Here's Hannah's uncle J. aka my lil bro. He calls her "Squishy" as her nickname.
We had a good time on Thanksgiving... had it with friends here in town. Ate a good lunch/dinner and just hung out. Hannah had fun playing with lots of kids. We did miss our families though.
Have photos of Hannah's 1st Thanksgiving...I'm totally behind on downloading and uploading and posting photos...and on posts in general.
She got dragged out of bed with mommy & daddy to go after Thanksgiving shopping. We were out and about around 4:30am. We had hit 4 stores by 7am. And about 10 stores by 1pm. It was crazy, but Hannah was really good for all of it. Mommy and daddy were fried.
Then we had our friends R&R in town from Houston, and we went to the Texas State Aquarium, had a great dinner with even more ppl, and played mommy & daddy's favorite game: Settlers of Catan till 11pm.
More later...
Yesterday was her follow up at the pediatrician's office. Her lungs sound clear. Yay! She's 22 lbs 5 oz (give or take on the oz) and 27-3/4 inches (I think). She still has a little congestion in her nose...and she's been having more coughing, but productive coughs. She got part one of her 1st flu shot. She barely cried. Just a little delayed reaction after the needle went in, but then she was okay. We still waited a long time at the pediatrician's so I'm still evaluating whether or not we'll switch or stay - and we still haven't met the doctor. I'm starting to wonder if he practices or if he's more of a businessman/supervisor that has his NP's do the work.
So Sunday afternoon Hannah crawled up the stairs and then down the stairs all of her own accord. It was her 1st to crawl all the way down the stairs un-coerced. She just went up and came down. Daddy was the one to supervise as he was the one that noticed her heading up, and he watched as she came down. (I have no idea what I was doing at the time, but I missed it). Daddy's been basically heading up the "stair training."
We've not posted much... Daddy was out of town Wednesday through Friday, and so mommy was on "Hannah duty" 24 hours every day & night, and it didn't leave much room for much else. Hannah was sick and needed lots of special attention. Mommy tried to get Hannah to sleep and rest as much as possible. It was difficult to use the nebulizer on her while she was awake, so we tried doing breathing treatments while she was asleep.
Friday Hannah threw up during breakfast because she gagged on a bit of banana that mommy gave to her. (Hannah's been wanting to self-feed more and more, and so mommy cut up banana into small pea-size-pieces for her.) She had stuffed too much into her mouth. And then she threw up some of her breakfast and a whole bunch of mucus. It think it was good for her to get out the mucus. But it was a mess to clean up.
Hannah seems to be doing a lot better though. She hasn't gotten regular breathing treatments because she seems to breathe okay, not too much wheezing or coughing - I just hope that her lungs are clearing up on their own. She doesn't take her liquid meds well with a syringe though...so I've been putting a bit on a spoon and then feeding it to her in small amounts. It works, but it's time consuming process...and sometimes really painful process for everyone because the stuff isn't her favorite and she fidgets and doesn't want to swallow.
We were both really happy when Daddy returned late Friday night. We really missed him while he was gone. He's so helpful with everything!
Hannah has been eating a lot more this weekend (Sat & Sun) when Daddy fed her. She ate the most solid food ever in one sitting Sunday night. about 5 oz. Yay!
We've made lots of new friends recently (talking to people as of the past week when we started putting our feelers our again for a home). Hannah got to play with them Friday night...and mommy got to eat some really yummy homemade Thai food.
On the side, mommy has been doing lots of house hunting research, spending time doing comps, research on the area homes, values, appraisals & appreciation. She's learned lots of new stuff including soil survey info, foundation info, renovation info, etc.
...So I dunno why I'm referring to myself as "mommy" and keep on switching back and forth...
I've sort of been obsessing about the housing market research I've been doing. It's what my brain thinks about when it's "idling" - you know the "what do you think about when you're not thinking about anything" - what are your "default" thought processes.
This is becoming more of me musing than posting about Hannah...so it should probably go on my musings page...oh well...
I really don't know why I'm still up. I can't sleep. I'm obsessing... doing more research still...
and letting Hannah and DH sleep.
The title says it all...
Today we went in for our scheduled 9-month "well baby exam" which turned into a sick baby exam (& insurance doesn't pay for both on one visit...though medicaid does?! anyways, i could rant on about that and maybe i will on my musings page, but not here.)
Our baby girl has developed bronchitis. I'm so sad! The runny nose...and congestion has now gotten all into her lungs. They swabbed the mucus in the nose to check to see if it was RSV, and it's not. So that's good. But the bronchitis ISN'T good. That can develop into pneumonia.
They put her on 3 prescriptions. Zyrtec, Albuterol, and something else I can't remember now. She got a nebulizer and so now we can give her breathing treatments at home - every 4 hours. She got her 1st breathing treatment around 2 or 3 months at the doctor's office when I took her in and she was congested (I remember we were told to let her sleep upright in a baby chair/bouncer or car seat.) But since then, I haven't taken her in for what I considered "minor viruses" of the usual cold variety.
I was worried about her when we were in Taiwan b/c she got really congested there. I called DH, who called the ped office, who said it was RSV season. So we went to the hospital in Taiwan, and they prescribed some stuff (3 different things: decongestant?, cough supressant, and an appetite medication). All the medicines were powder and pre-mixed together in packaged doses, so I couldn't choose which to give her. So I gave her meds for one day and then chose not to the rest of the time. I didn't want her to have the appetite drug. But she got better rather quickly anyways. That's another discussion within itself also...cost & state of healthcare in diff countries, pharmaceuticals&drugs, dosings, explanations of prescriptions or lack of...etc...
So I hope she's not "prone to URI-upper respiratory infections" like they said about me. I just know that in late jr high or early high school, I had to go to the ER a couple of times because I just couldn't breathe well, and my chest got all tight. That was only within a few months time. They gave me an Albuterol inhaler, and I took some pills. But they never diagnosed me with asthma (I didn't get short of breath at other times, like physical activity-wise). And after those few months, I didn't have the same problems. Today we discussed how I may have had some allergy or asthma-type problems that went undiagnosed and how Hannah may have it also, since sometimes it's hereditary. All I know is that my lung capacity isn't very good, and when I get a cold or flu like virus, if I don't get plenty of rest and fluids, I almost always end up with bronchitis. Anyways...'nuff about me.
I just feel so badly for Hannah. She's been having problems breathing these past 2 nights, and we've ALL slept poorly (besides her already not sleeping through the night - I wonder if that's made her body extra tired and the immune system hasn't been top notch). In the past when she got a runny nose, she got over it rather quickly...but this time around, it's pretty bad. The complications are piling up. I can hear the congestion in her lungs, and her breathing is labored. After we gave her the meds tonight and forced the nebulizer on her (she cried and protested and struggled, but dh held her) she did breathe A LOT better.
So I'm glad we saw a health practitioner today. (I can't even say doctor, b/c till now, we still haven't met the doctor. Just the NPs) We scheduled a follow up for next week (which hopefully it can be her 9-month physical).
I was hoping the runny nose and on&off diarrhea of the past week was part of teething, but I guess she does have a virus or whatever it is that's gotten worse. Though she IS teething. DH says he saw tooth #5 (a top canine) and #6 is just barely breaking through (other top canine). I haven't seen them yet since I haven't felt for them with my finger. I try not to stick my finger in her mouth too often. She likes to bite...and she's biting whatever enters her mouth, whether she sticks it in herself, or if it just happens to be there. Yeah...and breastfeeding has gotten a bit more painful recently due to the teeth...
More thoughts... I was trying to be more laid back and letter her crawl around and explore, play with random toys at other places, and play with other kids whose condition was unknown and such... But now I'm feeling like I should return to my more vigilant self and more restrictive of what she's exposed to. Ppl down here in South TX have to touch every baby - it's to ward off evil or bad luck, you see. And so lots of ppl touch our baby girl when we're out. I don't really like it all the time, but what can you do when they've already touched her before you could do anything? They don't even ask. So Hannah's definitely getting exposed to a lot of "stuff" plus the air is humid and probably carries more "stuff" in it that she breathes and can get sick from.
Eek...thinking about all the ways one can get sick. And all the different sicknesses out there. and how they are worse in babies. I just tell myself I need to trust in the miracle of the human immune system....
Somehow she managed to unscrew the top off of her Aveeno Baby Lotion, and she'd squeezed the product all over herself and on the carpet. When I discovered her, she was feeding globs of lotion to herself by scooping it off of her legs, her clothes, and stuffing it into her mouth. I don't think the taste bothered her because she continued to do it as I was trying to wipe her up. She was rubbing her fingers & hands together. She seemed to be intrigued by the texture and feel of the lotion. I didn't know whether to be amused, surprised, or disturbed by this incident. Only after I cleaned her up did I realized I should have taken a photo. So I've now put her in her chair so that she can feed Cheerios to herself.
Oh I did it again...I didn't realize it was the 10th...and now the day has come and gone. So Happy 9 months to our baby girl! But we do have the camera and we will take photos and post them...
So in the past 2 days, the search for sleeping solutions continues. We moved her bed back to our bedroom, and she now has an enclosed & restricted sleeping area and can't crawl out. Tonight we let her CIO for about 35 minutes (she was fed, she was comforted, she was bathed, temperature was stable - more controllable in our room than anywhere else) before she finally fell asleep. And she's been asleep for a good chunk of time since (with only a few single-breath cry outs, which we've ignored).
It brought back memories of when we went through a period of letting her CIO around 5 months, and it got her into a rather good sleeping pattern back then...
After referring to the Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child book again tonight, I personally think the traveling, the developmental age that she's at, the teething maybe, and maybe some nap deprivation, has led to the recent problems.
CIO is difficult for me b/c although it has worked in the past, it has also caused problems. She has thrown up everywhere all over the bed before - Not just once, but a couple of times when we let her CIO, and she escalated to the extreme. So I am very hesitant and cautious about it.
I always start posts, and then don't totally finish b/c I get interrupted and then a day later, I don't always remember what I wanted to post and finally just press the post button. So I just did that, and here I start another post.
Last night, she had diarrhea (a ton in her diaper- greenish) and it was unexpected, since in the morning she had already gone poo. This morning, by the time I got off her diaper to take her to potty, she already had diarrhea in her diaper too. I'm hoping it's b/c she's teething.
We had 2 different plans today, both of which fell through. We could have had a friend E* over, but she went elsewhere. And then we could have hung out with R* & 3 kids, but her daughter An* is sick with cough & fever last night. Hannah played with An*&Ad* yesterday and so we're all hoping she didn't get what An* had. Though Hannah has had a runny nose for a few days now it seems, but I don't know if it's due to teething or if she has a virus. Ad* also had a runny nose yesterday, but we don't know why she had a runny nose. They did play together last week, so who knows.
Hannah woke up at 2am last night, screaming and totally scared - it seemed. Neither dh or I could calm her down. I tried nursing, which only worked for a few minutes. Then she was crawling all over me trying to get out of bed and get out of her room. She would look around frantically like it was unfamiliar to her, and cry. I finally turned on the overhead light and she calmed a bit. I kept on racking my brain trying to figure it out. I turned off the light and tried to return her to bed, but she still kept on wanting to leave the room. We had moved the night light to a different spot in her room, but I couldn't think of what she was scared of - maybe shadows?
Finally after an hour of trying different things, I took her to bed with us in our room and had her sleep in between us. Things after that are a blur. All I know is that then we woke up this morning around 8am and were tired. So Hannah and I took another nap from about 10am-12:30pm. So that's her longest nap this week. Yesterday I think her 1st nap reached 2 hours, but the 2nd nap was taken at 5pm (fell asleep in the car) and was 45 mins.
So I don't think I documented when we moved her bed to her room, which was a "playroom" for the duration of time her bed was in our room. And now I don't even remember the exact date, but it was sometime in all of the wedding hubbub. Sometime there either after San Antonio before Dallas, or after Taiwan before San Antonio. either way...somewhere within that time frame we moved her b/c she was getting up throughout the night and it totally was killing us. Especially daddy, b/c he ended up falling asleep at work one day. So I think it was after that incident, we immediately moved her. So quality of sleep for me, went down even more after that. Since I was moving from room to room through the night. Eventually I'd end up falling asleep on her bed with her. And so I'd start out in our bed, and wake up in hers. A week of that, I was so tired that I'd fall asleep on her bed while putting her down but also wake up on her bed.
Not the greatest of habits... I just can't bear to let her CIO in her room alone. She ends up crawling out of bed, and crawling to the door, and sitting there crying. Sometimes, all it takes is picking her back up and patting her bum, holding her and putting her down, and she falls back asleep - but that's sometimes. I can't figure out why our daughter won't sleep through the night.
On a more positive and happier note, she finally climbed down the stairs & feet first last night! Yay! Not the whole staircase yet, but the bottom quarter.
And more good news, our camera came in the mail! But it's at the post office and I need to go pick it up today. The package was too big to fit in our keyed mailbox, and so they left a note yesterday (which I didn't get till after we got home after 5pm).
So Hannah's not been sleeping through the night at all. It's been rather bad. AND she's not been napping well...though today she's going on 1.5 hours right now, and that' really good for the past few weeks. I've been racking my brain trying to figure out how to help her sleep better...though it could be teething causing the waking or an inconsistent temperature in the house (room that she's in).
Other things...
There were all sorts of things I was putting off till "after the Taiwan trip and after the wedding." Now it's after the trip and after the wedding, and implementation of those things are not progressing - since we're trying to relearn some other things that got lost on the way - namely a good sleep schedule.
I've only been partially diligent with E.C. Travelling so much has thrown us off, and mommy got lazy with taking Hannah to the bathroom. She's really good in the morning with poos. She almost always poos in the toilet 1st thing in the morning, so then we don't have to worry about it the rest of the day. Peeing on the other hand, she just doesn't seem to care. I've started to put her in cloth diapers again for the 1st part of the day (if we don't go anywhere). But apparently she's okay with wet cloth diapers too, and it doesn't bother her. I've tried to take her to the potty, but I always seem a bit late in timing - she's already peed. So I take her anyways to show that we need to pee in the potty.
I wanted to start more of a routine and schedule with lessons: Baby Signs and associating signs with actions, do daily story time and scripture story time, and due to my lack of diligence (and lack of sleep) I've not been on top of it, and so Hannah doesn't get the consistency needed.
photo credit: Circle Lam
So here's our little family at C&N's garden celebration. Hannah's doing her "I'm staring at the camera" look.
The photo was sent via email from C. I cropped it, so the balance may be off - oh well. We're awaiting the DVD of 600+ photos to arrive via snail mail from C&N... and our camera with our photos from the day on it from A-ma... snail mail...ack.
Daddy's been teaching Hannah how to climb the stairs. This weekend was her 1st time to go all the way up the stairs to the 2nd floor by herself. Once she realized how "easy" it was, we found her climbing up rather quickly. At first her "motivation" was to be with us, so she'd climb up the stairs to be with mommy or daddy. Then today, all mommy had to do was face Hannah towards the stairs, and up she went.
Later when mommy had her back turned, Hannah decided to climb the stairs. Baby girl did have a brief toppling over when she went up to grab the cell phone that had been left on the 3rd stair from the bottom. She got all excited after obtaining her goal and then tried to stand or sit up. Since her hands were holding the phone, she fell backwards.
She's not very good at climbing down yet. She seems more scared to go down.
I haven't figured out how to get the photos off of the Pearl onto the computer. And we still have no camera yet. I've been waiting patiently everyday hoping that it gets here in the mail. So I'm dying here as these milestones are going unrecorded. Like all 4 teeth showing very clearly when she opens her mouth... top 2 and bottom 2. Or the speed at which she climbs the stairs.
She's super duper curious. "Hao Qi Bao Bao" as my grandmother, Hannah's great-grandmother would say. She's getting into everything. She knows how to open boxes. She opens containers and wrappers and chews on anything & everything. She continues to pull a loose threads on the couch and anything else even slightly frayed. She chews on my clothes if the tag is hanging out. She chews on my waist band ties (if there are any). (She got into some f products and chewed on a t.) She moves super fast (when she's motivated) and gets into whatever you're working on. Oh...and she can walk with us holding only one hand. Yay!
Last night we went after-Halloween shopping for next year's costume, and I convinced dh that she'd look cute in a duck suit. DH wasn't fond of it, but he relented only after much babbling from me. So...for next year, she's going to be a duck. I thought it was cute. He said we lived in South Texas and it was going to be too hot to wear the costume. He suggested I make a costume for next year, but I said the fabric and supplies would probably be more than $10 (and I'm lazy-haven't felt like sewing). So we bought the duck costume. I'll have to put up a photo. Hopefully Hannah likes it and will want to wear it. She liked it when I handed it to her. She kept on squeezing the duck beak/bill.
So she started yesterday with a runny right nostril. Today both nostrils are runny. Nice and clear so far but really runny. Last night wasn't so fun for mommy - Hannah kept on waking up every hour or so... b/c she wasn't sleeping well and couldn't breathe.
It was funny b/c she had fallen asleep on the body pillow we have next to her twin mattress (on the floor) and she was half on/half off, sitting on the floor but with her head propped on the matress and arms on the pillow. I guess the position helped her to breathe.
