Thanksgiving

This year, I am so thankful for my beautiful baby Susannah, my wonderful and hardworking partner Charles, my support network of friends and extended family, and of course my ever supportive first baby, Samadhi the cat. I am also thankful that we live in beautiful Vermont, such a wholesome and healthy place to raise a child.


Standing in our new house!


With some of the friends we've made at our baby group at the nearby Waldorf school.


View from the window of our new home.

Sleeping and Eating Issues

So as I mentioned, Susannah's sleep fell apart when she was around 3 months old. Before that, she was regularly sleeping 8-9 hours through the night. After her sleep fell apart, she was waking up 6-8 times a night to eat. At first I thought she had developed sleep issues, but then I realized she was actually hungry most of those times. She is pretty big for her age and super active, spends the day rolling all over the place. Plus I am away at work 3 days a week and haven't been able to pump enough to allow her to have much extra breast milk during the day. I was barely keeping up with pumping (despite drinking Mothers Milk tea and trying More Milk herbal supplement) and breastfeeding on demand 4 days a week. I was struggling with what to do, given the recommendations to exclusively breastfeed for 6 months. Theoretically I could do this, but she would be up all night eating and I would need to spend all my spare time pumping on the days I am home. I was going crazy from lack of sleep and this is just not a solution I could sustain. In fact, I feel like my stress and exhaustion were contributing to lower my milk supply.

I began researching formula and had the Vermont Organics cows milk brand recommended both by my naturopathic doctor and several friends. It is sold at Hannafords and I believe on Diapers.com. I was then lucky to find a local mom who was willing to share her extra frozen breastmilk. I also hemmed and hawed about starting her on solids. We started bananas this week and she loves them, ate half a banana yesterday. Now I am able to nurse her in the evenings, then give her a bottle of my friend's breast milk and some banana to top her off. She is sleeping so much better already and is only waking up 2 or 3 times a night rather than every hour.

It was really hard for me to admit that she wasn't getting enough from my breast milk alone, not to mention get over my guilt for not wanting to breastfeed her all night long or pump around the clock. But I was a shell of myself and barely able to function at home or work, bursting into tears from lack of sleep. Now we are all happier and sleeping better despite not following LLL recommendations to the letter.

See, Susannah is having fun with bananas!

Highlight Reel

I can't resist posting some highlights of Susannah's cuteness. Her smiles are infectious and we spend lots of time trying to capture them on film.

Framing the House

This really deserves more than one post, but Charles has been doing an amazing amount of work framing up the house since I last blogged about it. It's really exciting to watch it start to look like a real house. Scroll down fast - it's like a flip book!

New Skills

Susannah has really had an explosion of new skills in the past month. She is rolling over both ways, holding her hands and feet, looking in the mirror, and grasping things.

I took a video of her rolling over - click on the picture and it will take you to a new site to watch:

From October 2010

Falling Behind (at blog and life)

I have fallen woefully behind at updating this blog. I have a good excuse though. I went back to work on October 11th, and life got significantly more hectic. Also, Susannah's sleep regressed a lot right around the same time, when she was about 3 months old, so we've been operating on VERY little sleep for the past couple of months.

Still, we managed to have a lot of fun adventures in October. Susannah met her cousin Rowan:


Went to visit friends in Charlotte, Vt:

From October 2010

Climbed Mt. Philo:


Met her visiting relatives:


Explored a big field on a crisp fall day:


AND was a reluctant lobster for Halloween:

Welcome, Rowan!

My cousin Hilary & her husband Noah welcomed their baby Rowan on Friday. He's happy, healthy, and has a nice shock of brown hair. Welcome to the world, dear baby! Hilary and I were born 3 months apart and grew up together. It's amazing that our babies were also born 3 months apart in the same birthing center, and will be able to grow up together too! Susannah is thrilled about her new playmate.

Susannah, Charles, and I got to meet him yesterday for the first time. It was incredible to see how much bigger Susannah is compared to a newborn. We see her every day so we don't notice the growth, but she is hard at work growing fast. She's still eating like a horse to fuel all that growing.

I haven't downloaded the pictures of Rowan yet, so here's a gratuitous picture of Susannah in her new legwarmers, arms a-whirring as usual:

Construction Supervisor

Susannah decided to supervisor installation of the first floor:


We've been getting lots of lumber deliveries, and Charles is pretty much done framing up the rafters and decking for the first floor.



I'm getting very excited to watch the walls go up next.

Baby's First Trip

Susannah and I returned from a week-long trip to Massachusetts. We left Charles at home to frame up the house in peace and rented a house in Ipswich near the beach.

We had wonderful trips to the beach and got to see a lot of dear friends. We spent a lot of time at Crane Beach breathing in the salty air and playing on the sandbars at low tide. Susannah even got to dip her toes into the ocean for the first time! She curled up her legs at the last minute and I ended up dunking her bum instead. Oops!



On the down side, both of us got colds, I got food poisoning, and we were attacked by ticks while lounging on the lawn. Still, all in all it was a really nice week. Susannah enjoyed meeting lots of new friends. She's very alert now and no longer seems like a newborn. She's at least 12 pounds now and 24 inches long. She's gained 3.5 inches since birth! She has also (knock wood) been sleeping through the night most nights, about 7-9 hours straight. Here's hoping that continues, because it's really helping us reclaim our sanity and ability to do higher-lever reasoning.

Hanging out with Alicia and Z:


And auntie Beth:


Z loved meeting Susannah:


We also spent time in Rockport:


Susannah really enjoyed spending time with her grandparents too:




Crane Beach is really beautiful:

Two Months Old

Sunny is growing so fast now. She's up to 11 lbs 10 oz and somewhere between 23 and 24.5 inches long, depending on which measurement you trust. That puts her in about the 75th percentile for her age. She's developing really well so far. She does a lot of social smiling, can hold her head up very well, and is even starting to roll over. It's way early to be rolling over so it's possible the times she's done it so far were a fluke. It's really fun to be getting to know her personality, which so far seems to be happy and energetic. She flails her little arms and legs around constantly, even while breastfeeding.

We've enjoyed some great visits with family and friends over the past few weeks. Her aunt, uncle, and cousins came up from New Jersey over Labor Day weekend, and we had so much fun with them. We explored Stowe and the Montpelier farmer's market. I also gained confidence taking her out to eat in restaurants. I figured out that if I walk around with her, she will fall asleep in the Moby wrap and sleep through dinner! We had a great meal at Frida's in Stowe.


Little Robin was excited to meet Sunny:


And we had fun at the farmer's market hanging out with her future friends that are still in their mommies' bellies:


All that activity tuckered her right out:

The Foundation is Finished!

Charles has finally finished the foundation! It is superinsulated to R-30 and consists of ICFs (insulated concrete forms) plus 2 inches of foam board on the exterior. It has bituthene waterproofing below grade and will eventually have structural skin above grade down to 6 inches below.

Charles was a busy bee doing a lot of earth-moving equipment work, which is hard on his back.


Finishing the last bit of fill:


Now onto framing! Charles ordered lumber today. I'm excited to see the house begin to really take shape.

Starting to Smile

It's so awesome that Sunny is starting to smile! It just melts a mommy's heart. She really holds our gaze now and is so alert. She will also sometimes stick her tongue out at me in response to me sticking my tongue out at her.

New Adventures with Sunny

Susannah is 6 weeks old now and growing so fast! She now weighs in at 10 lbs 14 oz (clothed) and she's getting big for her age. She's so much more alert and active. She likes to lay on her back and look all around her, and she is making good eye contact with us now. When we put her on her belly, she pushes so hard with her little feet. I think she'll be crawling before we know it!



We're having so much fun with her. We're getting out on some good walks almost every day. Sunny loves being outside and gazing at the trees.





She's also making some new friends.



She's been a little bit cranky and gassy recently, which is apparently normal for around 6 weeks old. But holding her like this can usually calm her down.



It also helps that I've been getting back into yoga. I'm trying to get to one class a week, plus the post-partum class. Sunny comes to that one with me, and the wonderful teacher Elizabeth will hold her if she's cranky so that I can do some poses. It takes a village, right?