Our little cutie is 2 months old!  She’s continuing to reach out and hold onto things.  When she’s in her bouncer or lying on the play gym she’s no longer just starring at the toys but trying to bat at them.  She’s a curious little lady.  She’s becoming a lot more interactive and I love knowing that she’s learning more and more everyday, just absorbing it all.  We want her to be super smart so we’re helping her out by talking to her, singing to her (or playing music), and describing all the wonderful stuff around her.  She’s smiles constantly (my heart melts every time it happens) and loves standing up on our laps when we hold her.

We were busy this week.  Monday we had a friend of mine over for lunch, Tuesday we had the nanny over to meet Annabelle, Wednesday we had a lunch/play date at a girlfriend’s house who has a little one and then Friday we went for breakfast at Panera with my two mommy friends who are also on maternity leave with their little boys.  For the most part Annabelle does a great job even when we’re out and running errands.  Sometimes I think she does better when we’re out because there are so many thing to keep her occupied and she loves being in the car (when it’s moving).  She does have her moments but those are usually after we’ve been out for several hours or when she’s hungry.

Annabelle continues to be a pretty darn good sleeper (knocking on wood as I type this while holding my breath that it continues). We’re putting her to bed by 9pm, even some night by 8pm if she’s super fussy and she usually wakes up just once, before waking up at 7:30am.  I’ll feed her again and she just hangs out with me in bed until 9am.  We snuggle and chat.

Getting her to bed isn’t always the smoothest process but we’re getting into a better routine.  I nurse her, then we burp her, put her into a swaddler and most of the time Dusty walks her around the house until she falls asleep.  Once she’s in her bassinet, if she wakes up I can usually just rock her in the bassinet and she falls back asleep after 10-15 minutes.  If she’s still fussing I usually try my hand at walking her around.

Even though it sounds like she’s perfect, she does have her moments.  There are plenty of afternoons that she doesn’t want to take naps or will only take short catnaps and evenings that nothing will soothe her.  Evenings are her fussiest times but aren’t we all a little crankier after a long day.  And then of course, there are plenty of nights that she wakes up more than just that one time (like last night).

This is my last full week at home with Annabelle before going back to work.  I can’t believe these last eight weeks have gone so fast.  I did accomplish the one thing I wanted this week and that was to make sure she would take a bottle.  My goal was to pump and feed her with a bottle during the day (when I’ll be at work).  I can happily say that she takes the bottle just fine but I failed at feeding her with a bottle the entire week.  I realized how much easier it is for me to nurse Annabelle and how much I actually enjoy her cuddling up to me when I’m nursing.

I’m excited to be back to work and back in a routine but I’m also sad that I’ll be missing all of those adorable things Annabelle does (isn’t that what every mommy says).  I’m going to miss our snuggle time in the mornings and our walks in the afternoon.  I’m counting down the days until winter break already and am happy that for the rest of the semester I have a flexible work schedule and don’t have to be on campus every day, some days I’ll be able to work from home.