The Tickle Monster!

17 weeks

Now that Sam is rolling over onto her tummy on a regular basis, we have stopped swaddling her at naptime and bedtime. Well...you could say that hasn't exactly been going well. That might be an understatement! She keeps hooking her fingers on the soother ring and flicking it across not only the crib but sometimes the room. Other times she still has the soother in her mouth but also a couple of fingers and is unable to latch onto anything. So it's been pretty trying. We had a follow up with the pediatrician yesterday and she said we need to let Sam soothe herself...aka, cry it out and let her calm herself down rather than rely on us to get her back to sleep. This creates a sleep association...she associates getting back to sleep with Shawn or I picking her up and rocking her back to sleep. Then when she wakes up 10 minutes or even an hour later, she's in her crib, we're gone, she's confused and then she's MAD! So we are trying our best to know that we have to let her cry so that she can develop this skill. It is really, really hard to listen to her cry though and not rush in! So we've had some pretty rough nights but as Sam gets used to not being swaddled, it's gradually getting better.

We also had an appointment with a pediatric cardiologist yesterday. Some of you may know that at our first checkup after being released from the hospital, the doctor heard a heart murmur. We were sent for an echocardiogram which is basically just an ultrasound of the heart. It showed 2 small holes in Sam's heart. A simple explanation is that the heart is divided into 4 chambers and she had a hole in between the left and right upper chambers and a hole in the left and right bottom chambers. At the time, we were not sent for an actual appointment with the cardiologist, just the echocardiogram. So our family doctor referred us again but this time requested an actual appointment with the cardiologist. This took us until yesterday to get in. They redid the echocardiogram since it had been so long and also did an EKG on her. Good news...the one hole has completely closed up and the other is so small that the cardiologist couldn't even measure it. He said it's completely fine and that this type of hole is actually pretty common...8/10 babies have it. It goes undetected for the most part because it's such a slight murmur that most doctors don't even hear it. We don't need any extra precautions and no additional follow up is needed. Definitely a relief and very nice not to have that in the back of our minds anymore!

Yesterday Sam weighed 13 pounds and 1.5 ounces and was 24 inches long. That puts her in the 50th percentile for weight and 50th percentile for height.

16 weeks

Quite a few exciting things happened in the past week. Samara can kind of sit on her own (for a few seconds anyway!). She is much happier when propped up or standing on someone's lap so that she can see everything that's going on. Last night she slept from 9pm till 3am without so much as a peep. That, according to the books, is called sleeping through the night! Not quite the kind of sleep that most people consider sleeping through the night but definitely something good around our house! Unfortunately I'm so used to sleeping like crap that I wake all the time now and find it hard to get back to sleep, always wondering if she's going to wake up soon, thinking I should go check on her, etc. Another new thing that just happened this morning, she rolled from her back to her tummy. Pretty exciting except that we have been using swaddle bags for her to sleep in. If you haven't seen them, they basically wrap up the baby as tightly as possible, much like swaddling in a blanket except Sam kept escaping from blankets so we got these because they velcro shut. They keep the arms swaddled tightly to the body. So now that she can roll to her tummy, we can't use those anymore because it leaves her face smushed down into the mattress with no arms to prop herself up. Hopefully she will be able to sleep as well without being swaddled.

Sammy's First Trip

We had always planned to go to Wetaskiwin in late August and spend a week or so out at the acreage. When Sammy turned out to be a bit more difficult and fussy than we had anticipated, we put the trip on permanent hold! But things lately have been going considerably better...she is on more of a routine and is sleeping quite a bit better than before...so we decided to give it a shot!

Mom came and picked us up and all our stuff last Thursday. The vehicle was FULL. I have never packed so much for a trip. Even 3 weeks in Europe didn't result in even half as much as this trip! The drive went extremely well...she slept pretty much the whole way. She would wake up from time to time but went back to sleep quite easily. She started crying on the gravel road right at Dawne and Marion's...which is only about 30 seconds away from the acreage so it was good timing! She settled in pretty well right away. Her naps were the only thing that seemed to be affected. She would go down for her usual 45 minutes but wouldn't sleep much longer than that. After 2-3 days of that, I think she must've been exhausted because she started sleeping longer and one day even had a 3 hour nap! The first night sleeping in her playpen went fine. She slept no better and no worse than usual...up around 6 times or so. That was a relief! There were a couple of bad nights and a couple of better nights but that happens when we're at home too. We are feeling pretty good about this as it gives us more freedom and means we can take future trips without too much worry!

We had a great visit at Mom and Bill's. It was great spending so much time with them. Bill was on holidays for the first part of our visit and Mom was off the whole time. We had a family BBQ and got to see Dawne and Marion, Barb and Wade. I also met up with my friend Amanda for coffee, went for a walk with my friend Brenda and went to a movie with my friend Gina. It was great catching up with everyone! And for some, it was their first time meeting Samara. During our visit we also got to see some newborn kitties that one of Dawne and Marion's cats had. And another milestone...we took Sammy out to her first restaurant! Dawne and Marion were taking Mom and Bill out for their anniversary. Everyone suggested Sam and I come along but I was super hesitant. It was not so long ago that I couldn't even take her to the grocery store or for a walk around the block without her screeches being her heard for miles! But I figured it was just Wetaskiwin so it was a perfect place to try! HA! Anyways, she did SO well! She stood on my lap for most of the meal looking around at everything and watching people eat. So more great progress! Now Shawn and I can take her out to eat from time to time! I wouldn't bring her to a fancy restaurant but it's nice to know we can go out for something as a family!The drive back wasn't quite so successful. We got pretty close to Hobbema and she took one smelly poop! I wasn't really looking forward to changing her on the side of the reserve and there really isn't anyplace I feel comfortable stopping in Hobbema so we decided to turn around and head back home and start all over! Once we did that, we were on the road again. She didn't sleep very much at all...maybe one 45 minute nap and then closer to home another 20 minutes or so. She also cried a bit too. It wasn't terrible but she made it pretty clear that she was tired of being in her car seat! Anyways, overall I would say the trip was a huge success and Sam pleasantly surprised me with what she is comfortable with and what she can adapt to!

It was a very long time to be away from Shawn though...it was difficult on both sides. But, while we were away he got a lot of painting done and the house looks fantastic! The bedroom used to be my least favorite room in the house and now it is my favorite, it looks like a comfortable room at a bed and breakfast!

Speaking of little kitties, if anyone is looking for a cutie to adopt, these guys are available to good homes. There is another cat out there that is due to have a little in another week or so too.

15 weeks

Sam is growing like a weed. Now when you wave a rattle in front of her, she reaches for it and grabs it (and sticks it in her mouth!). She puts everything in her mouth and is drooling over everything in sight! She can roll over from her tummy to her back. I thought she was doing it regularly because she did it twice in a row but now she hasn't done it for a week!We also got a Jolly Jumper from Kelly and Josie and Samara LOVES it!

Sick.

I'm not sure where, but somewhere a few days ago I caught a terrible cold. I haven't had a cold this bad in years. Shawn caught it right away and now we're just waiting to see if Samara will catch it or not. Yesterday she was acting pretty fussy, her feeding and sleeping schedules were way off and she was obsessed with either sucking on her soother or putting Sophie in her mouth and gumming her! So either she just had an off day, she is catching a cold or she is teething. We'll see how the next few days progress!

So of course getting sick would coincide with Sammy's first road trip! The good part of that is that once we get to Wetaskiwin, I'll have help all day and night so I can get healthy quick. Mom is coming this morning and I hope to leave as soon as I feed Sam at noon. Wish us luck that the car ride goes well, that the progress she made with sleeping in her crib also transfers to sleeping in a playpen at Nana and Grandpa's!

We are going to miss Shawn so so so so so much. Since the house will be empty, he is painting over the horrible bedroom colour we mistakenly chose when we first moved in and painting the landing to the basement as well. Since we'll be gone around a week, there will be lots of time for the fumes to dissipate before we get back.

14 weeks

Samara is already 14 weeks old. She's just the greatest! We had another good night last night, only up twice for a soother and once to feed and she slept for 11 hours. We are all fully rested this morning. She is so so so cute, smiles lots, is giggling at different things now...she's so much fun to be around. As long as we stick to her napping schedule, she is super pleasant. She is grabbing at things pretty regularly now and sticking everything she can grab into her mouth.

Mom left on Tuesday and it was super sad. It was so wonderful having her around...not only for her help with Sam and around the house but it was great having company every day. Before Mom left, Shawn and I were able to go out for a drink together with a couple of friends and went out for dinner just the 2 of us. It was pretty nice to have some one on one time with Shawn...it had been at least 3 months since we had last gone out!

We are looking forward to next week when we do our first longer road trip and visit Mom and Bill for a few days. Fingers crossed that the trip goes well!

Crib Report 3rd Edition

We are still making good progress with Sammy in the crib. It's been 2 weeks and as always, we have some good nights and some bad. Last night, we had a later walk so she wasn't in bed until 9pm. We have been "topping her up" with a 2-3 oz bottle of pumped breast milk after I nurse her to get her as full as possible to see if that will help her sleep better. It seems to work. Last night she fell asleep on her own at 9pm and we didn't hear a peep from her until 2:15am. I kind of think it's my fault she woke up too. Starting at midnight, I started tossing and turning thinking she would be waking up soon. After 2 hours of this and hearing nothing, I was convinced she had stopped breathing so I had to go in there and check for myself. I went in, saw everything was fine, went to the bathroom and went back to bed...and then WAAHHH! Of course! Between 2:15 and 3:30 was pretty terrible, we were up about 4 times (each!) and eventually I just fed her at 3:30. She went straight to sleep afterwards and slept from 3:45 until 7:15 without another peep. I gave her a soother at 7:15 and she slept for another hour and is now up for the day at 8:15. Not bad!

3 Months

13 weeks

Sam is getting more dexterity in her hands. This morning she was in her swing and we put a rattle on the tray in front of her and she picked it up and brought it to her mouth. It is so cool to watch her learn!

After the worst night so far, last night we had the best one! She was up 4 times, only once to feed which ended up being 8 hours from her last feed. All in all, she slept 12 hours!

Sammy and Daddy playing with some puppets that Auntie Barb got her on her vacation: Sporting the super cool sunglasses Auntie Barb got her:
Ready to meet up with my friend Angela and her son Jamie who is 1 week older than Samara: Really starting to like the swing Janice gave us:
Ready for the nightly walk with Mommy and Daddy:
Love the look...Mom, enough with the camera already!