Sitting Up

Judith is no longer content to just sit back in her bouncy seat or her car seat, or even on my lap when I hold her facing out. She wants to sit up. (I tried to get a picture of it - but it looks like her head's on that diaper...really it's all air between her head and the chair!) I don't know whether it's that she wants to look around more, or if she's just trying to get closer to her fingers (often she'll sit back again once she gets them in her mouth). Either way, she's definitely growing and building those muscles! She'll be sitting up on her own before I know it.

Thumb!

As this picture clearly shows, this morning Judith managed to get her thumb all by itself into her mouth! So far she's only been chewing on her knuckles. All day she's been avidly sucking on fingers (both hands interchangeably). When she's not trying to sleep, she'll push the pacifier out of her mouth in favor of her fingers; however, at nap time she seems to prefer the pacifier.

A little cold

I mean the title in more ways than one.

First, Judith has had her first sniffle. She was so stuffed up that she could hardly breathe :-(. When she ate, she'd take a big gulp of air and then suck really hard for a few seconds and take another big gulp of air. It was both funny and sad at the same time! The hospital gave us a bulb syringe when she was born, but it's too big to fit in her nose (we were supposed to suck out her spit with it) so Lance went out and bought a smaller bulb syringe as well as some normal saline, and we were able to help her. It was a challenge, though, to get the saline actually in her nose...and then Lance got to have fun sucking out the result.

Second, it's also finally cooled off in Sacramento (well, it's 70 degrees in the house when we get up), and the first time I got Judith up at that temperature, her little hands were icy. So we're making sure to dress her a little more warmly before bed, and we're contemplating putting her in the blanket sleeper (the issue is that it has a hood, and I'm afraid she'll just fill up the hood with spit!). She kicks off any blanket we try to put over her legs.

Zebra!

Here's Judith in her bouncy chair - a gift from our friends Debbie and Merrill. She has always enjoyed sitting in the seat, but the few times that we've attached the animal bar, she hasn't really even noticed them. Yesterday that changed! She sat and talked at the animals - mostly the zebra - for about 10 minutes. Fortunately, I managed to get it on film, because after the 10 minutes, she was DONE with those animals. Lance said she enjoyed looking at them several hours later as well. It's very fun to see her really noticing things now.

She has also, in the last day, begun to notice us (Lance and me). Until now, she hasn't really cared one way or another if we were in her line of vision. She just stared at whatever. Today she actually watched me walk away every time I left her in her chair for a minute, or in her crib for a nap, and as soon as she couldn't see me any more, she let me know. And when she's crying in her crib, she would stop as soon as she saw me and coo - as if to say "see, I'm good if you're here!" We'll see how long it takes before she figures out that spitting the pacifier out makes me come and starts doing deliberately.

Giggles!

Today, for the first time, Judith giggled at me! And I'm pretty sure I wasn't imagining it either. She has, in the last day, begun to smile at me if I smile at her, and today I was laughing as I approached her (she had dropped her pacifier but it was right next to her mouth and she was trying to get it back in) and she giggled three little giggles back at me. Amazing.

Fingers

Although she hasn't quite mastered the art of keeping them there, Judith has begun to find her mouth with her fingers - or rather, her fist. She will get her fist to her mouth suck (quite loudly) for a few seconds, and then her arm will move, and she'll lose the fist...and this is repeated frequently. With both fists.

She actually prefers her fingers to her pacifier, and will knock the pacifier out of her mouth because she's trying to get her knuckle in there instead. Unfortunately, since (as previously mentioned) she can't keep her fist, she'll get desperate for the pacifier, which we'll give her--and the whole process will start all over. I am anxiously awaiting the day when her fingers stay in her mouth!

less rough

So, it's been a couple days, because Judith's been having a rough time. Yesterday, after her 9:00 a.m. feeding she didn't sleep for longer than 30 minutes at a time until we put her down for the night at 10:00 p.m. I'm really hoping that that's just a side-effect of the vaccinations still, and that she'll be a little less discombobulated today. Because she wasn't "happy to be up" when she wasn't sleeping - she was fussy for most of the day, and obviously so tired and yet not able to sleep. Something kept startling her awake and instead of going back to sleep, as she normally does, she'd want to be up and held instead. So yes, I'm sincerely hoping that today is different...I don't mind her being awake more, if she's willing to sit in her seat occasionally, but if she's going to cry for most of the day again...

She has still be sleeping for 8 hours at night - followed by a 10 minute feeding and at least 2.5 more hours. But on Tuesday night, her 8 hours started at 7:30 p.m., and Wednesday night started at 8:30. That meant a middle-of-the night feeding for me for both those nights, and since I didn't go to bed at 7:30, it was a pretty short night. By God's grace, last night she was finally "back on schedule" and I slept pretty well. So I shouldn't be quite as desperate for her to sleep today.