Maude is 7 Weeks Old!

Our 7th week with our baby girl has been wonderful.  Her smiles light up our days.  She is a pretty agreeable and happy little gal.  After having the last few weeks with just me and Maude during the day, I've started to figure out her days much better than I was able to before.  I'm starting to understand when she's hungry vs tired vs has gas.  I know about how long she stays awake between naps.

Other things we've figured out this week:
- Maude is not a big fan of the swing.  She doesn't hate it, but it is certainly not the go-to bucket to put our baby in.  She's satisfied in that thing for maybe a full minute.  Luckily, we borrowed our swing from friends who visited this weekend and were able to take it off our hands.  We're happy to have our living room back.
- Maude is able to projectile many things from her little body.  Use your imagination.
- Mike is better at swaddling Maude than I am.
- Maude can shove her entire fist in her mouth.
- Maude likes to shove her entire fist in her mouth so we're now doing the one arm swaddle so she has access to that fist in her sleep.


Today has been a rough day.  Maude got her first round of vaccinations.  The poor gal hated them which was to be expected.  She's been Ms. Fussy Pants tonight as well.  She's been sleeping then will suddenly start crying and fussing.  I feel terrible for her.  Most of the other moms I've talked to said their babies slept a lot the day of the shots and then were cranky for a few days afterward.  Maybe since Maude is cranky on the day of, it will be over by the morning.

We also got Maude's updated stats while at the doctor.  She's now 9lbs 7.5oz and is 21.5 inches tall.  Her doctor was impressed with her neck control.  Our devotion to tummy time has paid off.  Maude and I even took a tummy time class at our favorite place, the Pump Station.  We go there at least once a week for various classes or support groups with other new moms and babies.  It's become our second home.

Below are a few videos and photos from the past week:

Hanging out on her bedroom floor.

Time in her activity gym with Stella keeping a watchful eye.

Daddy after getting a very upset little Maude quieted down.  Shots are no fun!

Close up of the hand on her face.

6 Weeks!

Today is Maude's 6 weeks old.  Woah.  In some ways, it feels like she was just born, but it also feels like she's been a part of our lives forever.  As we do every Sunday, we celebrated her birthday at her birth time.  I'm sure most everyone does this after they have a baby, but it feels like a special little thing that the three of us do together every week (four of us when Stella chooses to chime in on "Happy Birthday").

Our first full week alone went really well.  We had something going on every day which made the week fly by!  Since it takes nearly the entire morning to actually get out of the house, once we're out and go do what we need to get done and then get home, Mike is almost home so I don't feel like we've even had much hanging around the house time.  I decided to leave at least a day or two in the coming week without plans so we can have a little more down time.

We had friends visiting from Seattle this weekend.  Uncle Jason and Aunt Tonya took a few days to come over while on their annual trip to Vegas.   Maude went out to eat for the first time at night.  It was a sport's bar and with the NCAA tournament, it was quite a lively (aka LOUD) place!  She did great - I think it was a lot of excitement for her with many things and people to check out.  The entire weekend was pretty stimulating for her.  Mike, Jason and Tonya went to Magic Mountain yesterday and Maude took a 3+ hour nap!  I was able to shower and get ready all at once (that never happens anymore!), eat lunch, bake some bread, pick up the house, unload the dishwasher, and even relax a little bit.  It was amazing! 

In other sleep news, last Thursday night, Maude went to sleep at 8:30 PM and didn't wake up until 5 AM, then went back to sleep after eating and slept until 8:30.  I felt like I'd slept forever and had so much energy on Friday!  This weekend wasn't as good, but I think the excitement of the guests and the late bed times messed her up a bit.  Here's hoping we can continue with the good sleep patterns starting tonight!

I reported last week that we thought Maude was smiling for real and I can now confidently say that she is!  (We're still pretty sure she's been smiling at us for a few weeks now, but there's now no denying it.)  There's nothing better than getting a wide grin from her just because she sees our faces.  She's also making more little noises and practicing using her voice.  Her very favorite place to be is on her changing pad.  We get more smiles and "oohs", "goos", "gaaahs" and "ahhgs" when she's laying there than we do anywhere else.  She has a colorful, toy-filled, musical, light up play mat that she enjoys, but it's nothing compared to her changing pad.  I spend a good portion of every day standing there and talking, reading, and singing to her. 

Maude's favorite songs are the "Hokey Pokey" which we sing when we're putting an outfit on ("You put your right arm in...") and "Mary Had a Little Lamb" with modified words.  She has a soft little lovie which is a pink lamb so we made the song about Maude and her pink lamb.  Here is how it goes:

Maude had a little lamb

Little lamb

Little lamb

Maude had a little lamb

Its fleece was pink as a pig

Everywhere that Maude went

Maude went

Maude went

Everywhere that Maude went

That lamb was sure to go

It followed her to school one day

School one day

School one day

It followed her to school one day

And went to calculus class

(We also replace "calculus" with geometry, biology, chemistry, AP English, or some other class she's sure to love someday)

We're looking forward to what new thing the next week brings! 

Here are updated pictures from this past week.  I felt like we took a lot more than this, but then I realized that Jason and Tonya took a lot with their camera.  It was the first time since the day she was born that we got a few pictures of us as a family so hopefully we can share those once we get them.

All smiles on her changing pad!

I bought her a hat which she obviously loves! (Note that she is on her changing pad, but it doesn't have its cover on and Maude is naked except for the hat.  She'd just peed all over her clothes and the cover.)

Again, loving life on her changing pad!

All dressed up!  I think she looks like she's trying to be all mysterious and model-like in this photo!

Snoozing with Uncle Jason.

I don't know if you can see it, but her shirt has a little scarf on it.  It's cold and rainy today in LA so it is a very appropriate top.

A close up.

5 weeks old!

We skipped the 4 week/one month post mostly because I just didn't have the time.  My mom was visiting during that time and I just didn't get around to updating the blog.  So here is a 5 week update.  Because February was a short month, Maude's 4 week birthday was also her one month birthday.  We celebrated by buying an ice cream cake and letting Maude go to town eating it.  Kidding!  Mike and I sure enjoyed it, though!

As we do every Sunday in celebrating her birthday, we relive the day she arrived.  I have a few funny stories from that day that I forgot to share in our first blog post after she was born.  First off, my water broke at home and we needed to get going to the hospital but I was determined to shower, wash my hair, and dry it before we left.  We also had to pack a few more things for the hospital.  Mike thought I was nuts when he said "ok, let's go" and I said "no, I need to shower and get ready."  Thankfully he was patient and let me do my thing before we left.  We left our house to drive to the hospital at 2:30 AM on Saturday night/Sunday morning and I was absolutely convinced that every driver on the road was a drunk driver.  I think I drove Mike about crazy as I exclaimed about every car "WATCH OUT!  There's a drunk driver!"  Our hospital had recently changed it's procedure for arriving overnight.  It used to be that you'd enter at their main entrance which was right next to labor and delivery.  Beginning February 1 (5 days before we showed up), check in was at the emergency room.  So we parked in their parking ramp and went into the emergency room around 3 AM.  The staff on duty didn't seem to quite know what to do so they gave us some paper name tags and sent us on our way.  After we walked about 10 feet, I realized we didn't know where to go so I went back to ask.  The security guard just pointed at the name tag where it said "East Wing, 1st Floor" and said to look for that.  Ok.  So we set out on our own to find labor and delivery.  Let's just say that finding the East Wing is NOT an easy feat and Mike and I walked around that hospital, completely lost for quite some time.  Because it was 3 AM, there was also nobody around.  (And let's keep in mind that I was having very regular and not so pleasant contractions at this point.)  We thankfully, finally ran into a maintenance worker and begged him to help us find our way.  Even he wasn't entirely sure where to go and didn't even have proper access to get there!  We did finally get there but the whole adventure was a bit stressful at the time and now makes for a good story.

While my mom was here, Mike and I were able to go out to eat BY OURSELVES twice!  A huge thanks to my mom for watching Maude and to both her and my dad for paying for our dinners out.  =)  What a treat!  We were gone for maybe an hour and a half both times which felt like a long time to be away from Maude but it was also nice to have some adult time.

Maude is starting to be awake a bit more throughout the day.  It's fun to have more time to interact with her but also makes it difficult when I need to get things done.  I think she also got pretty darn spoiled with my mom being here and holding her all the time.  In the 4 days since she's been gone, Maude hasn't wanted to do much else besides hang out in our arms.

We think we've seen a few smiles that aren't of the I-have-gas variety but we're not 100% sure.  We like to think she's smiling at our silly antics but I think it's more likely they are involuntary grins.  She should definitely be smiling in reaction to our smiles sometime in the next few weeks.  She's also starting to make some noises that aren't just grunts or cries which is a lot of fun.  There's a part of me that can't wait for the next new thing she'll do, but I also want her to stay her tiny self for a while longer.

On the subject of staying her tiny self, our gal is packing on the pounds (er, I mean ounces)!  As of our last blog post, she weighed 7lbs 5oz and just four days after she weighed in at that, we had to go back to the doctor and she weighed 7lbs 13 oz!  It's been over a week since that appointment and my guess is that she's around eight and a half pounds by now.  She can still wear about half of her newborn outfits, but some are a bit snug at this point.  She's been starting to wear some of her 0-3 month outfits, too.

This will be Maude and my first full week on our own.  I'm really hoping to get into some sort of routine.  Not sure how possible that is with a 5 week old, but we'll give it a try.  It will be nice to have our time together and figure out our days.  I'm very much looking forward to it.

Here are more pics of the little lady.  Enjoy!

Ice Cream Cake!

Clearly she was thrilled to be having her ice cream cake celebrating her one month birthday!

She's a big fan of her fingers when she's coordinated enough to get them to her mouth and have them stay there!

One month old!

Had to get one of Stella in here.  She loves to lay on Maude's play mat.

As long as that pacifier is even near her mouth, she's fine.  If it moves too far away, she lets us know!

5 weeks!  As you can see, we give her a bath each Sunday and take a lot of photos at that time.  We have a photo that looks almost identical to this from each week since she was born.