Monthly Archives: January 2014

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History and future

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Thursday, 30 January 2014: Three Hundred and Four Days Old.

Ayla and I visited one of my old school friends and her six week old baby boy today.

As we sat around the kitchen table and caught up on old times I found my heart warmed by how easy it was to talk with someone who’s known me so long.

Although my friend and I had fallen out of touch over the years (this was only our third catch up since 2005) it was our two beautiful babies who brought us together.

New life is amazing.

Ayla has changed my world – the way I see it, the way I value it and the way I live it – and it’s clear that Baby James has done the same for my friend.

My friend and I now share not only our history but our futures as well.

And although there’s thousands of kilometres between us our friendship has been refreshed as if we’d moved in next door, and I have my Baby Ayla to thank for it.

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Seasoned pro

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Wednesday, 29 January 2014: Three Hundred and Three Days Old.

I am so lucky to have a baby who is as forgiving, placid and easygoing as Ayla.

Up at 4.45am this morning Ayla was happy to wait with me as we huddled under the front patio in the pouring rain and waited for a taxi to arrive and take us to the airport.

Once there, nearly twenty minutes late mind you, Ayla sat comfortably on my hip and I sweet talked our way into three adjoining seats in Row 5 at no additional cost, and Ayla quietly clung on to me as we charged through the security checks,

The two of us spent the next half an hour sitting side by side on a departure lounge couch, sharing a toasted sandwich and watching other red-eye warriors prop their eyelids open with tooth pegs… Or coffee.

The flight itself was great, thanks to Row 5 but ultimately due to Ayla’s awesomeness at traveling; this is her third interstate trip since she was born and Ayla’s evidently a seasoned pro, happy and content to play with her toys and smile at the passengers behind us through the gap between seats.

I didn’t even have to feed Ayla during landing because her ears handled the change in altitude all by themselves, and I was able to somehow bundle Ayla into the Baby Ka’tan and be ready to “disembark via the front door” without a fuss.

Our luggage arrived on the carousel and we made our way to the pick up area where Ayla’s Grandma met us and helped us load our things, smothering Baby Ayla with cuddles and oodles of long awaited love.

From the airport we headed to a shopping centre no less, and while Grandma finished work for the day Ayla and I killed time browsing and stocking up on nappies and fruit.

We finally made it home in the late afternoon and by then Ayla’s eyes were hanging out of her head, as were mine.

Although we’d been able to jag a little over an hours sleep on the plane it was a massive, long, tiring day of travel and Ayla took it all in her stride.

I would have completely understood if Ayla had reached breaking point on the plane, in the car or even at the shopping centre but my baby girl is a trooper and she helps make even the most exhausting day a pleasure.

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Researching

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Tuesday, 27 January 2014: Three Hundred and Two Days Old.

I’ve been researching ways to get a baby to nap when they’ve just learned how to crawl/stand/sit, and the general consensus seems to be; “good luck”!

Thankfully Ayla’s night time sleeps are starting to improve, slowly and irregularly mind you, but getting Ayla to nap during the day has become a nightmare.

They say it’s because Ayla’s just learned so many awesome new skills she’s simply hyped up and wants to keep using them all the time.

So I guess it could be akin to and adult discovering a cure for cancer but being told to go to bed… Yeah right!

I think there might also be a knack to the whole “feeding solids” thing that could be impacting on Ayla’s nap times.

Now that Ayla is starting to eat more food I find myself worrying if she’s getting enough and wondering if she can’t sleep because she’s still hungry.

At the moment I just keep giving Ayla different types of food until I start to see more of it on the floor than in her mouth, but how do I know if Ayla’s throwing the food away because she’s full or because she doesn’t like it?

I guess it’s all just another matter of trial and error, and of keeping fingers crossed, until Ayla finally gives up the fight and gets back into a rhythm again.

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Play date

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Monday, 27 January 2014: Forty Three Weeks Old.

Ayla went on her first play date today, to the adjoining hotel room for a play with our friend’s 3yo daughter.

Man, I am going to be such a mess when I go back to work and Ayla goes to day care!

Ayla was only next door and she was gone for only 30 minutes but I was aware of every second as it passed by.

Don’t get me wrong, it was great to know Ayla was out of the way and in safe hands while I was busy packing up our stuff, but goodness knows what I’ll be like when we’re apart for a whole day!

The thing that struck me the most was the wondering what Ayla was doing, what funny antics she was pulling or what new lesson she was learning.

I wasn’t worrying about whether she was safe or getting in to trouble, which surprised me a little bit, but I think the fear of missing something important was harder to reason with.

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Australia Day

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Sunday, 26 January 2014: Three Hundred Days Old.

It’s was Ayla’s first Australia Day today and what better way to spend it than road tripping to Kakadu.

We made the journey in convoy with some friends and no sooner had we entered the park than we were bombarded with reminders of why they call this the lucky country.

We saw dingos, wallabies, goannas, eagles and snakes, I even saw a eagle with a snake in it’s talons, and the flooded wetlands were breathtakingly raw and spectacular.

At this time of year everything is green and growing. It creates a stunning display of natural beauty that makes me feel privileged just to look, and while Ayla may be still too small to appreciate it Hubby and I feel blessed that our little girl has such wonder and adventure on her doorstep.

We spent the day fishing in road side culverts, and at one point we even reversed the ute into a swollen creek so that the boys could use the tray as a pontoon platform for flicking lures.

In the afternoon we relaxed in the resort pool and escaped the heat, where we played beach balls with other holiday makers and Ayla learned to fall into our arms from the edge.

Later, Ayla loved cruising around our hotel room, pulling herself up on the bedside tables and playing with the bed spreads, and when the time came for her to go to down for a sleep she settled nicely into her made-up bed of blankets under the desk.

To top it off we shared a lovely dinner and drinks with our friends and kicked back on the patio as a massive tropical storm front rolled in. It was the perfect end to a perfect Australia Day.

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A baby on the go

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Saturday, 25 January 2014: Two Hundred and Ninety Nine Days Old.

When I made the call and said Ayla would be “properly” mobile within a fortnight, I didn’t expect it to be so soon!

Ayla is so good at crawling now that I’m already starting to experience the “oh crap, she’s too quiet” moments, and my privacy is well and truly out the window.

Hubby also noticed the impact of Ayla’s mobility when she crawled her way from one end of the house to the other today and set up camp in front of the fishing rod rack in our bedroom.

It must have only been seconds but Ayla somehow managed to dig out a box of hooks and even get one out… O.M.G. What have we got ourselves in to!?

I also found Ayla standing in front of the vanity draws in the bathroom this morning. She had one draw open fully and was happily pulling out and throwing everything she could get her hands on.

And talk about getting ready to go out! It used to only take me about 15 minutes to get out of the house with Ayla, but today it took nearly an hour; turns out it’s hard work catching, cleaning and clothing a baby on the go!

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Vampire

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Friday, 24 January 2014: Two Hundred and Ninety Eight Days Old.

I’ve decided that for next Halloween Ayla should dress up as a vampire because she looks so cute with blood all over her face.

Now don’t be alarmed, she didn’t get an injury or anything, and to tell you the truth it wasn’t even really blood, but there’s no denying she can pull it off right?

It’s raspberry juice.

Now that Ayla is properly eating food (instead of just making a mess with it) but she’s hungry all the time!

So today while I was baking piklets for Ayla and she was constantly under my feet, ramming my already bruised ankles with her walker, I had an idea to put some frozen raspberries in her food net to see if that would keep her quiet.

It did, and it also resulted in everything turning a lovely shade of pink, including her hair.

Ayla had a ball, she must’ve loved the cool fruits on her sore gums and the tart tastiness of the berries, not to mention the truly spectacular mess!

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Ironic

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Thursday, 23 January 2014: Two Hundred and Ninety Seven Days Old.

Along with Ayla’s new found freedom has come a seemingly endless ball of energy.

In all of today Ayla has napped for less than an hour (instead of her usual four) but surprisingly she still isn’t showing signs of tiredness despite it being nearly 5.30pm.

It’s ironic because just this morning I took Ayla to the community health care nurse to discuss possible reasons for her being so tired and needing a nap after every few hours of awake time.

The nurse looked at me like I was crazy and explained that Ayla is far too spritely and active for there to be anything to worry about. I felt like trying to explain about the dark-ringed eyes, the yawning and the passing out in awkward positions but decided against it and chose to cop the “crazy lady” looks on the chin.

And now I realise that all the extra sleep Ayla was needing must have been to rest her brain after all it’s growing!

I can’t express how much Ayla seems to have developed in the last couple of days; it’s like she’s become a big kid overnight.

She’s communicating on a whole new level – talking almost – and she’s now comfortably 50/50 on solids and breast milk 😦

Ayla can sit up from lying down, her crawling has improved tenfold since yesterday and she’s way more interested and involved in things like books and songs.

It turns out Ayla’s little body has been busy growing too!

According to the nurse Ayla’s now almost in the 50th percentile for height and weight, even though she’s been the 25th percentile or lower since she was born.

Ayla’s stats at a little over 9.5 months are;

W 8.18kg / 1.2 stone)
H 70cm
H/C 45c,

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24 hours

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Wednesday, 22 January 2014: Two Hundred and Ninety Six Days Old.

Ayla is developing so fast! In just the last 24 hours alone she’s made so many new developments it’s hard to pick just one to blog about.

So I won’t.

Ayla officially crawled today. Not the strange bulldozing kind of crawl she’s been doing for the past week, but a proper crawl on her hands and knees.

Ayla didn’t crawl far mind you, probably just a couple of metres or so before collapsing on her belly, but she kept it up throughout the day which was enough for me to make a note of it in her baby book: First crawled… Wednesday 22 January 2014.

But then it was like there was no stopping her!

Every time I tried to put Ayla down for a nap she crawled around in her cot, grabbing at her toys and finding any distraction available to prevent sleep from happening.

It also only took a few attempts for Ayla to work out how to pull herself up to standing from all fours, and because her favourite place to do this is in her cot, now the bassinet insert has GOT to go.

I think the assortment of stuffed toys that have surrounded Ayla as she dreams since she was born are going to have to make themselves scarce pretty soon too.

It’s a shame, but during one attempted nap time routine today I poked my head in to see if Ayla was asleep and found her sitting upright with her toys surrounding her as if they were sharing a tea party!

I also saw Ayla push herself up into what looked like the downward dog yoga position this afternoon.

I nearly jumped out of my skin because it looked like Ayla was about to stand upright and walk off! Thankfully though, while I watched, Ayla sat her little bottom back down on the tiles and turned her attention to something else.

Ayla’s also making big developments in the pool. Although I don’t actually let her go, Ayla seems to have the basic motion of swimming sorted out, and she certainly has no fear of diving under the water…. Today she even seemed to deliberately hold her breath and stick her face in!

So as you can see, things are pretty full on here at the moment! I am excited, overwhelmed and a little anxious but I can’t wait to see what tomorrow will bring… I can almost see Ayla’s brain growing bigger and stronger every day, I just hope I can keep up!