Adventures with Amelia

Saturday we went out to dinner as a family for the first time. We went to Landry's and had seafood. Amelia behaved herself beautifully and the wait staff even cooed and admired her. After that we went to Babies R Us to look at baby monitors.

I think we are finally getting comfortable enough to have her sleep in a room away from us in the evenings. We have been having her sleep in the pack n play at night in the living room until we went to bed. But by doing this we are not allowing her to have an evening routine where we bathe her and dress her for bed, read her a story and put her in her bed. Really, a lot of kids need the ritual to go to sleep. All we have to do is throw her in the crib with a toy wide awake and she puts herself to sleep with no rocking, begging, pleading or crying involved (baby or parent). I guess after 11 months in the NICU she doesn't have a need for such things.

I am ready to have her in bed and get the pack n play less use, but I think Todd is having a harder time. Because he is not home with her all day he wants her out so he can look at her while she is sleeping. So even though we know she needs to be in her bed, w are having a hard time following through with it.

After BRU we took the dogs out to the park for a romp and pushed Amelia around in her stroller. She didn't go to bed until around 9:00 that night which is really last for her -- especially since she had had maybe a 30 minute nap that day.

Sunday we went to Mass and made it through the entire time without a medical emergency. I was mortified that I had to use the bulb suction on her once in the middle of mass, but you have to do what you have to do. Later on that afternoon we took her out to Katy Mills Mall for 3 hours and pushed her around in her stroller. She loves all the noise and hubbub. She was clapping and kicking her legs and smiling the entire time and did not fall asleep.

Then Grandmom and Grandad came over with brisket for dinner and we all sat around the table and ate together. She was having such a great time that again, she did not fall asleep until nearly 9:00.

She has been putting her hands in her mouth for very long periods of time, playing with her tongue and her saliva, making rasperries and babbling a lot more. We are not going to be continuing with the sippy cup for a while because we had a swallow study done recently and it looks like she aspirates when she drinks from it.

Physically she is stronger: she is sitting up by herself for longer periods, she is pushing up on her arms to hold her head up for longer periods of time, she is attempting to roll from her back, and she is bearing a little more weight on her feet (I put her in the jumparoo recently and she is making it bounce by herself). She an almost make herself sit up from a lying on her back position, so the girl has great abs somewhere under that doughy middle.

We have been going to a mommy and me infant story time at the library once a week and she loves it so much! We sing, dance, read books together and she gets to see lots of other babies. This is fascinating to her to see all the little rug rats running, crawling, cooing and squealing all around her. In this case, I wouldn't mind if she picked up a few things from the other kids on the playground!