Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Feeling better

Everyone is on the mend. Abby has been taking formula since Saturday afternoon shortly before Rob started being sick, but took a while to get her appetite back (you eat toast for a couple days after having the stomach flu before eating regularly sized meals so it makes sense).

Rob has also taken a couple days to get back to regular eating patterns. Meanwhile, I'm relieved to not be worrying whether Rob needed to go to the hospital or if Abby was getting enough fluids.

Now I just need to catch up on my sleep.

Sunday, September 23, 2007

Sick Baby Update 3

Abby is through with her virus, but her eating is still off. Two ounces here and there, but rarely keeping to her normal schedule.

The update, though, is that she gave it to me. That's one of the big problems with taking immunosuppresants - I can get sick pretty easily.

No more sickness updates - I am going to grab another nap. Ugh.

Saturday, September 22, 2007

Sick Baby Update 2

She looked and felt really good all night last night. Then we woke up this morning...

After her first solid poo (see previous post), she has definitely made up for it since 5 this morning. She has not slept a wink since then, a very long stretch for her. She's had ten ounces of the pedialyte and it seems that her body has regulated itself to push is straight through.

I long for the smell of baby poo again. This is our first diarrhea bout, and it's disgusting. Not hard to clean up. Actually, easier to clean up. But the smell....

Since a lot of you are non-parents I will not try to compare it to anything, and I'll leave it right where it is.

We have bravely given her some more regular formula about 20 minutes ago. We'll take her to the farmers market and hope that it stays down.

Friday, September 21, 2007

Sick Baby Update 1

Okay - I'm home with Abby today. She kept down the pedialyte that we gave her through the night. This morning we thought we should give formula a try, and after four ounce of that it came back at us. She's now just doing the fun drink for the next day and a half, no formula for our little one.

You're right, by the way, to think that baby puke on your feet is not the way to start the day. Anny is a trooper, for she was the one holding Abby.

I changed a stinky diaper only to find a robins egg of poop. Yup, first solid poop. (for those of you without kids, first solid poop typically happens after you start feeding them solid foods.) Perfect little egg of poop, but still kind of freaky when I'm used to true baby poo.

Anny headed off to school and Abby and I have been spending time together. Mostly it's been getting her to eat, then encouraging her to sleep. When a baby does not want to sleep, they won't sleep! That meant that we played on the playmat, sat in the bumbo and really just hoped that she would not throw up on me again.

We did have to make a run to Target as I realized that we were running out of the fun drink. She fell asleep in the sling pretty quickly, so a trip for Pedialyte cost me $50 because I made four trips around the store. She was happy and I could walk for a while. Win win.

The only pedialyte that Target had is the "artificially fruit flavored" orange flavor. The only flavors she has ever had are breast milk and formula. She was taken aback by the sweet flavor. She got the hang of it, and is now napping.

She's truly happy through all of this. She smiles and chats while she's awake. We are slated to go out tonight to a viewing (like funeral viewing). If she's still happy when it's time to go, we'll go. If not, we will put in a call to send our condolences this time.

I hear crying. Update later.

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Sick Baby

Anny has back to school night tonight and I get Abby all to myself.

Of course this is the first time that I get a call saying that she's sick. Threw up all over the day care teacher. One other child was sick earlier this week, but we thought we had skipped it. That appears to not be the case.

I immediately left work, leaving behind a consultant that needed a ride to the train station, to get to school. By the time I got there, Anny already had Abby. We walked around the school a little and gave her two ounce of pedialyte, as directed by the doc's office.

She threw that up as we got to the car.

Once we got home Abby took down four more ounces and is now sleeping.

She is still happy, just not well. No fever. Smiley. Abby. Just threw up a few times.

We'll see how she is when she wakes up. Hopefully the pedialyte will stay down. I'll keep you posted.....

Monday, September 17, 2007

Mooving On Up!

Abby slept in her own bed the last two nights. We have company coming in October for her baptism and are dutifully getting things in order for that. One necessary thing is to get Abby out of her pack and play, which means moving her into her room.

We were a little nervous - by we I mean Anny - about not hearing her if she screams. We have a monitor by the crib and the receiver is between our pillows while we sleep. It's still very different than when the noise is actually coming from a foot away from the bed!

I think the advantage is that we don't hear each peep, coo or sneeze because she's far enough away from the monitor that they are faint on the receiver. Definately heard her waking up at 5:15 this morning, right on time!

She slept through the night both nights! (Saturday and Sunday nights) Now I'm wondering if I woke her up or if she woke me up at night...

Friday, September 14, 2007

Labor Jokes!

Several people have asked me if I followed through with my plan to tell jokes as Anny labored back in June. I am happy to report that I did indeed tell my jokes, but some had to wait until the next day because I left them at home.

I have posted those jokes, but not here. It's several pages worth, and I didn't want to do all of those here.

Go to this site to see the jokes:
http://www.mdmonroes.com/laborjokes

Let me know what you think. Was I crazy to have read them? Are there others your would add?

Monday, September 10, 2007

I Feel Like I Owe You

I'm sorry, dear friends, that I have neglected the blog for more than a week. That's not like me and I hope that it never happens again. Here is the last ten days of Abigails Adventures:

For starters, we weighed her and she's more than 13 1/2 pounds! She is a little heavy, but it's cute-heavy.

Labor Day weekend we headed out to the family house in Lewes, DE. (Just north of Rehoboth, by like 1,500 feet.) The weekend was fun filled and a little chaotic. Just the way to spend a holiday weekend!

This was the first time that my (Rob) dad and his wife got to meet Abby. They live in Florida, so a casual trip this summer was not ever an option. They made the drive up for about a week, split between the beach and our house. With them came my dad's Father-In-Law and Sister-In-Law. That point is important with the next paragraph....

There were 18 people gathered at one point over the weekend! People came and went as their work schedules allowed, but it was still a huge family fun time. We opted to stay in a hotel just into town a little bit for the two nights we were there.

On Saturday night we went down to the sandy part of the beach (long story, but that will come at a later time. short version: we typically go to the beach for shopping, not surf) for professional photographs. There were five generations of Monroe's together for the first time in a VERY long time. (ever?) We did a huge family shot and a bunch of smaller, family group pictures. His shots were great, but expensive. We got a few with our own cameras, and they are here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ARMonroe/0907LaborDay

This was obviously Abby's first trip to see the ocean. Our last big trip was over the Mississippi, so it was only fair that she see the other water too! She was really really happy there. It was loud and there were lots of colors swirling around. We got a picture that is good in color, and great in black and white:


We stayed in DE until Monday before coming back to the grind of daily life. For those that have inquired: daycare is going really well. Abby gets lots of attention, and she's really close to Anny's school. Anny is even doing well with it!

On Tuesday one of the daycare teachers noticed that Abby has thrush. We had noticed the white spots, but only after eating, when she displays her tongue for everyone anyway! We immediately called the doctors office and they sent a perscription over to the pharmacy. The funny part is that it is flavored for her pleasure. Cherry/Mint is the flavor. Just the smell is gross to us!

Basically, Abby is a happy baby and we're happy to have her:



She has slept for seven hours each of the last two nights! Hopefully she continues this streak as we move her into her own room next weekend. (I imagine it will be harder on us than it is her. She's pretty adaptable.

With this post you are going to get TWO, yes TWO, links to photos! The previous set is just pictures from the beach trip. The following link is pictures from this month! It gets updated at least four times a week as I submit my outfit choices for approval by a co-worker!
http://picasaweb.google.com/ARMonroe/September2007

Feel free to comment! I like getting comments as much as anybody else.