First Wedding

August 29, 2007: This past weekend Casey took her second airplane ride to Duluth, MN for Angie's wedding. Once again she was a very good baby on the flights. On Saturday she had her second ever bottle and was quiet enough that James could keep her in the church for the ceremony. She fell asleep at the reception during dinner and slept thru the whole thing. She would wake up ocassionally if there was a lot of loud noise but would go right back to sleep. That night she also slept thru until 6:30am. I only wish that was the norm. We are still trying to put her to bed around 8pm but she wakes very often at night to eat and sometimes she wakes between feedings and just cries for no apparent reason. It is very tiring for me and James. Besides the night times she is still very fun. She is very vocal, loves her toys, and puts everything imaginable into her mouth. She drools like crazy. Recently her eyes have begun to change colors. From the middle they are starting to turn brown and very slowly creeping outwards. We are back at school and James has started faculty meetings. The students arrive back on campus next week and class begins the 10th. Yesterday we took Casey down to the river and she watched us jump off the rope swing. Besides the night time sleep aspect the hardest thing about Casey is keeping her nails short. They grow like weeds and she is always scratching herself. She is getting big but I don't know how much she weighs. Her 4 month check up is September 10th. I am dreading the second round of shots!

Moving

August 21, 2007: Casey is a crazy baby! She is on the move all the time. She rolls over and back, and is now scooting around on her stomach some times. We can no longer swaddle her at night because she will roll over onto her face while swaddled and then she can't fall asleep like that. Her newest thing is yelling. When we hold her in a standing position she loves to scream with delight. It is pretty funny. As she is developing she is more interested and capable of playing with other toys. We have tried the bouncy seat (see picture), and she loves all the rattles and things that hang from her car seat or play mat. She still enjoys the bath and we just got her a rubber ducky. We read a few books every night before bed. The negative of this stage is that her sleep pattern is getting worse. She used to sleep from 11pm to 5am. Now we put her to bed at 10pm and she wakes anywhere from 1:45 (last night) to 3am. I'll feed her, she go back to sleep until 5 or 6 then feed her and back to sleep again hopefully until 8 or 9. I talked to Jordan today who said I should move her bedtime earlier so we are going to work towards a 7:30 bedtime. Anyways, if any moms out there have advice for me on how to get Casey's sleep going in the right direction again I am all ears. She seems to also be gravitating towards two naps a day instead of one nap every three hours. Sometimes she goes down easily in her bassinet, but other times I have to use the swing. I'm so terrified of creating bad habts that all the books warn you about but sometimes you just do what you can to get by. She has her hands in her mouth all day long and drools so much. Maybe teeth are on their way? Her hair is still falling out but much more slowly. Anyhow, we had a nice week in Greenwich. Casey spent lots of quality time with LaLa and Eddie. We went into NYC one night for dinner and she had her first train ride. We visited Baba and Pop and just saw Meme too. On Friday morning we head to Duluth for Angie's wedding and Casey is coming with us. I love the last picture on here...this is real parenting, trying to quickly eat dinner with a fussy baby on the couch. Holding the paci in with one hand and eating Mac n' cheese straight from the pot with the other. How glamorous!

Holiday Road

August 6, 2007: We just got back from Italy and Casey was so easy to travel with. She had no problems on the plane rides and slept a lot. When we arrived in Rome, we managed to sightsee the first day and stay up in order to adjust. I was so worried she would wake up in the middle of the night leaving me feeling awful. Instead she slept all night until almost 9am, her longest straight sleep ever! Casey went to many famous sights in Rome and visited many beautiful towns in Tuscany in the weeks that followed. She convinced people all over Italy to let us cut lines which was great. We were zipped right thru security in Boston's airport, they let us cut the whole line to get into the Vatican museum, and on the way home we were brought to the front of the line in Rome's airport. She seems to change and develop every day. She loves chomping on her hand and can fit her entire fist into her mouth. She has found her feet for sure and is constantly grabbing onto them with her hands. She even sucks on her big toe from time to time. She rolls over all the time now. She will hardly play on her play mat any more without doing a few barrel rolls first.We'll often find her rolled right off of it. She smiles when we sing songs or make certain faces at her. Her smiles turn into giggles sometimes which is so cute. She became more comfortable with other people holding her during the trip which is good. She still gets startled from time to time for no apparent reason. All in all she was just so well behaved and a dream baby on the trip. We are home now and things have changed. Her internal clock must be all screwed up from the time change because it's like having a newborn all over again. I have been up for large portions of the night trying to get her to settle down and sleep, and when she does get to sleep it is for much shorter periods than she used to do. I am exhausted and hoping she gets back on track soon. Big congrats to Celluch and Craig on the birth of their son Rhys while we were away.