Lily has officially mastered the art of thumb-sucking.

The Happy Family

A Few Updates...

First trip on a plane!!

Some quality time with Daddy at the airport.

Last weekend, we took our first official trip as a family. The scheduled itinerary: fly from Baltimore to St. Louis, leaving on Saturday morning and returning on Tuesday afternoon. The plan was to fly out of BWI at 6:55 am on Saturday morning. Bad weather in the Ohio area = cancelled flights = outrageously long lines = us missing our flight. Lots of cancelled flights + people missing their flights because of long lines = no room on any flights leaving BWI going to St. Louis for the rest of the day. Long story short, we drove to Dulles Airport in Northern Virginia, spent 10 hours in the airport, and didn't arrive in St. Louis until almost 9:00 pm (10:00 EST). We also had the added bonus of nearly having the car overheat on the way to Dulles.

We were sure to arrive at the airport way in advance on the way home, so no problems with the flight. However, we made a wrong turn while we were driving home and ended up getting lost in downtown DC Tuesday night (again with the car nearly overheating). Needless to say, we were a bit weary from our travels when we got back home, and we're still recovering.

That being said, we had a wonderful time while we were in St. Louis. Lily got to meet many of her Meyer and Pellerito relatives, and she was so wonderful through all her travels, both on road and in the sky. Thanks to everyone for the making the trip great despite the travel complications! Unfortunately, we were so busy the entire time that we didn't get many pictures. As I receive pics from others, I will try to post them.

It seems that Lily makes some type of developmental progress every day. She spent a couple of weeks looking very intensely at her hands, and then she started reaching out for objects and can now grab them and, of course, put them in her mouth. She loves to grab onto and pull my hair which will probably result in a hairstyle change for me. She opens her mouth when anything gets close to her face, but my favorite is giving her kisses because you end up getting a big sloppy kiss in return.

Lily currently has her first cold. She is such a pleasant baby; you would not even know she was sick until you heard the coughing or saw the runny nose. Lily's sleeping has remained a dream (pardon the pun), even with the cold. She slept straight through the night for about a week, but then she switched to waking up once any time between 2:00 and 4:00 am to eat and then sleeps until I wake her up around 7:15. She has proven to be a cat-napper during the day, but we are all very happy with her schedule.

I switched to feeding Lily myself at work, so no more pumping for me during the day! It has worked out much better this way because before I would get busy and delay pumping, which resulted in discomfort for me and would have led to decreased supply for Lily. Now I'm on-demand and being able to steal some time with Lily during the day is just another added benefit.

All in all, we are having a great time with Lily. I had no idea how much fun it would be to have a baby, but we're loving every minute of it. Lily is so great that I think we are ready for another one. Just Kidding!!

Terra at Doggie Daycare

Every time that we take Terra to Doggie Daycare, the Daycare Director e-mails us pictures of Terra so that we can see her in action. I liked this idea so much that I started doing it at The Young School. Occasionally I send the parents pictures of their children so that they can see what they are doing during the day. As you can imagine, it has been a big hit with the parents. I feel fortunate to be able to look in on Lily any time that I want to during the day, and I wanted the parents to be able to share in that feeling a little bit. Below are some pictures of my 4-legged baby.

Terra thinks that its good to be the Queen.

Terra and her good friend, Molly the Miniature Schnauzer, on the playground.

Terra and Molly inside

The grass is always greener...

How could you not love this face?

True Love

Going for the Gold

Our little amazing athlete, Ms. Lillian Deetz, performed an awe-inspiring stunt this morning by rolling over!! She had been holding off on this move for quite some time now. We think that she was saving it for the big games (didn't want anyone to know her moves until she was ready). We are so proud of her, and she was clearly pleased with her accomplishment, judging by the huge smile on her face after completing the maneuver. We are also proud to say that Lily has been sleeping through the night (8:00 pm - 7:00 am) for a whole week now!! She is just so amazing.

I'm going for my own record in marathon cooking. Last Sunday we made Chicken Fajitas, Eggplant Parmesan, and a big pot of Chicken and Rice Soup. Today we are making Lasagne and Pot Roast. This has made weekday dinners a snap - just heat and eat.

We can't wait to see everyone in St. Louis next weekend. We are packing our bags today to be ready for Lily's first trip on a plane. Hopefully we will be out from under the 17 inches of snow that descended upon us by then. We look forward to seeing many of you soon!

The Winter Games

Downhill racing

(Eat your heart out, Bode)

Freestyle

(A flying dog beats a flying tomato any day)

Lil' Calabasa

We love school!

Lily and me with her Young School bag on her first day of school

Lily's first (official) day at school and my first day back at work went splendidly. The "Tiny Tidbit" note that we get from her teachers every day that records naps, meals, diaper changes and other observations said that the two Lilys really enjoyed looking at each other. They are not really old enough to play (or hit, kick, and bite) so looking at each other is as good as it gets right now. Her teachers also commented that she is a good eater. I was really glad that she did not seem to have any problems transitioning to bottles. For today, I just pumped and then brought the bottles down to her room. When I get more into a routine at work, I will probably feed her myself at least once or twice a day.

Lily slept through the entire night for the very first time last night!! We put her down at 7:15, and we had to wake her up this morning at 7:15. We, of course, worried throughout the night about why she was sleeping so much, so Carl made frequent trips to her room to check on her. I suppose we will get better about this as time goes on.

I really enjoyed my first day back. It reminded me how much I really like what I do and how lucky I am to have a job that I really like. While I was on maternity leave, I actually got a promotion. Before I was the Cottage Director of the preschool program and now I am the Assistant Director of the school. It was a bit stressful to start a new position while sending Lily to school for the first time, especially since I got a cold and sprained my ankle (from falling down our stairs) right before I went back. But, everything worked out really well, and I think we will adjust just fine.

I've been a little over the top with preparations for this week, but it helped me to feel more prepared and better equipped to deal with this transition. So, I made three dinners on Sunday for the week, and I picked out her outfits for the entire week and I have them lined up in the order that she will be wearing them. I know that I won't be able to keep up this level of craziness, but it was nice to have Eggplant Parmesan today with no preparation time. And, I am lucky enough to have a great husband who came home early to walk the dog and heat up dinner so that it would be ready when Lily and I got home.

All in all, we are off to a great start.

Baby, I Love to See You Smile

The Report

Today Lily had her first unofficial day of school. We were able to do a trial run before she officially starts on Monday. So here's the scoop: I woke Lily up at 7:30, and we arrived at the school by 8:15. We put away her things in her bin and on her shelf - her color in the room is purple so everything that is hers is marked with purple tape. Of course, I had to get her a purple crib sheet, a purple wipes holder, purple burp cloths, and we are currently on the hunt for a purple NUK pacifier. Lily hadn't eaten since 5:30 am so we warmed a bottle for her, and they began to feed her. After many years of working in Early Childhood Education, I knew better than to linger around for both her sake and mine. So I left around 8:35. Luckily, I had 2 appointments today (one at 9:00) to distract me. I felt the need for some additional reinforcements after I left, so I called Carl and my mom while I was in the car. The good news is that I didn't cry once. The bad news is that I was nauseous the entire time. I truly thought that I could vomit at any time. But, I didn't.

The report from Lily's teachers is that she was fussy the first time they gave her a bottle, but the second feeding went smoothly. She took a half hour nap and otherwise looked around pleasantly at her new surroundings. When I picked her up at 1:30, she had just dozed off again. Although her room will eventually have 6 babies, there is only one other child there so far (the rest will be filtering in this month and next). The other child there now is the other Lily, so it is currently the Lily Room.

It was such a relief to get past the first (half) day. I am feeling much more confident about Monday. I know that it won't be half as bad because I won't have to leave; I'll just be right down the hall in the office. And, the Director offered me the option to breastfeed Lily during the day, so I don't have to pump if I don't want to. That's great news, but I'm going to see how it goes. I don't want to take advantage of the situation.

The funniest thing about the whole experience is that by the time I returned, every teacher in the building had seen her cloth diapers and everyone wanted to know where to get them. Apparently, they had never seen diapers like hers before, and they loved them. I was very excited. I just wanted to do my part for the environment, but I certainly wouldn't mind being a catalyst for a cloth diaper revolution!