Time Flies!

Wow! I can't believe it's almost been a month since our last post. Time is flying by and I sure do wish it would slow down!

Things are going great right now. We are working hard to keep Ava on a schedule and even though it can be tough at times, it's going great. Last week we stopped waking her up for her two thirty feeding and let her wake us up when she got hungry. The first two nights she woke up at two and two thirty and then she started stretching it out to three or three thirty. One night she slept until four and she did that three nights in a row. Six hours of sleep felt so good for all of us! What's even more amazing is that last night she slept from 10 to 5 a.m. She is well on her way to sleeping a full eight hours.

Many of you know that Kyle and I have decided to use the Babywise method so that Ava will start sleeping through the night at about eight weeks. Lots of you moms out there know what Babywise is, but some of you may not. So, I'll tell you a summary of what this method is all about. We use a continuous cycle called feed/wake/sleep. Ava is on a three hour feeding cycle during the day. She first eats at 6:30 and continues eating every three hours until 9:30 at night. That is our last predictable feeding as of now. After each feeding, we try to play with her for about an hour before we put her down for a nap. She takes a nap at 8, 11, 2, and then goes down for bed at 6:30. We wake her up at 9:30 and feed her for the last time of the night. Normally she naps for an hour to an hour and a half. We've been struggling with naps lately. We put her down and she cries for a long time. We check on her every ten to fifteen minutes and eventually she'll cry herself to sleep. It is very, very hard to listen to her cry, but we know that it is what's best for her. By doing this she will learn how to put herself to sleep and eventually she won't cry at all.

So that's what we're working on. Basically training our baby to sleep. By the time we get it all down pat, we'll have a happy, well-rested baby and who doesn't want that?

Ava's belly is also doing so much better since I last wrote. I can't remember if I wrote about her having to go to the doctor and the hospital for x-rays of her belly or not. So, I'll tell you the shortened version. She just hit two weeks and the weekend after that she was really fussy. So fussy that Kyle and I couldn't calm her down (pretty uncommon for Ava.) We called and got an appointment that Monday morning and the doctor could tell her stomach was messed up just by feeling her stomach. He did a rectal exam and realized her bowels were backed up a couple of days. He told us to give her 1/2 of a pediatric suppository that night and another 1/2 two days later. We did that and didn't have a lot of results. The next day she screamed uncontrollably for hours. My sweet mother in law, who works at our pediatrician's office held the phone up to the doctor's ear. He could tell she was in a lot of pain and ordered x-rays for Ava at Greenview. Frantically we went and had that done-it was awful for Ava and me too! Luckily there was not an obstruction in her bowels just "severe gastric distention"-or as we call it, lots of gas. We were relieved it wasn't as serious as it could have been. She was back to normal in a little less that a week. (I don't know if that was brief or not...but you all know I talk a lot so that's ok!)

Last night we went on our first big outing...our Small Group Thanksgiving Dinner. It was so fun to be around our friends again. We still haven't taken Ava out in public but that will come in a couple more weeks, after she's had her first round of shots. We really look forward to going back to church as a family. That is the number one thing we have missed the most, but we know we'll be back soon.

I go back to work in three more weeks. I'm not too excited about it. I know I will miss her terribly every second of every day, but I know it is what is best. She needs to learn how to be around new people and other kids and what better way to do that than start early? The first week I go back to school Ava will be staying with three different people. Her wonderful Granny on the first day, my best friend, Katie's sweet mom for the next two days, and her regular babysitter for the last two days. She'll have a babysitter for the first two months of childcare and then she will start daycare in March. I'm so thankful to our family and friends for helping out this first little bit. God, once again, has provided for our needs and we know that it is because of Him.

We had our first professional pictures taken of Ava and family ones too. I'll put a few of our favorites up on here and you'll have to check out the rest on Facebook or come by.

That's it for now!