Granny care

So.... yesterday was Kirby's last day at daycare for a while. Gary's mom is settled in her new place and starting today, she's watching him full time. I know that she says that it's her pleasure, but it really is quite generous of her and I know that we're lucky that he's being watched by a family member that loves him. We're not sure how long before we decide to put him back in daycare (so he can get used to playing with other kids, etc), but a large part of it will be up to Granny - just depends on how long she finds it fun instead of a job. :)

In other news, another yucky stomach bug hit the Miller household. Kirby was feeling "off" all weekend - mostly cranky, couldn't settle down for naps, etc. On Sunday evening, we were driving to meet another mommy and her family for dinner, when Gary looked into the rearview window and saw Kirby throw up all over himself. He pulled the car over and Kirby wasn't upset - just wet. I didn't have the phone number of the other mommy, so we drove to the restaurant to cancel and it turns out that her husband wasn't able to come b/c he was feeling sick, too. Originally, we thought Kirby was cranky b/c he was teething, but then we realized that there was probably another bug going around the daycare. Just great. :/

We drove to Wendy's for drivethru dinner and on the way home Kirby threw up all over himself again. By that time, he looked pretty sad. :( When we got home, we threw *everything* into the washing machine and scrubbed our hands. I wanted to Listerine the heck out of my mouth, too! Poor little guy was completely soaked when we took his clothes off, so we gave him a quick bath and put him to bed.

Thankfully, he slept well that night, but we took him to Granny's on Monday so he could get the extra TLC that he wouldn't get at the daycare. She said that he was definitely acting different (not his usual happy self), but by the end of the day he seemed to be doing better.

Not so much for Gary! He worked half a day and ended up spending the rest of the day in the bathroom. He was still sick the next day, but thankfully he was able to eat some and felt better by the evening.

I thought I had avoided it all until this morning. :( So far things aren't as bad as either of my guys, but I'm nervous waiting to see if it all kicks in! *fingers crossed* that I've already dealt with the worst of it!

Kirby's already 5 months old! I saw the idea for the blocks in a magazine, but I didn't see it until recently, so I missed the first 4 months. Oh well - better late than never!

rice cereal

All the baby books I've read lately say that they suggest babies drink breast milk exclusively until 6 months. However, at Kirby's last dr appt, he said that they now suggest adding rice cereal between 4-6 months. Apparently, it was decided at the last Pediatric convention and since it just happened, the books we have are out of date. *shrug*

I was hesitant to start rice cereal (mainly b/c I'm hesitant about change :P ), but I warmed up to the idea b/c I started thinking of how cute he'd be eating from a spoon. Since he didn't gain much in the last 2 months (only 1.5 pounds!) I thought the extra calories would do him some good. :)

We've only fed him 3 times so far. The first time, he didn't know what the heck was going on, and he ended up spitting up all of it 5 minutes later. Same with the second time. Last night, however, he seemed more interested and even opened his mouth when Gary got close with the spoon. Since he hasn't eaten much of it, we've only been giving him 1 tablespoon once in the evening. Maybe we'll give it another week and bump it up to 2 tablespoons. I know it doesn't sound like much, but it takes a lot to pump out each tablespoon and I hate to see any of it wasted!

Here's video of his very first time eating with a spoon and eating rice cereal (sorry about the light coming from behind him).

Itchy!

Poor Kirby! His eczema has been getting worse lately! He has some raised spots on his head (which we originally thought was cradle cap) and now he's getting patches on his legs, arms, face and neck. His head is bad enough that he now scratches it (which Granny thinks is funny), and of course, his little nails are hard to keep short so he has little scratches all over his head. :(

I started using Burt's Bees lotion on his skin this week and it's gotten a *little* better, but thankfully he has his 4 month appt today so we can find out what we should really do for him. I'm hoping that it goes away with some form of cream because I read that another thing that might help is for me to give up dairy, eggs, soy, seafood and peanuts for 3 weeks to see if he has an allergy. Oi - the thought of giving up dairy (cheese & ice cream) makes me a sad panda for sure! But I'll do what I need to in order for my baby to be happy and healthy!

Speaking of dr appts - I'm curious to see how much he's grown since the last appt (2 months ago). He gained 4 pounds and 3 inches last time. If that's the case this time, he'll be 18 pounds! We're already getting to the point where we have to buy another car seat b/c he's growing too long for the infant seat we currently have.

In other news, Granny has officially moved to Durham! She moved her stuff here last weekend, but had to go back to TN to take care of some things (clean and re-list her farm, etc). She arrived back in Durham yesterday and she's spending all her time unpacking and getting her place set up. We're going to leave Kirby in daycare until the end of March so that Granny has plenty of time to get her affairs in order (additionally, she's going to spend a week in Florida visiting her daughter and grandbabies). It'll be nice to have her watching Kirby full time - especially since Gary, Kirby & I always seem to be sick. Blech!

Here's one of my new favorite photos of Kirby & Gary.

And so it begins......

Ever since Kirby rolled over that handful of times, he hasn't done it since. I'm certainly in no hurry to get him rolling around and walking, but I thought it was interesting that he seemed to have "forgotten" how to roll over.

Since he got us up earlier than usual this morning (5:45am - UGH!), we had some extra playtime. We decided to put him on his stomach on his floor mat to give him some tummy time. He held his head up well, etc, but then he got annoyed and Gary moved him to his play mat to bat at the toys above his head. During this time, I was in the kitchen packing my lunch. After a few minutes Gary got excited and said that Kirby had rolled over to his side, but by the time I got over there, he was on his back again. This happened several times so I delayed packing and got on the floor with Kirby. And you know - he did it several more times!!

It was just the cutest thing. He would bring his legs up in a ball and just BOOP! roll to one side. He'd only stay there for a few seconds then roll onto his back. He just kept rolling back and forth - like it was no big deal. :) I asked his teacher about it and she said that he started doing it yesterday, but he was doing it a lot.

I'll see if he'll do it again and try to get some video to post.

Back to Work

Well, my maternity leave is over. :( It's been really great hanging out with Kirby for 2.5 months, but unfortunately, we're not really in a place that would allow me to be a stay at home mom. Actually, we could do it, but it would be really tight with just one paycheck. Besides, as much as I love my little dude, I definitely need some adult time.

We dropped Kirby off at the day care center today for about 4 hours - mainly so that Kirby isn't thrown into a full day with strangers but also because we needed to deal with some official business (getting our passcodes, dropping off supplies, etc). I was fine when we first dropped him off (he was asleep), but as I talked to one of the teachers about things we need to do, all the babies started to cry. And not just fussing..... hardcore crying! One kid even looked up at me and had these huge crocodile tears running down his face. :( One teacher was talking to me and the other was feeding a baby while rocking two others in bouncy seats with her feet (there are 8 infants and 2 teachers). I know they're good at multi-tasking, but it just broke my heart to know that Kirby would be laying on the floor crying, waiting for his turn to be comforted. :(

As the front desk person worked on setting up our passcode, I wandered over to the infant 2 room to see what was going on. I wanted to look in on Kirby once more before we left, and I saw him laying in his crib, wide awake, staring at the ceiling and snacking on his hand. I immediately started crying and had to quickly leave the building. I didn't realize it would be so difficult. Tomorrow's really going to suck! :(

Gary & I ran around doing errands (looking for a Wii), read magazines at a bookstore, ate Indian food for lunch, and grocery shopped before picking up Kirby. When we got there, he was eating. Apparently, he had a really good day - just hung out in various spots in the room and just enjoyed looking at his new surroundings. He didn't sleep much (about 30 minutes) so I was prepared for a meltdown when we got home.

I fed him just a bit when we got home and he completely passed out! I let him sleep on me for 3 hours b/c I couldn't bring myself to put him down.

I gotta say, we really lucked out with such an amazing baby. He's generally a laid back, happy baby. He's such a sweet heart! All last week he had a cold and even when you could tell he wasn't feeling well, he still had interest in playing and smiling. I feel blessed to have such an amazing little guy in my life and I'm sad that I'm not going to see him as much every day because he's changing so much and every day it seems like he's able to do something different.

Here's the latest video of him - he's talking to his new baby animals book.

First cold

Kirby has his first cold. :( We noticed it Saturday night when he was making more noise than usual when sleeping. During the day on Sunday, he seemed a little out of the norm, but around dinner time it was obvious that he was sick b/c he sounded congested and had a bit of snot.

We took him to the ped on Monday and she said that it's just a typical cold - nothing to do but wait 7-10 days for it to go away. The only thing we can really do to help is to saline/bulb his nose 3 times a day and use a humidifier when he's sleeping. Being a first time mom, it's weird to experience your baby being sick. It's really hard to see him struggling to breathe and to be so miserable. :(

Since Monday, it's been pretty typical - snotty, running nose, coughing, sneezing, and sleeping a lot. Today was a little different - he slept a LOT today. I'm hoping there's nothing new going on - just that he needed a lot of rest to get over it. A few hours ago, he had a coughing fit and then ended up throwing up. The ask-a-nurse doesn't think that it's anything to be worried about right now b/c we're not seeing anything else that's a "warning sign".

Hopefully, he'll start to feel better soon b/c ugh - he's going to start daycare on Tuesday and I'd hate for him to feel so poorly when his life is turned upside down by being with strangers all day.

Here's a photo of him from this afternoon. Even though he's feeling like crap, he still has a smile for his mommy. :)

What do you think?

Here are a few baby photos of The Miller family. Who do you think Kirby resembles?

Kirby:


Theresa:


Gary: