Wednesday, January 28, 2009

First food!

Today Lauren took her first bites of food! We got the whole thing on video which will be posted on flickr soon. We gave her a few bites of watered down rice cereal. She seemed intrigued and didn't cry at all. It took her a long time to swallow what was in her mouth, she just gummed it awhile before it finally went down. Immediately afterwards she cried to be breastfed and then went down for a nap. I'm hoping for a good long nap... if it works, we might start feeding her a bit every night before bed, to help her sleep better.

She sleeps well at night, but only because we co-sleep. It's hard to know exactly how long she's sleeping because usually I just latch her on and go right back to sleep. Sometimes I don't even wake up enough to remember in the morning! For instance, last night she slept 12 hours. I went to bed at nine because I was sick, and she joined me. I woke up at 6:30 and she actually kept sleeping till 9, which is very unusual for her. Usually she wakes up shortly after I leave for school, sometimes before.

As far as my schooling goes, the long hours of inpatient Peds are over. Outpatient peds is much better in that respect. It's pretty much an 8-5 schedule, with a nice lunch break. I get to see my baby girl a lot more often, which makes me very very happy!

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Almost 5 months!


New Outfit
Originally uploaded by linuxgrl
I can't believe I haven't blogged since before Thanksgiving. It's been such a whirlwind since that time. We drove home for Thanksgiving, Christmas and then on Jan 5 I started back to school. I'm doing my Pediatrics rotation which is a lot of very long hours.... I get in around 6:30 and leave at 6:30 or 7. It's been very hard being away from Lauren all day but I think we're doing great given the circumstances.

Lauren has grown so much! At her 4 month checkup she was 27 inches, 16.8 pounds, which is above the 90th percentile for babies her age. We're still exclusively breastfeeding and it looks like we'll make it to 6 months, which was my goal. I pump 3 times a day at work, which I'm really proud of. It's actually been no problem at all. Several of the residents have babies so they're really understanding.

Her new favorite thing is bath time. We just fill up the regular bathtub with shallow water (so her face isn't covered) and lay her down and she splashes away! She smiles the whole time and cries when we take her out. We try to do this right before bedtime so she sleeps well.

We're still cosleeping, which is not something I'm in a hurry to get rid of, at least not yet. I'm away from her for such a long time every day so I really want to be close to her at night. Plus, she still eats once or twice during the night and I'd have to get out of bed to feed her. Too much work! I like our situation just fine and she'll sleep through the night alone someday.

She's really laughing a lot lately, at the strangest things. We bark at her like dogs, say the word "dada" over and over again, and she laughs and laughs. It's the cutest thing ever.

Overall, I think things are wonderful right now. We have a happy girl, a great daycare and I'm doing fine back at school. What more can you ask for! :)