Croup Update #2

Alli had a good day today. She's having problems sleeping (naps as well as night), so I've taken the Boppy and propped her up in her crib to help with the drainage as she sleeps. I did it last night after the 3rd time getting up with her. I put her to bed that way tonight, so we'll see.

She's still spitting up quite a bit and has lots of drainage running out her nose. Some of that I think may be from teething. Hydration looked pretty good today, although appetite is down a little (probably because she's having a hard time breathing through her nose). I used the aspirator tonight before bed to get some extra mucus out. Hopefully it will help.

She did do a new trick today... She wasn't happy about going down for a nap, so she cried for a while. I came in after about 5-10 minutes and saw a face staring at me with hands hanging on the side of the crib. No, she didn't pull up, but she did get to a sitting position and was hanging on waiting to see if we would come in. It just made me realize that it won't be long before she *is* pulling herself up and we'll have to lower the crib mattress. My gosh do they grow fast!!

Croup Update

Alli is doing pretty well. And why shouldn't she - she got an epinephrine enhaler treatment last night because she was having difficulty breathing, and also a steroid shot to help keep the airways from swelling too badly. The thing I'm most worried about now is the fact that she keeps puking and is becoming a little dehydrated. (Last night the first steroid was a liquid, but that came up in about 2 minutes - all over mommy.) I will be nursing her often today, although so far she hasn't been eating as much and small amounts are still coming up. Her poop this morning indicated some dehydration. I will be counting diaper changes today to see how the hydration is looking.

Apparently the virus runs its course in 5 days, so the bulk of the problems should be over the weekend. Looking forward to getting "happy Alli" back. Right now she's just uncomfortable...

Alli in the ER with Croup

Alli's First Trip Via Airplane

This weekend we met a bunch of friends in Park City, Utah for a wonderful 3 days of skiing/snowboarding. Alli did great on the plane - I had heard from a friend to nurse her during take-off and landing so that her ears would pop while she fed. I did and she had no problem. On the way there, she fell asleep - right before we landed! So we got off the plane with Kim carrying *everything* and me carrying our dead-weight child. :) Lucky for me she's only 16 lbs. :) Then things really started to get interested...

We picked up our bags. 2 out of 3 anyway. The car seat didn't arrive. How the ??? Anyway, they gave us a loaner car seat and said maybe it would arrive with the next flight from Phoenix. (BTW, my ski boots were in with the carseat - doh!) So then we went to get our 4WD SUV that we reserved. Yay, that didn't work so well. See we arranged flights to maximize the car-rental. We had a friend from Florida (Wink) and two of his daughters (Grace and Ella), and a friend from South Carolina (Butcher) all ready to fit into our car. That's 7 of us - one in a car seat. So that took a while to straighten out, and we finally got a..... minivan. :( We were stylin'!!!

Well, so be it. Then we drove to the wonderful house where the rest of the crew finally gathered. All together for the weekend we had 17 adults and 12 kids. Whew! Alli was the youngest and Grace (from Florida) was the oldest at 8.

So here's what we found out as first-time travelers with kids. a) Don't forget the nightlights - especially if you are sleeping in the same room as your child! (We had to go run out and get some.) b) Your child's sleep cycle will probably be a bit weird. Yes, Alli would wake up and cry and not go back to sleep. This happened *every* night we were there. Funny thing though, as we would be up trying to calm Alli, we heard crying from other rooms with small kids as well. So most adults didn't get much sleep - and it wasn't from excessive partying like it used to be with the kidless ski trips! Other than that, I think we did well.

BTW, our sleepless nights? To try to prevent Alli from waking the whole house, we wound up nursing her to calm her down and then sleep in our bed with us. It was sorta fun, but we're a little worried about what kind of a week we're going to have now that we're home. She's *not* coming to bed with us here, and I'm not nursing her 3 times during the night!!!

Snow was not a fun thing for her. I guess it's because she can't really play in it yet. Her exposure to it was me dressing her all warm and taking her outside, then putting her bare hand in a snow bank. She just cried. Hmmmm... not the response I was looking for, but I guess that makes sense cause it was really cold!!! :) Maybe next year when she can play more...

And one more fun thing... Alli did crawl! :) She doesn't go very far crawling, about 2-3 leg pushes before she gets down on her belly to try to army crawl/reach, but she's moving - forward! It's been very exciting to watch. In fact even the single guys in the house were excited for her!

And one more first from this trip. Kim and I had our first night out together since Alli was born. Avis (our wonderful trip planner) had arranged babysitters so we could have an adult-only dinner out. This was the first time Kim and I had a sitter for the night. So we toasted - with 15 of our friends. :)

9 Month Checkup

Yesterday was Alli's 9 month checkup. She's doing well. So here are her stats:

Eyes: Yep, still blue.
Weight: 16.7 lbs (15th percentile)
Height: 27 inches (31st percentile)
Head Circumference: 17 inches (27th percentile)

She's lost her momentum in the weight gain area, and dropped slightly on the height. But boy has her head taken off! ;) We think part of the slowing of the weight gain is her recent mobility. We're sure it takes a lot more energy to roll and scoot all over the place, which means we'll be adding solids for breakfast (after our ski trip next weekend).

So here are some sweet Valentine's Day (and 9 month) pictures of Alli. No, we didn't put her here - she rolled and scooted to get in the hallway.

Hey, What's That Over There?

Alli's world is definitely expanding. She is no longer content sitting on her blanket and playing with her toys, at least, she's not content to sit there for very long. :) No, the toys are only somewhat fascinating now. Now she looks around and thinks "hey, what's that over there?" and the next thing we know she is on her belly, and then rolling. Once she hits tile, it's scooting - backwards. She pushes with her arms and doesn't move her legs yet, but she gets around. Everything is a curiosity, including electrical outlets. Uh oh. Luckily, she can't reach them yet, and I tell her "no" if I see her going for them. I think she's actually starting to understand that word. I hope so. It sure will make things easier...well...if she listens to it!

I've been resourceful at keeping her contained while I'm doing things. When I'm in the closet changing, I sit her in front of my dresser. She's learned how to open the bottom drawer and apparently finds the items in it interesting. Who wouldn't? It's lingerie! :) I also used a nearby laundry basket the other morning. I wanted to brush my teeth before work and I wanted to watch her, so I took a laundry basket, set it on the ground, sat her in it, and gave her a teddy bear. She wasn't very amused, but I was! :)

Besides not being able to leave her in one place anymore, we had another little surprise this week - two little, white, sharp teeth popping out of her bottom gums. So she gets her first sign of teeth at 9 months! Woo hoo!! It does explain why the last 2 weeks she was waking up in the middle of the night and crying. She would always go back to sleep after some comforting (well, quite a bit of comforting), but I wasn't really sure what was going on. Now I get it! :) (It was always a thought that maybe she was teething, but I never saw anything or felt anything on her gums.)

9 month checkup on Saturday, so check back this weekend for her updated stats.

8 Month Photos

Ok, I know Alli turns 9 months this coming week, but we've been super busy and *finally* took a couple of hours to go through all the photos we've taken of her to get some ready for posting to her blog. So between the last post and this one, here are a few of the ones we thought were super-cute. This post contains pictures specifically taken at 8 months. (She was so cute, we could narrow down anymore!)

Just Some Photos of Fun Things With Alli

Here are a few fun photos that we've taken over the last month or two.

Alli in her new bath tub, finally enjoying bath time again thanks to tub toys:





Alli's first tattoo, courtesy of Ryker Christensen's 1st Birthday:

The End of a Chapter, The Beginning of a New One

Today was our last day of Krista-Care. Krista was offered a teaching position with discounts for childcare for Tyler right there at the school. It's a great opportunity for Krista to get back to teaching, and also a great opportunity to bring in more money for the family. We will miss seeing them every day, and assume Tyler and Alli will miss each other in their own ways.

Alli will be staying with a neighbor of ours. They are relatively new to the neighborhood and we have just started getting to know them. John and Marcie have 5 kids living at home: Rachel (8), Morgan & Mandi [twins] (7), Reegan (3), and Gage (19 months). The oldest 3 girls go to school, so Alli will be spending her days mostly with Reegan and Gage. They both love her, giving her lots of kisses and tickles. When the twins are home, they really help take care of Alli. (Yes, it's odd to watch a couple of 7 year old girls take care of your baby, but they do a pretty darn good job!) Marcie seems pretty at ease bringing another baby into the house. She is also a teacher that became a stay-at-home mom with the kids.

Oh, but that's not all. Marcie works at her husband's business on Mondays doing payroll for him. Unfortunately, that means she can't watch Alli. She takes her kids to a lady's house named Kim that has daughters in the same grade as Marcie's. So, I spoke with Kim to see if she would be willing to take one more kid on Mondays. She thought that would be fine. We haven't met Kim yet - Alli and I (and hopefully daddy) plan on meeting her this weekend and having her start watching Alli next Monday. She sounds very nice on the phone and comes with references, two of which she has been watching for the past 4 years, so that's got to be a good thing.

Mondays are going to take me a little getting used to (the idea of the arrangement). Marcie picks her kids up from Kim's at 3:30, which is an hour earlier than I can get back to Fountain Hills to pick up Alli. So Marcie is going to pick up Alli as well, and I'll be picking up Alli at Marcie's house. It should be interesting. Not only are we leaving Alli on Mondays with a total stranger (at this point a stranger), but I won't even be picking her up from there, you know, to get the debriefing on how the day went. I'm sure everything will be fine and I'm being a typical "new mom". It's just....different.

My Mother and Me

It's interesting the things you recall of your mother once you become a mother yourself. My mom right now says she goes to bed around 11pm. I can't believe this and I keep thinking she's just reading the clock wrong. The mom I remember always fell asleep around 9pm, so clearly my mother must be mistaken (or on drugs - just kidding) to think she can stay awake til 11pm on a nightly basis.

Now I'm realizing that my mom probably fell asleep at 9pm because of all the things she tried to pack into her day in order to raise us kids. From the time I can remember, my mother was always up and dressed before my brother and I got out of bed. Once out of our shower, she would come into our room to ask what we wanted for breakfast. Choices were always egg, waffle, oatmeal, toast… Mom would take our orders and have breakfast ready by the time we were dressed. Then it would be off to school. At night she would make sure our homework was finished, cook dinner, and then as a family we would watch some TV, sometimes getting a snack around 8:30 with dad - either a bowl of ice cream or a bowl of cereal. Mom would always announce after cleaning up the kitchen that the "kitchen was closed".

I'm understanding some of those memories more now. Because of stress from work, my milk supply is waning. In order to get enough milk for Alli, I'm getting up now at 4:30am to pump an extra bottle. Luckily, I produce enough when I'm not working to keep her at least satisfied. And if for some reason I'm short and she cries, I have supplies because of my early morning pumping sessions. During work days, I stay up after pumping so that I can get completely ready for work and log in for at least 1/2 hour before Alli wakes up. I do this for two reasons: 1) I get paid hourly and this helps increase our income slightly and 2) I am able to put in time that I really need for the job without losing time with my family.

When I finally finish dinner dishes and bottles, I just want to say "kitchen is closed", as in, "don't you dare make any more mess in this room cause I have no energy left to clean it!" Bedtime seems to be 8:30-9:00, even though dad stays up til 10 or 11 still. Periodically I stay up with him til 10 (helping with photography stuff usually). I try to keep this at a minimum, not that I don't like staying up with my husband, but I wind up grumpy and that is a worse price to pay we've found.

The last two weeks I've done really dumb things, like forget to pack Alli's solid foods in her lunch bag for Krista's. It's not that bad - we've stocked Krista's place with rice cereal, so at least she gets that. But I always look dumbfounded when I hear that I've done something so stupid and say "I'm going for the mother of the year award". It took my husband to remind me that it's the things that go unnoticed that apply to the mother of the year award, not the stupid little oversights that happen periodically. Getting up early to pump that extra bottle, cooking breakfast to make sure the kids have something healthy to eat in the morning, working while the family sleeps so as to not miss any family time, etc. Mom, I'm sorry it took me almost 40 years to realize some of the truly awesome things you did for us growing up. So here's your mother of the year award - finally.