Mia Pia Pod

Happy Halloween! The baby girl's first Halloween. She was such a good sport and went along with our dressing her up and hauling her to the door every time the bell rang. Of course, everyone thought she was a cutie and one little boy even commented on what a "good-looking baby" we have. It was great to finally get trick-or-treaters. The last 2 years not one single person rang our bell on Halloween night. It was a lot of fun.

13 Weeks Old

Daddy and Mia - Baby's First Boo

It seems strange to say she's 13 weeks old when the 28th is tomorrow and she'll officially be 3 months. My little girl is going to be 3 months old! Wow! She is growing so fast and changing every week! I noticed when I picked her up from the sitter's yesterday that she seemed to change in the few hours I was away from her. I have this fear that she is going to do all of her "firsts" at her sitter's house and not ours. When I put her in the car seat to take her home she started sucking her top lip. Barbara pointed out that she was sucking her top lip AGAIN. It was the first time I had seen that. It was cute as pie and sad for me at the same time because I missed that "first".


Ooooh, I'm so scared!

Mia had a visit from Aunt Sandee and Uncle Gary on Sunday. They brought her a present which was a cute footed sleeper (I just love her in those things) and a sweet little stuffed animal named Hope. On Monday, we met Daddy and MeMe at El Chico’s for lunch. Otherwise, it's been a fairly quiet week. We were only able to get out one day this week for a walk.


Aunt Sandee and Mia

The Gamecocks are playing Tennessee tomorrow and ESPN is going to be in Columbia for Gameday. Clay wants to get down there early tomorrow morning and try to get Mia on TV. Hee hee. We're going to the game that night while Mia stays with her GranE. Other than that we have a pretty quiet weekend ahead of us.


Daddy and Mia sleeping late on a Sunday morning

I know I said that I would only be getting on the scales every other week but I couldn't help myself this morning. Again, I felt like I had gained weight because my pooch seems to be getting bigger and my hips are definitely wider. Pregnancy has really changed the shape of my body. Well, I was surprised to see that I'd lost another 2 pounds for a total of 43 1/2 pounds. I never in a million years would have imagined that I would have lost that much weight at this point. I've always been one of those people that HAS to exercise to lose weight or to maintain my weight. It's definitely a result of breastfeeding. It has to be.


Tasty thumb

A new exercise place just opened up down the street from our house that I’m thinking about joining. I really wish we had the room at home to purchase an elliptical machine or a treadmill but we do not. I’m not quite sure when I would have the time to go but I would like to start making the time. I think it will benefit me a lot to do some strength training. I have been having a lot of trouble with my back aching and even my hips are achy. I’m sure a lot of it is due to leftover hormones in my body and my body trying to get back to its old self again. At least that’s what I HOPE it’s trying to do!


Talking to Mr. Turtle


Bathtime with Mommy!


I'm so silly


Have a great weekend!

12 Weeks Old

Our baby girl is growing up WAY too fast! I keep asking her to slow down or to just stop for a little while but she won't do it! I'm trying to savor it as much as I can but it's just flying by!

We took her to the State Fair on Sunday. She slept through most of it but when she woke up for the picture she seemed bewildered by all the people. She was cute and such a sweetie pie during the visit. Next year should be even more fun and maybe we can actually take her for a ride on the ferris wheel.


This has been a fairly quiet week. She had a visit from "uncle" Ron and again I forgot to get a picure! Daddy spent a couple of nights studying for a differential equations test. Fun stuff! I have been trying to spend more time playing with Mia on the floor and loving every minute of it. When I was home with her on Monday and Tuesday she napped on my chest after her 4 o'clock nursing. It was so sweet lying on the couch with the most precious child in the world sleeping soundly on my chest. That's going to be a regular thing on those days from now on. :)

On Saturday, Clay and I are going to a bar to watch the USC/Vandy game. It's an away game and is only available on pay per view so Mia is going to stay with GranE while we go to the Wild Hare and watch the game. Should be fun. I know GranE sure is looking forward to all that quality time with Mia.

In the last two weeks I have lost a 1.5 pounds. It's good because I thought I had actually gained some. Seems like the more weight I lose, the bigger my tummy pooch seems to get. Time to start doing something about it. I've lost a total of 41.5 pounds and realized today that if I was actually making an effort to lose weight by exercising and really watching what I ate, I could be dropping pounds left and right.

Look at me!

Look at her! She's holding that ring all by herself!

11 Weeks Old

This has been a busy week for Miss Mia. Last Friday was her cousin Erica's 8th birthday party. It was a great Halloween themed party. All the kids dressed up including most of the adults. There was a haunted house, a worm hunt, lots of decorations and yummy junk food like pizza, chips, cookies, and cupcakes. Mia dressed up as a sweet pea. Such a cutie pie!

Mommy and daddy dressed in scrubs - mommy was an ER doctor and daddy was a surgeon. My sister-in-law really knows how to do birthday parties! Mia did very well around all those screaming kids and even slept through some of it.



We spent the weekend at home and watched the Gamecocks on television Saturday night. Sunday was a lazy day around the house with Clay's birthday dinner that night. His birthday was on Monday the 9th. HAPPY BIRTHDAY! I made his favorite, eggplant parmesan and cheesecake. His very first birthday as a daddy and I did not get any pictures of our little family dinner or present opening. I stink.



Monday night, his actual birthday, we went over to his mom's for dinner. She makes THE best lasagna and I think we both overdid it eating that and red velvet cake! It sure was good!



Tuesday night, his dad, Rhonda and Caryn came over with dinner from Longhorn's. YUMMY! Rhonda brought Mia 3 new outfits that are going to look just adorable on her. We had another red velvet birthday cake. Can you tell that red velvet is Clay's favorite? Unfortunately, neither cake had cream cheese frosting on it. I didn't know bakeries actually made red velvet cake without it! Kinda unheard of if you ask me! It was still a tasty cake and a very nice dinner. Mia had her first taste of something other than breast milk and Tylenol. CAKE FROSTING! She seemed to like it pretty well. Here's some video of it!

DVD photo slide show at onetruemedia.com

Mia also had an appointment with a pediatric orthopedist on Tuesday. This is regarding her right hip being "loose" do to a breech positioning. The doctor performed another ultrasound and said that everything looks great. She was such a big girl and just smiled and laughed at mommy and the red biohazard box the whole time. (Red seems to be her favorite color.) We will go back for another look at her hips in about 4 months just to be sure. The doctor said the looseness was probably due to leftover hormones from birth. Glad it all worked out for the best and we are done with that!



Work has been going pretty good. I am getting more accomplished when I'm there and adjusting pretty well. Although I still miss her like crazy when I'm there! No new weight loss to report. I have decided to only jump on the scale every other week now. I like the results even more that way.

Almost forgot to mention....Mia slept through the night for the first time last night without being swaddled. She is wiggling out of her swaddle and moving all over the crib now so we decided having a blanket in there wasn't a good idea. She is such a big girl. I am so proud of her! I still swaddled her for the car ride to the sitter's house this morning. She still likes to be snuggly. :)

10 Weeks Old

Mia is doing great! I do believe we were blessed with the most perfect child. I would love to say that she is adjusting to the staying with her sitter very nicely, but it doesn't seem like any adjusting was required at all! I talk to the sitter several times during the day and Mia is always doing great. She takes her bottle just fine. She's napping pretty well. Her sleeping at night as even IMPROVED and she's sleeping longer lengths now...like 8 and 9 hours at a time! She's keeping busy with checking out the new surroundings and entertaining herself in the bouncy seat, etc. She really doesn't even seem all that excited to see me when I get there either. I hope that will change. It sorta hurts my feelings right now. :(

This week of changes turned out better than I thought it would for all of us. I thought I would be crying every day at work, but I haven't. I still miss her terribly but I feel confident that she is in good loving hands so there's no extra stress like I thought there would be.

I jumped on the scale this morning and have lost 4 1/2 more pounds in the last 2 weeks. Woohoo! I certainly didn't expect it at all so I had to get on the scale three times just to be sure. That's a total of 40 pounds lost. Only 18 more to go to reach my pre-pregnancy weight. It will feel good to reach that point. Even though I was trying to lose weight and working out when I got pregnant, I was very comfortable at that size. I'm pretty comfortable now but still can't wear most of my regular cloths. I'm trying to save money and I don't want to have to spend an arm and a leg replenishing my closet. I can't believe I just said I didn't want to spend money on clothes. LOL!

Have a good weekend!

Update

Well, my first day back to work is about to come to a close. I made it! I lived through the day! I seriously was doubting I could do it this morning. Yes, I have talked to the sitter 3 times today but who cares. Each time she assured me that Mia was doing great, eating well, and even napping. I cannot WAIT to see my little sweetie baby!

Ta-ta for now!

First day back to work

This is my first day back in the office and Mia's first day with her sitter. Let me just go ahead and say THIS SUCKS! I cried all morning. I cried when I was nursing her. I cried when I was wrapping her up and putting her in the carseat. I cried when she smiled at me in her sleep. I cried when I watched her daddy carrying her to the truck. I cried as they drove off. I cried while making my coffee. I cried in the shower. I cried on the drive to work. Deep down I know I will be okay and things will eventually feel less horrible but this first day is going to be pure torture for me!

2 Month Check-up

Mia had her 2-month check-up yesterday with her pediatrician. She is up to 13 pounds 6 ounces and is 24 inches long! The doctor joked that she would some day have trouble finding pants in a long enough length. She's almost off the percentile chart but Dr. W said not to pay much attention to them because her height and weight were proportionate to each other and that's what counts.

After all the good news came the bad and the ugly - SHOTS! My poor baby. I can see why Dr. W doesn't give those things and makes the nurses do it. Dr. W just loves Mia and her little rolls and loves to hug on her when she's in there. I can see where it would be difficult loving on a little angel like Mia and then turning around and sticking her FOUR TIMES! That's right. They stuck our precious baby FOUR TIMES, two in each juicy thigh! Mia didn't seem to realize what was going on until the nurse stuck her the second time. After that, it was just blood curtling screams. They really need to come up with a better way to vaccinate babies and children. There has GOT to be a better way!

She cried for a good 5 minutes afterwards. I was surprised she let Clay put her back in the carseat and even more surprised that she slept all the way home. I was fully expecting her to cry during the ride home. She woke up when I got her in the house. I unbuckled her and she stretched her legs out and I think they much have still been tender because she started crying again. I gave her infant Tylenol and nursed her. She calmed down and I thought maybe she wouldn't react to it the way I had been warned that she might. A few hours later is when she really started to feel the effects. She cried a good bit last night and we could just tell she did not feel well at all. I was prepared to sleep in the rocker with her on my chest all night, but I swaddled her up a little before 11:00 and she slept until 5:00 this morning. She still seemed a little achy so I gave her a little more Tylenol, nursed her and she went right back to sleep. When she woke up again around 8:30, she was more of herself and smiling a bit. She is napping again right now.

It completely broke my heart to see her in such pain and agony. It broke my heart all over again several hours later when she was feeling so badly and I couldn't take the pain away and make her feel better. I am not looking forward to the next check-up which is at 4 months because we have to do the shots ALL OVER AGAIN! I know they are probably for the best, but I can honestly see why some parents don't vaccinate.

First Vacation

We took Mia on her first vacation this past weekend to Hilton Head. She did beautifully. I thought her sleeping habits would be disrupted a little but really were not. She woke up one extra time during the night and her sleep stretches only lasted about 4 hours but I thought that was great considering. I thought once we got back home she would need to get readjusted, but did not. She slept for 8 straight hours Sunday night.



We took her shopping at the outlets and bought her some warmer (and bigger) clothes from Carter's and Baby Gap. I really like Carter's stuff. It's roomier and is just good quality clothing. We got her the cutest body suit and denim overalls from Baby Gap and a pink fuzzy coat with little ears on the hood part. It looks so warm and snuggly. They are going to look adorable on her!



The next big event was introducing her to the sand and the ocean. I'd like to say that her face just lit up and she was truly amazed by that vast amount of water, but she is only 2 months old so she just looked at it without much reaction. In her defense it was about 6:00 in the evening and she was winding down for the day. It was so cute to see her scrunch her toes in the sand. She wasn't scared of any of it at all. We got a couple of smiles out of her. We didn't stay down there too long. It wasn't cool to us but for her the breeze seemed to be too much. We stayed long enough for a few pictures and then back to the condo.



We tried to have dinner out that night but it wasn't agreeing with Mia so we ended up having to get it to go...which was fine. I was with my 2 favorite people so not much else mattered. The last day was very relaxing. She woke up in the morning and nursed and then slept on her daddy for a couple of hours. Long enough for him to watch an entire movie. LOL! She woke up and nursed again and instead of breakfast, we ended up going out for lunch. The last time we were in HH (2 months ago to be exact), we found a Mediterranean restaurant we like to eat at. They have an outside patio which is where we like to sit. Mia slept through lunch but woke up just as we were getting ready to leave. We left for home shortly after lunch. Swaddled her up and she slept the entire ride home.



It was a very nice weekend.