Bad Blogging + Promised Update

There's no excuse for bad blogging - it's really self-imposed pressure to create something worth reading that prevents me from blogging more often.  My own answer to that: "Lame, Mary. Lame."

And so, I'm going to TRY to make sure that I don't miss these massive milestones that fleet through our daily lives. Especially as I reiterate to myself how quickly it all goes by. 

Baby #2 update: we do not have a name picked out for our 2nd daughter.  No, we are not simply "not telling people", "keeping it a surprise" or any other version.  I thought we (read: I) was sold on a name that suddenly was bounced after reading Elizabeth a story about a Saint from Peru and she liked the picture.  Lots of high level reasoning on this one, huh? 

We're pretty boring in general these days.  I've taken to trying to rest as much as I can, but I may have jinxed my own luck, after merrily responding to questions about sleep and comfort with, "I'm very blessed; I've been sleeping great!" Until 2 nights ago when I stopped sleeping well. Another great example as to why mother's have a short memory.

Elizabeth is still biting the heads and faces of the baby dolls that we work to lovingly introduce; but when her sweet 2 month-old cousin, Brandon, visited yesterday, she was all eyes and seemed to recognize the difference between plastic and skin. Thank Goodness!  Molly did find her curled up inside of Brandon's carseat, yanking on his toys and clamoring for his bottle and pacifier.  But...when he made any sad sounds, she perked up and looked equally distraught on his behalf. Very sweet to see her concern.  He's such a great baby; I was thrilled they made the trip and helped get E used to babies.

Thanks again for all of the well wishes!!! We are so fortunate to have loving family and friends helping at all corners.

xoxo
The Slaugs

Tricky little hands!

After mass two weekends ago, we headed to the hospital to visit our new nephew.

While watching the Steelers game in the waiting lounge (thus, the serious face...it was the final drive and Pittsburgh was behind), Dave felt something in his pocket.

Ahuh, she pinched the tag/sign that the ushers wear at church.

Oh the pride...

The Best Part of Weekend Mornings...

...is that at least there's homemade lattes! Thanks to the mukka bialetti from our wedding...we enjoy a hot cup during Sunday Morning and the Philly Inquirer...mmm...

Here Dave takes a sip of a fresh cappuccino!

Why I'm a bad blogger...

Around the 5 month mark, Elizabeth was playing while I was typing, likely blogging on the floor of our dining room. I pulled her onto my lap and she hurled onto the keyboard of the laptop.  I quickly threw her off my lap (ok, well not threw, but you can imagine) turned it upside down and blotted like there was no tomorrow. It seemed to salvage all of the keys, but I didn't dare turn it on or use it for fear of squishing regurgitated breastmilk further into some electrical board. 

Later that night, or the next day, I forget, we discovered that the "o" doesn't work.  We tried everything to no avail.  Dave developed his own shortcut by copying and pasting each time you need to type an "o"...I took it to Best Buy's Geek Squad and they offered the sweet estimate of $135 to send it out and then they would call to give me the price to fix it..."if they can". Nice, huh? So, since I make a habit of throwing $100 bills down the drain, we figured we'd save the dough and just keep doing the copy and paste for each "o". 

Thankfully, we have an iMac for photography work, but when I'm on it in the office, I feel like I'm slacking on post processing stuff, so I don't play on that computer, just this beat-up-freakizoid laptop that can't spell "Mom".

Excuses excuses. My New Years Resolution is to be better at marking the milestones and the daily life of my expanding family.

Lesson here: don't let your kid near your computer. Duh, Mom.

Overdue

Wow - sorry for the overdue posting here - I'm going to have to make it short, since Ellie's on her way up from a nap. 

I realized it's been almost a month since I last posted!  Crazy. Quick synopsis of the big things that have come and gone:

• Trip to Germany and Austria (basically the reason I went missing on the blog for a month). Lots of funny stories from this trip that deserve their own post.
• Baby play dates that get so much better each week!  Because the 'play' date actually involves 'playing.'
• Dave has been shooting a LOT. So there's lots of post production that I need to get on - thus, my time normally spent blogging went toward my 'other job'. Which I enjoy just as much, albeit keeping me away from my fun social avenues. :(
• Switching rooms around in the house so that Ellie now has almost an entire room to be safe and play in.  I'm sure the commitment to the kid is much to Annie's chagrin, but it's nice that I can be in the kitchen and keep an eye on her destruction.
• David has been super Dad.  He took on watching Ellie all day yesterday from awakening to nearly  sleeping - he was exhausted when I got home and said, "I don't know how you do it every day." (HUGE GRIN HERE)
• She's started sleeping through the night!
• Nana visited and saved Mama on a few occasions.
• Oh yea, and we're pregnant!

All of these items deserve their own post, so I'll have to get on that!

Glad to be back!

xoxo

Hilarious Mommy Article - Must Read

An Aerial Disaster

Little victories

Last night, David and I were having dinner. I had steamed some very small pieces of zucchini and didn't mash them. We put them in the middle of her tray in hopes she might become interested in using her hands to start feeding herself. Since she places everything in sight on her 'direct-to-the-mouth-conveyer-belt' I thought for sure she'd pick it right up.

A Blueberry Morning

Instead, we got some fake crying noise, grunting in the spoon's direction (we had a second course of scorn squash) and a complete disinterest in the zucchini. After about 5 minutes we move on. Oh well, we said. Guess she's not ready yet. I had talked to Heather about Pippa doing just this, so I knew it was within her developmental ability.

Not terribly disappointing, but parents are great at getting excited to try something new only to learn it rarely works on the first try. So I started feeding her the acorn squash. We were all using utensils when all of the sudden we see her slam both hands down on the zucchini and bring them to her open mouth. We look on in amazement! Then she did it again. David puts his hand up to quietly high five and my eyes filled with tears. Yes, tears. And yes, I deserve to be teased for crying because my baby picked up food. So exciting!!!

Little moments that surprise you.

We had halved blueberries for breakfast...on to something new!

Food Update

The girl's getting it down. She's a champion spoon eater. It doesn't really matter what's on the spoon, as long as it's reloaded as soon as she wipes it clean. If you're not fast enough, you'll be treated to a pounding of the right hand on the tray table and some bizarre fake crying noises.

It's most astounding how much Elizabeth can eat. One of my greatest fears in this whole food thing, aside from the obvious choking, is that I will somehow teach her to overeat and pressure her into a lifetime of being overweight. They say breastfed babies develop a sensor in their bellies to let them know when they're full, but it still sits high on my list of neurotic mommy fears.

The strange thing that she does when she's eating is she sticks her left hand, well up to the fingers at least, into her mouth after nearly each spoonful. After overcoming questions of infant bulemia, we've learned from Heather that Pippa does it too. Phew!!! My Mom swears that she's exploring the textures in her mouth, but when my helpful husband pitches it, the hand in mouth makes him a little crazy. (it takes twice as long to feed her when she's 'exploring' each bite!)

time to lower the crib!

On anything. On everthing. Whenever. Wherever. Look out.

It was one morning when I went into her room to get her only to find her staring over the crib rail at me. We lowered the mattress that afternoon!

Pulling herself up on objects and people came so quickly after crawling that it's hard to believe.

She will crawl over and pull herself up on my leg. She will crawl over and pull herself up on her highchair. She will pull herself up on the dog. She pulls herself up on the exersaucer, which leaves her looking like she's providing the percussion for a thunderstorm. Swaying, bending, arching, teetering and (if I can get there fast enough to avoid it) crashing. It spins and rocks, so it's my least favorite thing that she climbs on.

The carpet often provides a safe landing, and I watch her like a hawk around corners and hard surfaces. That aside, she's so proud of herself that I can't help but let her keep doing it. Everywhere!

Date Night!

We had the most incredible date night. My parents offered to watch Elizabeth, and Dave decided we'd head to the Mann Music Center (an outdoor half shell amphitheater).

One of our favorites was playing with the Philadelphia Orchestra behind him. Chris Botti, the trumpet master, himself. Awesome show!  Beautiful weather.  I wanted to sit on the lawn rather than in the seats underneath the partial roof.  We packed a picnic basket of red wine, pellegrino, asiago, sharp cheddar, roasted garlic hummus, garlic naan, baby carrots, red grapes, and a cobb salad (with ranch dressing for my awesome husband)!

We kicked our shoes off and spread our blanket - hearing Chris Botti under the stars and with a city skyline in the background...it just doesn't get better. 

So grateful.

Teaser!

We don't dare talk about it.

We've become as superstitious as hockey players refusing to shave their beards during the playoffs.

If you kid sleeps through the night suddenly, you don't tell anyone, for fear of taking for granted that it might never happen again.

That great nighttime storm two nights ago provided our first full night of uninterrupted sleep. Around 5:45 I ran down the hall to her room, Dave must've heard me scurry and followed. I gently touched her shoulder, didn't feel anything. I tried her arm, and still no discernable movement, so I began pocking her to evoke some sort of response as my panic started. Dave shouted in as much of a whisper as he could, "what are you doing?! Don't do that!"

I couldn't help it! And fortunately she didn't wake up until after I hopped out of the shower.

She made it through her first night alive; she can do it again. Just have to make sure we don't talk about it.

"We make plans and God laughs."

First Major League Baseball Game!

Baby's first game: Phillies vs Pirates. 7:05 start. Dollar Dog Night!

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Apparently not pooping for 6 days isn't really a problem.

Not for adults, but for breast fed babies it's a milk production situation that works itself out. Who knew?!

The first time she hadn't gone in I think it was 4 days. I was driving home from my parents' house and frantically called Dave's cell. He was outside building a shed, so he wasn't able to get any of my 7 methods of communication. (voicemails, texts, screams-just kidding about the screams.) I was just begging him to go get prune juice for me to drink. He said I was yelling at him when I got home. I didn't think that I was, just merely talking loud enough so he could hear me over the wailing.

He encountered another Dad in the prune juice section who was all too happy to share some advice. He indicated that they gave their child prune juice, in a ratio of 2 (water): 1 (prune juice) as early as 4 months.  Since we were right at 4 months, David came home and shared the vast knowledge obtained in the juice aisle with his frantic wife. 

So we mixed up the potion and she gobbled it up!  Here's the hindsight.  The poor baby was HUNGRY.  I've since learned, and it makes perfect sense, that babies grow a lot around 4-5 months.  They need more food and so if they're being breastfed, the supply needs to crank up to meet demand.  When she's not pooping, it means she's not eating enough, which is also why she seems terribly upset and wails in stomach pain - it's called hunger.  I had no idea, so of course, I gave her more prune juice - which she continued to lap up (again, clearly hunger, but what did I know?!)  Then I learned part 2 of the prune juice encounter: gas.  It's the smelly stank of putrid. I kept mistaking the gas for her poop, but it wasn't so.  The poor child had awful gas.

Lesson Here: our bodies are meant to work - let them. :)

Ah, teething...

At first you tell yourself that there's no way. She's too young. It's too early.

Then you notice that she isn't eating as well and sometimes cries while nursing. She's been drooling for some time and everyone seems to be warning you that she's teething. So you ask other mom's who have had babies in this decade. They respond, "are her gums inflamed? Do you see the teeth coming through?" the reality is that first time Moms have never gone through this, so we haven't a clue what we're really looking for.

Then you watch as she grabs for things, draws them to her mouth and wails out in pain. Finally catching on here, Mom.

OK, it's teething. The drool, the poor nursing, the trouble sleeping and random crying is buttressed by noticing reddish gums and white bud looking shapes under the gumline.

Thanks to Becky Sechrist for offering her teething solution of frozen washcloths. These serve as fantastic replacements for the rapidly melting teething rings the stores hock.

And so it begins.

Gotta love it!

How much your heart expands

Your heart feels like it could explode with love for your child.  Suddenly so many things feel different.  The news becomes almost unbearable to read and watch the crime stories. 

Millions of kisses...and the kid's only 3 months old.  Such joy with every smile, twinkle, sweet nap, and laugh.  Being a Mom is the best job, and I'm so blessed to have it!

Week 17

Tricks: She's suddenly clutching everything and wants to get her hands and mouth on just about everything she sees. She regularly bounces on our legs, laughs at the dogs (and only sometimes at us.) She's still trucking down the crawl track. Ellie loves petting Killian, practicing sitting up, and showing off her grins.

Life: Wow, time is really starting to fly!

And we're flying to Italy this weekend, so wish us luck! I recognize that her routine will wind up slightly 'off' with the 5 hour time difference. I cannot wait for Ellie to see some of the paintings in the Vatican.

As for this week, the weather has warmed up and so we threw the windows open throughout the day and night. I think that the outdoor lullaby isn't as sweet as she's used to, so she's begin waking a bit more often at night. In contrast with my former self, I'm sure she'll work it out.

But for now, I find myself typing this on my phone as I'm sitting in the car hoping she can extend her nap and catch up on some much needed sleep!

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

The Poop Decoder

A diaper always goes on clean - but you never know what you're gonna get in the morning. :) This was her Happy St. Patrick's Day onesie...maybe too much Guinness.  Diaper Decoder

Wanting another

I was talking with my girlfriends about next pregnancies, more kids, etc.  Much to my amazement, those earlier feelings of not being able to imagine having more than one child (from a time/energy/child safety standpoint) has dissipated. 

In fact, we were all in agreement.  Having another would be great -whenever it happens. :)  I'll catch David talking to Elizabeth about a brother or sister (mostly a brother).  It's incredibly sweet.

Amazing how overwhelming it feels at first followed by the transition to wanting to repeat it all over again. We are so blessed.

Lamest New Year's Eve Ever

After 2 days of battling a cold, I looked at the clock and realized it was seven o'clock on New Years Eve. My husband was home looking a little bored. We hadn't really talked about what we'd like to do to ring in the New Year, but I'm sure that neither of us imagined we'd be sitting on a couch, (me, not having showered in 3 days) ready to fall asleep at any moment.

So here's a recap of the night: leftovers for dinner (eaten separately), a half shower, put the baby to sleep in her bed (1st successful attempt lasted for about 2 hours) followed by the vow to David that we will never have such a lame New Years Eve again as we both fell asleep on the couch (not together)...yes, completely lame.

Lesson: I have back-up plans for next year already in place. :)

Learning to Shower and Eat

My first attempt to shower was a bust.

I was able to get E down to sleep finally (yes, on my own) and not fear she'd wake up. But I was equally fearful that she'd somehow suffocate in my temporary absence, so I had her in her carseat, on the shower floor, then feared that she'd be too cold, so I put her kiddie coat on, then in the carseat, then with a blanket. (those bathroom floors can get chilly!) finally, I turned on the water and noticed that I hadn't plucked my eyebrows in almost 2 months, so I got to work on those, then I remembered to brush my teeth and put contacts in...as I was undressing, guess what?

She woke up.

Lesson: don't dilly-dally, Mary!