Five Months!

My sweet baby girl turned 5 months old on Monday! This past month has been great in many ways and challenging in others. I love watching her grow and learn. It is definitely the most gratifying part of motherhood for me. But with that learning and growth also comes different challenges that make me feel very inept, and when you combine that with my current situation of living in a hotel in Alabama, it makes for some interesting times.

Jane's nighttime sleep routine the past few weeks has been really hard. There are some nights she wakes up every 2 hours from 8:00 PM until 6:00 AM wanting to eat. It's KILLING me. I worried about trying the "cry-it-out" method because we are living in a hotel and have neighbors on 4 sides of us. Not only that, but most of these neighbors are aviators and the Army imposes minimum sleep quotas. If you don't get at least 7 hours of sleep at night you are considered "high-risk" and they may not let you fly. I didn't feel right allowing my child to keep half of Army Lodging awake at night. However, 2 nights ago she woke up at 9:00 after going to sleep at 8:00 and I decided it was early enough that most people wouldn't be asleep yet anyways. We let her cry and she cried for 30 minutes and then fell asleep until 12:30. I fed her at 12:30 and she fell asleep again until 4:30, ate again, then slept until 7:00 AM. Last night, she cried for 15 minutes, woke up at 1:30 and 5:45 to eat, then slept until 8:00. I am really encouraged and hope that we are breaking some of her bad habits. I can handle getting up twice a night, especially when it is spread over a 12-hour period. Hopefully it will continue.

Although there are hard times, we have lots of good times too. Jane is still small, but she is growing and gets cuter every day. I love this picture of her with Jimmer. We went outside one afternoon and I took this magazine to read. I set it in her carseat so I could carry her back inside and this is what I saw when I set her down. I love how her little hand is holding it. So cute! When we took her in for her 4 month checkup last month she weighed in at a whopping 12 lb 1 oz, which is only the 10th percentile. The doctor suggested we start her on solids and after much debate and a second opinion (thanks again Jenny!) we decided to start her on rice cereal. It's not going so well and I'm starting to think she's just not ready. Jane is a petite baby girl but she's not sickly or lethargic. She has plenty of fat rolls around her legs and bum and is active and happy. Maybe we'll try again in a few weeks. This particular day I tried mixing the cereal with sweet potatoes which went a little better, but not much. Oh well.

This past weekend Jane started sitting up on her own. She is still a little tipsy but does really well overall.

Motherhood is definitely an adventure! Hopefully we can make it through babyhood without too much permanent damage on either side. Despite the challenges I LOVE being Jane's mom. She is by far the best thing that ever happened to me.

Georgia Adventures Part 1

Last weekend we took advantage of our close proximity to Atlanta and visited the Smith family. I met Christine my freshman year at BYU and we have been friends since. It was wonderful spending time with her, her hubby Decker, and their sweet daughter Laralyn.

Zoo Atlanta

The atrium at the CNN complex in downtown Atlanta.

World of Coca-Cola.

Jane was asleep in the stroller and missed the photo-op with the Coke bear.

My friend Nemili from high school lives in Athens, GA while her husband Niles completes his post-doc at the University of Georgia. Niles is also a friend from high school (my date to Senior Ball in fact) and it was so fun to catch up with them. They have a little boy named Linus and Jane thought he was hilarious. She would look at him and start laughing. He would look at her like she was crazy. It was really cute.

Florida Adventures Part 2

The first week of March my mom and grandma flew down to visit for a week. We drove down to Pensacola, Florida for a few days and stayed in a little cottage on the beach at a Navy base called Naval Air Station Pensacola. Fort Rucker is the headquarters of Army aviation and Naval Air Station Pensacola is the headquarters of Naval aviation. Much to Carl's delight, Navy aviation has a long and diverse history so the Naval aviation museum (conveniently located 2 minutes away from where we were staying) is a bazillion square feet big and has a gazillion different aircraft displayed. Enough aircraft, in fact, to allow for hours (...and hours...and hours) of aircraft viewing pleasure. This museum put the Army aviation museum at Fort Rucker to shame.

We were at Pensacola the Saturday before Mardi Gras and attended the downtown Mardi Gras parade that day. Don't worry, this was a family parade. They saved the drunken, topless party for after sunset. The parade was a lot of fun. There were beads EVERYWHERE!! At first my mom was hoping to get enough beads to take home one strand for each member of her primary class, but I think she got enough for each member of the entire primary.

Jane enjoyed the beads. She looks like she is hanging on for dear life. Not too long after this picture was taken she fell asleep in Carl's arms. I wish she would fall asleep that easily at home.

One more picture for cuteness' sake. This one was taken on March 4th, the day Jane turned 4 months old. She is a darling baby if I do say so myself!

Florida Adventures Part 1

Carl's birthday fell on President's Day this year so we decided to take advantage of the three day weekend and our close proximity to Florida's gulf coast and drive to Destin. Being the off season, the rooms were cheap but fortunately the weather was lovely and the food was great. Is it sad that my favorite part of the trip was the delicious breakfast we ate on Saturday morning? The place was called "Another Broken Egg Cafe" and it was so yummy that if I was entrepreneurial I would start a franchise in Utah (no wonder I am having such a hard time losing the baby weight). Maybe we should start a tradition and spend Carl's birthday in Florida every year.

Alabama Adventures Part 1

What is there to do in southeast Alabama on a Saturday? Not much. One Saturday early in February we decided to drive down to Dothan (the closest "large" city to Fort Rucker) and go to the Wiregrass Museum of Art. Let's just say we are glad we didn't have to pay real money to see their art collections. However, directly across the street from the museum is the Guiness Book of World Records certified "smallest city block in the world." Who knew? That, my friends, is excitement at its finest.

Boot Camp

My 6 week "Boot Camp" experience at Fort Rucker ended the end of February. Overall it was a good experience, although I think I had unrealistic expectations about the results. If nothing else, I had fun and gained a little of my core muscle back (which was hammered by pregnancy). I don't have a lot of pictures, but here are a few of the morning we did yoga on the shore of Lake Tholloco.

Unrealistic Misconceptions

Thank you all for your words of encouragement about my weight issues. I am realizing that it is perfectly normal to still be packing pregnancy pounds and I just need to be patient. In other news, Jane turned 3 months old last week! These past 3 months have been the most wonderful, challenging, and exhausting 3 months of my life. I can't imagine life without her. She is such a fun baby and I love being her mom. She is smiling much more and will even giggle once in a while. She recently found her feet and will hold on to them while lying on her back on the bed. It makes changing her diaper and dressing her a little difficult. She was sleeping really well at night but has recently decided that she needs 2 night feedings again instead of one. I am hoping it is just a growth spurt. She loves to sing songs and loves to play with Carl. She is not so fond of her car seat (aka the "baby torture device") but tolerates it when absolutely necessary. She has made lots of friends here in Alabama including all of the housekeeping staff and the ladies who run the register at the dining hall. They will yell out in their thick southern accents whenever they see her, "How's baby Jane today! Aren't you so precious!" We had family pictures taken in early January before we left Utah for Alabama. I know its a little late, but here's a sampling. I will post more recent 3 month pics soon.

Jane was blessed a few days after this picture was taken, on January 9th. She did really well during her blessing. I was nervous that she would start screaming during it because she wasn't in the best mood when we left the house, but she didn't. Thanks to all who came to share this special day with us!