the end of spring

it appears that spring has come and gone, and summer is on the way. it's been in the mid 80's and let me give a small sigh of disappointment. sigh.

meanwhile, in other news, the blog has a new layout. the layout is fabulous, except for one minor detail... i no longer have comments enabled on the posts. so, just drop me an email to let me know what you think. i believe everyone who reads this knows how to get in contact with me, whether by myspace or email, but, for those who don't, its:
from.a.to.zoe.blog AT gmail.com

change out the word at for @ and you're set. the periods remain in the email address, and i check it periodically. not as often as i check my main address, but this way, if i get spammed to death, at least it's not my main account. and if that's too complicated, click on over to the tagboard, and leave me a note.

zoe has been a little pill the last couple days, and i'm glad we're going to the pediatrician on monday. she's got some reflux issues, and i'm guessing i'll have to change my diet a bit. she's not vomiting forcefully, but after eating, she has to really work to keep her food down, especially if she falls asleep and we lay her down. for right now, i'm keeping her head a bit elevated for 30 minutes or so, and then laying her down. she swallows a lot after finishing eating, and when she gets burped, every once in a while, she spits up a lot of milk. last night, i got soaked. poor kid. i know she's feeling the worst of it, and a little pre-digested milk never hurt anyone. or at least it hasn't hurt me. but with the reflux comes short naps, and cranky babies.

she's sleeping for 45 minutes at a time during the day, and while i know she's becoming more alert, and will stay awake for longer stretches, she gets sooo cranky by the end of the day. she's not sleeping through the night anymore, and that's getting old too. at least she's only getting up once or twice, but it's still a disappointment. for example, last night she went to bed at 9. she woke up at 12, and it took me until 2:30 to get her wound down and asleep. she woke up at 5, and went to sleep at 6. after that, she slept until 11 this morning. i don't mind the midnight feeding at all, but 2 and 1/2 hours to go back to sleep is hard, especially since i went to bed at 9 too.


so, there's a small update on the girl. i'll take pictures later when she gets up. oh, and house news. we're building a house, in case you didn't know. so, yesterday spencer was talking to our builder, who is also a friend of his. waylon said we'd have to go down on square footage to stay within budget. the problem is, the neighborhood we were going to build in has a minimum square footage requirement. so, that means we're now looking for land again. the upside though, is that we found a plan that is smaller and has the kitchen i wanted all along. spencer's picky about the bathrooms in a plan, and i look for countertop space. so, we found a great compromise, and it's nearly an identical layout to my parent's house in mississippi. in fact, i'm changing the kitchen a little to be exactly the same layout. what can i say? i like my mom's kitchen.

change is in the air

just wanted to give you a heads up, i hope it's not too late. i'll be changing the layout of the blog, and i wanted everyone to be prepared. i'm trying to find something fairly straightforward, but with a little more "me" in it.

a new day

a long empty crib
finally here
grandma ellen and zoe hanging out in the warm breeze
i think zoe senses the flying death from above
saturday, hanging out... looks a lot like her announcement pose, doesn't it?
unimpressed after her bath. she would rather eat than bathe any day.
scoping the room for food
kicking her legs and flailing her arms out of excitement. she was under the impression that nap time was over.
see above



trying to look over to get my attention. this was right before she started yelling at me.

an interesting weekend

you'll have to forgive the lack of recent posts. while zoe was sleeping through the night, for all of last week, the schedule changed this weekend. or at least it changed after the weekend. last night was nightmarish, as zoe woke up every 2-3 hours to eat, and slept for approximately an hour or so at a time.

that pattern continued into today, and she slept for 45 minutes at a time the entire day. she's been asleep for 2 1/2 hours now, and i feel a little like i'm playing russian roulette.

i'm guessing it's the lack of sleep, but i've been getting awful headaches... although the green scum that covers everything within pollination distance could be the culprit. ah, spring. the birds are singing, the flowers are blooming, and the trees are unleashing flying death upon us. i've forgotten how much of a contradiction in feelings that spring in the south brings up in me. in one sense, winter is over, and it's time to start playing outside again. but then reality sets in when my snot turns lime green (yes i know it's too much information, but get past it... i haven't discussed zoe's poop, so it could be worse.) and i come down with bronchitis because of uncontrolled allergies. so, enough of my complaints about spring. i'll save the real ranting for summer. since our bedroom is over the garage, and never gets below 78 degrees during the summer. sigh.

i did manage to take a few pictures of zoe, during the moments that she wasn't eating or crying because i wasn't holding her. one picture in particular is poignant to me, as it mirrors the first picture posted on the blog. we have the child in the crib now, the one we waited and prepared for, and had no idea what was in store.

this weekend was fun, as i had a girls night with ellen and lori and zoe. well, sorta. in between cooking dinner for spencer, feeding zoe, and watching to see if she was asleep yet, we had a girls night. marlene sent both lori and i movies, and while lori showed amazing restraint, i watched mine as soon as i opened the box. lori brought one movie that marlene sent, and it was fabulous. Sabrina was a very cute audrey heburn movie, one that took us 3 1/2 hours to watch, since i had to keep getting up to tend to zoe. oh, and did i mention that saturday was also a 2 hours at a time day? yeah. long weekend, no sleep, and i had another one of those days today.

this is an awfully complaining post, but i think sometimes i paint a rosy picture of life with zoe that is at times inaccurate. not that life with her isn't generally easy, and pleasant, but there are days that i pray God makes her go to sleep. today was one of them.

so, on to this incredibly photogenic child.

cutest baby ever

anyone who has seen ben stiller in Zoolander will appreciate the expressions on this baby's face. she's just too much of a ham!

the week in retrospect

suzanna and her daughter linley. i haven't seen these two since my baby shower. linley is wearing an amazing shirt that says "where my peeps?" i love it! *monday
i haven't seen nakia in nearly 4 1/2 years. and she lives in the same state i do. shame on me. but it won't be another 4 1/2, i hope. *monday
after the long day on tuesday. she finally fell alseep on me... note my tired expression.
"wassup mom?" *wednesday
i never include myself in any pictures, so i thought i would. not that you're here to see me though. *wednesday
zoe is thinking... "i'm not going to sleep! sleep is for babies, and i'm most definitely not a baby!" *wednesday
"no, i'm not going to sleep. that tired expression on my face is unfortunate, because i'm not tired!" *wednesday
"just checking my eyelids. yep, they're still there. and that snoring you here isn't me. it's dad, i swear!" *wednesday
and she's asleep. here jammies reminded me of old school sean connery era james bond. like a pink floral scuba suit, and i expect her to come rising out of the water, with a utility belt on, and she's ready to rumble. but that's just me. the jammies are made to fit snugly, and they just look sooo cute on her. with her fat tummy and all. *wednesday



sooo... here's those picture's i've been promising. and also, i was scared to mention it earlier this week, since it seemed too good to be true, but zoe's slept through the night, pretty much all week. generally sleeping from 10:30 to 11ish, all the way until 7 or 8. earlier this week, she did wake up at midnight for a snack, but the last 3 nights have been wonderful. now we'll see if it continues. unlike last time i thought she was about to start sleeping through. and there are no pictures from thursday, since zoe took 2 long naps yesterday, and i didnt think to take pictures while she was awake.

yes i know i promised pictures...

the camera is in zoe's room, and you better believe i'm not going in there to retrieve it. i'm trying to make sure she repeats last night.... we laid her down sometime around 10:30, 11 ish, and that little eating machine didnt wake up until 7 this morning. and that is what i call sleeping through the night! so... when she wakes up in the morning, i will post pictures. and i promise i really will post pics. for real. i swear!

pictures coming soon

it's been a few days, i know. monday, i went out to athens to hang out with some old friends, one that i haven't seen in 4 years. so, between an hour drive one way, and cooking dinner, i was exhausted. yesterday, zoe wanted to do nothing but eat. by the end of the day, i was a mess, and really sick of being awake. we're attempting breastfeeding again, and while i'm still pumping, it seems she gets hungrier when we breastfeed. so, it was a long day. i think she slept a grand total of 4 hours through the middle of the day, broken up into 45 minute stretches. then, last night, she finally went to bed at 10, and woke up at 12:30. it took me until 1:45 to get her to sleep. the good news is, she didnt wake up until 8 this morning. i guess she's going to start switching her awake times to the day, and sleep longer at night. or at least i can hope that's the case. so, it's now 1pm, and zoe's down for her afternoon nap. when she gets up, i'll make sure to take pictures, but for right now, i have lots of laundry to do.

for grandma sleevi

the headband was a little tight, and zoe was less than impressed. but, i did get a picture! even though it is no longer st. patrick's day, when you're an irish mutt like she is, you need no reason for "the wearin' o' the green."

Beannachtai na Feile Padraig!*

*happy st. patricks day!

a happy baby

these pictures were just taken, she's smiling at me so she can get out of her swing. amazing how quickly she's learned what it takes to get what she wants. and smiling huge for mom and dad is one way to make sure things go the way she wants. gotta run, time to get her out of the swing.

at long last

so, it turns out the issues with my camera were nothing more than batteries that woudn't sustain a charge. i've had them for three years, and after countless rechargings, they quit holding a charge at all. it's been a lovely week with zoe, nothing of any great importance to report. she's still cute, still a snugglebug, and still eating. she has slowed down a little, so i guess her growth spurt is over.

i weighed myself without her, and then weighed myself with her, and the grand total was 14 pounds added to my weight. she's getting so big, and she's definitely gotten longer. i can still get some 0-3 month shirts on her, if they were made to be longer, but she's for the most part in all 3-6month clothing. pants included. i cannot find any shoes that are small enough to fit her feet, since the size 0's mom had sent me are too big. oh, to have small feet again.

the pictures i'm going to post are from earlier in the week, since i've been unable to take any lately. but, it's still pictures, right?

picture delay again

i'm having some issues getting pictures to upload to the computer. as soon as i get them worked out, i'll upload pics.

falling in love

i'm sure this post will have some rambling issues, since i thought through the bulk of it at 4 am, while sitting on the couch with zoe. bear with me though.

i am not so proud to admit, i was not a mother who fell in love with her child immediately. sure, i cried when she was born, i was so overwhelmed with love for her. and then something happened. it was another 16 hours before i could even see her, and even then, it was few and far between. i don't think i really got a chance to "be" with zoe before we came home from the hospital. when i visited her in the NICU, the visits were so crammed with trying to breastfeed her, asking the nurses questions... trying to fit all our time together into a 2 hour stretch was nearly impossible. and to top that, the 4 days i was in the hospital, when it was easiest for me to go down and see her, i was hooked up to an IV, and couldn't stay in the NICU longer than just being able to feed her. she nursed so slowly, and fell asleep so often that to feed her truly took an hour and a half. so, after a week of this, zoe came home.

we were truly unprepared for the effort that goes into a newborn's first few weeks, and i struggled with serious frustration at zoe for a good week. understand, this was fueled by sleeplessness, and feeling helpless to console her. i felt like there was nothing i could do to make her happy, i didnt understand what she needed, and why she would seem so unhappy all the time. i felt like a pitiful excuse for a mom, since i couldn't seem to get breastfeeding down, and we were still supplementing with formula.

but things changed. slowly, i started understanding what she needed when she cried after eating. she needed to be burped a little longer, and have her diaper changed. and when she woke up crying after sleeping for 30 minutes, she just needed me to hold her, and maybe walk some laps in the hallway. my frustration started abating, but my feelings for her were truly no more than "wow, she's a cute kid. she's really got a sweet temperament when she's not crying." i told spencer i was really afraid things wouldn't change, and that i would feel distant from her forever. once again, i worried that temporary situations (similar to when i thought i would be pregnant forever) would become permanent ones.

this weekend, zoe turned 5 weeks old. and i realized i've fallen in love. it wasn't this weekend, i'm sure it built up before then. but this was the time i finally realized it. holding her on the couch at 2 am, i'm not feeling frustration anymore at my lack of sleep. i'm rejoicing in the fact that i get to hold her. and i'm thinking of the days when she'll tell me, maybe not with words, that she's ready to feed herself. and i'm cherishing the moments i get to enjoy that sweet face. beyond the superficial "falling in love," my heart is full of a feeling that i've never felt before. something akin to a fierce adoration, protection, an active love that i've never experienced. everything i'm doing with her is fueled from this love, love that makes me get up when she starts crying at 3 am, and rejoice that she's with us. i can't say i don't have my nights where i'm truly exhausted, and really not wanting to get out of bed. but when i do, and i see that face, my heart melts, and all i want to do is comfort her, and make sure she knows she's loved. loved beyond what i ever understood was possible.

i'm sure this post seems unnecessary to some, but it was for me. the catharsis of admitting that love grows and cannot be forced. and that it's okay for it to have taken some time. and that every day, i'm going to love her a little more, in different ways. the necessity of laying on the table my failings, and how i'm growing.

she fooled me

pictures coming soon... zoe slept on a very different schedule this weekend than she did through the week. so, i'm re-adjusting. as in, re-adjusting to getting up every 2 1/2 hours. i'll post pics soon, i promise. most likely monday afternoon.

tummy time on the boppy

her chicken was a big motivator, the one that she was reaching for in some previous pictures. but we also brought out some other animals, an elephant, and a butterfly that crinkles and makes noises. she's batting at things now, but loves to keep her hands in a fist. eventually, she'll start reaching with open hands... until then, the look on her face when she's entranced with something is priceless, and it's so fun to see her discover things. she's also starting to smile at spencer and i, but it's intermittent, and not as often as we'd like. i tell myself she's laughing at our silly faces, but maybe it's gas. i know we'll know the difference soon, and i'll probably cry the first time i know she REALLY smiled at me.

she has really done well supporting her head, and on her tummy, she's lifting it up and turning it like a champ. and when she lies on her tummy, those legs are always kicking, and she's pushing with her arms at the same time. i hope that's a sign of developmental progress, since like every parent, we want her ahead of the development curve.

and oh the chatter. she's making little noises all the time, not just grunts, but ah's and oh's at everything. when she bats at something, when i'm talking to her, when she wants to eat, or just to narrate. so, she'll be memorizing sonnets and reciting them soon. i'll keep you posted on that development.