Busy Busy

I know I need to be taking it easy, but unfortunately company is coming again tommorow, and I have a very big day ahead of me. Bella has an appointment at 10:00 am, then we have to go to Atlanta for the swine flue vaccine at noon, then we go home, then my husband goes to class, I need to clean the house and decorate for halloween, and then we need to do laundry.

Friday isn't looking any better, but in a much better way. It's my birthday :). We have a morning meeting that couldn't get rescheduled at 8:00 am, and then we are all going to go to a birthday breakfast. Go home and feed the baby, take a nap, go to lunch (haven't decided where yet) then off to the spa for a relaxing massage and hair appointment. Then its home to feed the baby. Then its time for a manicure and pedicure , feed the baby, then leave the baby with my mother in law, and go out to dinner and to a movie. My husband has a present for me, and my mom sent me a gift card to a clothing place, so I'm very excited.

*deep breath* it's not exactly taking it easy though.

Time Management

It's sort of difficult to plan your day in two hour increments. Bella has her times when she's awake for an hour or so, generally between her 4:00 am, and 6:00 am feeding, and then she has her typical two hour naps, like from 6:00 am to 8:00, and from 8:00- 10:00, and then she has her random long stretches, like from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm. And it's hard to figure out what to do with my time.

When she's awake I want to spend time with her. I look at her, play with her, dangle toys in front of her face, dress her in cute outfits, that sort of thing. Mostly though we just stare at each other. She doesn't like to be put down while she's awake, and since it only lasts longer than ten minutes while she's not feeding twice a day, I'm loath to put her down.

I try to nap during her two four hour naps during the day, but then that leaves me doing things like cleaning, and work, and blogging at night. I can clean at night without a problem, but the computer is in the bedroom so working or blogging while my husband is trying to sleep is out of the question. I'm seriously considering moving the computer to the babies room, since I spend most of the night in there with her, but how ridiculous would that look?

It's already odd that our baby has a tv, cd player, dvd, and ipod touch, but we had those in our guest bedroom earlier, moving them out just because we had a baby wouldn't make a lot of sense.

Plus I've been told not to get attached to any one schedule, because she's going to change it soon. So what to do?

Breast Feeding Basics

I think I may finally be getting the hang of this breast feeding thing! I've been doing it for one week and one day, and Bella and I are settling into a routine, and my nipples are toughening up. I haven't really had to deal with engorgement. Sure my breasts get sore and full feeling when Bella sleeps through a feeding, but nothing like the books described. I'm either a super lucky woman, or those books exaggerate to the nth. degree. Most likely its a combination of me being lucky, and me being young, and not having to work.

I about quit two nights ago when Bella just kept feeding until she was due for her next feeding, and she was still hungry! I was out of milk, and thank goodness I had pumped some earlier for my husband to take her away from me and feed her. She of course settled right down.

Since then I haven't had time to pump, I've been trying to get back into the swing of things. My house is clean, my work is done, I eat and sleep on a regular basis, and the baby eats and sleeps on a regular basis, but that doesn't leave me a spare second to pump milk for the baby.

That upsets my husband, I can tell. He loves giving her one feeding a day, heck he'd do all the feedings if I'd let him. I'm nervous though because I wanted to have a reserve in the fridge and so far that's not happening.

The biggest difference in breast feeding was getting the position right. I thought I was doing exactly what the lactation nurse told me, but I was reading a baby book the other night and it pointed out the baby needs to be tummy to tummy with you. *head bang* well there you go. I was cradling the baby not putting it tummy to tummy. Wow the difference that makes!

Hopefully I'll be as enthusiastic about this tommorow as I have been yesterday and today!

Life with baby

Being home with the baby is so strange. When I was in the hospital, I couldn't wait to get home, even though all the books told me to take my time and stay as long as I could, because I would be longing for those catered meals soon. I knew that, but I also know my insurance policy makes me pay 20% of the bill, and I'd rather have a lower one, and I also know that my food is better, and that I like being home. I knew my husband would take care of me once he got to feeling better.

I'm still a little annoyed at the husband for being sick when we got home, even though he couldn't help it. It helps that he's as embarrassed as I am annoyed. I just gave birth and am walking around cleaning the house, and he's knocked out by a tummy ache? Ah well, at least he acknowledges that's stupid.

Anyway, being home with the baby is strange. It makes her existence more real to me, because she's in my space, not this unfamiliar place where strangers will come and whisk her away in the middle of the night to do lab work. Yesterday and today I pretty much just sat around staring at the baby, and it was great. I feel no need to do anything else.

On the one hand I know I should be cleaning, and cooking, and working, but on the other I should take a break, I mean if not now when? I made a point to get ahead on work so I could take time off once I had the baby, so why don't I take advantage of that? Instead I'm about to get off the computer, clean the house top to bottom because my husbands cousin is coming to visit, and then get to work. Something is wrong with me, because I just can't stop.