Spring Break (Part II)

The best part of Florida was all the people that Julia got to be around . . .

Nana with her 3 of her 4 grandchildren (we'll see you soon Sophia!)

Taylor holding Julia



Cousins Chase and Taylor meet Julia for the first time

Chase was very intrigued by Julia...

Grandpa and Julia

Aunt Arlen and Uncle Bill with Julia

During Arlen and Bill's visit to Tampa Julia behaved perfectly, awake, happy and smiling when they first arrived, then slept peacefully while we all enjoyed lunch. The loud music and construction that started at the end of lunch couldn't even wake her up. That basically summarizes how Julia was the entire trip: awake and smiling or sound asleep and no amount of noise could wake her up.

Spring Break (Part I)

Julia went on Spring Break to Florida, but don't worry her parents were there as chaperons so she didn't get into any trouble. We went to the beach outside Tampa and had an relaxing vacation. She had many firsts during the trip including flying on an airplane, going in the pool, going in the ocean, and meeting her cousins and aunts and uncles. She loved the trip and to thank her parents for taking her on vacation she slept quietly both ways on the airplane and let her parents catch up on sleep by going 7 hours been feedings at night (she had gone 7 hours one time several weeks ago, but it hadn't happened since then).

Relaxing by the pool with her dad and cousins, Chase and Taylor .

It took a minute for Julia to decide she didn't like going in the pool.

She didn't like the ocean anymore than the pool. She was sound asleep when I dunked her feet into the water and didn't appreciate being woken up.

... more pictures to follow

2 Months

Julia turned 2 months earlier this week, part of turning 2 months includes a trip to the pediatrician. She now weighs 9lbs 9oz (25th percentile), she is 22 1/4 inches long (50th percentile), and her head circumference is 15 inches (5oth percentile). She also had a repeat ultrasound of her hips (because she was breech) and her hips are completely normal. Part of the doctors visit included vaccines and I now know what a true look of betrayal looks like. Fortunately she recovered well and had her first little 'squeals' of delight today, so I think she forgot all about the doctor's visit.

Great-Grandmother

This weekend Julia got to go on another road trip, this time to meet her Great Grandmother. This is Grammy's 7th great grandchild. We all had a wonderful time together, we went out to lunch (Julia's first trip out to a restaurant), got ice cream, and tried to keep up with Ella running in the hallways at Grammy's retirement home.

Ella was kind enough to share her stickers with Julia, she started with a large spiderman sticker on her shirt and then came back with another one for her pants.

We attempted to get a group photo with the many generations of MacGregor women, which was a little more difficult than we imagined.

Friends

Julia had a friend come over to play yesterday. She got to spend part of the day with Margaux, my friend Manon's 15 month old little girl. Margaux had a lot of fun chasing the cats, playing with all the toys that Julia has no idea what to do with yet, and showing me that my house is in no way 'toddler proof'.

Clearly we had some difficulty getting a good photo of everyone...

Margaux crying

Julia crying

Everyone happy!

Baby Bean

We didn't get a repeat last night of seven hours between feedings, but as one of my friends told me at least at this point we know she CAN go that long between feedings so it's a matter of time before it becomes the norm. Overall Julia is a very good sleeper at nighttime, goes to bed easily and only wakes up when she is hungry, but daytime naps are a different story. With some advice from my cousin (thanks Erin!) we have been working on establishing a set routine at naptime that is similar to her nighttime routine. She is swaddled to sleep at night time, so I have started swaddling her for day time naps, and overall it has been working well. Still not a 'perfect' daytime napper, but we've made a lot of progress over the last week.
My sister complained about the lack of photos in the last blog, so to make up for it, here's a picture of my beautiful baby bean sleeping away during her nap. Her previous nickname of Orzo didn't stick once she was born, instead we routinely call her baby bean, little bean, or lima bean. It's a long story how the name actually got started, but swaddled in all green she does have a slight resemblence to a bean.

Seven Hours

We are very excited that Julia went 7 hours between feedings last night. She was feeding every 2 to 3 hours during the day and every 3 to 4 hours at night. Last week she had 3 nights when she went 5 hours so we were very surprised when she jumped to a night at 7 hours. Unfortunately, we are so used to her waking up more often, that John and I didn't sleep peacefully during that time, instead we kept waking up to check on her. Who knows if it will happen again soon, but we are thankful for any extra sleep we can get.