Here we are getting to see Aunt Becky, Uncle Bobby, and Abby! This is the only way to see your bestie during a quarantine. They came over and hung out on the deck with us, and we stayed apart from each other, but still got to hang out a little bit.
Here's my little mean mugger.
We got a swing that we've kept in our garage this month. And we've spent LOTS of time hanging out in there.
Kayla likes to play in her baby chair while we are outside.
She is starting to play and interact with her toys more and more.
Here she is SO fascinated with Mickey mouse.
She has really blossomed into liking me reading to her. We read between 5-15 books a day. Our favorite books are Kayla Rose can change the world, Little Quack, and Peter Rabbit. Kayla really likes to look at the pages of those books.
She is starting to try to eat all of her toys. Here she is trying to eat her piano mat.
Kayla has been able to roll onto her tummy for a while, but now she's able to roll back onto her back now too. This has been a game changer, because instead of her being stuck on her tummy and crying, she's able to roll back onto her back on her own now.
Kayla is FASCINATED with anything that Cody and I are eating or drinking. She always shows a lot of interest in what we have. So much so, that I can't eat anymore while she's nursing or she'll stop and look up at me like "Whatcha got there mom?" So that leads me into some of Kayla's "rules." If you break the rules, she'll let you know about it. For instance, if I try to eat while she's eating or move wrong she'll stop eating and sometimes cry... because I broke the rules. Likewise, if she's eating and I talk too loud to Cody across the room... that's also against the rules. The deadly sin is being in the car and stopping at a red light. That is VERY MUCH AGAINST THE RULES. And Kayla will scream and howl like a banshee until the car is in motion again. Once the motion resumes, baby is happy again. I joke with her that's she always changing the rules on me, because I'll do something and she'll get mad about it, and I often say to her, "Sorry I didn't know that was against the rules today."
She has been hilarious this month with peeking over the top of her bassinets. We placed her in the opposite way to look at her mobile, and Cody and I were talking next to her... we turned around to see a little head peaking up at us.
She's like, "Hi Guys! I'm in here you know."
So funny. She does this in the morning too.
Kayla loves to "feel the breeze" in her hair. She always gets big smiles when the wind blows on her. She also really likes it when we blow on her too. Sometimes, if she is having a melt down we'll blow in her face, and she'll be kind of shocked/happy by it and she'll stop crying.
Daddy also is trying to get Kayla to practice "standing." He'll tell her ok... let's go... get your balance. I'm going to let go and you're going to stand up on your own. She lasts about a second before she tumbles and he grabs her back up. She does the same thing trying to sit on her own. She can sit assisted pretty well, but if nothing is in front of her or supporting her, she will fall forward pretty quickly.
She still doesn't like to pose for the camera and will give us her mean mug. Here is Cody doing his too! HA! I cracked up when I saw this selfie on his phone.
Crazy hair girl!
Here she is on her piano mat. She LOVES playing on this mat. It's pretty much what we do all day long. I have lots of toys and books around her, that we rotate and she plays with throughout the day.
Of course the goal is to roll around and get off the mat as quickly as possible.
Here she is in her "supergirl" pose. She has been doing this ALL the time lately. She does it while she's standing up too.
Sweet baby girl!
Happy in our swing. Normally, when she shows signs of being tired of being on her mat, we go into the swing to relax.
Happy baby girl.
Breastfeeding journey update... This month, I got my La Vie breast massager, and I've noticed that I've been getting quite a bit more milk when I pump. At one point, I was only getting between 4-6 ounce a day, and now I'm around 8-10 ounces a day. So my milk output seems to be pretty good, but Kayla still isn't gaining a ton of weight. She's just a little peanut. We started "Ready, Set, Food" this month to help prevent food allergies. So that has changed the supplement bottles that I've been giving her. The mixture needs to be added to breast milk, and it can get pretty thick... so I've found that it needs to be mixed with at least 3 ounces of milk to have a good consistency. So at first, I was giving her 3 "extra" bottles a day. One was two ounces and the other two were between 1-1.5 ounces, and I gave her those after a feeding. But now I've gone to one 3 ounce bottle to replace a feeding, and then I come back with a quick feeding after that and one to two 1 ounce extra bottles a day. Although, I've found that most days she has been fighting me to take a full bottle. She'll take the bottle up until the last half an ounce, and then it's a fight to get her to finish it. I was hoping that meant that maybe she was getting enough while eating, but she's still not gaining a ton of weight. She's gained just over a pound this month, and baby's her age are supposed to gain 1-2 pounds a month. So she's definitely on the lower side still. I also think that she's had trouble with allergies this month (I have too). I've noticed she's scratched at her eyes and has had a plugged up nose. The nose has made nursing challenging sometimes. I regularly have to squirt her nose with saline spray to help open up her nose so that she can eat better. This month we are going to start trying baby cereal, so that will be interesting to see how it changes her eating patterns, and to see if it helps her gain weight. I can mix the ready, set, packets into her cereal instead of a 3 ounce bottle so I can change up how I give her, her extra milk too.
Here's a shot of my angry baby. I think I took this after she was upset that her nose was clogged and she couldn't eat. We've had some really good days together and then other days that were tough. Some days she'll take a nap around 11am just fine, and those days she usually has a good day. But other days she won't take that nap and then she's tired/crabby/crying the whole day until she eventually falls asleep for her 2-3pm nap. Her inconsistent napping has made it hard for me to try to work from home this month. I've been waking up early and trying to get my work in before she gets up for the day, but I can usually only get an hour or two in before she wakes up. Then I'm working around her for the rest of my time that I need to get in. Luckily, I don't have to call into too many meetings so I don't have to worry if she gets fussy while I'm trying to work. But it definitely been an adjustment and a challenge at times.
More cute pictures playing outside
You can tell we've spent a lot of time out here this month haha.
Sweet girl in her jammies.
Super girl!
Towards the end of the month, we started to feel better about the Coronavirus and started to venture out to hang out with some people. Here are Kayla and Maia. Maia was sooo adorable with Kayla. She was soooo excited to see Kayla, and kept saying "baby."
At first Kayla was a little scared when we got to Hannah's house. It was our first outing pretty much ever! So once we got there, she had a scared cry and big crocodile tears. Luckily, Hannah has the same piano mat that we do, so we set her on it and turned on her tunes, and by the stomp, stomp, stomp song Kayla was giving smiles and happy again. She was loving Maia.
Maia kept saying "Baby! Me!" and she'd point to the couch. She wanted to hold Kayla sooo bad. Here they are! And she kept bringing her over a bunch of toys to play with too.
I love this picture so much!
Maia was all about her baby! Hannah told me that later on Maia was laying on the piano pretending to be a baby and going "goo goo gah gah" Haha too funny! We were actually able to go over to hang out with them two times this month. The next time we got to meet Sam and Kyle. Sam is such a natural with babies! Kayla took right to her.
Baby girl at home playing on her mat.
Look at my cutest girl! Doesn't she look so grown up with the little pony tail?? Kayla has always had quite a bit of hair, so she's never liked headbands. Hannah showed me these little bow clips that Maia wears, and we tried it on Kayla and she didn't seem bothered by them. So I was instantly like yaaaay! I have a way for my baby to wear a bow! So I bought her a whole bag of clips.
My sweetest girl!
We also got to see grandma, and grandma was able to hold the baby. Kayla was smiling and happy to see her.
We also went to Aunt Becky's 40th birthday party. My phone was at full capacity, and it wouldn't let me take any additional pictures or videos on it. So I didn't do too well with getting pictures taken. This was the first big gathering that Kayla has been to since we went to Hancock. She was fine with letting Allisa and Aunt Becky hold her, but her smiles were tough to come by. Abby on the other hand was super smiley and very snuggly. It was so nice to get the girls together, Becky and I have quite a few plans to get together for the next month while I'm still working only part time.
