Play Time with Dad

Arek loves to play with Julie when he is all finished with work and school stuff. Here's just a bunch of snapshots of one of their playtime sessions:

Major Accomplishment

So it's been a while... and I forgot my camera at home, so no pictures, sorry... next time, I promise. BUT Julie has officially slept through the night. She'd gotten pretty good at waking up only once, but then around the new year she caught a cold and went back to two or three times a night. So finally last week she got over her cold and started waking up only once again. I was so happy. Then yesterday was rough... she didn't nap as well as she usually does and she was fussy all evening. But she finally fell asleep around 11 and this morning she didn't wake up until 8:40, when I had to wake her up to feed and change her before taking Arek to school. I was so proud of her. And she didn't even wake up screaming for food... just my bright eyed, smiley morning baby. So, hopefully it was not a fluke, and Julie really is starting to sleep through the night. Arek and I got to bed by midnight and my body woke up at 7:30 all by itself, and let me tell you, 7 1/2 hours of straight sleep never felt so good! :)

Two Months Already!

I can't believe another month has gone by. Julie is already 10 weeks old! She had her two month appointment last week, and boy, has she grown! At her 2 week appointment she was 7 1/2 lbs and 21 inches long. Last week she weighed in at 12.0 lbs and was 23 1/2 inches long! Craziness. She has almost outgrown her 0-3 month clothes because she is so long! But she is such a sweet baby and we love having her in our family. She loves to cuddle (although NOT in the cradle position), look at books, and she loves to smile and laugh and be tickled. And since it is now Christmas time (hurray!) her new favorite thing to do is stare at the Christmas tree lights. Also, since yesterday was St. Nikolas Day (a holiday where you put your shoe out at night and St. Nikolas comes by and fills it with goodies and -in our family- a Christmas ornament), Julie now has her first Christmas ornament. We can't wait to celebrate the rest of the season together as a family. Anyway, here's some photo updates:

Julie on her Blessing DayA tired mom and dadHappy Julie... Look at those chubby cheeks! Yes, she gets it from my side of the familyJulie loves her carseat... she's already getting ready for the car ride, where she pretty much always falls asleep

Update and Smiles

Ok, so I have been a BIG blog slacker since our baby was born. Julie Michelle Higgs was born on Spetember 28 which means she is already 6 weeks old (as of tomorrow). We are all doing great. Postpartum period is officially over and both mom and dad are finally adjusting to the new sleep schedule (or lack thereof). The main reason I haven't updated before now is because we don't have the internet at home and it has been difficult to get out often enough to check my email, let alone blog. The other reason is because I am a lazy blogger. Yes, I admit it. But, I will try to update at least once a month. But right now I have to go pick up Arek from school, so I'll leave you with Julie's newest trick - smiling. She is a little camera-shy... this is the only photo we could get of her actually smiling, but she loves to be tickled. She can't laugh yet but her face lights up. It's super cute.

Feels Like an Early Christmas

Tomorrow is the day! Had our last doctor's appointment today (to make sure she hadn't decided to turn at the last minute) and everything is all set for the delivery tomorrow. What have I been doing on my last day without baby? Pretty much nothing. Cleaned the apartment a little bit (I really should dust tonight because I am sure it will be a few weeks before that ever gets done again!), took a walk, watched a movie, took a nap, tried to get into a new book (just finished Jane Austen's Emma... LOVE it!) , and now I am blogging. Hmm... I feel like I need to be productive on my last day before this baby is born but I can't seem to want to. Maybe I will tonight when Arek is done with work and homework...

I still am having a hard time believing tomorrow is the end of this pregnancy and the start of mommy-hood. Where has the time gone?! It has been so awesome being pregnant, feeling this little one grow inside of me, I can hardly believe it is time to meet her! Arek and I are super excited (and scared and intimidated and...) to become parents. We are so excited, it feels like an early Christmas. I already have that Christmas Eve feeling, and I know I am going to toss and turn with excitement all night and not get hardly any sleep. Oh well... starting tomorrow I won't ever get a decent night's rest like I used to (or so everyone has told me)! So... tomorrow we have to check into Labor and Delivery at 5:30 a.m. for pre-op stuff. At 7:30 the surgery is supposed to begin and by 8 (or shortly thereafter) we will have our little baby! Craziness. I better post this before I keep rambling on. It may be a week or two before I have access to the internet again to update... so be patient please :)

Yellowstone

Finally... documented evidence of our trip to Yellowstone. One of my best friends has been working at a bakery & motel up in West Yellowstone, MT, all summer long. Labor Day was the first weekend we were able to go up and visit her. It was SUPER fun to see all the sights (and have such an amazing tour guide... since she spends all her free time there!) and we were also VERY grateful that Arek's cousin Drewann could come up with us.
We made it! :) Actually, this was one of the last photos we took before we LEFT, but still...
Our first geyser... we were pretty excitedOne of the many hot pools... the colors were gorgeous! If only the smell of sulphuric acid wasn't quite so strong!Waiting for Old Faithful to be "faithful"... it sure did take a while
Finally... the grand sight we were waiting for!
Drew, Brynn, and me on a bridge just past the Upper (?) Falls
"A buffalo... a real buffalo!" Yeah... we saw about a million of these. This one was right along side the road while we were driving by, though
Our last geyser for the day... we all forgot our hoodies back at the motel and we were freezing! To emphasize how cold it was: it started snowing on our drive out of the park!

That's all for now... One week from today until Baby's here!

"Funny" baby

Ok so Yellowstone pictures are still coming, I promise. Suffice it to say (for now) that we had an awesome vacation and I have just been too lazy to go through photos and update. But I will...
Anyway, last Friday we had our 36 week appointment (see above belly photo). and at said appointment we discovered that our little girl thinks she is pretty clever or funny or both... take your pick. Either way we found out that she is footling breech. What exactly is that, you might ask? Well at this stage a baby is supposed to be head down. That is good and normal and safe. Frank breech (the most common) is when the baby is bum down (meaning the head is right under the ribs). Footling breech is when the baby is feet first... meaning our baby is pretty much standing straight up and down inside of me, with her head pressed right under my ribs and her feet in my pelvis (see photo). Anyway, so what does this all mean? Well, our doctor let us think things over during the weekend and on Monday we came back for our 37 week appointment (yes she is still breech) to decide what we want to do. The options? Try to turn her or just schedule a c-section. She can't be born the way she is because footling breech babies come out feet first... and that means that the umbilical cord almost always comes out first, too, which is BAD. So, after asking lots of questions we decided to forgo trying to turn her. Our reasoning: The odds were against her turning - the way she is positioned and this being my first pregnancy (i.e. my uterus isn't super stretchy since it hasn't done this before) and my having an anterior placenta. So instead of risking having an emergency c-section, we have scheduled a normal c-section for our baby's birth date. So unless I start going into labor early (hopefully not!) our baby girl will be born around 8 a.m. on September 28 (at our 39 weeks, 2 days mark). That is 2 weeks from yesterday! Needless to say we are super excited to meet this little one and are SO glad to live in a day and age where our "funny" baby can be born safely!