6 Week Show & Tell

Today our little Bryn Bear is 6 weeks old.
Is it weird I feel like she should be one year old already?
Although we still are fishing through struggles here and there while getting to know one another, somedays I feel like days are flying by while the majority of days it feels like they are creeping.
In those "creepy" days more and more things become relevant to me about this little girl that makes her more and more unique and special in her place in this world....So here's a little show and tell.

I'd lie if I didn't say I was totally biased in this, but I think my kid is absolutely adorable.
In that, when Bryn was five days old we got her newborn pictures taken.
We hired the same photographer that did our maternity session.
She came to our house and set up in our living room.
What was supposed to be about a 3 hour session took about 5+ hours but in the end you get little moments of this bliss that make it totally worth it.....

J. Christina Photography

During these past 6 weeks the most noticeable change I could see was her observation of things.
She's always had a fascination with windows and light, often staring with complete contentment at either or.
From almost the beginning Brynlee had an absolute fascination with a mirror that hangs over her changing table.
It's a mirror I bought at a thrift store and repainted with some neat art hanging above, that her great aunt Liz sent her a week or so before she was born.
I now have deemed that part of her room the staring station.

Bryn has also become completely intrigued with the tree on the wall by her bed as well as the patterns of her bedding. I've "caught" her content laying in her bed looking around at the tree or intently staring at the damask pattern of her bedding. Makes me happy.
We put in a lot of work on that tree and her bedding and although ultimately she could care less about her room decor and bedding, I love the fact that she "sees" some of the things we've done. She has also discovered the tree and birds by our chair where we nurse the most. I've caught her eyes wondering and her mouth pausing while laying there staring at the wall.
While burping her I'll actually sit her up on my lap facing that wall, which also has a window, and she'll just stare and stare. It's so neat to see her eyes wonder along that wall observing the shapes and light...





 It's made diaper changes seem all the more fun while hanging out there.
There are times where I'll just buckle her in and let her hang out there just staring at the mirror and sometimes "talking" to it (I don't leave her there obviously, I may still be learning, but no worries on that!). She's even fallen asleep on it, even during a diaper change...go figure!
Here lately she's started talking and cooing to her mirror, or whatever she's seeing in it.
The progression of her facial expressions are also part of this transformation. As a newborn most of her expressions were the same ones over and over...sleepy...angry/crying.
People tell me that is normal. So we're going to go along with that.
The past couple weeks we've added some real entertaining expressions....some of which I have no idea what they mean or if she even knows she making them....but they are so neat.
There are happy faces, sad faces, confused faces, pondering faces, lower lip quivers as well as lower lip pouts....these continue to grow on a daily basis and although at times these faces are hard to read, queue wise, they are so neat to watch and learn and observe!
I'm going to try to get some more pics of the entertaining ones so I can share....currently compiling some examples. :)

6 weeks old :)

When Bryn was first born she hated being naked.
Diaper or clothing changes were a dreaded event in our house.
This was a total buzz kill for me because of all the precious clothes I wanted her to wear but was too afraid to, heaven forbid, remind her where she came from, in undressing her and changing her clothes.
Nowadays, the girl is pretty chill "free ballin" on the changing table in all her glory. If anything we have a great time at almost every diaper change just hanging out in her bottom "nekkedness."

On a similar note, we've learned that if this little girl even farts in her diaper, it's an epic event comparable to Armageddon.
If she dirty's a diaper in her sleep, we're cool, most likely she's in a milk induced coma anyways, so she won't wake up. But during the day between feed times, wake times, and nap times, when the girl lets loose, even a little bit, the neighborhood will know.
I'll go to change her diaper expecting something horrid and there's like a dime size worth of poo in there.
Such a drama queen.

Our little swaddle Houdini...

We have had to come to a understanding on the whole swaddle bit with this little gal.
We've discovered we have a little Houdini on our hands.
From what I've read, researched, and been told, newborns love the tight feeling of the womb that they miss being in.
Well, that's all great and stuff, except when said newborn gets out of her imitated "womb" and starts startling herself awake by smacking and mutilating herself with the freed limb.
Baby acne is one thing, but man, that little gals fingernails are like little needle daggers and as soon as a hand is free it instantly flies to her face nails digging into precious baby face. She's actually scratched some of her baby acne bumps open by clawing at her face, it's seriously horrible.
She gets a "manicure" about every 2-3 days to keep the wounds to a minimum but it was still not solving the real issue of the loose limb.
Introducing the SwaddlePod.

A newborn straight jacket, if you will.

It's the newborn version of the SleepSack.

She sleeps and naps amazingly with the closeness of being swaddled which is why I've ventured down so many avenues to find a solution. 

She will still manage to get an occasional hand out of the top in complete desperation, however the fact that she's not scratching her face up any more, slapping herself, or startling herself awake, makes it totally worth it!

White noise.

White noise. White noise. White noise.
If there is anything I'd suggest to future/new mom's is the absolute magic of white noise.
Introducing 'G'erry the giraffe.
He is one of our best friends.
Bryn's Grandma Christian bought this for us when she was born and I'll be the first to admit that I had no idea what we'd use it for. It's a precious little animal, but I had absolutely no idea how handy it would become.
Where baby goes, Gerry goes.

Yes, there's an app for that.

We may be using it too much as a crutch, but I really don't care to be honest. I went into college listening to music, TV, stories on "tape" when being in my room and/or going to bed. This is a crutch that I don't think will cripple her in her adulthood.
As an adult I still "need" white noise and the fact that she likes it so much convinces me that she might be related to me in some way. We have also discovered that the vacuum and the iPhone app that has the vacuum, running water, or a blowing fan is an absolute God send.






The Breast Friend is our best friend.
I registered for this nursing pillow when planning for our baby shower in Colorado and I'm so grateful that it was bought for her and I. It's not only saved my back, shoulders, and boobies, but it's also given me a way to be somewhat hands free when nursing Bryn.
I know a lot of people consider nursing as this huge bonding experience, and don't get me wrong, I totally get it and most the time I'm right there with you, but sometimes I feed her out of obligation/necessity and need to do something else to either stay awake or pass the time.
This pillow has been awesome in allowing me to have an available hand to read, hold my water bottle, restart Gerry when his timer goes off.

Back a little bit to the swaddling, the 5 S's of Dr. Karp have also been an amazing factor in transforming our newborn from terror to tolerable.
Thanks to a fellow supportive-from-afar mommy, I got the DVD The Happiest Baby on the Block, and it's been amazing how following these 5 steps will get this baby into a comatose state in a matter of minutes.
Through trial and error we've found that swaddling, shushing, and "jiggling" speaks to our babe.
We used to add the sucking of the paci and side laying in there too.
I am not sure if it's a good thing or bad thing, but Bryn is very particular about the pacifier. She has to be in the absolute specific mood to take it.
We'll just say she prefers the real thing and honestly I'm ok with that.
Here lately she's been completely rejecting it, so we've changed our 5 S's strategy to cut that part out and so far so good.
Now the other big challenge, napping.
This has been a HUGE struggle for us from the get go.
With my grandma being here since Bryn was 3 weeks, it's gotten better but in a worse way.
Call it lack of experience, but John and I could not ever get Bryn down to nap during the day.
If we did, it was by pure luck or exhaustion on her part.
This baby would seriously stay up for hours and needless to say it wasn't in a happy way.
Now you can see why I have such a negative view of newborns!!

While GG has been here we've managed to get her down for naps but she was always being held in GG's lap for them and it was always after a good 10-15 knock down drag out wrestling match on Bryn's end plus a pacifier. No doubt we had been over stimulating her, but I wasn't recognizing the signs or the patterns in which we were doing so.
That on top of the nursing binges we had been focusing on (that's a whole other blog topic to come) I just succumb to the sleeping while being held because it was working and because it was giving me a break between feedings, etc.
Lord bless grandparents and great grandparents that are perfectly willing to take a screaming babe with a smile!
After a week or two of this, all three of us (John, me and GG) were concerned about this habit we were slowly forming.
They say you can't spoil a newborn, but at the same time, I have a life too. I can't spend my whole day holding her all day all the time and have that be the only way she can function.
This age is a hard one because they are still in the age where they usually want to be held all the time, but we were already seeing a bad habit forming in Bryn and knew it needed to be broken, even if it meant me not getting breaks anymore and GG not getting to hold her to sleep all day.
Thanks to another mom friend of mine here at Bragg, we started Bryn on a feed, wake, and sleep schedule leaving time for additional feedings if necessary.
It is like implementing the "Baby Wise" method but not to the extent that the method gets its bad rap for.

Here at six weeks, to the day, we've implemented this new method for two days. I'll feed her, we'll do an activity for a certain amount of time, timing it to end before she starts getting fussy or over stimulated, then we'll swaddle her up and put her in her bed with Gerry--no paci, and wide awake.
She'll cry like a banchee and we've let her for no longer than 5-10 minutes.
After that amount of time we'll go into her room, check the diaper, rewrap her, use two more of the 5 S's (shushing and the "jiggling") and she usually is asleep before we can lay her back in bed.
Alone, sleeping in her bed, no pacifier.
As of today, we had success at every nap time. She didn't last the full nap time goal we were aiming for, but the point was she was napping.
We were all getting breaks and it was weird.
GG has read through her third book since she got here.
I can write more blogs!
John has more down time to focus on his healing than having to take turns passing around the over stimulated fussy baby.
It's been such a win win so far.
We know it's not going to work every time, but so far so good!

We've still been implementing the "feeding on demand" style with this to a point. We can tell when the girl is hungry, and considering she's six weeks, she's due (and I think in the middle) of a important growth spurt, so I'm not sticking to a set timed schedule right now. They are just goals and so far, we've achieved 70% of them. That, my friends, is awesome progress!
With that, she's kind of following a timed schedule in her own in a natural way, and I'm sharing the reigns with her for now.
This mixture of methods has also allowed longer nights!
She's usually asleep by 11 (10 pm being her last feeding and straight to bed, no wake time) and she's been sleeping solid until 5 am give or take.
When she's woken up, I'll feed her again and she goes straight back to bed for another hour or so.
Lord, thank you for more than 3-4 hours of consecutive sleep!

On another note, with John's surgery getting "in the way" of things, his deployment is on at least a thirty day hiatus while he heals and gets back into work and training. Lord knows we all look at this as a blessing in disguise. Not only with the timing of GG being here to help me (technically had two babies!) but also with the fact that if he leaves a month later than planned, then that's an extra month he has with Brynlee while she's still this little.
Gotta find the positives!
This is John's last week at home before heading back to work next week.
We still don't have dates for this impending deployment, especially now with the surgery setting things back at least one month, but we know it's there and looming in our future.
It's going to happen, it's just a matter of when.
I'm ok being blissful in our ignorance of when the gauntlet will hammer us down with all the deployment craziness.
My goal right now is to make sure that little girl is with her daddy as much as possible.
Today I totally achieved that goal and more, and it makes my heart sing.
This whole "kid thing" may be a huge adjustment that I'm constantly learning the in's and out's of, but it's moments like these that make the good, bad, and ugly so totally worth it all.