6th Wedding Anniversary and Father's Day

Last weekend was busy but fun.

We celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary last Friday. It was pretty low key but enjoyable. Jesse worked a half day and we ate lunch together in the backyard. My mom bought Jesse an unfinished adirondack chair for Father's Day so he spent the afternoon staining the chair and I sat outside and knitted while Ali napped. We had dinner at home and spend the evening reminiscing about the past 6 years. Our travels (Germany, Hawaii, and Pennsylvania Christmas) were some of our favorite memories but we also looked back fondly on our first months together in the apartment with no furniture. It was a great evening laughing together.

Father's Day

Dad's with their babies

Ali started off Father's Day by giving Jesse her present of sleeping in so we could have a relaxing morning. We went to church and enjoyed the beautiful weather.

Jesse's parents treated him to Old Chicago's in the afternoon and then we joined Brian, Julie and the girls for a delicious dinner.

Ali will be 4 months old tomorrow so I got all her fourth month pictures uploaded to the shutterfly site this afternoon.

Progress!

Ali had a great day Tuesday. Her nana (my mom) watched her while I was at work and got her to take 2 oz from the bottle! Yay! Still not nearly as much as she would normally eat at a feeding but that is much better than she has done in weeks (certainly better than none which is what she was doing for a while) and is a definite step in the right direction.

Then Ali slept until 4 am Wednesday morning! We had trouble getting Ali down for bed Tuesday night - she didn't go to sleep until 9:45 pm but then she slept great until 4 am - Yay! She has been getting up more during the night recently so this was a welcome change :)

Nicknames

I just read a funny blog that a friend wrote about nicknames which got me thinking about all of Ali's nicknames. Nicknames are funny things - who knows where they come from sometimes and why some of them stick but they do.

I will start off by saying I am apparently a nickname lover probably thanks to my dad. I didn't expect Jesse to be such a nicknamer but he is as well.

Now we choose Aletheia with the intention of called her Ali - I love Aletheia for a name but it is a lot of name for a little baby plus no one can ever pronounce it so for now Ali is perfect. So I don't really count that one . . . but all the rest . . .

First of all, I have the tendency to call her "Al" - really Al? Is two syllables too many for me? And Al? I don't know about you but it makes me pictures a middle aged balding fat man not a gorgeous little baby girl . . . Then there are all the rest of her nicknames (most of which I shared on the blog a few weeks back).

A lot of the time Ali ends up being called Princess or Pumpkin. Neither is really what I would choose as a nickname . . . Princess - what do I think of? A spoiled, rich, entitled little girl. The little girl part is fine but the rest I could do without . . . and Pumpkin - a big round orange fruit (or is it a vegetable?). I don't associate any of those things with little Ali but the nicknames stuck all the same (and as for how they started in the first place - who knows? They just came out).

Most of the others are just silly - wah-mbulance, fuss-apotomos - but still how do we come up with these?

Teething!

For the past few weeks Ali has not been sleeping well at night and has been fussier than normal (although as her nana says she is still a pretty easy girl). About a week ago she was doing this head turning thing while she was eating and she has been drooling and chewing on her fists a lot!

I had been attributing the poor sleeping to a growth spurt (since she is happy to eat everytime she wakes up) and the fussiness I thought was tiredness since she is so much more aware now and naps much less. We read the drooling is normal for her age and doesn't necessarily indicate teething and I figured the head turning thing was just that she was more aware and curious about what was going on around her. Then I realized - my poor baby is teething :(

Then the past few weeks a bunch of the moms in our new mom class have been talking about their babies teething (most of them older than Ali by a month or two but one younger). Yesterday I finally had an epiphany that all the new things going on could add up to teething. I managed to get a peek in her mouth this morning and there looked like there was a little indentation in the middle of her gums on the bottom. Then I got a chance to feel around tonight and there definitely feels like there is something going on.

I feel like she is too young to be teething already but realize she will be four month soon! And it does explain a lot. Especially the sudden cries. She will be perfectly happy then all the sudden she will do this sharp cry that sounds like she is in pain.

I hope she is not uncomfortable for too long - she seems so sad about it sometimes and I could really use the sleep :)

Getting so Big!

Ali is getting so big I can't believe it. I packed up all her newborn and 0-3 month cloths last week as well as her newborn and small size diapers. I can't believe she already fits into 3-6 month cloths - I remember opening them as gifts when Ali was brand new and thinking "How on Earth will this fit her in a few short months?" and now it does!

Ali has gotten very strong too. Jesse will fly her around like an airplane (which she loves) and she holds her whole body in line so well! She can also balance for a moment in sitting position and will weight bear on her legs (she has no real balance of her own standing though). She is not yet rolling over either way but looks so close! I think she could if she really wanted to but she tends to be pretty content however we lay her down and doesn't seem that motivated to roll over most of the time.

I have been told a lot of babies go through a phase around 3 months where they show a distinct preference for the breast of the bottle. Ali is definitely doing that - she has never taken the bottle very well but refuses it almost entirely right now. At one point she would consistently take 2 oz (even though at the time she would nurse 5 oz sometimes). That dropped to 1 oz with a lot of effort and recently she has refused it entirely most days (although Jesse did manage to get her to take almost 1 oz yesterday). I have to say I am not that surprised - Ali is much more opinionated these days about what she wants and when and there was never any question as to what she preferred for feeding!

She has not had another 8 hour stretch of sleep but I am hopeful she will again soon. She has been spreading out her daytime feedings from 2 -3 hours and I think longer time inbetween during the day and longer at night is too much for her right now. I am going to try shorter intervals during the day this week and hopefully she will sleep better at night!