and listen to the whole service. it felt really good. i know both of us have really missed that in our lives, and we're starting to feel the lack in our attitudes.



by the time we got home, elenora was really tired. i put her down, but ten minutes of crying later i peeked in and she was on her belly again. i readjusted the little sleep positioner in her crib and ten minutes later she was fast asleep.



she slept for two hours straight.



tonight when i laid her down she fussed for about two minutes and then we haven't heard a peep from her since (2 and 1/2 hours later). she's just amazing.



so now i'm going to watch a movie with j. in our bed... something we haven't done since before elenora was born. yay!

rice cereal rejection

unbelievable.

so ella's morning nap lasted for two hours. her afternoon nap happened easily, with maybe ten minutes of on-again off-again fussing. i watched her through a crack in her door and she was playing with her "bunny lovey" and reaching for her mobile as she fell asleep. she woke up a half hour later but only fussed a little bit and then i saw her just laying in her crib peacefully looking around and slowly letting her eyes close. she slept for an hour and a half.

tonight when i put her in her crib awake for bed...

...SHE DID NOT CRY AT ALL.

not at all.

oh, and we tried the rice cereal. she didn't like it. hah! i thought it would be awesome, but it was hilarious to see that she was actually completely rejecting it! she wouldn't open her mouth, and she started taking the spoon and trying to throw it on the floor.

so now what do we do? do we try rice cereal again for a few days? or do we try something else, like oatmeal or veggies? i'm not sure. better ask a. or c. three babies for one and four for the other... i'm sure they've dealt with this.

and she has a little rash on her belly and back. what is that? it's like little red bumps. i sort of feel like waiting until we go to her appointment in a week and a half, but then again, maybe i should call the doctor? i think she had it before we started giving her formula... but i don't think it's her bath soap because she has used the same stuff since she was born, and this is new. we've used the same diaper wipes forever, too.

hm.

oh, she just woke up and cried about twenty-five seconds and went back to sleep.

awesome baby.

sleeping like a baby

elenora is amazing. last night after waking twice and putting herself back to sleep within a minute each time, she woke for four minutes at one in the morning, and then slept in her crib until five! i couldn't believe it! i didn't have to feed her or anything.

(i brought her into our bed at five and fed her and we all snoozed until about eight. not sure if i should bring her in at the end, but it let us get good sleep.)

then for her morning nap i nursed her and rocked her in her glider chair and then i put her in her crib. she got upset and cried, but after ten minutes she was asleep and slept for nearly an hour before waking. then we let her cry for a minute to see what would happen, and again she put herself back to sleep and has been sleeping for another forty minutes!

i'm speechless. it's such a relief to find that she's mature enough to learn this so easily. what a good little girl. i feel silly for being so afraid of this for so long. this is really going to make life easier.

change of tactic

tonight i gave elenora another bottle of formula after i nursed her. i rocked her and then i thought "what would happen if i tried to put her in her crib?" so i put her in her crib, and she cried. so i picked her up. she got quiet right away. so i put her in her crib, and she cried harder--like she suddenly realized i meant business. so i picked her up. when she was quiet, i put her in her crib, and she really cried hard, so i picked her up and sat in the glider chair and nursed her and rocked until she was really pretty much asleep (about ten minutes). then i carried her over and put her in her crib. she woke up crying, but i just kept my hand on her belly and after about fifteen minutes her crying became softer and i withdrew from her room.

j. was out in the living room and just looked at me like "are you sure you're ready for this?" and everything in me was second-guessing. my blood pressure was way up and i just felt nervous and sick. but after fifteen minutes she was suddenly silent. an hour later she started crying and j. and i looked at each other like "what do we do?" within a minute she was silent again. then an hour later she started crying again, and again we didn't know if we should race in and comfort her or if i should feed her or what. but within a minute she was silent again.

do i just try to let her do this all night? does she need to eat in the middle of the night, or can she sleep through?

it will be amazing to have our room back... let alone our bed.

hopefully this will go as well tomorrow.

my poor darling, though. i felt so sad for her. but this really is in everybody's best interest, and she will be a happy little girl in the morning.

a sense of humor

yesterday i came home from work to find elenora giggling like crazy every time momB would copy her hiccups. so cute.

we fed elenora her first bottle of something other than breast milk last night. i'm trying to figure out a way to help her sleep longer, as she sometimes wakes up four times before i get to bed. it's stressful for me to always feel as if i could be called away to put her back to sleep at any moment throughout the evening. v. gives her baby a bottle of formula at night to help with the sleeping, so i figured i'd try that, too. my supply runs low by evening, i think, no matter what the books say about it just being a matter of supply and demand. it's so difficult for me to pump enough out for elenora to have while i'm at work each day. and between the pumping and the nursing i think she doesn't get a lot at her last feeding. so last night we gave her a bottle of formula and she went right off to sleep! she still woke up once, three hours later, but at least she didn't wake up more than that.

we're going to give her rice cereal starting monday (st. patrick's day: a guiness for me, rice cereal for her!) anyhow.

and we're going to try cry-it-out... maybe starting tomorrow. i need to get her into her own crib, and i need to teach her to fall asleep on her own and to put herself back to sleep if she's still tired without my help.

dreading it. they should do parent swaps for these things--i'll listen to your baby cry it out while you listen to mine. poor ella.

j. and i took her to the grocery store yesterday afternoon. she was so cute looking at all of the boxes and colors. she's so curious. i think that is my favorite personality trait of hers...

...and her sense of humor.

thanks, c.!

i was so excited to find a package in my mailbox today from c. these beautiful headbands arrived with love from texas (and Brianna!) just in time to add something special to elenora's easter dress. how sweet!

here's a video for Brianna (they're going to be adorable pen-pals):

it looked like spilt milk...

elenora got the babysitter all to herself today. e. decided to keep penelope home with her grandmother, so ella got all the attention she desired... which is a lot right now while she's teething. when s. got here it had just stopped raining and was sort of mild out, so i told her that she could take ella out for a walk if she liked. when i got home s. said she'd taken elenora out and they'd had such a good walk. when s. left, it was sunny out, so i took elenora out for another walk around the neighborhoods. she chewed on my thumb the whole way and jabbered on and on as we walked. i conversed along with her--imagining that she was telling me about all of the things she was seeing, smelling, and hearing. she gets so happy when we're outside. the earth smelled wet, like dead leaves and spring, and we could hear the birds and there were wind chimes in someone's yard. the breeze was blowing nicely and there were huge puffy clouds in the sky that "looked like spilt milk" as one of ella's books says.

i get so happy when we're outside, too.

the other night when k. was over she was playing with ella on the play mat and she was putting "clarence" (a little stuffed animal lion) on ella's head and asking "where's clarence?" then clarence would fall off her head. by the third time, ella was tipping her head to drop clarence off. by the fifth time ella was dipping her head in expectation of clarence being placed on her head. it was so amazing how well she got the gist of the game. she laughed, too, as the lion fell off her head.

she's so amazingly smart.

elenora likes to touch our faces now. sometimes i'll wake up in the morning and she's staring right at me with her hand out-stretched by my nose or cheek. she also likes to pass her fingers through my hair.

during bathtime now, she's figuring out that the water is fun. i take the little water scoop and pour down a stream of water onto her belly, and she really likes to reach for that. then after the bath she always turns around on my lap as i dry her off and faces the tub to look at her bathtub. she likes for me to pour the water out and to watch it swirl down the drain.

ella is getting impatient with changing times. she starts fake crying as soon as i pull her onesy over her head and try to pull her arms through. i know it's fake crying because it can stop on a dime if i sing "itsy bitsy spider" or pick her up.






tonight she was turning the knob on the jack-in-the-box all by herself.


her favorite book is still "too much noise." she sits through that story better than any other, though she also loves a book of "mary had a little lamb" because there is a soft lamb head on each page of the story. she thinks that is so cool.


i think she is so cool. what do i know. i'm just her mother.

teething

the poor dear is teething. i can see white bumps beneath her gums and she's been so very cranky. you can't blame her. i can feel a tooth ridge in her mouth. that can't be fun. i keep trying to find that perfect thing for her to chew on. why do they make teethers so difficult for babies to hold?

after work today i found j. out walking with ella in the stroller and his friend a., who is visiting from L.A. we all walked to a local cafe and got sandwiches. elenora was so interested in the ceiling fans and my glass of water, but it's almost torture for her to watch us eat now. she wants to get into the food so badly! i think i'll wait just about another two weeks and introduce the solids.

that's one week before we plan to try the cry-it-out again.

it was fifty five degrees outside today. so mild and lovely. the perfect day to get outside with the stroller. ella really loves her walks. she was asleep by the end.

everything squeaks in this apartment. our bedroom door...the wooden floors...the oven door...the refrigerator door...the cabinets and drawers... it's not conducive to a sleeping baby.

five months old