Day 1 - survival

I made it through the first day with Joe out of town. He was at the door by 5:45 AM and I woke up about 5:15 and I think I was just too stressed to sleep. I felt like I was organizing something huge! It's a lot to worry about when thinking of making sure Ella has what she needs to get through daycare, being picked up by our neighbor, paperwork at daycare, new room at daycare (she graduated from the Ladybugs to Bumble Bees) and everything she needs to go to sleep at the neighbors house.

Things went well! Why do I stress??? Cathy successfully picked her up at daycare (although she said it took awhile to find the car seat, try to figure out which diaper bag was ours, etc) and then Ella did well at her house. It seems that Ella was a little stinker and needed 110% attention. Poor Cathy felt bad leaving her to go to the bathroom because she cried! Seriously, child? I am just so thankful she was good -- with Joe's crazy travel schedule, I'm going to need her help again!

When I arrived at Cathy's door at 11:25 I was greeted by an AWAKE, smiling Ella! She has not been up past 9 in a while.......we came home and she went to sleep like a champ. It appears she didn't nap at daycare today either, so I'm guessing we'll be sleeping in tomorrow very late.....works for me!

Joe made it safely to The Bahamas and it seems the hurricaines are keeping clear for now.

2 more days of work, random babysitters at night and then Ella and I are off to the Hawkeye State for a fun family weekend! Do you have a bottle of wine waiting for me????

Only my little girl.....

Miss Sweet Ella is hilarious! Tonight, Auntie Alyssa called via Skype while we were eating dinner. My laptop is in the kitchen, so I just put Ella's highchair in front of the computer and her and Alyssa "chatted" while we finished dinner. Ella was just finishing up her finger food, so it was perfect timing. I heard Alyssa say something about chicken in hair, but it went over my head. Well, sure enough, I was holding Ella and we were still talking to Alyssa when I found a huge chunk of chicken hidden in her hair.

She loves to entertain and she works with what she has!!!! I think we all needed a good laugh tonight!!!!

Postcards from Ella

I design a 4x6 card every month with updated pictures of Ella to mail to family every month. I am slowly learning to do more things in the program and I think they keep getting better. I am very proud of this one that I made from the Alaska pictures!

The daredevil

She is on the go and way too brave! She climbs like a monkey! There were seconds between the 2 above shots! I thought little girls were calm and liked to sit still? The days of posing for a picture are long gone.....maybe we should have bought the fast shooting "sports" camera!

Finally....the weekend!

It was a very long 7 days at work. Between my new boss and other changes, it was just a bummer of a week. Poor Nicky is beyond ignored and very needy. Miss Ella just plain misses me and doesn't understand why I'm not home with her and the few hours we had together every morning she just wanted to be held!

Yeah for 3 day weekends! Today we are just going to spend some quality time together.

Joe is off to the Bahamas for work next week, so we are working on babysitters for Mon, Tues, and Wed night (actually Joe found them for Monday and Tuesday; I just have Wednesday left).

Too cute

A friend sent this from the baby shower last week. Precious!

Anyone seen this?

My co-workers loved it and I never really understood what it was about and thought it was a Vegas show, not a broadway musical. When we started talking about it, the songs from the Four Seasons bring back so many childhood memories for me! I am thinking of talking the fam into going while we are in Vegas in October. Do you know anything about it?

The Scoop

I never have much blog material during my 7 days on at work....but here's an update on what's happening.

Palm -- after another phone call to Palm Support this AM, my Palm Calendar on my computer and my handheld match. I did lose 3 years, but getting back some information is better than none. I will slowly get adjusted......but I still feel lost!

Camera -- Joe and Ella made a trip to Best Buy and replaced our canon elph -- not exactly the purchase we wanted to make right now, but again, we use our little camera daily and I greatly missed it. On a positive note - the charger we ordered works for the new camera, so now we have an extra charger and 2 extra batteries. Readers, don't worry, there will be plenty of pictures of the munchkin!!!!

Sleep -- we are all better rested at our house. Ella has been going to sleep easily and sleeping through the night! Naptime is still going to take some work, but we'll get it figured out and all in all, much improvement!!!

I am ready for September! I can't believe summer is almost over.....Ella will be moving up to her new class at daycare and we have great trips planned to Iowa and Denver.

Ella Update

She is just over 10 months and doing great! Her sleeping at nap time are drastically improved and I think she likes a better routine. Poor kiddo....now that she's used to it, it changes. I'll be at work all weekend and then Monday I go to evenings so she'll be in daycare in the afternoon.

She started crawling! At first it was a funny crawl where she kept one leg tucked under so that she could use it to balance and pop back up to a sitting position at any time. Last weekend she began the all out crawl and she will get into the crawl if she sees something she would like. Her favorite things include Nicky's bowl (she likes to dump out the food or if it's empty flip and bang it), any type of cord (and we have many and I'm not sure how to baby proof those), little things she can put in her mouth, the electronics under the TV and CD's, DVD's. She loves to play with Nicky - including pulling his fur, poking his nose and eyes, and today she got a piece of his food in her mouth. Gross!

She eats any and all foods we feed her. Daycare offers her toddler foods more than we do and I just follow their lead when they tell me she likes something. This week she had ravioli and meatballs at home. Her favorite food is probably graham crackers, but she also likes anything she can feed herself including cheerios, toast, pancakes, yogurt melts, etc. She has been doing poorly at drinking her formula, but she is far from picky when it comes to solid foods.

Here are some fun pictures!

House

Here is the before and after. I think it looks great. It took me a few days to get used to the tan, but now I love it. I didn't realize how much grey we really had and now it is a lot softer.

Camera Update

The new chargers we ordered arrived yesterday! Yeah! I will have my cameras back......except now my Canon Elph is on the fritz! When the battery was almost dead, the screen was white and I just thought it was because of the low battery. Nope, with a fully charged battery it's a broken camera. I guess we will have to figure out how much it will be to fix it, but likely will have to buy a new one! Seriously??? I think a digital point and shoot should last more than 3 years.....even with the number of pictures I take!

You may be seeing less pictures than usual.....I'm hoping someone sends me some of the cute pictures of Ella from the baby shower last night. She was a hoot.

It's been a bad week for electonics!

Palm Update

It's gone......

I was working in my palm calendar on my laptop and it must have gotten corrupted. I just knew suddenly it was gone without errors and just figured my handheld would update my computer upon hotsync. That was a major mistake -- never do this! Instead, this caused my Palm to be corrupted as well and cleared the calendar. Thankfully I only lost the calendar.....but this is where I depend on my Palm the most. It could have been worse.

I still didn't stress -- I could just "restore" my computer back to yesterday, right? Nope, that doesn't save the Palm Calendar.

So Joe put Ella to bed and I called Palm Support. For a charge of $14.95 and a kind gentleman, I was informed my information was GONE. Again, I didn't worry I backed up my computer to an external hard drive. Joe was searching that for me. NOPE - didn't back up that file - it's in a weird place in my opinion. I hung up with the guy and he assured me Palm would be happy to help me with anything else without an additional charge for 15 days. What about my last 9 years, lost??? Whatever.....

I did remember that we have my old computer downstairs and I thought it may still have some Palm info on it. It did, so we were able to restore my Palm Calendar from 2000-the middle of 2006. I am just missing everything from about Oct 2006 - Now. My life is essentially blank from when we moved to Salt Lake! It makes me most sad because I am missing the little details since Ella was born and all of her appointments for the future.....

I also lost many birthdays, etc and it will take me a while to remember what I am missing! I guess I have a project for any downtime at work this weekend -- re-enter my schedule and travel plans I can think of!

I am just devastated! My Palm is now backed up in 2 places and I am working on entire hard drive back up using a program instead of my poor attempt!

Night #3

She went to sleep super quickly after bedtime routine (completely by Joe - I had just lost my calendar and was calling Palm Support). She is a super quick learner and is so happy when she wakes up in the mornings and has been eating well every morning.

BUT, last night was the first night she woke up in the night. It was rough - probably worse for Joe and I, but in time she did get herself back to sleep on her own and is in a super mood this morning.

I won't call it all a success yet, but I will call it a major improvement!!! Bedtime will be much more pleasant for all!

I am LOST!

I am a planner and I live by my Palm Pilot......I have had a Palm for over 9 years and my whole life is in that little thing. Today my calendar disappeared and I thought nothing of it, I could just do a hot sync and it would restore. NOPE.....instead the hot sync wiped out my calendar. Yep, 9 years worth of information GONE. I depend on my Palm daily to tell me what to do.

I have been crying.......it hasn't even set in how bad this is.

Labor Day Weekend

I am getting excited to go back to Iowa for Labor Day Weekend. We are going to have a family BBQ with both sides of my family and celebrate many things including Miss Ella's First Birthday!!! I ordered plates, napkins, table clothes, etc from Oriental Trading and I went to the party store yesterday and found some fun things including a cupcake pinata!!! It's only for decoration this time, but I think I'll see if my mom will store it and fill it up with candy someday!!! I mailed invites to family, but if any of my readers will be near Charles City on Saturday, Sept 5th -- you're invited! Stop over at DT's and join in the fun. We will have some BBQ type food and many cupcakes. Just let me know if you can make it.

Joe's trips to Brazil are likely to be mid-September, so he booked a flight and will be joining us for part of the weekend. I am also looking forward to seeing a couple pharmacy peeps and their families on Sunday afternoon. Miss Ella will be thrilled with all the attention!

AT - you will be missed. :(

Night #2

Ella is amazing! Why didn't I choose to improve her sleep long ago????

Last night the plan was bath (well.....that part of bedtime was off, at 6:30 she had a major blow out and got an early bath), lotion, PJ's, story, rock, sing, cuddle......then to bed, awake! The book said check on her at 5 min, then 10 min, then every 12 mintues. I checked on her at 5, Joe at 10, and she was out before the end of 12 minutes came. I choose to rub her back and neck and it really relaxes her and it makes me feel good and I think she feels loved. She has transitioned from a back sleeper to a side/stomach sleeper. She slept all night (that's 2 nights in a row). She wakes up and wimpers when she moves around, but all in all --- sleeping through the night!

We are a happy family!

I doubt things will continue so perfectly, but all in all I think we have a better plan for our family and for Ella long-term. Sleep is a skill and I know I haven't had enough in years!

Naps have improved as well and I hope to transition to a nap schedule(ish) for her soon. Now it's just when she seems tired and it seems to be working.

New Addiction!

Etsy.com

I just love it! I am working on Ella's cupcake party in Iowa and found some of the cutest things ever! I ordered her a cupcake hair clip and bib. I found the most adorable cupcake costume and showed Joe to hear begrudgingly......"just get it, she won't let you dress her up as a cupcake next year". At $120 plus another $25 for the cute ribbon topper.....no go for me! But....incredibly cute and slightly tempting! :-)

Night 1 - Success

Ella did so well last night. I did the usual bedtime routine including rocking and cuddling her and layed her in bed awake with her silky puppy dog, blankey and she cried after a few minutes (looking for her bottle). I checked on her in 3 minutes and she was still laying down, I repositioned her, reassured her and left. Joe went in 5 mnutes later and did the same. I expected her screaming, standing and reaching for us over the crib, but she continued to lie down. She was cycling through louder and softer crying and when I went in at 10 minutes I rubbed her back and she settled quickly and that was about it. We heard her cry a few times for less than 30 seconds....but for the most part she slept until 6AM! She woke to drink her entire bottle (it's been months since she's eaten her measley 5 oz in one sitting) and is in a happy mood. Much less crying than the previous nights.

We didn't sleep very well last night!!! I think I woke up every 10 minutes. I had worked myself up thinking last night woud be so hard. Then poor Nicky ran into the new gate in the middle of the night....we are all exhausted this morning, but our munchkin is ready to go!

It's makes sense to wake up the same place you fall asleep and it makes sense that she can't get herself back to sleep at night without us if she always goes to sleep with us. I have been asked a million times if I put her to sleep awake and I always said, yeah, sort of. After last night.....nope, I had never put her down awake and I regret it!

I feel like I am giving her a life skill and the modified ferber method is working for us. I also read a lot of the "No cry sleep solution" by Elizabeth Pantley and found some ideas helpful as well. Both books have taught me a lot and I'm not sure either would have made a difference had I read them earlier.....

It had to get this bad for me to realize what I was doing wasn't working. I would have never guessed I could do this and it isn't for every parent or child, but it is working for us today and I will continue to share our experience!

I am hoping tonight goes well, but I am preparing for the worst. Last night was way too easy!!!!

I am willing to do anything for my little sweetie, but most importantly I want her to keep growing and I think sleep is our current barrier.

Sleep Advice?

Any sleeping advice parents? I am at my wits end with Ella. Last night she was up until 3AM and then up again at 4. Her pediatrician recommended "Solve you child's sleep problems" by Richard Ferber. It's the gentle cry it out and go check on her at increasing intervals method. I have always rocked her to sleep with a bottle and I screwed up! She can't get herself back to sleep at night and it's my fault.....

Everyone also says, it's so hard on her because you take her so many places, but that's when she sleeps best.



Wish me luck and I'll take any advice!

Like to eat out?

If you like to eat out and try new restaurants, check this out! Restaurant.com if a great site where you can discover new restaurants (or find your favorites) and buy gift certificates at a discount. See what you think! I need to remember this when I travel!

PS I love La Caille, Al Forno's, Epic, and Tiburon.....

ABC's of Me

I did this on crazy facebook and thought I'd paste here as well. It's kind of fun! I challenge my readers to do it as well (or copy the one you did in facebook).

A - Age: 31

B - Bed size: Queen

C - Chore you hate: Cleaning the house

D - Dog's name: Nicky (he was adopted and came with that name)

E - Essential start your day item: Caffeine

F - Favorite color: Red

G - Gold or Silver: Silver

H - Height: 5'5"I - Instruments you play(ed): clarinet, piano

J - Job title: Clinical Pediatric Pharmacist

K - Kid(s): Ella

L - Living arrangements- home in Salt Lake City, UT

M - Mom's name: Diane (DT)

N- Nicknames: Flamingo

O - Overnight hospital stay other than birth: Yes

P - Pet Peeve: laziness, tardiness, people who won't commit to plans

Q - Quote from a movie: sorry, nothing comes to mind

R - Right or left handed: Right

S - Siblings: younger sister (and she's the best)

T - Time you wake up: When the munchkin calls (5ish most days)

U- Underwear: yes

V - Vegetable you dislike: radishes

W - Ways you run late: rare, but again, the munchkin (sometimes I spend too much time on the internet before work)

X - X-rays you've had: teeth, hand

Y - Yummy food you make: My lasagna is the best!

Z - Zoo favorite: monkey, giraffe

One Last Cruise Photo....I just had to buy this one!

A beautiful double rainbow!

I would love to show you the beautiful double rainbow over the mountains we saw tonight.....but my canon elph is dead and I don't haul my new big camera to lacrosse games. You will just have to take my word for it -- it was amazing!!!

Ella had so much fun tonight watching Joe play lacrosse - it's the end of the season and before the young guys championship game they had an over 35 year old game in hopes of beginning an old guy league next summer. It was fun and they all got t-shirts that said "The older we get, the better we were".

Alaska Cruise Advice

I have a ton of advice if anyone wants to plan an Alaskan Cruise and now I can also compare NCL and Carnival cruise lines. Here are a few pointers and feel free to contact me if you are planning a cruise!

It's always colder on your balcony than in the town if it is sunny out -- you lose the sun factor on your balcony (we were overdressed in almost every port)

Look carefully at the amount of time the ship is docked at every port when choosing your cruise. We would have enjoyed more time almost everywhere, especially Juneau where we were only there for 6 hours

Cruising with a baby

I am posting this in hopes of helping others prepare for a cruise with a baby. I did several google searches and I appreciate the help I found online and hope I can help others. If you stumble along this and have questions for me, please post a comment on a recent blog post and I will be happy to help!

Cruising with a 9 month old baby to Alaska

Bring a few toys for the room and some for the diaper bag to get through excursions, stroller rides, dinner
Expect the cruise ship staff to provide much attention - they miss their families and love to see babies
Necessities: scented diaper bags, disposable changing pad (huggies are great), Dining mat (kiddopotamus tiny diner mat), disposable washcloths (wet and place in baggy and use after meal)
I used the water on the ship to mix formula, oatmeal, etc and also packed some ready to feed formula - 2 large bottles and I always carry an 8 oz bottle in her diaper bag. I would fill a thermos with hot water from the restaurant or buffet and use to mix or warm the premade formula.

I found cheerios on the ship and the staff offered to find some for her at dinner and even offered to find her some yogurt. I could order mashed potatoes for her and once they even brought her a baked potato because they were worried the regular mashed had too many seasonings. They were so hospitable.

We were in a suite and had plenty of room for the pack-n-play provided by NCL and we also requested a highchair for our room. Sometimes the restaurants had a plastic highchair and they would try to find a tray for it. If not, I would just pull up the tablecloth and put her dinner mat down and pull her up to the table. No complaints from anyone although I tried to pick up the random cheerios, graham crackers and yogurt melts that hit the floor.

She will miss all the attention from the staff while eating!!!

We were able to bring her stroller on all excursions. We had to fold it up on a bus ride and during the whale watch (they strapped it to the back on the very small boat). She loved the boats and took a great nap on the very rough whale watch speed boat.

Looking back at all the pictures she was truly happy. She won't remember a thing but we have adorable pictures to show her and family memories to last a lifetime. My husband keeps commenting that he couldn't imagine going without her.

Cheese, anyone?

It's no secret I could survive on appetizers only! One of my favorites is good cheese. At the wine tasting I attended I discovered a new cheese and it will be a staple for future parties at my house!

Saint Andre' - it's a brie, but like butter, only better! Give it a try! I was able to find it in the cheese island at my usual grocery store. I thought it was a long shot, but when I asked the cheese guy, he was so excited to show me where it was and we shared a cheese moment!

I just read wikipedia (75% fat - triple cream) --- no wonder I like it!!!

Alaska Trip Day 8 - on our way home!

We enjoyed one last fabulous breakfast at Cagney's, stayed in our room until last call to depart and we barely made it through Customs, but a mom, dad and baby looked pretty innocent. We were off to the airport and it was insane with 3 ships worth of people! We were home by 5:30 and all exhausted!
This is where we left Ella while we packed! She did really well sleeping and napping on the ship.

Here's our room - not great quality, but you get the idea.

Ella has missed all the friends she made on the ship, we couldn't go anywhere without someone "hello, Ella" - everyone knew her and just loved her. It is sad that so many of the employees leave their children at home. She brought a smile to many employees and grandparents!

Auntie Meredith, I can walk the whole airport if you let me!
Crazy, huh? Two stamps already!

Joe and I were both upgraded on the way home, Miss Ella traveling in style - I love the 3 drinks to the left!

Filled to the brim!

Alaska Trip Day 7 - at sea

We tried to relax as much as possible on our last day at sea. We spent time at Under 2 zoo, went for sushi, enjoyed the crew show (ella loved the men dancing) and caught the rated R show from Second City. We started packing and it was depressing.....
Story Time

We went out to one of the pay restaurants for Italian and Ella had a ball as usual

The most perfect pear martini - I had one twice, I need to figure out that recipe

Bedtime stories and live music

Auntie Meredith is the best!

Second City was great - we saw them 2 or 3 times! I think we will see the girl in the glasses again - she was hilarious and would be a great addition to SNL

Alaska Trip Day 6 - Prince Rupert

We spent most of Thursday at sea and arrived in Prince Rupert at 4PM. We were able to get our passports stamped again (Miss Ella has 2 stamps) and toured the town. We stopped at a pub where we were served beer from NY (seriously???) and we ordered a pizza when Meredith realized they were cooking up fresh crab outside. We quickly got an order in. This crab was brought in at 3:30 and we were eating it at about 6 -- it doesn't get any better than that! It didn't even need butter. When we returned to the ship we watched a fishing boat unload their crab.

We spent some time by the pool

There is a part of town in Prince Rupert called Cow Town and everything is painted black and white

Did you think of this use for your old bug?

Family pictures in the gardens

Ella found Pooh bear

We walked through the firehouse museum
The most amazing crab ever!

These clouds came out of nowhere - it was incredible to watch

I enjoyed watching them unload the boat from our balcony

Fun on the balcony!