3 Months Old and Counting

Well, little Julia was three months old on Friday. And 13 weeks old on Thursday. We've started leaving her arm out of the swaddle at night and it is going very smoothly. Which is a good thing because she is almost out of the the darn thing every morning. We will most likely switch to one of those miracle blanket things in the next week or two. I would try with nothing at all but I worry that she would get cold and that with all of the kicking she does she would wake herself up all night long.

She is winning the Nap Wars. For awhile things were looking better, but the last two weeks have been just awful. She is only sleeping for 30 minutes, then waking up screaming and crying and refuses to go back to sleep unless she is held. And that is the morning nap. The afternoon nap is even worse. It is becoming very frustrating as all of the sleep experts say that this is the time when she should be napping better, not worse. Plus it makes her so cranky by the end of the day that we end up putting her to bed earlier and earlier. Which just makes her wake up earlier in the morning and the whole vicious cycle continues. She is also sliding back to eating every two hours as well, which means she is not eating as well when she does eat. I don't know what is going to happen when she starts daycare. I think that they will have their hands full with her. Especially because she refuses a pacifier and sucking on her hand only gets her more worked up. I will have to ask her teacher how he deals with getting difficult babies to nap. I can see when she is tired, but if I try to wind her down when she first starting acting sleepy, she gets more worked up. And if I wait too long she is too worked up. The pediatrician said not to worry until she was four months old, but I cannot help but worry.

I've started getting pictures ready for her teacher to put together in a poster for her at school. She is in the Treefrogs group and I am going to make her a little onesie with a picture of a tree frog. I don't think she will appreciate it now, but she will when she is older. At least it will make for a cute picture. We've got this one last week at home, then it is back to work for me. I am going to try biking to and from the UW to see if that would be a faster way to get back over at lunchtime and nurse Julia. Plus it would be good exercise for me. Here are some newer pictures...

Big smiles for Daddy

What is that black thing they keep pointing at me?

Holding her head up high!

Dad and Julia on Father's Day

Happy Father's Day!

Well, it is Dan's first Father's Day and he is doing what every father should do: napping on the couch while listening to the US Open. He has requested stuffed shells for dinner, which is most doable. We haven't done much today. We bought a couple of cupcakes at the bake sale after church for dessert, played with the baby, talked to his folks back in Maryland, and now Dad and Julia are taking naps. He is resting up for his big talk next Saturday, while Julia was rubbing her eyes in obvious need of sleep.

Julia turned 12 weeks old this past week and is still amazing us. She goes down easier for naps now, with only 5 minutes of fussing before drifting off to sleep. We moved her to the crib on Friday night and she seems to be doing well there on her own. We had to put the pack n'play mattress into the crib so that her little well was still present. Although I told Dan that I suspected when she woke up in the middle of the night, she was using the little well and the suspended nature of the bassinett to rock herself back to sleep. She has been better about taking a bottle the last week too, taking almost 3 oz yesterday! So I think that she will be fine when she gets to daycare. In any case the pediatrician thinks that she will start solids sometime between 4 and 5 months anyway, so will have plenty of milk in her rice cereal.
It is hard to believe that in two more weeks I will be back at work and she will be in daycare. Just another little step towards her becoming independent from me. I read a book this week called "Mothershock" and it summed up the ambivalence I am feeling about returning to work. While I was pregnant, Julia was completely dependent on me; we were the same person. Once she was born she started moving away from me. Every day she becomes more and more separate from me and needing me less. True, it is a slow event of incrementally small steps, but they are there nonetheless.

This week will be more difficult I think, only because it is going to be all Mommy, all the time. Dan is at a conference, which is being held in Seattle. Unfortunately the talks go until about 11pm every night. So there will be no breaks for me or breaks for Julia. Thank goodness we have our PEPS meeting on Tuesday night. Here are some pictures from when family was visiting last week...

Julia and Mom at Mt. St. Helens, Silver Lake

Auntie Em and Julia at the Seattle Japanese Garden

Julia and Grandpa near Kerry Park

The whole Family at Seattle Japanese Garden, courtesy of Tom

Four generations: Gramma, Granny, Julia, and Me

Julia's Baptism

We had a big event this past weekend. Julia was baptized at our parish here in Seattle! Lots of family attended, with Gramma and Grandpa Meier flying in from Cincinnati. Joining them were Uncle Tom, Auntie Em, Granny and Papa. Dan's brother Bobby was the godfather and Emily was the godmother. We also had Granddad Klein and GrandPam come up from San Francisco by way of Portland. And the Olympia Beusches drove up from Olympia to share in the celebration (we loved Ed's sentiment in the card....'isn't it great to be a Catholic?'. Julia looked so precious in the white heirloom baptismal gown. It was handsewn for my mom by Granny when she was born and all of the Greene children and grandchildren have worn it. So now it starts in on the third generation. It was amazing to see the fine detail and handiwork that went into making the gown. And Julia loved all of the attention she received as I dressed her. She was a champ during the baptism, only stirring when the water was poured onto her head, then falling back asleep.
While everyone was here we took advantage of the weather to drive down to Mt. St. Helens and see the volcano smoking. Dan and his family took a helicopter ride over the crater and also spotted some elk roaming the mountainside. I turned Julia front side out in the Moby and she seemed to like that. We saw some ducks and a bullfrog as well as the volcano. We also went to the arboreteum and the Seattle Japanese Gardens, which she also seemed to enjoy. At least a little bit. It was great to see everyone and to watch Julia playing with her relatives (and smiling for other people).

Other news in the childraising arena: She drank a whole 2 oz from a bottle given to her by Dan today! We will meet her daycare teacher next week and are looking forward to that. She has been a little easier to get to take a nap during the day (today being the exception), but she still only sleeps for 40-50 minutes. I guess that is all she needs? Or at least all she thinks that she needs. Here are some pictures from this past week....12 weeks old tomorrow!!!

All ready to get wet!!!

Now we can relax: the dunking is over!

At Johnston Ridge Observatory, Mt. St. Helens with Emily

Playing with Gramma...this must have been before the tummy time!

Ten Weeks and the Nap Wars

Well, another month has passed (actually more than a month, but who is counting?). It is hard to believe that we have come this far. There are a few things that I want to remember about Julia's second month of life: her first smile, how she smiles when I sing her wake up song in the morning, the moment I discovered she no longer fit into some of her newborn clothes, and how excited she looks when we start to play with one another. Her smiles are more and more frequent and she is starting to stay awake and look around when we go outside which is so nice to see. She actually stayed awake through the entire mass on Sunday night and even smiled at our friend Carol sitting behind us. So now we have outside proof that she smiles.

In my enthusiasm for babywearing, I bought another babywearing device, the Moby Wrap (www.mobywrap.com). I saw my friend Lisa wearing her baby Talia in one and it looked so darn comfortable. I thought about making one, but then I realized several things:

1. it is almost impossible to find good apparel fabric in any fabric store in the US
2. I have no time to sew
3. I am not experienced in pattern drafting.
4. I have no time to sew.
5. By the time I had found good fabric, paid for it, and drove back home, it would have cost the same to buy it from a local store.
6. I have no time to sew.

So I bought one. And it is darn comfortable. A little bit tricky to get the hang of putting on, but darn comfortable. I still love the sling for running errands that require the car though because it is much easier to put on. I will have to take a picture of the two of us in the Moby and post it. I also discovered today that it is possible to sew with Julia in the sling. I probably shouldn't iron any seams with her in it, but I can operate the sewing machine while she hugs close to me.
On to the nap wars. Since Julia will be going to daycare in another five weeks or so, I decided she should learn how to take a nap by herself. Some days it was easy; she inexplicably fell asleep in my arms (or Dan's) and would be placed gently in the crib to sleep blissfully for two hours. Other days I could only get her to sleep by wearing her (which I still love to do). And the worst days she didn't nap at all unless we went on a walk. So far we have not had much success with the structured nap. Today we attempted the nap and after 1.5 hours of shushing and patting I gave up. After she ate again, I tried again. But she just smiled and started laughing when I started shushing her. And I couldn't help but laugh back. So we played for a little bit, then I tried again when she got a little cranky and started making her tired cry. She fell asleep and stayed asleep for about 30 minutes. Then she woke up and couldn't resettle. So I told her she did a good job, put her in the sling, and starting singing to her. She relaxed, held onto my shirt, nestled up against me and smiled as she fell back asleep. How could I ask for anything more?

I have pictures to post, but they will have to wait until tomorrow's attempted sleep session. She may be sleeping through the night now (9pm to 5:30am feedings), but I am still tired. And 5:30am is early. I cannot wait until summer solstice is past us.

8 Weeks Old!

As I write, Julia is trying to put herself to sleep. She is making little grunting noises with the occasional sigh and whimper. And just now she had a little giggle that scared her awake. I know that we should move her into the nursery at some point, but I will miss all of those little sounds. Except for the grunts she makes after the 4 am feeding when she is trying mightly to pass gas. I still have to figure out if I can hear her in the nursery if I am back in the bedroom when she cries. And I don't know if I can trust the cat yet.

We have our two month check-up on Tuesday where Julia will get five shots. We've been warned by other parents to bring along some infant tylenol for afterwards. And that she might sleep the rest of the day, waking only to eat. I guess that would be the infant way of dealing with trauma. We weighed her yesterday and she is 13 lbs! And 23 inches long! She is already fitting into some of the 6 month clothes that relatives and friends sent; and looking extremely cute as well. Which makes her yelling when she is upset all the cuter...cute little baby dressed in cute outfits trying to look like she is angry.

Tonight was dinner with some friends from church. They have an 11 month old, Bridget, who is adorable. And such a contrast to Julia. Bridget was crawling all around, playing with Julia's toys, making babbling sounds, trying to open cabinet doors and lots of smiles. It is exciting to see what we have in store for us. I was also comforted by Cheri saying that Bridget was also an intense baby. She said that Bridget was also very aggressive when nursing, but grew out of it in her third month. Cheri also said that Bridget ended up hitting her developmental milestones before other babies her age. So we have an intense little baby that seems to be ahead of the curve. Another friend, Carmen, said that Julia probably realizes that she is a baby, but doesn't want to be one....instead she wants to already be walking and talking, etc.

We have some video of Julia on her 8 week day, but I haven't figured out how to download it to the computer yet. She is smiling more and more, especially when I sing to her. The subject of singing came up in our PEPS group on Wednesday. Some of the other mothers couldn't remember the words to classic baby songs. I remember the words, but I end up making up new ones. Like "This little light of mine" has become "That little bum of yours" and the other day we sang about "Slip, Slide into the Onsie" to the tune of "Slip Sliding Away". Plus there is the classic "Air Bubble in the Belly Blues". Dan knows that I have this terrible habit of making up songs about anything I happen to be thinking about or doing. I think it drives him crazy sometimes. And my coworkers know that I am always singing or humming or whistling in the lab. Thankfully it doesn't drive them crazy. But the ability to sing and make up silly little songs is coming in very handy now with Julia. It doesn't seem to drive her crazy yet.

On the picture front, here are a few shots from Mother's Day. And a special note to Gramma and Nanny...we are waiting for some photos to arrive in the mail and then your gifts for Mother's day will be on their way.

Seven Weeks!

Happy Mother's Day!

Only a day late, but that is alright. We still haven't mailed out the cards and gifts we made for our mothers (sorry Gramma and Nanny). But we had a nice day yesterday...Dan made breakfast and had bought some cinnamon monkey bread from the Macrina Bakery. It was delicious bread; we kept calling it the Chunky Monkey bread. Then we went to church, sat through the 1.5 hour long mass with only a single nursing break. They were giving out flowers after mass so I was the recipient of a beautiful peach rose. The mom handing them out said it would perk right up in water and it did. We then headed home to get ready for our afternoon at the zoo!
Julia was waiting for me in the bouncer seat (Dan had gotten her changed and dressed for the afternoon) with her Mother's Day gift tucked neatly in her left hand. I didn't see it at first and Dan had to point it out. She picked out a nice pair of earrings with little blue flowers, which shows that she has excellent taste at a young age. We then spent the next forty minutes looking for a parking space at the zoo. Seattle's Woodland Park Zoo is very cute; for such a small zoo they have a lot of interesting animals: tigers, lions, bears (oh my!), snow leopards, gorillas, emus, etc. Julia didn't pay attention to any of them. She nursed for 40 miuntes when we got there and slept the rest of the afternoon. But Dan and I had fun. We were both really tired when we finally got home though. Julia was nice to me last night and slept from 9pm to 3:30am. Which meant that I slept from 9:30pm to 3am.

Now we are into Attempted Sleep Week #2. Since she will be going to daycare in another eight weeks, I've decided that she needs to learn how to fall asleep on her own. She can do it every once in awhile, but not consistently. I have another motive though: I would love to be able to get one of those elusive naps every afternoon. My baby sleeps, but only when I wear her in the sling or if we go for a walk. Neither option allows me to doze. Last week was somewhat successful in attempted sleep, with Julia taking a few naps during the week. Not every afternoon, but at least twice. The problem is that I usually have more things to do when she is asleep (like calling Delta about infant fares) and I do not get to nap. So from now on I am just going to lay down right away. Right after the laundry is folded. And the chicken for dinner thawed. And the mailed sorted. I promise.

Anyway, here are some more pictures....

The lineup from our Childbirth Class Reunion (l to r) Maggie, Julia, Connor, Zev, Chloe, Lucy, Johan, and Theo.

A little fuzzy, but much cuter that way.



Oh and thank you to Tina and Amy for the comments...it was a growth spurt, but she still eats about 10-12 times a day. Which would explain why she weighs 12.5 pounds. Luckily she is 23 inches long so she carries it well.

6 Weeks Old

We're a little late with the pictures this week. And we really don't have an excuse because Julia's Nanny was here from Maryland and we should have had plenty of time to get the pictures posted. Oh well. More smiling this week, although they disappear whenever the camera comes out. And Julia seems to be going backwards in her feeding times. She used to be good for at least 2.5 hours from feeding to feeding, but lately I am lucky if she makes it to 2 hours...it is more like 1.5 hours. And now she is sleeping less at night as well, which is heartbreaking. Mainly because it means I get less sleep and end up more frustrated. I've been trying to break her of her habit of using me to fall asleep (she likes to nurse until she is sleeping), but have had no luck thus far. It seems like every time I think we are making progress, we move two steps backward. She gave us six hours of sleep the other night, but we haven't come close to repeating that since then. Add to that the fact that she most definitely smiles more with Dan and saves the pouty lip face for me and it is pretty demoralizing. At least she can hold her head up.

First Smile

May 2, 2006

How do I know it was a real smile? I smiled back. She cooed. I cooed back. She promptly burst into tears.

5 Weeks Old!

Well, and a few more days. It seems that the time with Julia is passing more quickly than ever and that I have less and less time to myself. Today was full of big acheivements: our first experience nursing in the car (she behaved very well), putting her down for a short nap while she was just drowsy (she slept for about 1.5 hours and I only had to go in once at the beginning to get her to settle down), and several feedings without the crying/burping/screaming circle of dread. Tomorrow we get to attempt our first lab meeting and a doctor's visit for me. It will be a busy morning.

We've been getting out for walks around Green Lake fairly regularly now with the other girls from childbirth class. Today we walked with Jen and Theo and their dog Dixie. It rained for the first half of the walk, but we perservered in our raincoats. Wednesday we have our PEPS group again in the morning. And rounding out our week, Dan's mom arrives on Thursday for a visit. We weighed Julia yesterday and found out that she is a whopping 11.5 lbs! I had to wash some of the clothes that everyone has been sending us because I think that they will fit soon. Some of them are marked for babies up to 12 lbs, so she will not have long to wear them. If you are a kind friend or relative waiting on a thank you note, they are coming. And we mailed the annoucements on Thursday so you should have those soon too. We set a date for the baptism, June 10th, and are looking forward to welcoming the family that is coming out for that event.

Here are some pictures from the last week:

4 Weeks Old!!!

Here are some more pictures of our little miss. She has really started to change in the last few days. Now she is fascinated by her hands when they happen to wander into her line of vision. And she has started to reach out and knock around the toys we place around her. I am sure that it is not intentional yet, but it is awfully cute to watch. Some things about these first four weeks that I don't want to forget:

- her greedy little look when she is getting ready to nurse

- the little patch of blonde hair behind her ear that my mom pointed out...I had one just like it.

- the smiles and giggles she makes when she is in REM sleep

- the first time I realized that she really does look like me and how overwhelming that was...it really blew my mind that another person (that I had a hand in creating) could have my face....of course this emotion could also have been due to my severe lack of sleep

- the way she looks up at me in the sling right before she closes her eyes to sleep

- how I have to be grateful for the small blessings in my life








We had our first PEPS meeting yesterday and I really liked it. Dan came with and we got to hear about everyone else's troubles with their babies. At least two of the other mothers talked about how their babies had witching hours from 11pm to 2am....that made me so glad that Julia doesn't seem to have one. She just fusses when I try to burp her and when it is time to nap during the day. And the fussing when I burp her is the most distressing. She is easy to put back to sleep at night (usually) after feeding. Last night she went 4.5 and 4 hours between feedings which was really nice. Especially because she wanted to eat almost every hour that we were home.

I also found out that one of the other couples from the PEPS group lives two blocks away on our same street. They have a little two week old girl and the mom, Sascha, will be home until mid-July. So I will have someone to take walks with once Dan goes back to work next week. I discovered that they lived there totally by accident...I was walking back from TJs when I heard someone calling my name. It was Sascha, who was also excited to see me. It was especially nice given the toughness of yesterday and how tough this morning had been too (total lack of sleep combined with baby who hates to be burped). Anyway, we've made it through the first four weeks with Julia intact. And seemingly enjoying herself. Big achievement on my part.

Trial Run

Today is a test for Julia and I. Dan went back to work to start some experiments that will run for the rest of the week and we are home alone. So far it is going pretty well, thanks to the sling. After eating, burping, sitting upright for some activity time, Julia is ready to sleep and I can carry her around in the sling until she wakes up again for another round. So we are falling into some kind of predictable routine.

Last night was a good sleeping night. We gave her a bath, then I fed her again around 8:30pm. And she went down fairly easily and slept until 12:30am or so. After that she slept again until 4:00am. She still wakes up at 6:00am or so, not hungry, but lonely. Once we bring her into the bed with us she calms right down and sleeps for another hour. This afternoon we took a nap together on the bed, which was a real blessing for me. Plus we even got some laundry done this morning and we get to make an excursion to the grocery store after she wakes up from her nap and is fed. I hope that I am doing the right thing by carrying her around in the sling with me so often. I know that she likes it (once she settles down) and I am playing with her before she decides she has had enough and starts to fuss.

Dan came home for lunch, which was nice, although we didn't get to eat it together. Dinner tonight is the lasagne we made before Julia arrived...it will provide dinners all week I think. Well, we might throw in some swedish meatballs as well. Maybe a pork roast if Dan gets really ambitious. He made a great dinner on Sunday for Easter: leg of lamb, sweet yams, and sauteed zucchini and mushrooms. I hope he continues to cook...he is really good at it. Anyway, I hear Miss Julia starting to stir. Here are some more Easter pictures....

Three weeks!!! Happy Easter!!

Two Weeks Down...the rest of our lives to go...

Little Julia is gaining weight like a prize fighter....almost 1 lb in a week! So she is up to 8lbs, 13 oz now and the doctor said I can start feeding her on demand at night. Which translates to about every 3.5 hours. Not too bad and we've decreased the overall number of feedings as well, which means more time for me to rest. She is looking awfully cute though, despite the fact that this week she discovered her lungs and crying. Julia seems to have some difficulty getting over the hump of drowsy to asleep, although thankfully this only occurs during the day. At night she goes back to sleep after eating, as long as she is wrapped in her yummy fleece blanket from Gramma.

Speaking of Gramma, she left today after her week plus long visit. We were so sad to see her go; she made our lives so much easier this week with the cooking and cleaning. She also occasionally held Julia, but she did not spoil her. We've also got the video conferencing thing up and running on our end and are just waiting for the relatives back on the East coast to buy their webcams and sign up for broadband.

This week also had a lot of firsts...Our first walk outside with the sling, first trip to church, first walk in the stroller (complete with rain gear...this is Seattle after all), first bath (really cute video taken by Gramma), and first stirrings of fussiness when trying to go to sleep (see above). It is definetly a learning experience and we cannot wait for those first smiles to come and reward us for all of this hard work.




Here we are on our first walk in the sling....we took Gramma to Kerry Park again to see Mt. Rainier and get some fresh air for Mommy. The sling is a wonderful invention....Mommy and Daddy will probably start wearing it full time during the day now that Gramma has gone back to Kentucky.

Later this week we get a visit from Granddad and GrandPam (Dan's dad and Pam). We've also been getting about a package a day from family and friends and are very grateful for all of the nice gifts you've been sending for Julia. We especially like the quilt that Auntie Em made and the dalmation blankie that Ann sent from Madison (we're going to name it Kirby). We'll try to keep the pictures coming.