Fathers Day

Last weekend was Fathers Day, the Hubs first! We kept it pretty low key around here, the Hubs didn't really have anything that he wanted to do (I'm pretty sure I was more excited about Fathers Day then he was. Ha!) And the only thing he asked for was some more books that he could read to Tegan. I was more than happy to add to the book collection since I get such a kick out of the voices the Hubs comes up with for the characters he's reading about. Lately we've been hearing about the adventures of Frog and Toad... ahh yay, good times!

We also had a visit from the FIL over Fathers Day. He flew in from NY on Friday afternoon, and stayed until Monday morning. It took Tegan a couple hours to warm up to him, but by Saturday she was only eying him with slight trepidation. Which if you know my FIL, slight trepidation is pretty good, he can be a bit of an odd ball at times, and some of the things he says can just be plane bizarre. I think the Hubs had to tell me a couple of times to just zone out what he was saying. If you think its hard to follow him during adult conversation, you should hear the kind of babel he carries on to a baby! Ha. The FIL is a good guy though, and it was great to watch him interact with Tegan. Before he left he mentioned he was hoping to make another trip out in August or September. I'm sure it has to be hard for him to be living so far away from his first grandchild.

But back to the point of this post, the FIL wanted to see the King Tut exhibit at the Science Museum, so the Hubs, his brother, and the FIL spent the morning in St. Paul while I slipped over to my Dad's with Tegan for a quick visit. After lunch we were all back here where it was pretty much business as usual, with a little extra story time mixed in. All in all it was a great first Fathers Day!

Daddy's Girl

The theme of this weekend was 'Daddy's little Girl'. Tegan was so fixated on the hubs this weekend, it was pretty adorable.

She's also started playing a game with the Hubs whenever he's sitting next to us. She'll squirm towards him and lean as far over as she can, then with a little help from me we lean over far enough to get kisses from Daddy. She gets the biggest smile when we do this, and usually gives us a little laugh. It's just to much :). Now that the Hubs is back at work, she spent all morning staring at the spot he usually sits trying to find Daddy!

4 Months

Happy 4 month Birthday my little girl! You are growing so fast! In just the last few days you have started to be so much more interactive with your Dad and me, and I am so looking forward to this continuing. Your personality is also starting to unfold and we can already tell that you are going to be one stubborn little girl. Ha! I'm not sure if that's your Dad's fault or mine, I'm sure we'll both claim it comes from the other person.

So here's what you've been up to these days-

Weight: 13lbs 9oz, placing you in the 50th percentile on growth charts! A big jump from last month when you were 10lbs and in the 15th percentile.

Height: 24in, placing you in the 42nd percentile on growth charts. Another big jump!

Clothes: We just switched you to size 3-6 clothes, they're still a little big on you though. Some of your new clothes are the same styles you had when you were wearing preemie clothes which makes for a crazy comparison. It's hard to believe you were really that tiny! Maybe I'll try to get a picture of this up soon, it's crazy!!

Diapers: We just started using size 2 diapers. We pushed that transition off a little longer then we should have, but we were trying to use up what we had left of the size 1's. You're in such a hurry to grow that we still weren't able to get through our last box of size 1's.

Feeding: You love to eat! We're still  breastfeeding and besides your fits of wiggles its going great. It's been a while since we gave you a bottle so I'm not sure how much you are eating these days. I suspect it's around 5 ounces. We have successfully managed several outings where I feed you on the go but we're still working out the kinks of that nursing cover. We also learned that you are NOT a delicate eater. Ha!

Sleeping: We're trying to get you used to a bedtime routine and so far it's been a little rough. We're changing how we go about it this week so hopefully you stop fighting us at bedtime. Once you're asleep though you sleep for a good long while. You're technically sleeping through the night and have been for a while, but you take your first 6 hours from 8pm-2-3am, and then after a late night snack go back to bed for another 6-8 hours. Your record so far has been sleeping for 9.5 hours straight! Way to go! You still have to be swaddled to get to sleep or you thwack yourself awake and cause a sad baby (and sad parents) We're hoping you'll be out of the swaddling soon.

Baths: You still absolutely HATE getting a bath! Hate is almost not a strong enough description for your feelings towards baths. You have started to tolerate them a little more and wait a good 10 seconds before screaming like crazy. I think everyone in the house hates bath time as much as you do now. The poor dog has taken to pacing the hall during your bath time waiting for you to stop crying, she's even brought you peace offerings with her favorite toys to try and help! I keep waiting for one of the neighbors to show up on our door making sure everything is okay. Ha! In all seriousness though, I do really hope we can get past this hatred of baths. I really want to take you to the pool during the summer, but I have a feeling we have to get over bathing before we try that.

Milestones: You support your head most of the time and only need a little help when you start to get sleepy. You've  started to reach for things and manage to grab them some of the time. Rattles are your favorite thing to reach for these days. And when we do tummy time you've already gotten your legs underneath you and started to rock (you've been doing this since you were two weeks old though so no surprise there!). We suspect that you'll be cruising around sooner than expected since this immobility stuff seems to really tick you off. Ha! You've also started to discover the new world of jumping. You're favorite time to exercise this new ability is when I'm trying to burp you on my shoulder. So far I've avoided a bloody nose, but I'm sure I have one in my future.

Check Ups: We had your 4 month check up yesterday. Everything went well. As always the Doctors and nurses are in love with you. As we we're leaving I heard the nurses at the nursing station saying that everyone fights over who gets to be your nurse when you come in. Ha! The doctor thinks you might have reflux which is pretty common, so we'll be trying some different tricks to help you out with that. There's also some marks on around your knees that the doctor wants us to watch, but no ones all to worried about it.

I'm sure there are other things I had wanted to mention in here, but I've forgotten what they were. So we'll wrap it up with some pictures. Keep growing strong little girl!

Her new favorite face- did I mention she's starting to show her personality :)

And because I'm a sucker for comparisons- That's the same stuffed animal in the above picture!

2 weeks old!

A Week in Review

This last week has had its share of ups and downs, a little bit of a whirlwind for sure. Our biggest hurdle lately has been bed time. Oosh! We've started trying to put a bedtime routine together which we should have been doing for a while now. We're certainly paying for our late start on this. Tegan doesn't have enough of a set schedule to have a real set-in-stone bedtime, but she is predictable enough to give us a pretty good idea when its going to be nap time i.e. an hour after a meal almost like clockwork. Unfortunately she's decided that instead of her bedtime routine triggering her to sleep, it's her que to start a full fledged meltdown. Not fun! The biggest thing we are trying to get away from during bedtime and nap time is rocking or bouncing her to sleep. So once we get her initially calmed down and in her her crib we try everything we can to calm her down without picking her back up. This, as you can imagine, is not an easy task. We're also trying a hybrid version of the CIO (cry it out) method, where we start with letting her cry for only a few minutes before you try to sooth her, and then add a few minutes to each attempt. Our stubborn little girl went, for all intensive purposes, 40 minutes last night before I caved and nursed her to sleep. (Lil-sis, I'll blame this stubborn streak on you :) Just another crazy trait she seems to have gotten from you somehow.)

This week certainly hasn't been all struggles though. On Thursday we met up with Melissa and baby Azalea for a picnic and a walk around a popular lake. It was our first ever picnic, and if I do say so myself it was a great hit. I've really enjoyed having another new mom to talk with (Azalea is only two months younger than Tegan). Its amazing how long a conversation you can have about a babies bodily functions. Ha!

Just hanging out!

Then on Friday we got the two little ones back together and included the Daddy's to enjoy a dinner. Another great day!

And lastly we'll add a three day weekend to the week and end it on a very happy note. I'll never turn down an opportunity to have the hubs home to help out. Plus then he gets extra baby time which I'm sure he looks forward to, and I get a shower that doesn't involve keeping an ear out of screaming. Definitely a win win.

Next week will be Tegan's four month check up! I'm looking forward to finding out where our little squirt falls on the growth charts now!

Getting Frustrated

I had a sad realization this weekend. Tegan isn't quite 4 months old yet and the MIL is driving me crazy! Thankfully, I'm not alone the hubs is getting frustrated too otherwise I'm sure this would be causing problems for our relationship!

I've heard there are usually two common situations people have with in-laws after a baby- either it brings you closer together, or creates an even larger rift. I'm the latter. From the very start I never had a great relationship with the MIL, but I think it worked because we didn't see each other that often. She lived in NY, and I lived in MN. Problem solved. Then she moved out to MN right before the hubs and I got married. I still didn't see her that often, and it continued to work. Now that we've had Tegan (who is the first grandchild on the hubs side) we see her a lot more often, and this is where I'm reaching my wits end. To make the problem more complicated I'm not comfortable letting the MIL babysit because of a host of mental, and physical problems.

I know there's not a lot of people who read this blog, but the few out there that have past by, I NEED help. I'm reaching out for advice, even if the opinion is "Get over it". I don't know what else to do but at this rate somethings going to need to give. I can't make it another 18+ yrs like this.

Here's the situation- she calls the hubs on a regular basis (meaning weekly or several times a week) asking for a time to see Tegan, and emails me usually once a week asking for time to come by during the week. She pushes constantly for chances to babysit (that's actually what she asked for for Mothers Day which irritated me to no end). Whenever she hears someone else babysat, even if it's the hubs taking time off work, she blasts us for not having her babysit. When we do have her come by, she pressures me to let her do special trips with Tegan like going to the mall or taking her out in her stroller for a walk. And when we do tell her 'No' to something she has to know why, and will revisit the topic several times for answers.

What we've done so far- before Tegan was born we explained that we were not comfortable with her babysitting so not to expect that. We've told her several times to back off a little, and she does for a little while but starts pushing again before long. The hubs confronts her on a regular basis when she gets out of line, like explaining that we don't have to have a reason for saying 'no' but that she needs to respect our decision. The hubs has really done a great job running interference so far but it's still getting to be too much.

So what does the cyber-world say? Is there anyone else having similar problems? And how did you make it work?

Bad Mommy Award

I won my first "Bad Mommy Award" this week, it broke my heart. Tegan and I were playing on her play mat when I decided it would be a good idea to switch to reading since it had been a while since we had read a story. I went to pick Tegan up off her mat and thought it would be fun to add a little flare to the maneuver and go from the floor to swooshing her just over my head. We've done this before and she likes it so I didn't think twice about it. Unfortunately this time around there was a ceiling fan/light just above us. I swooshed her right into one of the light globes and bonked her head on the edge of it. She wasted no time making sure I was aware of my mistake and started crying. It took about 10 minutes to get her to calm down. I was feeling pretty awful. She now has a crescent shaped mark on the top of her head from the light. Its fading quickly but I can still see it.

Tegan's Piglet Lovee Helped calm her down afterwards

Her boo-boo (It really wasn't that bad- I just felt awful for doing it in the first place)

I know these things will happen, and this is probable only the first of many "Bad Mommy Awards", but that doesn't make you feel any better when your little one is crying as a direct result of something you did. And usually its something pretty stupid you've done.

Special Visitor

My little sister paid a visit to us last weekend! She came all the way from Kentucky. It was so great to see her again and she was so excited to meet Tegan. She stayed in the 'Sibling Hotel' (aka our spare bedroom) so we were able to spend a lot of time together. It was great watching her interact with Tegan too. As the days went by she got more and more comfortable with her, she even mastered dirty diapers before she left. Ha!

While she was in town we gathered everyone together for a family picture. That was a bit of an experience to say the least. We had 8 adults (2 pregos) and 3 kids (3yrs and under). My nephew Ethan was so fasinated with Tegan it was adorable. I think in all the pictures Ethan has a hand on her head. There's even a series of photos where Tegan is crying so Ethan reaches across her to where his sister is sitting and takes the stuffed animal shes holding and gives it to Tegan. So cute!

Cousins!

My sister is hoping to make it back out for Thanksgiving or Christmas, so until then...