8 Months already?

It feels like just yesterday that we were anticipating Emily's birth!  It is still fresh in my mind.  I look back at pictures and it is almost hard to imagine that my crawling, babbling happy 8 month old was once my tiny 6 lb baby. 

Last month she learned how to pull up on on couches, toys and just recently can cruise from ottoman to couch and back to snag a remote or piece of junk mail that is in her reach.

She loves to rip up paper.  I call her my little paper shredder.  Give her a newspaper and she will be happy for a few minutes.  Luckily she hasn't learned to put it in her mouth yet!  I am sure that is coming though.

Emily had a little stomach bug a few weeks ago which she lovingly shared with us, her Grandpa and her second cousins.  She lost some weight.  She was 13 lbs even two weeks ago.  Lately this week she has been upping the food intake going from 1/2 jar of food to eating a whole jar at a feeding and I think I am going to have to up her milk bottles from 4 oz to 6 oz.  She has been wanting to eat every two hours.

I have been weaning myself as pumping is getting harder and harder.  I have trouble letting down and I just don't feel like dealing with the frustration anymore.  I couldn't get anything out this morning and didn't bring my pump with me to work.  By the time I got home, I was ready to pump and only pumped 5 oz. total.  I have been doing 1/2 breast milk and 1/2 formula for a few weeks now.  I still have a pretty good freezer stash.  I think I have enough BM for another month.  

I know eventually Emily will be on formula only.  I really wanted to make it to a year of breast feeding.  With the nursing strikes and pump issues, I just don't see how.  I am almost OK with it.

Emily has been home with me for the past two weeks as I was looking for a new job.  She has become increasingly attached to me.  Especially when we are out in public or at family gatherings.  She clings to me and screams if I try and hand her off to someone else.  I can't even enjoy church service because she screams the entire time she is in the nursery room.  I can hear her through the thin walls and it breaks my heart so I end up staying in the room with her.  She would be too disruptive if she was in the service with us so that is not an option unfortunately.  Now that I am back to work, I am hoping that this attachment issue settles down.  Emily apparently cried for 15 minutes after I left her with her great-grandparents this morning and when I came to pick her up, they handed my screaming baby over to me.  They had a friend over and she didn't approve.  

Emily has not been sleeping as well as she used to either.  She used to sleep all through the night from 10 pm-7 am.  Now she has been getting up at 11 pm, 1 am and 4 am. We have been letting her cry it out when we put her down initially because the Ferber method just didn't work.  Every time I would go into her room to settle her, she would just get more upset and would start the process all over again.  It would take an hour or more just to get her to sleep.

 Now she is not napping after 5 pm and goes to bed at 9 am.  I think once we get back on a schedule, she will get better.  I hope she gets better.

This week she has started saying "da da da"  adding to the "ma ma ma" sound she was already making.

By the Grace of God

We were in a car accident last Sunday. Dh was driving, I was in the passenger seat and Emily was in her car seat in the middle of the back seat--right where she is supposed to be. we were on our way to church at about 9:30 am. We were going down a main busy road, but it was pretty quiet this particular day. We were running a little late and decided I would pump in the car. No big deal, I do it all the time.

We were heading up to an intersection--not a busy one. The light was green. We had the right of way. This maroon Saturn decides to try and make a left turn in front of us and she didn't make it. DH slammed on the breaks and we tried to swirve, but not too much because there was a car in the lane next to us. We were going about 25-30 mph as we hit. I just remember looking at DH like "what do we do now??" and then looking at the car as we hit.

It was weird. I was like slow motion. Hard to explain. I saw the window crack and the airbags deploy towards me and all of a sudden lots of powder and it smelled like gas and burning metal. The airbags did not hit us. I heard a "poof" like we hit something. It fels as if we were in bumper cars and we just slammed into another bumper car. My ears were ringing. The rang for a few hours after the accident.

DH pulled the car out of the road and onto a nearby plaza. I frantically got out of the car (my door would barely open) and ran to get Emily out of the car. She was alsleep through the entire ordeal. She only started crying when I was panicking to get her out. I thought the car was on fire so I wanted to get her out as soon as possible.

The girl who caused the accident came running over crying yelling "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry" I was livid and just didn't care if she was sorry or not. I started yelling at her. "What were you thinking??!!" "You could have killed my child!!" She thought we were slowing down and that she could make the turn. I was so mad.

Three cops and an ambulace came.

The ambulance guys were very nice. One young guy and one older guy. The older guy just loved Emily. He wanted to take her home! She got a perfect bill of health and she got a "feel better bear". She loved it.

My mother came to the scene to help us. We had to get everything out of the car and stuff it in my mothers small compact car.

We got home and called the insurance company and we had a rental by noon.

Geico is our insurance company. They have been great. We are getting $5400 for our beloved Infiniti (gawd we loved that car) and Emily has a brand smankin' new Graco Safe Seat Infant seat.

Thank God for protecting us. Objects can be replaced, but the people you love can't.

Pics of my little lady

Here are some pics from the last week. Enjoy! This first one was taken on Valentine's Day. I love the smile.

Free fallin'

Emily in her little tutu

Emily and mommy

6 months pic

Car seats

I bought Emily her second car seat today after finding a great deal on a Britax Marathon. Funny thing is, this is the one that we registered for and now it is on clearance for $179 with free shipping! They are $279 full price.

I am so excited. She won't need to use it for another 6 months, but it is worth taking advantage of a great deal. They are the safest car seats on the market in my opinion.

Also, I will be keeping her rear facing for as long as possible. Babies need to stay rear facing until they are a year old AND 20 lbs, but recent studies and the Amerian Academy of Pediatrics now suggest that keeping them rear facing until they are 2 is even safer.

Here is an insert from the Carseat.org website:

Safety experts and the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend that children remain
rear facing as long as possible and never travel forward facing before they are one year
old and also weigh at least 20 pounds. This reduces their risk of serious neck or spinal
cord injury and lifelong disability. All new convertible seats available today allow
children to remain rear facing until they weigh 30 pounds or more, depending on the
model.
Babies have heavy heads and fragile necks. In a crash, an infant’s soft spinal column can
stretch, leading to spinal cord damage if he is riding facing forward. The baby could die
or be paralyzed permanently. This is true even for babies who have strong neck muscles
and good head control. The neck bones are flexible, and the ligaments are loose to allow
for growth.

This video was enough for me.

6 Months!

I cannot belive that my sweet little baby is 1/2 a year old already. Time has gone by so fast. She is such a sweet little girl and both DH and I are so blessed to have her in our lives. I thank God everyday for her. She is precious.

We went to the doctor yesterday. She is a whole 13 lbs 1 1/2 oz and is 26 inches long. She is low in percentiles for both height and weight, but she is gaining steady so the doctor is not worried. When she has parents who were barely on the charts themselves, Emily shouldn't expect to be "normal" according to the charts.

Usually DH takes her to the doctor and this was my first time taking her for a well baby visit. We were both fine until it was time for those shots. The nurse stabbed her little legs so fast, it took Emily 5 seconds to realize that she was in pain! She started screaming and I quickly scooped her up in my arms as soon as the nurse was done. It took her a while to calm down. There was no way she was going into her carseat after that! I had to carry her, the diaper bag and the car seat out to the waiting room. She let me put her in the seat shortly after and we were on our way back home. As soon as we were on the road, she was asleep. She slept for 2 hours!

Emily will be crawling shortly, I am sure. She has learned that rolling can get her places. Last night I put her at one end of the living room and about 15 minutes later, she had made her way t0 the other side of the room! She managed to take her socks off and bring a few toys along with her, dispursing them throughout the room.

I loved staying home with her yesterday. It was fun to be able to play with her and just take it easy mid-week. I wish I could do that everyday. Maybe someday soon.