Super(tired)model

Today was our first professional photo shoot with Ellie and me. We went to a local place, Studio This Is. Goofy name, I know. They do mostly wedding photography, but were open to taking pics of us. Our day started off poorly with Ellie missing an hour of sleep and then fighting her morning nap. Then, our appointment was at 11, and by rights, she should have gone down for another nap around 12 or 12:30. She was a pretty good sport, but spent about 80% of her time with her hands in her mouth. And, she started getting fussy about noon. As it was, she fell asleep in the stroller while I was waiting for lunch at the coffee shop next door.

She hasn't done that in a very very long time. And, she's still asleep in her crib over an hour later. Part of me wants to go start on another project, but another part of me knows this is too good to be true and she'll wake up just as soon as I get started doing something else. So, even though she hasn't moved a muscle since she got comfy in her crib, I'm probably just going to wait it out. The cat is doing her level best to wake Ellie by racing up and down the hall. If she keeps it up, it won't be long now.

With luck, the proofs from the photo shoot should be online by Tuesday. Depending on the security, I'll try to post a link.

Just When You Think You've Got a Routine....

Helping Dad with the wirestrippers.

I just reviewed my last post and can't believe that was only a week ago. Since that post, Ellie has suddenly caught onto sleeping in her crib – although as I write she is fighting bedtime with all her might.

We finally installed our blackout curtains in the nursery (although the black trash bags worked better, these look nicer). I've been catching Ellie's sleepy windows. And, she's been going to sleep relatively quickly with little fuss MOST of the time. Usually, her first nap is about an hour after she wakes up, or halfway through my breakfast. Then, she sleeps around 11 or 12, and around 2, and then we make a final push to meet our quota around 4. Most of her naps are about 30 minutes. Every now and then, she'll go 45 minutes or her record of 1 hour and 15 minutes. That's why we're currently at about 4 naps. However, according to the sleep book I'm reading (slowly), naps of less than an hour or naps with motion (ie. in the car, the swing, the baby carrier, etc) aren't very restful. I find that troubling since that's about all the sleep she gets during the day. Her last nap usually starts in the crib and ends in the Ergo carrier. For some reason, she can sleep in that about 95% of the time. For hours. Today, I had to wake her up so she didn't sleep into bedtime. Now, I'm thinking I still let her sleep too long. She was NOT happy with me when I woke her.

Okay, she is finally asleep. A mere 55 minutes past "bedtime", which is 8 pm. Usually, we start nursing around 7:40 so she's in bed around 8 and generally asleep by 8:30. Tonight, she had no real appetite and then threw up when I kept trying to get her to eat more. So, we changed her clothes (for the second time) and sleep sack and then I put her to bed. I think I need to move her max nap time to 2.5 hours before bed instead of the 2 hours I currently use. The book I'm reading also suggested that short naps mean that she's overtired and needs to go to bed earlier. So, I think we'll start inching bedtime up this weekend until we notice improvement. Supposedly, we may see her sleep 10-12 hours straight through. That makes my boobs hurt just thinking about it. She slept 8.5 hours straight last night and I thought I was going to burst. But, I'm sure I'll adjust.

Other than sleep, her eating has changed drastically also. Last week, she was eating 2.5 hours a day. The last few days, she's barely nursed an hour or hour and a half. She snacks for 6-8 minutes on a side and then starts arching her back and giving the boob dirty looks. She doesn't seem overly gassy, so I'm not sure what's going on. Her attitude is still mostly sunny though, so I'm guessing she's getting enough to eat. Still, I am willing to bet her weight gain has slowed significantly.

She was playing with Daddy the other day and he got some beginner giggles. See the video below.

Sneezy Visits the Doctor

Today marked day 16 of the sniffles and congestion. So, we went to see Dr. L. We were running 5 minutes late, but I didn't stress because I knew he'd be later. The parking lot and waiting room were unusually sparse, so I held out a little hope that we'd be in and out in less than an hour. I was close. We got in the room pretty quickly, but then waited forever to get a quick 5 minute consult and a script for medicine if she got worse instead of better. Basically, she could be in the 10% of cold sufferers who takes longer than 10 days to recover, or she could have a sinus infection. Either way, I think she's started to recover since most of her sneezes are pretty dry now.

The highlight of the visit was getting another weigh-in. Ellie now weighs 12.5 pounds. She's climbing the charts to the 13th percentile! So, the fact that she's been eating another half-hour a day seems to be paying off.

A little tongue for the camera

Otherwise, we're kind of in a holding pattern. Ellie has gotten on a rough nap schedule, but has to be forced into them with the Ergo carrier. Mom's back is starting to ache from approximately 3 hours of wearing Baby each day. However, Ellie is getting about 13-14 hours of sleep a day and is a happy girl for the most part. So, I'm just hoping that she grows out of the clingy nap phase at no later than 6 months. I have a sleep book to start reading again that has been highly recommended by several mommy friends. I keep trying the crib nap, but it has only worked when she was already pretty deeply asleep from the car. Even then, she doesn't recover after she startles herself awake the first time, so they're generally 30 minutes or less.

Sniffles and Adventures in Napping

Ellie is going on 9 days with a moderately runny nose. I think it might be allergies. She's avoided a fever and her snot is clear, but it's also persistent. We missed the Y one day and had Grandma watch her a couple other times, but she doesn't seem to have improved or gotten worse. So, I took her to Childwatch today and they didn't say anything, even though she seemed to get really congested sounding right before we left the house. I've decided that the bulb syringes are just about useless, although using a little saline does help loosen things up. As disgusting as it sounds, I've actually tried the Nose Frida, which is a manual snot sucker (ie. Mom sucks on one end and opposite end fits at baby's nostril). Ellie doesn't like it at all, but I seem to be getting a little better at it. It's easier to clean than a bulb syringe also.

Over the weekend, P covered Ellie's windows in black plastic to try out a theory that she might sleep longer in the mornings if she didn't see the growing light and maybe she'd be able to nap in her crib during the day. Well, the real blackout curtains should be in tomorrow, but I don't think they'll work either. She still wakes up for the morning around 6:30 or 7. And, while she did nap in her crib today, it took her crying for an hour to get a 30 minute nap. After discussing with some other moms on Facebook, I'm going to try transitioning her from her Ergo carrier to the crib once she's asleep. Maybe that way we can wean her off that particular crutch. It'd certainly help my back if we could. A few other friends of mine indicated they had similar challenges with their kids and that Ellie might grow out of it by around 6 months if not before. Still, I need to read a couple sleep books and see if I can pick up any tips. I'm kinda sick of reading baby books though. So much of it seems common sense, and there are so many caveats since every child is different.

Lately, Ellie has been spreading out her feedings and lengthening most of them to 20 0r 30 minutes. It's allowed us to develop a schedule of sorts. If I can just get her to fall asleep in her crib we'll be golden. In other news, she's started sleeping on her right side. Because she's been improving on the rolling front, I replaced her birdie bumper with a breathable mesh one just until she gets more independent and reliable about rolling. I laid her down Saturday on her left side and she flipped over onto her tummy, which she didn't enjoy. Sunday, she repeated the trick during tummy time with slightly better results. However, she usually doesn't initiate the rolling, so I've been trying to help her out just to get her comfortable with it, and she seems almost there. She actually rested her head without crying tonight, which to me indicates that she's getting stronger and enjoying being on her belly a little more.