Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Lily: 1 Year and 7 Weeks (4/12/10 – 4/18/10)

I worked at the Brighton Health Center on Monday through Wednesday of this week so Paul was in charge of dropping Lily off and picking her up from daycare. She was really sleepy on Monday morning and wouldn’t wake up so we ended up packing her clothes and breakfast and Paul dropped her off in her pajamas, still asleep. It is understandable that she didn’t want to wake up considering that Paul had to leave the house 45 minutes earlier than he did when Lily was at Kirsten’s due to his earlier start time and the added driving distance. When he picked her up, Tammy told him that Lily seems to be doing a little better every day. That is certainly encouraging. We still miss Kirsten, though. Lily played outside a little after she got home but it was kind of chilly out and she was quite tired. She may still not be napping well at her new daycare. She started acting sleepy at 7:30pm and I had her almost asleep at 8, then 8:30, then 9, then 9:30. She kept thrashing around to wake herself up then wanted to play. However, shortly after starting to play, she would cry because she was tired. It seemed like she was overly-fatigued and just couldn’t make up her mind what she wanted to do. Paul was unable to comfort her and she just wanted Mommy which made me nervous about my impending midnight shift at work. I worried about how she would sleep without me.

Lily finally dozed off shortly after 9:30pm on Monday night so it was no surprise that she was again unable to wake up before Paul took her to daycare on Tuesday morning. I decided that I hate having her leave for daycare asleep because I miss our quality time together in the morning. I know that I need to start implementing a firm bedtime and use her crib because she now keeps fighting sleep and struggles away from me in her efforts. She also sometimes starts crawling on the bed half-asleep in the middle of the night. I always wake up and grab her but I fear that one night she will end up falling off the bed and getting hurt. However, I am still not ready to lose my nightly cuddle time with her. I can’t win. I know that I said that I would try the Ferber method with her this week but I am just not ready yet.

Although I had less time each day with Lily when I worked in Brighton, I did enjoy that I got to sleep in an extra 30 minutes while still getting another 30 minutes of free time in the morning and 30 minutes of free time before Paul got home with her in the evening. I tried my best to use that time to get things done around the house and make lunches so that Lily could get my undivided attention between when she got home and when she went to bed. I think that Lily was needier for me due to our shortened time together because she wanted to nurse every evening when Paul brought her home. She has only nursed at bedtime for a long time now so this step backwards was probably more about reconnecting with me than about nutritional need.

Paul and Lily got home extra late on Tuesday because Paul stopped to pick up another load of compost on the south side of Ann Arbor after picking Lily up from daycare. I took advantage of my extra time to run some errands. It is so much faster without a baby in tow! One of my errands was to go to Costco for the third time in four days. Apparently it is my second home. It was cold out but Lily wanted to play outside nonetheless when she got home. I finally insisted that we go inside because I was getting chilly. Lily’s hands were like ice cubes but she still cried when I brought her inside. My little girl just loves to play outdoors. I gave her a bath to warm her up and intended to attempt to move her to her crib after nursing her to sleep on our bed but I ended up falling asleep as well so there went that plan!

Finally on Wednesday, Lily woke up before leaving the house in the morning. She got up at 6:30am but was still very sleepy so we cuddled on the couch and watched Blue’s Clues together before she and Paul left at 6:45. She didn’t have time to get dressed and was never perky enough for breakfast so we sent her off with her outfit and food packed yet again. After they got home, we planted peas in the vegetable garden which means that Paul will have to get the fence up soon. Otherwise the deer will certainly munch on our sprouts!

I returned to working at the main hospital on Thursday which meant that Lily didn’t have to leave the house quite so early since I drop Paul off at work then drop Lily off at daycare before parking the car and riding the shuttle bus to the hospital. We had time to get Lily dressed after she woke up but still didn’t have enough time to feed her breakfast so I sat in the backseat and shared my breakfast with her while Paul drove into Ann Arbor. Lily ate almost my entire waffle with peanut butter and ate the egg and cheese off of my breakfast sandwich. What a hungry girl! All I ended up getting to eat was the edges of the waffle and the English muffin from the sandwich. Oh well. Then when Lily got to daycare, she was very interested in the toast and sausage that the other kids were eating. She must be growing for sure. She cried really hard when I handed her off which is always difficult for me. That evening, I cleaned the upstairs before Lily’s bedtime bath and intended to clean the downstairs after she fell asleep but she fought sleep yet again. It took forever so I ended up falling asleep with her. I woke up after midnight and tried to clean despite the late hour but Lily kept waking up wanting to nurse so I finally gave up. Lily was very restless and nursed pretty much all night long so I hardly slept. She finally woke up for good at 5am on Friday morning so Paul took her downstairs and fed her a huge breakfast while I got a whopping half hour of uninterrupted sleep. After eating, Lily fell asleep on the couch on Paul and continued to sleep through the car ride to daycare. She woke up when I took her out of the car and cried when I handed her off to Tammy’s mom, Herma. Tammy was busy getting the older kids ready to go to the bus stop. Lily prefers Tammy which is fine because the two-year old, Jack, prefers Herma. My passing Lily to Herma caused Jack to cry because he felt possessive of her so when I left, there were two crying kids!

After work, it was sunny but windy out. We took Lily to the Matthaei Botanical Gardens for more daffodil pictures which are shown in the previous post. After our quick stop at the gardens, we headed over to Meghan’s house for a pizza dinner with her and Ryan. The dinner was a thank-you for our mattress-moving assistance last week. This was the first time that we actually got to hang out and chat with Ryan. He is a really nice guy. I was amazed at how easy-going Abygail is every time we visit them. She is not at all like our colicky Lily who screamed every night from 5-11pm for the first six weeks of her life! We left around 8:30 when Lily got tired. She instantly fell asleep in the car and continued to sleep when we brought her inside so I was finally able to get the downstairs cleaned.

I got up early on Saturday morning to meet my mom at a huge Mom 2 Mom Sale at the Perani Arena in Flint. I still didn’t find an outdoor ride-on toy with a push handle like I wanted but I did get some cute clothes for both Lily and Abygail. I also found two Halloween costumes for Lily- a spider and a bee. They are adorable. My mom, Lily, and I had lunch at Halo Burger then stopped at Wal-Mart before I had to head home. Lily missed her morning nap but took a good afternoon nap on the drive home. I took a nap myself when I got home because I had to work my first overtime midnight shift in the Blood Gas Lab that evening. I only slept for a couple of hours then got up to make dinner and get Lily down for the night before leaving at 10:45pm to start work at 11:30pm. It was a super busy night in the lab which wasn’t easy because I was really rusty at the job. I hadn’t worked in that lab in over two years so I was hoping for an easy start but instead I had to dive right back in. In the end, I think that the busy night was a blessing because when things started to die down around 5:30am, I got unbelievably drowsy.

I got out of work at 8:00am on Sunday morning and hurried home to see my baby. I missed her horribly and worried about her the whole time but Paul said that she did just fine on our first night apart. She stirred a few times in the night but only fully woke up once at 4am. Paul took her downstairs and gave her a snack then she fell back to sleep watching TV with him. She was taking a bath when I got home and was super excited to see me. I hung out with her for a little while until I got too exhausted then I went to bed for a few hours. I didn’t want to sleep too much because I still wanted to be able to sleep that night. My mom came over around 10am to watch Lily so that Paul could get some work done outside. When I got up from my nap, Lily was just waking up from a late morning nap herself. She was happy to see me and wouldn’t let me leave her side for the remainder of the day. She no longer wanted to have anything to do with Paul or her grandma. My mom made us a delicious chicken dinner at 3pm then left shortly after. Paul went back to working outside while Lily and I played. Lily finally took her second nap at 6:30pm and pretty much stayed asleep the entire night. She woke up briefly at 10:30pm so I gave her a snack and tried to put her back to bed. Unfortunately, she was wide awake and completely thrown off of her sleep schedule due to her late naps so it took until almost midnight before she dozed off. Then she woke up multiple times in the night wanting to nurse. I think that she wanted to make sure that I was still there and didn’t leave her again.

I am glad that Lily’s drop-offs and pick-ups at her new daycare continue to improve. She is now happy when we pick her up but drop-offs are still teary, especially when they involve leaving mommy. Lily seems to have less of a problem transitioning away from daddy. I hate leaving her when she is crying but I think the problem has more to do with the fact that she is in the stage of development where separation anxiety is problematic, not that she doesn’t want to be at her new daycare. She cried sometimes when she transitioned to Kirsten’s house even though it was her second home. According to an article that I read on babycenter.com, “If your child gets upset when you leave her now, she's right on schedule. Twelve to 18 months is prime time for separation anxiety - a psychological term that means your toddler can't bear to be without you. The best way to handle painful farewells is to keep them short and sweet: Say goodbye with a quick kiss and head out the door. Your toddler's tears will subside soon after you're out of sight. It's hard not to feel guilty, but in the long run you'll help your child become more independent.” They are certainly right about the feeling guilty part!

This week Lily discovered a new favorite food- goldfish crackers. She can’t get enough of them and eats them by the fistful. She had them in her lunch every day.

Here are some pictures from this week.

Lily loves to carry sticks around with her when she plays outside and prefers to have one in each hand. Here she is playing with her sticks on Tuesday evening:





I bought Lily some juice boxes at Costco. Lily enjoyed her first juice box while watching Blue’s Clues after we came inside before her bath:


Lily playing in the bath:

Lily loves bubbles in her bath but always looks so puzzled when she gets bubbles on her hands:

Lily always points excitedly at the faucet when she wants a warm up. Here she is pointing to the nice warm water that always revives her bubbles:

Lily chewing on her washcloth, of course. Don’t worry, we always use two washcloths- one for me to wash her with and a clean one for her to nibble on:

Lily still loves to play with her Easter eggs and carries them around the house in her basket:


Lily’s new bee balloon that she just had to have from Kroger. She spotted it as soon as we walked in the door and gasped with excitement. She hugged it the entire time we shopped so I decided to buy it for her:

Lily can multitask. Here is she playing with her penguin and her Easter eggs while watching cartoons on Thursday evening:

Sacked out on the couch on Friday night after a long week:

I sat on my car all by myself but something just doesn’t seem right:

I think I’ll get off and try again:

Our little Linus now carries around her blankie when she is tired. Here she is being goofy and turning it into a bonnet:



Goodnight! See you next week:

Monday, April 26, 2010

Matthaei Botanical Gardens (4/10/10 & 4/16/10)

The bloom of daffodils around our house reminded us of an adorable picture that Paul took of Rachel at U of M’s Matthaei Botanical Gardens back when she was a toddler. We absolutely love this picture and have it hanging in Rachel’s room:

We wanted to try to recreate the picture with Lily with little success. The first time we tried was on Saturday, April 10th. Only about half of the daffodils were in bloom. The original picture was taken in morning light but we tried it with evening light. Lily slept on the way to the gardens and woke up when we were getting her out of the car. She woke up in a good mood but just wanted to be held so she was less than cooperative about being set down amongst the daffodils. She loved looking at them but quickly got fussy every time we put her down. We did get a few good pictures, though:




Lily and Rachel looking at the flowers together:


Paul, Rachel, and Lily together. At this point, Lily was refusing to be set down:

We gave up after a while and decided to walk around the gardens. Besides the daffodils out front, there wasn’t anything in bloom but Lily loved to walk the trails and especially loved the three wooden bridges on the property. She delighted in running back and forth across them over and over. It was really cute.
Lily running to Rachel:

Running with daddy:

Running to me:




We finally dragged Lily away from the bridge and down the trail to this stick hut where she and Rachel hung out and pulled up weeds:

Chasing a very unhappy goose:

Another trail! Come on guys, let's go:

My adorable girls:

Lily was delighted to find a bridge on this trail, too:

Lily playing on the bridge:




There was another small bridge further down the trail which Lily also found to be quite fun:



The second time we tried to take Lily’s picture in the daffodils was after work on Friday, April 16th. It was warm but super windy out. More of the daffodils were in bloom this time. Again, Lily was only cooperative for a short period of time but wanted to run on the bridges until we had to physically drag her away. Silly Lily!
The ground was really lumpy so it was hard for Lily to balance:
She decided to kneel instead:

I like these pictures and they seem to have the same tree as Rachel's photo but I need to learn to use Photoshop so I can remove the stupid cars in the background:


My friend, Christina, cropped and touched up the above picture in Photoshop for me. Yep, I definitely need to learn how to use it myself:

Smiley girl:





The wind picked up and did silly things with Lily's hair:


I think that she was pointing at a bird:

Big wind gust:

Playing with the flowers:


It looks like she is hugging them:

Another big wind gust came along:

The wind got too heavy and Lily was done cooperating so we headed to her favorite bridge. Here is Lily and daddy on the bridge:

My cutie:



Lily discovered something:

A spiderweb! She was quite fascinated: