The amazing sleeping baby!

The growth spurt that I was mentioning in the last post culminated in a rough Monday for me as all she wanted to do was feed - constantly! Good thing we picked up a tv/dvd player for the bedroom on Sunday - so I didn't have to leave our bedroom on Monday. Literally watched a tonne of movies and tried to get some sleep when Maddie did.

The growth spurt didn't do much for her stretching her feedings out to every 3 hours - for some reason she's an every 2 hour baby - I think we have a touch of thrush (in her mouth) which may be affecting it, and making her gassy, so we'll have that checked out by the Dr this week.

But we are now consistently getting 4-5 hour stretches of sleep at the beginning of the night now. We've finally fallen into a consistent routine - Seth gets home around 7:15, he helps get dinner ready + we eat while Maddie sits and watches us from her swing. Then we watch a bit of tv while Maddie naps + eats - head upstairs around 9-ish for Maddie's bath. Then she gets a baby massage and we do a bit of tummy time - that brings us to around 10 - I try to feed her again to 'tank her up' and put her down in her cradle. Then she sleeps until 2 or so and wakes for another feeding (and then we're up every 1-2 hours from there - but still, that 4+ hours at the beginning of the night has just given me a new lease on life - I guess one cycle of REM sleep really does wonders for a person!)...

What else can I tell you about the week - the days seem to blend together and the weeks are flying by (not really flying, but just melting away in a haze) ... Seth got very sick and was off work for a day - just a terrible cold, but he was sleeping in the spare room to make sure he didn't pass it along to Maddie - and so he could get uninterrupted sleep - lucky guy, even if he was sick!

I finally got her room organized and all the gifts from the Kingston shower put away and her crib set up with the new mobile and stuff. She loved it - take a look at the pic of her enjoying herself. We went out for a big walk on Wednesday (she slept REALLY well that night - I really wish that winter wasn't coming and we could go out like that more often!). On Friday we had our first "lunch date" with an old colleague from mine - met at Markville Mall and did a bit of shopping (window shopping, no $$ to actually buy anything on our new budget!).

That's about it - Seth had to work yesterday (Saturday) so Maddie and I had a bit of a quiet day - then when Seth got home he took her so I could take a bubble bath - my first alone time all week (as he was sick, wasn't holding her at all - I have tonnes of respect for single parents out there now - it was a tough couple of days not being able to 'hand her off'). The bath was delicious and when I was done Maddie I took a 2 hour nap while Seth raked up the leaves from our trees in the front and back yards. Last night we watched a movie and were in bed by 11 - wow, the exciting life of new parents.

Today is a bit of a milestone though - I have a date with Liz to go out for the afternoon - the ENTIRE afternoon! So we've taken a bottle out of the freezer for Seth to feed Maddie with and I am going out without her. It's weird and I'm nervous about it (I know they'll be fine - but this is my first time leaving her for an extended period of time - god, I got my hair cut when my mom was up and left her for only an hour and was nervous the whole time). But this means I get to go to a movie and do some xmas shopping and you know, enjoy a bit of freedom. It will be weird, I'll let you know how it goes.

Leaving you with some pics of our munchkin - holding up her head like a big girl during one of our 'tummy times' this week. Oh and couldn't resist posting her shoe collection - she's definitely mommy's girl - look at that collection so far! I can't wait to start seeing them on her - although you'll see in the pic above (in her crib) she's wearing her first pair with her little dress - she was all dressed up for our Friday lunch date - so cute! For more pics take a look at our Flickr site (www.flickr.com/photos/thevalliers) - we'll continue updating that.

S&S