Our Week without Daddy

This week, Richard was traveling to Dallas for our good friend Kenny's wedding. Originally, I was hoping Lily and I could join him on the trip, but since she's still a little too young for a plane trip and the car trip takes about 20 hrs, we ended up staying home instead. Richard met up with Kenny, Wes and Bizzle - three of our close friends and his fraternity brothers - and they made a 3 day journey down to Dallas, stopping in Nashville, Memphis and Shreveport (got a little gambling in there) on the way to Kenny's wedding. It sounds like they had a great trip down there and really enjoyed the weekend and wedding festivities. Because of some work stuff Richard needed to do today, he left Dallas at 9am yesterday morning and drove straight home - he finally got here about 6:30 this morning! I hated that Lily and I weren't able to go, but we were definitely thinking of Kenny and Callie on Saturday and can't wait to see them as a newly married couple soon!

Since Daddy was out of town the majority of the week, Aunt Katie came over to stay with Lily and I. It was so helpful to have her here! On Wednesday night, the day Richard left on his Dallas trek, Katie and I packed up Lilypie and headed over to Bonefish Grill for dinner to enjoy their $5 Bang Bang shrimp (every Wednesday night in June and July!) - we are both huge fans of Bang Bang shrimp and had been looking forward to it all week. We were not disappointed! I'm thinking this may be a regular thing for us this summer :o) . We also made a Target run (being within a 5 mile radius, how could we not?) and picked up a couple of things for our upcoming beach trip.

On Thursday, I packed up Lilypie and headed down to Asheboro for the day/night. My best friend Sarah Beth came over with her little boy Jaxon (who is already 1 yr old, crazy!) to meet Miss Lily. Lily didn't cooperate much, as she was sleeping for the most part, but I got to hang out and catch up with Sarah Beth and Jaxon for awhile, which was really nice. I can't believe how big Jaxon is! At the end of their visit, Lily finally woke up and we got some great pictures of Jaxon checking her out - I think he was pretty fascinated:

Thursday night, Lily, Mom, Dad and I headed up to Greensboro to eat dinner with Richard's family and to see his dad after his recent trip to Turkey. Lily was introduced to the whole family and to some close family friends as well. I think it was a little overwhelming for her at first, but she calmed down and was able to hang out with her Great-Aunt Margaret for awhile, eating her dinner. Later on, she did get fussy again, on and off, but with the help of her Nana, Grandpa, Grandma Libby and Aunt Margaret, we were all able to enjoy our dinner. At the end of the night, it was easy to see that Lily was exhausted! Unfortunately, she only got one of her three naps on Thursday, which I think contributed a lot to her overall fussiness. But, she slept the whole way back to Nana and Grandpa's house from Greensboro and gave me a 5 hour strech of sleep that night as well!

On Friday, we headed back up to Raleigh to hang out with Aunt Katie. She had stayed with the pups the night before, which I know they enjoyed. We didn't do much that night; Aunt Katie hung out with Lily while I ran some errands and then we had a quiet night at the house.  Lily was catching up on her sleep much of the day on Friday, so really, it was just Aunt Katie and I hanging out together. 

On Saturday, Nana and Grandpa came up to spend the weekend for Father's Day and to pick up some supplies for our upcoming beach trip. We ran to Trader Joe's and Target (of course!) that afternoon and then headed to their hotel for the evening to enjoy Happy Hour and to eat some dinner. Lily took a great nap that afternoon, first in Grandpa's arms and then in Nana and Grandpa's hotel room. On Sunday, we all met up for a yummy lunch at Firebird's (can you tell I like that place?) for Father's Day and Aunt Marie joined us. We did a quick shopping run at Crabtree before heading back to our house for the afternoon/evening. Nana and I put Lily in her crib for the first time to show her the mobile - she thought it was very fascinating. I know it probably seems like a long time to wait for her to be in her crib for the first time, given that she's almost 7 weeks old now, but pretty much since she was born, we've been using her crib as a storage place for some things that needed to be organized in her room. Also, we've had to keep it blocked so that Stella will not continue to use it as a dog bed! Thanks to Aunt Katie, everything that was in the crib was put away and her crib all set up again. 

 

I have to say a huge Thank You! to Mom, Dad and Katie for helping me get my house cleaned and organized before Richard came home yesterday. It really is so nice to have the house back in order and I know we will both enjoy it this week. 

I also want to say Happy Father's Day to my dad and Richard:

Daddy - thank you so much for the great example you've been in my life and for all the love and support you give us! I love to see you with Lily; I know she's so blessed to have such a great relationship with her Grandpa and I can't wait to see that relationship grow. I love ya! 

Richard - you are an awesome dad. Watching you with Lily makes me melt, as corny as that may sound, and seeing the two of you together really touches my heart. I know how lucky she is to have such a great dad in her life and I know she's going to feel the same as she gets older. I'm looking forward to our future as a family and the memories we're going to make. I love you!

I hope all the dads out there had a fantastic Father's Day!

A Night Out for Mom and Dad

This weekend Lilypie hung out with her Aunt Katie while Richard and I had our first date night in almost exactly 6 weeks! The Friday night before Lily was born was our last date night before becoming parents. It actually was the night I thought Miss Lily was coming on her own, as I'd had contractions all the way through our dinner and a movie night. We did dinner and a movie again last night and really had a good time. It was nice to have some alone time, just the two of us. It gave us a chance to catch up on each other and spend some quality time as a couple - although we were ready to see our Lilypie by the time we got home! Before we left, we were able to snap some family pictures of all three of us, as well as some individual pictures of each of us with Lily:

We went to Firebirds for our dinner (I had the delicious salad I love again - yum!) and this time, we topped our meal off with individual desserts - something I definitely did not need, as I'm trying to get these baby pounds off, but it was so worth it. After dinner, we headed to see Robin Hood. Now, before the movie, we were both pretty excited about this movie and had in fact been looking forward to it for a few weeks. We were disappointed. I think Richard might have actually fallen asleep at some point towards the end of the movie and I was still trying to figure out what the exact point of the movie was by the time it ended. In fact, the end was the most promising part of the storyline - and it ended about 30 seconds later. Unfortunately, for us, it turned out to be a pretty generic and rather boring plot - something we were not happy to discover (especially as the movie theater had raised its prices and we had paid $20 just to see the movie!). Next time, we'll be reading some reviews before we head out for a movie date. 

On Thursday, Lily had her introduction to BD, where I work. We packed her up that morning and headed over to visit with some coworkers I haven't seen in quite awhile and to eat some lunch with them. I dressed her up in one of her newborn outfits, complete with one of her Sophie's Sprinkles bow/headband combos. She looked pretty adorable, if I do say so myself:

At work, we visited with Miss Gwen and my boss David, as well as my good friends Kelly and Kara and a few others - I've missed everyone! Although I know I'm going to really miss Lilypie when I head back to work, it will be great to get back into the swing of things and see the people I've missed on a daily basis. 

Miss Gwen and Lily

Today has been more of a hang out day for all of us. We've had some scattered thunderstorms, in between the muggy upper 90 degree heat (are we back in Houston again?!), so we've all been taking it easy in the nice air conditioning. Lily had a busy morning on her playmat, as you can see. She's now able to see herself in the mirror and finds the baby looking baby at her quite fascinating. I think she's going to enjoy it even more as time goes on. She's still not a big fan of tummy time, but it gets a little better day by day. She can now move her head from side to side while on her tummy and is really getting good at lifting it off the playmat. We hope everyone had a wonderful week!

Lily's 5 week Stats

Well, Lily had her weight recheck and wellness visit yesterday and she is an amazing 7lbs and 4 oz!! Who would have guessed?! That was a much bigger weight gain than I expected - I think I surprised the nurse a little when she told us her weight and I said "holy crap!" (sorry mom). I was fully expecting her to gain 14 oz; after all, it'd been 14 days since her last visit (weighing in at 6 lbs) and gaining an ounce a day would put her at a healthy 6 lbs 14 oz. I definitely did not expect a weight gain of over a pound in 2 weeks! She is now exactly 2 pounds bigger than she was when she was born. After her birth, she lost about 5 ounces, putting her at 4lbs 15 oz when she left the hospital. In total, shes gained 2 pounds 5 ounces since then! According to her doctor, most kids only put on about 1.5lbs by this time, so she's definitely making great progress. As far as her height goes, she is 20.75 inches, which is 0.25 inches more than when she was born and her head circumference measured at 36.75 cm, which is 4 cm more than at birth.

I'm really happy she's growing so well. I know that she eats constantly and a good amount at each feeding, but it's nice to be able to have a concrete number to go by to see that she is actually growing and putting on some good weight. Her doctor thinks she'll continue eating like this at least for the next couple of months and that she will have caught up to other kids her age in weight by about the 3-4 month mark. As far as her height and head circumference goes (and belly size, according to the doc), she is in the 25th percentile for kids her age and she is in the 5th percentile for her weight. Her next appointment is not until July 12th, when we go in for her 2 month well check and to get her shots (not looking forward to that!). We'll keep you posted on how she's growing!

Lily at birth in her Boppy bouncy seat:

Lily today in her bouncy seat:

"Born to Shop"...

That might be Lily's motto right now - shopping was her (and my) biggest past time last week! Since it was so incredibly hot already and I haven't technically been cleared for big exercise, we haven't had much opportunity to be out of the house, besides our small shopping trips. Since the weather is supposed to be much better this week, we are going to start walking in the late afternoon, which will help us get rid of some of the stir-craziness we have.

I always underestimate the time it will take for us to get out of the house - getting myself ready, Lily ready (feeding, burping, changing, dressing..), the dogs ready (going potty and getting their Kongs prepped), making sure Lily's bag is stocked with enough supplies for the duration of the trip and getting us both out of the house takes a lot more time than when I was taking trips by myself! I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it though.

We needed some household and fish supplies early last week, so we made (another...) trip to Target and a quick Petsmart run. Lily did well again - she was a little grumpy when we first arrived at Target, so I quickly mastered the "carrying baby while maintaining pacifier location and pushing cart" skill. She calmed down really quickly, though, and slept for the rest of our trip.

On Saturday, we had a great treat. Lily and I met Grandma Libby, Nana and Grandpa at Triangle Town Center to do some clothes shopping. Since Lily is such a tiny thing, she can really only wear newborn sizes right now - and only specific brands of newborn sizes, in addition. Carter's seem to be the clothes most true to the weight range they state on their tags and fit Lily the best. We will be heading to the beach in a few weeks (woohoo!) and unfortunately, I think most of the 0-3 month size clothes will still be too big for her to wear, so she needed some summer clothes in a size that will fit her at the beach and for at least part of the summer. So, we headed to Belk (they were having a great sale, as usual) to see what they had in Lily's size - we were able to find her 4 new outfits - 2 creepers and 2 outfits that have shorts and shirts (a rarity in newborn clothes).  We also found a onesie she absolutely had to have - embroidered with her motto for the week:

After shopping, we headed to dinner at the Twisted Fork where we met up with Richard, Aunt Margaret and Uncle Rodney. I am a big fan of the Twisted Fork - they have a really yummy Cobb salad that I love (they make theirs with grilled steak - what could be better?!) and they have a fantastic selection of desserts - my favorite is the gooey caramel brownie - oh so good! We had a great time at dinner and loved being able to spend time with the family. I was able to snap a couple of pictures at dinner:

Nana and Grandma Libby toasting Lily with pink lemonade martinis:

Nana feeding Lily:

On Sunday, it was time for Lily's 1 month pictures - that's right, Lily is a month old already! I can hardly believe it's been a month since she arrived. Before we headed out to have her pictures taken, I snapped a couple pictures of Lily and daddy hanging out on the couch. Lily loves hanging out with her daddy - she really finds him fascinating I think - especially when he's talking. She also gave him her first real smile on Sunday (mommy was jealous!) 

Lily's reaction to daddy's goatee on her head:

Although it did take us 3 hours to get 14 pictures of Lily taken, we were really happy with the way the pictures turned out and with the service at the portrait studio we went to - we will definitely be heading back there again. Hopefully, it will not take 3 hours every month! After Lily was done with her modeling, we headed to get Richard a haircut and then to another yummy meal at Firebirds. They have the Grilled Tenderloin Salad- a salad that I absolutely love - actually, it's probably my favorite salad of any restaurant we've eaten at so far in our lives. It was another nice family afternoon :o) . 

Lily has gotten so much more alert this past week. She now regularly looks at and focuses on people's faces and spends a lot of time checking out ceiling fans, paintings on the walls and any light that catches her attention. Her hands are also really interesting to her and it's so funny to watch her focus on them (her eyes tend to cross when she's checking out things so close to her face, which is really cute.) She's also finding her voice, we've noticed. In the mornings, she spends the time between waking up and her naptime just chattering away - well, it's more like making "aah" sounds all the time. We've also heard a few coos mixed in there. She's still not a huge fan of tummy time, but we're making progress on a daily basis on that front. She's getting a little more control over her head and can turn it to either side by herself when she's on her back or on someone's shoulder. If she doesn't want to be up on your shoulder, she will suddenly fling her head one way or the other to make sure you get the point. She's now eating a steady 2.5 - 3 ounces at most of her feedings and can usually do 4 ounces in the afternoon/evening feedings. Her sleeping routine is pretty much the same - she does 3-4 hour stretches at a time, which I'm told is really typical of breastfed babies for the first few months. We go in tomorrow for another weight recheck and wellness check, so we will keep everyone posted on her stats afterwards! Any guesses on how much Lily weighs now?