Ear, teeth, lungs, cranky-pants!

Well you would think a mother who has all summer off with her gorgeous baby would write more often about the wonderful trips we are taking, the long hours spent in the library, the daily trips to the pool, etc. Or you may think that’s one crazy and busy momma, we’ll hear about all the fun at the end of the summer… That’s my hope.

Michael and I have used the phrase “we just can’t get ahead” quite often in our life together. Most of the time this has referred to him getting laid off at inopportune times (when is it opportune?). Just when we think things will work out, we can finally get a bill paid off, something snaps and we are back to square one. I guess you could say this is how my summer started off.

I was all set to walk a group of my students down for graduation the Sunday of my first summer off and woke with a horrible pain in my “lower left abdomen”. A quick trip to the ER, blood work, and a CT scan later I had appendicitis. Surgery the next day and sent home with lifting restriction of 20lbs for 15 days. Thanks to my perfect DNA combine with Michael’s, also perfect, DNA we made a huge baby and yes at 7month she weighed just that, 20lbs!

"Just can’t get ahead" – We are still paying off Michael’s appendectomy from 2009!

So the first week my mom and Michael do what they do best and cared for me and the Bean. The second week Stella and I took an impromptued visit to my mom’s and stayed the week with friends and lifting assistance, it’s easy when your babies cute!

The third week things started to get back on track. I figured out Stella preferred a grand schedule that alternated solids, and bottle feedings, and naps almost to a T. I was thrilled. Things were going well. We made a stop by the library, the pool, play-dates with other babies…

But alas “We Just can’t get ahead”

Stella developed a bad ear infection (her first, and God willing her last) over the weekend. This gave her breathing problems and a low-grade fever. She’s been on Albuteral treatments and antibiotics since Saturday; another scare and glitch in the system life. Her breathing seems to be better, and then worst, so I can’t figure out if we’re ever on the upswing with that. The infection and pain in her ear seems to be subsiding, but the antibiotics are giving her diarrhea and bad diaper rash. She doesn’t have an appetite, therefore she only want a bottle (this doesn’t help the diarrhea) so I’m slipping rice into her bottles.

She started teething again. I hope this time is for real and we actually see some results. I think I feel bumps and I think this is another cause of her low appetite. Needless to say she's uncomfortable, sleepy, and just plan cranky.

Hopefully things thin out this week and we just get ahead!

Photo of my "Sick Bean" taken by her Auntie Michele

Stella Bella

A button nose
And sapphire eyes
Rose petal lips
And giggly sighs

Squeals and squeaks
Bubbles and coos
My life is blessed
With I love yous!!

Written by the world's greatest Grandma.

Summer's a Comin'

Well I officially have 5.5 days left until I am off all summer. I am so overjoyed by this tid-bit of information I can hardly keep it to myself. And the best part of it all is it’s keeping me in a good mood! Stella and I are literally going to spend every waking hour together this summer and I couldn’t be more thrilled about anything, I’m serious folks, not even a trip to Hawaii could beat out this feeling I have!

· I had my first officially mother’s day this month. It was wonderful. I spent it with Stella, Michael, and my mom (my three favorite people ever). Michael got me flowers, my mom cooked for us and we went on walks, fabulous. (Also if you aren’t catching on, I’m easy to please)
· I’m wrapping up things with school. All my students are focusing on their big final projects and seniors are out of here in less than a week. I’m working hard on getting my first yearbook together and complete by the end of next week!
· I’ve decided to grow my hair out and go dye-less this summer, admittedly, though I am starting to gray right at my hair line, so we’ll see how long that last.
· Michael and I have it on our agenda to act as though we’re paying the $200 a week for daycare, but instead paying down stupid bills and hopefully catching up by the summer’s end.
· We don’t have any vacations planned, though we may venture to Tennessee to see Michael’s sister or Georgia to see his Aunt, this contradicts us saving money so we’ll see.
· I’ve bought a bike trailer and am looking for a bike. Stella and I are going to hit the pool and trail daily so I can work this extra weight off. She’ll be my motivator for sure.
· Stella starts SKIP swim lessons May 30, totally excited for this!!!

Stella is a great eater, has been for a few weeks now. We started her on the rice cereal just at four months, and kept that up for a few weeks or so. We started adding pureed veggies and grains and things are going great. She gums on apple pieces and bananas if she can pick them up.
She’s been a wonderful sleeper since day one! And for this I am so thankful. She does wake off schedule ever once in awhile and this week seems to be one of those; getting up at 11 or 12ish for a bottle and again at 3 or 4ish. I read teething and developmental accomplishments will disrupt sleeping habits. I think she’s going through both. She’s able to sit now, though not full on her own. She was rolling a while back but hasn’t managed to do it again, and still hates tummy time.
Six month check up will be in June.

The Nose Knows

A few weeks ago we officially moved Stella to her crib. She did wonderfully as we were strong at establishing a routine for bedtime when she was tiny, and holding true to the routine the little bean falls right to sleep.

Also after the stay in the hospital it all proved too stressful for me to produce milk and Stella wouldn’t even take my breast, so we moved to just formula about two weeks ago and this combined with sleeping in her own room helped mom and dad to alternate nights.

However, lately she’s started a new waking time, an extra one. She use to sleep from 7:00PM to about 3:30AM. We would get up with her, feed her and she would fall right back to sleep until 7:00AM. But for the past two weeks she’s been waking up about 11:00PM eating a little and falling back to sleep, or should I say struggling back to sleep. No we don’t stick a bottle in her right away. We’ve tried the patting, the soothing, the singing, the mobile, the white noise machine, the swaying, the binki, but all this only leads to her crying louder so we resort to a bottle.

On Wednesday of this week I tried the rice cereal for the first time, hoping it might fix the 11:00 waking. Well she woke up, I think out of habit, but I was able to rock her back to sleep. The only catch is I also wrapped her in the nighty shirt I was wearing before I laid her back to bed.

Now the thing I’m learning about this baby thing is to not try two things at once, in this case it was the rice cereal and the nighty shirt. Trying two things at the same time will only keep you guessing which one worked, as you don’t have a control group and are too scared to take one or the other away.

Last night we didn’t have time for rice cereal, and she work up at 11:00. It was Michael’s night for the early shift (as we take shifts, not nights now) and he tried to do all the soothing, nothing worked. Then made her a tiny 3oz bottle (she’s drinking 6oz at a time). She only drank 2oz and feel back to sleep. She struggled though, and I got up… I remembered the nighty shirt from the night before so I did the same thing and she snuggled right up to it.

She naps so well in my bed against my pillow, she's even able to "self-sooth" when she's in my bed. I have now made the connection it’s about the smells. My smell in particular.

I’m working on patenting an air freshener that you can load your mommy smell into…. :-)

You Are My Sunshine

When I was little my mom would give me a bath and afterwards pull me out of the tub wrap me in a big towel and rock my in her lap while singing:

You are my sunshine
My only sunshine
You make me happy when skies are gray
You’ll never know dear, how much I love you
Please don’t take my sunshine away

I have found myself singing that song obviously more often in the last four months than I ever have before, and for good reason, I have a sunshine to sing it to now. But the one line in the song I realized was false tonight. It says “you’ll never know dear, how much I love you” but as of today I realize I do know how much my mom loves me, because I know how much I love Stella.

I love that she laughs at me and that when I talk she looks in my direction.

I love that she goes to bed so well, but hate that it’s so early, because all I want to do is play with her.

I love that I felt guilty dropping you off at daycare on my day off, because I’ve never had a reason to feel that kind of guilt before.

I love that you have blue eyes like you daddy, and that your cheeks are wonderfully soft and chubby, and great for kissing.

I love that I spend my free time reading about how to make your life easier and how to play with you so that you’re smart.

I love that my prayers consist of asking God for your health, safety, and happiness.

I love that I now know how much my mom loves me because of how I love you.

I love knowing that someday you'll be able to realize how much I love you.

RSV becomes Pneumonia

Since Stella has been in daycare, I’ve only got two calls from them, but whatever the reason, when I see the name on the caller ID my heart takes a leap. The first time they called, it was because she was going through a growing sprit and they thought they might run out of milk before the end of the day, something that could easily be taken care of. The second time was much different.

On Monday I got a call from the lovely lady who watches the infants. She informed me Stella had a rough morning, as she was crying and coughing all morning and then proceeded to vomit all her morning bottle up over herself. Then she informed me she had a fever.

Stella had been sick for three weeks, with a cold. We were in the emergency room at the beginning of those three weeks because her fever got so high, but they said it was just a virus and sent us home with the “lots of fluid and plenty of rest” remedy.

I couldn’t get off work so Michael took this one and called the doc and picked her up from daycare. According to Michael her pulse-ox (amount of oxygen in her blood) upon arrival to the doc office was in the 80%. She was rapidly breathing and grunting to get a breath. They gave her a nebulizer treatment and pulse-ox went up. Michael called to tell me the prognoses:

“So . . . don’t be worried, but . . . the doctor told me I needed to go to the hospital and check Stella into the ER”. My heart sank, I couldn’t keep the tears from coming I took a breath and tried to think. I was going to finish out the day, grab some stuff at home and head over there… YEAH, RIGHT! There was no way I was going to be able to work the rest of the day. So the wonderful secretary called in a last minute sub for me and I left.

I went home and grab things that I thought I needed: pj’s, chap-stick, contacts, toothbrush, only really hoping it wasn’t bad enough to have to stay the night.

When I got to the hospital Michael and Stella were sitting in the rocking chair of the Peds ER and rocking and singing, my heart sank again as I was so thankful to have an amazing husband to be such an amazing daddy to this little sick baby of ours. Over the period of four hours they did chest x-rays, mucus suction, nebulizer treatments, RSV check, and then they came in with the news that our baby had RSV which developed into double pneumonia (both lungs).

I cried. I bawled.

I felt guilty. I sent my sick baby to daycare; I didn’t know she was that sick, I felt like a bad mom. I felt helpless, sick. I was scared.

I made a food run for Michael and when I got back they were doing her IV. I saw my baby strapped down, screaming, scared, Michael worried and trying to calm her while they got that tiny butterfly needle into her arm. They also had her wear the oxygen tubing around her ears with the two little pieces going into her nose.

Over the course of three days she got: nebulizer treatments every four hours, antibiotics every 8 hours, a constant IV drip of fluids, and every nurse who walked through her door to fall in love with her.

Through all this, she was truly stronger than I ever was. She smiled and cooed. She played and acted like she was just fine. Her red sleepy eyes would have told you otherwise, but her smile kept me going.

Sleep Well Stella Bean

Previously before going into the hospital to be induced Michael and I set up the bassinet in our room. A lovely co-sleeper style by ArmsReach http://www.armsreach.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=3_1&products_id=19 we got from a group of college friends in October, and she has slept in it every night since we've brought her home. It is honestly the one thing I have used on a daily bases and that I’m so happy about getting and would totally recommend to anyone about to have a baby.

We have toyed with the idea of the crib, putting her down for naps on the weekend. There were a few talks about moving her to her room for night time here and there. Of course I read tons of articles, blogs, and books. Talked to several reliable mommies who had good opinions on sleeping arrangements. Michael thought it would help us get more sleep, ironically he’s able to sleep through anything and isn’t the one missing sleep. Other mom’s would say they weren’t able to keep their baby in there room long at all, others said their seven month old was still sleeping with them. So it was an up and down world and I realized I had to do what was best for me, Michael, but most of all Stella.

This was one thing that was truly personal and neither I nor Stella could be rushed into.

So here we are tonight, Feb 26, 2011 and I’ve put Stella to sleep in her crib for the first time for night time. Its bitter sweet, but I think she is more ready for it than anyone and that’s what makes the situation more comforting than anything. My baby girl, though young, is growing up; becoming independent. It makes me happy to think she’s starting to develop into this littler person, one that can be on her own. It’s melancholy to know that we are no longer attached, or need to be next to each other all the time.

But that’s life. My baby will grow up but hopefully we won’t grow apart.

Sleep well Stella Bean, sleep well.