the cats

Any guesses where our main heater vent is located?

Lucy made the mistake of jumping into my lap last night while I was already holding Rose. Rose, as you can see, was thrilled - she loves sucking on the ears of her stuffed animal toys, and here were some real live ears! Lucy will probably never make that mistake again.

Happy Friday, everyone!

random updates

1. Mike took Rose to the MD this morning and she has an upper respiratory infection (viral) and the stomach flu (also viral), so we just need to treat with rest, fluids, and probiotics (as we've been doing). Thankfully no pneumonia, bronchitis, intestinal blockage, etc. Mike said she was happy to get back to school, so hopefully she's on the mend! :)

2. We're getting a new hot water heater and a water softener on wednesday. I'm so excited! I'm sick of taking lukewarm showers, and I'm especially excited to take a bath for the first time since before I was pregnant. Bye bye to tepid water!

3. Back when I started pumping I bought an extra set of pump parts, plus an additional package of six extra "membranes" since I heard they were prone to breakage. Well, I never ripped one of the tiny white discs, but I accidentally ended up dropping plenty of them down the garbage disposal! Yesterday I had to pull out the last of my extra membranes - I refuse to buy any more, so if I lose/break any more it will be a sign that it's time to stop nursing. Along those lines (TMI alert!) now that I'm down to nursing "only" twice per day (this weekend we decided that I could ditch the 4pm nursing), I'm wearing a real bra today for the first time since mid-pregnancy! What a treat!

Have a great day, everyone!

41 weeks

Well, Rose has been struck by a new sort of illness. We've already gotten through numerous colds, influenza, ear infections, and occasional vomiting/diarrhea . . . now we have a terrible cough and recurrent vomiting. Yuck! Yesterday (Saturday) morning we woke to nuggets of undigested food strewn around Rose's bed, with Little Miss herself adorned in dried on chunks and a strong scent of "eau de vomitus." Ew. After an impromptu bath, Mike fed her a bottle of freshly pumped milk and she promptly puked again. Double ew. But after another bath, she quickly morphed into her happy-go-lucky self again, so we thought it was just an upset tummy and she was already recovered. Rose and I went to the MOA to walk with my friend Dotty and her kids, as we do every other Saturday, and I very nervously fed her another bottle of milk at the end. It stayed down! So of course I thought she was fine. She ate some cheerios for lunch when we got home, then we took off for Mike's mom's house for dinner. At first she still seemed fine, albeit with an ongoing cough and running nose, but as the afternoon progressed she became more grumpy. She even fell asleep on Mike's chest right before dinner, which is something she hasn't done for quite a few months.

After eating in shifts, we headed out so we could try to stick with Rose's usual night-time routine. After saying our goodbyes, just as I was about to buckle her into the car, she vomited all over me. Triple ew. We cleaned her (and me) up as best we could, then headed out again. After her third bath of the day, she was in bed only a little later than usual. We prayed she would sleep through the night and not vomit any more.

She slept straight through the night and we were relieved not to find any evidence of overnight vomit. But as she was enjoying her morning milk, she puked all over me once again. Quadruple ew. We got her (and me) cleaned up yet again, gave her a little time to let her stomach settle, and then she took a bottle of milk with no problems.

Clearly vomiting 4 times in 24-36 hours is not normal, but we still can't figure out what's causing it. There seems to be no pattern between time of day, food vs. no food, fresh milk vs. frozen milk, etc.. We've been giving her ibuprofen for a slight fever since last night, and needless to say we're calling the doctor first thing tomorrow morning (and will call sooner if she develops more emergent symptoms).

She's on her third nap of the day already (so not like her!) - the first two were on me, and now she's in her stroller. Poor Rose!

I managed to put her "weekly onesie" on under her sleeper this morning, but I didn't want to disturb her too much given how sick she's been. So here are her weekly photos - the best we could do under the circumstances!

(Please ignore the atrocious tilt in this photo!)

"So big!"

"Forget the tripod crawl - I can go full speed now!"

"Up?"

"Where's Daddy?"

"I've almost got him in my reach..."

In other news, a week or so ago we gave Rose her first Oreo.

"More, please!"

I'll keep you posted about what the doctor says tomorrow. We're sticking with bland foods and lots of naps today, so hopefully she'll be on the mend soon.

Enjoy the Superbowl, everyone!

Night on the town

Rose had her hair styled at school today, so we treated her to a night on the town! (my burger + yogurt lab = yum!)

[exhale]

I just sat down and relaxed for the first time in a really, really long time. Man, it feels good!  Things are finally getting settled at work (I got an official promotion!), I finally got caught up on all the work that I got behind on when I was sick during the entire month of December (probably won't last long but I'll enjoy it for tonight!), I finally boxed up the last Christmas present that I have to mail (let's just ignore the fact that it's February tomorrow and the fact that I still can't mail it because I ran out of packing tape, but at least it's boxed up!), and I finally got a chance to bake something for fun after Rose went to bed tonight (just muffins, but what a treat after a week of difficult bedtimes for Rose!). Between all the sicknesses that we've been experiencing for the past few months and all the work stress I've been under, it feels unbelievable good to exhale all the lingering stressors that I'd been holding on to, especially now that the big stressors are all gone. Ahhhhhhh.

40 weeks

The theme for this week's photos is definitely Rose's mastery of her tripod crawl!

"Here I go!"

Determination

Success!

In other news, Rose has developed a sudden aversion to loud noises. We made the mistake of taking her to the car wash yesterday, thinking she would enjoy it since Mike and I both loved car washes as kids. Big mistake! Huge screams! And then this morning I made us smoothies (as I usually do on a weekend morning, but hadn't for the last couple weeks since we had run out of mango until yesterday) and we got the same response. Yikes! I don't like hearing her yell and cry like that. I guess we'll avoid loud noises for now, but hopefully those things will be less scary for her soon!

Have a great week, everyone!

CRAWLING!!!

Rose is officially mobile!!! It's the coolest thing ever to watch - I could watch her crawl all day long! I'm ridiculously proud of her new-found crawling abilities. (So impressed, in fact, that I pulled out the dreaded video function on my phone, despite the fact that it crashed my blog for a couple days earlier this week!) Anyway, apparently she's been crawling all week at school but they didn't want to say anything to us until we said it first. (Milestones never happen at school, only at home!) Then on Thursday night she started crawling in the bathtub... so after she went to bed, Mike and I moved the rug from our dining room to our living room in case our hardwood floors had been handicapping her. And then she started crawling at home on Friday morning! Alas, I did not get to witness it because I was already at work by the time she woke up, but I rushed through my day to pick her up so I could see it myself. She's already a pro! Here she is, our mobile daughter:

 

Poor Lucy has no idea what to think of this new skill!

And here's an aerial view to show off her "tripod" crawling technique:

Definitely one of the coolest skills she's learned to date (right up there with waving "bye bye"!). I can't wait to see her crawl again tomorrow!!!