Time Marches On......

She gets older every day. The same way we all do. But as she gets older she gains so much more than the normal wrinkles and grey hair adults dread. As she gets older she gains her independence and newly learned skills. Every day we inch closer to toddler-ville, leaving infant-land far behind. I am convinced we will be those unfortunate parents who have a child that walks at 9 months. And although we would be thrilled for our little pumpkin to transition from crawling to walking at a young-er than normal age, part of me has been secretly hoping she sticks with crawling for a bit longer.

Josie now sleeps through the night on a regular basis. This is not necessarily new to us or her, but what has changed is that we no longer feed her during the night. I am sure you are thinking “Well, duh, if she is sleeping through the night then you can’t feed her”. But what I am really saying is that even if she does wake up and cry out, we let her cry for a bit and put herself back to sleep (thank Heavens for self-soothing skills). This is opposed to me dragging from the bed to nurse her at the first sounds of stirring.

This is going to seem crazy to very new parents, but there is a huge part of my heart that hurts knowing I won’t be feeding her in the middle of the night anymore. In fact, I won’t be nursing her at all anymore. Eight months of breastfeeding and my body made that tough decision for me. I basically woke up one morning and the spigot had been turned off. This lifestyle that had so many times become my burden was over. And weirdly, it was heartbreaking for me.

There is truly something special about the bond of middle of the night feedings. Sure, there were some nights where I probably slept through half the feeding or mornings where I was so tired I swore I wouldn’t make it through another day. But I survived, as most parents do. There is something so comforting and sweet about a barely awake baby. For those brief moments, she was still and quiet, along with the rest of the house and the rest of the world. I could feel her breath and actually take in her sweet baby scent. This was that special time where I memorized every feature on her face and studied her sweet hands and feet down to every last detail. This was that special time where I told her I loved her a thousand times, but never actually spoke a word. This is time I wouldn’t trade for all the money in the world.

Bottom line: I don’t ever want to forget those moments. The times I had with just Josie and I. Those are the sweet moments I want to remember so that when she is grown and experiencing her first baby I can say “Hang in there, honey. It only gets better.” And I will know with complete confidence that nothing could be truer!

First time parents with a first time fever

I had, in my head, an idea of how I had hoped Jo's first 4th of July would go.  It was something along the lines of baths, feedings and pj's complete, followed by a later than usual bedtime so we could sit in the drive way and watch the fireworks.  I was excited to see Jo's reaction to the fireworks, whether good or bad.  And naturally, I was excited to document her first 4th through photos and eventually a blog (ahem). 



Ahh...one can only dream of making their child's first 4th this memorable.

The older Jo gets the more we realize our "ideas" of how an evening or event should go may or may not go as planned.  There were a couple of things I really did not factor into my "plan" for Jo.  First....the wretched heat.  Wednesday was yet another triple digit day in East Tennessee.....yuck.  Second....fireworks generally don't start until after it gets dark, which means keeping Jo up past 9pm.  Which is nearly impossible.  Third......7 1/2 month olds probably don't really seem to care about fireworks (hmmm). 

Or, at least I assume 7 1/2 month olds don't really care about fireworks.  I really wouldn't know as we never even got close to finding out.  About 6pm on Wednesday evening Brandon and I noticed that Jo seemed to be pretty warm.  By 6:45 we checked her temperature and sure enough she had a fever. Although I did not realize that a baby isn't considered to have a fever until their temperature is above 100.5...so technically at 100.3 she didn't have a REAL fever.  But, don't go telling that to first time parents experiencing first time fevers/sicknesses.  You might as well have sounded the alarms in the Bice household.  How is it that parents who seem to stay fairly calm and collected 90 % of the time (at least we hope) can fall apart in a moment over something as simple as a low grade fever?  Although, I will say, in reality we stayed pretty cool......for the most part.  So our 4th of July ended with baby Tylenol, extra cuddles and an earlier than normal bedtime for Miss Josie.  As it turns out, our little sweet potato has her first ear infection.  Both Brandon and I agree that making it to nearly 8 months of age without any ear infections is pretty darn great for ANY daycare baby! 

On a brighter note....

Brandon and I are so excited to spend some time with his family soon!  His sisters and aunt/uncle/cousins have never met Jo and it will be so incredible to introduce her to all of them.  We also have a new niece we have never met!  We so look forward to this time with them!  It's hard to believe we haven't seen some of his family in two years!  Two years can seem like a lifetime when families are growing and changing so quickly.