21 Weeks

First and foremost, I am going to be an AUNT! x3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My sister-in-law Becca is expecting TRIPLETS, and I am SOOOOOO excited (and, so thankful it's not me :). 3 little cousins for Annie! They will probably (hopefully) come in December, since she's due in mid-January. It'll be a wild ride, and I can't wait! (but of course, want them to stay in Becca's tummy as LONG as possible!)

Once again, it is a very good thing I write these posts on Sundays, because this week was kind of rough! Annie is SO much happier on weekends! I think she is just so worn out by the end of the day at daycare that she's just super cranky at night. She had been finishing up her last nap at daycare at 2:30, and sometimes not wanting to take a nap at 5 when getting home, which made for a VERY overtired and cranky little Annie by around 6pm - NOT fun! A few nights this week were especially rough - and she even had a catnap those nights! Some nights Annie was just pissed off about going to sleep too - she'd cry all the way through getting wrapped in her blanket, and through the bedtime story, and through being rocked for a few minutes. Ugh, it was hard for us all. Those nights I don't even want to do a bedtime routine, but I guess that is the point of it - to be consistent! She would still fall asleep really quickly - just a few wails after being put in the crib and she was out. It pretty much made me dread every evening though, and just be waiting for her bedtime... which is horrible! Some evenings I was pleasantly surprised, but on the whole this week kind of sucked. I know it's just a phase, and at some point she will be ok being awake for longer. Can't wait until that happens :)

Sophie kept Annie occupied for a bit one cranky evening this week

We went down to Lakeville one evening for Ben's grandparents' 60th anniversary dinner, and that was quite honestly one of the worst nights I can remember for a LONG time! Not sure if it was all the people there, or she was just having a bad day, but HOOOOOO BOY, was she ever PISSED! And those who have heard Annie have a meltdown know that this child is L-O-U-D - no pansy newborn cries for her! We ended up leaving before we even ate (but we did take a plate of food back - which was delicious!) and Annie and I were both in tears for much of the ride back. Then Annie passed out, we got home, and she was HAPPY and laughing up a storm! WTF, mate?? Whatever though, we NEEDED to have a little bit of happiness after that screamfest! I just get SO anxious when she's crying. You'd think I'd be used to it right now, and sometimes I am, when there is a reason, and I can solve it. I really try not to take it personally and not feel like it's me doing something wrong, but that is hard. I also honestly am fine letting her cry a little before going to sleep too - I know she's fed, changed, and really just needs to sleep. I think it's much harder in a crowd because no matter how much everyone says they don't care, I still do! It is NOT fun to be among a group of people trying to calm a cranky little one - so yeah, no more weeknight outings for us for awhile.

See how happy she is?? This is probably going to be my favorite video of all time. I was clearly a little emotional that evening because I was crying when she was laughing too and at one point you can see me wipe a tear away. I watched this video about 10 times at work on Friday.

This weekend she has been great for sleeping - for naps and bedtime - she got a LITTLE cranky a few times, but NOTHING like what she during the week! We are going to talk to Sue about pushing Annie's awake time between naps - at times she'll put her down when she's only been awake for an hour (I have a feeling this is when she is in the swing and just falls asleep), and she seems to nap for longer and be on a better schedule if she's up for about 2 hours between naps, so that she wakes up from her last nap at like 3:30-4... and can keep going until at least 7pm for bed! Hopefully that conversation goes okay... I think she's going to stop putting her in the swing as often now because she now tries to twist her way out of it. She does 20-30 minutes of floor time each time she's awake, and now is going to get out the Exersaucer/jumper thingie for her too - we'll see how she does with that! We don't have one so we've never tried it out.

It was this week that I noticed that I actually am starting to enjoy breastfeeding. I honestly never thought it would happen, but lo and behold, I really start to look forward to feeding times now! Even if Annie is being fussy through a feeding (happens kind of frequently before bed), I still like that cuddle time together. She's much more interactive now too, and will look up at me, and it's just a great time for us to share. Plus, she's much more efficient now, so each feeding only takes like 15 minutes which is awesome!

We had a really nice weekend - we didn't have many firm plans, but it ended up being really fun and relaxing! Yesterday, Scott, Christie, Erik, Jen and Oliver came over for brunch - I really enjoyed cooking again - there will be several blog posts coming up with things I've been making over the past week. It was nice to get back into the kitchen a few times, it had been awhile since I took the time to actually enjoy cooking and baking! We then spent some time in Newell Park in the afternoon - it was HOT but Annie seemed to like going on the swings - yes it was a total photo op but it was fun :)

We also went to Becca and Joe's paella party yesterday - Annie nearly had another meltdown after being passed around from person to person, but we placed her on the grass in front of a fan, and she stayed happy for a long time that way, and then even allowed a few family members to hold her :)

Eating her dress with Aunt Amanda and Grandpa


Hanging out outside after we got home!


The evening was capped off for Annie with an outdoor bath!


Nice butt.

Today was really fun - we decided to head to the University of Minnesota campus for the day - we met up with Liz and Jono on the mall, walked to the West Bank, where Liz and Jono decided to pick up some Nice Ride MN bikes, which is a really cool idea - you pay for a bike at one place, and you can drop it off at any of the other places, which are all over Minneapolis. There are a ton of the spots on the U of M campus, and near Liz's apartment in Northeast. After they left, we walked over the Purple Onion, grabbed some iced mochas, and walked around for awhile to allow Annie to get in a "good" nap (which for her is like 40 minutes) - she woke up and seemed QUITE alarmed - she SCREAMED a few times but was happy as soon as she got out of the sweltering stroller (she was super sweaty!) and got her eat on :) We finished off our outing at Stub and Herbs - all in all it was an awesome day!

I had to show Annie Murphy Hall, where most of my journalism classes were :) She was VERY interested.




Liz and Jono with their bikes!


Passed out




Giving Annie some time to cool down :)




Happy as can be, just kicking away and chewing on a burp cloth


Annie has definitely discovered my hair and likes to grab and pull now!