Birthday

Today is my 33rd birthday. Lance "helped" Judith to make me a card! He said he put the pen in her hand (like all infants, she has a phenomenal grip) and held the paper up. It was while she was trying like mad to get her thumb in her mouth, so she moved her hand all over and made quite the picture...although Lance did have to sign her initials for her. Beautiful!

If you had asked me a year ago, on my 32nd birthday, if I thought I'd have a child by my next birthday, I'd have said not only was it extremely unlikely, it was also quite cruel of you to bring up such a painful subject (and on my birthday no less!). And now, a year later, God's faithfulness and grace, and my husband's courageous faith have given me more than I could ever have dreamed of. Happy Birthday to me!

sleeping

After her growth spurt, Judith's sleep patterns have been all messed up. She still goes 8 hours between feedings, but she's now almost impossible to wake at 10:00 p.m. for the last feeding, so, instead, she sleeps 8-4 or 9-5. Given that she usually goes right back to sleep for three hours after her first feeding of the morning, that's not so bad - except that I don't go to sleep at 8 or 9, and my body had finally adjusted to her old schedule...and now everything's 1-2 hours off from that. It's extremely frustrating for someone who really likes to stick to a schedule! But yes, I know, babies are unpredictable, and God's teaching me to loosen up. I just pray for naps.

Growing!

I'm pretty sure that Judith's going through a growth spurt:

1. She's eating every two hours today.
2. She's sleeping a LOT today.
3. I put this 3 month size outfit on her this morning, and as you can see in the picture(her hands and feet are blurry because she moves so much!), it's too short for her. It's always been a little tight through the torso (those huge cloth diapers!) but now it's too short in the arms and legs as well. How can she been growing out of 3 month clothes already??? Guess it's time to wash the 3-6 month clothes.
   

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.