Watch me grow- 15 weeks

10/29/11
15 weeks old
13.2 lbs
24 1/2 inches long

WOW! I can't even begin to start this blog without looking at this 14 week photo of Catie Grace looking at those LONG legs! I guess its no secret who she got those from. :)

Well first off, Catie is now ROLLING OVER!!! We truly are starting to have a big girl on our hands.  For a long time, she wanted to be placed on her side when sleeping and she would then occasionally roll over onto her belly from the side position, but she has now figured out how to roll from her back to her side to her belly.  The process of rolling from her back to her side is actually pretty amusing.  Catie does this 'air guitar' move where she slings her arm from her side, over the top of her head, and back down her belly, as if she is playing an air guitar.  After making her signature move, she will sling the same side leg over her body to give herself momentum.  Usually after about 3 attempts, she will be up on her side. 



Another developmental step we took around week 14 was that Catie started to really purposefully reach out for objects and to grasp hold of them.  Once she get a hold of whatever she is reaching for, whether that be your finger, her ladybug toy, or a stuffed animal, she will then proceed to carry on a full length conversation with it. (I'm going to post a video in the next blog that caught her carrying on a conversation with the ladybug).

13 weeks

14 weeks

15 weeks

Another trend we are starting to see more of is Catie sucking on her whole fist or her thumb.  She will usually just suck on her whole fist because it is much easier to navigate to her face.  When she does achieve getting just her thumb in her mouth, then she usually ends up poking herself in the face with her other four fingers.  It was just more recently that she figured out that if she left her hand open while sucking on her thumb, then she would avoid gouging out her eyes and scratching her face.

Caught that thumb

During week 14, Catie Grace went through a fairly large growth spurt.  We had a few days where she wanted to nurse just about every three hours, day and night.  It was during this time that I was reminded how grateful I was that we were choosing to co-sleep because we would not have been able to get through the days if we had to stay up and nurse her in the nursery, let alone if we had to actually get up and fix a bottle every time she started to cry.  But I also went through a learning curve myself during that week.  Kelly and I prayed and decided that the best method of family planning for the next few months was going to be for me to start on an OCP.  I did research and found that a Progestin-only OCP is the only one that  MIGHT be effective for me to use while still nursing, but I soon regretted that.  The very first day I stated on the pill, we stated to see changes in Catie and her behavior.  She wanted to nurse for longer periods of time and much more often.  She would also show signs of being very frustrated and mad after she got done eating.  These behaviors were ones that were very similar to ones we see if I would time my pumping badly and end up needing to nurse Catie Grace right after I had finished pumping.  Because there wouldn't be as much milk for her to consume due to the pumping, Catie will get frustrated after nursing because she is still hungry and we would have to wait for my body to produce more to satisfy her.  These were the same behaviors we were seeing that first day of taking the OCP.  I also noticed that when I would pump, I was not getting anything close to the normal amount.  So, you would think I would put two and two together to equal four right? NOPE! So we proceeded on with days 2, 3, and 4.  Each day getting continually worse and also during this time, Catie had not had a single dirty diaper.  We were going on four days of having a fussy baby, who was constantly hungry, and had not filled a dirty diaper in over 4 days.   It was at that point that we decided we needed to start eliminating possibilities that would create this much of a change in our daughter, and PTL the first thing we did was eliminate the OCP.  After 12 hours of no OCP, I saw a HUGE change in my production and Catie had her first dirty diaper in 5 days.  After 24 hours, Catie Grace was back to being satisfied after every feeding and my pumping numbers were back to where they should be.  Now now, I know what you are thinking, and no you will not be hearing another announcement in the next few months.  Even though this method of family planning didn't work, we are still pursuing other methods.  Our desire is to have a large family, but with about two years between each child.  We know we serve a Sovereign God and HE could change everything in a moments time, but for now we are enjoying Catie and planning for the future, but with a more natural approach.

Falling asleep on Daddy

Overall, it's been an extremely busy and active past three weeks and these are just the big highlights.  But in these hectic weeks, we have watched our daughter developmentally and physically grow leaps and bounds!

First Halloween

Yesterday was Catie Grace's first Halloween and she was the cutest lamb we have ever seen!!

October 31 has never really been a day that my family has seen as Halloween, but rather, it was my Papa Melton's birthday.  We would usually take a trip down on Halloween or the weekend close to it and celebrate my Papa's birthday, but this year was going to be a little bit different.  My Papa received his heavenly promotion this past January and this was going to be our first Halloween without him.  So instead of breaking the tradition, Kelly and I decided that we would still make the trip down to Campbellsville and we would take Catie trick-or-treating with my little cousin Andrew.  And what a fun and memorible trip it was!! :)

Andrew was making sure Catie was ready for the pictures

The Scarecrow and his little Lamb

Making sure her hands were warm

 We left Lexington around 2:30 and arrived in Campbellsville around 4pm.  Catie slept the whole way down, so we woke her up and fed her before changing her into her costume.  Andrew was a scarecrow and Catie Grace was his little lamb down on the farm. 

After getting dressed and snapping a few photos,we hit Taylor County Elementary school for our first stop.  The school sets up tables in the gym sponsored by different groups in the town and provides an opportunity to quickly rack up the candy by following the train of kids and parents. 

Waiting in line at the school

Holding her bucket while waiting in line

Kelly and Andrew

Out cold

Catie (little lamb) with the Black sheep and white sheep.

Through our whole trip in and out of the school, Catie slept.  After we made it through the school we headed out to hit three trunk-or-treats.  After her short catnap, she woke back up and enjoyed people watching.  While trick-or-treating, we couldn't walk 15 feet any direction without hearing, "Look at the cute lamb", "Oh how sweet", "Look at the baby sheep". 

Walking from one church's trunk-or-treat to the next

We walked and gathered candy till it got dark around 7pm and then headed back to my Granny's.  Catie got a clean diaper and a top-off feeding and then we drove down the road to visit my cousins Steven and Vanessa. 

Vanessa with little Catie Grace

Kelly being goofy

After more visiting and family time, we returned to Granny's for some birthday cake for Kelly.

Time with Granny

Laughing at Aunt Sharon

We stayed WAY later than expected and had TONS more fun than I ever dreamed of!  I am SOOoo very thankful for family and for the one we have been blessed with! Catie Grace will never know her Great-Papa but his legacy lives on in the family he left behind. 

Watch me grow- 12 weeks

10/16/11
12 weeks old
12.8 lbs
23 1/3 inches long

We have a BIG baby on our hands.  This week Catie Grace amazed me by deliberately rolling from her side to her chest.  She has been sleeping on her side with us in the bed for weeks but she started to roll over onto her belly after she finishes feeding.  When we see this, Kelly and I have been rolling her back over onto her side.

Catie is also starting to sit up on her own.   Not totally, but she can sit up in her Bumbo for longer and longer periods of time before getting tired and mad.  


This past weekend, Catie Grace got to spend some time with her Great Granny Dee over at Granny and Pa Rexroat's.   

Time with Great Granny Dee

After lunch, it was time for some football with Daddy.  I recently heard on the news that children under two should not be allowed to watch TV.  Welllllllll, we blew that one! lol! But seriously, I do not think that the time she spends watching TV with us will affect her speech development.  You should hear her coo! :)

We also made a trip down to Campbellsville to spend some time with family.  While we were there we were able to see both grandmothers and my Aunt Maria and my little cousin Andrew.  Andrew ADORES Catie Grace and he is itching for when she is big enough to teach her all about his trains and monster trucks. 

Catie with Granny Melton and Andrew

Catie (12 weeks) with Andrew and Maria

Watch me grow- 11 weeks

10/8/11
11 weeks old
12.2 lbs
23 1/3 inches long

First off, let me apologize for the delay in getting this up.  We have been crazy, busy and we are watching the Lord do some pretty amazing things in our lives right now.  I will have to create a whole separate blog update to fill you in on those details when the time is ready. :)

While Kelly and I have been super busy watching our Father weave together some events, Catie Grace has been busy GROWING!! She eats, sleeps, fills a diaper, eats, sleeps, eats some more and fills another diaper again. Her one pound weight gain in two weeks is evidence enough that she is going through another growth spurt. 

10 weeks old

10 weeks old photo

Even with her going through this growth spurt, I think we have finally started to nail down a routine.  I will confess that during my pregnancy, I did not read a single book that had anything to do with putting babies on a 'schedule'.  I have never been one who agreed with this idea of forcing a schedule onto a child, but I am all for a 'routine'.  Through the natural process of Catie and I both needing to rest, sleep, eat and play, we have naturally established a 'routine' that fits us.  I can honestly say that I have never once had to put Catie in bed while she was screaming nor have I ever felt like I have missed out on either sleep because of her wanting to be awake and alert. 

Here is an example of Catie's typical day:

7am: Dressed for the day, and top-off feeding
7-10am: morning nap
10am-1pm: cluster feeding and play time
1-3pm: nap in swing
3-8pm: alert, awake, play time with cluster feeding throughout
8pm: bath time
9pm: bed time

It's amazing how your opinions change from before you have children to after you have crossed that threshold of being a mother.  One of those issues is co-sleeping.  I have recently become a big fan of co-sleeping at night.  A major part of our sucessful routine that Catie and I have is due to the fact that we co-sleep at night.  Now up until Catie was born and even several weeks after she was born, I was vehemently against the idea of co-sleeping.  I did not want mine and Kelly's bed to be 'invaded' by a child because I did not want it to interfere with our intimacy and I also did not want to worry about the possibility of rolling over on an infant while in a deep sleep.  So before Catie was born, we set up her nursery and put my rocker that I was going to nurse her into one of the spare bedrooms expecting that her room would be one that we spent hours in.  And to this day, Catie has never spent a night in her crib and we have moved the rocker out into the living room. 

After we brought Catie home from the hospital, she would wake up and eat every 3 hours during the night and Kelly and I both would get up and sit in the living room with her while I fed her.  She slept in the swing that we would bring in and put at the foot of our bed so that her head would be elevated and would help to give her some relief from the reflux, but she never really slept soundly in the swing.  So she eventually ended up in our bed.  Lots of time, she just wanted to be touched and know that we were close.  At first, I was embarrassed that we co-slept and would never had admitted it, but after attending a breastfeeding convention with my mother, I learned of all the benefits of co-sleeping and have now become an advocate of it when it is done safely.  Kelly and I bring Catie to bed with us every night and she starts out sleeping between us in our queen size bed.  Catie Grace will usually fall right to sleep when we draw her in close and she will stay asleep for several hours.   Usually around 1am and 4am she wakes up hungry.  We used to have to wake up, get up and out of bed, get her out of the swing, and feed her while trying to stay awake ourselves, and then try to peacefully and gently transition her from my chest to the swing without her waking.  We were successful about 1 out of every 5 times.  That would make for long, tired nights with a huge interruption in the middle of our sleep cycle.  But now we get all our sleep with only having to barely wake up.  Catie now feeds at those same times at night, but I simply roll over and help her to latch on then drift back off to sleep.  There have been several nights where I don't even remember feeding Catie but its evidenced that I did by the lack of bowling balls on my chest and by the very content baby that we find sleeping beside us when the alarm goes off.

Now I know this topic of co-sleeping is another hot button topic like immunizations- you are either for or against it, no middle ground, but I have to admit that I have flip flopped sides since having Catie.  I know this trend is going to need to stop and we will do that after Catie weans.  Oh and I feel the need to also just clarify that other 'things' that usually happen in the bed other than sleeping did not suffer from co-sleeping. Catie does still spend some quality time in her swing from time to time :)  

Chewing on that fist

Many have asked how the animals are doing with Catie now that she is a bit older and honestly, we could not have asked for better pets! They ADORE Catie and Catie Grace loves running her hands through their long fur.  Moose is still uber protective of her and Foxy and Panda are excited to see her for the first 5 minutes, then they loose interest and go back to sleeping or chasing cats.

Foxy giving kisses

Moose checking on his little girl

This weekend marked our first time when Kelly had to spend a night away from both Catie and I.  He went to a shooting sports training with 4H and Catie and I took the opportunity to have a sleepover with Grumpy and Nahna.  It was a HUGE blessing to both Catie and I to spend the weekend with them because I truly do not like being in a house by myself. 

Bath time

Always trying to taste the water

We have a little minnow

After Daddy came home after a weekend away

Kelly, "Make your kissy face Catie"

Just for laughs

I know I had promised to keep yall updated and to maintain my blog and I have not abandoned that promise- just yet :)  It has been a busy past two weeks and I am currently finishing up Catie's 10 and 11 week update.  While I am finishing that in the next day, I thought  I would indulge your Catie fix with this sweet example of Catie gnawing on her fist.  She doesn't suck her thumb, but half her fist :)