Developments

We started a bit of rice cereal two days ago as a last attempt to help Arielle sleep through the night before making everyone suffer through the "cry it out" method.

First night, no luck.

Last night.... I kept waking up hearing her cry, but then realizing that she wasn't crying. Then, all of a sudden, Chuck was kissing me good bye and it was 7:30 am and neither girl was awake. What? I not only get the luxury of the baby sleeping through the night, but I also didn't have to get out of bed until 7:45.

Sweet!

Fingers crossed that tonight will be a repeat.

Updates

Arielle still isn't sleeping through the night. Her schedule is very consistent during the day, but it changes every night. She goes to bed around 8 or 8:30 pm and sometimes wakes up at 1 or 2 am and sometimes doesn't wake up until 5 am. She always eats 6 oz of formula and goes right back to sleep. She's a 15 pounder and we KNOW for a fact that she doesn't NEED to wake up and eat. If she would just eat a few more ounces during the day, maybe she wouldn't. Can't make a baby eat though.

Eden pooped on the potty for the first time a few days ago. We are not formally potty training yet, because I am happy changing diapers because that (for the most part) means I get to change them when it's convenient for me. Whereas, if we are out and she has to go and there's no diaper involved, that means I drop everything (but hopefully not the baby) and find a bathroom. Not to mention the mess of public restrooms, trying to carry the baby in the stall with us and help prop Eden up on the big seat so she didn't fall in etc, etc. No thank you. I'm getting stressed out just writing about it. She can go on the potty whenever she likes at home, but that's all for now.

Arielle had her 4 month checkup on Monday and all was well. The combination of prevacid and gentle formula seems to have all but completely taken care of her reflux and spit-up issue. I'm sure the fact that her digestive system is maturing is also contributing. She is working on rolling over and sitting up. The doc was concerned that she might favor looking to one side so much that she couldn't turn her head to the other side, but when I called her name, she swiveled that cute little head right around. No problem. She hates tummy time and doesn't really push up at all yet, which is fine, because we are trying to hold out until June to get a pro shot of her pushing up for the first of the Watch Baby Grow 4-panel. (just like we made for Eden)

The sisters are still adjusting to life with one another. Eden scares Arielle sometimes by being loud and Arielle's constant needs frustrate Eden, but they really do get along swimmingly most of the time. I thank God aloud every day for sisters so that Eden continues to think of the whole idea in a positive light. You can tell she's going to relish helping Mommy and Daddy teach Arielle all sorts of things.

Arielle is beginning to recognize the sign for milk. It's been much more natural to sign with her, as I assumed it would be. It felt kinda weird the first time around, but now that we've seen the results with Eden and we're just plain used to doing them, the signs feel more like an integrated part of how we communicate.

That's all for now. Yea for babies sleeping through me writing a whole blog post!!

Arielle's Adventure

Sisters and silliness

A Memory Book

I have begun a sort of memory book for Eden. She says so many little hilarious gems during the day and I try to remember them all to tell to Chuck when he gets home, but I thought I should take it a step further and start a journal to record her hilarity. The journal's purpose is a multi-faceted one. It is for her to look at years from now and laugh at her two-year old self. It is for her to reference if she likes when she has her own two-year old. It is for me to look back at when I need a pick-me up. It is also to require me to find something special and precious to record about her every day, even the particularly rough ones when I don't find her cute at all, and cause me to catch the bigger perspective. It is also because I just seem to be more sane when I write about my life instead of just experiencing it. Small outlets, like this blog and my new journal are healthy for me. If you're lucky, I may just share a few pages with you here every now and then. :)

An Outing

Since the mundane and every-day seems to be all I can think about, that's what I'll blog about.

I went to the grocery store this morning. That's an accomplishment with two babies. I really couldn't even wrap my brain around how to do it when Arielle was first born. Do I balance the car seat in the front of the cart and put Eden in the basket, hope she doesn't open everything I put in the cart or jump out... and try to steer by peeking around the face-level car seat? Do I put Eden in the front where she belongs and put the car seat in the basket, leaving no room for groceries? Do I sling the baby and hope she doesn't urp and soak the sling and me while I shop? Do I just use my double stroller and fill the basket underneath and the canopies with as much as I can?

Here's my solution: I put Eden in the seat in the front of the cart, Arielle in her carseat in the main part of the cart and scoot her halfway underneath Eden so about a third of the cart is available for groceries. My diaper bag goes in the narrow space between the front wheels under Eden and I put two plastic shopping baskets underneath the main part of the cart. It requires a lot of pulling up of pants and readjustment of shirts from bending over so much to put things in and organize the lower baskets, but it's really easy to take them directly from the cart to the checkout counter. So much faster! Now, I have found it to be more difficult to get the bagged groceries back into the cart to get everything to the car. Once it's bagged, it's much harder to organize it. If you enjoy Tetris, you'd enjoy this experience, but I never really got into Tetris. I just played it because it was one of the few games I had for my GameBoy.

And that's grocery shopping for me. Fascinating huh?

Arielle - 2 months old