One week : (

One week from today my time as a stay at home mom will come to an end.  : (  I am returning to work three weeks early to take on a new position at my Company that will allow much more flexibility (I get to work from home one day a week!) and I hope to enjoy a lot more (which isn't that hard to do compared to my old one) so I think it will be worth it.  But I am filled with emotions... mostly just sad to not be able to spend every day watching my baby girl learn and grow, scared that our tight bond will somehow change, anxious to leave her with someone new (although we have a great situation: a nanny coming over 2.5 days/week and my mother in law 1.5 days/week), wondering if I will miss something important.  That said, I am SO grateful for the amazing leave I have had... I haven't been to work in 6 months!  My company has a great maternity leave combined with the state of CA FMLA, so I know I am lucky to have had this much time.  I look forward to coming home to this smiling face every day.....

My Two Teeth!

Got a couple of pictures today of Kiera showing off her two TEETH!  What a big girl!  She likes to bite my fingers and knuckles (along with anything else she can get in her mouth) and ouch those babies are sharp!

 

I finally picked up a Sophie the Giraffe for Kiera.  At first I just couldn't get over how much it resembled a rubber squeaky dog toy, but man she loves that thing already!  I think it's because it is small enough that she can easily pick it up and maneuver it to get it in her mouth and chew on it's little rubber face and legs.  If you don't have one already, you should really get one!  

That's all for today... happy Friday! 

Are you going to do this to me EVERY Saturday?

This is what happens in a home with competing college football interests...

Saturday morning attire:

Saturday afternoon attire:

Not sure what we will do when Iowa plays Wisconsin!  : )

At Last!

I have been trying to upload videos forever with no luck so I finally created a YouTube account to do it and it works.  Yay!!  This video was taken during our trip to Idaho and is about 6 weeks old, but better late than never!  I will get some more up now that I have found the secret!

Homeward Bound

OK, well it's not really our home anymore, and Madison never actually was my home.  I'm referring more to the Midwest in general... you know the place where people actually smile and say hello to you on the street... and where the high and low temperatures of the day can be 50 degrees apart... where there's 4 real seasons and not an empty seat to be found at a Hawkeye (or insert your favorite Big Ten team here) football game.  Aahhh, the Midwest, we miss you!

We had a great trip to Madison over Labor Day weekend (yes, this post is a little late... still getting used to this motherhood and blogging thing)!  Kiera was a trooper on the plane.  We flew Southwest and learned to ask ahead of time how many open seats there were; that way if we knew there were going to be open seats we would just let Kiera chill in the open seat so no one would sit there.  We had the whole row to ourselves and Kiera even napped laid out across the middle seat between us.  She also practiced sitting up in the seat and even tried out her seatbelt.  : )

The wedding was great and I am so sad to report that I have no pictures of the lovely bride and groom!  Oops!  It was on their land out in the country and turned out beautifully.  They had a big white tent and all sorts of cute details like little birch tree stumps holding up the table numbers and the placecards hung on a mini clothesline with little clothespins!  I love weddings!!  It was definitely a bit challenging to have Kiera with us at the wedding reception though.  My back was very sore after holding her most of the night.  We took her out on the dance floor for a couple songs when she was fast asleep... isn't it amazing how babies can sleep in the strangest/loudest places?

We stayed in downtown Madison on Sunday night and it was so much fun!  Taste of Madison was going on so we walked around the Capital tasting some yummy food and drink before heading to the Union for a beer on the lake followed by dinner (a Gritty Burger and fried cheese curds!) at the Nitty Gritty!  The house Joel grew up in is on the other side of Lake Mendota behind us in the lake picture (not that you can see it!).

Now that we're back and have no more trips planned (yet!) hopefully Kiera will get back into her routine and start sleeping ALL night!

4 Months!

Wow, another month gone by so fast!   Kiera is 4 months old already!  She is SO much fun and I am loving every day I get to spend at home with her (and getting incredibly sad thinking of going back to work soon).  We had our 4 month check up and here are the stats...

15lb 4 oz... yes that is the 75th percentile folks
23.5 inches... 25th percentile

She is Joel's daughter afterall!  haha : )

Here is what she's up to at 4 months:

- She is wearing 3-6 month clothing, but there isn't a whole lot of room left in there and I suspect she will be onto the 6-12 month (yikes!) clothing fairly soon!

- She is wearing size 2 diapers.

- She has TWO TEETH... yes, already!  A few nights ago she was fussy and just wanting to be held and not acting like her self (along with the excessive drooling and hands constantly in the mouth, but that part was nothing new).  I finally felt along her bottom gums to see if something was going on in there and  found two teeth had already poked through and the doctor confirmed!  What a big girl!

- She LOVES to stand up and therefore loves hanging out in her exersaucer.  She is quite good at it and can do full circles to get at the toys she wants.

- She is still not sleeping through the night... she has gotten close many times but between two colds, two out of town vacations, and teething she keeps getting set back.  The longest stretch she has given us (other than the one night she did randomly sleep through) is about 7.5 hrs.  She is generally just eating once in the night, and sometimes waking more than that, but the doctor tells us this is normal for breastfed babies and not to force it until she is 6 months old, unless she is doing it on her own by then.

- She is quite a talker... she has definitely found her voice and loves to babble and make noises with her spit bubbles.

- She is sleeping about 11-12 hours at night and taking good naps (up to 2.5 hours if I let her) during the day.  She still likes to sleep with her arms stretched out above her head, and when she wakes in the night lifts both legs into the air and simultaneously drops them back onto the mattress.  : )

- She is still such a smiley, happy girl!  Still very easy going and flexible, she allows us to get out and do lots of things.

- She has rolled over from her tummy to her back three times.  She still doesn't do it frequently and usually just gets mad when she's ready to be off her tummy, but has made the move herself a few times.

To the land of fried cheese...

We're off to Wisconsin bright and early tomorrow morning for a friend's wedding!  It will be Kiera's second flight.  She did so well on the last trip, we are confident she will do a lot of sleeping and not annoy the other passengers too much.  We are looking forward to spending some time with our friends and sharing in their special day, hanging out in Madison, maybe trying to catch the first Iowa football game of the season Saturday morning, drinking a Spotted Cow, and of course, eating some fried cheese curds!  YUM!  And we cannot wait to get a Nitty Gritty Burger... an amazing burger with a yummy sauce, we have been talking about it for months!

No, this will not be a healthy weekend.   : )  But we can't wait!  

On another note, we put together Kiera's exersaucer about a week ago and she loves that thing! (Thanks Aunt Stacey and Uncle Jeff!)  She loves standing up so much that we thought she might be ready for the exersaucer.  At first she wasn't really sure about the toys but still enjoyed the ability to use her legs to stand up, but now she really likes the little farm animals and even does a 360 around the whole thing to check them out.