First solid (sorta) food – nom nom nom

This past Sunday Lily had her first bit of sorta solid food. We went with homemade rice cereal. I wouldn’t have attempted making my own but Lindsey had just done a post about making her own and it seemed really simple so I went with it. It was really simple. I used organic sweet brown rice, which gave a nice little bit of sweetness to the cereal which was nice.

At first Lily had no idea what to do with the gloopy stuff I was putting in her mouth. But with each bite she got more and more of a hang of it. It was amazing to watch the little gears working.

First bite
Lily's first food

Rice cereal bubble
Lily's first food

The fingers are tasty too
Lily's first food

Lily's first food

Lily's first food

The food was everywhere by the end of it
Lily's first food

This is my first attempt at video editing.

Lily’s first solid food from Christy Wiggins on Vimeo.

Check out wholesomebabyfood.com for more homemade baby food recipes and information.  Its a great reasource.

*post edited to add links*

Catching up

Moving has really put me behind in everything but especially here.  We still aren’t done but we have a couple of weeks to finish up and a plan so that should help.

♦I guess I haven’t really talked about why or where we are moving.  The house we’ve been renting for the last couple of years is small as in teeny tiny.  I believe somewhere around 600-700 sq feet.  It was 2 bedrooms but like I said small.  More then small it is infested with hobo spiders (only click the link if you are brave).   They only really come out late spring to early fall but they are nasty little things and I don’t want Lily exposed to them.  And I really mean infested, we put out sticky traps for them and would catch sometimes 10 or 12 a week and then we’d kill probably another 5 and that doesn’t count what the cats take care of that we don’t know about.  There were weeks when we caught/killed more but I try not to think about them. *shivers*

The place we moved is about a mile from Waldo’s office, he had been driving 20 minutes each way before.  And just a couple of blocks from a nice park.  Its probably 1000 sq feet in the living area and there’s a full basement for storage and laundry.  I hate that I have to go into the basement to do laundry but its better then nothing.  We have found 1 dead hobo but we are counting on the fact that there just can’t be as many as in the other house.  This new place is open and bright, I always felt kind of closed in at the old house.  It has 3 bedrooms, 2 of which are pretty small but we can live with that, 1 bath and a nice size living room.We have nice front and back yards for the Kiddo to play in.  All in all we are excited about this place.  Oh and new carpet and a stove that has 4 working burners.  Woot!

♦Lily got her first sink bath the other day.  The old house had a cabinet right above the sink and it just didn’t work out for bathing.  It was really nice to be able to give her a bath (in which she didn’t cry) and not have to take one myself. Although I love taking baths with her, lately she still ends up crying at the end no matter how fast, slow, splashy, non-splashy, etc I try to be.
Lily's first sink bath
We’ve now had 2 sink baths and she seems to like them well enough.

♦I really want to thank everyone for their kind words, thoughts and prayers about Lily.  It really touched me and I just wanted to let everyone know that even though I don’t comment back to the comments I do read each and everyone of them.

♦On that same thought train I really want to start commenting back either in the post or by email I just don’t know where to find the time.  How do you all manage it?

♦Today I took Lily in to get some blood drawn so that when we go see the genetics specialist in July we will have the results to go over.  I figured it would be another heel stick like they did for the bili checks so when Waldo told me that he would go if I changed the lab to one closer to where he works I figured it wouldn’t be necessary.  Oh how friggin wrong I was.

I had to be at the hospital and be done by 9:00 a.m. and its a 20 minutes drive. I worried and almost turned around about 100 times for the last 15 minutes.  We stuck (pun intended) it out, when we got there Lily charmed the pants off of everyone like usual and then they told me for all the tests my doctor ordered they had to use vains.  I was serously wishing my Hubby was there at this point.

They put a little numbing cream on her arms but I don’t know how much it helped.  I tried nursing her while they did it but she pretty much just screamed with her lips around my nipples.  I cried as much as she did and damn it I’m crying again just thinking about it.  They had to take blood from both arms, I think the second arm was worse because we both knew what to expect.  The lab techs kept telling me that she would get over it and forget all about it in no time.  I know they are right, but I don’t think I will get over it any time soon.

We went to the hospitals meditation room and nursed after it was done and then she feel asleep and when she woke up she was happy as a clam.

I don’t remember what all they are testing for and I don’t know how long it will take to get the results but I will post about it when I hear back.

♦My first Mother’s day was nice.  Waldo ordered me flowers from proflowers.com and I got them the Thursday before Mother’s day.  They are Lilies of course.  It was called something like the 100 bloom something or other.  They were not pretty when I first got them because they weren’t bloomed yet.  They were beautiful by mother’s day and they are still going strong.
My 1st Mother's Day flowers
Lily with my Mother's day flowers

All in all we had a busy mother’s day because of the moving.  We spent most of that day down at the old house packing stuff up.

♦May 13, 2008 we found out we were going to be parents.  I know I’ve said it before but I can’t believe what a difference 1 tiny year makes.

1 year anniversary of two lines

May 13, 2009

We had driven from Montana to the Oregon coast and down to central California to visit our families.  I realized my period was a couple of days late but Waldo said not to take a test yet since we were traveling it would mess with my cycle.  Only my period was suppose to start before we even left.  I decided to wait though.

The second day we were in CA I took off to go to the jewelery store I used to work at to visit and get my rings cleaned.  That was my honest to goodness plan.  The car had other ideas.  It pulled into a Walgreens.  Then my legs took me inside without anyway say so from me and I bought a two pack pregnancy test.   I met back up with Waldo at his brother’s house and when we were alone he asked me if I bought a test.  That man knows me better then I know me.  We had to wait to get back to his parents house for the night to take the test.  That was the longest day ever.  Of course the test was positive but I wouldn’t get my hopes up till I took the second one, which we agreed on doing in the morning.  I’m sure there was some logic to it but I don’t remember now.  I woke up early and took it and again it was 2 lines.

It was so great to be able to tell our families in person.  My one sister lives in Oklahoma so I had to tell her on the phone but everyone else got to give us hugs and kisses, it was perfect.

♦I’m trying to figure out what to do about photo hosting.  I like flickr and it works well but editing is such a pain with picnic because it has to load with every single photo and I’m impatient.  I’ve tried picasa and it works pretty well but I haven’t worked all the kinks out yet.  Like do I have to upload to my web album to upload them here or is there something I’m missing?  I have a photobucket account and it looks like it has pretty good editing functions but I haven’t really messed with it yet.

I’d love to know what other people do for photos.

♦As I said we got a new couch and I’m hoping that this is so far down in my update that no one is still reading because this old couch is a major embarrassment.  This was a hand-me-down in the worst of ways.  It belonged to my ex-husband’s parent’s friend, who gave it to the ex’s parents who gave it to the ex and I and somehow I managed to take it when I left him.  I bet this couch is 20 years old, ok maybe 17.

I can’t believe I’m going to post this picture.
old couch
It always had a cover on it because it looked so bad.
old couch
(I probably could have straighten the cover for this picture but I didn’t care, the whole thing was heading to the dump after I got done with the camera)

new couch

The new couch

Ahhh is it so comfy.

I think that’s just about everything that I needed to cover.  I will hopefully be back to regular posting soon.  We should be done moving and cleaning sometime before Lily turns 21.  🙂

CT Scan on my 4 month old try 2

If you remember from this post we were suppose to keep Lily up till midnight, wake her up at 6 am and not feed her after 4 am.

Why is it when you want them to sleep so you can maybe sex up you hubby or eat a taco they won’t sleep for anything, but of course when you want them to stay awake they zonk out hard core?

Staying up to midnight was a bust, she fell asleep about 9:45 and you know what?  I didn’t care.  Waldo did some research on the Google and found studies that said sleep deprivation doesn’t help or hurt sedation in infants.  So we were in bed at 10.  I set my alarm for 3:45 so I could give Lily 2 ounces of formula to hold her over till I could feed her after the scan.  That all worked out fine and while the bottle warmed up I worked on our Mother’s day gifts (which will be late sorry Mom and Rita) and nursed.  Then we went back to sleep till the alarm started making terrible noises at 5:30.  We drug our tired butts out of bed.  I can hardly see straight because I’m so tired, Lily on the other hand is all smiles and happy as a little clam.

Fast forward about 45 minutes and the crying starts.  Lil realizes that no boob is coming at her and I won’t let her close her eyes.  This had to be the longest 90 minutes in recorded history.
Then there was this

crying in the carseat

See the big tear?

We had a 20 minute drive ahead of us.  Before the car got out of the drive way there was much sleeping

Sleeping no matter what Mom did

not even the sun could wake sleeping beauty

and much harassing to no avail.

When we got there and took her out of her seat she was refreshed and happy for about 15 minutes, of course they made us wait about 45.  What kind of morons make a baby wait that long?

This was during the happy 15 minutes

Wide awake finally and blowing bubbles

bubbles and smiles

Sorry for the bad picture, I just thought the bubbles were cute.

When they finally call us back we get informed that I can be in the room with her during the scan, hell if it would keep her still I could be in the tube.  I’m really glad I can be in the room, not so sure about the tube though, I just couldn’t imagine how that would work.  At some point it gets brought up that I have a bottle with a little formula.  Oh they say this will cure everything.  The nurses were really nice oohing and aahing over Lily, trying to make her stop crying while we figured it all out.  So it was decided that we would give it a try without sedation.  I swaddled my poor tired girl in her miracle blanket, the nurses then wrapped her in a warm blanket, I grabbed the bottle and away we went.

Into the scan room we venture.

ct scan machine

(this is the scanner from the first hospital)

*I didn’t have time to grab the camera so this is pretty much the end of the photo portion of the adventure*

This hospital had a nice little head holder thing attached to the table, it made all the difference.  Lily couldn’t move her head even if she tried.  You probably can’t tell from the picture but the first hospital just had a flat table and Waldo was going to have to hold her head still.  I don’t know about your babies but Lily is very strong and likes freedom of movement when she wants it.  Waldo and I were put in lead dresses (I really wish I had a picture of this) and I plopped the bottle in Lil’s mouth.  Pretty much before the tech left the room Lily was asleep sucking happily down her formula.  The whole thing was suppose to last 30 seconds, but of course there was a problem with the machine and it ended up taking almost 10 minutes.  There wasn’t radiation that whole time, it was mostly hanging around watching paint dry kind of time.  Thankfully Lily slept during all of it.  They rebooted the machine and about 30 seconds later we were done.  I am so thankful that we didn’t have to sedate her, there isn’t much risk with it but I don’t want my baby to have any medication that isn’t 100% necessary.

Putting Lily in the car meant undoing the miracle blanket and of course that woke her up so for the 20 minute car ride home I was screamed at.

The poor girl ate and slept the rest of the day.  Probably wondering what she did in a former life for her parents to treat her so poorly.

*******

It has taken me so long to write this we’ve gotten the results of the scan.  Its not the super duper final report but its very unlikely that the information will change.  Lily’s head is fine.  The scan shows no signs of early fusing.  Of course all of this is wonderful news, I could dance on the ceiling kind of great news.  But (isn’t there always a but) now we have to keep trying to find out why Lily’s head is shaped a little odd.  Well Waldo and I don’t think its that odd and we think Lily is fine, but the doctor’s job is to worry and we appreciate and hate her for it.

DSC01398

Breaking in the new couch

The picture is just because she’s cute and its a good profile shot.

4 month well child or the day my world changed

I’m so glad I decided to stay home.  Life got very bumpy after Lily’s 4 month well child appointment.  To make a very long story short…
Lily is in the .75% for weight, 15% for height (yay) and .02% for head.  On top of that her head is still long and not round like its suppose to be.  To help with her weight we have to give her 2-4 ounces of formula a day, it helped too.  (Which kills me) She gained 7 or 8 ounces last week, that’s very good for us.  She’s up to 10 lbs 1.4 oz.

As for the head shape, my doctor is really worried about it.  We have an appointment with a genetics’s specialist in July and this morning we had an appointment for a CT scan.  It didn’t go so well because Lily is a crappy napper.  She wakes up as soon as I put her down 95% of the time.  So tomorrow we go to a different hospital imagining center for a CT scan with sedation.  Tonight/tomorrow morning is going to suck.  We have to keep her awake till midnight, can’t feed her after 4 am and have to wake her up at 5:30.  Our appointment is at 8 so we are going to have a sleepy hungry pissed off baby till after 9am.  I am so not looking forward to this.
I also have an appointment with the Child development center to make sure she’s developing on track.  This is just precautionary.   We think she’s fine and perfect.  She’s super alert and smiley.  She is very interactive and focuses on things great.  But we have to do what’s best for her.

I never imagined that I’d be a Mom that had to make appointments for genetic testing or worry about getting help for my baby.  I’m not organized enough for this shit.  I feel like I should be taking notes and being proactive but I have no fucking idea of what to do.  To us Lily is still just our prefect baby girl and I don’t want to think of any other option.

Today my doctor called to apologize for the fiasco this morning (apparently our local hospital doesn’t do infant sedation and she didn’t know that) and I asked her if the CT scan come back fine is it possible that Lily’s head is just shaped that way and that she’s fine.  Nope, if her skull hasn’t prematurely fused then we have to find out why her heads long and not round.  In other words it must be genetic.  She’s skirts the question when I ask what problems that may cause in the future.  Because seriously people I’m not just being a blind moron here, Lily acts just like a normal 3 month old baby (giving her 1 month for her prematurity).  My doctor even says so, but we have to be careful.  I just want to stick my head in the sand and watch my girl grow up.  Ok I guess I’d have to take my head out of the sand to watch her grow but you know what I mean.

In fact I didn’t want to write about this, hell I don’t want to talk about it.  My family all lives in other states then me and I told one of my sisters because she called me right after I had talked to my doctor.  Well she told my Mom and our other sister. So of course my Mom calls all worried and then I had to call all the family and explain what I was going on.  Which to be honest just made me feel worse because I don’t know what’s going on.  But I decided to write about it, not to get sympathy but to get it off my chest.  That’s what a blog is for isn’t it?

This whole thing is odd to me because when the innernets was abuzz with sadness over Maddie and Thalon I avoided learning too much about them.  Not because I’m some heartless bitch but because I can’t imagine something bad happening to my Lily.

Lily is waking up so I don’t have time or desire to reread this and correct errors, but I hope there aren’t too many.

4/28/09

My perfect girl

Lily’s weigh-in #3

Today was another new mom group meeting which means Lil got weighed.  A little refresher, last week she was 8 lbs 15.9 oz.  This week she was exclusively breastfeed and weighed… (drum roll please)

9 pounds 3.4 ounces!  That’s a 3.5 ounce gain!!!  For Lily that is a huge 1 week gain, especially when she’s not being supplemented.

I’m so excited to go see our doctor next Wednesday.  I’m going to bring the calendar that I keep track of this on with me and show her Lily’s progress.

Shoes from Antie

Shoes from Auntie

The shoes are way too big, but because of the elastic they stay on and more importantly they keep her socks on.

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