Get ready for a long weekend...

I have decided that we're going to use the long Memorial Day weekend to get Samantha sleeping in her crib. Her nightly routine consists of her waking up around 2:00 in the morning and fussing until I pick her up and put her in bed with me. I can't keep that up forever, and as long as she is in the bassinet next to me I'll always be temped to do just that because it's easier.
I'm pretty sure she'll do fine for the first half of the night, it's the second half that I don't know about. Wish us luck, we'll let you know how it goes!

Samantha's Dedication

It's another catch up post! I tried to post a video from her dedication at our church on here but for some reason it wouldn't load. We'll just have to settle for a few pictures. On Saturday March 28th we were part of the baby dedication at Prairie Lakes Church. It's a really neat experience, and I wish I could have uploaded the video so you could see it.

We were asked to either talk about why we picked our baby's name or talk about a special goal we have for our child's life. Our choice was to talk about our goal of seeing her grow up to be a follower of God. Then we were asked to pick a promise verse for her, which the church put on the dedication certificate they made for Samantha. We chose Luke 12:32-34 for Samantha's promise verse. We wanted to pick something that will speak to her as she gets older, as well as the people who attended her dedication.

After we were finished talking Pastor John took a few minutes and prayed for Samantha. It was a neat experience and I'm really glad that we have the video footage of it to show Samantha when she's older.

Happy Mother's Day!

I suppose Samantha's gift to me was being happy long enough to take some pictures. All week long I've been planning to take spring time pictures of her with tulips in the background. Unfortunately for me it's been raining a lot, so it's been too wet to get her outside. I've since given up on the tulip idea and just settled for the front lawn as a backdrop. Rest assured, the self-inflicted scratches on her face look worse than they really are.
I'm impressed with how well she's doing holding her head up while she's on her belly. She can't sit up on her own yet, but she really seems to be happy sitting in her yellow Bumbo chair. I didn't realize until we came back inside that she had grabbed fistfuls of grass while she was laying on her stomach. At least she hasn't gotten to where she wants to shove the grass in her mouth!









Due to popular request, I'm adding a random picture of Samatha in her cow coat into this post.

Working on the backyard

Last weekend Chris decided that our backyard was going to get a makeover. When we first moved in the backyard was one of the selling points of the house for us. It has a great deck, a tall privacy fence and lots of room for the dogs. After a year and a half of letting the dogs have free reign of the yard we had almost no grass left back there. We were getting tired of seeing dirt and sad looking patches of grass everyday.
Samantha seemed to enjoy our project weekend, it got her out of the house and onto the deck for an afternoon. She definitely likes the bouncy seat better when she's outside!

As of a few weeks ago we finally were able to lay the concrete for the big dog kennel we've been wanting to build. Since the dogs are now primarily confined when they're outside we're able to work on the grass situation. The dogs are pretty happy in their new kennel. Chris put a couple bales of hay in there for them so they would be more comfortable, and Katie decided to make a nest out of one of the bales.Most people would probably spread grass seed and fertilizer and hope for the best when they try to grow grass in their yard. Not us!
One of the guys Chris works with just happens to have a tractor and a tiller, so we ripped up the entire yard to make the environment more suitable for our grass seed.
It's been a week now since our project began, and we're still waiting to see grass sprout up. It's going to be great to have a nice green backyard later in the summer. Hopefully tearing everything up back there will turn out to be worth it!

Backtrack...

Since we have only just started this blog there are a few months to catch up on.
Nearly a week after Samantha was born we took her to a free newborn assessment at the hospital. For the most part she was doing fine, but we were a little worried about how yellow she was looking, and asked the nurse to check and see how jaundiced she was. The nurse drew some blood, and a few hours later the hospital called us at home to tell us that Samantha's bilirubin levels were high enough to cause some concern. They told us to bring her in so she could be admitted to the hospital.
We ended up staying in the pediatric ward for about 24 hours with Samantha under the bilirubin lights. She would scream and cry every time we put her in the incubator, so we eventually positioned the lights over her while she slept on Chris' chest. Needless to say, it was a very long 24 hours for everyone.

We were able to bring her home Saturday evening, but we had to bring the bili blanket with us. It's basically a fiberoptic pad that we had to keep against her skin so it could continue to break down the bilirubin in her system. By Monday afternoon her levels had dropped to a more normal range and we were able to return the blanket to the hospital.

Jaunice may be a common newborn ailment, but that didn't make it any easier for us to deal with. I would just as soon never have to spend another night in the hospital with her again. Thankfully it was only one night, and it wasn't anything more serious.

Happy 3 Month Birthday Samantha!

Has it really already been 3 months since Samantha was born? It sure doesn't feel like that long sometimes...
Over the past 3 months she has changed so much! It's like she's a completely different person now from who she was at first.
In addition to all the crying she likes to do, she laughs, smiles and "talks". Her favorite word is "goo", which has inspired that to be one of her nicknames. One of her greatest accomplishments is how she's starting to tolerate her baths now instead of screaming the whole time.

Just about a week ago she figured out how to grab things with her hands. Now she plays with her crinkly toys when she's in her car seat. I've seen her talking to her lion toy, and on a few occasions she's tried to eat it. Most of the time the lion just keeps her pacificer in her mouth because she holds it so close to her face.


Even though she can still wear in a lot of her newborn and 0-3 month clothes, they're starting to get a little snug. It's just about time to break out the bag of 3-6 month sizes!
At her last doctor's appointment on April 27th she weighed 9 lbs 15 oz. She was given her first shots that day, and she seemed to take them pretty well. She was happy and smiling at the doctor, which made it even harder to watch her start to cry when she was stuck with the first needle. Thankfully it didn't take too long to calm her down. She was very clingy that afternoon and evening, but she didn't run fever and she was just about back to normal the next day. This is a picture of her that afteroon right before I took her bandaids off.

Samantha has gotten really good about sleeping at night. She goes to bed around 9:00 pretty much every night, and she usually sleeps until sometime between 3 and 5 in the morning. She'll stay awake long enough to eat, then most days she's out for a few more hours. Technically she isn't sleeping completely through the night, but we're not complaining! She spends most nights in her bassinet now, which is a huge relief for us.
As the weather gets nicer we're trying to get her outside more often, which will hopefully lead to some more really good pictures!

Our First Blog!

Well, we're giving the blog thing a try. It's hard to keep everyone in the family updated through facebook and myspace since so many people don't use them. We'll still keep on posting pictures of Samantha on webshots, but we'll try to give little updates as we can on this page.