More Halloween

Here are more Halloween photos that didn't fit on the previous post. I just had too many to share!

Rylee and Mama

Meeting Great Grandma for the first time

Rylee and Grandpa

Halloween

Rylee and her cousin, Mara the lion

4 Generations - Great Grandma Angie, Grandma Barb, Mom and Rylee

Rylee and Grandma

Rylee and Uncle Derek

Rylee and Auntie Jenna after getting her costume off

Halloween was pretty fun this year. I think it will continue to get more fun as Rylee gets older. I enjoy Halloween, but always have such a hard time coming up with a costume for myself. It is much more fun to dress up a child! Rylee got good use out of her costume this year too. She wore it 3 times! And her dad didn't think she even needed a costume this year!

Rylee was a little pumpkin first for her friend, Will's 1st birthday party. His birthday is the day before Halloween, so he had a dress up birthday party. Then she dressed up for our Mamma and baby class. Although she was the only one in class that really dressed up. And then she dressed up on Halloween to trick or treat at Grandpa and Grandma McNamara's house and at Great Grandma Angie's house.

We spent Halloween day with Grandpa and Grandma. It was Rylee's longest car ride so far. Luckily, I timed it right and she slept the whole way there! The way home was a different story. We had to stop part way home to get some hot water to make a bottle. She is very particular about the temperature of her bottle. I sat in the back and fed that to her as we continued on our way home. She sucked down about an ounce and fell asleep for the rest of the drive. Silly kid was just tired!

She had a lot of fun with her grandparents. She also got to visit her distant cousin, Bonnie. She's my second cousin, so does that make her Rylee's third cousin? And then she got to play with her first cousin, Mara. Mara actually looked at her this time, so we are making progress! And then we went to meet Great Grandma Angie for the first time. It was a very busy day for Rylee and she was awake for a very long time. She slept very well once she finally went to bed that night at 2 am. She slept for 9 hours! Yay!

Mama and Baby

Last week we started going to a weekly Mama and Baby class. It's held at the hospital where Rylee was born. I have found it to be pretty informative so far. It's been nice to be among other moms that have the same issues and questions. It makes you feel a little more "normal".

At the first class Rylee was the cranky baby. There were 2 of them that slept the entire time. Must be rough! The lights are dimmed and there is some soothing music playing in the background to help relax the babies. My baby doesn't like it! In fact, when she was screaming the one thing that worked to calm her was to go out in the hallway under all of the bright lights. Doesn't that seem a bit backwards?

Today she did better, but still cried for a while. I think she must get hot in there. Well, screaming certainly doesn't help anything. She acts hungry, but when I put her under the "hooter hider" to eat, she screams even louder. I am thinking she is just a bit hot under there. Instead we went out in the hallway and once again she calmed down. I'd go back into the room and she'd start screaming again. Fun times! The other thing I found that worked was to lay her down. I changed her diaper on the counter in the room and she was smiling away afterwards just lying there. (And her diaper was barely wet.)

Anyway, she calmed down eventually and we took a class photo. They were all supposed to wear their Halloween costumes. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but Rylee was the only one in an actual costume. The one boy in the class did wear a little baseball outfit. Yep, only one boy in the whole class! A couple of babies did have on Halloween clothes, but does that really count? Rylee was the cutest one there! Well, of course she was...with or without a costume. ;)

Six Weeks

Time is flying! Rylee is 6 weeks old and my maternity leave is half over! I have no idea how people go back to work already at this point. She is not on any kind of schedule yet. It would be so hard to stay up until 5 am with her and then try to go to work! I can't even imagine. We are trying to get into a routine, but she sleeps when she wants to sleep. We can usually get about 6 hours of straight sleeping from her, but it always varies as to when she actually does it. We don't have a set bed time or anything yet.

Another thing we need to work on is the bottle feeding. She is not much of a fan. Right now Mama is a comfort to her. She likes to fall asleep sucking. Lucky me! It would help if we got her to like a pacifier so at least she would have something to comfort and soothe her. I've tried pretty much every kind...except Avent. I've talked to 2 moms in the past couple of days that use those so I guess those are our next try! I do like the idea that those have covers, so it makes it easier to keep them clean. I guess we shall see if she likes those. Would be nice to have something other than me that works!

All of her newborn clothes are now too small. Even some 0-3 month stuff is too. My child is growing like a weed! I could tell a definite difference in her weight at about 5 1/2 weeks or so. It was like she had a huge growth spurt. Amazing how fast they grow! So she is now wearing 3 month clothes for the most part. I tried to put her in a few outfits that she hadn't worn yet, but shucks...they were already too small! I should say too short! She has a long torso so those onesies won't snap. I am going to try to do better with the 3 month clothes and make she at least gets to wear everything once!

First Stroller Ride

There was finally a nice day a couple weeks ago where it worked out for us to get out in the stroller for a walk. It was still cool out, but not bad. Rylee seemed to love it. She looked around at everything and took it all in. Once we got home and the stroller stopped moving, she started crying. She really liked the motion of it. Just like the car. As long as you are on the highway, you are usually okay. Once you stop at a light or slow down, she starts fussing. I guess that's maybe while she likes the swing too. She likes to keep moving!