Firsts

Dear Olive,

Lots of firsts this week. We took you in the pool for the first time on Friday. You loved it and it was sooo much fun. We took a video but I'm not going to post it because I'm hanging out all over the place in my tiny bikini that no longer fits me. If you want to watch it though, you can. You laughed and kicked and it was great.

We also took you to the mountains for the first time. You loved the pine tree fresh air, and we put you in the ergo the whole time we hiked around. You were so happy!

You also got your first cold this week too. I am pretty sure it started a week ago and gradually got worse. Tonight seems to be the peak of it, you are having a lot of trouble sleeping because you're coughing and have a stuffy nose :( It pretty much means no sleep for either of us. I wasn't quite sure you were sick at first because you didn't' have symptoms, you were just a bit more irritable than usual. But now I know for sure. Poor baby girl.

Hope you feel better soon...

Bad Mom Bad Friend

(written yesterday)

Dear Olive,

I am not perfect. So someday when I tell you I am, you can refer back to this post and remind me of what happened today.

It was a long day, but you were a happy girl while I worked at Kamie's, and even at Lori's. But then we went to Kristine's house because she (as well as Tracey and Amanda) have offered to watch you so I can get in some yoga now and then.

I tried to feed you, I really did, but you fell asleep. So I left to you enjoy the relaxing home of a good friend who loves you.

Unfortunately, I didn't realize how hungry you were going to be, and boy did you ever give poor Kristine a run for her money. Apparently you were screaming the entire time I was gone practically. Why? Because I didn't leave you any food! What was I thinking? I don't normally leave you places without me so I guess I just didn't realize.

I felt like such a bad friend AND a bad mom, but both of you seemed to forgive me...

I just can't believe how lucky we are Olive. We have these caring clients who don't mind when I have to haul you around with me to work, friends who will watch you so I can maintain a little sanity in my life, and grandma's o'plenty to hold you everywhere in between. Oh, and a daddy who plays with you every chance he gets, even when I tell him not to.

It's challenging at times, that's true. Things take me a lot longer, and the days fly by way too fast, we're a busy family... but at least I'm with you. And we're blessed with a good life. What did I do to deserve such blessings? It makes me worried it will come crashing down. But those are fears I always struggle with, and for once I'd like to just be at peace.

*Thank you to all my amazing friends who have so graciously offered to watch baby Olive while I go the gym. Thank you to the people I work with who hold Olive while she's fussy so I can keep plugging away at work. Thank you to our family members who let me come get away and do laundry and have food made for me. Thank you to my husband who works so hard and never complains. Thank you God.

The Great Aunt Eve

Happy Birthday Aunt Eve...

I say "The Great" because not only was she my great aunt, but she was a great woman. And she was full of great quotes.

She was there through all my dating disasters... One saying I loved, "Let them go, they'll either prove themselves or hang." She was definitely my favorite person to talk to and vent to. She was always open minded and liked thinking about things in new ways. She was always reading philosophical and psychological books and learning about why we are the way we are.

She loved when I played guitar and sang, and she was forgiving.

I'm so glad that Luke got to meet Aunt Eve. Sometimes I forget she is gone and I think about all the things I want to tell her about what's going on in life. I get fleeting thoughts like, "Oh Aunt Eve's going to love the name we choose for our baby!" and I get so disappointed I can't share important moments with her.

It's really not everyday I meet someone who is capable of leaving such a positive impression on me. She's moved me in many ways, I miss her incredibly.

I found this post from September 2007, and I thought since nothings changed in all these years, I'd repost it to celebrate her amazingness.

"In the end, it's not the years in your life that matter, it's the life in your years" -Abraham Lincoln

Oh honest Abe, maybe not even as wise as my Grandma Carey's 9th sibling Aunt EVe. She is 88 years old now. She is the most wonderful person that I know and the way she expresses knowledge is indescribable. Her open mindedness and fun approach to life makes her an island of peace in my mind's stormy waters.

We talked about living life to its fullest, about cancer, about life and death, love, friendships... all things we talk about on a regular basis yet never seem to run out of new topics within these.

Here's a picture of Aunt Eve feeding me when I was a baby in my giant diaper. I look about Olive's age. <3

Tired

Dear Olive,

You're sleeping right now, totally unswaddled! You fell asleep that way tonight so I just left you. I was curious to see if you would wake up or not, but so far so good.  Although I am sort of afraid it will get too cold tonight to not swaddle you.

I have a lot to say, but I'm just too tired to say it. I've been working around the clock and you've been right there with me! We are always going going going, this whole family actually.

We took you to Vegas last week. Yup, LAS VEGAS baby! I played black jack and roulette for the first time in my life, and overall we came out 5 bucks ahead. But listen up girly, I don't really condone gambling. We had 20 dollars to try it out, and once it was gone, it was gone. Don't go sneaking off to any casinos or anything!

We also went to Red Rock Canyon, it's pretty...

Your dad's not home from work yet, and I'm so tired I am going to go to bed. You're laying in there and I want to let you sleep there with me and cuddle... but I know neither you nor I will sleep as good if I don't put you in your crib. 

Goodnight sweet babe.

Sleep Monster

Dear Olive,

I haven't figured you out yet, but I'm on my way. You still are not a fan of napping, but at least you're making up for it at night.

The other night you were SO tired you took what I thought was a nap at 5:45 pm. A couple hours later I thought to myself, "I'd better wake up Olive so she can play and eat a bit more."  Well I tried to wake you and you WERE NOT HAPPY. So I went with my instinct on this one and just put you back to sleep, even though I was afraid you'd wake up at like 2 am and be ready to start the day.

I couldn't believe it, but you slept all the way until dad went to work at 5:45 the next morning and after I fed you in your sleep (you were just restless) you slept again until 8:30.

That's kind of... a LOT of sleep! Is that even good? Anyway you don't do that all the time, but it was pretty nice for me. Even though you hate naps, I'm glad you understand bed time.

You and I are going to need to start getting out of the house more for walks though, because I think dad is sick of seeing me in my baggy clothes. Plus even though you are sleeping like a log all night, I'm just laying awake thinking, sometimes for hours.

Today we went for a walk around the bay and once again, Ben Gibbard put you to sleep in the stroller while I tried to get my sweat on.

Oh yeah and I almost forgot, last weekend we went to the Indie fest and I let you try some hummus. Sshh don't tell anyone because you are not supposed to try real food for a while longer still. It was roasted red bell pepper too, but hey, you actually liked it. Your dad tried to get you to taste some frosting last week and you didn't like it, so at least you take after me and like your veggies!

Here are some pics... the farmer's market, the indie fest (check out all the pink thanks to the groove kitties) and some cozy time with dad.

Out n About

Dear Olive,

We went to the beach on Saturday, it was such beautiful weather and I thought I might surf. It was fun to get your feet in the sand and see what you thought. You didn't seem to care either way however.

But we made you a little seat out of the sand and eventually got you to take a nap. Elizabeth and I decided we were too cozy in the warm sun to surf, so we all just laid around.

Last night we went to an open mic at a cafe. We wanted to get out of the house and enjoy some entertainment. When we walked in to the back and sat down, the people running the open mic gave us quite a dirty look. They were probably thinking, "What are they doing bringing a baby to a small live music venue?"

The guy finally said, "I hope the music doesn't scare the baby, it's going to get loud in here." I think it was his way of saying, "I hope the baby doesn't become intrusive and cry during our performances."

I told him you would be fine and added that you were a pretty good baby, so if you cried we'd leave.

You just sat there the whole night watching, and at one point you fell asleep. It wasn't that loud, and you never fussed. The guy finally came over and said, yeah your baby is pretty good... I was like, uhhh YAH duh that's what I said. No need to get all uptight. (I mean, that's what I was thinking)

Ps this guy and this whole open mic WAS HILARIOUS. Quite a joke. But that is for a different blog. Pps, we all wore stripes on accident, all three of us.

 

Sweet Sleeper

Dear Olive,

I had not planned on writing tonight, but this is not a night I want to forget. It was the first time I saw you fall asleep peacefully on your own.

I know you've done it before, but I've never seen it. Well, not like this. I've seen you get close, make a few squawks, and then close your eyes. Otherwise it was always in the car, or after you were fussing, or if you were being rocked.

We had a long day and just got home from Gramakins around 9 at night. You seemed happy and awake so I decided we should take a bath.

The tub was filled with warm water and I put you on my lap as usual, but you seemed more relaxed, and so was I. It's just so nice and calm this late at night.

I got you in your pj's and gave you a little snack, swaddled you, and laid you on the bed. You looked so content so I just went about doing my own thing for a few minutes, and then decided it was time to turn out the light. I turned it off, and you just flickered your little eyelids a few times and finally let them close. No soothie, no fuss, no big deal.


It was so sweet and I wanted to remember it <3

The funny thing was, we were just talking about how we couldn't wait for the day when we could just lay our babies down while they were awake and just leave them there to fall asleep, happily on their own. I recall saying, "Oh that will happen SOME day far away." But you surprised me tonight :)

Busy Bodies

Dear Olive,

I realized that this is supposed to be a virtual baby book for you, about you, and just like a real baby book, I should write to you!

Today you came with me to work on our way to Gramakin's house. You just chilled in your moby wrap while I took photos and did some work.

Gramakin and I decided to have a bi-monthly cooking day where we make new recipes for the week and share it all, since cooking is so much easier in bigger amounts. But among all that commotion, there was an exciting moment tonight when I realized you had rolled over onto your side while you were playing on the mat!

Then you were on a roll (no pun intended) just rolling around and I realized I will need to keep an even closer eye on you.

We had another exciting moment when I wanted to see if you could hold your breath under water. I've been too scared to try it for reals, so tonight we took a shower and I blew in your face and put you under the streaming water, and wow, it really does work! We did it a few times and you looked so excited... I'm hoping you're a water lover like your mama.

<3 tee

Time Just Keeps on Tickin...

So my idea of blogging to remember things is more difficult to keep up on, as I'd have thought. But who am I kidding, I tell people that for a living (keeping up a blog is harder than you think).

Today Olive's 3 months old and I busted out the floor mat thing with the dangly stuff hanging. Happy graduation OG!

SHE LOVES IT!  She absolutely loves it.  It's so cute.  Yeah so she can just bat at it right now, but hey, she is a good batter!

It's funny how things that are new are SO exciting and then they just become the norm.  She laughed for the first time a couple weeks ago, like a real laugh. Ha ha's in a row, you know?  And I tried so hard to get her to do it again for a week, but nothing.  Then on Tuesday she laughed again.  Then today in the morning AND at night.  Pretty soon it will be so standard, but I try to get her to do it as if she will never laugh again!

I don't have too much to say right now, but I was laughing at myself tonight when I was so amazed by her giggles.

My nana was saying how people grow up and change and she misses the people they were. I might not be saying it as eloquently as she did, but I think about it all the time now.  I see little Olive looking around so cute and curious and I think to myself, "wow she will never be this little person again."

She will be cute and wonderful later too, but she just won't be that person anymore.  I'm not making much sense, but it makes me be so in the moment.  Having a baby has made me so much more aware of small moments in life and the understanding that this time is passing so quick and can never be recaptured.

The 2nd Best Time Of Day

My favorite time of day is the morning, when Olive wakes up and is SUPER happy.

But the second best time of day is bath time! She loves it, I love it, it's a win win.

Beauty in Bonding

I think I fall more and more in love with my baby each day that passes. Being a mom gets a lot more rewarding as your baby starts to develop a personality, and best of all, lights up and smiles every time she sees you.

I have this problem where I am constantly trying to record Olive when she's doing something new or extra cute. Of course, it never works, it never happens. And tonight I realized that there's something special about that.

It's like all this time that she and I get to spend together is a secret just for us. It really hit me. Who cares if I can capture it for everyone else? It's so special that I'm the only one who gets to witness those private and amazing little breakthrough moments. It's an award.

This doesn't meant I wont still share her growth with my friends and family from afar, but I definitely won't be so quick to think I need to find my camera and snap a shot.

Everything's changing so fast, and I try to be in the moment every minute I can. It's so intense. I think about how I must be like every other mother thinking, "I have the CUTEST baby in the world!" She is so cute I just can't even stand it.

It's a scary kind of love.

hehehe

Olive had her first real laugh tonight.  It wasn't like the smiley one breathed ha that she's been doing, it was a  real hearty ha ha ha ha ha ha kind of laugh.

I was shaking a little round fabric rattle in front of her face and she somehow found it amusing enough to laugh at! I was SOOOOO happy, what an absolutely adorable sound!!!!

Magic Pooing Chair

I have now discovered TWO things that make Olive poo.  One was the puj (if you remember pooing in a puj) but the other is the magic poo chair.

Someone I know calls it a buzzy chair, so that is generally what I call it too now.  Except for in the mornings.  In the mornings it is called the magic poo chair because NO MATTER what, when she sits in there, she poos.

I got it for 5 bucks at a garage sale, and it's not as cute and fancy as some of the newfangled ones I see, but it does the trick.

Maybe it's those calming vibrations or the splashy water sounds it makes, but it's really getting funny how magical it is. I know you wouldn't normally use the words magic and poo together in the same sentence, but I do it with no shame.

Magic poo chair, I love you.

The Innocence of Child

It's trippy sitting here watching my tiny baby girl sit so happily in her buzzy chair, looking around, tasting her hand, making little noises... just so content.   But behind her in the background there's a commercial of a woman who has no voice from smoking. She's bagging on the tobacco industry, and I wonder, "Will Olive ever try smoking? Will she be a smoker?" She doesn't even have any idea what a cigarette is yet.

Then comes the news of Egypt and I see all the horrible things happening around the world as she just sits here so innocently and unaware.  It makes me sad to think about the things she is going to go through in life and the things she might experience, the things we always see and think, "glad that was not me"...

I know she will laugh and have good times, but she's also going to cry and go through hard times. And it's a new feeling I don't like, to sit here and see her little innocent eyes look up at me. I think about how she just has no idea.

You just want to hold and protect them forever.

Maternity Jeans

I now fit in my maternity jeans again.

Yes you heard right. I bought some super cute designer maternity jeans about mid pregnancy and they eventually became too tight.  But they fit again now!  I know you aren't supposed to wear maternity clothes after pregnancy, but I finally have some pants that fit and that aren't leggings or cozy pjs, so I'm wearing them!

BOOBS!

So as I slowly lose weight I find myself getting closer and closer into wearing some of my old clothes again. Except for one, small (or should I say large) thing...

These DAMN boobs! They DO NOT make cute clothes for busty women, I tell you! Or maybe I just don't feel good with big boobs. I am going on a date with my husband tonight for the first time since Olive was born. I want to look cute and feel somewhat confident, so I went out to buy a new top.

For one thing, shopping with a baby, not so easy. My stroller really does not maneuver well in a crowded H&M store. Needless to say, in an hour and a half, I only got into that one store last night, and I found what I thought might work. I had a simple criteria:

1. Long
2. Large
3. Not tight in the middle but not a potato sack.

I found a nice top that fit that description. It has long tiered layers to cover my hip area and old baby uterus syndrome and could be worn with leggings. But the only problem was when I zipped it up it squished my boobs, and unzipping it made it look stupid.

Now I look in my closet for something and I'm realizing, Ok now I weigh 153, I MIGHT be able to sneak into some of my bigger pre pregnancy clothes.

But no. These boobs. They don't fit in ANYTHING. Plus, a little hard prego belly looks a lot cuter in tight clothes than left over fat.

So I'm back to square one. Baggy clothes for date night. Unless.. do I dare bust out my girdle?

I'll let you know...

Me n Babe

What a good baby...

So I'm really realizing what a good baby Olive is. I know I had a stressful night and wrote about how the only way to calm her down was to let her breastfeed, and after all, it's a blog so I definitely vent here, but the more days that go by the more I realize she's so good!

Just after some simple observations, I've found I rarely need to calm her down by letting her breastfeed after all. In fact those 5 s's really work wonders. She could be very upset and crying and all you have to do is swaddle her, put her on her side, and jostle her around a bit. BOOM she's silent and content in under a minute.

Also I've been practicing letting her drift off on her own, because SO many people have been holding her since she was born that I was getting really worried about the way she would wake up when set down. But again, she's proven me stressed for no reason because she's really catching on quick to what I do.

If she wakes up after I set her down, I just help her to fall back asleep without picking her up. She now likes her swing finally. I can put her in there wide awake and she falls asleep on her own. We also let her lay wide awake in her moses basket last night because it was late, I was tired, and I thought, well she's probably fine so we went to sleep. Thankfully she eventually went to sleep on her own too. Good girl!

I've heard the first 6 weeks are the hardest, and I'm happy things are looking up. On the other hand, I still can barely pump 2 oz of a milk and sometimes none at all. I need to get a little guidance on that because it's definitely confusing me.

I'm happy that although she can be fussy and gassy and what not, she can always be calmed down. I love my little baby Olive!

(Here is a picture of her practicing sitting. She doesn't love laying on her tummy so this helps her with her neck muscles too... she liked it!)

Weight Loss

I wasn't going to weigh myself for a while because I didn't want to be disappointed. It was a good plan because today I went to the DR. and they weighed me. And I was disappointed.

I've lost 24 pounds and I now weigh 160. I guess I just thought I'd have lost more by now because so much of that was baby, placenta, water, etc.  I felt kind of bad in the car on the way home and cried for a few minutes. I have over 30 pounds left to loose before I am close to where I was before. 

I know it's going to take a lot of work, especially with such little sleep and time to work out, which is how, for the most part, I maintained my weight before. Luke was telling me he saw an interview with Kendra last night, she also gained 60 pounds and said she lost it all mostly by dieting and walking because there was not time to do a lot of working out.

Today we went to the store and I was stocking up on all kinds of healthy things to eat and I realized I had decided to try no dairy for a few weeks to see if it makes Olive less gassy. I had to put back a lot of the food I had been planning to eat.

Well, here we go... tiny jeans, will I ever see you again?

Bottles and Boob

So Olive's a month old now, and I definitely had some sort of mini one month break down tonight. I didn't cry or anything, I just felt really tired and stressed out.

My mom came down to help me clean the (tiny) apartment and watch Olive so I could get some work done. Well needless to say, it's now 3:30 in the morning and I finally got the real work done. How can it take ALL day to do laundry (not yet put away), go through your mounding pile of papers, take some time out to eat, oh yeah, and try the breast pump for the first time.

Olive had her first bottle feeding today, and no problems there! The only problem is how LONG it takes to pump out 2 ounces of milk! Now I can see why it's worth it to spend the extra money on a hands free double pump. I just sat there confined to the chair, holding the pump up to my boob, watching it ever so slooooowly drip, drip, drip...  I tried it again later in the night and I couldn't even get an ounce.

We had to go buy some warmer pajamas for her too. Everything we got passed down happens to be mostly little onesies that are too cold for right now, and she really sleeps better when she's all snug and warm (duh, who wouldn't).

I know I should go to bed, but being up right now reminds me of how much I love the middle of the night. It's so quiet and calm, and I really have not seen it since before I was pregnant. But tomorrow is another day and I'll be regretful if I don't get a little more sleep while I can.

Night night...