Grace's First Birthday

Grace is such a lucky baby to have two sets of wonderful grandparents who both made her first birthday so special for her.

First, we celebrated in Ann Arbor, with Grandma and Grandpa LaMoreaux, Great Grandpa LaMoreaux, and cousin Jamie LaMoreaux (who happened to be in town from Florida).

Grandma made a special healthy banana muffin with strained yogurt topping for her frosting. Grace loved it!  

After she had licked the "frosting" for awhile, I tried to take it so I could cut it into smaller pieces, and she grabbed the whole thing from me!

She got some sweet gifts, including a very special book Grandma LaMoreaux made.  It is a baby board book that has our immediate family members and their pictures, so Grace can start to remember family members and their pictures.

So far, she likes to look at everyone's page, but only points at Brian's picture and says "Da".  I'm looking forward to seeing her learn all of our family's names and being able to point them out in her family book.

Then the day before her actual birthday, we celebrated Grace again with a party that Grandma Lindsay put together in Ludington.  Grandma Lindsay also made a special healthy cake with yogurt frosting, and Grace loved it!  

Grace got her very own kitchen set from the Bailey family, and a pink baby doll stroller and some adorable outfits from Grandma and Grandpa Lindsay!

Brian and I talk every day about how lucky we are to have such supportive grandparents in Grace's life.  Grace's first birthday was just perfect, and we owe it to them. 

12 Months Old Baby - "MamaMama"

Our baby is officially one!
Here is the latest update with Grace:

Teeth:
Still 6 teeth! 4 on top, with spaces in between, and 2 on bottom.  She seems to be teething all the time though, so I'm sure more are soon to come.


Sleep:
Minus a few setbacks (sickness, teething, and travel), sleep has been great!  We are down to one wake up a night on most nights. Some nights more, some nights less.  After almost a year of living in a fog on broken sleep, I almost feel like a functioning adult again.  She still takes 2 naps a day, but seems to be somewhat transitioning into 1 solid mid-day nap.

Food:
Grace eats everything!  She loves almost all food, but especially fruits (like her mama).  She still nurses 3-4 times per day.  She still gets water out of a sippy cup.  I've been trying whole milk in the sippy cup, but so far she hasn't shown much interest.

Sizes:
Grace is still wearing size 12-18 months and her diapers are still size 4.

Talking:
Grace has a few words:
- Da
- Mama
- doh (dog)
- buh (bunny)
- nahnah (no-no)

She clearly and consistently identifies Brian as "Da", but also still uses that sound for other items and other people too.  She now clearly says "Buh" for her stuffed bunny.  She very clearly calls for me "Mama! Mama!" when I am out of sight or even in the same room but not holding her.  She can say "doh" for dog, and she makes a "leeedle" sound for "kitty".  It is very cool to see her very slowly get a grasp on the English language, she is always watching, always listening, and always learning.

Comprehending:
It has become really obvious that Grace is understanding some/a lot of what we say.  When we say "Where is bunny?" she will crawl over to her bunny and hug it.  Or if I say, "Come here to Mama and I'll read you this book", she will crawl over to me (depending on if she wants to or not). She is motioning and gesturing for things and really comprehending.  It's cool because she can really communicate to let us know if she wants more or is done with something.

Walking:
Well, she's been standing up supported for 4 months! And is just now feeling more confident to let go with both hands to stand unsupported once in a while.  She definitely has the body strength and stability to stand up without holding on to anything, but at this point we're just waiting for her to feel ready to do it.  She will walk anywhere by pushing her push-cart, but has never taken more than one step without it.  She seems so close, it seems like she is ready to walk this month!  But she has also seemed ready for many months in a row now.

Attachment/Anxiety: 
Grace is going through a bit of an attachment/stranger anxiety phase.  She is currently preferring me to all others, and will cry for me if I'm gone (even in the next room).  It is very sweet, but also a bit exhausting.
In addition, she loves staring at strangers/people when we are out and about, but as soon as that person gives Grace attention, she buries her face into my shoulder and peeks out.
I'm fairly confident that this is just a phase, because she never was very shy before.



Anyway, Grace at age one is just a beautiful and sweet little thing.  Every day, Brian and I just look at her in awe of how lucky we are to be her parents.

One Year with Baby Grace

We have now had a one-year old baby for 2 weeks.  Being a parent is everything I ever dreamed it would be.  It is also much harder, much more stressful, but much more amazing than I ever imagined.

Grace has given me the greatest gift in the world in this baby. Grace has made me a mom. I love her smiles, her giggles, her curiosity, her spunk, and her sweet sweet little face. I love holding her more than anything (even though she's a solid 20-plus pounds now).

My first month of motherhood was so hard. I thought I was ready, but I wasn't. She rarely slept more than two hours at a time. Breastfeeding was excruciatingly painful, and I cried and had to take deep breaths each time she fed.  (And she fed all day and all night).
By months 2 and 3, things started really looking up. She slept slightly longer (3 hours at a time, sometimes) and breastfeeding finally stopped hurting.

Month 4 was awful. I went back to work, and it was the hardest thing I've ever done.
It is still gut-wrenching for me to think about my first day back at work. I woke up, put on makeup for the first time in weeks, packed myself a lunch, and packed bottles for my baby (even though I knew she provably wouldn't take them). Brian and I drove to Nemeh's house (basically a perfect stranger at that time), I handed my tiny bundle off to her in the pitch black early morning, I went to my car, and I wept. The guilt and separation feeling was absolutely overwhelming and awful. The first day I picked her up, a little toddler said "that baby cry all day", which was just another punch to my gut.  She had refused a bottle the entire first day. Somehow though, she and I survived it. She learned to take bottles. I learned how to pump during my lunches, and do lesson plans late at night after she has gone to bed.

She got sick almost immediately after starting daycare. Her pink cheeks and stuffed nose added to my already-long list of reasons I hated leaving her SO young to be at daycare full of germs.
But we got through it.

When Grace was 6 months old, summer came, school let out and I had the most glorious summer with my angel baby. She and I took a vacation with my family to the coast of North Carolina. She got some extra time with her grandparents and cousins when we went to Ludington in August. And she spent some time playing in my classroom while my parents and I set it up for the school year in August.

Grace started solids over the summer, and so taking her to restaurants became so much fun. Brian and I loved taking her to brunch.  And we started a routine of Saturday night Mass and out to dinner after with my parents.
By the fall, heading back to work was not as bad, but of course, still stressful, and hard for me.

Despite being back at work, fall was just wonderful with our baby. She crawled around in the leaves.  I took her on walks after work. 
Grace made some "friends" at daycare, and she smiles when she sees them at arrival. That takes away a lot of guilt for me.

At the end of October/early November we had another rough patch: Grace got her first ear infection.
She had been acting really off, just not as happy, and fussing for seemingly no reason. Finally, it got so bad, she was up many times one night, clearly miserable, so I took her in to the dr. (Taking her into the doctor isn't easy. I had to take a sick day at work, which meant driving back in to school after I put her to bed, then from 8-10pm writing up sub plans and get materials ready for the sub.  I never take sick days for myself, but for her, I'll do whatever I have to).
She was diagnosed with a double ear infection and put on antibiotics. She seemed to get better almost immediately the next day, which was wonderful! Then, she took a huge dive that evening and seemed worse than before. The hardest part for me was seeing her in such a lethargic state. She is a feisty, active baby, and seeing her just lay on the floor, staring blankly and avoiding eye contact was just heartbreaking and really scary for me as a first time parent.
Thankfully, after an entire week on antibiotics, two sick days for me, many sleepless nights for both Grace and me, she was finally back to her active and happy self.
We finished off her first year with a fun Thanksgiving weekend in Ludington, complete with a special first birthday party for Grace.
I can't believe it has been a whole year since she was born.  I miss that tiny little bundle.  But I'm also completely in love with my big 1-year old bundle of energy.
And another season begins, and time marches on.  Looking forward to see what Grace's second year with us will bring.

11 Months Old

Each phase of these 11 months so far has been both wonderful and challenging all at once. This phase is no different. She's finally sleeping (thank God), but she's all gas and no brakes when she's awake.  She is an explorer and an adventurer, but also a silly little thing.

Weekdays are hard for me.  I get some sweet cuddles with Grace in the morning, but usually not very long, because I need to leave for work by 7:45.  Then, after work, she's tired and hungry and fussy, and to be honest, I'm tired and hungry and cranky myself.  We do get a little bit of fun playtime in after work, but it's not very long before it's time for dinner/bath/bed.

So, weekends have become more precious than ever.  I love spending the day with her.  I love taking her out and about to places.  It's a huge hassle to get her ready to go places, but it's so worth it because she loves being out and about. And I'm so proud to have her in my arms wherever I go.

Here is the latest with Grace:

Teeth:
Grace now officially has 6 teeth!  She got her bottom 2 last summer, and we've been waiting awhile for more to show up. Just this past month, within a span of about 2 weeks, she grew top middle 4 front teeth.

Sleep:
I don't want to jinx it, but we've had a few really good months of sleep now.  Grace still wakes up at random times throughout the night.  But, I watch her on the monitor, and she usually rolls over, makes a few noises, sucks her thumb, and falls back asleep.  It's amazing!  She always has one big wake up though, where she cries and I come down and nurse her. This is usually around 2 am, but sometimes is as late as 4 or 5 am.

She still takes two naps a day.  At home, the naps are almost always exactly 1 hour 15 minutes.  At daycare, she seems to have one long afternoon nap about 2 hours every day.

Eating:
Grace is still nursing about 4 times per 24 hour period.  And eating lots of solids and drinking water from a sippy cup!  She loves all kinds of food.  She likes scrambled egg, chicken breast, avocado, cheese, all fruits, most veggies, and she loves her Cheerios and yogurt drops.

Sizes:
Grace is officially in size 4 diapers.  She is wearing 12-18 month clothes.

Milestones:
Grace isn't walking yet, but she's getting sturdier and sturdier on her legs every single day!  She loves to practice her standing, sometimes letting go for free-standing, but so far not longer than a few seconds at a time.

Grace still loves clapping, and can clap when I just say the words "clap", without actually showing her.  She sometimes waves byebye, but it usually requires a lot of prompting.  ("Wave byebye, Grace! Wave byebye to DaDa! Look, he's waving at you!" etc.).

She plays "Peek-a-Boo" with us and it is adorable! She will cover her face with a blanket, and burst into giggles when we say, "There she is!"

Words:
Grace is still saying "Dada" to Brian.  And still saying it to other random items (like the window).  But mostly to Brian!  She says "Mamamama" but not to me at all.  She sometimes imitates "hi" and "bye", but not consistently.  She loves to make noise and babble at us! So, I can't wait for some of her babbling to include actual words.

Likes:
Grace truly loves books.  It has been so cool to see how her interest in books has increased each month.  It's especially interesting for me, because my whole career is teaching young children how to read, so it's cool to now see first hand how the foundational skills of literacy can be introduced as early as infancy.
Grace is now able to pick up a book (these board books are heavy!), open it up, point to a page, and make random babbling sounds.  This is so cool to see!  Sometimes, she'll even grab on to a book, try to carry it over to me, and crawl into my lap to show me that she wants me to read it to her.  No matter how tired I am or not in the mood, if she crawls into my lap with a book, I will read it every time and hope I can continue to do so.  

More Likes:
Grace loves other kids. She smiles at the other babies at daycare when she sees them.  She loves when she sees other babies at church or at restaurants.  Recently, we were at a Chinese restaurant with my parents, and two other babies were there and making babbling words.  And Grace repeated their exact babbling sounds loudly right back at them.  The waitress was impressed and was like "They are communicating across the room"!  It was really cute.

Grace loves to explore.  My nickname for her is "my little sneaker" because she is always trying to sneak around to get into something! 

She loves animals! She sometimes sees the neighbor cats at my parents' house.  She'll try to follow them, but they usually keep a little distance from her!

Dislikes:
Diaper changes. Oh my goodness, diaper changes have become such a pain.  She rolls over, tries to crawl away, and cries as if I am torturing her for forcing her to lie there.  I try singing to her, showing her toys, and talking through the whole thing.  But she is not having it.

Strangers.  She's right now going through a minor stranger anxiety period.  She will bury her head in my shoulder and peek out at people. There is one man who works in the produce section of Kroger, and she has burst into tears twice just because he looked at her!

Overall, 11 months is a pretty wonderful and sweet age.  I try to appreciate every moment, because I'm realizing how fleeting her babyhood is.  These next few months we'll be entering toddlerhood, which is terrifying.  But to me, no matter how much she toddles or walks or talks, she'll still always be my baby in my heart. I'll never forget her chubby baby legs or the army crawl she did for months.  Or the happy panting crawl she does when she's exploring somewhere new.  I'm not ready for time to move on and her to take those first steps.  But I know it's inevitable and it's time.  I try to embrace each milestone, no matter how much it breaks my heart. She'll keep on growing and changing.  And I'll keep on cherishing every hug and every cuddle I get.

10 Months Old - A Sociable Baby!

We officially have a 10-month-old baby.  She is truly everything I ever dreamed of and more.

Here are some updates:

Milestones:
Grace is officially waving!  It is the sweetest thing and it takes family, friends, and strangers by surprise as she raises her hand in greeting or in parting, accompanied by a big smile.  She will clap, too, which is also just so sweet. 
Grace will pull to standing, cruise along furniture, and walk using her push cart.  She is yet to stand up with no hands, and yet to walk without pushing her cart.  I'm not in any rush for either of those things to happen, I am happy to wait several more months before I have a standing, walking toddler.

Likes:
She loves her "Da" and she loves her grandparents!  Brian's parents have come down to visit a few times lately, and she is just full of smiles the whole time she's with them.  And luckily, living so close to my parents, she gets to see them all the time and especially loves our Saturday night routine of Mass followed by dinner out at a restaurant.

   

She loves making noises and "talking".  She loves food!  She loves seeing animals (cats, dogs, squirrels).
I would say what she loves the most right now, though, is being out and about and around other people.  She loves attention from adults, she loves watching bigger kids, and she even loves seeing the babies her same age at daycare.  She smiles as soon as she sees her "friends" at daycare, and it just melts my heart.  Is it possible for my 10-month-old to have friends??  She really seems to!

Dislikes:
She doesn't like if I'm out of her sight of vision, or if she's not being paid attention to.  She dislikes being put in her carseat, but once she's in it she's usually fine.  It's hard to think of what she doesn't like, because she seriously is a happy baby.

Talking:

Grace still makes all kinds of sounds.  Her first and only real word so far is "DaDa".  When Brian enters a room, she calls out "Da" or "DaDa".  She still occasionally uses the "Da" sound for other random objects/people/items, but mostly just for Brian.  She finally says "MaMa"! It's not really directed at me or anything, but she has no problem with the "M" sound.  And she still says her classic "Loddy doddy" and "leedle deedle" sounds.  I love all of her sounds and can't wait until someday when I can understand what she's saying.

Food: Grace eats all kinds of food: chicken, avocado, whole milk yogurt, hard boiled egg yolk, all fruits (except no blueberries anymore). She is an eater and just loves food.  She is still breastfeeding, and she nurses about 4-5 times per day.  Once or twice in the morning before daycare, twice in the evening and usually once overnight.  Breastfeeding has become such a special sacred time for me.  Because Grace is always on the go, I love this special time where she is calm and peaceful in my arms.  It is really special, and I know when the time comes to wean her, I will be emotional about it.

Sleep: This is the first blog post where I can write that sleep has actually improved.  Grace is now down to one wake up per night, and it is truly life-changing for me. After 9+ months of sleep deprivation, I can think clearly (most of the time).  It's still tiring being up once per night, because sometimes I don't fall asleep for several hours after she goes back down, leaving me with still just a 4-hour night of sleep.  But for the most part, she is sleeping, I am sleeping, and life has improved.

These past 10 months have just flown by.  Where did that tiny baby go?  I am clinging to every last "baby"ness from Grace that I can get.  She is our little angel miracle, and I am the luckiest woman in the world to be her mom.

9 Months Old - Back to Work for Mom

Each month I seem to claim that she has changed the most, but she is now 9 months old, and I swear at 8 months Grace grew the most, cognitively and physically!

She has been doing an actual crawl (no more army crawling or slithering) for about a month now. She is now very sturdy on her two legs (plus one hand holding onto something). She hasn't taken any steps by herself, but she does love to pull up to standing and check everything out from that view!

Grace has truly developed a personality and it is so adorable.  She is cuddly, sweet, playful, silly, and sneaky! I say sneaky because she is always trying to sneak her way into things that she isn't supposed to! (Her drawers full of clothes, our basket of shoes, or the kitchen for example)!  She is so playful and loves games like "Where's Grace?" Or "chase" where I pretend to chase her. She loves being chased and will crawl away and giggle and bury her face on the carpet (thinking that she's hidden herself). It is my favorite and so cute.

Grace now can officially say "mama", but it doesn't seem to be directed exactly/only at me yet. She says "dada" definitely at Brian, and only occasionally at other things/people.

There is absolutely nothing better than being with her. And I write this as my summer comes to a bittersweet end. I will forever remember the first summer where I was a mom. How proud I felt pushing a stroller through the neighborhood or carrying her in my ergobaby while we grocery shopped. How Grace squealed with happiness when we put her in the pool.

I will miss her more than anything when I'm back at school tomorrow. But luckily, this time is different than last spring. This time, I will be less than one mile away from her all day, every day. This time, I may pop in and visit her during my lunch. This time, she's 9 months and can crawl and stand and clearly show her dislikes and likes. She's a much different baby than the 3.5 month old tiny little thing that I first took to daycare last spring.

I will still miss her with all my heart.  But I love my job, I'm so lucky to have a job at my new school, and I know this is what's right for our family right now. She loves her Tuesdays and Thursdays with Grandma. And I think she enjoys the rest of the week when she plays with all the other toddlers and toys at daycare.

She is truly my whole entire world. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

Here is the latest with Grace at 9 months;

Size: wears size 9 and 12 month clothes, size 3 diapers, weighs 19 pounds and is 28 inches long.

Teeth: still just the front bottom two teeth. I'm bracing myself for the inevitable teething that's going to happen sometime in the next few months.

Sleep: down to about 2 wake ups a night. Really hoping to get down to just one so I don't have to feel like a zombie while teaching this year. Still takes 2 good naps and 1 quick nap a day, the 3rd nap will probably be dropped when school starts, in favor of an earlier bedtime.

Food: still breastfeeding all day, but also LoVES her solids! She loves avocado, heard boiled eggs, bananas, Cheerios, carrots (I give her one big carrot to gnaw on and that keeps her happy for awhile)! Her favorite food of all is blueberries.

Language: she makes all kinds of sounds all the time, but her only true word that she says in association with its actual object is "DaDa". When she sees him, when she hears him, when I bring her down to the basement or upstairs to our bedroom. She whispers it sometimes at first, but then says it out loud when we praise her.

I know my time with a 'baby' is dwindling. She's about to be a toddler, exploring the world and challenging my life in ways I don't even know yet. But forever, no matter how old she gets, I will never forget this sneaky, silly, playful little baby she is right now.

Grace's First Summer

A huge perk of being a teacher is the fact that I get summers off.  A lot of people (my husband included), think this means 3 months off every year.  For me this year, it's exactly 7 weeks (not 3 months) from my last day of school to my first full day of work.  That's okay, 7 weeks is still way more vacation than most people get.

And the summer I've had so far has been truly amazing because it's been with Grace.

Grace's summer kicked off with her first flight for our family trip to the coast of North Carolina.  Grace truly made the trip special for everyone.  She's the first baby to be born in 18 years in my extended family!  Grace got to splash her legs in the ocean, she got to feel sand in her toes, and swim in both the outdoor and indoor pool.  Her favorite part of the trip had to be dinner time. Every evening the whole family meets in Grandpa's condo for dinner. And Grace had everyone's full attention and she loved it.  It was during this trip, at 6.5 months old that Grace's army crawling really took off.

Another special part about this trip was how much time she got to spend with her Uncle Brian.  Grace is my brother's only niece, and he is such a sweet uncle to her.  I just know he's going to be a wonderful father (hopefully someday soon).  But until then, Grace just loved the attention she got from him.

The plane rides with Grace were okay/not so good. I planned to nurse her during take off and landing, but she had other plans.  Our flight down to NC went okay.  Our flight back to DTW was just awful.  It's an hour and a half flight. Grace slept for a half hour, and screamed/cried for an hour.  My mom and I tried everything we could to help.  And to add to it, she screamed the car ride from the airport to the house as well.   I think a few factors were causing the screams for the second flight and not the first.  I believe that timing had to do with it.  Next year, I will try to plan for morning flights if possible.  Our return flight was in the early evening.  Grace's fussiness level increases throughout the day.  She starts out in the morning as a happy baby.  By 5pm, she is much harder to please.  Another tactic I plan to try next year will be screen time.  Grace doesn't really have chances to see screens much (besides my phone as I take pictures of her with it all day long haha).  So, hopefully saving screen time up to be a secret weapon will help next year as well.

Also this summer, we have gone to the pool a ton!  And my parents got a mini backyard pool just for Grace, and she loves it.  She sits and crawls and splashes and plays with her toys and it's just adorable.  This summer has had many 90+ degree days, and luckily, Grace is a water baby.

  

Brian has been working a lot this summer, but we try to squeeze in family time every chance we get.  We've taken Grace to some Ann Arbor favorites like Zingerman's and Afternoon Delight (even though she didn't get to eat any food at either place)!  It's really nice to be able to sit for a meal and just enjoy being together.  Grace and I even brought him a picnic lunch at work one day from Panera.  She absolutely adores him and her face lights up when she sees him every time.

This summer we put Grace in a park swing for the very first time, and she loved it!  We also learned that many babies love this swing, and there can sometimes be an awkward wait for the baby swing.

We had a really nice visit from Brian's parents.  They noticed our long wait for the baby swing, and went out and bought Grace her very own swing for our backyard!  It's a big hit so far!

(They also installed black-out blinds in Grace's room which are amazing!  She goes to bed at 7:30 pm no matter how bright it is outside).

Grace got to meet her cousin Aedan, who is 7.5 months younger than Grace. Sheena is already a wonderful mom to Aedan, and I know Grace is going to love having a younger cousin to play with.

Grace met William Claiborne Hancock IV!  He is my friend Jessica's son and we had a fun little swim date when they were in town.



Most recently, Grace had a visit to her Great-Grandpa LaMoreaux.  He has all kinds of fun toys to show her, including a talking parrot.  I plan for Grace and I to visit him a few more times before summer is up.

And, Grace has pulled herself to somewhat standing!!  This is a scary development, but exciting!

This summer with Grace has truly been the best summer of my life.  Granted, I wish we saw Brian more.  I wish I could get more consolidated sleep somehow.  I wish it was easier to keep our house clean.  But, I will never wish away this time with our baby.  She is my everything and I wouldn't change it for the world.