Two baths in one day...Hmmm what in the world is she doing?

You would think that a 1-month old wouldn't get that dirty, but today really changed my thinking about that one. One-month old babies don't really need to be bathed on a daily basis because they don't really sweat or get dirty. We've been bathing Lola every third or fourth day depending on any accidents she may have had. Today I decided it was time to give her a bath since her hair was getting very oily and she'd had a few really poopy diapers. Bath time was pretty fun. She really enjoys being in the warm water. I think it's because it reminds her of being back in my belly, but who really knows what babies think about. After the bath, we put some baby oil on her and got her dressed. After a few hours and a pretty hefty feeding, Lola decided she wanted to explode poo in her diaper. This is not an uncommon phenomenon for her so I was prepared for that whenever I changed the diaper. What I wasn't prepared for was for her to be a pee geyser as I go to put the new diaper under her. She must have been holding it just for this particular occasion. She offloaded a TON of pee and was essentially bathing in it. It even got all the way up in her hair!!! I figured that even though she was all nice and baby fresh it was a good idea to clean all that pee off of her. Back into the bathtub she went. And out she came again smelling clean and baby fresh. I can't really complain because it's great to watch how much she loves the bath and I LOVE what her hair smells like after we wash it. I also have to look at the positive...I could be washing poo out of her hair instead of pee.

1st Night Without Drew

After a month or so of job searching, Drew finally got an interview. He decided that it would probably best if he stayed at his parents' house to get a good night's sleep before his interview. I told him that was totally fine, as I sat there thinking to myself, "God, please help me get through the night." I was very nervous being alone for the entire night with her. Not because I can't take care of my daughter on my own, but because the past week has not been the best of nights for us. Since we switched her formulas, we've been trying to get back to a regular schedule of sleeping, not an easy process with a gassy, semi-constipated 1-month old. Instead of really worrying about it, I just did my motherly duty and took care of her all on my own, something hundreds of thousands of mothers before me have done. She took a short nap from 9:30 p.m. until 11 p.m. I decided to give her a bottle of the thicker formula because it seems to satisfy her a little more than the other formula does. We stayed awake until about 12:45 a.m. when she finally decided to drift off to sleep. We slept until 5:15 a.m. which is an accomplishment for her! I gave her another bottle and then she decided she wanted to sleep some more so we slept from 6 a.m. until 9:30 a.m. when she finally decided she wanted to be up for the day. I can't believe how refreshed I feel from only having to wake up twice in the night. I don't think that I've slept this well in a very, very long time. Hopefully we'll have a repeat performance tonight.

Baby Bath Time

The first time we gave Lola a bath when she came home was very good. She was quiet and content. We decided it was probably because she was milk drunk. We had fed her and cleaned her and she was just totally out of it.

Babies first bath time with daddy.

This was the last time that she would be happy during bath time. We have bathed her quite a few times since this amazingly peaceful moment. Each time we've bathed her, she screams like it's the end of her entire world. Anyone who has given a baby a bath knows that it's quite a process. You only uncover the part of the baby's body that you are washing. You start with their face and work your way down. The head is usually done second to last so they don't lose a ton of heat. You do their bottom last because you don't want any cross-contamination from their poo. We couldn't even get to her head before she would start screaming.

Tonight we realized the joy of the baby bathtub and baby insert for the tub, kinda like a baby hammock that you put inside the baby bathtub to hold them up. We ran the bath water and prepared ourselves for the worst. We put her in the bath tub and after a little outburst of cries, she realized that the bathtub was a good thing and calmed down. She loved every single minute of being in the bathtub, even getting her hair washed!! Then we oiled her up with baby oil and she loved it!

Baby Lola getting her hair washed. She had a full spa day: nails filed earlier, full bath, and then a little baby oil to top off the whole day.

Drew holding Lola up on the baby sling so she wouldn't slide down into the bathtub.

Pretty good shot of Lola's double chins while I'm washing her body. She looks so content!!

Bright-eyed while we soap her up.

Grandma holding baby Lola after the bath.

The Poop Cannon Dried Up...Oh no!!!

So the transition from breastmilk to formula has not been a fun one. Just for a little background, breast fed babies rarely get constipated. Breastmilk is perfectly formulated for babies and what their needs are. Formula is a little more harsh on their developing digestive systems. We had been giving Lola formula at night because it seemed that it was filling her up more and letting her sleep through the night better and we were still giving her breastmilk during the day. After a long discussion about how well the breastmilk was working for her, we decided it was best that we start giving her solely formula. AHHH!! Not a fun transition. We had a seriously constipated baby! Apple juice mixed with water became our best friend. It was the only way we could get Lola to poo. After about a week of trying to get her system used to Enfamil, we decided it was best that we just switch the formula that we were giving her. And now...I think we've got it! I think we've beaten the constipation problem!

"Mom, look what I can do"

So, for a 3 week old, Lola has a ridiculous amount of neck and head control. This isn't really a new phenomenon. She's had decent neck/head control since she was born. Lola just really likes to look around at everything and take it all in. This is all well and good until you're holding her and she decides that it would be better to throw her head back while you've got one arm around her and one hand making a bottle. Don't worry, Lola has not been injured in this process. I've mastered holding her in a modified football carry so I can support her little head and still do things with my other arm, things that are necessary to make her a happy and content baby.

Poop Cannon and Pee Geyser

So I'm sure there are a ton of first time parents out there that have dealt with this. Almost every time we change Lola's diaper we end up going through 2 to 3 diapers because she decides to pee on us. Gotta love the combination of cold air, cold wipes and a cold changing table. We could put something down on the changing table to make it not so cold, but she'd end up pooping on it and it just wouldn't really be worth it. The other thing that Lola really enjoys doing is being a poop cannon.

The first week that Lola was home my mom and I were changing her on the couch. This is all well and good and everything was going great until Lola decided that she was just too gassy and needed to fart. Well instead of just letting out a little steam...she let out a lot of poop! It sprayed across the diaper and onto my mom's couch. Thank God for Resolve!

Drew has gotten a great deal of experience with the joy of changing a spraying cannon. There have been a ton of times that Drew has gotten pooped on. One time in particular was pretty funny. In the middle of changing her, Lola let out a pretty good one and it sprayed all the way to the end of the changing table. If he had been holding her legs up to wipe her or put a new diaper under her he definitely would have gotten poop all over him or all over the carpet. Neither of those would have been a good option at all!!!

This morning was one of the most humorous incidents that I can think of over the past 3 weeks when it comes to changing her (although the time that Drew decided to put a full, unfolded diaper on the floor as a poopy land-mine ranks pretty high up there too). We have decided to switch her from a breast milk/formula diet to a strictly formula diet for a number of reasons. We had been supplementing her diet with formula at night and still feeding her breast milk during the day. As of yesterday, we started to give her exclusively formula. Being first time parents means that we are going to be performing a series of trial and error experiments until we figure out what works. Well we figured out that weaning that quickly doesn't work. Lola became severely constipated. This was definitely a problem when we woke up to her empty diaper after we had fed her a number of bottles. It's gotta come out one end and we really didn't want her to spit it up. We decided that we would give her some breast milk that we had left in the refrigerator, since breastfed babies hardly get constipated. Well, after a very sludgy diaper this morning, I got a wonderful surprise early in the afternoon. As I'm changing her, my little pee geyser decides to erupt. This was all good because I've almost mastered catching pee in a diaper. Yay point for mom! Well while I'm wiping her down from the pee that she just got on her she lets it rip in her diaper. A very liquidy runny substance that I don't think I can even describe properly and do it justice. Point for Lola. I wipe this off, only to have it happen 3 more times. So, four points for Lola. She also managed to get it all over her back and all over her WHITE sleeper!! Yes Spray-N-Wash is now my best friend (Sorry Kristina, Kelly and Angela. Love you all but you don't help get poopy stains out. Haha). So the final tally was Mommy-1, Lola-6. I think she won that round.

Baby Kipfer's Big Entrance

I was really excited that Drew made it home from the cruise just in time to be there for the birth of our little girl. We got a week together before I went into labor. My labor started late Saturday night/early Sunday morning. My contractions were light and I could sleep through them. Sunday they were a little stronger, but nothing I couldn't make it through. We watched the Colts game with Drew's family. Everyone thought it was really funny that I would have a contraction every time the Colts did something good. I just got too excited I guess. That night was not the most fun night I've ever had. There was no rhyme or reason to my contractions. Sometimes they would come 2 minutes apart, other times they would come 15 minutes apart. They would be so bad that I couldn't move through them, while others I could talk through. Around 2:30 am I essentially started one long contraction that lasted for an hour. I was laying on the floor of my room because it was the only place that I could get comfortable. A contraction would start and I would get into a position that was comfortable and I would make it through. When I laid back down another contraction would start again within 30 seconds of the last one. Not a good time!! Drew had to go get my mom so we could all decide what was the best course of action would be. We decided that it would be best if I went to the hospital to get checked. We got to the hospital and I was only 2 centimeters dilated. The doctor decided it would be best if I walked around for awhile, so Drew and I walked the halls of the hospital for 2 hours. Sadly, this didn't help as much as the doctor had wanted. This is the point when I decided that some pain meds would probably be best. I was given something for the pain and was able to sleep in between the contractions. After a few hours of lying in triage we were admitted and moved into a labor and delivery room. About two more hours of contractions passed and then we talked to the nurse about all of our options. We decided because my labor wasn't progressing the way we wanted it to that it was probably the best idea for me to have an epidural so I could relax enough for everything to move along. With the pain meds on board and the epidural done, my labor became a very fun experience. We watched 4 movies and listened to an entire CD. I was able to laugh and joke around with my mom and Drew. I was also able to sleep through some of my worst contractions, which just shocked my mom. The doctor thought that by giving me an epidural my labor would begin to pick up. This just wasn't the case. They decided to give me some pitocin to speed up my labor. I didn't really mind this at all since I couldn't feel any of the contractions. Julia, Will and Pam had arrived by this point in my labor. It was nice being able to visit with everyone and enjoy it. A few hours later it was time to push and everyone besides my mom and Drew had to leave the delivery room. Lola was face up, not the right way for a baby to be born, which increased the amount of time it took me to push. It was my mom and Drew's job to hold my legs since they were numb from the epidural and I couldn't hold them up on my own. There were more than a few times that my mom got distracted by the monitors. After about an hour-ish of pushing the doctor started talking to me about the possibility of having to use suction on Lola's head to pull her out. Having a serious problem with suction (I know that plenty of babies have been born using suction that are perfectly fine but I did NOT want this to be used on my baby) I politely said to the doctor that if it was medically necessary that we could go ahead with it. At the same time I'm sitting there thinking that if they came near my baby's head with a suction I was most likely going to kill someone. My mom said that she saw the look of determination come across my face and as my mom will tell anyone, when I get to that point it's gonna take a major miracle to get me out of it. So I started to push a heck of a lot harder than I had before. While this was good for my labor, it wasn't necessarily good for me. My nail beds started to turn blue, which promptly put my mom in RN mode instead of mom mode. I had to remind her that while she is a nurse at that particular moment she was a mom and grandma and not a nurse. This got her in check very quickly. After 2 hours of hard labor and pushing like a crazy person, Lola Jean Kipfer was born at 12:42 am on January 26th, 2010. She was 6 pounds 12 ounces measuring 20 inches long. That is probably the happiest moment of my entire life. I thank God every day for the amazing little miracle that He has brought into our lives. She continues to amaze me every day with everything that she does.