3 months old!

There are a few things I know for sure about Grace and motherhood since the past month:
1. Nothing is more beautiful than a baby sleeping.
2. Perhaps the only thing more beautiful than that is a baby smiling at you!
3. A baby CAN breastfeed for hours on end without passing out.
4. Grace has Doug’s metabolism in that she eats and eats and gains only ounces at a time…
5. Grace may look like Doug, but she has my temper or worse.
6. The good thing about that is: she’ll never lose any race if she doesn’t have to.
7. I’ve never questioned myself as much as I do now that I’m a mother.
8. Babies don’t always sleep when they’re tired.
9. Mothers who breastfeed are superwomen.
10. Fathers who lovingly come home night after night to tired wives and wired babies are supermen.
This month has been full of gains and challenges. Grace has started to smile and that is fantastic to behold! Today I put her down for a nap and thought she was pretty close to falling asleep; as soon as her head touched down, she opened her eyes. I’ll be darned if she didn’t look at my astonished face and grin from ear to ear. And not only did she do this once today, but twice. I couldn’t help but laugh back at her. She can’t help it; being a prankster is in her genes.
Grace had lots of other “firsts” this month: first wedding, dance, party dress, ride in a limo, KU alumni meeting, trip to the KC plaza, venture to Kansas, polka dance, accidental rollover, and many more.
Well, we went through baby bootie camp and it didn’t really change her napping schedule at all. It did, however, increase her sleep at night, which I’ll take for now. She is the queen of catnaps and can recharge with a quick 10 minute nap in the baby sling or in her bed. Amazing! I didn’t figure that out until I was in college! Another great thing that came of our experiment was that I learned several new tricks to calm Grace and put her so sleep; now I still just have to figure out how to keep her there. I have given up milk products to see if it will help, and so far it seems as if she’s less crabby and fussy. I’ve also started using a weighted blanket because she will sleep soundly if you hold her at times, so I’m trying to mimic that as much as possible. Cross your fingers… and your toes if you can!
On a great note, Grace has begun to break up her nightly marathon feeds (previously 7 pm to 10 pm straight). We have to take her in a stroller ride or on the highway in the car to keep her happy during those breaks, but 3 hours straight is a long time to breastfeed! She can do it, but I’m starting to lose my mind, as it’s been over a month now. I can’t tell you how much I admire women who breastfeed! I cut her off at 40 minutes per feed with the exception of the marathon and am guessing we spend 7 hours a day breastfeeding! Amazing! But to her credit, she is gaining weight and is around 8 lb. now. 3 months old, 8 lb. and 22 inches. I look at her and wonder how women birth babies of this size or greater. She seems so big to me! The pediatrician says she is following the growth curve, but needs to start gaining on it. She’s still in the zero percentile, but considering it took her nearly a month to get to her birth weight, I’m not surprised. We’re trying our best and certainly doing our part. With much love and encouragement I have started to give her a bottle of alimentum formula at night prior to bedtime; the bottle has helped to ‘top off’ her marathon feed and not make her hungry for more until early morning. It has been a relief to know I have a bottle waiting for her to help her when I’m pleading “Uncle!”
Grace will start going to the sitter 2-3 partial days per week starting next week. The sitter we have found came highly recommended by several teachers I worked with over the past year. She is very experienced and will hopefully help us with our napping issue. As of now she is the only infant of the group. I pray she’s ready. While I won’t start at work for another 2 weeks, I need some time to myself during the day before I start back. Without her napping yet, I am lucky to get in a quiet shower and return any phone calls or pay bills. Emailing or calling friends has long been a thing of the past and a luxury at best; Doug had a day off last week and gave me a coupon for 2 hours of free time. I went to the gym for the first time in 3 months and then to the coffee shop for a caffeine free steamer. It was amazing being by myself for that bit of time. I have to admit though, I was excited to see them once I got into the house.
Doug has been amazing with helping and often taking over. There have often been weekend mornings when she won’t go back to sleep after a feed; he puts her in the running stroller and takes off for a run, allowing me to get some more snooze time. He’s become adept at finishing half-cooked meals that were interrupted by nursing demands, as well as finding precooked foods his organic-finicky wife will eat from the grocery store. He’s always asking what I need and how he can help. Grace and I couldn’t be luckier!
I will be updating the blog monthly on the 12th to celebrate her birthday. If I have time in between, I hope to update it then as well, but no promises. Thank you for your support, encouragement, patience with me, and love, love, love. We feel it and continue to need it!