Cruisin'

Emily can now cruise the bars of her crib.  She won't do it on her own, I have to offer something she wants at the other end, but hey I am not above bribery.  I'm extremely excited about this because I have been a bit worried about her lack of mobility.  She gets to wherever she wants to go with her butt and tummy scoot, but I was reading that babies that do this have a harder time learning to walk because their cores do not get as strong without hands and knees crawling.

It's also really hard, almost impossible for her to pull up on furniture from a sitting position, vs if she were crawling and could pull up from a kneel.  She loves to stand and she can stand without your help if she's holding on to the furniture, but that was it, she wouldn't cruise.  A couple weeks ago I got her to take several steps holding onto the couch, but it took her forever.  But between today and yesterday she has walked to the other end of the crib three or four times when I entice her to.

I'm really anxious about her not walking by her 15 month appt since her pedi wants to send her for evaluation if that is the case.  I try so hard not to do it, but it's hard not to feel like a failure if your kid is behind on things.  I blame myself for not doing more tummy time when she was younger.  Especially when her 7 month old cousin is about to crawl.  But, I am not THAT worried about it.  Like my husband's uncle said, no kid ever went to college still scooting on his butt.  She'll walk in her own time.....I just hope it is before June :)

She's started feeding herself a lot more.  I used to feed her those baby food packets either from a bowl and a spoon, or those spoons that screw on to the end.  But now she just grabs the pouch from me and sucks the food out.  I still have to help her so she doesn't squeeze the pouch when it isn't in her mouth, but man, feeding just got so much more efficient.  She can suck down a pouch of food in about a minute or two, vs the ten or fifteen it used to take to feed it to her.  She's also graduated from puffs to cheerios and we got her some of those Gerber graduates meals.  She fed herself a whole container of cheese ravioli the other day.

We try to give her some of what we're eating, but if our dinner isn't really good for little ones, too spicy or something, it's nice to have those meals on hand.  She's growing up right before my eyes.  Just in the month since she turned one she seems like such a bigger girl.  She's trying to repeat more words, she says mama and dada in the right context now for the most part, and when she has something she shouldn't, like a crumb off the floor I tell her yuck and she repeats back something kinda close.

We went to my brother's to watch the Game of Thrones premier the other night.  I knew it wasn't the best idea to take her since we left the house at 7:30 which is her bedtime, but I figured one night up late wouldn't kill us and I was hoping I could get her comfy enough with blankets and pillows and maybe she would sleep there.  Nope!  She was awake until we left just after midnight, but it was fun.  I took her over there in her jammies and slippers and told her we were going for a mini sleepover.  I'll be excited for when she can go for real sleep overs there and at the grandparents house.  I am not ready for it yet, and I don't think she is either.  I want her to be old enough that it's fun, not scary to sleep at a different house without mom and dad.

She got into the magazine pile and just tossed them all over the place.  She was surrounded by magazines.  But it serves my brother right, apparently he used to empty off the bookshelves every day when he was little.  My SIL was trying to get her to say their names but that's a mouthful so she tried getting her to say Sassa, which is what her friend's kids call her.  After several times, Emily finally pointed at her and goes Sassa?!?! of course it wasn't as clear as Sassa, but it resembled it and it was so cute.  Like she was so proud of herself that she figured out who Sassa was.

Greenfield Village opens this week, I'm so excited.  We're going to get a annual pass this year.  It pretty much pays for itself after not even two visits.  It will be great to go this summer and walk around the village, they have a really nice playground for the littles and last fall Emily loved riding the train and the carousel.  We can also go to the museum on rainy days and in the winter, and it will be free to see Santa at Christmas.  They have the best Santa, we went with my friend and her family last year, he was the nicest sweetest guy and they only let a couple families down the hall at once so it's pretty intimate, you can enjoy the visit without a whole line of noisy families behind you, and they let you take your own pictures so no expensive picture packages to buy.

Sometimes I forget all of the amazing things where we live, that other people drive a long ways for.  In addition to the museum and village you can go to some sports game anytime you want, the Tigers, Red Wings, Lions, and Pistons are all a 45 minute drive or less.  We live 15 minutes from the airport, and Greek Town and the casinos is a fun night out, not to mention all the theaters and opera house downtown.  I'm pretty bummed that the Detroit Symphony Orchestra is coming to a venue in my hometown soon but it's a 10:45 am show.  I'm just not in the mood to go to hear the symphony play in the morning.  Though our night out to the DSO for our first wedding anniversary was a disappointment.  I wore a fancy strapless cocktail dress, hoping to get to spend some of the evening drooling all over the beautiful gowns people had on; I thought it would be like the opera scene from Pretty Woman.  I was by far the only one dressed up so much.  Most of the men had on suits, some had more casual clothes, but most of the women were in just sweaters and dress pants, and I even saw some jeans.

I totally get not dressing up for the grocery store.  Clinton and Stacy from What not to wear can bite me when they judge people for not wearing a complete ensemble including coordinating jewelry and handbag to go to the grocery, but it does bum me out how lazy our society has gotten for dressing up for formal stuff.  That is one thing Emily will learn the art of, which is dressing to impress.  She can wear what she wants to school and stuff, but my kid will never be caught wearing jeans or tennis shoes to a wedding, a funeral, or church.  That irks me so much.

I just cant....

Why do I read the comment section of articles?  Why?  Why do I do that to myself?  It literally drives me insane how stupid people can be, but yet I voluntarily read them over and over.  I must be a masochist.  I was just reading how Heathrow Airport took Alyssa Milano's breast milk because it apparently exceeded the limit of liquids she could take on the plane.  Ok, I get it, check the rules before you fly.  Yeah yeah.  But I have to say, I sympathize with her.  Pumping SUCKS, and to have that 10 oz of liquid gold taken and just tossed out is so frustrating.

Especially since I am reading that there are strips they could have tested it with to make sure it was fine.  I know rules are rules and normally I am all for it, and I really don't think celebrities should get away with things just because they're celebrities, but come on!  It's Alyssa Milano!  Little Samantha Micelli!  What are the chances Alyssa Milano is going to blow up an airplane with her breastmilk?  Seems like the TSA agent was just a little full of himself.  I mean somehow people are getting actual dangerous weapons and shit on planes all the time, but oh no, sound the alarms, there is a nursing mother with breast milk and she is not afraid to use it!

So anyway, regardless of whether she was right or wrong, the people commenting were so stupid.  It's fine if you don't know how nursing works, it would be kind of weird for a guy with no kids or a wife who didn't nurse to know all about it, but if you don't know anything about it, keep your mouth shut.  People saying she should have just whipped her boob out and fed her kid the "normal" way (Um, the kid wasn't with her, which is WHY she had to pump.  And I pumped for six months because my kid wouldn't eat "the normal way").  People saying haha, she walks through with milk but no baby, I wonder why it was taken from her.  Again, that is WHY she pumped, because her kid wasn't there and she would have gotten engorged (I think that is my second most hated word, second only to moist).

Then a woman of all people says why didn't she just wait until she could feed her kid.  When someone explained to her why women have to pump, she said oh, well I don't have sympathy for her, if mommies can't follow the rules then mommies should stay their ass at home.  Yeah sure, like that is feasible.  Damn you, you feed your child so therefore you have to stay at home.

I get it, people who don't have kids look at parents and their kids as evil little snot producers.  They seem to think all parents are on a mission to piss off everyone around them who don't have kids.  But we don't want the world handed to us because we have kids, we just want our lives to be a little bit easier, and if it doesn't affect anyone else, then who the hell cares?  One day I was searching for a movie theater that had a bring your baby matinee (whenever I see that written I always think it says bring your baby manatee.  I'm like manatee?  Do people have those as pets now?).  I found a yahoo question or something asking if there are any theaters with this, and one person responded, who the hell would want to see a movie with a baby?  Parents think they are so special because they have kids.  Uhhh, whut?  First of all, it is a matinee....the only people that go to matinees are, ahem, parents with small kids, and old people.  Or people like us who liked to save money on the movie even before we had kids.

So it's not taking up any theaters that you probably want to go see a movie at, and hello, it's a movie FOR parents and their babies.  Lights are turned up a bit, sound is turned down a bit, and parents, babies, and strollers are welcome.  This is not a regular movie that just any old Joe would go to.  It's FOR parents and their babies.  Why does this piss someone off that some theaters want to make money off stay at home parents that want to get out in the world and see a movie now and again without having to get a babysitter?  I am just baffled on how this could be offensive.

So anyway, we're planning a trip with family to Disney next year, so it will be our first flight with Emily.  Quite frankly I am terrified.  She's not on formula or breastmilk anymore, but between our regular packing and the hooplala of getting to the airport on time (not to mention the fact that my husband is a complete spazz when he flies so he will likely be more work to get on the plane than Emily) and making sure we've packed everything we'll need for Emily, worrying about getting her through security and entertained through out the flight so we don't piss off everyone around us with a cranky annoying child, I can totally see messing up something like taking something through security we're not allowed.

I was really nervous going to Vegas last year with my insulin and my syringes, so had I somehow messed up and took the wrong stuff through/wrong amount and it got taken away, I would have been pissed as hell.  I know more breast milk can be pumped unlike trying to find a pharmacy in another state to refill your prescription when it's not time to refill it.  But like I said, pumping sucks ass and you don't know how long it took her to pump 10 oz.  If that were me, that would have been about 4 days worth.

On a different subject, Em and I went to the mall today, ran a few errands but mostly to walk around.  She must have really needed to get out of the house, she was so happy at the mall, she kept looking back at me and smiling, and she'd hang over the side of her stroller and watch the floor go by.  She's saying mama a lot more, and I think it is more so in the correct context.  It melts my heart, I just love hearing her sweet little voice say mama.

Viability

I just read an article about a petition going to change the viability of an unborn baby from 24 weeks to 22 weeks.  Being that I am a mom of a baby born sleeping at 22 weeks 2 days, you would think I would be jumping in line to sign this, but I am not sure how I feel about it.  I really can't wrap my head around it.

I could still feel Kayla kicking at least 30 minutes prior to her being born.  I know she was still alive then, and since there was nothing wrong with her, just that my body couldn't keep her in where she could safely grow, I believe she was alive up until whatever moment in the birth canal her sweet little body just couldn't withstand the trauma.  So whether she passed one minute before she came out, or ten, I have no idea.  I was in labor for at least 24 hours but I do not know how long my active labor was, I don't know how long I was dilated to ten before she was born.  My water broke about 3 minutes before I started pushing, and she was born at 10:11am with no signs of life.  So I know that at least as of 9:30am, she was still alive.

So it was basically the trauma of being born that killed her.  Her sweet little 1 lb 1.6 ounce body couldn't withstand it.  Had she been born via emergency C-section, would she have made it?  I don't know.  If she was considered viable at 22 weeks 2 days would I have been a candidate for an emergency section so that she could have a fighting chance?  I don't know that either.

In the few minutes she had before I started pushing, my doctor explained that she may or may not be born alive.  I personally know, and know of many babies that were born alive at 22 weeks or even prior, so of course it was not a definite that she would be born sleeping.  But I clearly remember asking, through tears, if there was anything they could do if she was born alive, and she said no, it just wasn't possible.  I love my doctor, and I think she was an amazing doctor and person, so I have no doubt in my mind that had Kayla been born alive, she would have attempted to save her despite her not being viable.

I just cannot see her letting her suffer, or not try when there could be a chance, however slight.  However she told us there was no possibility, because I think she wanted to prepare us for the very high possibility that she would be born sleeping, which she was.  I think had Kayla defied the odds, then she would have resorted to whatever plan B would have been, but I think she didn't even want us to think plan B was possible because it wasn't very probable.

But let's say she had lived, and they were able to save her.  At what cost though?  I am not saying I would not have wanted her if she had problems, or disabilities.  She was my little girl, of course I would have wanted her no matter what.  But I guess what I am trying to say is, just because modern medicine can do some amazing things, should it?  Maybe in our case, or maybe in lots of other cases, the baby could have been saved and went on to live a perfect or almost perfect life with no repercussions of being a micro-preemie.  But what if statistically, it is better to leave viability at 24 weeks?  Isn't there a reason it was set at 24 weeks to begin with?

I hate to talk statistics because when it happens to you, stats don't mean shit.  I don't care if stats show that 95% or maybe higher won't make it at less than 24 weeks, when it was my baby I would have wanted everything humanly possible to be done.  But in the bigger picture, in the best interest of saving as many babies as possible, what if pushing that line too much actually causes the reverse to happen?  Micro-preemies need a level III if not a level IV NICU.  Not every hospital even has a NICU, let alone one to accommodate babies that fragile.  If hospitals are forced to try to save babies as young as 22 weeks, wouldn't that take up valuable resources that are already needed for babies born at 24, 25 and 26 weeks who very badly need the care, but have a better chance of pulling through than a baby born a full four weeks earlier than this baby who was born early?

That sounds cruel and I am not intending it to be.  I don't mean that any one person's baby is more important than someone else's, I am just afraid lowering the viability would cause more heartache and stress that already exists.  A lot of people that signed the petition already say their 22 week, or 23 week or 24 week preemie survived and are now a happy healthy 5 year old.  I think that's wonderful, I cannot imagine how horrible it must have been for them to go through that, but how wonderful for them that their little ones survived and are now thriving.  But how many babies born alive at that gestation do not make it, and simply cannot make it no matter what?

By changing the viability to 22 weeks, is that going to give people a lot of false hope that because their baby was viable at birth, that must mean they will survive and if not, it was the doctor's fault?  When I was pregnant with Emily, I celebrated getting past 22 weeks because that was when we lost Kayla, and I celebrated again when I reached V day at 24 weeks.  My SIL said my brother was so happy when I reached V day and he asked her, so she could come any time now and be ok?

She had to explain to him that while yes, 24 weeks is better than 23 or 22 or what have you, you certainly don't WANT your baby to be born at 24 weeks.  It wasn't a guarantee, just a chance.  For most people, the idea of their baby coming anytime before 37 weeks is terrifying, but in my mind, anything at 30 weeks and beyond was amazing.

The very fact that you hear of babies surviving when born at 21, 22, and 23 weeks is proof that there are doctors who will attempt to save them if they are born alive even though viability is currently 24 weeks.  Believe me, none of these babies born that early are just placed on their mother's chest and make it on their own.  All of these babies that survive is in part by the doctor who did something, who put them in an incubator or intubated them or took other life saving measures.  I don't think it would be going out on a limb to say NO baby born at less than 24 weeks could survive without some kind of medical intervention.

So I feel like keeping the viability at 24 weeks was kind of what my doctor did for us when she told us there was nothing that could be done.  She prepared us for the worst, and the worst happened.  Had Kayla been born alive, I believe with all my heart she would have done whatever she possibly could, I cannot imagine any doctor who has taken an oath to save lives, would just stand there and let a baby suffer because it was born at 23 weeks 5 days.

I think it is best to keep it at 24 weeks, and if born earlier and alive, doctors will likely do what they can anyway.  But by lowering it, it is going to raise people's expectations.  I see lawsuits happening when a micro-preemie cannot be saved, I see parents being put through hell as they fight to save their babies life, but then she dies anyway because there was just nothing that could be done to save them over and above whatever was already done.  I guess in short, I feel that doctors know better than I do.  It would be one thing if doctors delivered a live micro-preemie and said well, he/she is alive, but they are only 22 weeks 3 days so there is nothing I can do, and walked out of the room, but I don't think that is happening.  Of course I cannot speak for any case but my own, but like I said, since there are babies that were born prior to 24 weeks that have survived, or at least survived past birth, obviously there are doctors who are attempting to save them despite how early they were born.

But, if I heard about this two years ago, when I was laying in the hospital about to give birth, would I have been for a viability of 22 weeks?  Most definitely.  It seemed like a cruel sick joke that I was about to lose my baby because she was coming less than two weeks before viability.  But 24 weeks viability was not set by doctors because they felt like choosing an arbitrary number and are too lazy to work on babies younger than that.  It was set for a reason.  If they do succeed in lowering it, would people petition in another 20 years to change it to 20 weeks?

Before I ever got pregnant, my only exposure to child birth was what I saw on TV.  The woman was in labor for however many hours, the nurses assisted her until she was almost ready and then the doctor would walk in, say ok push push and weee, catch the baby as it popped out.  But that could not be further from the truth.  I think my doctor is pretty much the most amazing person on earth.  It only took about ten minutes of pushing, if that, but that entire time my doctor and the nurse worked very hard.  She encouraged me to push when she wanted me to, but then she would tell me to stop and take a break, she would tell the nurse, ok hold on, gently gently, ok Amy stop pushing, ok go ahead and push, keep pushing keep pushing, then she would give the nurse more direction.  Despite Kayla being so small, it wasn't as simple as pushing and out she came.

They had to be careful to get her out the most gentle and easiest way they could.  She was also breech so that added to the complications, and they were trying to be as gentle on her delicate body as they could.  I know that her first priority was to get her our safely for both me and the baby, and on the off chance that she would be born alive.  But even if in her mind, she was 100% sure she was delivering a stillborn, she still treated Kayla with the care and soft touch that she deserved.  She had done this before, she has delivered countless number of babies, and who knows how many of them were with complications or sad outcomes like mine.

Who knows what all criteria she was using to make her decisions, but it was a hell of a lot more than I knew anything about.  All I knew was, I was in a lot of pain, I was scared, I was about to go through the worst thing a parent can go through.  She was sad for me, I know she was, but she was also a professional doing her job.  She knew better than me, that Kayla would likely be stillborn.  She probably also knew that even if born alive, chances were, even with doing everything she could, Kayla would not make it.  So I feel like taking that power from doctors to do what is best for their patients, and give it to the parents who would literally sell their soul to the devil just to make sure their baby survives is sort of an insult to doctors.

I know my doctor did everything she could, and I know she would have done everything she could to save Kayla.  If you don't know what, you probably should find yourself a new doctor.  I think people should be advocates for their own health, but this might be the wrong way to do it.  Now I would definitely be in favor of routine cervix checks, even if the patient has no known reason to have an incompetent cervix.  Of course there are many other reasons a baby could be born that premature, but since my reason could be, and was preventable with Emily, it seems a better option would be to try to stop women from going into pre-term labor in the first place, rather than trying to save a micro-preemie when they do.

In the days before my mom died, her doctor was speaking with us about the next steps.  She had been diagnosed with leukemia, so to any lay person, it would seem chemo would be the next logical step.  But he explained that in her state, he could not ethically give her chemo.  Chemo is horribly hard on the human body, it is hard for people in relatively good health (aside from the cancer of course) who can walk and talk and move about on their own.  But my mom was not ambulatory, she was in a hospital bed....was she in a coma?  I honestly don't know.  It was one of the many things I never thought to ask at the time, or found out since.

I suppose as her family that loved her dearly and did not want her to die, we could have insisted they give her chemo, or maybe found a doctor who would.  But her doctor knew better than we did, he knew her body could not handle it, so he chose to let her die in peace, or give her the chance to recover from whatever was making her non-ambulatory so she could receive chemo; he refused to go the chemo route when it would just put her through torture and probably not be enough to save her.  So I kind of feel like this is similar....just because they can lower viability to 22 weeks, does it mean they should?

Despite everything I have said, I am still not sure of the answer.  I won't be signing the petition because while I am not sure that it shouldn't be lowered, I know I am not sure it should either.  Of course many things could influence my opinion....if this was a year ago, or two years ago.  If this was the days I sat there staring off into space, trying to wrap my brain around the fact that I was no longer having a baby that July, or the many months I spent crying on my way to and from work every day, the days when the pain is so raw that you feel like you cannot breathe, maybe my opinion would be different.

If I wasn't at a place of acceptance that I am today, where the pain is still there but it has just become your new reality; maybe if I was sitting here, still childless except for my angel in heaven, maybe if I wasn't so lucky to go on to have another baby who survived, I would say yes, absolutely lower it.  I feel for these parents.  I feel for them so much when they are told their child likely will not survive because they are not yet viable.  I wish nobody had to go through this, I wish all positive pregnancy tests ended happily.  But they don't, and I can't shake the fact that when I read about the petition, my gut feeling is that it should not be changed.

Toddler

My baby is officially on her way to being a toddler.  Her birthday was really great, the night before at the suggestion of my friend Pinterest, I took a picture of her sleeping at 11:58, her last picture as an infant.  Ugh, that made me so sad.  Especially if she is our one and only.  But, growing is a good thing.  The morning of her birthday Ryan and I surprised her with a balloon bomb in her crib.  She was both excited, and wondering what the hell was going on.  I think we'll make that a tradition for her birthdays.  So after she played with the balloons for a bit and before she could pop one, we got ready and went to the aquarium.

It was fun, a lot smaller than I expected.  I think we went through the whole thing in about 20-25 minutes.  Of course, having an older child that could walk around at their own pace, do the fun activities (getting their picture taken in the bubble they can pop their heads up through to look like they're in the aquarium) playing on the playscape and petting the jellyfish would have taken more time, but still a lot smaller than I expected, especially for the price, 20 bucks per adult and thankfully Em was free, but I am sure 2 or 3 and up is a charge.

But, it was a very cool aquarium.  Unlike say, the Shedd in Chicago, it isn't just a big building of aquariums.  It's small and intimate, and a very cool atmosphere.  The aquariums are all surrounded by what looks like coral and rock caves....one of my favorites was a room that was in a circular shape with aquarium all around you and the swarms of fish all swam in the circular motion.  If I were rich I would have that in my bedroom, how relaxing to watch.

I also loved the sharks.  Most aquariums only have nurse sharks, but this one had black tip, hammerhead, and one other I couldn't identify.  I know I know, the shame I feel as a self proclaimed shark nut, to not be able to identify one.  It kind of looked like a small bull, but I doubt those would fair well in an aquarium.  Hmm, the website doesn't help any, all it mentioned was the blacktip when I know they had others.  Maybe it was just a black tip and I didn't notice the tip.

I wish an aquarium could have Great Whites.  I would travel great lengths to see that.  Diving in a shark cage to see white sharks has always been on a fantasy bucket list of mine, but now that I have a kid I am not so sure I still want to do it.  That and skydiving.  I know I am more likely to get into a car accident, but still.  Plus, non-family friendly vacations aren't really a possibility anymore.

So after the fish we walked around the mall some and rode the carousel.  Emily loooves the carousel.  She went on one for the first time when she was about 6 months old and the first thing she did when I set her on the horse was grab on to the pole....she's so smart :)  She doesn't act like she loves it during the ride, but once the ride ends she always cries.  After that we had lunch at the Rainforest Cafe.  The food was good, and I like the atmosphere.  We were sitting near the fake elephants and about 3 times during lunch the lights would dim, and there were stomping sounds and the elephants would flap their ears and make the noise they make, lol, I don't know what it is called.  Like a champ, Em sat through it, interested while lesser children around us cried, haha.

We had to pack up most of our lunch and take it home cause it was going on 1:30 and Emily was melting down.  She slept almost the whole 45 minutes home, and then we got cupcakes on the way home.  This place is known for their interesting cupcakes with chunks of cookie on top, or frosting in the middle, so I had Ryan get the plainest one he could find, which was a Mountain Dew cupcake.  Strange....the cake part was dry and the frosting was weird, she dug into it a little but I don't think she liked it much.  After cupcakes she opened her present from us which was a Cabbage Patch doll we named Amelia Marie and gave her the same birthday as Em, she seemed to like it, though she is almost the same size as the doll.  But she plays with my old one so I wanted her to have one of her own too.

After that grandpa came over for a bit to snuggle since he had been up north all week.  Her party was Saturday, it was a lot of fun.  We had a good turn out, everyone except for three people came, but that was our niece's dad, his fiancee and her daughter.  We got party subs from Tubby's, I made some pink candy popcorn which was a big hit with the kids, my MIL brought a fruit salad and my dad brought potato salad.  It was a nice change to not really have to cook a lot, and we barely had any dishes.  We got the basement all cleaned up so people could mill around between there and upstairs, so it wasn't too over crowded.  Then we had cake, Emily really dug into hers, she was so cute, such a mess.  Her whole face was covered and her hands and arms.  But really once I cleaned her up and got her bib off, she wasn't messy anywhere else.

We had a small #1 candle in her cake and then on the big cake we had this special candle that you light the middle, it shoots up like a torch and then it lights the small candles all around, which make the petals drop to look like a flower and there was a lit candle on each petal.  It was supposed to also spin but it did not, but judging on the reaction from the crowd, it was pretty cool.  After cake we opened presents....she got lots of good stuff.  Two baby cell phones (that's cool, one can go in the diaper bag), a cd player, stacking cups, tool bench, clothes, puzzles, a book, some fake food that is sooooo cool.  It's all in sections and stuck together with velcro and comes with a cutting board and a wooden knife and you can "cut" the food apart.  Where was this shit when I was a kid?

Despite not liking to cook now, I LOVED cooking outside as a kid.  My favorite mediums were mud and sawdust.  The sawdust really helped to hold my mud creations together.  I also liked to put water inside those plastic easter eggs and "crack them" open.  I would have loved this cut apart food.  For now she just chews on the pieces and bangs them together but I think she'll really like them as she gets older.

For her second birthday (or maybe later, we'll see how much she might like it by then) I want to convert an old entertainment center into a play kitchen for her so the food will be awesome.  She also has a grill....we actually bought it some years ago for our nephew for Christmas.  Before giving it to him I decided he was too old for it so I returned it and got him something else.  An entire year later, I came home one day to find the grill on our porch.  Walmart had sent it back for no apparent reason, but also didn't charge us for it.  A whole year later!  And you could tell it was the same exact one because of how dirty and beat up it was.  I can't imagine where this thing was for a whole year.

So, we got a free grill.  I already faced the hell that is Walmart to return it the first time, I sure as hell wasn't going to waste my sanity when they apparently didn't feel the need to sell this thing for a year, and send it back.  So we've hung on to it all this time for our kids.  I'll be excited to put it out on the deck so Emmy can grill when daddy does.

She had her one year well visit on Tuesday.  Everything went well, the doctor was happy with her height and weight.  She is in a high percentile for her height, but the website I was using said she was in the 19th for her weight, which was 19.4 lbs on her birthday, but the doctor said she's in about the 50th, so I feel better about that.  She was a little concerned that she doesn't do a traditional crawl, but I'm not worried, I know lots of babies don't crawl.  Besides, she does the belly scoot or the butt scoot, so she gets to where she wants to go.  And also the fact that she doesn't pull up to stand a lot.  I think that is more due to lack of opportunity.  I cannot fathom how her tiny hands would get any kind of grip on our furniture.  But she definitely is always tugging on us to walk her around, so not worried about that either.  Last week she did really well pushing her vtech toy, but she took a bit of a nasty spill and now she seems afraid to do it.  We try to keep getting her to try, but she just wants to hold our hands.  I don't blame her though, falling is no fun.  She was so funny at the doctor.  She was standing on the exam table and I had my arm around her and she kept blowing raspberries in my face, trying to steal my glasses, sticking her hand in my mouth....I could barely concentrate on what the doctor was saying.

She's been much more affection lately, giving hugs and kisses...she loves to give kisses, except she gives them with her whole mouth open.  So if she kisses you on the lips there is often tongue involved, lol.  But it's just so cute and funny to see her coming at your face with her mouth wide open.  When I went to pick her up from my inlaws the other day she was very happy to see me and kept hugging and cuddling.  I also love that she seems completely at ease with all her grandparents.  That was a worry of mine to make sure she sees both sets often enough, but she laughs and giggles and seems very happy with them, so I think we're doing a good job.  Plus I see how she is with people she doesn't know well.  She does good, but she remains very cautious, I have to be in sight and even then she mostly just stares at them.  I have a lot of younger cousins so I played with lots of babies when I was growing up, and I was always a favorite cousin.  But it's so nice to be #1, that one person your child wants and has to be near.  It's a nice feeling to be so needed.

We started her on whole milk today.  She seemed to like it, but not as much as her formula, but she drank most of what we gave her.  But then I put her to bed, she had been asleep for a good hour when she woke up puking everywhere.  So, not sure what that means.  Is she allergic or intolerant to it, or does it just takes some time for their tummies to adjust?  I gave her a bath because she was just covered in puke, and she was farting up a storm too.  I'll probably try it for a few more days and if she's still puking I'll call her doctor.  I think she just needs to adjust to it.  I got her all cleaned up and put on fresh sheets and jammies.  Lol, my friend gave me an excellent tip, to make up the crib with two layers of sheets and waterproof pads so in time likes these you can just strip off the dirty top layer and not remake the whole bed.

Well that would have worked great if Ryan hadn't set the wet bundle of dirty sheets on top of the clean one  :)  But he was a big help, he got her bath ready while I cleaned her up some.  He's a good daddy :)  I love watching the two of them play together, it melts my heart.  So she got puke on both of her teddy bears, one of them being the heartbeat bear.  So we took the heart out and tossed him in the wash, and I put her to bed with the heart.  She's so funny, she's just laying in there, playing it over and over and putting it to her ear and and smiling.

The other day I was having sharp pains on my right side so I took an OPK...it was positive.  I was all excited because I am pretty sure it is my first time ovulating since Emily was born.  But then I remembered I started metformin a month ago so that's probably why.  But, even though my body isn't doing it on my own, regular is regular, and if I can track O I can use it as cheap, non-hormonal birth control.  I jokingly told Ryan I was Oing and asked if he wanted to try.  He said we should play Russian roulette.  I still don't know if we'll have another baby, but I have never been more sure of anything than the fact that I do NOT want to get pregnant right now.

I'm worried because despite thinking maybe we'll want another in a year, I am now back to thinking maybe we're done.  I'm just so scared I still won't know when the time comes.  In an ideal world, another would be nice.  But the idea of worrying about another early loss, having surgery (this time with a kid at home to take care of) to have the cerclage put in again, worrying about my cervix, worrying about all the other things that can go wrong, worrying about a newborn and SIDS again....it just all terrifies me.  I love Emily so much and being a mom is so amazing, but I am just not sure all that worry is worth having another.  I mean, when all is said and done it would be worth it, but during?  I am not sure.  Plus Ryan mentioned the other day how thankful he was that nothing was wrong with Emily, and how he wouldn't know what to do if we ever had another and got a bad diagnosis and we had to make the decision to keep going or to terminate.  I know this is all getting the cart ahead of the horse, but when it came to an early loss (I thought I was miscarrying Em when I was 5 weeks along), incompetent cervix, her being healthy....I just feel like we beat the odds and we would somehow be tempting fate for something bad to happen again.  Plus add in the fact that next year I will be going on 37, and the odds of actually having something go wrong would be a lot higher.  Those risks were all worth it to get Emily....but we got our rainbow, we're parents to a beautiful girl in heaven and a beautiful girl on earth, shouldn't we quit while we're ahead?

Tuesday we remembered our first daughter on her second angelversary.  This year wasn't as sad as last, I think because more time has passed and I am not pumped full of post child birth hormones.  But then again, I've had days here and there where the grief just hits me out of nowhere for no apparent reason.  But I could definitely feel it coming, my heart felt heavy for the last few days.  The night before I kept thinking about the time....this time I was headed to the hospital, at this time I was in active labor, and the next morning I thought of her at 10:11 when she was born.  I pointed to her clothes in the shadow box in Emily's room and told her that today was her sister's birthday.

Just in time, I received my copy of Mother of all mothers in the mail with Kayla's name on the tribute page.  I love it.  I cried while reading it, but it's an excellent mantra to read when I need to be reminded that none of it was my fault, contrary to the burden of guilt that I feel.  After Emily's doctor appt we went to a late lunch at a Mexican restaurant, and then got some balloons.  Ryan got a lawn sign that he wrote on so we put that at Kayla's grave and tied a happy birthday balloon to it.  Then we took Emily to a spot away from the trees and set her down and gave her a balloon.  At first she just played with it, but we finally nudged it enough for her to let go and released it to heaven.  Then Ryan and I released ours.  It's so beautiful watching them float away.  I am glad Emily got to participate more this year...last year she was only 6 days old and it was chillier so she was in her car seat covered with a blanket.  I'll be excited to watch her be able to actually release the balloon and know what it means as she gets older.

Happy 2nd birthday my sweet angel, I love you <3

Happy Birthday baby doll

Wow, I guess I have been a little busy lately.  I'm going to write this post a day early as I am pretty busy this week.  On Thursday my baby girl will be one year old!  I'm so proud, sad, and excited all at the same time.  We made it through the newborn phase, those sleepless nights when she would just cry and cry and I would cry with her because I didn't know what was wrong.  The nights I DREADED bedtime because I was so scared she would quit breathing in her sleep, and the nights I was so tired I dozed off while feeding her and dropped her.....BOTTLE, not her, haha and then couldn't remember how I got back into bed.

Those days seem like sooooo long ago, but just yesterday at the very same time.  It's hard to believe she will already be one, but then it also seems like we've had her forever just because I cannot nor do I want to remember my days without her.  She cracks me up all the time, she makes funny little faces, or squeals at these high pitch levels, she'll shake her head back and forth and she is her daddy's parrot.  She mimics everything he does, even his burp, she'll try to make a noise like a burp.  She's
got her 7th tooth coming in, she loves to clap, she can sort of wave (it's like a two handed wave and almost a clap but her hands don't meet), she loves the cats, she pulls herself along on the floor but doesn't do a traditional crawl, she gives kisses, she says mama and dada (though the jury is still out on the meaning behind them) she loves to blow raspberries and if we make a psssst sound, she'll mimic it.  She loves getting into the DVDs and tossing them all over the floor, and she eats everything.  Aside from puree green beans months ago (she likes fresh green beans) I've yet to feed her anything she doesn't seem to like.  She gets mad if you eat in front of her and don't give her any.

Her newest food that she loves are dill pickle spears.  She's getting better and sippies but half of the time still spits the water back out, and she does even better with a straw.  I just bought her a little water bottle with a straw that has her name on it.  She knows her name, she loves to babble and screech and she loves to walk.  If she had it her way, she'd make you walk with her all.day.long.  She's such a fun, sweet, happy little girl.  She not only claps and gets excited when Bubble Guppies comes on, she gets excited when I pull up the DVRd shows because I always record them since they're on when she naps.  So she knows when the DVR menu comes up, it's Bubble Guppies time.

This past weekend she and I and my stepmom joined my aunts and a few cousins for girls' weekend.  We started with lunch in Birch Run, then we shopped till we dropped at the outlet stores.  I got a new leather coat and a Easter dress for Em, and Grammy bought her quite a few outfits too.  When we were all shopped out we went to the hotel and had pizza and then we went for a swim.  Emily had been swimming once before but she was only about three months old, so this was pretty much her first time.  Her suit was so small on her, even with added elastic to the straps, it was still pretty tight, so I definitely need to get her a new suit for the summer.  Ryan and I had both agreed no second hand swim suits...it's gross.  But then I realized, she has a swim diaper on (which is new) so really second hand suits are no different than second hand clothes.  I'm so happy for this revelation since Once Upon a Child has a ton of cute suits out that are so cheap.  Since she can only get one season out of them, why spend a bunch on a new one?

So luckily our clan were the only ones in the pool when we went, 'cause this mama does not like wearing a swim suit right now.  Operation lose baby weight isn't going so well.  So I took her in, and it was coooold, even for being an indoor pool.  So we didn't stay long at all, her poor body was shaking and her lower lip was trembling but I wanted to stay in for a few minutes to see if she liked it.  I showed her how to splash in the water so she had fun doing that and getting mommy all wet.  Then I held her out from my body a bit so I could twirl her around in the water a little.  She kind of liked it, but she was hanging on to me pretty tight.  She did let my aunt take her and swim her around a bit.  When I couldn't take her lip trembling anymore we headed back to the room, gave her a warm bath to rinse off the chlorine and got her ready for bed.

I wasn't sure how she was going to sleep being in a pack n play and in a strange place.  She had barely gotten even one short nap that day and it was already an hour past her bedtime.  I tried putting her in bed with me until she fell asleep but she just wanted to play, so I put her in the PNP.  Within a minute or two she was out.  Most nights she wakes at some point and either plays or fusses a bit but I think she was out cold the whole night.  My alarm woke me up, but she didn't wake up till about 10 minutes later.  So after we had breakfast and packed up, we headed to Frankenmuth for a carriage ride.  It was a fun little ride around the area and Emily got to meet our horse.  Then we went for chicken dinner.  By then she was due for a nap, but I suspected she was still a bit overtired from the day before and there was too much going on....my two cousins who are about 4 and 7 both loved her and wouldn't leave her alone, so it was tough for her to catch a nap.

Between my cousins and my niece and nephew on Ryan's side, I think she will be known as Baby Emily till she is an adult.  They all call her that...it's tough being the youngest on both sides.  I tried taking her out of the restaurant to calm her but nothing was working, so when I came back my SIL took her since she was finished eating and I still needed to eat.  Then my stepmom took her, and she was out in the lobby and an accordion player came over to them.  I kept thinking, he better not be out there keeping her awake.  So I went out a few minutes later and he was actually playing her to sleep.  She was half out when I came out there and then boom, she was gone.  He even played her a lullabye on his accordion.  I wanted to take him home with us, he was like a baby whisperer.

So after dinner we browsed the gift shops downstairs and she woke up not long after, but I think she got at least a 30 minute nap.  I wanted to go to the toy store but I didn't want to navigate the stroller, so I left her with my SIL so I could go, and she was with all my aunts and cousins.  When I came back, everybody was gone.  I knew they were headed outside soon, so I went out and found them....all of them except my SIL my stepmom and my daughter.  I tried texting them, my SIL answered, saying she had gone to the bathroom but she didn't know where my stepmom was.  I was like ok, you still have my kid right?  She said no, my stepmom took her so she could go to the bathroom and when she came out they were gone.

So, I know my stepmom didn't run off with her, and I knew she had her and she was fine, but when it was going on about 20 minutes and no sign of her, didn't respond to my text or answer her phone, I was getting antsy.  I mean, I KNOW my stepmom wouldn't leave her somewhere, but not knowing for sure where your kid is for more than a few minutes was a feeling I wasn't fond of.  Mama bear didn't know where her cub was and mama bear was getting agitated.  My SIL and stepmom finally found each other, and we all met up, but I am thinking once Emily is mobile and walking on her own, she will not be leaving my side when out in public.  I don't care if it is to go somewhere with Grammy or Nana or the damn Pope, not going to happen for a while.

So once we are all reunited, we headed to Bronner's (the worlds largest christmas store) and wandered around there for a few hours.  There were just so many things to look at.  I got Ryan a 5K ornament and a cute little stuffed snowwoman.  After that we hit a couple more outlet stores, got dinner and then headed home.  It was a good little weekend.  I am looking forward to making girls' weekend a tradition with Emily and I (my family has been doing it for a few years now and this was the first time I could make it).

So I took my camera crash course last week and took Emily's pictures.  I think they actually turned out pretty nice.  Especially nice that I was able to save a couple hundred dollars.  Some were a bit dark, but nothing photoshop couldn't correct.  So I am excited to have pretty pictures of her one year for almost peanuts...I have a few promos from shutterfly from pampers rewards, so I think I'll be able to get a bunch of pictures for like 12 bucks.

Last time I said how Emily walked with her walker toy a few steps, whereas before she would just stand there.  Well today she walked all the way through the living room, down the hall and we started to come back but she fell and we couldn't catch her in time.  Once she calmed down I did have her walk a few more steps just so she won't be scared to try again, but I was so proud, she did so well!  I'm predicting that she'll walk by say....14 months.  Yep, that's my guess.  I have a lot to do this week to get ready for her party, but I am so excited to celebrate my baby girl's first year.  This time last year I was sitting here, taking it all in, knowing that the next morning I was going in for my induction.  My how my life has changed and I wouldn't change a thing.

Here are a few of the pics I took, not bad for a novice I say.

A baby no more

In less than three weeks my baby will be a toddler.  How is that possible?  I know everyone says the time goes by fast, but seriously, I blinked and her first birthday is almost upon us.  It's like she is growing up so fast just overnight.

I don't think she is ever going to do the traditional crawl...she is getting around very well with her belly crawl.  Unless at some point she decides she needs to go faster, I think the belly crawl will suffice for her.  The day she turned 11 months she started waving, she did it several times but now has only done it once since then.  She by far prefers clapping.  She will even clap when she hears clapping, like on TV.  To test the theory further, I played an applause track on my comptuer and she looked up and got all excited and started clapping.  Damn I love that little girl.

Unless she is surrounded by my snoogle, she cannot go from sitting up to crawling, so lately she has learned to just scoot her butt across the floor, like when dogs scoot their butts on the carpet, lol.  She gets into everything now!  She has a few bins of toys in the living room and now that she can get to them they are all dumped out all over the floor every day.  She also likes getting into the DVD cabinet, I may have to put a lock on that because the DVDs are all pulled out every day.  She also likes turning on and off the DVD player.  I don't mind that, but she occasionally turns off the cable box while I am watching tv.  The one day I said no no Em, turn it back on and she did!  I think it was just a happy coincidence though.

So now I tell her no every time she goes for the cable box, but I'll say her name and say no and she'll turn around fast and be like who me?  No, I wasn't doing anything....and then she'll go for it again and then I'll tell her no again.  She does it like four times before she finally gives up and realizes I am going to tell her no every time.

My family came over last night for dinner and she was going to bed when they were all leaving.  She gave Grammy and Grandpa a kiss and then they were like do you have a kiss for your uncle so she leaned over and gave my brother the sweetest little kiss on the cheek.  He looked like he was going to cry, it broke my heart.  I know it is because he loves her so much, but also because it is still unknown if they are going to be able to have kids, and I know he wants them so bad. 

She can sit up from a laying down position now if she is on a pillow, or on our bed or in our crib.  I woke up this morning and could only see her foot on the monitor, so I panned over and there she was, sitting up in the corner of her crib.  Her one foot was sort of bent back and stuck in the slats, so she would try to get it out but couldn't, so then she would clap....then she would try something else to get unstuck but failed, so then she clapped again, lol.

Today was a big day for doing new things.  She's loved to stand for a long time now, but today all day long she kept holding out her arms to me, wanting me to stand her up.  Then she'll try to push my hands off her, not knowing that she'll fall down otherwise.  So she was doing a lot of walking around holding on to me, so I went and got her Vtech toy that she can push and use as a walker.  So far she wouldn't walk with it, she would just use it to stand there, and if she pushed it forward at all she wouldn't take steps to catch back up with it, she'd just stand there bent over like oh crap, now what do I do.  But today she walked a lot with it....she wasn't all over the house or anything, but to go from not walking at all to taking several steps, I think she did great.  Then I had her standing up holding the bars of her crib, and she tried to let go and walk to her vtech which was just about three feet away but she fell over and I caught her.  Who knows, she may be walking by her birthday.

So also has more teeth coming in, currently her fourth and fifth ones are on their way in.  Such a little lady.  I've got to get going on her birthday party....I made all these plans months ago but now that we're getting close I am a little stressed that I need to execute them.  But it's really no big deal, the decisions are all made, just got to do it when the time comes.  Invitations are done, just waiting until next weekend to mail them out, we know what we are doing for food...we're still a little iffy on the cake but I think going there and talking to them will help us figure out what to do.  Her Cabbage Patch came the other day.  Since we already gave her the easy chair, we wanted to get her something else to open on her birthday so we got her a Cabbage Patch doll in a ballerina dress and we gave her a custom name and gave her the same birthday as Em.  I think she will really like that when she gets older that they have the same birthday.  We named her Amelia Marie.  When I suggested it Ryan was like are you sure you aren't going to want that for a kid's name someday.  I was like no I don't think so, but now I'm like crap, I kind of like it.  But I don't know, are the names Emily and Amelia too similar?  Eh it doesn't matter.

My MIL has a family friend that takes pictures.  She does charge for them, but I don't think it's like a business, she just does them as a hobby.  So as part of their gift to us she is going to book her to come take pictures for Emily's party.  That's really cool, then we can just relax and enjoy the party and not have to worry about getting pictures of this and that.  I need to hurry up and finish my photography crash course so I can take her one year pictures.  I plan to do them a week or two early so if they don't turn out well we still have time to take her to a studio, so I really only have about a week to do that so I can get going on taking them.  I really hope they turn out well, I am tired of paying hundreds of dollars at a studio. 

I am in desperate need of a mommy make over.  I blow dried my hair last night and did my make up and it felt so good to look human again.  So I've decided I need a new hair cut.  Most of the ones I want are too short for Ryan's taste.  I don't want short short hair, but maybe something I little shorter than I normally do, but I also don't want Ryan to hate it.  So I have something in mind that I think might work but it will still be on the longish side.  He and I are going out for some sushi with some friends next weekend.  I'm so excited, we're going to my favorite restaurant, and I'm going to see if my stylist can get me in earlier that day.  I always try to get my hair cut on a night that I am going somewhere so I can get some miles out of it looking nice.  My stylist always does it so nice and you can see all of the layers and it looks so good....then the next day I wash it and blow dry it and it looks nothing like how she did it.  So it's nice to go out looking good for one day anyway.  Maybe I'll get a mani pedi too.

Something good

Can I say it, can I say it?  Emily is officially.....army crawling.  So no real crawling yet, but it's a huge step.  Last week she was planking and then lunging herself forward like an out-of-water butterfly stroke, and she would try to get up on her knees but when she couldn't she would push off of them to cover some ground.  Now this week she is pulling herself with her arms and dragging her legs behind, like a zombie, lol.  She'll be 11 months old on Thursday, maybe by then?

Still no waving, but boy does this girl love to clap her hands.  Whenever we try to get her to wave she'll look at us with a confused face, then clap as if, I can do this with my hands, is that good enough?  Today daddy taught her how to take something from him, and then hand it back to him when he asked for it.  Such a simple task, but you'd think she just walked on the moon, I was so proud.

I decided to clean my home office today so I took her in there with me and let her play on the floor while I organized.  I brought some toys in but of course she discovered other things she wanted to play with, like the cats' water dish.  At first she was just splashing in it and I figured eh, there's worse stuff she could be doing, but then she did the worse stuff, she picked it up and dumped all the water out.  Sigh, baby 1, mommy 0.

So like I've said before, I've struggled with my faith a lot since losing Kayla, and I have come to the conclusion that I don't believe God makes bad things happen...I just can't believe that God would MAKE someone beat the life out of a defenseless baby, or kill a single mother of three kids in an auto accident, or allow horrible monsters to conceive a healthy child but not parents who would do anything for their kids.  But I pinned this quote on pinterest today, and it made me happy.  It says, "God promises to make something good out of the storms that bring devastation to your life". 

I love that.  I believe that he doesnt make the bad things happen, and he cannot stop them from happening, but he can help soften the blow a little by helping to make something good come of it.  For instance, after my mom died, my best friend whom I had had a falling out with two years prior came to her funeral and we re-kindled our friendship and it is now stronger than it ever was.  I think of the last ten years since my mom died, and I cannot even count how much of my life has been filled with fun, laughter, support, understanding, and love because I got my best friend back, and for that I am very thankful. 

I also feel like I am a better mommy to Emily, because of Kayla.  I know I would have been a good mom to Kayla too, but because of our loss, I appreciate how fragile life is more.  I think knowing how lucky we are to have her helps us remain more grounded on those tough days, and not take for granted those moments that many parents likely do.  I am human and no doubt cannot possibly soak in every magical moment with my daughter, but so far in the almost year with our little miracle, I feel like I have been able to soak up as much love, happiness, appreciation, and gratitude as I can, and I feel like that is largely because I know how quickly and easily that can all be taken away.  I will never be glad these storms happened to me, but I am very thankful for the something good that I believe God gives us to help make it through them.