This past week was rough. It started out fine and dandy with a visit from Grandma and Auntie on Sunday. Auntie had baby practice - she observed the changing of a diaper AND fed Ellie her dinner! She did a great job - soon she will be all ready to babysit :-)
The first few days of the week were blissfully boring. I accomplished things around the house and felt like we were falling into a solid routine. It was great. Then on Wednesday, something strange happened. I've really been craving sweets recently. Actually, my cravings are SO much worse now that I'm done being pregnant. Anyway, I had a box mix for a coffee cake sitting in the cupboard that I decided to make during Ellie's afternoon nap. She had been in a really great groove of sleeping for at least an hour and a half at a time during the day, so I figured I had plenty of time to throw the ingredients together and let it bake for 30 minutes. Then, she woke up 45 minutes early - 15 minutes before the cake needed to come out of the oven. I was able to put her off until the cake was done (I figured it was better than letting the cake burn!) and thought nothing of it. She woke up early for her next feeding too. And the one after that. Before the next morning, she was only sleeping for 45 minutes in between feedings. Hello, growth spurt.
This went on all day Thursday. She would eat for an hour (yes, an hour straight) and then sleep for an hour. It seemed like by the time I would get her put down, I would have just enough time to go to the bathroom and get a drink, and she would be up and crying again. I know everyone says that when she sleeps, I should sleep, but when the intervals are that small, it just really isn't worth it. Plus, I swear she's some kind of psychic. Every time I go to lay down (or pick up the phone or eat a meal), she decides she's hungry. Every. Single. Time. But then as soon as I throw off the covers and heave myself out of bed, she settles back down. So I lay back down, and guess what. Fussing and crying.
So anyway, I think she's working her way out of this growth spurt craziness now. Thursday night I actually got two stretches of two hours of sleep, which actually made me feel more tired. Then during the day Friday, she was still eating for an hour, but she was sleeping for an hour and a half or two hours. Still not quite enough to get a good nap in (although I tried!), but still enough to allow me to do things like eat and wash a load of laundry. I'm still trying to recover from the lack of restful sleep, but I think we're settling back into our nice little routine.
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| Catching up on some zzz's on Saturday morning |
On the sunny side, we tried another tub bath on Thursday night (we did sponge baths for several days after the last tub bath catastrophe) and it went GREAT! It's hard to say whether she liked it because she hasn't really started smiling and things yet, but she certainly didn't HATE it like the last time! There was no fussing and no crying at all. She didn't even poop in the bath water! I was so proud :-)
So because of how difficult this week was, I didn't take many pictures. I know, I should take pictures every day because she grows so quickly and some day I will look back and say 'what happened to week number four?' but I just couldn't do it. This was just one of those weeks that I wanted to throw in the towel. I think it was just the sheer exhaustion (and probably the crying wearing me down, too), but it still got pretty bad. Time for some honesty here: I might have raised my voice a little bit when I was begging her to stop crying. That's not something I'm proud of, but it happens to everyone, I think, so there's no use trying to hide or deny it. We both got through it and, luckily, she won't remember any of this! I'll do better next time, I promise :-)
The good news is that my mom came to visit on Saturday and we went out shopping for a little bit and left Ellie at home with Andy and my dad for a bit. It was so nice to just be out and not have to worry so much about every little thing. I am so glad that Andy is so good with her that I can feel confident leaving them at home alone.
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| Wearing the first dress that Grandma bought after she found out 'it's a girl!' |
The best news is that I was able to wear non-maternity jeans for the first time in months! Granted, they were a size bigger than what I wore before I got pregnant, but I bought them (at a thrift store) for the specific purpose of delaying the onset of maternity clothes, so I'm still happy with it! I think starting this week, I will try to get back into a routine of doing yoga (along with a dvd that I have) every day. I know, I should still be resting when Ellie is resting, but I feel like I need to start doing SOMETHING, so 15 minutes of yoga instead of napping won't kill me. It might actually help me feel a little better! That's what I'm hoping for, at least.
And I also got a fun new hair cut this week. MUCH shorter, which equals much easier to take care of! I didn't want to fall into that cliche of getting all my hair hacked off after having a baby, but oh well. I just couldn't take it any more. So far I'm enjoying it, and that's really all that matters :-)
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