9/27/2007

All The Way

Our Miss. Bailey slept all the way through the night last night without waking up once!!! Not even when her binky fell out of her mouth! She just slept and slept and slept. Eventually this morning, Kelly had to wake her up!!!

WOW!

I haven't gotten this much sleep since I was 6 months pregnant.

I feel amazing today!!!

9/26/2007

New Pictures!

Isn't her sweater just so freakin' cute???? Bring on the cold!!!!

I love her blue eys. They are SO MUCH like her Mommy's beautiful blues...

She's a cutie...and she takes cute pictures, don't you think??

Always the sticking the tongue out! Always!

This may be the most beautiful, precious smile I've ever seen.

What's with the camera, Momma?

Laughing at her Mommy!


Mommy's really funny!

Yeah, Bailey...I love her too!

Momma and her Bailey on Football Sunday!!! Notice she's sitting on her own?? Yep, she does this regularly, now!

9/25/2007

Big Girl

Our little honey has started a new trend! Well, we hope it becomes a trend, anyway...

For the second night in a row, little Bailey slept through the night without needing to eat! Now, she wakes up and fusses because the binky isn't in her mouth and I sleep walk to her crib and pop it back in, but that is it. She falls right back to sleep. She's waking up about 4 times a night wanting the binky.

We think that the trick has been her rag. Her rag. Yes. Her rag. YUCK! But, we got started on this thing when she was just an infant. She was such a sloppy bottle drinker that we needed to use something very absorbant to keep her clean. We started using cloth diapers because they are very absorbant and cheap.

*sigh*

Bailey has now taken to them like a child would to any blanket or "lovie". The likes to hold the rag and put it over her face. She NEEDS the rag. So, we give it to her and it helps her sleep.

We're not complaining...

9/23/2007

Without Equal

Loving Bailey is without a doubt the best thing we have ever done. She is just so freakin' wonderful. Every day she changes and grows and becomes more and more her own person. She can sit up on her own now. Sometimes she will topple over, but she can usually stay up. She's trying really hard to crawl. She's not really even close yet, but she's trying. She gets on her belly and just thrusts her whole body, using her arms and legs to try and make it happen. It's truly precious.

Also, she's noticed the kitties. She likes to watch them and when they come near enough, she reaches for them. We are working on being nice to the kitties and talking about how much we love them and how we are gentle with them. But she still comes up with fistfuls of hair...LOL! The cats are amazingly patient with her. They know that she belongs with us and so they've accepted her.

Here are some cutie pie pictures of her. We have gotten bad about picture taking...but I promise that we'll get some good shots her soon!
Chillin' in the bath

She was smiling, but the camera caught her eye!

I'm not as annoyed as I look...just tired!


With my buddy, Danny!

Sleeping peacefully...

9/20/2007

Snot

You know it's bad when your child actually WANTS you to use that horrible blue squeegy thing and suck the snot out of her nose.

Our Bailey's cold is back. Do these thing ever go away??? I guess, as an adult, you don't realize how horrible it is when you can't breath through your nose.

Bailey was up every 45 minutes last night (and that was if we were lucky...most of the time it was more like every half hour or so). She has thick, green snot dripping (pouring?) out of her nose. Nothing seems to help. We're going to try some decongestant tonight. Hopefully we'll all get some sleep then.

Poor baby girl.

9/18/2007

Hard to be Away

For the first time yesterday, I had a panicky moment about being away from Bailey. I woke up at 4:30 AM and was out the door by 5:30. I didn't walk back through our door until 6:45 last night. When I arrived home, Bailey and Kelly were out shopping. The house was so quiet. I knew they were out, so I wasn't surprised.

What did surprise me was how horrible it made me feel to not hug my child or smell her sweet baby smell all day long. I haven't had that feeling yet. I mean, I've missed her...but not to the point where I wanted to cry.

I love her. Yep. I love her lots.

9/17/2007

Horrid

Honestly, I've become such a crappy blogger. It's not for lack of cool new developments or great little stories. It's not because I haven't taken a million pictures of Bailey. It's not because I want to neglect all of you who care about us and our family...

It's simply because we're SO busy all the time. We run from early morning till we drop at night. We work constantly. "Relaxing" means that our list of things to do is short - not that we actually get to stop. After we do everything we have to do, and then a couple of things we want to do, there is no time to do the things we should do...like keeping up with the blog.

Regardless - we are all doing very well. Bailey is just the light that brightens all of our days. We've gone from what was a very, very difficult first couple of months into having a dream child. She's friendly, funny, easy to be with and easy to entertain. She loves people, loves to interact with us and the world around her. She's inquisitive and so very sweet. Her bright blue eyes seems to absorb the world and the world responds right back. There isn't a day that goes by that someone does stop on the street and smile and touch her.

She's healthy, strong and developing normally. I'd like to say that she is so far advanced from her peers, but I don't think she is. She's just a normal, beautiful little girl with two parents who love her more than life itself.

Mommy and Momma are doing well. I think that we've finally redefined "normal". We are starting to actually have time to spend together...even if it is just stolen moments before we fall asleep. We are also having some time (and energy) to tackle projects like organizing the garage and utilizing our shed. We are excited for the coming holidays and have arranged for a vacation for the three of us.

All told, things are good. Life is different than before, and I would argue, better. We are where we wanted to be. We are living the life we've envisioned for ourselves. It took a little work, and a lot of Prozac, to get us to this point...but we've found our way.

I wish that I had more extraordinary news to report, but honestly, I'm just happy that life ISN'T so complicated. I've had enough adjusting and rearranging for right now. I'm so happy to look around my world and feel like it is familiar again. I'll go with "normal" for a while. Boring. Easy. Predictable. Stable.

9/14/2007

Gettin' the Itch

It's been just a little over four months since Bailey joined our world and I'm getting the itch again.

Kelly and I have always known that we want more than 1 child and we've always known that we want the children we have to be pretty close in age.

Momma's got the itch.

We're not even discussing it until she is 6 months old. But after that...well...we'll see.

9/13/2007

10 Years...Almost

It's almost been 10 years since I met the love of my life. 10 years since I breathed and nothing was the same again. 10 years since what I thought I understood about life collapsed in the face of the deepest love I've ever known. 10 years since all my best-laid plans were brushed aside for a new path. 10 years since my dreams came true.

My heart stopped beating and I was reborn nearly 10 years ago.

I am thankful every day for the love that I have found. I never would have believed that my life could be so full, so happy, so rich.

My love, you have made my life extraordinary. My heart is yours forever.

From Danny's Song by Kenny Loggins

And even though we ain't got money
I'm so in love with ya, honey
And everything will bring a chain of love
And in the mornin' when I rise
You bring a tear of joy to my eyes
And tell me, everything is gonna be alright

9/12/2007

All Our Love

Everyone take a minute and send prayers to Camryn (Kelly's sister's daughter) who is in the hospital undergoing some testing. We're keeping our fingers crossed that it is nothing serious.

We love you, Camryn!!!

9/11/2007

Pissed Off Turtle

One of the funniest things about Bailey is that she gets irrationally pissed off at the turtle in her exersaucer. I know that this seems like a strange thing, but it's true! We put her in the seat and she immediately spins herself around to face the turtle. She spends a few seconds gumming it and generally slobbering all over it...and then she starts to yell at it. And it's not that cute little squeal that she has when she's excited. It's a full-on, pissed off yell...complete with crying and slamming of her arms on the surrounding toys. She hovers over it and stares down and rocks the exersaucer back and forth and yells at the damn turtle.

No other toys on the exersaucer make her mad. In fact, no other toy that she owns makes her mad.

Kelly did an experiment the other day. She took the turtle off the exersaucer and gave it to Bailey while she was sitting in her bouncy chair. The theory was that maybe Bailey was pissed off about not being able to get the entire turtle into her mouth. By giving it to her to hold, Kelly thought she would solve the problem and prevent her from being so pissed off. No dice.

You guessed it! Bailey got pissed off at the turtle while she was holding it and screamed and yelled at it just as if she was in the exersaucer.

Now, we have to take the turtle off the exersaucer before we put Bailey in it.

We don't know what the turtle did...but it's definately on her shit list.

9/09/2007

New Videos

There are bunches of new videos on YouTube! Use our login (located at the top of the page) to sign on and check 'em out!!!

All is good here. We are off this morning to Danny's baptism. We are really looking forward to being present for such a wonderful day for him and his Moms!

Before I sign off, I thought I'd introduce you all to a VIP in our Bailey's life. Karen started out as our neighbor, and while she still is that, she has become so much more to us and to Bailey. Simply put, Karen is Bailey's favorite person outside of her family. Karen is famous in our house for her ability to "drop" the baby (bouncing her and signing) and to make Bailey smile no matter what her mood.

Equally as important, there has never been a better champion for Kelly and I. Honestly, when I've felt like I was about to crack, Karen has been there to remind me that I'm doing great and that I'll make it through.

Karen, we love you!!! Thank you for being such an important part of our family!!!

9/07/2007

Quickie

Bailey had her 4 month check up yesterday. In addition to receiveing another 4 shots and an oral vaccination, we found out that our little butterball is 18 pounds, 10 ounces and 26 inches long!!!!



She's WAY off the charts for weight and in the 95% for height.



Our little cutie...



We bought her a new jumper. She's been needing it. We have seriously cute video that I will post this weekend...



I was sick yesterday and not feeling so great today...I'm hoping this weekend is low key...



Okay - gotta run for now. Coffee and a very full inbox of email is calling!

9/04/2007

Teething

Yes, Bailey has entered that lovely, lovely teething phase. Our inconsolable child yesterday was our first clue. Her top-of-her-lungs screaming in the middle of the night was our second clue.

Add to that buckets of drool, a penchant for chewing on whatever she can pull to her mouth, and some rough feeling gums and we are pretty sure that we've got a teether.

*sigh*

Kelly and I are tired. It was exhausting yesterday. I'm sure that comes as no surprise to those of you who have already gone through teething-child phase. I think that we were so relieved that the constant crying of early infancy was over that we deluded ourselves into believing that it would never come back.

HA!

Oh well. It's much worse for her than it is for us. Poor baby girl.

But, soon, we'll have cute little pictures of her brand new tooth...

9/03/2007

My Apologies

I must apologize for being such a bad blogger. It's funny, but life has taken on a rhythm that is almost like breathing. Our lives are moving so quickly, and the cycles are predictable. The weeks are dominated by work and preparing for work and the weekends are dominated by Bailey's sleep and awake cycles. The moments are so precious that I find it hard to step away for long enough to blog.

So, I apologize to those of you who count on these blogs to stay caught up. I've been a bad blogger...

Bailey is doing remarkably well. She's just an amazing child. Her personality is front and center these days. She's funny, curious and affectionate. Karen pretty much sums it up when she says that Bailey has the world wrapped around her little finger. She smiles and people melt. She enters a room, and people are captivated. Strangers stop us on the streets and in the stores to look at her, get one of her smiles, touch her chubby cheeks. She's a star in her world...and she knows it.

She's learning how to manipulate. I say that with all the exasperated humor of a woman who is at the center of her world. Bailey is quickly learning that if she cries for long enough, we will pick her up. And if we try to match her will, she just cries harder and longer. She's got will of steel. Honestly. We're working on it. We don't always give in. It's easier for me than it is for Kelly, but Kelly is working on it too.

She is 100% in her crib now. The swing has been moved away and she isn't in it ever anymore. We were sorry to see it go - it was a lifesaver for the first few months. But now, it's nice to have our honey sleeping soundly in her crib. She'll stay in our room for the first year and then we will move her into her bedroom.

Her bedroom has become a holding pen for now. We don't have the time to store everything neatly yet. What I can say is that I've done a great job making sure that all her old clothes that she doesn't fit into anymore are washed and folded before being piled. We'll put them in storage containers soon. Her bassinet, her swing, her infant bathtub - all the things she can no longer wear - everything is piled in her room right now. We'll figure it out soon...

And how are we? Well, Momma and Mommy are doing 100% better than we were before I was on Prozac. It's funny, I've gotten some weird looks from people when I tell them that I am on Prozac...as if I should keep it a secret. I always feel strange, because I'm not ashamed. I'm not upset that I need it. I don't know if I'll need antidepressants permanently or if this is temporary. I don't know...but I'm sure not ashamed that I need them now. I have seen such an improvement in my quality of life...and in the quality of life for Bailey and Kelly. How could that ever be something I was upset about?

It's strange what people feel like they need to hide.

Before I sign off for now, let me think...are there any new things about Bailey? Ummm...well, she's eating food regularly now. She loves oatmeal, sweet potatoes, carrots, applesauce. We don't always have success - sometimes she just wants her bottle, but we try twice a day and most of the time, she enjoys eating. She's moved up to size three diapers, she's in 12 months sleepers and she's wearing 9-12 months clothes. She's a big girl...

We've got her four month doctor's appointment on Thursday...we'll be sure to update her stats at that time.

Until then...I promise to try to be a better blogger...