Why I Love Mah Honey-Man ~ Reason 75

Because he loves our lil' Jellybean so much, but he's also honest about his own needs just the same.

Our lil' Jellybean's preschool always closes for our 'spring break,' which would be FABULOUS if we didn't both have to work throughout the entire length of spring break, but we do both have to work. 

And so, for the past 3 years now, every 'spring break' has always been more of a difficulty than anything truly fun or relaxing like a 'break' or vacation; us having to juggle our two work schedules, me taking a couple days leave time off from work despite the need to work, me bringing her to my office for a morning and/or an afternoon, passing our lil' Jellybean over to willing and able friends, hiring a babysitter for a day or two, and my honey-man often staying home with the girlie, thereby, unable to get any work done. It's always a bit challenging and we do get it done, but by the break's end, we're utterly exhausted and so is she.

She returned to school this morning and after my honey-man had dropped her off, he called me... 

Taking her to her classroom and seeing her teacher, he said he was nearly brought to tears.  At first I totally misunderstood him - - ahhh, how sweet, her daddy sad to return his little girl to school.

And then he continued....

He's finally going to have a full, productive day at work for the first time in over a week!

Be Forwarned... I feel a MASSIVE post coming on...

So much has happened over the last 6 months - - things I wish I'd written about sooner. And the last 3 months, those have been especially busy... I'll be making a last ditch effort very soon to write up as much as I can, yes, very soon (promise!).

Day 14: Two Weeks Outta dah Womb

As of last Thursday (or does one count from the first full day after the birth, in which case, Friday?), our baby sweet potato girl is two weeks old!?! and I cannot believe it. Where does the time go? I kid you not, we were in the hospital only yesterday! The days just FLY BY now, more than ever before. The concept of time hardly exists. I can only measure the days by checking against the dates on the photos I take, oh, and having a calendar handy is essential now, speaking of which, today is Monday - ?!? oh yeah, that makes sense... was Easter Sunday just yesterday.

I now spend my days staring at mah baby girlie in total awe of her. I feed her every 2 to 4 hours (or every 5 hrs at night), and we change her diapers [BRAVO TO MAH HONEY-MAN, who dutifully changes diapers without a word of complaint! He VOLUNTEERS to do so! Bless him!], and we give her a bath, and we swaddle her, and we help her fall asleep when she needs our help... and we talk to her, and we sing to her, and we baby-talk her to death as well... and we stare at her... oh, do we stare at her, gaze at her, adore her. And we thank our lucky stars that she is whole and healthy, and she is eating (what a lil' piglet!) and sleeping so well, and she's growing like a lil' weed and changing by the hour!! We feel so blessed and fortunate to have her. I tear up at least once a day, so grateful for such a miraculous and wonderful, precious lil' gift.

This here is my honey-man's favorite onesie for her to wear, although the kid's got nearly enough clothes to last her a month without wearing anything twice!

At her 2nd peds appointment for her two weeks check up and weigh in - - She'd grown a 1/2 inch in that last week and she put on 2.5 more ounces. I love her lil' chinny chopper in this shot! She was just about to do a big 'both-arms-above-the-head' stretch here.

Trying out the 'Snug n' Tug' swaddler ~ and she's snug as a bug!
(Where does that expression come from? - anyone know?)

Really wish this was in sharper focus...

Day 13: What a Good Girl, She Is

I love how she'll lounge awake in the Boppy, just chillin' out ~

Off to the OB with mommie and daddy (where she had everyone's attention in the waiting room), to take care of mommie's NASTY allergic reaction to the icky glue used for the steri-strips placed over her c-section incision... [NASTY is short for: Itchy, totally on fire, red, swollen and peeling!] Once the strips were removed, the area oozed for 2 days. Nyce, eh? Yeah, just had to share that last lovely detail with ya'll! I'd post pictures for you (and you know I have them), buhht that's a bit much... plus they're plain NASTY!

Most of these photos taken in this way never work out so good, but I have a ton of 'em and this is the best one yet! And yes, my boobs are ENORMOUS now = I'm a living, breathing dairy walking upright on two legs!

More digicam admiration for the tinsy toes!

Our lil' jelly bean~

Day 12: Poochie Lips, Tinsy Toesies & Binky Action

I'm absolutely smitten: I love her lil' smootchie poochie lips and all her lil' tinsy toesies just kill me... and I adore her button-like chinny chopper, and her lil' nosey, and the furrow above her nosey too, and her lil' fuzzy head, and her tiny earlobes, and, and...and... I LOVE HER!

And after taking this picture, I accidentally nibbled off a chunk of her left cheeky...

Her daddy does a fabulous swaddle and great 'jello head'... gets her fast to sleep!

I've eaten each of her toesies several times over...

I'll hafta post a video of her binky sucking in action... it's adorable, the motion and the sounds.

She's soooo NOT a fussy baby at all. She'll lay there and just stare and watch and stare and coo.

Day 11: Sent From Heaven

Most of this day's pictures feature our baby sweet potato girl with either her daddy or an extended member of my mum's family... or a kitty cat (some of those were already posted a couple days ago), but I'll give ya this one:

She reminds me of some lil' cartoon character here...

I spent a lot of time that day thinking about my mum, missing her, wishing she were here to enjoy this lil' baby of ours, imaging how she would be. Since our baby girlie's birth, I've found myself wondering each day, throughout each day, whether or not my mum would like what I'm doing, what I'm trying to accomplish. So far, despite fleeting bouts of insecurity and hormonal imbalances, I feel I'm not doing a bad job, overall. And my mum? I think she'd be pleased and proud, pretty sure.

Day 10: Again! Again! Again?

I don't know what happened this day, but we have a number of repetitive photos taken, trying to get certain shots, taken again and again, but sadly, very few of them are in focus.

I woke up, looked down, immediately reached for and grabbed my camera with my free left hand, and did a 'point and shoot' from above, and all before budging anything but my left hand to grab and point the camera. This is what I woke up to that morning...

She's out cold here...

My lil' uber cutie patootie...

I have NO idea how this was even remotely comfortable for her...
We tried the sling that day for the first time, and for the first couple minutes, you'd of thought I was killing her (I was about ready to throw the thing in the trash), but once I stood up, she shut up and conked right out.

Day Nine: Doin' Just Fine

Okay, so these pictures are from her 9th day of life, but the following commentary relates to her first 12 days of life thus far...

I wouldn't dare call it a routine just yet, but over the last several nights in a row a definite pattern has developed ~ Our baby sweet potato girl has her final din-din of the night between 10 and 11 pm, and then she wakes for her middle-of-the-night snacktime between 3 and 4 am, after which she sleeps some more, usually until 7 am, but she could be up anytime between 6 and 8 am, ready and raring to go, ravenous for breakfast. She's become predictable enough that I can set an alarm for her feedings on my Itzbeen, so I can prepare myself and be all right and ready to meet her needs well before she has to get upset and cry. [SEMI-RELATED TANGENT: Do you know what an Itzbeen is? Oh. My. Goodness. Can I tell you just how much I AM SOOOOO IN LOVE WITH MY ITZBEEN!?! For an uber organization nerd like me, the Itzbeen sings to my heart! I can track how long ago we changed her last diaper; I can clock the duration of her feedings and the time since her last feeding came to an end; I can keep track of which side -as in right or left- I last fed her on; I can also track when I'm to take my meds; I can set either audible or silent visual alarms to go off whenever something is due to happen; I can read it in the dark; and I can actually use it like a quick flashlight, like when I'm trying to locate a misplaced breastfeeding bra pad in the middle of the night. I could go on and on... but I won't. I can't say enough about the Itzbeen - - although, I'm certain I could write an entire lengthy post about nothing but the Itzbeen, but I won't (I've come close enough to it anyhow). END OF TANGENT.] So yeah, so far she's been really easy. I'd expected things to be more difficult than they've been, honestly... oh yes, breastfeeding details to come later! Oh and I'm sure you're just dying to hear all about that!

I took this picture at nearly three in the morning, just before waking her to eat...

She slept in past 7:30 am

I love it when she yawns -- ya may have noticed this ain't the first pic to feature my baby yawning!

My lil' pixie

About to head off to her first social gathering in order to meet several visiting members of my mum's extended family, all staying at Aunt Radeane's

Day Eight: Ain't She Grrreat!

Her first peds appointment! And she was a total angel - didn't even cry once.

She regained all but one ounce of her 13 ounces lost since her time in the hospital, post-birth

2nd bathtime at home...

All clean n' cozy, and deliciously cute!

Day Seven: Cute Lil' Mug

My guess is that only me - -an uber biased mommie, and a new one at that- - would find this so greatly amusing, but I really love watching my baby girl's subtle and not-so-subtle expression changes:

Day Six: Hanging with Great Grams

Although the day wound up going as smoothly as it possibly could have, we had my Grams, who'd been in town since Sunday, March 15th, come over for the day to help me out and keep me company while my honey-man returned to a full day's work for the first time since our baby girl's birth.

We lounged around and chit chatted most of the morning away, and then Grams made tuna salad sandwiches for our lunch, and we watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which my Gram's had never seen before and she really enjoyed it. And at one point, Grams held the sleeping baby girlie on her lap for nearly 2 hours straight... while we both had an afternoon nap as well. Grams also prepped a number of our fresh produce items in the fridge for us [She chopped and washed a head of romaine, cleaned and cut up two celery hearts, and washed and dried a bag of red grapes], and she made a ground turkey and vegetable soup for our dinner that night. It was really wonderful to have her with me and we really enjoyed our time together with zee cutie baybee doll.

Just hangin' out for a couple hours in her travel bassinet, swaddled and blinking, wide awake!I have nearly a couple dozen pictures of her laying like this propped in the Boppy while wearing this cute outfit, all of them basically the same, except a different expression on her face in each one

I have a number of these pictures as well with her swaddled and lying on a pillow and varying degrees of 'so peaceful and serene' shown upon her lil' mug.Grams has herself a mouthful of sugar cookie in this pic... one of those yummy "Cookies By Design" cookies!

Grams left Vegas just this morning to head back to Bear Lake, and I'm really pleased that she was here for our lil' juli-bean's birth, and to spend so much time with us. I really enjoyed our time together. We love you, Grams!

Day Five: Bathtime at Home

Her fifth day of life on this earth was her first full day spent at home...

And her 5th day ended with a bath!
This video is a bit all over the place (I was watching her more so than the camera's aim), but it's what I have:

Thanks to Rob & Lisa for this lil' newborn outfit!

Post-bathtime: Clean and cozy-warm, well fed and well swaddled and sound asleep. She didn't wake again until her middle-of-the-night 3am mealtime.