The return of the boobs

The little one slept from 7:30 to 4:15 AM, and damn! These things can be used as weapons! No, seriously, I'm talking about an extension of the kind of "weapon" you might be thinking they're already be used as. If a bad guy got too close to these things, I could knock him out. Imagine how safe the streets would be if every police officer was equipped with two of these babies!

The brain is a funny thing

Since getting back to work I've noticed a few strange things things about auto-typing (you know, like auto-pilot, only not).

1. I type phonetically. Instead of typing "one" I type "won".
2. When I type my password, it's almost always an old password from over a year ago, not the one I had before leaving on maternity leave.

At least I should be grateful for still typing quickly. Go me.

Boo!

I decided to write this post today because it occured to me that I can still count on one hand the number of things that have scared my baby (to the point of crying).

1. Auntie Erin's dog barked and woke Ellie up with a startle.
2. Air brakes on a shuttle bus while picking up Daddy from work.
3. Air brakes on a bus at the airport.
4. Mommy blowing her nose (I try not to take that one personally).
5. Daddy giving her a rasberry on her back (she was attacked from behind!).

I guess gone are the days where she just jumps when surprised, but doesn't actually cry. I suppose that's what happens when you start becoming aware of the fact that there is a whole world of stuff out there!

One huge step backward, 4 big steps forward

At 5 months of age, I believe that Ellie is sleeping through the night again, like she did before going to Colorado. Whoohoo! Finally!

Here's what happened:

After returning form Colorado, for two and a half weeks she would only sleep an hour at a time. Often it would be 15 minutes at a time. You try getting sleep if you have to get up every 15 minutes to put a baby back to sleep. We once got desperate and tried to let her cry it out but that lasted 2 hours! Ugh.

Finally, she got to the point where she would sleep 3 hours at a time again. Obviously this wasn't as good as the 7-9 pre-Colorado times, but it was a significant improvement.

Last night marked the 3rd night in a row that she slept 7 hours! Woohoo! Go baby, go baby! I've even been able to get a small stock-pile of milk stored because of this!

So it has taken us a month and a half to get back to where we were pre-Colorado... but even that's not true. We're ahead of pre-Colorado because of the following MAJOR accomplishments:

1. She is no longer swaddled at night.
2. She has recently been putting herself to sleep.
3. SHE NO LONGER HATES THE CAR SEAT!!!

It's still not perfect. Supposedly a baby her age should be able to sleep 10-12 hour stretches, but at this point I'm not complaining. I think we're pretty lucky to find ourselves at this point without having to do any real sleep training. Go baby, go baby! It's your birthday!

Can't we all just be friends?

This last weekend we were going to attack the 3:00 AM feeding that Ellie has gotten herself in the habit of needing. Her current schedule is: bed at 7:30, wake and feed at 12:00, wake and feed at 3:00, wake somewhere between 5:00 and 7:00. It's not nearly as nice as what it was before taking her to CO, but we're managing.

Anyway... Operation Attack 3:00 Feeding did not end up happening because we keep going back and forth on "fix the feeding first" vs "learn to put herself to sleep first". As a compromise, we ended up spending hours at the bookstore looking up our options for sleep training.

At the bookstore, we met an older lady who said that you really need to let the baby cry it out or getting them to fall asleep on their own doesn't work. She said that the book she used with her kids was great and was written by "Farber, I think". Oh yes, Dr Ferber. He's the father of the concept of "cry it out", which essentially means that you let the baby cry herself to sleep and in a couple days she learns to put herself to sleep. The theory is "more short-term tears, fewer tears in the long run."

After this lady left us, we were approached by another, younger woman. She said "I overheard you saying you were thinking of Ferberizing your baby and I wanted to plead with you not to do it. I would hate to have to cry myself to sleep thinking that no one out there cared for me." She recommended a book by Dr Sears. Oh yes, Dr Sears. He's the father of the concept of "no cry", which essentially means that you do everything in your power to prevent your baby from crying, even if it means sleeping with them or waking up every hour to feed. If this idea bothers you, then you just need an attitude adjustment.

Come on, folks!? Can't we all just get along? Just because Ferber lets his baby cry for a couple nights does not mean the baby will need counseling because his mommy and daddy didn't love him enough. Nor does it mean Sears' baby will still be sleeping in his parents' bed when he graduates and goes off to college.

Ugh. Unfortunately any book we find with a middle of the road attitude ends up lacking specific alternatives. Once again I have to realize that there are no instruction manuals for this little bundle of jiggles.


P.S. Funny thing about lady #2 was that I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt and asked her "oh, what technique did you use to get your baby to sleep through the night?" Her response was "Oh, she doesn't. She's 10 months old and still wakes every hour and sleeps with me, but at least she knows I love her." Ummm... yeah. Let's not touch that one.

An Honest Moment

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.

I love that quote. Always have and always will.

I have a friend who asked me to keep her informed on how having a baby affects my career and today I have come across a related dilemma. It's no secret that I want to move back to Colorado. I have always wanted to be close to my family and friends when I raise my children and now that I am a mother, obviously that time is approaching, if not already here.

However, as you will soon see... it's not easy leaving. Take a look at the videos I've added to the right of my blog. They are videos of the prosthetic arms that I worked on. I wish I could show you some better ones, but alas I'm sadly restricted to only what's available in the public domain (and to be honest, I was surprised to see so much because a couple of these were only presented a month ago and only in one location).

Point is this... You have to admit that a project like that is a "once in a life time" sort of thing to work on. How rewarding it is to see Jesse and Claudia move their arms like that again! It's humbling to know that I was involved in making it happen. I doubt anyone can watch those videos and blame me for extending my stay in Maryland like I have.

Yesterday the Branch Head held a meeting and talked about the upcoming projects we are going to be involved in. Many of them are extentions of the prosthetic arm (there are so many applications for this new technology!) but there are other extremely interesting projects as well. And they all fit under the "do the world good by improving the quality of life" category that makes my soul sing.

So, my friend, I must tell you that the biggest way in which having a baby is affecting my career is just that... do I choose my family or do I choose to save the world? It's a tough one. Really. I wouldn't want to have to be the one to decide. Would you?

Life as a working cow

Well, I'm starting my third week of work and I bet you're wondering what I think of being back and since it's Monday morning I will try to keep it short:

1. I miss Ellie. It is so hard for me to wait the entire 8 hours before leaving to pick her up again. I doubt this surprises anyone.

2. Pumping bites. I'm pumping every hour or two. How am I supposed to get anything done with a schedule like that? I can see why a lot of working moms give up breast feeding. I feel like the only thing I've accomplished at work is pumping 15 oz every day. Moo.

3. I think daycare is good for Ellie because, in general, she's been a lot easier to get to smile since starting daycare. So yay!

4. It's very apparent that I have already lost a good portion of my adult vocabulary. When I talk to Ellie, she doesn't care what I say. Heck, she doesn't even care if I say real words, just as long as the sound that comes out is entertaining. This method doesn't work so well when conversing with coworkers.

5. I'm bored. Things are slow at work and I haven't gotten any real project to work on yet. Do you realize how long the day is when you're bored?

6. It's too bad there isn't a sleep budget I can charge to when I'm feeling exhausted from dealing with a baby that doesn't sleep nearly as well as I know she's capable of.

7. I was hoping to make it to 10 things on this list, but like I said, it's Monday morning and I have a baby who doesn't sleep like I know she's capable of. Give me a break.

She ain't a farm girl

I thought that Ellie was getting tired of the limited number of songs I know the words to. She should count herself lucky that I know 5 songs! Please don't remind me that three of them of the same melody (Twinkle Twinkle, Bah Bah Black Sheep, and ABC's) because as long as the words are different, dammit, they count!

Anyway... because I'm sure there is a limited amount of time before she realizes that ABCs doesn't really contain words, I figured I'd try to expand my playlist when, with delight, I realized that I knew the words to Old McDonald!

Sadly, though, Ellie hates Old McDonald. She hates his farm. She hates his cows and their moo moos here. She hates his sheep and their baa baas there. And here a cluck and there a quack, yep she hates them too. She even hates the pigs and their oink oinks everywhere.

Bummer. I do think, though, that I should still get credit for knowing the lyrics!

Boob update

I'm not sure when it happened, but I noticed the other night that I was sleeping on my stomach! You don't understand. Let me repeat myself. I was sleeping on my stomach! I wasn't even doing anything to prop myself up to take the pressure off my chest. I was completely sleeping on my stomach. WOW! I thought the day would never come and it turns out it came and went and I didn't notice when. Go figure.

Princess Ellie

This last weekend we went to the Renaissance Festival, which is something I always enjoy doing every year. At the festival, an elf sneezed on Ellie and I swear we're still trying to get the green glitter out of her hair. I'm hoping she plans on wearing green to her senior prom!

We were also told that it only takes 10 minutes to cast a baby's butt. We're putting that one on the list of things we don't need to ever hear again.

But when all is said and done, of course I had to make Ellie into a princess and get great pictures of her. Look how cute she is! Oh my god! I have a cute baby!