Practically Perfect In Every Way

Just a quick note about Maeve’s 15 month check up.
Stupidly I made the appointment for 8am which is breakfast time for the girl and she sleeps so well lately that waking her up early enough to leave in time was hard. I made sure everything was ready that the moment she woke up I just put a coat on over her pjs, popped her in the sling and headed out to catch the bus. She ate breakfast in the doctors office while we saw the nurse and waited for Dr M.

Maeve is now 21.3lbs and 31.25inches tall. Apparently she has the right to slow down her weight gain at this point but she’s still gaining a healthy amount. She’s still tall and skinny (but not too skinny).

Check up and vaccinations
She wasn’t too happy seeing the Dr today, she fussed at getting undressed and weighed and measured. She fussed at having her heart checked and her ears and eyes looked into. She *hated* getting the 4 shots (2 in each arm) and was very cross with the nurse. But now we have 4-5months until her next appointment and after that no more shots until 4 years!

Speech
Doctor said that the few words she speaks (Hi, Bye, Mama, Dada, Book, Ball) is a fine amount for her age and that even the “buh” sound for book/ball counts as a word. Yay. Simon is so vocal that I occasionally worry about Maeve’s slow speech development. But in the couple of days since her appointment she’s added ‘dow’ (down), ‘ooh’ (all done) and ‘more’ to her vocabulary!

After the doctor we walked home, skyped with my parents and went to the thrift store. In the evening she woke up cranky from her afternoon nap and cried most of the evening. She wouldn’t let Lewis near her and was just squirmy and uncomfortable and drooly and snotty. I think it’s part teething (still working on tooth #7) and part reaction to the shots. I gave her a bath and when she still seemed uncomfortable (like bloated gassy discomfort) I snuggled with her in her pjs until she started to doze off. It was half an hour after I put her down that I realized I should have given her some fever reducer, but she slept through the night fine. and we had a lazy day after than. Of course now she has a cold so we have all of that added to the mix to throw us off kilter 🙂

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Maeve’s one year check-up

This morning was Maeve’s one year check up. It is also Lewis’ birthday. We woke up, opened some birthday presents in bed and went for a birthday breakfast at our favourite spot before going to the Doctor for her appointment.

Maeve is now 20.2lbs and 30” tall!

Doctor M was very happy with her progress. She said that it’s okay for her not to be talking yet as long as she’s babbling a lot which she is. She’s started making new vocal sounds and sounds like an alien character or something (“b’duk duka ticuh” etc). She commented on her friendly social nature saying that most 1yr olds are dubious of her but I think Maeve is a generally good judge of character. She can be shy with some strangers and friendly with others.
She was given the all clear to eat any food she wants! Yay! And as for the reflux Dr said to try her on the ¼ tablet once a day for a few more weeks and then try stopping altogether! She’s been doing the once a day for 10 days now so I’ll give it to the end of the month and see what happens. I can’t believe we might be done with medicine. She still spits up once in a while, but it’s not even every day now 🙂

After the doctor saw her, she got 3 sets of shots (2 in one arm, 1 in the other). She cried a lot, but the nurse was very quick. Then we went to get blood drawn which #1 was the rotten cherry on the top of the pile of crap that was the 3 shots and #2 was just miserable for all involved 😦 she cried so much and was sobbing throughout. I had to hold her legs between mine and wrap my arms around her so she couldn’t wriggle. The nurse tried twice to find a vein in the arm, when she found a vein she wasn’t able to get any blood so she had to do a pin prick on the finger and collect the blood for 2 vials that way (which of course takes so much longer). Maeve was sobbing, Lewis was unhappy, I wasn’t happy, I felt sorry for the poor young nurse too. It was a rough 10 minutes or so.

Since her birthday she has had a few new things going on:

Pooping. She has started to go to the bathroom door when she needs to poop. It’s only happened a few times. Or she’ll come over to me and want to climb up on my lap for a cuddle and I get a whiff 🙂

Weaning: A few weeks before her birthday we were down to one or two breast feedings per day, then a few days after her birthday I went out for the afternoon and she wasn’t able to have her mid-afternoon snack so she went all day with only sippy cups. I think it was the next day that I managed to distract her and she went 2 days without breastfeeding! I was so surprised when I went to bed that night I had to text Christina 😛 We are now managing to breast feed every 2^nd or 3^rd day. If she sees my boobs when I’m changing she gets excited and sometimes she’ll grab at my shirt but I can usually offer her a sippy cup or a pacifier and she’s happy. Now I have to hope she doesn’t get too attached/dependant on a pacifier. I’m trying to keep it out of sight and only offer it at nap time and even then only when she’s fussy about going down.

So she’s now 30” tall which means her reach is even longer and not too many surfaces are safe from her grabby little paws. She can also climb, remember?! She can climb onto the loveseat and onto the windowsill behind; she can climb onto the couch and then onto the table behind; the other day we turned around to see that she can climbed onto the windowsill by my bedside and was looking out at the world below!!!; she can move the step stool around the kitchen and has started to attempt to climb it… This morning she wobbled the rack where her food is kept just enough to knock a munchies cup filled with cheerios down. I might have to do some rearranging!

I’ve bought a little harness/leash type thing at Babies R Us. I’m hoping that this way I can wear her when we go out and then when I get tired or she gets fidgety she can walk around without darting into a street. I am also looking at getting a cheap umbrella stroller for some outings so that we can ride the bus if needed. The jogging stroller is great for most trips but it’s a pain to break it down if I want to ride on the bus (and I hate taking up the space on the bus if I don’t break it down).

I love the little person she’s becoming. I look at pictures or read my journal from a year ago and it amazes me. Those first few weeks were a haze of sleep and feeds and now she’s a blur as she zips around the condo.

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7 months

On Feb 18th, Maeve hit the 7 month milestone.
We’ve put her back on medication for reflux because she was still having trouble sleeping through the night. Even with the medication she is having trouble, but it feels different now. The other night she was waking me up so often I don’t think I actually fell into a deep sleep until Lewis had left for work. She would cry and wriggle around but eventually settle down to sleep on me, and then 10mins after I put her down she’d start crying again, but she wasn’t searching for food which is a major improvement. Last night I tried to avoid picking her up for cuddles (just rubbed her back so she knew I was there) and eventually I was able to let her whimper herself back to sleep. I think she had gas so I’m looking at what foods are potential suspects and what I can do to help ease the nighttime pain. Other than me not sleeping much I think we’re making progress. She has her last feed by 8pm (depending on when she got dinner and if she wanted any boob before bed) and manages to last until midnight before her next feed. Last night I fed her at 3am and then she slept until almost 8am.

She is far less whiny these days. She still spits up some, but far less than she used to and hopefully the medication will help her reflux and heartburn and make her more comfortable. We have 11 refills for the prescription, so a full years worth(!), hopefully by then her system will have matured some and she won’t need it.

She is still cruising along furniture nicely and working hard at walking freely. She stands up and looks like she’s working really hard at lifting her foot, but plops down before she manages to do it. She is quite fearless in some respects. I put Lewis’ little desktop table on the floor (it’s about 6″ tall) and she climbed right up on it and then stood up! If it is next to the loveseat she will use it to try and climb onto the loveseat too! If things are in her way she simply crawl/climbs over them to get where she needs to be 😛 I foresee some adventures down the road!

I just removed a few more of her 3-6mo clothes and am integrating more of her 6mo clothing into rotation.

Today we went to the doctors to get the 2nd round of her 6 month shots. Because she had the flu shot last month they wanted to spread out the rest of the shots to make it easier on her. So out we went in the ‘blizzard’. Thankfully I didn’t have to fully undress her for this visit, because I’d bundled her up so much, I just had to take off her trousers. Because this wasn’t a proper milestone visit she wasn’t going to get weighed or measured (boo), but while the nurse was out of the room I plopped Maeve on the scales and she’s up to 16lb 14oz (fully clothed)!
So she got her shots and the nurse apologized for making her cry. she said “She’s so strong so I had to be a bit strong with her” which I understand. She did cry but while I was giving her a cuddle afterward the nurse was straightening the paper and had to change the roll so Maeve got totally distracted by the whole lifting the chair and everything.
We spent some time in the waiting room after so she could have some fun before getting bundled up again for the ride home.

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Maeve and Me at 4 Months

So Miss Maeve hit her 4 month birthday on Sunday and today she had her 4 month appointment with Dr Maxouris. She weighs 12lb 11oz, and is 24 inches long. Dr Maxouris said that she has reflux, but that from her healthy weight gain and everything we told her it doesn’t seem to be anything to worry about other than laundry issues. But she told us what to look out for if it starts to be a problem and we need to give her medicine or add cereal to her feeds. Otherwise we’re to carry on with breast feeding for the next 2 months as she seems to be getting enough from me and growing well. Whew.

This visit she had 2 more shots and an oral vaccine. She was so happy and smiley for the first nurse who took her measurements, but then she had to wait a long time before the doctor came in and it was getting close to nap time. So I fed her and the doctor came in talked to us for a bit, and then checked her ears, mouth and hips etc which made her cranky (apparently her teeth are still far down so all her dribbling is really early prep). We managed to calm her down again and another nurse came in to give Maeve her Tylenol and vaccines which she really did not like 😦 she was really crying hard for a while. I gave her another feed and we tucked her up snug in the stroller and walked home. She was fine on the walk and managed to fall asleep, but when we got home and she woke up she needed a fresh diaper and poor Lewis had about an hour of her crying and fussing and whimpering before she went to sleep while I went out to my usual evening with friends. Hopefully she wakes up feeling less miserable.

So at 4 months she can still fit in to a few of her 0-3 month clothing, but if she’s wearing a cloth diaper she has to wear the 3mo clothing. She is wearing size 1 diapers (which fit up to 14lbs) but I think I’ll buy some size 2 this week and see how they fit.

Her favourite toys are still the crinkle paper and her exersaucer/play station and now the puppy that Ian gave her. It is soft and cuddly and has a rattle in the head and 3 things to chew on. Her feet *almost* touch the bottom of the exersaucer! She still wobbles a bit and can’t spin herself around yet, but she can now reach the toys and enjoys figuring out how they work. I have started to video her for a few minutes most days so Lewis doesn’t miss these special moments of her figuring out how to work the toys or vocalizing a new noise etc. A passing stranger at the store the other day commented that she isn’t very smiley, which is somewhat true I guess. She’s certainly not as outwardly cheerful as Simon, but I think she’s just very intense and studious. She studies everything. Her most cheerful time of day is first thing in the morning when we first wake up. I pick her up and sit her on my tummy and we have smiley giggly time for almost an hour before I get up.

This past week she has suddenly started eating more and I feel drained dry! She usually feeds for 8-10 minutes every 2.5-3hrs, but this week she has had occasionally had 20minute feeds. Lewis had to give her a bottle of formula on Friday evening as I wanted a chance to ‘fill up’ again.

She is being bad about sleeping in her bed at night this week. She wakes up crying and stretching and arching her back and refusing to be put back in her bed. She arches her back and stretches and then she pulls her head up and kind of uses her elbows to push herself off the bed wanting to be in a sitting position. If I haven’t mentioned it before a few weeks ago we got her one of these (http://www.fisher-price.com/en_US/brands/babygear/products/51903) rocking beds. It holds her in a more upright position than a regular bassinet or crib and she can rock herself to sleep by kicking her feet. She’s so much more comfortable in this! She’ll get to sleep in this until she hits the 25lb weight limit or can pull herself to a sitting position, which to be honest will probably be the sooner for her.

She’s *so close* to needing a bigger bed and to be honest I’m kind of looking forward to when she moves into her own room. Having her cry during the night is tough on me because I have to try to quiet her down so Lewis can get his sleep. Technically I have the option of sleeping later or taking a nap in the afternoon but that rarely happens. I am surviving on about 5hrs of broken sleep per night these days.

When I lay her on the floor for tummy time she is starting to lift her legs into a downward dog type position but still doesn’t lift with her arms past the elbows and if she’s on her back she is starting to wriggle and arch her back like she’s getting ready to flip over, so I think by Christmas she’ll be rolling. Also, I think she’s headed toward skipping the whole crawling thing and moving right on to walking, but we shall see, maybe once she gets rolling figured out she’ll work on crawling.

Our next appointment is toward the end of January when she’ll be 6 months! Wow.

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In which I have my first birthday since this whole adventure started.

Last night I was thinking about what mini milestone’s we’d had since last week and it hit me that she’s *5* whole weeks old now and how much she’s grown. I was thinking back on the initial struggle of breast feeding and tracking every feed and every poopy/wet diaper and fretting that she wasn’t getting enough from me. We are still working on a more regular routine and sleeping through the night better, but it’s not as bad as it was just a month ago.

I was right about some of my postpartum expectations of myself, but underestimated myself in some respects. I had a strong feeling that I would be tired and cranky and frustrated with my parents when they arrived (whether I was still heavily pregnant, in labor or dealing with a newborn)- and I was correct about that 😛 I knew that they wouldn’t be as ‘helpful’ as some parents are presumed to be. My mum is somewhat frail from various health issues over the past few years, my dad tries to be helpful in non-baby-related ways, they aren’t familiar with Chicago so I felt like I had to entertain/look after them as much as much as they wanted to help out and their daily schedule was out of sync with mine so while I was up and about and trying to get chores done by 8 or 9am, they weren’t ready to do anything until noon or 1pm (right when we were wanting to have lunch and take a nap).
Anyway, It was nice to have them visit, but I am slightly more relaxed now that they have gone home and I only have to work around Maeve’s schedule and not theirs too.

My first birthday as a mum was not my favourite birthday ever. I had a bad night with Maeve, I think she’s going through another growth spurt, and she was fussing constantly. In the morning she was filling diapers all over the place and spitting up lots. We met up with mum, dad and J for lunch. I spent the afternoon feeling tired from Maeve, frustrated with my parents incredibly slow pace (mum has tendinitis in her ankle and walks soooo slowly) and guilty for Lewis not having as fun a day as he would have liked (he gets on with my folks but sitting around chatting about baby stuff etc isn’t something that appeals to him). By the time we headed home I just wanted to curl up in my bed and cry. I mean the weather was beautiful and I got some nice gifts and I got to hang out with my parents and J and Lewis and Maeve, but on the whole it was less than amazing.

On Monday, Maeve had her 1month doctors visit and now weighs a whopping 8lbs 1oz!! Wahoo! And she is 20.5inches long now too. She did pretty well during the appointment and only peed a little when we stripped her naked for weighing 😛 Next appointment is in a month and she’ll start getting some of her vaccinations- eek!

So since last week we have been out in the Moby Wrap 4 more times and are learning the limits of the buggy (cup holder only holds certain sizes of bottles of water, the basket only holds 5lbs and isn’t very big etc). I still haven’t showered without someone else watching Maeve (either my parents or Lewis when he gets home from work). I haven’t managed to breastfeed in public again yet, but I know that I can if I have to.
We bumped into our downstairs neighbour, on our way home the other day and it was the first time she had seen us since Maeve was born. She is moving out of state soon, to be closer to her daughter and baby granddaughter. Her 2 sons live in Europe with their families and her 2 daughters live on the east coast and so now that one has a baby she wants to be able to see her more often and as she’s retired she doesn’t have anything keeping her here. Then we bumped into our other neighbour, Marjorie, and her 2 little boys- also for the first time since Maeve was born, how have we not seen any of our neighbours in 4.5 weeks!?- Marjorie is expecting her 3rd baby in October. I think they will also be moving at some point soon! I have noticed that the collection of strollers and buggies in our courtyard has disappeared except for ours which makes me kind of sad, but I know that it happens and that next August Lewis and I will most likely also be
moving to a bigger place.

For now I like being able to walk to the doctors (1.5miles each way) and the dentist (1mile each way) and Target/Jewel (2miles/1.5miles each way). I like that there are a few parks nearby, with rivers and playgrounds and whatnot, for walks with Maeve. I might not love our specific neighbourhood, but I like the area and don’t want to move too far unless the new area is amazing.

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