1 month!

We've made it to the one month mark:). This I remember to be full of wakefulness and struggle with sleep for Laurel, so I am hoping to have a change with Audrey. So far, Audrey is definitely waking up more, but as long as we have a good morning nap, she does ok for the rest of the day with naps. With no pacifier, she likes to nurse to sleep, then we prop up on the chest for a burp and go to sleep. Sometimes she wretches around for a while but when she's out, she's out, slack jawed and all. Audrey is also losing her hair, big time:). All of the top of her head is balding and fast! On our way home from Thanksgiving, she twisted and turned so much that her hair jumped ship. She'll be growing a baby mullet before we know it. I don't know how quickly the hair will grow back in but it's quickly receding. Audrey is also starting to coo and every now and then make some smiles. Some of the smiles are wide mouthed and some are a genuine ear to ear grin. But there's no predicting it, so no pics of the smiles yet. Her coos come out sounding like "hi", which is fun, we're having very early conversations. I say hi, she said hi back, lol. We're on a good night time routine, again helped by good sleep during the day. We start our bedtime around 6:30 with nursing and rocking, sometimes a bath prior. Audrey's skin is sensitive and so is her body temperature, so she doesn't like bath at all. I'd hate to put her through it every night the way she screams:(. Some nights we don't have to go in at all and some nights we have to rock her repeatedly to get her to stay down. But she definitely knows her bedtime and starts getting craking between 5:30 and 6 pm. She's still waking twice at night, sometimes with a feeding around 11, sometimes not. Occasionally she's gassy in the morning, but not consistently and so a normal morning has her waking around 7. If she's been gassy, we're both in and out of sleep all morning long.

Laurel has gotten so much better with the baby crying. That's a huge relief. If we're in the car, she will be nervous about it and point out that she's crying, but there's not much I can do about it! Audrey does cry pretty much every car ride, so I really don't look forward to running errands and try to stay close to home. At least for now until Audrey gets better with her car seat. Laurel is always on spit patrol. She will point out a spit up very quickly and run to get a towel and rag off Audrey's face. Laurel is getting good at occupying herself when she has to. While I put Audrey down for bed, Laurel plays games on her iphone and watches shows on tv. She's become very independent, gung ho to do everything herself because she's a big sister now. She can hoist herself up onto the potty and wipe all by herself. I tried to hoist her up the other day and she complained about doing it herself, got down, and got back up on her own. Laurel is a little better at helping herself to her toys and playing a bit by herself. She wants to look at Audrey all the time and asks if she's awake. She likes to squeeze her "cheekies" and kiss her on the head. Laurel continues to go to school and is doing very well. She's made some little friends and is really enjoying their company. It's helpful to me that she goes to school right around the corner from the shop. I can just walk to pick her up. Audrey comes to the shop with me pretty often right now because she sleeps in her bjorn carrier and falls asleep. It's not the most convenient position, but i can press with her strapped to my front. Laurel is very sweet, she picks flowers for me on the walk from school:). Laurel is starting to draw with more recognizeable figures. She drew a huge circle with a circle inside and a tiny stem - the circle inside was the bite on an apple! She also can draw large circles with eyes, stick legs and arms and a string of hair. Laurel is able to put on her own clothes - after whatever battle takes place to choose an outfit! Most of the time she wants to wear dresses and I had to put away all of her summer ones so she wouldn't pick them from the closet to wear. She's picky about shoes still, but she's able to put some things on herself so it helps get out the door! Her conversation is more inquisitive, asking what things are, why things happen, where things are. She asked me when she would get boobies! I told her not until she was older, to which she replied - when I'm 4? She asked Grandma the other day where her Daddy was. Grandma replied that he was at work. Laurel said, Daddy loves to go to work? Grandma said, well, I'm not sure he loves it, but he likes it ok. All in all, she's becoming quite the independent free spirit - which also comes with some stubbornness. We've taken to bargaining on how many bites of food she has to eat before she's done, or what kind of clean up has to be accomplished before the next action of play. It's an interesting transition:).