Do They Still Make Calgon?

If I drank alcohol, I'd be sitting here with a glass of something.  Be it wine or something stronger, I don't know, but something would definitely be sloshing down my gullet right about now.  If I smoked, I'd be sneaking outside with the baby monitor for a drag or two.  I (thankfully) don't subscribe to that vice either.  So instead, I'm sitting here cherishing my second Cadbury Caramel Egg (mini, not full-sized), just trying to have a moment of peace before my boss starts screaming at me again while listening to a nice, folksy version of "You Are My Sunshine" by Elizabeth Mitchell.

Things are finally quiet now, but since around 5 AM, the boss has been at me more often than not today.  The boss is gassy today and hasn't had her daily poop yet.  Also, I'm learning that she dislikes being hot as much or more than she dislikes being cold.

I think that today and Tuesday's fits may have something to do with her getting her nighttime bottle basically in the morning though.  Today we slept until 5, and it was almost 6 on Tuesday.  I'm guessing that's not good for her schedule, and I'm going to have to set my clock for around 3 AM now so that I will wake up to wake her to eat at a decent time (Yippee).

I'm actually looking forward to my trip to Walmart tonight for groceries, though Bart may not be so happy about it.  I wonder if they still make Calgon, and if it can take me away?  If so, I may buy some tonight.  This is definitely one of those days that can try my soul.  I just remind myself that she is a blessing.  She is wonderful.  Even her cries are beautiful (they really are).  This too will pass.

Thankfully she's been throwing me goofy smiles and grins when she hasn't been screaming today.

Five Weeks

I'm a couple of days late with this, but Monday we were adjusting our routine (we're always having to adjust it for something it seems), and Tuesdays seem to be the one day out of the week Lorelai decides to be a fussy baby from Hades.  Thankfully all is usually well by bedtime.

Honestly, we're very blessed with Miss Lorelai.  She would sleep through the night if we could let her.  Thankfully her pediatrician said that once she hits two months we (I) can let her sleep through the night (I can't wait!), and I'll no longer have to wake the both of us up once every night for a feeding.

She's staying awake longer now, and starting to smile and coo more often.  She likes to change out of her jammies and either bathed or cleaned off in the mornings and relaxes at night when she's changed into that night's jammies.

During the day she spends time squirming around on a blanket, and often Lucy and Dory join her.  Dory is still very protective and obsessed with her girl.  Lucy is getting more comfortable around her.  She loves her, that's obvious by little things like the way she sleeps next to her swing (Lorelai sleeps in her swing right now) most nights when she's not in bed with us, but she's far more careful and less smothering about it.

She's about to grow out of her newborn sized clothes.  That makes me both proud and sad at the same time, kind of like how I cherish each moment I spend holding her, but my arms get so tired after a while.  These days are so tiring at times, but I know they won't last forever.  I'm sure that our parents feel like it was just the other day when they were holding us in their arms.

Questions From Melissa

My friend Melissa sent me this email:

                   4 states to which I have been to:         FL, TX, CA, Hawaii         
                   4 favorite smells:                               Baked cookies, vanilla, the ocean, coffee
                   4 people you think will answer:            Jen, Rissy, Addy, Mom
                   4 TV Shows I watch:                          Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Little Einsteins, Max and Ruby, Jake and the Neverland Pirates (can you tell who is in charge of the tv around here?)


 Here's what you're supposed to do now...... and please don't spoil the fun. Hit "Forward", delete my answers, type in your answers, and send it to a bunch of people,  including me . Its only four questions....thanks for doing this!

Now, I'm not sending it out to people via email, but am posting it here for people to answer in Comments.

Here are my answers as well:

                   4 states to which I have been to:           VA, NC, TX, IN     
 
                   4 favorite smells:                                 Coffee and books together, fresh laundry,             freshly baked bread, clean baby

                   4 people you think will answer:          Erin, Louise maybe, and I'm not sure

                   4 TV Shows I watch:                          Jeopardy, The Big Bang Theory, Gilmore Girls, Modern Family

One Month of Lorelai (AKA Starvin' Marvin)

Yesterday Lorelai was four weeks old.  Today, depending on how you look at it, she'll be one whole month old!  One month.  It's hard to believe that it's already been a month.  All of my days have a tendency to run together lately, especially since I get up at least once a night with my little Marvin.

Marvin's short for Starvin' Marvin from the early days of South Park.  I call Lorelai that, because she believes herself to be starving several times a day even though she's now taking three ounces of formula every three hours.  I don't think it'll be long before she'll be moving on the four ounces.  Our girl definitely has a healthy appetite.

She's staying awake longer and longer these days.  Most of the time, she's in a fairly good mood, unless she's gone a day without pooping.  Then, I have to give her an ounce of pear juice to make the world a better place again.  The funny thing about making the world a better place is that it has to get really dirty before it can get better.  I'm talking so dirty that I hold her away from my body, take her upstairs, and rinse her off in the bathtub with my handheld shower messy.  After that though, everything's pretty much roses though - just hold your nose when you open any trash can with a lid in our house.

Marvin is starting to smile some, and coo and try to talk to us.  She has at least one moment of glee when I fasten a bib around her neck before bottle time.  Last night I swear I heard her giggle even though I know developmentally she's not supposed to be able to for a little while longer.

She's noticing toys and other things more now and reaches out to touch them.  She's obsessed with her Daddy's face when he hold her and likes messing with my hair.  I have to admit to tickling her with it some.

She made her longest trip anywhere fairly easily Saturday, when we went down to Greenwood to fix her grandparents' computer.  Before that, the greatest distance she had traveled was down to the Square in Fayetteville to visit our friends at the TV station.

I've started reading Anne of Green Gables to her.  I've chosen that particular book to read to her, because I love it, Anne and Lorelai both have red hair, and I also run out of things to say and sing to her at times, when I know she's just wanting to "talk" with me.

She's just about the sturdiest baby I've ever known and already holds her head up very well, especially when she's climbing my body when I'm trying to burp her.  Interestingly, she usually will burp for me when I ask her to.

Once she's had what I call her "bedtime" bottle, around 10 or 11 at night usually, she's not that difficult to put to bed.  In fact, I often still have to wake her in order for her to have her bottle in the wee sma's of the night.  Then, once she goes to sleep after that, she often will sleep until we wake her again, which she doesn't really appreciate.  I'm really thankful for the fact that thus far, I've been allowed to sleep at night for the most part.  Our worst two nights were her first and third nights home, and the first night's discomfort had a lot to do with the fact that I slept on the recliner because I my incision.

Thursday we go back to the pediatrician to check her weight.  Hopefully she's gaining the appropriate amount now.  Then we won't have to go back there until her two-months shots.  I can't wait to see the milestones she hits after another month!

I Like It, I Actually Like It!

I haven't been a listener to music on the radio in probably six seven years, since we lived in Bryant and worked in Little Rock.  Back then I listened to both enjoy music, and it was then that I really started listening to talk radio and also traffic reports.  I learned to live by the traffic reports in Little Rock so I could travel to or from work on either the more scenic route of Highway 5 or the faster route (unless there was a wreck) on I-30.

While listening to traffic reports, I also started listening to the local talk radio station.  Working at the time for the state, living so near the capitol, and it being a legislative year, it was very interesting and enlightening to hear all of the goings on at the capitol.  You hardly ever hear about what's going on there in the news here in the western part of the state.  From there I progressed on to listening to nationally syndicated shows at lunch as well.  In doing this though, I stopped listening to music on the radio for the most part.  I didn't stop listening to music completely, I just (at the time) listened to cds that I burned at home of mp3's and eventually my first iPod, a 2nd gen black nano.   It also turned out that especially once we moved to Northwest Arkansas, there weren't really any stations that played music that I enjoy listening to.  The Pop stations were too poppy for my maturing tastes, and the adult contemporary stations were still playing the same stuff they had since I was in high school or even before that.  So, my radio presets suddenly became littered with political and sports talk radio stations.

I still keep my nano in the car though, and listen to it whenever I'm in a music mood, rather than torturing myself with whatever passed for music on the radio stations.  However, because I honestly couldn't comfortably drive (turning to look for oncoming traffic grew increasingly impossible) the last couple months of my pregnancy, I stayed out of my car for the most part.  That meant I let the battery on my nano die, and when I was in my car, I had to listen to the radio.  Also, all the good talk radio shows are weekday-only.

While flipping through the known radio stations, I realized that at some point what had been yet another mediocre adult-contemporary station (it used to air John Tesh's radio show, for heaven's sake) had changed its format to something far more like what I enjoy listening to.  Almost every song played was in my eclectic collection in iTunes.  I was impressed, and am now actually listening to (at least one) music station on the radio again, which is good, considering my child's enjoyment of music.   If you haven't yet, give KRUZ 94.9 a try.

Lorelai's Most Listened To Playlist.  Pardon the album name of the first song.

Enough Time To Form A Habit (Three Weeks)

Wearing her Old Navy jeans & Strawberry Shortcake onsie.

Today, my Dad would have been sixty-six years old.  It's hard to believe that he's been gone for over twenty-one years.  He would have loved his new granddaughter.  She seems to have my nose, which is his nose.  Sadly, that means it's a bit crooked and turns to the right. Every day she looks a little like one person or another.  She's very much a mixture of all her DNA.  I can't wait to see what she'll look like when she grows up, even though I'm not in a hurry for her to no longer be small enough to curl up on one arm.

They say that it takes twenty-one days or three weeks to form a habit.  I guess that's true, because after three weeks, living with Lorelai is seeming more natural and common rather than this new, novel thing.  Even the new has worn off on the dogs.  Dory only checks on Lorelai almost every time she comes into the same room with her now, instead of every single time.  What have we learned in three weeks?

• We are finally establishing at least a bit of a routine.  Every morning we wake up around seven for a bottle, then we're ready to be either bathed or sponged off, and changed into our clean clothes for the day and a fresh diaper.  After that, she likes to hang out in her crib for a while, listening to the radio or iPod, talking to Stuffed Lucy and Dory until she falls asleep again, while I shower.  We read books and just hang out in our room until our next bottle around ten.  We eventually come downstairs and hang out off and on in between bottles, naps, tummy time, etc.  I do housework when I can too.  We have a tendency to get fussy in the evening when it gets close to bedtime, but usually after our 10-11 pm bottle, we're out for the night.
• She's a very good girl for the most part, but she has a tendency to only poop every four or so days, and by the last day she can be a nightmare, so her pediatrician has her taking an ounce of pear juice every other day.  She LOVES it, and it makes her much more pleasant.
• Her hair sticks straight up after it's been washed.  I love it that way right now, though it tickles when she's cuddled up against me.
• Bart and I have decided that we need a baby carrier.  I think I'll be heading to Target this week to buy a Baby Bjorn.  We don't mind holding her a lot, but it would be nice to be able to do other things as well.

I Did It Again

Once again, I've changed the title of this blog.  It's just a personal blog, so I'm not trying to garner more readers by becoming well-known, so this isn't really an issue.  I just think that it's a good time to make note of the changes that have occurred in my life by adding Lorelai to my blog. 

This is still my blog, not Lorelai's, but seeing as though my entire life is centered around her right now, I believe that she has an important place here, along with Lucy and Dory.  I think that this title more accurately reflects where we all are right now.  I still haven't changed my URL, but I may eventually.

The One With Bart's Inappropriate Song

You know that episode of Friends where Ross gets Emma to laugh by singing "Baby Got Back" to her, and they talked about how that's not really a song that's appropriate to sing to a little girl?   Well Houston, we have that beat.

Last night while I was at Walmart buying groceries and honestly having a moment to myself, Bart was home with a very unhappy baby.  He had swaddled her and and held her close, he bounced her, he tried everything.  Finally he just started watching music videos with her On Demand and of all things, she got quiet when he started watching Cee Lo's "F You" video.  Tell me that's not inappropriate.  At least it was the cleaner version where he said, "F You," rather than the full monty.

When I got home he told me about it, and I had to think a moment and remembered that while I was pregnant, Lorelai and I rocked out to the Gwenyth Paltrow Glee version in the car all the time.  I guess that's why she enjoyed listening to "Sweet Child O' Mine" the other day.

How could such a sweet face love such a song???

Glee - Forget You feat. Gwyneth Paltrow! from Yana on Vimeo.

Living With Lorelai: Two Weeks and One Day

Taking Mom to the Dr.

I can't believe that two weeks and a day ago, I was in the OR at Willow Creek having my C-section and meeting Miss Lorelai.  Two weeks.  It seems like it was yesterday, yet hasn't she always been here?  Astonishingly enough, I'm getting enough or close to enough sleep.  Once L finally goes to sleep for the night, she's pretty much out for the night.  In fact, today when I took her to the pediatrician, he told me to start making her wake up at night to take her bottles, because she has lost an ounce and a half since last Monday.

Honestly, I was sure she would have gained back her birth weight by now, because eating is not an issue with our girl.  She loves it and doesn't spit up much at all, really.   We had already started giving her three ounces of formula occasionally, instead of two per feeding, because a few times a day, she just can't seem to get enough to eat.  Now we're going to make her take a bottle every three rather than four hours though, because she really isn't getting enough.

Two Weeks Old

After all of this, and because she's having very little problems with gas or spitting up, I'm very glad I decided to bottle feed her rather than breast.  I know that I couldn't keep up with her demand, especially since she has a sixth sense and starts screaming almost every time I try to sit down and eat a meal.

I went into the hospital weighing roughly 150 lbs, having gained between forty and forty-five pounds during my pregnancy.  Between running myself ragged and not getting to eat as regularly as I would like, I'm already down to 127.  I hope to get down to 110, but not via the new mom unintentional anorexia diet.  Even though my appetite without Miss Piggy is nowhere as huge, I still like my food - a lot.

We're still trying to find a routine.  I thought we were about there, but now that we're having to amp up the feeding schedule, we're still going to have to work at it some.  Anything is worth her gaining weight and thriving though.

Things I Love About Lorelai 

• I love that to calm her, I have to cuddle her close, and that's her preferred method to sleep.  I know that all too soon from now, she won't want me to hold her so closely or for so long.
• I love that I can hold her little bottom, and remember feeling it before she was born sticking out by my rib cage after Dr. Hinton told us that's what it was.  BTW, I'm very glad my doctor could tell the difference between a head and a butt.
• I love that I can hold her feet, and that she wraps her toes around my fingers just like when we're holding her her hands.
• I love (again) when I'm holding her and find her beautiful (still blue) eyes gazing back at me.

Presenting Lorelai G. & a Prayer Request

A week ago, I was spending Super Bowl Sunday packing bags, finishing last minute laundry, and attempting to relax before the scheduled big event on Monday morning.  I think I did a fairly decent job of relaxing too, considering the cornucopia of emotions coursing through my veins.  We glanced at the Super Bowl some that night, but didn't pay too much attention to it or the commercials.  I've had to be reminded that the Giants won several times, though I did enjoy listening to Madonna perform the halftime show.

Bart let me watch Downton Abbey after the Super Bowl for a change.  Usually he asks that I wait to watch when he's not around.  I vaguely remember watching it as well.  Then we went to bed and tried to get some sleep.  We knew it would be difficult to do, but we didn't know exactly how difficult that task would be.

Around two am (three and a half hours before we had to be at the hospital), I got up to go to the bathroom.  It happened so gradually that I didn't know what it was, but I spent the next hour going back and forth to the bathroom because even though we had already scheduled a cesarean, my water was breaking!!!

Lucy sensed something was wrong, woke up Bart, and had to go outside for a little diarrhea.  Then she laid down on me in bed, trying to take care of me.  By three, I was still in denial about being in labor, because the contractions were so light and sporadic, but got up to shower.  I then proceeded to shave my legs (as best I could), put on makeup, and straighten my hair for the day.  Yeah, I did that while in labor.  Lucy stuck to me like glue during this time.

We decided to leave early for the hospital, which is thankfully just a stone's throw from our house.  We went to the room where they were to prep me and they hooked me up to all the necessary monitors.  Yep, I was in labor, and my engineer husband thought it was "so cool" to be able to watch my contractions and how heavy they were.  I wasn't so impressed.

It seemed like forever (but wasn't really) before the anesthesiologist came in to talk to us, then Dr. Hinton came in to see us.  After that, it went pretty quickly.  The crew at Willow Creek is just awesome and I couldn't have been in better hands.  My spinal was done fairly painlessly, then Dr. Hinton came in, they brought in Bart, and after a few minutes, they held this wide-eyed screaming, beautiful thing up for me to see.

Bart went over and cut her cord, then brought her for me to see all cleaned.  She was beautiful, and I had the privilege of watching Daddy fall in love at first sight.  Her screams were even beautiful, though they didn't last long.  Once she was swaddled up and in Daddy's arms, she was good.

The rest of the day is very much a blur.  Actually the next few days have been a blur of sorts.  Lorelai is a very good girl and mostly just cries when she has a reason.  While at the hospital, she would only cry when she was hungry, dirty, wet, or naked.  She has since kept me up all night one night, but we realized that was because she was cold.

Right now, I'm still so enamored with her and grateful for her health that I love hearing her banshee screams.  They're truly a blessing.  Everything about her is.  Monday afternoon or evening, I posted this on Facebook:  "Everyone, thank you for the prayers. Each one was felt and much appreciated. We're so thankful to God for this incredible blessing of a baby girl He has given us."  At the time, I didn't realize just how true this was.

A little while later, I remembered a tweet I saw from a former coworker the night before that I had to put out of my mind on Sunday night regarding how two of her former coworkers had babies pass away in the past year.  I had a very, very uneasy feeling about it, but didn't couldn't think about it then.  On Monday night, while Bart and Lorelai were both out of the room, and after the visitors had left, I messaged the friend on Facebook about it.  Sadly my suspicions were correct.

Our friend Amanda was one of the first people I told that I was pregnant on the day I found out.  She was also one of the friends who cried with me two years ago when we had our miscarriage.  When I told her I was pregnant, she came up to me and told me that she was too.  We progressed through our pregnancies together at work, comparing sicknesses, and all the other little things about pregnancy.  We planned play dates for our little girls, who it turned out would probably be born just days from each other.

From what I've gathered they went into labor Saturday night, and were in labor all Sunday.  Around the time of the end of the Super Bowl though the baby had been born, but they couldn't get her to breathe.  Bart and I are devastated for our friends, especially because of the similarity in our situations and how they could easily have been reversed.  We've been praying constantly for our friends and asking others for their prayers as well.

Our hearts are full of joy at the advent of our precious baby girl, but they're also breaking for our friends.    Another former coworker had a baby early Friday morning.  It should have been one heck of week for all of us.  I can't imagine going to the hospital and never being able to bring home our little girl, nor can I imagine trying to put life together again after or my body going through all the changes of having given birth without the reward.  Having lost a baby at eight weeks was the most difficult thing I ever had to experience.  Losing a full-term baby at birth is devastating.  I am for devastated for them.  Keep all of us in your prayers, but especially Dan and Amanda.