family photos

My dear friend Joanna got back from her two year stint as a missionary and teacher in Africa in early June, a week or so after Bridgette was born.  She was kind enough to offer to take a few family photos during her short stay with her family in Bowling Green before returning to Louisville, Ky.  Joanna is a talented photographer.  These photos turned out beautiful. You can see more of her work on her personal blog, Only Snapshots.

Below is a sample of the photos that Joanna took for us.  Bridgette was about three weeks old when these were taken.

Guess What?

 

Now that I have successfully freaked a couple of people out...

Guess what? This picture is exactly one year old today! What a joyful day it was to find out that we were expecting our first child. I bought a test on my way home from work that day as I suspected from charting the day or so before that I was probably pregnant. After I found out, I quickly made this sign and laid the test result on top of it hoping that Chris would find it on the bathroom counter top sometime after he got home from work that evening. Well...I wasn't exactly patient enough to wait until he found it on his own, so I made some stupid excuse to have him go to the upstairs bathroom pretty much immediately after he got home from work that day.  It was great to see his reaction because I had been careful to not tell him what I had been suspecting for the last couple of days. We went to dinner at Mellow Mushroom that night to celebrate!

Here's a picture of Chris the day he learned he'd be a father!

I guzzled more water that night and took a second test just to be sure before I went in to have blood work done at the doctor's office later that week. 

September 18th will always be remembered as a joyful day. We are so thankful for the Lord's blessing over our family!

third month

Bridgette is already three months old! That just sounds so big to me! I want her to slow down a little bit and stay my little baby.

I thought it was about time to write a little update on her third month. She is still as sweet as can be and is showing us more and more of her little personality. She loves to talk these days. She will scream, laugh and coo all in one conversation. I think she likes to hear herself talk.  This is such a fun age.

I went back to work the week she officially hit three months old, which was three weeks ago. It's been a smooth transition, but being a working mother of an infant is exhausting sometimes. Between packing her up each morning, getting to day care, working and squeezing in pumping sessions, I don't have much time to think. I have a system down now, so that has helped. Pray for me to keep up with everything. I feel exhausted a lot of the time.

Bridgette has been on a pretty consistent schedule with eating and sleeping over the last month and a half or so. She still takes mostly catnaps during the day. She usually squeezes in one good one though. Sometimes it's in the morning, and other times it's in the afternoon. She usually sleeps for at least a few minutes between each feeding. She's eating about 6 or 7 times per day. Most days she will eat 7 times, but on the rare occasion that she eats really well during her last feeding of the night (if I can get her good and awake), usually between 8:30 p.m, and 9:30 p.m., she will sleep through her 3:00 a.m. or 4:00 a.m. feeding and only get 6 feedings that day.

Though I had her on a pretty consistent feeding schedule when I was home with her, having her at day care has her on even more of a consistent schedule. It's basically the same as when she was home with me, but it starts about an hour earlier.

Here is what she's doing right now as far as feedings:

• Sometime between 3:00 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. nurse and back down to sleep (Did I mention I'd be fine if she dropped this feeding?)
• 6:30 a.m. nurse before we leave for work/day care
• 9:30 a.m. bottle at day care
• 12:30 p.m. I leave work to nurse at day care on my lunch break
• 3:30 p.m. bottle at day care
• Sometime between 5:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. nurse
• After 6:30 p.m. she crashes for the evening until I wake her up to nurse one more time and get her ready for bed
• Sometime between 8:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. nurse for the last time of the day
• 9:30 p.m. get ready for bed, read with Daddy, CRASH!

Some special memories from this month were:

• Learning how to roll from tummy to back (about 2.5 months old) on the floor (before she could only do it on the bed).
• Fussing during a feeding sometimes if you take away the bottle or breast for time to burp.
• Exploding with spit up almost every time she burps and even up to two hours after eating.
• Visiting Daddy at his work.
• Starting at day care and getting moved to another one three weeks later because they had an opening at the one that's close to my work. So glad she finally got in to the day care that's closer! We've been on the waiting list at the new place since January. Today was her first day. It went well!
• Discovering her hands. She loves to suck and chew on those hands!
• Grabbing at toys hanging over her head with her hands AND FEET!
• Smiling at faces like crazy!
• Staring at fabric patterns.
• Talking up a storm.

We haven't had any new growth checks this month. Her next weight and height check isn't until four months, but my guess is that she's around 13 pounds. I guess we'll find out if I am close in a about two weeks.

Chris and I lucked out with such a good baby. Her last week at the first day care was last week. If they weren't so far out of the way I would have kept her there. They were wonderful to her.  The lead teacher kept telling me how sad she was that we were leaving so soon. She told me multiple times last week that she'd been working there for two years and had never had a baby as content as Bridgette. I guess we should be counting our blessings!