Seventeen weeks!

I'm starting to feel marginally better, thanks in large part to Mike letting me sleep in (until 7:30am!!) by giving Rose a bottle after she woke at 6-ish. Thanks, Mike! But by the time I woke up, Rose was winding down for her first morning nap, so our photo shoot got delayed a bit. That's okay, though, because it means I had Mike's assistance so I could actually get some pictures of Rose smiling! Here's our beautiful, smart, hard-working, and fun-loving seventeen-week-old little girl - she'll be four months old on Wednesday!  :)

Week in review

Oy vey. What a week! I started feeling a little sore and dragged down on Sunday, but I thought maybe I had just taken too long of a walk on Saturday. Then it got a little worse on Monday, and by Tuesday afternoon I was running a fever and felt like I was dying. I think it was a combination of stress at work (a couple really tough clients) and stress at home (doing a lot to help Mike in his summer psychology class - the last prerequisite for the teaching program he wants to start next year).  But Tuesday was primary day, so my sense of civic responsibility prevailed and Rose and I voted anyway. (All the election judges were enamored with her!)

"I decided I'm only going to wear my grumpy face for pictures nowadays!"

I went to bed early Tuesday night, but I still felt even closer to death on Wednesday morning. Ugh. So despite that fact that I have next-to-no PTO left for the remainder of the year, I had to stay home. Basically all I did was sleep, and yet I was still exhausted by the time Mike and Rose came home around 4:30pm. Sigh. At least Mike's class was finally done so he could be on "Rose duty" for the rest of the night, other than when I fed her. (BTW, we switched to giving her only fresh - not frozen - milk this week, in the hopes that I'm producing some good antibodies against this illness and that she might be able to stay healthy even though I'm sick.) But I wasn't too sick that I couldn't snap a quick picture of her "dancing" with him. She's getting so strong when she stands!

"I like Beyonce! And 80's music!"

Thursday I went in to work. I planned to only take a half day, but I had so many meetings scheduled that I ended up working seven hours. So I think it's okay if I don't use PTO for that day, right? I cancelled three clients (my third Thursdays are incredibly long), but I still did a lot of work that day. I don't know - I have until the 31st to decide. Anyway, I worked a fair number of hours so was pretty exhausted again by last evening. And even though my work stress (tough clients) and home stress (Mike's class) had improved, a new stress entered my life today: there was a case of pertussis (whooping cough) at Rose's school. AAAAAAAHHHH!!!! This has been a huge fear of mine. She's too young to be fully vaccinated yet, but this is a potentially fatal illness for kids her age. (See: scary, scary, and more scary)  Mike took the lead on contacting Rose's pediatrician and she recommended that we give Rose a prophylactic dose of antibiotics, just to be safe. So tonight we started azithromycin. Sigh. I hate giving meds when they might not be necessary, but I also totally trust our pediatrician's judgment regarding this super serious disease.

I'm really hoping that bad stress comes in threes and now things will be on the upswing again! And on that note, it's nearly 8:30 which is way to late for this sickly momma to be awake. Sleep well, everyone.

"My Kitty Tales book sure is fun! Thanks, Jaimi!"

Little Picasso

Rose's teachers keep telling us how much she LOVES art! (She also loves singing and dancing, but that's a little harder to capture in a blog post.) So here are a few photos of her artistry to date!

Isn't she talented?! :)

Sixteen weeks!

Rose is approaching four months of age! She is such a thinker - it's so much fun to watch her try to make sense of the world. She is also such a happy baby! I wish I had such big smiles when I woke up in the morning :) Although recently she has decided that she won't smile is her picture is being taken with the big camera (and not my cell phone). Did I mention that she is opinionated? ;)

Right now Rose likes:
+ flying!
+ taking long walks in her stroller
+ going to school

And she does not like:
- when her bedtime is delayed
- being over-stimulated

Flying!

Rose's new favorite activity is to go "flying"!

In other news, we have officially learned that we can't take her places on weekday nights. Now that we've established a 7/7:30 bedtime, she needs to be at home and winding down by 6:30 at the latest. My "Amma Mamas" had a reunion dinner last night at 5:30 out in Chaska. The first few minutes were fabulous - all the other babies have grown up so much in the last month! - but then Rose started getting tired. By 6pm she was having a full-scale meltdown. Mike tried to calm her down so I could catch up with everyone, but Rose was having none of that. Sigh. Well, now we know for sure that daytime is best for socializing.

I also found out this week that I was NOT selected to be on the Board of Rose's school. Initially I was very disappointed. But then I realized that I was mostly disappointed because they didn't pick me, not disappointed that I wouldn't be on the Board. Hmmm. I reflected on that a bit, then decided that this might be the perfect opportunity for me to take some time for myself, rather than giving so much to others. So I think I'm going to sign up for a meditation class in September! That's something I've been wanting to do for awhile, so maybe this is the right time to do so.

Finally, Mike and I have a date tonight! We're going out to celebrate our 9th anniversary - my, how time flies! Thanks to Grammy and Grandpa Jack for offering to spend some time with Rose tonight so Mike and I can have a "fancy" dinner together.

See you tomorrow for Rose's 16-week portraits!

Good morning, world!

Fifteen weeks!

During the week I'm usually off to work by the time Rose wakes up, so I love being up to get her up on the weekends (even if it is around 6:30am each day). This morning she started making some noise around 6:15, so in I went to check on her. At first she was still half asleep...

...but look at that smile once she saw me!!

So after a quick breakfast and a change into her "weekly onesie" we got work on her 15-week portraits! She decided the theme of today's photo shoot would be "showing off my open-handed thumb-sucking technique."  (Think she'll be right handed?)

And then, just for a little variety, she also wanted to show off how she is starting to explore the rest of the world through her mouth. In addition to her "flying spaghetti monster" blanket (shown last week), she also loves this blanket/toy from my parents.

 

We did a little tummy time, and then it was time for Rose's first nap of the day (which allows me to blog!).

Have a great week!