12 weeks and going back to work!

Gabriella is 12 weeks today and our little girl is growing by leaps and bounds. She is such a happy baby and really brings so much joy to our lives. She is squealing with delight and constantly smiling. She's become somewhat of a crappy napper....she likes to only nap for about 25 min at a time, but we're working on it. I think we have a new bed time routine that is working well for us. Usually Gabriella would get her 2nd to last bottle, then a little playtime, then bath, nap, last bottle, bed. However, Gabriella is always super hyper and active after she eats. So, I have started to give her a bath about 30 min after her 2nd to last bottle so that she gets sleeps about 30 min later. Then I swaddle her and put her in her crib like its bed time. I let her sleep for about 25-30 min (just shy of when she would wake up on her own) and then wake her in her crib and do a no nonsense nighttime style feeding in her own room. After I feed her, I change her if needed, if not she gets wrapped right back up. I've tried this the past 2 nights and its worked pretty well. She'll wake up and spit out her paci 3 or 4 times within the 1st 30 min, so I have to be close since she'll start to cry, but otherwise its working well. Friday night she slept from 9 till 7 (with the last feed around 9.30) and last night she slept from 9 (feeding at 9.45) till 8.30!

While I am bummed to leave her, I know I can't stay home. So, I am actually kinda excited to go back to work...get dressed nice, actually wash my face, do my hair, etc. Tomorrow is my 1st day back. We have some exciting stuff coming up in September. My sister is visting us for a week on her way back from Europe before she goes home to CA. That'll be on the 10th. Then, on the 18th Chris' brother and fam, including Gabriella's adorable 5 month old cousin will be visiting.

I leave you with some recent pics of my cutie :)

10 weeks old!

OMG, I'm gonna say it again. Time is flying by and I have left my blog in the dust when it comes to updates. I somehow always manage to do other things while she naps and never get around to updating.

The latest and greatest, Gabriella is doing great. She had her 2 month check up last week and was 12 lbs 5 oz (90th percentile), 22.5 inches long (50th percentile). Now the length measurement at the pedi's is different than the one they used at the hospital so while it seems that she's only grown 2 inches, she's really grown 3 since the 1st pedi's visit they clocked her on their scale at about 19.5. So, anywho....Gabriella has reflux and is on Zantac for it. We're still on the fence about whether or not its helping her. She's been on it for almost 3 weeks and if we don't see more of an improvement, we'll switch to Prilosec. Basically what happens with her, in addition to her spitting up, is that she cries for more food after she spits up, but not b/c she's still hungry, rather to kill the heartburn. You might wonder how we came to this conclusion, well after many episodes of eat, spit up, cry, eat, spit up and some research on my part, I took my concerns to the pedi. She also sometimes arches her back during and after feedings and will also sometimes cry prior to and after spitting up after much time has elapsed since her feeding. On a good note though, she loves to smile and makes all sorts of adorable little noises like "Gaa!"

We have days where I just cry right along with her, but we get through it. I'm thinking about adding rice cereal in soon to see if perhaps thickening up her milk will help her keep stuff down and not trigger the burn.

I go back to work on the 31st and I am totally torn about it. While I love love LOVE my little girl, I am so F-ing stir crazy. Sure I take her places when I want to get out of the house, but with her temperment when her reflux is bothering her, I try to work around her schedule as best as I can. I am looking forward to going back to work, but I'm not looking forward to being away from Gabriella. I think an ideal situation would be for me to work part-time but that's really not an option at this point in time.

In terms of my continued post partum recovery, things are going well. I've got about 10-15 lbs left to lose to get to my pre pregnancy weight. While that's great considering I gained almost 50 lbs, it still leaves me some new clothes to buy for work...which on the one hand is fun b/c I get to go shopping and on the other hand sucks b/c I know I'll be back to my pre preg size soon and won't be able to wear those clothes (I'm mainly sticking to pants). I am still pumping, which I have to say, I'm pretty proud of myself for. My Lansinoh crapped out on me 2 weeks ago and I decided to invest in the Medela pump in style and WOW what a difference! Like night and day. B/c of the investment, I decided to pump until Gabriella is at least 4 months. That's my goal. If I hadn't bought the pump I would have likely just started her on all formula.

I will try to be better about updating, I promise!

Here are some newer pics :)

Where has the time gone?!

I'm such a slacker! Its been almost a whole month since my last post. Sorry for the lack of updates.

We are all doing really well. Gabriella is 6 1/2 weeks old. I can't believe it. She is getting so big. We were at the pedi's a week ago and she was 10 lbs 10 oz and I guarantee that she's 11 lbs by now. The girl LOVES to eat. She takes 4 oz every feeding and sometimes even wants more. She's becoming more and more alert each day and I love her so much. She just started really smiling the other day and totally melted my heart. I can't wait to capture it on camera.

The lack of updates was really due to the fact that my mom was here with me for 3 weeks and I didn't want to spend any extended amount of time on the comp. It was such a wonderful time. I was such a wreck when she left the other day. I pretty much cried all day. I miss her so much and so does Gabriella; I just know it.

Now its back to just us and our days are filled with singing and playing on the playmat, spit up, explosive poop and all sorts of other fun stuff. Poor Leo even got spit up on the other day! I went for my 6 week post partum check up the other day and all is well with me. Although the doc told me I couldn't go on the pill or do an IUD since I'm EPing (exclusively pumping), I'm going to ask about the mini pill.

We have our 2 month check up on 8/5 and I can't wait to see how big she'll be by then.

Here's my precious girl 2 days ago:

Gabriella in pictures

Some baby product reviews

We got a ton of stuff from our baby shower and I thought it would be helpful to other soon to be mommies for me to review what we use and don't use out of popular baby items. I've seen this on other blogs and have gotten a lot of great advice.

Boppy pillow - great for bottle feeding or support for holding the baby. Not good for breastfeeding; you need more support and will end up using extra pillows or hurting your wrist (like me) from holding the baby up. I'm sure the Boppy will be great later for tummy time.

My Brest Friend pillow - good for breastfeeding (obviously), but depending on where you feed the baby, you may need extra pillows as well

Itzbeen timer - OMG a lifesaver! Walking around like a zombie makes for absolutely zero comprehension of time whatsoever. This timer allows me to track feedings, diaper changes, sleep, and I use it for tracking when I last pumped.

SwaddleMe - awesome product. I wrap Gabriella in when we go to bed and she consistently sleeps a good 2.5-4 hours in it. We have an organic cotton one and Chris had bought a bamboo one as well. Caution about the bamboo one--the fabric is so soft that is stretches out easily...allowing for arms to get out and consequently causing the baby to wake up.

Boppy Vine Swing - although we only just started using it, Gabriella loves it. It has the perfect recline for her and I love the automated weight adjustment for swing speed. Many of the other swings out there went too fast on their lowest setting, but this one is perfect.

Moby wrap - I got Gabriella in this the other day, kind've. I need to master the wrapping of it a little bit better...but I will say that the few minutes she spent in it, she seemed to enjoy.

Sleep Sheep sound machine - awesome awesome awesome. I think Chris and I sleep better b/c of this too since Gabriella is still in our room.

My new favorite picture

Cheeks

Um yeah, I want to SQUEEZE her