Baby’s Firsts

I haven’t written in a while because things have been a little busy here in Baby Land…

Even though Ken was working most of the weekend, Julia and I had a lot of fun!  Saturday morning Julia and I spent the morning at home, playing and enjoying the sun on the porch. 

After a morning nap, we celebrated our friends’ graduation from Medical School!  We got a chance to hang out with Kathleen’s family for lunch and with Liz’s family for dinner.  It’s so funny to think that this was actually Julia’s second time going to the Tulane Med School graduation since she was technically there last year when Ken graduated from Medical School, only she was in my belly at the time! 

Julia really seems to love social events… while we were with Kathleen’s family, she loved being held by Kathleen’s sister and her boyfriend, and she was so happy to watch the dogs running around the room.  She even laughed when the dogs started barking at someone knocking on the door!

Sunday we went to the zoo with our Mommy & Baby Friends.  It was Julia’s first time going to the zoo!  She slept for a while, and was sleeping when we took this stroller picture of all the babies in front of the Elephant Fountain.   It was really hot and muggy out and I had to put sunscreen on her for the first time, but I’m glad we got a chance to go to the zoo before leaving New Orleans.  I’m definitely excited that Baltimore has a good zoo, since when Julia gets to be a little older, it will be a lot of fun to have a zoo to go to.  

I think she’s still a little too young to appreciate the animals at the zoo, since she was more interested in looking at all the people than she was in looking at the animals, but I had a good time at least, and enjoyed hanging out with the other Moms.  It’s always nice to talk with moms of babies the same age so that you can compare and contrast and talk about things that are working, things that aren’t working, etc.  We ended up talking most of the time about what the babies are eating, how they’re sleeping, what fun tricks they can do, what toys they like to play with, etc.  We also stopped for lunch in one of the cafeterias–it was nice to sit in the AC for a while and it gave us a chance to nurse the babies and then let them play on the table for a little while. 

One of the moms also had a really nice camera with her and took some great photos! 

Monday after work, before picking up Julia, I stopped to visit Baby Leigha.  She is just so precious and teeny tiny.  It’s hard to believe she’s just about the same size that Julia was when she was born.  It’s amazing how many changes they go through in such a short period of time!  Julia looks closer in size to our 20-month old neighbor than she does to Leigha, even though she’s closer in age to Leigha. 

Evan and Jade seem to be doing well with Leigha at home, though of course they are exhausted (they’re supposed to be–they have a newborn!).  It’s nice to feel as though we are a source of information for them since we were just there a few months ago and we understand what they are going through.  It’s always nice to have someone who has the newborn stage fresh in their memory while  you’re going through it so they can remind you that this, too, shall pass.  I also feel like seeing us and Julia is kind of like seeing the light at the end of the tunnel for them, since they can see what they have to look forward to!

When I picked Julia up from daycare Monday afternoon, they told me that she had thrown up three times after her last bottle of the day and that she had diarrhea.  This was her first time exhibiting any sort of gastro-intestinal symptoms, so they suggested we keep an eye on her.  I got her home, where she was a bit more fussy than usual, but didn’t seem too sick… but since she did have a bit of a fever, we gave her Tylenol, and then she went to sleep without a problem.  She woke up after an hour, screaming, which is very unlike her, so I went in to check on her.  The minute I sat down to nurse her, she threw up, and her vomit was red from the Tylenol.  After nursing, she went right back to sleep and slept through the night.

Tuesday morning she seemed okay… she nursed fine, didn’t throw up, didn’t have a fever, etc. so I took her to daycare and asked them to call me if there were any problems.  Around 11:30 AM they called to say that Julia had a fever.  I picked her up at about 12:30, by which time her fever had gone down, but she had two little sores on her tongue.  I wasn’t really sure what they were or how I could make them hurt less, so I called the doctor to schedule an appointment for that afternoon.  Julia seemed miserable Tuesday afternoon… her tongue was clearly bothering her–she kept sticking it out, was drooling a lot, and the only thing that seemed to help was nursing and sucking on things–her thumb, her pacifier, toys, etc.

At the doctor, her temperature was about 100 degrees, and it turned out she had an ear infection in one ear.  The doctor said that probably what happened was she got an upper respiratory viral infection, which could have caused the nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, and then she developed a secondary ear infection.  The trend amongst pediatricians is to prescribe fewer antibiotics but the doctor said that in a baby as young as she is, she does like to treat ear infections, especially when they are accompanied by a fever.  If she didn’t have the fever, we probably would have just let her clear the infection on her own.  So this is baby’s first ear infection and first course of antibiotics!  I asked the doctor about how contagious she was, and the doctor said that the general rule of thumb is that kids should be on antibiotics for 24 hours before going back to school, so I kept her home Wednesday and took the day off to stay home with her.  When Julia is sick, she sleeps more than usual, and that was what tipped off the folks at daycare that something was not quite right.  Tuesday morning she took a 2 hour nap at daycare.  Then, when we got home, she took a 30-minute nap before we went to the doctor and she took another 45-minute nap when we got home from the doctor. 

Wednesday, we spent most of the day at home, but we did run out to get a few errands done… and Julia went in the grocery cart at Rouse’s for the first time!  She loved it and was smiling the whole time!  I think she liked being able to look around at everything and everyone.  She was making lots of happy cooing noises and lots of people stopped to smile at her! 

Last night was the first night in a while that Julia didn’t sleep through the night.  She woke up at about 2:15 and since she’s sick, we didn’t feel comfortable letting her cry.  Ken went to get her from her crib and I nursed her in bed, which, of course, made her go back to her old ways… she only slept for about a half an hour between 2:15 and 4 AM, at which point I decided to go back into her room to put her to sleep.  I nursed her for about 10 more minutes until she seemed calm and sleepy, and then I put her in her crib with her pacifier and she went back to sleep for about 2 more hours.

When she gets sick, I can’t help but think of it as a blessing and a curse… of course it’s a curse because I don’t like to see her sick.  It breaks my heart when she’s not feeling well or in pain and there’s not much I can do to help her feel better.  She’s also so small, vulnerable and helpless and I can’t explain to her that if she rests, drinks fluids, and takes her medicines, she’ll feel better in a day or two.  She can’t understand what’s happening, which makes it worse.  At the same time, it’s almost a blessing when she’s sick since it means I get to stay home with her… we get extra snuggles and we get to take Mommy & Baby Nap Time together.

Anyway… that’s my story… sorry it was so long, but a lot has happened since I wrote last!  There’s a lot coming up in the next several weeks, too… here’s what I know of so far:

Saturday: Crawfish Boil at Ken’s Masonic Lodge

Monday: Memorial Day (Ken will be working nights so he probably won’t be the best company but hopefully we’ll get to spend a few hours together during the day before he has to go back into the hospital for his Monday night shift).

Next weekend: Goodbye Weekend for our Rabbi & his family at our Synagogue.  We’re getting a babysitter to watch Julia Friday night and Sunday night so we can go to the events at the Shul.  Also next weekend, our friend Caitlin will be in town for a wedding and we will (hopefully) have a chance to see her and introduce her to the baby!

June 3rd: My last day at work!

June 7th: Julia’s 8-month checkup, just a day before she officially turns 8 months old!

June 10th: Packing up our moving truck, and my parents get into town to help with the move!

June 11th: We hit the road for our move to Baltimore!

June 15th: We move into our new house in Baltimore!

So as you can see, life is a little stressful right now… but we’re rolling with the punches and taking it one day at a time.  Luckily, Ken and I have a good balance: he gets really stressed out by big things like this while I’m usually the calm one during big life changes.  We’ve always done well as a team when we need to get things done and I’m sure this won’t be an exception!

The search for the perfect diaper bag…

Most people who have babies these days, create a registry and register for a diaper bag.  There are so many options out there.  But then you have your baby and you carry your diaper bag around for a few months and then you start to get diaper bag envy.  You see other new moms with their diaper bags and you become jealous because their diaper bag is better, shinier, has more glitter and pizzazz.  I don’t think I am alone in my quest for the perfect diaper bag…

Here are some of the problems…

1) You don’t want to look like a hot mess carrying around a bunch of different bags so you need a bag that can serve as a diaper bag and a purse and a makeup bag and a lunch bag sometimes.

2) The older your baby gets, the more stuff they need… when you have a newborn, all you really need are some diapers, wipes, a change of clothes, a burp cloth or two, maybe a pacifier or two, a bib, some bottles (if you’re not breastfeeding) and a blanket or something to use as a nursing cover.  As they get older, you need to start carrying books, toys, blankets to lay them down on, things to distract them, baby food, spoons, sippy cups, etc. the list just seems to get longer and longer.

3)  It’s best if the diaper bag can clip onto the stroller in some way so you don’t have to carry it… those things can get heavy!

4) Mama wants a bag that’s girly enough that she looks cute carrying it around town but Daddy wants a bag that doesn’t  have big pink flowers all over it!

So in my time paying attention to diaper bags, here are some of my thoughts…

This is the diaper bag we had been using up until a couple of weeks ago:  

It’s a good diaper bag for a little baby.  It has a folding changing pad that comes out, is made of a very durable material, is neutral so Dad can carry it around without it really looking like a diaper bag.  The  side pockets are really nice because they hold water bottles for Mom & Dad or they can hold baby bottles for baby.  There are a couple of inside pockets that are a good size for carrying things like chapstick, hand sanitizer, lotion, etc. and the outside pockets are good for things like pacifiers that you might need to get to in a hurry.  I really like the fact that the bag has special hooks that allow it to hook onto the stroller.  The problem with this bag is that it isn’t really big enough to carry much more than some diapers, wipes, a couple changes of clothes and a nursing cover.

So a few weeks ago, when I was getting ready for my trip to Baltimore with Julia, I switched us over to another diaper bag… this was one we received as a gift for one of my baby showers.  Ours is a different pattern, but this is the basic design of the bag we have.  It also comes with two separate pockets–one is designed to hold a baby bottle, and the other can be used as a wet bag–for dirty diapers, dirty clothes, etc.  

This is a nice diaper bag for a couple of reasons… the material is basically plastic, so it can be very easily wiped off if it gets dirty.  It has a bigger folding changing pad which is nice now that Julia is a little longer and rolls around a little more while we are changing her.  Some of the problems: it’s HUGE.  It’s a little too huge for just every day use.  It was great to use on the plane since I brought a LOT of stuff with us on the plane, but for just an average day out and about with the baby, it’s too big.  It’s too big to fit in the basket of our stroller and it’s too big to hang from the handles of the stroller, so I end up having to carry it around, which is a pain in the butt.

Those are the only two diaper bags we actually have… but here are some other diaper bags I have had my eye on for a while… and if money were no object, these are some of the bags I would consider getting to add into the rotation:

This is one of the diaper bags I have been coveting for a while:

And this is another one that I would get if money were no object:

But alas… we can’t all afford $300 diaper bags, so I’ll learn to live with the ones we have, at least until I win the lottery!

Hair and Periods

Someone asked me the other day what the most surprising thing has been about becoming a mother… I don’t know that I can think of one thing in particular that I can say was the single most surprising thing but I have thought of two things that you don’t really think about or hear much about before hand…

1) Hair Loss

I know, from reading various forums online and from participating in various online mommy’s groups, that this is a totally normal response to the hormonal changes that happen after having a baby, but the amount of hair I lose on a daily basis is unbelievable.  It’s gotten to a point where I dread brushing my hair because I know that it will look like I have killed a small animal with the amount of hair that I lose each time.  I almost avoid washing my hair when I take a shower, too, since I know that the drain will be filled with hair when I step out of the shower.  I’ve always had very thick, curly hair and I’ve always really liked my hair but since having a baby, my hair is gross.  Just gross.  And it makes me not feel very pretty…

Luckily, I have an appointment on June 7th (3 weeks from today!) to get a haircut, and the woman who’s cutting my hair is a mom herself, so she will be able to hopefully give me some pointers for things I can do, and ways I can wear my hair that will not make me feel like my hair is quite so disgusting.

2) Periods

I always knew that breastfeeding is supposed to delay the return of your menstrual cycle after having a baby but I never realized that it could go on as long as it does… my last period started on January 17th, 2012, 16 months ago!  If I continue to breastfeed Julia, and she continues to like nursing as much as she does, it could, theoretically be another year before my period comes back.  This is lovely!

At this time a year ago…

At this time a year ago I was 17 weeks pregnant.  I thought I looked pregnant and I thought I needed to wear maternity clothes.  I was getting excited about being close to the half-way point in my pregnancy and we were getting ready for our trip to Disneyworld.  Ken’s graduation was coming up and we were looking forward to our parents’ visit.  We were also getting ready to move to our new house.  It’s so funny to look back and realize how much has changed in a year–in our personal lives, our professional lives, our family, etc.!  We’ve changed so much and our hearts have grown so much as we’ve gotten to know our little bundle of joy.  It’s amazing what can happen in a year! It used to be that after work we would want to go out and socialize.  We would want to meet friends for drinks, dinner or dessert.  We were always out and about, getting together with friends.  Now, when work is over I want nothing more than to go pick up Julia from daycare, take her home, nurse her and snuggle with her.  I cherish moments like this since I know they only happen for so long… Two of the ladies who sit near me at work have kids who are graduating from high school this week, and hearing their conversations over the past couple of weeks has made me realize how important it is to enjoy every minute that we have with Julia as a baby.  Before we know it she’ll be walking and talking, then talking back, asking for the keys, and then eventually we’ll be packing up the car and taking her off to college.  As cliche as it sounds, I’m really trying to learn to just live in the present.

One foot here and one foot there…

Ken and I met in Baltimore in September of 2004.  I was just starting college and he was a junior.  We met at an Orioles game.  We started dating a month later and we’ve been together ever since.  We have a lot of history together in Baltimore.  We went to countless Orioles games together, we became involved in the Jewish community at Hopkins, we discovered new restaurants, we played in the pep band at Lacrosse games, Ken introduced me to hockey in Washington, DC and we went to quite a few Capitals games, we got to know the festivals.  We went from being just Ken and just Anna to being “Ken and Anna.”  We made a lot of friends both through our University and through other avenues–the Jewish community, the Orioles, etc.  We moved into an apartment together in Baltimore in the summer of 2006.  We got engaged in Baltimore in December of 2007.  When we made the decision to leave Baltimore to come to New Orleans, we agreed that we would eventually go back to Baltimore.

Then, in the summer of 2008, we moved to New Orleans…

I was starting law school and I decided to pursue the Common Law program, which would allow me to take the Bar in any state except for Louisiana.  At first I didn’t love New Orleans.  The city seemed to be all about drinking and partying.  Our first month here, we had to evacuate because of Hurricane Gustav.  It was scary and terrifying to leave everything behind, to not know when we would be able to return, if we would be able to return.  But we came back.  And as they say, New Orleans got under our skin.  New Orleans grew on us a lot and now that we are preparing to move back to Baltimore, we are both feeling very bittersweet about this upcoming move.

I always try to stay positive and optimistic about big life changes and I’m trying to do that about this move.  By moving back to Baltimore, we aren’t necessarily leaving New Orleans for good.  New Orleans will always be a part of us.  We got married while living in New Orleans.  We became the Levins while living in New Orleans.  We became a family while living in New Orleans.  Julia was born in New Orleans.  New Orleans will always be a part of us, so we aren’t leaving New Orleans, never to return.  We’re leaving New Orleans to form new adventures as a family in Baltimore.  We know that we’ll be in Baltimore for the next three years but after that life could take us so many places and it might even take us back to New Orleans.  It’s definitely bittersweet to be leaving New Orleans and I feel like right now we’re in this funny place with one foot still in New Orleans, wanting to experience everything we love about this city one more time before we leave, and one foot on its way to Baltimore, ready to have new adventures in the city that we used to call home, and will soon call home again.  There is so much we want to show Julia about New Orleans and we plan to come back here for vacations in the future so that she can grow up knowing what the neutral ground is, knowing how to properly pronounce “beignet” and “Tchoupitoulas,” knowing how to shout, “Throw me something, Mister!”

As cliche as it is (and I hate cliches), we’re not saying goodbye to New Orleans, we’re saying, “See you later, Alligator!”

Mother’s Day

I promised a little more detail about our Mother’s Day… so here you go!

Our weekend started on Friday…

When I picked Julia up from daycare, they gave me this little arts and crafts project that they  made (with her help… sort of…).  On the back, it has her name and the year, 2013.

Ken had a really rough day in the ICU on Friday, so he made a special request for a “fancy” dinner.  I asked our friend Kathleen for a suggestion and she suggested making risotto.  So Friday night once Ken got home from work (after Julia was already asleep), I made risotto with asparagus and sweet peas for dinner and I made a chocolate mousse for dessert.  Both turned out to be delicious, and thank you to Kathleen for this recipe.

Saturday morning when we first woke up (Julia even let us sleep in until about 7:30!), Ken and I got some packing done while she played.  We put Ken’s beret on Julia and she was just being so funny and giggly and playful, so we snapped this adorable photo of her!

After that, the three of us went to brunch at Cafe Atchafalaya.  I had been there once before, for lunch, with my friend Holly, but Ken had never been there.  It was really nice… we each had a mimosa, they had really good food and they had a live jazz band playing, too!   For the past week or so, now that Julia has gotten really good at sitting up, we have started putting her in high chairs at restaurants.  It’s really nice to be able to do that since it means she can sit in a high chair with a few toys to play with and we don’t have to hold her the whole time that we eat.  We can have our hands free to eat and she feels like a big girl because she feels like she’s sitting at the table with us.  Here she was in her highchair during brunch on Saturday.  The other nice thing about this is that it means we don’t have to bring her carseat in to restaurants with us anymore.  Instead we can just take her out of the carseat and bring her inside while leaving the carseat in the car.  Now that she weighs almost 16 lbs., it’s really hard to lug the carseat around with us so I’ve gotten into the habit of only taking the carseat out of the car when we get home at the end of the day.  If we’re going to be in and out of the car all day, I just take her out and leave the carseat in the car. 

After brunch, we had some errands to get done around town–we had to go drop off some books to donate to the public library and we had to use up some of our gift cards to stores in New Orleans.

Saturday evening, we went on a nice walk on Magazine Street, where the Magazine Street Merchants’ Association was having a “Champagne Stroll.”  Basically a bunch of the businesses stayed open late, from 5-9 PM, and had champagne they were giving out to customers.  The “green” businesses (i.e. the eco-friendly ones) had “green” champagne (i.e. champagne with some midori and honeydew melon in it).  While we were out, Ken bought me my Mother’s Day presents!  I got a pair of purple lacy Toms that I had been asking for for months, and he also got me one of the Chewbeads necklaces–it’s basically a necklace made out of this rubbery material that is safe for babies to chew on.  It also has a clasp that snaps off easily so that if Julia tugs on it really hard it won’t choke me or hurt.

A children’s author was at our favorite baby store signing books, so we also bought one of her books for our niece and nephew.  It’s called “Today is Monday in New  York.”

Toms:

Chewbeads:

After Julia went to sleep Saturday night, I went next door to read our 3-year old neighbor, Eva, her bedtime stories!  After that, Ken and I had dinner together and then cleaned out my desk.

Sunday morning, our friends Liz and Moussa came over to buy my desk and desk chair (once we get to Baltimore we are going to buy me a little writing desk that won’t be quite so big and bulky).  I just need a little desk I can use to keep my computer, to write letters, and to store stationery and other “school supply” type things.  I don’t need a huge computer desk like the one I had before.

In the afternoon, Julia and I went on a nice walk around the Garden District with the Ergo

and then we came home and took a nice long nap together.

For dinner we went to Dat Dog with our Mommy & Baby friends Stephanie & Lily, and then we went to Kathleen’s birthday party for some homemade cake and ice cream!

Overall it was a wonderful weekend, and I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect first Mother’s Day!

Happy Mother’s Day!

I’m blogging from home this morning while my baby girl plays in her exersaucer.  Ken, Julia and I celebrated Mother’s Day yesterday because he’s working today in the ICU.  We had a lovely celebration and a wonderful day (more details to come tomorrow when I can blog from work).  Today I’m spending the whole day with the girl who makes me a mother, but for now I just wanted to wish all the mothers out there a very Happy Mother’s Day!  But most importantly, I want to wish my Mommy a Happy Mother’s Day! 

You’re the best Mom a kid could ever hope for and I think Julia will be a lucky girl if I manage to be half as good a mother as you are!  I love you and I appreciate all that you have done for me and all that you continue to do for me.  Here’s to many more Mother’s Days, hopefully spent together in the future!  I LOVE YOU, MOMMY!

7-Month Checkup

On Wednesday, Ken and I had a rare hour to spend just the two of us–we went out to lunch together before we picked up Julia from daycare to take her to her 7-month checkup! Here we were at lunch:

At Julia’s checkup, she passed with flying colors! She weighs 15 lbs. 11.4 oz. and is 25.5 inches long.

She’s still in the 25th percentile for height and weight, which means she’s little but she’s growing appropriately and staying right along her curve.  Her head circumference is still in the 50th percentile.  The doctor was perfectly pleased with her development!  You may recall that last month I took a photo of Ken and Julia sitting on the bench in the doctor’s office waiting for her appointment… well I took another photo on that same bench this month.  Here was this month’s photo:

and here they are side by side, at 6 months on the left and at 7 months on the right:

Even though she’s only gained a pound in the last month, she looks so much older!

The doctor wanted us to wait until she’s 9 months to come back for another checkup but because we’ll be moving between now and then, she said we could come back at 8 months so that when we get to Baltimore we are not scrambling to find a pediatrician.  That will be one of my first priorities when we get to Baltimore but this way we will have about a month before we need her to be seen.  All in all though, her 7-month checkup was a great success!

7 Months!

Today Julia is 7 Months Old!  We will be taking her this afternoon for her 7-Month Checkup so I can give you updates tomorrow about her height and weight.

Milestones: sitting up really consistently now.  Still not rolling over or crawling yet. 

Eating: at Daycare she takes 3 5-oz. bottles and in addition to that she nurses 3-4 times/day.  On the days we are together, she generally nurses 6-7 times per day.  She’s also eating solids now but not very consistently (we haven’t really figured out the timing as far as when she nurses, when we should give her solids, etc.)… so far she has liked sweet potatoes, avocado, pears, bananas, and she LOVES baby yogurt!  She also eats baby oatmeal cereal and we have stopped giving her rice cereal (it made her poops rock-hard and I’ve read a lot of negative things about rice cereal).  So far peas were not a hit and she also has not liked the apricot and sweet potato blend that I sent her with to daycare.  We need to start working on more vegetables though, so we’re going to be trying carrots and maybe spinach or broccoli in the next few weeks.  One of the ladies at daycare suggested disguising the vegetables by mixing them with fruits, so we might try mixing

Sleeping: Julia generally goes to sleep sometime between 6:15 and 7:15 and wakes up sometime between 5 and 6.  Sometimes she will wake up once in the middle of the night for a diaper change and feeding, but she usually goes to sleep very easily after that feeding. 

Playing: Julia loves to play with her feet, and she’s definitely at the stage now where she will put everything into her mouth.  At restaurants if we have her sitting on our lap, we have to be careful about what’s in front of us (food, silverware, napkins, drinks, etc.) because whatever is in front of her, she will grab and put in her mouth.  If anything even comes close to her mouth, she grabs it and puts it in her mouth.  She loves it when we sing to her, especially if the singing involves any kind of hand motions, clapping or gestures, and she loves getting kisses and raspberries.  We don’t ever have her watch TV but if the TV happens to be on where we are (a restaurant, someone else’s house, etc.) she is absolutely enthralled by the colors and the movement on TV.  I can see why for some parents it’s very tempting to just plop their kid down in front of the TV.  Julia is also very fascinated by the baby she sees in the mirror.  Whenever possible, I show her the baby in the mirror since I am curious to see when she starts to realize that it’s her and not some other mysterious baby!  She also loves to go in her “exersaucer” or “activity center” as we sometimes call it, and she likes to go in these at daycare, too!

Talking: There are still no discernible words but she’s doing a lot of babbling.  I’ve heard a lot of “bababa” and “dadada” and even some “gagaga” but still no “mamama.”  She also likes to make raspberries a lot and blow bubbles!

That’s all for now… I’ll give another quick update tomorrow with her height and weight information after her doctor’s appointment this afternoon!