2 Months Old

Amy had her 2 month check-up yesterday! She is growing well, and now weighs 11lbs 10oz and is 23" long. We discovered at the appointment that Amy did get at least ONE thing from me, heat rash! Poor little girl got her momma's sensitivity to the heat. She might grow out of it, but until then, she and I will be together in the shade with our sunscreen on! Amy was being so sweet to the doctor, smiling and cooing and kicking her sweet little legs with joy; it broke my heart to see her so happy knowing that any second the nurse would come in with 3 needles for my baby! When Amy got that first shot, and that sweet little grin turned into a bright red, teary face that was gasping between screams, I wanted to cry with her! Poor little girl was sensitive the whole rest of the day and had a rough night too. Turns out the taste of cherry flavored children's tylenol is almost as bad as the shots in her opinion. The face she made was absolutely hilarious when I squirted the medicine into her mouth! Next time she needs tylenol, I am going to video tape it.

As a two-month-old, Amy is a delight. Her hours of endless screaming seem to have relaxed a bit, we've had 5 days without hysteria, and are hoping this continues! She loves it when I sing to her and when her daddy talks to her. Alphonso likes to talk about tools and garage stuff with her, always cursing things that are made in China (he's trying to indoctrinate her early). She seems to think her daddy is hilarious, because she is always smiling and rolling her head around when he is explaining why old is better than new.... We are enjoying every bit of our little girl and I hope she is enjoying every bit of us.

Gummy Smiles

Amy started smiling a lot this week! I finally caught one on camera, not the best quality picture, but its the first documented smile! I am so happy she finally started flashing me a big gummy grin every now and then. Before she smiled, her only emotions were angry, sleepy and hungry. Unfortunately, those three emotions all manifest themselves very similarly in a newborn... But now, after a long day of cranky screaming baby, or sleepy and uncooperative baby, I get a little bit of joy. She smiles when you make eye contact and talk to her. She seems to really enjoy giving me those big smiles, because I keep getting more and more of them every day!

INSOMNIAC CHILD
So Amy is an insomniac. Everyday, without fail, she refuses to nap. She will scream and cry for hours until for some reason, she finally decides its nap time. This video is a short tidbit of my insomniac baby today after she had been awake for 4 1/2 hours. She didn't go to sleep for a real nap until about an hour and half after this video was taken. Even at night lately she has been fighting sleep. She wakes up to eat, and is happy and cheerful until she falls asleep. That would be fine, except she doesn't stay asleep. She will wake up 2 minutes later and scream. Its getting tiring, and I am really hoping she grows out of this soon. My ears are starting to bleed from all the screaming. lol

The First Month

So since I have been procrastinating with this blog, a month has passed already in Amy's little life. Here I have complied some of my favorite pictures of her, and a few of my favorite anecdotes.

Changing Table Antics:
Amy is a feisty little girl. For some peculiar reason she decided that the changing table was the most awesome place EVAR. She can be in the middle of screaming bloody murder, if I lay her on the table she instantly quiets and starts looking around and making faces. Perhaps my child is a nudist and enjoys the feeling of the open air on her nether regions... The above photo is one of those changing table faces.


Jealous Dog is Jealous:
Poor Samson. Our 1 year old Mini schnauzer was the center of attention and love in our house until that fateful day when Amy came home. At first he was afraid of her, running away anytime she screamed. Now he isn't afraid, he is just bothered by her. If she cries he runs over to where ever she is and waits for one of us to come and comfort her. If she is REALLY screaming, he barks at her, I think he is telling her to stfu... lol. The most interesting thing he does happens when I am breast feeding her. He goes and gets a toy, shoves it into my legs or lap, or jams it under the couch and then cries for me to get it out. Its a guarantee, baby needs to eat, doggy wants to play.


My Big Girl:
Amy has gained quite a bit of weight! I am so happy because for the first few weeks my extreme paranoia and panic over if she was eating enough drove me batty. The fact that she is growing out of clothes and diapers has erased my feeding fears. She enjoys the bathtub now, this photo was taken after a bath. So far I feel I have mastered feeding, bathing and changing; now if only I could master the fine art of keeping a baby happy and making her sleep...

Double Birthday Surprise!

I woke up on April 29th 2010 and began to plan for my husband's birthday. I was going to make Key Lime Bars instead of a birthday cake and was going to visit Red Robin for dinner, because Alphonso loves their burgers. I had been up half the night with irregular contractions, but was doubtful about their significance...

A couple of hours later my mother was driving me down to Kaiser in Fontana to have a baby. Guess those contractions were a bit more significant than I thought. When I called Alphonso, I tried to be as cool as a cucumber, because he is prone to panic. lol... Unfortunately my cool-headed illusion didn't fool him. From across the room, my mother heard Alphonso say "I feel like I am going to f**ing die." I hadn't heard my mom laugh that hard in a while.

We arrived at the hospital and I was almost 4cm dilated, but they made me get up and walk the halls for an hour to get labor really moving. It was torturous walking down the halls while contraction after contraction came, but these weren't bad yet, I had no idea what I was in for...

After an epidural, and 12 hours of labor that ranged from comfortable to intense pain, a 2 inch episiotomy, and stress over the baby's fluctuating heart rate, Amy was born at 11:24pm on her Daddy's 26th birthday. Happy Birthday Alphonso. Sorry I couldn't have gotten those Key Lime bars made, I was kind of busy...