Been a long time...

Wow it's been a while since I've posted on here. M has grown significantly and has begun showing her personality more and more everyday. Can't believe it will have been 2 years since she was born in a month.

Anyway this a short entry. Hopefully more to come later.

Here's a picture of our little one on Halloween.

Our Big Girl

OK, so i know that M is still very much a baby. But I can't help but feel like she's a "big" girl too. This little person is very good at telling us what she does and does NOT want. When she's happy she starts kicking her legs excitedly and flapping her arms - she smiles chinky like her mommy and when shes NOT happy she closes her eyes and turns her head, if we take away the thing she wants (wires/cords) she's flings her body back and kicks her legs. fuuuuun stuff. It's harder now vs. when she would just lay and entertain herself on the play mat, but it's a lot more fun now too. With all these big changes and milestones I can't, but feel like M is a big girl now.

Big Girl School aka Daycare
H and I have been stressing out, worrying about what to do with M in terms of choosing a daycare facility vs. in home daycare vs. nanny. We've been really lucky as H has been able to be home with her for nearly 2 months while studying for his board exams, but the time has come for him to bring home the bacon!! We weighed all our options, read reviews, searched the social services website, read forums, tours, interviews, and I think the right step for us as a family is sending M to a daycare facility. it's FAR more expensive than the other options, but we're really happy with the daycare we've chosen and the ratio is really great. M looooves being around other babies, and she's not so itty bitty anymore that I feel MUCH more comfortable than I would've even just 2 months ago. Thank God timing worked out perfectly and we're able to move forward with a place very close to H's new job.
Of course the typical Mommy worries are there...will she nap? will she eat? will she cry at drop off or ALL day missing us? sigh...but if i've learned anything these last 9.5 months is that babies/children are resilient and most everyone says babies adjust within the first 2 weeks, so cross your fingers, say a prayer for us.

Eats
It's a struggle to get M to eat, when she first started solids she would gobble everything up! Now that she thinks she's a big girl, she does NOT want baby purees, she wants the real good stuff. le sigh. She puts those lone 2 bottom teeth to WORK. Did i mention i was up til 10 making M some green beans for today's lunch that.she.HATES...? There are tons of books out there about helping kids eat, theories about how to encourage picky eaters, habits you should be weary of so they dont develop bad habits - I really hope we don't go down that road...but I really worry about getting her to eat a good, balanced meal. She's no longer a big B-milk drinker either, we really have to encourage her to drink the recommended minimum 18oz daily. I feel like a lot of my time is spent thinking about food she'll eat, buying new foods hoping that she'll love it and that it will be one of her favorite staple foods, any given day Daddy is pulling out several different types of foods every meal - cause Miss.M closes her eyes, and turns her head of course unless its cheerios. This girl is crazy though, one day she loooooves beans, the next day no beans. right now her go tos are:

• Pears
  
• Plums
  
• Mangoes
  
• Cous Cous
  
• Kidney Beans
  
• Blueberries
  
• Potato
  
• Any type of bread
  
• Colby Jack cheese
  
• Bagels and cream cheese
  
• Kalbi

and of course snacks foods - animal crackers, cherrios, baby cheese puffs. This girl is truly her mother's daughter, pass the bread, and cheese please. whoops. I know she won't go starving at daycare and often babies eat better in that setting since theyre around other babies eating, but I'm worried cause whatever we send has to be something she will eat.or.feels.like.eating.that.day - I'm crazy right?

Other Big Girl Things
M was sick for the first time 2 weeks ago, what we thought was teething turned out to be a mild ear infection :( she had a fever that we were monitoring and she was up.all.night. we were exhausted - everyone. M's been sleeping 12 hrs straight since...pretty much forever, and we were not used to getting up in the middle of the night, and it wasnt just the feed put back in crib and let her fall back asleep - it was the rock me, i need mommy, let me fall asleep on you, and dont put me back down kind of sleep. EXHAUSTING. But how could you say no to that wittle face, her fever broke on its own and the ear infection healed itself - her body broke out in a rash afterwards, but she's back to her normal self.

her 9 month appt was last week and M is:

• 50% in weight :( far from FTT (failure to thrive), but I'd really like to see this number go UP vs. down.


• 90% in height - we have no idea where this comes from, although H has no problem attributing her height to his super genes


• 75% in head circumference - we ALL know where THIS comes from. the dr. mentioned that around 6 months is when genes from parents start kicking in and the baby tends to follow 1 parent vs. the other...she was born around 50% then at 6 months was 65%...now 75%.

Pumping
I can finally see the light at the tunnel I'm an exclusive pumper - I stopped bfeeding pretty early on and that in and of itself is another posts, BUT i've lasted this long and I can proudly say that M has only had breast milk not including the bout with jaundice when we supplemented. I was really diligent in the early months and looking back i REALLY don't know how i did it - pumping every 2 hrs with a crying baby, but at the time if i didn't pump she had nothing to eat. Luckily my supply established itself early on and I was able to start freezing a stash - the stash grew and grew, my original goal was to stop pumping at 6 months, but i just didnt have enough to make it to the recommended 1 year so here I am at 9 months, granted i've cut WAAAAY back - I went from pumping every 2hrs, 3hrs, 4 hrs, and now just once a day. i could just flat out stop as we have enough milk to make it past her first birthday - but I cant but help feel a bit anxious - its not like she wouldnt have enough milk, or there's always the formula option. M did have a reaction to yogurt so we were worried she was allergic to dairy so I considered continuing to pump since she wouldnt be able to have cow's milk, but turns out she's not and were gtg. I think my days are numbered (probably after our family beach trip in the coming weeks- just cause traveling with frozen milk is a pain), I could write a whole post about my journey and maybe I will

ok enough of this word dump, but this is what happens when you're absent for 3 months, so many big changes in a baby's life. thanks for reading if you made it THIS far.

It is Finally Over

I am finally official. After worrying about my board exam and failing to study very well for it. I actually passed (barely) and am now a fully license PT in VA. I also started to slowly look for jobs and now I think that I might have one lined up starting in a week. Things are just starting to fall into place.

I have been watching Melo since I finished my clinical. And boy is it hard work. She is so mobile now. Crawling, cruising, pulling to stand. It's really hard to keep up with her and keep her out of trouble. However it has been nice spending time with her before I have to start working. We also finally lined up a daycare for M to go to while we are at work. Daycares are ridiculously expensive. Luckily I earn more than what we would be spending. J and I think that the pros out weigh the cons of the daycare we chose. Of course it would be nice to find someone to watch the baby at home for cheaper, but most people want just as much as a daycare and there's the chance that they will quit or not take care of Melody well.

So anyways, she is already 9 months old and in about 2.5 months she will be 1 year old! That's crazy! Seems like yesterday that she was born! Jee has been working overtime to plan her birthday party. I'm glad she is a great planner and loves doing this kinda stuff. Though she does complain I don't do much. But i don't know where to begin.

Well anyways. Here are a few pics from my phone. Blogger finally made and iPhone app which will hopefully make it easier to keep up with this.

One Hot Summer

So it's summer and I am half way done with my clinic and Melo is 6.5 months old! Man oh man she has been growing so much. It's hard to believe she was just an infant and unable to hold her head up on her own just 5 months ago. Now she is on her tummy pivoting around and itching to start crawling. She isn't able to sit completely on her own but she has her moments. She was rolling around so much that we needed to get a larger playmat for her to roll around on when she plays. We got a nice fobby large playmat like the one below.


She seems to be enjoying it. She is also eating all sorts of solids, like yams, pears, apples, oatmeal, brown rice, peaches, green beans, avocado, banana and butternut squash. She is definitely gaining an appetite just like her dad. We gave her yogurt but she ended up getting a rash all over her body so no yogurt for now. Hopefully she won't have a dairy allergy.

I must say jumpers are nice and all but they definitely don't help the baby walk. I get her standing but all she wants to do is jump. She's forgotten how to step reciprocally like she did when she was younger. But we need to focus on her crawling before that anyways. It's cute when she tries to inch forward and reach for the objects I place just out of reach. I wish she could stay small but I can't wait till she starts walking and is able to interact with everyone. I saw a boy at clinic today and he was with his grandpa and it made me think of what Melody will be like later on when she is older and how she is going to behave with people. Then it got me thinking of having to discipline her and all that jazz. Well anyways, more pictures and videos!

The whole fam after my hooding ceremony.

Dr Melody Lee

5 Months old!!


Graduation Day!


The only boys in my class! Wow I got a picture with Victor Washington!!! (inside joke from APTA 2011)

Some more peeps

I want a HUG!!


HAHAHA J/K!!

Playing on the playmat

Using my teething toy to conceal my identity.

Hokie Hokie Hokie Hi Tech Tech VPI!!

Yogurt on my face!! But I'm allergic =(

Got Melo the Munchkin Mozart Music Cube. First thing she does is tries to stuff it in her mouth. See the video below!

We Will Miss You

This past week has been a whirlwind. I got hooded on May 7th for my doctor of physical therapy degree and I "graduated" from Marymount on May 8th. During this whole time my grandmother was not doing well health wise. My mother told me the night of May 8th that it did not look like grandma has much more time to live. That following monday I get a call from my mom saying that the hospice nurse believed that it was my grandma's time to go and that all the family should come in. I was lucky enough to get there before my grandma passed. Even tho she wasn't responding I hope she knew that we were all there and that we all loved her. My grandma basically brought me up here in the states and so it was hard for me to come to the realization that she was actually leaving us. But she was able to be surrounded by loved ones and live her last few days in the comfort of her own home. I am really glad she was able to see Melody tho, she never remembered her or knew if she was a boy or a girl. She always told me to just raise her right and have a boy next time. She was funny like that.

I am going to miss you grandma.

Pretty Hard to Keep Up

Who knew blogging was hard to do. This will be a short post with pictures. I have finally finished the scholarly portion of my schooling. I just have my internship this summer and then I will officially be done! I have my graduation May 7 (in arlington at 3 ) and 8 (at constitution hall at 2). If you wanna come just hollar.

Anyways, we have been trying to sleep train the baby the past few days. It was definitely hard the first night but the second night she fell asleep on her own after 10 mins of crying. We are trying the cry it out method. You wouldn't know it but there are several different theories people have come up with to put a baby to sleep. It's almost a science. People actually analyze the cries of the baby and categorizes them as peak, mantra, overtired, etc. I always thought a cry was a cry but that's not that case.

We also started feeding Melody cereal and sweet potato. She loves sweet potato but hates cereal. And I hate her new poop smell. It actually comes out looking like whatever she ate. I guess that's how our digestive system works. What comes in goes out.

Anyways here are some pictures.

the not so happy easter bunny


Family photo


Melo's easter outfit

Melody's Easter basket from the Easter Bunny


Lovin' that sweet potato

4 months!

With the government shut down looming - guess i have some time to blog... Hello from Melody's (favorite) Mommy! I know I'm her only mommy, so of course I'm her favorite - but she makes me feel like her favorite cause she's always so happy to see me, one of the BEST things is getting her from her crib after naps and in the morning, she smiles so BIG when she sees my face...of course i'm sure its the same for her favorite daddy too. Things are going well, we've gotten into the groove of things, there are definitely good and bad days (like the time she wouldnt go to bed after a 4am feeding- and mommy had to soothe her back to sleep for an hour), but the good outnumber the bad. M had her 4month appt yesterday...shes in the 75th percentile for height and weight, down from 85 and 80th previously, and her head is still in the 50th...thank God considering who her daddy is :P the Dr. okay-ed us on starting solids, and I've been looking forward to this day FOREVER- one step closer to getting my body back. So I was ready: read the book Super Baby Food, and had feeding supplies on hand- spoons, bowls, and cereal...but she didn't really take a liking to it. We'll give it another try tonight - I really want to start making baby food this weekend...and I hope I can keep up with it, but we'll see. Things for me are going well-I'm lucky in the grand scheme of things cause M is such a chill, SLEEPY baby. Sleepy being key - she's been sleeping through the night since she was 2 months old, so i'm lucky i'm not too sleep deprived. But managing work with taking care of a baby, a husband taking his competency exams (he PASSED) and taking care of our humble abode isn't easy. Did i mention I'm not good with change? I'm a researcher and planner by heart, i NEED to feel prepared - but with a baby 2 days are never the same. I know I'm growing and God is chanllenging me - and most days I'd like to think i've risen to the occassion. But growing, and being stretched isn't always easy. As a mom I think it's easy to feel guilty, it's a struggle to not feel selfish - checking facebook/watching tv vs. being present with my baby. I don't know where I'm really going with this - usually I'm not this honest, since I'm a pretty private person. But I just wanted to share my feelings from a mom's perspective. It's hard, but it's very much worth it.

M on her 100 day - posing infront of her cake that she didn't get any of

M's newsest milestone - half way rolling over, she just can't seem to get her arm out

Picture's from her 4 month photoshoot

Bye from the Lee's