Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Memories

It's hard to believe that Autumn's already 10 months old. I feel like it was only yesterday that we brought her home from the hospital. She couldn't even hold her head up yet. Very dependant on me for everything. Especially food. Now she's crawling all over the place, eating table food, and learning how to communicate through signing.

I took some time to sit back and think of how blessed I am to be Autumn's mother. How she started as nothing more than an egg inside my womb that grew rapidly over the course of 9 months. The first time I felt her kicking. The warmth I felt knowing that I was supporting life inside me. Jordan feeling Autumn kicking for the first time. How grossed out he was and yet so excited that he helped create life! To the birth of our beautiful baby girl that took my breath away the moment I saw her!! Seeing Jordan's face when he realized that he was a father for the first time. The first time nursing Autumn, realizing that I will be supporting this life, again, through the works of my body. Through the milestones she's already accomplished. Holding her head up, pushing her chest up, sitting up, crawling, pulling herself up, going up stairs, and now walking around furniature. I melted the first time she smiled at me, realized who I was and then called me "mama". It's sad to watch her cry when she needs me, and yet so comforting knowing that we have this special bond between us that I pray will continue to grow throughout her life. I cannot imagine a life without her. Being a mother is one of the best lifetime experiences that I've ever gone through.

Autumn and I are also so blessed to have Jordan in our lives. That he is able to work so hard to have me stay at home and experience everyday with her! I cannot imagine missing a single day in her life!! Jordan is such a great father, he loves his little girl so much! And I love him more and more everyday just watching him create a special father/daughter bond that will shape her future for the better. God knew what he was doing when he placed Autumn in our life. I think Him everyday for her!!!

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Sleep illusions...

Last night was an interesting night... Autumn woke up at 4:30am. Which I thought was great, another 9 hours straight through the night. So I went into her room and nursed her. While I was nursing her I noticed that I was as "full" as I was the previous night. But I just blew it off thinking that my body already regulated itself. After she fell asleep, I went upstairs and made Jordan's lunch for him. Grabbed a glass of water and went back to bed. I opened our bedroom door, looked at the alarm clock and realized that it was 1:54am!!!!! Oh goodness... No wonder I wasn't as full. Little stinker. She was probably thinking "WOO HOO!!!" I blame it on the lack of sleep I've been getting, hehe. She then woke up again at 5:30am, nursed back to sleep until 7:30am. Hopefully tonight will go better :-)

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Pictures!

Enjoying a day at the zoo with friends.


Peek-a-boo!


Aftermath of a teething biscuit.




Check out the gap in between her top teeth!
This is where she'll eventually have to have surgery.


Autumn's new favorite way to play with her toys!


Enjoying the afternoon outside.


I have a very happy baby!


Showing off her teething necklace!




My favorite pic right now!
She has her father's facial expressions :-)

Sleep training... Again???

Here we go again... Sleep training! I've tried my fair share of sleep training. They all seem to work, until something happens. A cold. Shots from a doctor's appointment. Major milestone in development. So here I am, trying it again. I pray that this works, because I'm tired. Exhausted is more like it. Tonight will be night number 3. The first night went really well. I always expect the worst for Autumn, but she's a trooper! She woke up at 12:30am and I laid her down on her tummy and told her to go "na-night" and that mommy was there. What's different this time is that I stay with her the whole time. So that she understands that she's not alone and I will always be there if she really needs me. She fell asleep within 10 minutes. Hardly fought it. I thought it was too good to be true. She then woke up again at 4:30am. I did the same thing, laid her down on her tummy and went through the routine. Asleep within 5 minutes.... CRAZY!!! But that time was too good to be true! She was awake within 15 minutes, WIDE awake!!! She wanted to play. I tried really hard to get her to sleep, but she wanted nothing to do with it. And I did not want to stay awake until her normal wake time trying to get her to sleep. So I gave in :-( Last night was much, much better. Autumn went down at 7:30pm and woke up at 4:30am!!! All by herself :-D I picked her up right away and nursed her. Then it hit me... Shouldn't I be sleep training her? Haha. Oh well, I think 9 hours deserves a good nursing (and I was hurting too). I'm praying for another good night tonight. Mommy deserves it.

Wow, where do I begin on Autumn? She's everywhere!!! Literally. A house can never be baby proofed enough for this child. She's crawling, fast. Pulling herself onto everything. Walking around furniture. She learned how to climb up stairs, with mommy's help. I was curious one day if she could and she did. Right up the flight of stairs!!! She was so proud! Then she figured out that going up the stairs leads to tubby time, so she tries to go there every chance she can. I've learned to barricade her into the family room with me. Hehe.

Autumn now has 4 teeth, 2 top and 2 bottom. And a huge gap in between the top 2. Thanks to mama, hehe. She's going to have to have surgery, who knows when... I think I was in elementary school when I had the surgery done. But mine wasn't as bad as Autumn's is :-) That's one of the first things I noticed when she was born, besides her dimples! At Autumn's 9 month appointment, she weighed 19 lbs 1 oz and the doctor recorded that she was 27 3/4 in long. However, at her 6 mth appointment she was 27 1/2 in long... So I knew for a fact that that was wrong! My mom and I remeasured her and we got 29 inches. That sounds better!

Autumn loves eating solids now. She eats almost everything we eat at the table. She does, however, still loves her boobie juice. She always saves enough room for a full serving of boobie juice :-) I love it. I probably still nurse her around 3 - 5 times a day and sometimes a couple at night (depending on how long she sleeps). I'm not giving up anytime soon. It's so healthy for Autumn!!! And that bonding time that we have between us is the best!

The cutest thing that Autumn's been doing lately is dropping her toys from her highchair and saying "ut-oh". It's sooooo cute!!! She says it so well. Took her only a weekend to master it. She works really hard at imitating and can master just about anything you throw her way. I just started teaching her sign-language from the My Baby Can Talk series. It's great! I've been reading Autumn her books everyday. She loves them. Sits down in front of me, facing me and we go through the book and signs together. Somedays she's not super interested. Other days she's really into what I'm doing and you can see her little wheels a turning in her brain!

Well, Autumn's nudging me to play with her, so I'm off. I'll update with pictures later.