Friday, February 27, 2015

51 Weeks

Last week was a little rough again, as Audra was being particularly screamy. She really was only happy in the evenings if I were either holding her or at least sitting on the floor with her (so she could sit on me, apparently). But then she also screamed when she wasn't unhappy, but was just trying to communicate, like when she shrieked (repeatedly) throughout dinner whenever her food supply was getting low. I know this is just a phase, but she's already so loud anyway that I kind of wish she would ease up on the non-emergency screaming for the sake of our nerves :-\
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[Something was clearly not to her liking here]
[So cute.... and then the screeching starts]

Sleep was also not that great last week, with a few rough nights with many wakeups, although she also had a couple of 3-4 hour stretches over the course of the week. She did fall back asleep a few times laying on my chest without needing to nurse first, which does at least prove that it is possible for her to fall asleep on occasion without nursing ;) She also resettled herself during a nap on the weekend without nursing once, which is the first time that has ever happened (at home, at least).

Audra started wearing shoes more last week - she apparently is fascinated with the other kids' shoes at daycare and tries to put them on herself, so we sent her in her own.... at least, for a few days until she started getting very agitated in the car to and from daycare since she normally likes to yank her socks off then, and the shoes were preventing her from doing so. She certainly likes to play with shoes at home though, and for a few days, a popular game at home (for both kids) was to put various objects into one of the food storage containers, with Audra's favorite being her soft soled shoes.
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I think Audra is starting to make the connection that different objects have names now, since she has really been into pointing and saying "da" at various things for us to name them. She still loves her fish and duck pictures, but also discovered that pointing to the elephant picture above her change table will prompt me to do a (thoroughly unrealistic) impression of an elephant ;)

She did get less screamy as the week progressed too, and there were some sweet moments with her - she normally wants to be bounced, jiggled, flipped around in different positions, whatever, so I'm enjoying the latest trend of her just sitting quietly on my lap and letting me hug her :) Audra is also remarkably attentive when someone else is crying - as soon as Josie started crying one night, Audra stopped what she was doing and went right over to her and tried to pat her (and inexplicably throw a leg over her), and daycare has confirmed that she tries to comfort the other babies there too.

Audra developed a rash behind her knees about a week ago, and given its location within the folds of her chubby legs, we started putting antifungal cream on that. Then she came up with a bump on her back... then more, and more, and more, until her entire back was broken out and she had some spots basically all over her body.
She never acted sick though (well, unless the screaming was related), so we just kept an eye on her until one morning when a new rash was completely covering one of her armpits. So she went to the pediatrician on Wednesday, and they thought the two rashes were likely unrelated, so we're to continue with the antifungal cream for behind her knees (since of course it spread to the other one too), and cut out all topical irritants (scented detergents, etc.) and likely food allergens (dairy, eggs, nuts, seafood, etc.) to see if that helps her skin clear up. She's been a trouper and seems to be tolerating it pretty well even though I know she's pretty itchy, but we're following the doctor's advice and hopefully it will clear up soon.

Also notable from her trip to the pediatrician? She's apparently 29lbs now, which seems like a pretty big jump from the 25lbs she was a couple of months ago. And two different nurses came in to comment on the adorable sounds she was making and her fantastic laugh as we were waiting for the doctor. Given that Audra had just screamed at me most of the morning before her appointment (not because she was mad, just .... because), I found this view of her complete delightfulness funny but slightly exasperating :)

Audra appears to finally be backing off her milk consumption during the day in favor of solids, and we're now sending one less bottle (4oz) to daycare each day. This takes some pressure off me, since I can more easily keep up with her again when she's drinking less :) But really, I just have one more week (!) before I meet my one-year goal and then I'm going to cut down on pumping at work anyway. I don't have much of a plan beyond going down to 3x/day after next week, and eventually getting down to 1x/day (or ideally not at all), and using frozen milk to make up the difference between what I pump each day and what she needs. And once the frozen stash is gone, then we'll probably start using cow's milk to make up the difference. I'm thinking maybe I'll continue nursing in some capacity until she's 2ish...? I'm just in no rush to wean this time (since we won't be trying for another kid), so ideally, I'd like to get to where I'm comfortable only nursing her whenever we're together with only minimal/no pumping during the day. We'll see!

Not having to pump at work will also help me focus better, since going the mother's room several times throughout the day has proven to be very disruptive. Being able to focus will be even more important to me very, very soon, though, as I'm about to embark on a pretty big project at work. I mentioned previously that my company was being acquired and I was anticipating being out of a job... well, the acquisition just closed this week, and not only am I not out of a job (at least, not yet!), but I have been asked to be a contracts lead on the integration team :) So very exciting stuff - I served in a similar role for my company a few years ago, and that got me into the corporate work I've been doing the last few years (which I love), so I'm excited to see where this takes me next. :)

Miscellaneous cuteness:
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[Chicken tastes better if someone else feeds it to her, apparently]
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[Sitting like a big girl and doing some important work with the cookies]

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