Seven Months Old

Written by Sarah on May 20th, 2012

I am so excited that our big girl is seven months old!

Giana is such an expressive girl. Usually, this mean she smiles, laughs, coos, squeals, sings and talks to express her happiness. On the flip side, this expressiveness comes out when she is angry and she lets us know with her signature scream!

Giana loves to get on her hands and knees to try and crawl, but she hasn’t really figured out the forward motion yet – she ends up scooting herself backwards! She loves to play and chew on all her toys. Giana is such a joy!

 

 

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First night away

Written by Sarah on May 18th, 2012

We had a big event this past week – the first night Giana and I were apart. In a word, it was sad.

Giana and Rafael dropped me off at the airport at 8 a.m. They went on to drop-in daycare and work, respectively. I jumped on planes and made my way to Philly for a work conference and social event. I brought a battery pack adapter and pumped in tiny airplane bathrooms.

Giana did okay at daycare…but she refused to eat. That made for a long evening with her papa. He entertained her with toys and a bath, but when I called at 9 p.m., she was ready to eat and go to bed. I heard her hungry cries over the phone when I called and I joined in the tears! He got her to bed in his arms and managed to get some sleep until 3 a.m.

Finally, at 5 a.m., Giana decided she would eat her bottle that her papa had been patiently offering to her. As day two started, my loves were really getting the hang of things. I was so happy to see both of their smiling faces waiting for me! In addition to smiling faces, my dear man was holding these for me:

As hard as it was for me to be away from my little girl, it was so good to see her with her papa. As her primary caregiver, I can take the little things for granted – like the way she smiles after a good meal or the giggles when her diaper is being changed. When I’m not around, Rafa got to experience all of it. I love to see my man in action as the amazing dad that he is.

Edited to add an amazing photo of Giana and her papa by the amazing Chelsey Paul:

ChelseyPaul.com
 

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A crunchy momma

Written by Sarah on May 8th, 2012

So here I am, almost seven months into this parenting thing, and I find that I am much more crunchy than I expected to be. I always thought of crunchy moms as hippie, yoga-pants wearing, anti-everything pediatrician suggests. When I was pregnant, I thought I would be a mom who took advantage of every possible modern convenience.

I am much closer to crunchy now! We mostly cloth diaper, which I never expected to do. I love the pretty diapers and I don’t mind the extra load every other day. I even hung a little clothesline in the backyard so that I didn’t spend the savings in cloth diapering in energy to run the dryer.

Today, I made a nice big batch of baby food. I cooked up green beans and sweet potatoes. Then I purred them and froze in ice cube trays. I’ll have healthy, preservative-free baby food for at least a month.

This picture doesn’t do justice to the color of this beautiful veggie! I know Giana is going to love eating this up.

I’m still not really sure how I got this way. I just kept deciding that a little time is worth it if I can make something a little better for Giana.

 

 

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Beautiful, beautiful baby

Written by Sarah on April 28th, 2012

Not only am I so blessed to have such a beautiful baby, but I am also so blessed to have a husband with such amazing photography and computer skills to capture her beauty. We had a little photo session in our backyard to celebrate her six month birthday.

 

 

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She’s a sitter!

Written by Sarah on April 25th, 2012

Thank you Lord that I have a job working from home. I got to witness Giana sitting unassisted for the first extended length of time!

 

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I’d do anything

Written by Sarah on April 23rd, 2012

“I’d do anything for you,” she said.

I know, mom.

—

When I started my job with my new company, they told me about the company meeting they would be having in April. I said “Sure!” when they asked me if I thought I’d be able to make it. At the time, I figured two months would be plenty of time to get used to the idea of being away from Giana and to pump a week’s worth of food for her. Rafa and I thought he could use a combination of grandma babysitters, vacation days and maybe the drop-in daycare to get him through a week of life as a single dad.

I tried to prepare. But my pumping skills had severely diminished since I left MegaCorp and didn’t have any extra to freeze. I tried to practice leaving Giana behind, but I actually drove home in tears from a two hour trip to the grocery store. When signing her up for drop-in daycare, I kept running into roadblocks.  The trip was just a couple of weeks away and I just knew – I wasn’t going to be able to leave my little girl for that long.

I called mom. Would you be willing to drive 6+ hours in the car with me, stay in a questionable hotel and take care of Giana all day long?

“I’d do anything for you,” she said.

—

We loaded up her car on Sunday morning and drove across the whole state of Wisconsin. Giana did great during the drive, except for the blow-out while we were getting some lunch. Mom took her soiled onesie to the bathroom to scrub while I finished wiping down my peanut. We found our hotel, a run-down Super 8 with a super cheap rate. It was only seven miles from the college conference center where my colleagues would be meeting.

Each day of the trip, I would get up and get ready super early. We would load a sleepy girl into the car and mom would drive me to the meeting place. When Giana refused to eat, or when I just missed her, mom would jump back in the car and bring her to me. I stayed with my work friends through late dinner while mom gave baths and started the bedtime routine. Most nights, I came rushing back around 10 p.m., just in time to give Giana one more feeding before we all could go to sleep.

After a week of this, we headed for home on Friday afternoon. We went straight to Iowa so mom could jump in and help with my sister’s garage sale. Rafa came to pick us up and we got to Minneapolis around midnight.

—

We are finally all settled back in: laundry is done, Giana’s routine is almost back on track. The whole trip was exhausting for me. I lost my voice and I am losing a battle with a cold. But I don’t regret it one bit. I needed to have my daughter near me.

I would do anything for her.

I am convinced the whole trip had to be boring for mom. She said it was awesome. She said she loved having so much time with Giana. I have been trying to think of enough words to express my thankfulness, but I can’t. I can’t think of a gift lovely enough to show her how much I appreciate her sacrifice of a week. Hallmark doesn’t have a card that says, “Hey mom, your selflessness helped me be a good mom and employee. I wouldn’t have been able to be both without your help.”

The kind of mom I have is the kind of mom I want to become.

She would do anything for me.

 

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She cut it.

Written by Sarah on April 11th, 2012

Giana has been doing a bit of baby modeling lately. Her adorable face – combined with her Hispanic descent on the white Minnesota landscape AND the fact that her proud papa will show her picture to anyone who looks – has lead to several  jobs for Target.

Her first job was when she was 12 weeks old. It was innocent enough. She just had to lay there with her up&up diaper on and smile. No problem. Well now, she’s almost six months old. At some point during most weeks, we load up the car and search out a tiny studio for a go-see or a photo shoot.

I thought we were getting the hang of this baby modeling thing, but today was a tough one.

As soon as Giana woke up, we loaded her into the car and rushed to the fancy industrial space-turned-trendy studio. And we waited. And waited. And waited. Apparently, the model who would be posing as the mommy in the shoot was having some hair difficulties. Her absolutely gorgeous hair wasn’t quite gorgeous enough for this photograph, apparently.

And after two hours, my previously smiley (and now squirmy) baby was close to nap time when she was finally called to the makeup chair. (Makeup for babies mainly involves some hair combing and lotion, sometimes a spot of blush on the apples of their cheeks.) The lady started taming her stray hairs when she found “the lucky curl.”

“The lucky curl” is was a unique spot on Giana’s head. It was a group of ten-ish hairs behind her left ear that were about two inches longer than all the rest of the hair on her head. When the makeup lady found the lucky curl (also sometimes called the Hasidic curl by her father and I), the lady asked what I knew she would ask. I took a deep breath, said yes,

and she cut it off.

Now, if this would have led to a successful photo shoot where Giana looked great and her photographs would be used in the baby catalog, I *think* I would have been fine with this first haircut. However, since we were now walking on to the set about a half hour past nap time, I knew it was all for nothing. As expected, Giana squirmed, allowed herself to be distracted for a minute or two, then broke down – all she wanted to do was sleep.

I think we are done with baby modeling. It was fun while it lasted, but I miss her curl already.

 

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Black Jelly Beans

Written by Sarah on April 2nd, 2012

I’ve been missing my grandma a lot lately. I think that as I mother my little girl more, I think about my own mother more, which in turn makes me think of her mother more.

I am eating some black jelly beans right now. I thought they were gross when I was little, but Grandma told me they were the best. I started eating them with her and grew to love them. We used to pick them out of the dish on the Easter table together.

Last Easter was the last major holiday she celebrated with us. It was a special time  and Grandma was always so proud when her family got together. She looked so beautiful that day. It seems like a lot of families begin to splinter apart after losing the matriarch. I am so glad that we are going to continue to get together this year. I think Grandma would like that very much.

 

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Giana vs. pacifier

Written by Sarah on March 31st, 2012

She is conquering!

Giana started rolling over and over and over in bed. She makes loops around until she is face down and her head is where her feet started.

We had to unswaddle her because she would fling herself over even when she was tightly wrapped up. The bad thing was that she couldn’t get back on her back. Or get her face out of the bars of the crib – yikes. After a couple of days, she stopped hitting herself in the face long enough to fall asleep.

Now, we are conquering another sleep aid-turned-distraction – the pacifier. With her newly found mobility in the bed, the pacifier often gets pulled out of her mouth as she rolls. This leads to crying until the pacifier is found and re-inserted into her mouth. Today, we removed the pacifier and dealt with the baby’s wrath.

First nap without pacifier = 20 minutes of crying

Second nap without pacifier = 8 minutes of crying

Long, uninterrupted naps without mom running in to find the pacifier = PRICELESS

She did so great! Her time fussing got a lot shorter for her second nap. After the initial crying, she has slept longer and deeper during both naps. If tonight goes as well, we will all be sleeping great!

 

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She’s a joy

Written by Sarah on March 30th, 2012

Giana Marie is an absolute joy. She is, without a doubt, the most precious baby ever. Look at this smile!

Giana loves playing with her toys and discovering everything around her. Everything possible goes into her mouth!

I love the weekends because then Rafa gets to see her sweetness in the mornings too. She wakes up with gentle coos and giggles. She ooos and ahhs at the sights we introduce her to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here’s one more – she’s not smiling, but she just looks so darn cute.

 

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