Welcome to the Church!

On February 16, 2014, Madeleine was welcomed into the faith at St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church.  It was a beautiful day and a perfect weekend!

The weekend before, we tried on her christening gown.  My mom and I were both baptized in this gown, so it was very special to share this with Madeleine.

The night before, we had dinner with our family and the godparents at Alphonso's.  This was Madeleine's first trip to a restaurant, and she did great!  And by that I mean that she slept through the entire meal :)

At the end of Mass, Madeleine was not happy.  My wonderful mother-in-law and I did everything we knew to help her out, but Miss  Fussypants wanted none of it!  She got it together for a little while during the baptism ceremony, and shortly after Father K. finished pouring water over her head, she got the cutest hiccups ever!

Here are a few pictures from the ceremony at the church!

Madeleine is blessed to have wonderful godparents - Jay and Annemarie.

We were thrilled that so many of our friends and family members could join us at the church and for lunch afterwards!

7 Weeks

I can't believe Madeleine is already 7 weeks old.  49 days of life. In 49 days, she has learned to make noises, grab things, roll over, lift her head, and she could definitely beat me in a staring contest!  Her favorite things to look at are lights, especially her bird night light. There are times when she wants to look at it so badly that she won't even nurse!  (Is that a stubborn streak developing already?
 Haha)

On Tuesday, we took Madeleine to the pediatrician for her 2 month appointment.  We needed to do this early so she could get her vaccines before starting daycare. Poor baby girl was very cranky for the next day and then slept a lot for the next one. She didn't feel good, which meant I got lots of snuggles!!  We are proud to report that she is very healthy, weighing 10 lbs 15 oz and measuring 21.5 in long.

Wednesday evening, we went to my parents' house to watch Downton Abbey and have dinner. It was a great visit.  Madeleine loves snuggling with her Grandmama!  She found her ears that night and kept grabbing and twisting them. It was so cute!

Thursday afternoon we drove out to where I work, and Madeleine got to meet a few of my coworkers. She was on her very best behavior and snuggled right up with my boss!

Friday was Valentine's Day. I got an idea from The Dating Divas at the beginning of this month.  Every day it wrote something I loved about Madeleine and Joseph on a heart. Then I taped it to their bedroom doors. (Cheesey, but loving, right?). Here is Madeleine's closet door:

Madeleine and I made cards for some of our family members. She even wrote them a note!  Her Daddy was very pleased with his!

Check back soon to read about Madeleine's baptism this past Sunday!

  

Six Weeks and Six Things

Mommy-hood is a whole new adventure, and as you know, when embarking on any adventure you need to have the proper gear. While technically all you need are diapers and a place for baby to sleep, there are some things that have definitely made the last six weeks easier and more enjoyable.

1.  Fisher Price Soothing Motions Glider
Without this rocker, M&M would not sleep at all. I am serious. We don't even have to turn it on, although the gliding motion is nice sometimes. She will sleep in this tilted position even if she's had a fussy day.  Last night she slept for 5 hours!  Woohoo!! (Added bonus: it's sold at Buy Buy Baby, and you can use all those Bed, Bath, and Beyond coupons there!)  There are many different versions of this glider. Some of them are insanely expensive. I'm not sure what these do that is so necessary - do they change diapers for you?

2.  Cetaphil Restoraderm
Madeleine has seriously dry skin, and her Aveeno and Johnson & Johnsons baby soaps were causing eczema flare ups.  Thank goodness for Cetaphil. It changed her poor, scaly, and red face back into the beautiful, velveety one she had at first!

3.  BOB Revolution SE
Honestly, I don't jog, and M&M is too little to be jogged with, so until Joseph can take her jogging, it's being used as a regular stroller. We got ours in bright orange, so cars can see us at dusk/night time!  We use this stroller all the time. I get nervous about putting M&M in the car (I will get over this soon, right?) and we live in a highly walkable area.  We can go pretty much anywhere I need to go by walking in our stroller. Also, it's great exercise!

4.  iPhone
I can take all the pictures and videos I want, edit them with free apps, and share them with my family using photo stream.  I can also entertain myself when M&M will only sleep while I'm rocking her at 3 a.m.  Yes, I know, you might be thinking, why do you need to be entertained?  Aren't you holding your beautiful angel?  Yes, I am, but I've also only slept for like 3 hours in the last two days. My phone is keeping me awake. I can also use my phone to go shopping (I <3 Amazon and don't love driving) and keep in touch with friends so I'm not too out of the loop!

5.  Baby Wearing Device
Before M&M was born I thought baby wearing was a weird thing for hippy moms. I have a Facebook friend who always posted pictures of herself wearing her daughter. I judged you unfairly; baby wearing is awesome!  My sincerest apologies...
Baby wearing enables you to do things during the day. You see, after several days when I insisted my husband come home during lunch time because I hadn't been able to set M&M down long enough to brush my teeth, I knew there had to be another way.  Dental hygiene demanded it!  My sister-in-law called during this time and offered to let me use her Moby. Wow!  M&M can feel close and snugly. We can bond through closeness, and I have two hands!  We even got to go to Mass on Monday night.  I also have a baby sling that I L.O.V.E.  I'll write about the differences in a different post.

6.  Family
Technically it's not a thing. You cannot go buy my family on Amazon.com with your iPhone while breast feeding your baby in the middle of the night.  However, the last 6 weeks would have been literally impossible without them. They have answered numerous questions, provided many meals, and watched M&M so I could nap/shower/clean my house. Love you guys!  Keep up the good work!

I'll leave you with a few pictures of this week.

One Month

On December 27, 2013 at 5:03 a.m., we welcomed Madeleine Mary into our little family. Since then we have had many adventures, smiles, laughs, and a few tears.  Here is her first month in pictures:

December 26: I had just woken up from a nap and was playing around on My computer when my water broke at 4:30 in the afternoon.  We walked Wolfie, quickly cleaned up a few things, threw our bags in the car and headed to Winnie Palmer. Around 8:30, I was in the labor and delivery room, had received an epideral, and was feeling much happier.

December 27:  Madeleine was welcomed to the world weighing 8 lbs 10 oz and measuring 20 1/4 in long. After meeting her Mom, her Dad, Anny the nurse, and our favorite doctor ever, Dr Fritz, she passed all of her newborn tests. Her grandparents came to visit during her first nap around 7 a.m.  It was a fun day!

December 28: we had a few visitors today - Mimi, Pop, and Uncle David came in from Atlanta, and Debbie,Leslie,and Annemarie stopped by!

December 29:  We got to go home!  Jay came over to visit, too.

December 30:  Grandmama came over and took some adorable pictures!

December 31:  We rang in the new year at my parents' house. It was a fun night!

January 1:

January 2-10: This time is sort of a blur.  Joseph went back to work and started classes, so things got busy in a hurry!  I'm not totally sure what we did except for eat and sleep!  Here are a few pictures!

January 11-17:  This week also went by very quickly. We did have a few very short outings. Thursday was Joseph's birthday, so we went to Old Navy, Publix, and The Dollar Tree to get prepared. We also registered for day care.  On Thursday night, Joseph celebrated his birthday with the guys at Alfonso's, a great place for pizza and beer. Madeleine and I stayed home, since she was still too little for outings and had an eye infection!

January 18-24: Joseph's family came to visit this weekend from Atlanta!  Madeleine was so excited to meet her Aunt Rebecca, Uncle Sean, and cousin Anna!  It was a very special weekend for all of us. My mother-in-law stayed until Thursday afternoon, which was great!  I got to take a few naps, and we all went on several walks around the neighborhood. Wolfie enjoyed all the walking, too.

January 25-31: This was a rough week for us. Madeleine decided on Tuesday to go on a sleeping strike - night and day!  I'm hoping I don't jinx us by saying that it's over!! (At least for now)  It's hard to believe that our baby girl is one month old already. I started the morning of the 27th off with an impromptu photo shoot to commemorate the event!  Luckily, our model was very cooperative!

Here are a few of the highlights from this week:  

- Madeleine smiled on the 29th

- Mom and I got pedicures :)

- We had lunch with Aunt Frances and Amy

- Joseph learned how to wear the Moby wrap

- Madeleine rolled over from her tummy to her back

- We got ice cream at The Soda Fountain, twice!  I highly recommend the triple dark chocolate :)

We are so in love with our little girl and can hardly wait to see what she does next!

February 1

Today was pretty lazy. Joseph and I were up pretty much all night, so we just alternated taking naps and watching M&M. She also napped a lot. It turns out staying up all night is hard on a baby, too!  It was raining, so we couldn't even go on a walk.

We did, however, watch the first half of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.  Then, Joseph wanted to make sure that M&M was thoroughly nerdified and read to her from Lord of the Rings while I did some much needed cleaning!