Sick Baby Girl

I’m a real mom!  No, I didn’t just realize this, but I had such a mom experience.  Lola has had such a rough 24 hours.  I knew yesterday something was up with her, but wasn’t for sure what was going on.  We went to the Gaylord Texan with Clay’s folks and I knew she wasn’t acting herself.  Then when we got home and settled she was real clingy with Clay and me and was just fussy.  She ended up going to sleep after 20 minutes of crying, but it was such hard crying that I got her out and loved on her and rocked her.  Then when she was close to being asleep I put her in her crib which she pretty much just went to sleep.  Throughout the night I heard her moving around quite a bit, then heard her choke.  What could she be choking on?  I hurried in there and my poor baby girl was vomiting.   And it was like projectile and smelt so bad.  I hurried her to the bathroom and knew that this would be a long night.  Bless her heart and it was a long night.  Clay often got up to help.  THANKS BABE! We went through tons of pajamas and thankfully I had Nonna’s special shirt for Lola for when she goes over there and it’s super comfy and big, so I put that on her and I rocked her with a big bowl in our laps.  I had throw up on me, it was in her bed, in my bed… gross.  But I felt like such a good mom and I woke up and didn’t even think twice about being up through the night.  I love this kind of love.  Makes me love my own mom tons more too! I love taking care of her through good and smelly throw-up!  At one point in bed she just laid down on my legs and fell asleep then when she woke up throwing up again, she didn’t actually wake up.  She was so tired by that point she just threw-up and Clay and I held her up and wiped her down.  :(  She’s been sick today, but I feel better about tonight.  I think tomorrow will be much easier.  I meant to get a picture of her in her cute oversized comfy clothes sick, but didn’t get the chance. 

She wasn’t in a great picture mood yesterday and now I know why!  But here is a cute one…

A story crazier than last nights snake in the dishwasher ordeal…

Lola has been in her crib for twenty-five minutes and isn’t asleep, BUT hasn’t cried!!!! Can you all believe it?  This is mind boggling to me!  She’s had a very busy day thanks to Nonna watching her so I could work and then we took her out tonight and didn’t get home until late so I hurried to give her a bath yet of course let her take a bath for awhile and have lots of fun splish, splashing then got her pajamas on and Clay and I played with her in her room, then a bottle, then crib.  She has been going back and forth between playing with the ruffles on her bumper and laying down!  Ha!  This is great- hopefully this is the new routine.  I’m so interested to see how tomorrow night goes!  Praise Jesus for tonight! Seriously.

Clay and I along with Lola decided to adventure out to Northpark tonight for some Maggiano’s and a stroll around the mall.  We decided to give Nick a call and see if he wanted to meet us for bite to eat and he was in, then Mom and Dad called to see what we were up to and they joined in!  It was a fun night, but we took so long eating that by the time we were done the stores were closed.  Clay and I strolled Lola around anyway (she loves it) then headed home… and would you know it?  It was snowing!!! So cool and beautiful.  Snow still amazes me and I can’t get over how pretty it is.  The snow flakes were so big and fluffy! :)

Looks like it is family weekend, because tomorrow we are having lunch with Gram and Popper.  Another exciting day tomorrow!

So apparently everyone is freaked out over the snake, but I still think the squirrel thing is worse! At least I knew it was a snake because I didn’t have a clue what was running around in my attic, then my cabinets!

 

Seriously?  Not to die for cute? I love this child.

Uncle Nick (Uncle Bub) really has made huge strides with Lola lately!

Lola was playing peek-a-boo with Nonna with a napkin!  How smart is she?

Pathetic I know, but hey- it’s snow!

So the house has been rearranged over the last couple of months.  Almost every room… what was I thinking? But it’s turning out to be great!  Here’s the deal: the room off of the den with the glass doors is now Clay’s man room.  I have put up curtains so the room feels less open to the den and it looks great!  I wish I would have thought of doing that earlier!  And his room looks good.  Instead of having the focus of it be on a desk and computer, it’s now focused on his great record collection and love for music!  I just love it!  Clay even bought a rug for the room, which helps give it warmth!  Then in his old office, we turned it into a guest room/room for me.  I sold my big desk and got my old desk out of storage which I love!  Then made the closet (thanks to a lot of help from Paw-Paw for redoing the shelves) into a scrapbook storage area.  Then I am getting a daybed from my mom (used to be mine and I LOVE this bed) to put under the large window with plantation shutters on it.  It should look really good and homey and is pretty much Kebby’s room.  Unless Clay’s friends crash over here or Nick again.  I like having a guest room!  Then the old guest room will eventually be Lola’s big girl room or her sibling room- not trying to tell anyone anything… no babies on the way.  My mom and I are trading beds.  She’s  taking the black full bed and I get two twins.  The bed is absolutely gorgeous and was her grandpas, but really we need twin beds more than big beds!

By the way, Lola is dead asleep! No crying! Yayayaya!  So amazing! My heart feels rewarded and filled with joy!

Pictures below of the two big room changes.  I need to take pictures of my den because I arranged it differently and everyone seems to like it much better.  It’s much more open and gives Lola tons of floor space to play!  I love the changes we are making!  Now if I can just get my bedroom into shape… it’s been neglected.  Maybe I can find a great comforter and paint color to ask for, for my birthday!  A little ways off…

Guest room/My room…Scrap/Craft Closet- still working on it, but getting close!

Have y’all seen were people put a cute gathered skirt around a desk then normally have a glass top on the wood part of the desk?  I think I want to do that here and keep a few things stored under the desk!  ??

Clay’s room.  The piece of furniture holding the records was perfect and it was cheap at Ikea.  The record frames don’t have the records in them yet.  I think it will look really cool when he picks out the record art to go in them.  I sold my desk and bought some replacement furniture and still had money left over!

I love Clay’s passion for records.  It’s been a hobby that started since we got married.  He asked for a record player for his birthday and I just didn’t think this would be one of those things that turned into anything and as you can see a year and a half later… it has.  He probably has 300+ records now when he started at 0. 

Here’s what I did to the doors.  I didn’t want to cover the doors with panels or anything because I think they are charming, so this worked great.  I just put a rod at the top and bottom so it would stretch tight and gather!  Of course I made the curtains and fell in love with this timeless fabric (literally- that’s the name of the fabric)!!!!

 

Okay got to go ;)

Nat-

Goodness SNAKES alive!

So you may recall my crazy squirrel in my kitchen cabinet story, uh, two weeks ago! 

Well check out this picture of my silverware rack in my dishwasher…

See the snake?  He was pretty big- 12 inches long at least and pretty thick.  Clay prepped for 10 minutes then managed to get it out with grilling tongs and killed it outside.  He actually wouldn’t harm an ant, so I was impressed that he killed the snake!  Yayaya!

I called my mom and she didn’t believe me, so I e-mailed her a picture.  lol!   Amazingly enough I was much calmer over this than the squirrel, which I thought was  raccoon.  Mom is looking into getting someone over here to check that out and fix the hole the squirrel came through. 

I swear I do have a pretty nice home!  And apparently all the animals and reptiles in my neighborhood think so too!

 

Dr. Bala ROCKS!

I mentioned a day or two ago we had the well child visit and I just adore Dr. Bala.  She is so kind and Lola absolutely loves her.  She is very detailed, but not overly so if that makes sense.  She said with Lola’s sleeping to keep doing what we are doing but no more getting her out at night.  She said it would take much longer than a week, probably a month.  Dr. Bala explained that co-sleeping is much harder to break  and takes a lot of patience, sleepless nights, and consistency.  She said by one month we should see a big difference.  She said to try and do the same thing with naps, but it was most important to be consistent at night.  She said at nap time, just not to hold her.  She also said that her head looked just perfect (which I know it could have had more improvements) but since she mentioned something last time about it, I was interested to see if she thought it was better than her 6 month check up.  SHE DID! She also pointed out that Lola’s height is in the 100th percentile!  Where does she get this height from?  Crazy.  She is almost 31 inches tall.  And she only weighed 21 lbs.  That’s only 2 lb difference in 3 months.  Maybe I should learn to crawl?  

Bad news: she had two vaccines, one flu and one swine flu.  And even worse news- she had her blood drawn the adult way- rubber band tied above elbow and real needle withdrawing two or three tubes of blood and it took 3 of us to do it.  I’ll admit, I cried a tear or two with her.  I hate that.  I am very thankful we have a healthy baby girl. 

Here’s Lola showing off her battle wounds… Bless her heart.

Signing off-

The Animal Keeper

9 Months!

Happy 9 months to Lola.  When she turns an age like 9 months, it seems big because it’s a change in clothes size- although she wears 18 months so I guess it doesn’t matter… I’ll update what the doctor says and weight this weekend!

On to what I love about Lola at 9 months of age:

• I love that she says “Dada” at least five times an hour and says “Mama”…. oh wait…. she doesn’t say “Mama!” LOL She has only said it a handful of times, but I am patiently waiting… She always says “Bubu” which I keep telling her, “Lola, you don’t have a bubu yet!”
• Lola loves Chick-fil-A and I love that!  She eats nuggets and drinks apple juice when we go!

• My newest favorite thing is how she runs from us.  She can waddle crawl so fast and I love how tickled she gets when we say “I’m gonna’ get you!”
• This girl LOVES books and she has her favorites!  I love that I can pick her out a book based off her preferences and bring it home and sure enough- she loves it!  Who would have thought a would buy books?  Haha- don’t worry I’ll be buying crayons just as soon as she won’t eat them!
• She is fearless.  She is walking some now and loves going from one object to another.  She loves hanging upside down and being thrown high in the air.  Don’t call CPS- the girl just loves stuff like this… It won’t surprise me if she jumps out of an airplane one day. 

(Lola walking down our hallway naked… I didn’t know she was going to walk and I was just taking pictures of her standing up!)

• During the day when it’s just us two, I love how she comes and gets me to tell me something.  She’ll cry and reach for me when she’s ready for a nap, she’ll pull on her pants if she wants them off, she’ll bring me a book to read to her… it is just amazing. 
• About this age babies learn to point at things of interest to them, but not Lola… typical things of interest to her include babies and children and instead of pointing she yells at them.  I try and tell her, “Say Hi” but she looses all ability to wave and just yells.  It’s a funny yell, not like a tantrum, just a “Hey, YOU! Talk to me!”  Then she grins with every part of her face. 
• I love that she always kisses her reflection!

 

More Pictures…

Well here are some pictures because I finally found my camera cord… some are pretty old…

I feel like the girls look so old here!  Just hanging out and playing!

Lola was real into Laura at our park play date. She had sunglasses on, big earrings, and a muffin!  Dream land for Lola… lol.  

Love these 3 pictures:

 

Why do babies love these yellow ducks?  I have never heard of a baby not loving the yellow bath tub duck!

How can she look this big already?

Uncle Nick and Lola!

Lola!  She can wear a headband now thanks to her DOC Band! :)

Lola loves the new stroller and so does her momma (me!)!

5th night of letting her cry- she got rocked.

Lola already loves fashion!  She is wearing Aunt Kebby’s boots!  These may not fit her but she can almost wear her shirts!  Thanks for lending her a shirt the other day Keb!

Lola loves her baby stroller!

Over the break Lola got to catch up with STACY!!!!!! And so did I!  WE MISS YOU!!!

At the lake house!!

First trip to Canton!  Yes, I broke both rules- I brought my husband AND baby… lol.  Clay, Robert, Stacy, Lola and myself all went to Canton before heading to the lake!  It was just too cold that day!  Brrr!

Over the break we got the pleasure of having breakfast with Ginni!  They even brought Lola free baby pancakes!  We miss Ginni working night shifts!  Those were the days!  We snuck in a trip to HomeGoods too! :)

 

Okay… should I be sleeping since Lola is asleep in her crib?  Silly me!

Sleepless Night Six

Lola didn’t do so well last night.  Our max cry time for her at this point in this process is 35 minutes.  Last night after 35 minutes of nonstop tears and no sign of sleep, she won.  And after trying to put her down in her crib asleep a few times with no luck, she slept with us.  Ugh.  That one night of no Lola in our bed till 5 a.m. motivates me to get this to work, but not at the expense of too many unnecessary tears.  So tonight we reluctantly tried for the sixth consecutive night.  It took 30 minutes and she was asleep.  I still think this is taking too long now that we are one day shy of a week.  We see the pediatrician Thursday and look forward to her advice.  Hopefully Lola will sleep awhile in her crib tonight! 

Just keeping a log so Lola can read this one day when she is a mom and allows her babies to sleep with her… she’ll then see payback is a …..

:)

Sleep Video

Well after the terrible night last night there is good news! Lola slept in her crib until 5 a.m.! :) Yayaya- so once again we will battle the tears tonight. Here is the video of her sleeping while sitting and like I said earlier we ended up having to go in there to lay her down. Please pray for a better night tonight! Clay has been praying over us and about the situation and I told Clay for once I feel like God isn't listening and God really showed me by giving me a full night of rest with no baby! Although I did wake up every hour and look at the monitor because I was baffled that she hadn't woken up crying yet! lol

Watch her almost completely fall- she's crazy! Why doesn't she just lay down????

Above is the video and below is a still shot... pretty funny huh? She looks blonde in the night vision camera. Cracks us up!

35 minutes of tears…

So it took 35 minutes of crying tonight when she finally fell asleep… she was sleeping sitting up… we were so nervous she was going to fall back and hit her head on her iron crib that we went in for a risky move… I tip toed in to lay her down, which she woke up briefly with a big cry, but was quickly sound asleep again.  Either 35 minutes sounds like a lot or maybe not so bad to some, but by the 4th night- I just think it shouldn’t be taking so long.  I hate letting her cry that hard.  But when I got her out to change her dirty diaper I noticed that she wasn’t snubbing (I think that is the word) as bad as she should have been, which made me wonder how much of the crying was screaming and tantrum, more than just plain upset baby tears.  Last night she kept shaking her gate… she was angry.  Weird.  I mean I get it, who wouldn’t be, but to see a little baby angry is weird, especially Lola.  Sweetest child on earth…lol.

I deserve a bowl of cereal and to cry my own self to sleep now. 

This may be a bad idea, but we are still getting her when she wakes up in the middle of night for our bed, so when she masters falling asleep in her crib then we will try and master sleeping in the crib all night.  We just can’t conquer it all at once.  Hope this is smart.  But hopefully when she has learned to soothe herself and fall asleep then when she wakes up at night it will be easier to teach her to sleep in her crib through the night.  Her naps are a little better about sleeping in the crib.  She used to wake up the minute I put her down.  

Okay… cereal time.

Night again. 

So sad and frustrating…

You guessed it… the transition to the crib is going terribly wrong.  On our 4th night and each night is undoubtedly worse than the last.  She cries longer and harder… which contradicts everything I have read.  The last two nights she has pooped, which I can’t figure out if she does it because she knows I’ll have to change her or if she is just really upset or just simply needed to go.  She rarely poops at night.  TMI?  I just chuckled which was well needed since my daughter is screaming in her crib for 20+ minutes now.  Clay and I don’t let her cry too long so the first two nights she fell asleep but last night she cried so long and hard we finally got her out.  I rocked her then laid her in her crib asleep.  Last night she pooped, and broke out in a terrible sweat.  I had to change her pajamas in fact.  We didn’t like that very much- that’s why we thought it was best to rock her.  This is pretty hard on us both.  We want to be good parents who sleep in a bed without a baby, but just don’t know if it’s in the cards right now.  I read that if there are no significant improvements within a week’s time, then it is time to do something different.  We see the pediatrician this week, so by then I would have tried this for a week.  So we will see what she says. 

Night, night.  Prayers needed…   

You’ll be glad to know…

This is the second successful night of Lola falling asleep in her crib.  Last night she cried for almost (aka only!) 10 minutes then I went to check on her and laid her down and gave her the paci back and she cried for another minute or so and went to sleep.  Yayaya!  But she woke up at 12:30 and Clay heard her and put her in bed with me…. better than nothing.  Tonight she cried twice that amount and I ended up checking on her 3 times.  The third time I laid her down and put my hand on her chest (never picked her up!!!) and she fell asleep in her crib again!  When I checked on her I waited longer periods each time… The plan is to not put her in bed with us in the middle of the night if she wakes up… we will see.  We are hoping she stops waking up so much, which I think she will if she is now learning to get comfortable and fall asleep on her own without me!   Wishful thinking? 

Honestly, these days, rocking her wears me out more than watching her cry on the little video monitor.  It’s a tough call actually… but she is almost impossible to rock at night- know why?  It’s because she can’t get comfortable on my bony little body!!!  Hahahaha!  That’s the excuse I tell Clay anyway! Clay and I crawl in bed and stare at the odd, little, night vision monitor on our nightstand to watch her and decide when is a good time to go in and check on her… it’s so sad. 

I’ll keep reporting it- keep me accountable people!

I have some great pictures I can’t put up because I can’t find the cord to my camera and I have pictures that go back from Christmas time.  :( Clay said I have to wait till tomorrow to look for the cord so I don’t wake Lola up! lol  

Lola and I got to catch up with a now healthy Aubrey and Laura at the park today!  Once again- can’t upload my pictures! :(  But it was fun and today was beautiful!!!!

I left Lola at the church nursery twice yesterday and it was just terrible… once in the morning so I could enjoy a great, funny couple talk about balancing life as a mom and life as a wife… AMEN!  It was great getting the wife’s and husband’s thoughts.  And then that night for our Moneywise class.  Clay and I are really enjoying that- but Lola just had a rough time… surprisingly.  Sooooo today- was just as rough.  Miss. Clingy.  Every time I put her in the car today I think she thought I was leaving her… poor thing. 

Okay I have to go watch Conan’s last show tonight.  Sad night at the Swartz’ home.  We love Conan O’brien.  NBC- You are wrong and this sucks.  Leno is sort of creepy.  Why do people like him? Icky. 

Well hopefully next time I’ll have all my cute pictures to post!

Good night!

Apple of my eye…

So it turns out Lola LOVES apples!  :)  She doesn’t like sliced apples either- she likes to eat apples like her daddy does… he was eating an apple the other day and she was begging for it, so he gave her a bite and then she wouldn’t give it back.  LOL!  The bad thing is she can not chew an apple, especially the skin, so then I have to take the big apple chunks out of her mouth, hence the tears and dramatic faces… enjoy these pictures!  I just love them!

     

Her daddy stepped in to console her and said I was being mean- but I just explained that I was saving her life but not letting her choke on the apple chunks and just happened to take pictures during these life-saving actions on mine…

She started guarding the apple…

Clapping… and her new trick at 8.5 months is snapping!  Clay managed to teach her to snap!  How?  I do not know!

Happy, Happy, Happy… Almost 9 months old!  Can’t believe it! That much closer to being 1!