For better or for worse

It didn't take long to fall off the new year's resolution wagon, eh? It's been a pretty rough few weeks around the Garrett household, and I haven't wanted to be a Debbie Downer (wah wah waaaah), but I do believe whole-heartedly in the spirit of honesty and not glossing over tough times. So I'll summarize briefly and then post some more delicious pics to lighten the mood.

In short, Kyle and I somehow produced an adorable little peanut who has pretty severe tummy issues. Ever since she came home from the hospital, she's had some epic battles with reflux. As she's gotten older, we keep hoping she will outgrow her spit-ups, gassiness, general uncomfortability, and reluctance to breastfeed. It seems like every few weeks, we have one or two good days when we feel like we're finally getting over the hump, and then we backslide to where it is even worse than it was before. In general, we think it wouldn't be so hard to deal with our tricky cupcake if we were all getting a decent amount of sleep. If only! Unfortunately, because she doesn't feed well during the day, she does the bulk of her eating at night, which means she is up sometimes as often as every 45 minutes all night long. And starting around 1 or 2 am, her sleeping gets very restless with lots of squirming, crying, and gnashing of teeth (our teeth, since Lucy's haven's made an appearance yet!). I can't remember the last time I got more than 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep, and often I only get one 2 hour cycle. Or none, depending on the night. Daytime fussiness becomes increasingly harder to handle as the nights continue to seem unbearably difficult.

On the plus side, all the nighttime eating means that Lucia IS growing even though she doesn't eat very much during the day. And she will outgrow her reflux sometime in the next year (we're hoping on the sooner end!). She is also doing some pretty adorable things... right now, her favorite thing to play with is an old oatmeal lid. She must have a thing for Amish men? She eats it, passes it from hand to hand, bangs it on the floor, on her face, and on her tummy. Who needs toys? And she has recently started shrieking. Cute, if ear piercing.

Thanks for bearing with me... she's certainly worth the trouble, and Kyle and I are anxiously awaiting a day when we look back on these few months with fondness (well ok, maybe not fondness, but nostalgia at least?) because we have a happy, tummyache-free babe!

As promised, here's some recent pictures:


Some friends gave us this great activity gym after their son outgrew it . Lucia's favorite shrieking spot at the moment!

The 'here comes a giant wail' face...

The abominable snowbaby, part 2...

Lucia and I took a snowy walk to the post office and the library today and she was so hilariously puffy in her hand-me-down snowsuit that I had to pose her for a photo op. Bring on the cold!

The abominable snowbaby...

Just a bit of Sunday afternoon amusement... it was a snowy, snowy, snowy weekend here in Chicago (Kyle spent a plethora of hours shoveling, earning a gold star for the month) and Lucia decided to try on Mom's snow boots. Without pants on. Quite a fashion statement, we thought.


Also, in non-baby news, I've been on an absolute baking RAMPAGE (nesting instincts?). We discovered the joy of bread baking and Kyle's brilliant brother Layne introduced me to using a dutch oven to make delicious, beautiful, crusty bread! We're never buying bread again - this awesome recipe is ridiculously easy (no kneading!) and highly recommended. Check out the fruits of our labor!

4 months and counting...

It's hard to believe that it was a long 4 months ago today when this majestic little peanut popped out into the world with her scrumptious cheeks and her ability to quickly convert both parents into multiple-cups-of-coffee-a-day types. One of our favorite new 4-month tricks is laughing, which she has just started - she's only done it a few times, but she will just chuckle and chuckle and chuckle when something strikes her fancy. She also has just recently begun to develop the ability to grip things and not immediately drop them; the most amusing aspect of this skill is her never-ending routine of pulling out her own pacifier, dropping it on the floor, and then wailing in angst that some unkind soul has taken it away from her. Kyle or I pop it back in and the cycle starts again. She really enjoys eating people's hands (including her own), which involves grabbing a finger, barreling it towards her mouth, inserting, making a terrible face at the taste, and then munching away happily. Our funny little nugget of goodness... happy 4 months!

New Year's Resolutions...

Well, I'm not always a big fan of new year's resolutions for myself, especially since they never seem to last longer than a few days for me. But I think making a resolution filled with fun news and cute baby photos should be an easy one to keep, so I resolve to do more frequent postings on this here blog over the next year. Kyle goes back to work next week, so I will have more down time at home with the lovely Lucy and what better way to spend it than updating the world on her progress?

We've had some ups and downs over the past month or so; she's still fighting reflux really hard and isn't a very easy breastfeeder. But we are quite committed to keeping it up as long as possible, even amidst painful breast infections, spit-up galore, and feeding every 2 hours all night long. On the plus side, she's growing and growing and growing, and spending lots more time smiling and cooing and just generally being a delightful human being. She's quite inquisitive and puts just about everything under the sun into her mouth for further examination. Here's some more recent pics of her highness just being her lovely self. Sorry for the long absence and keep checking in, I will do a better job of documenting all things Lucy!

Snacking on my right fist, a delicious afternoon treat.


Let's see if the left fist tastes better... at least more of it fits in my mouth!


Pre-Christmas dinner (Evan's gourmet prime rib, mmm!) with Aunt Trish and Uncle E


A Christmas lounge in my new bouncy seat - thanks, Gigi!


Fun frolics with Dad - this Christmas thing is pretty exciting!


Happy New Year, everyone. Much love from the cutest baby in the world (in our humble opinion) and her exhausted parents!