Sweet Summer Days

Time is flying by. I now have a four month old... a smiling, laughing, cooing, precious four month old... and life is getting sweeter and sweeter with every passing day.

I won't lie -- the early days were tough. And there were times that I wondered whether my relationship with my DH would weather such a strained time --- raging hormones, a lack of real sleep, and a DH with a propensity to clomp about the creaky wood floors in our house and (unintentionally) slam cabinet doors and generally make a huge racket tried my patience and wore on my already-frazzled nerves greatly... But thankfully, the sleep situation has greatly improved and at least the nerves aren't quite as frazzled anymore. ...No improvement on the clomping and general racket by the DH, though he does try, poor thing... he's even acquired a slight case of tendonitis in his Achilles heel from trying to tip-toe around the house!

And speaking of sleep -- my girl is doing a stellar job in that department, averaging 9 to 10.5 hours per night, straight through.... She's been blessing me with this routine since her 8th week, God love her. :)

Claire wakes up smiling, happy, and squealing in delight these days, and she is such a barrel of fun to be around... she's learned to play patty-cake, giddyup horsey (bouncing on my knee), and peekaboo in the past few weeks, and now laughs in delight every time we play them. She's still not quite a huge fan of tummy time, but she's learned to tolerate it well for 10 or so minutes, as long as I'm down on the floor with her, making a game for her with her rattles.

A new challenge for us lately has been prepping our home to list for sale... we decided June 16th that we would try to sell it now in order to move into a better school district. --A bit premature, you might think, seeing as how Claire won't be going to school anytime soon --- but DH doesn't think the housing market here in ATL has bottomed out yet, and with interest rates as low as they are, it would seem wise to go ahead and try to sell NOW as opposed to 2 or 3 years down the road.

The past 3 weeks have been spent in a flurry of house projects - painting rooms, clearing out the basement, resurfacing kitchen cabinets, cleaning up and reorganizing closets and cupboards and desks... All while trying to guard my girl's routine as best as I could. Quite a challenge it was, and quite stressful... But thankfully, we've survived it all and the house is ready, praise God. Now comes the next stage: maintaining a "show-ready" house and dealing with house showings-- all the while protecting Claire's schedule.

A typical day finds her waking up around 9 (give or take a half-hour either way), and she typically nurses at 9, 12, 3, 6, and 9... though there are usually a few four-hour stretches mixed in there. While she's great at sleeping through the night, she's not as great at napping --- I ususally only get 3 or 4 45-minute nap sessions out of her per day. And while I'm not complaining too much here -- any break is great! -- 45 minutes isn't very long to really get deep into any projects or cleaning around the house. Thankfully I can get showered and cleaned up well within that time frame, but that's about all I can do. So I will welcome the day when she transitions to fewer but longer naps -- 2 or 3 hour stretches. ...whenever that day should come, I'll be ready!

Overall, I've been just trying to enjoy every single moment with my sweet girl. She lights up my days and brings such joy to every moment. I am just so very thankful and grateful to God for every breathe she takes, for her little life. Every time she snuggles into my arms I think my heart will burst from happiness. I am in heaven, and so very thankful for the privilege of getting to spend my days with my sweet girl.

...And she wakes. More later~