Daycare

It's interesting when you talk to other moms about childcare. One person, not knowing my situation, stated that her mother in law from India was watching her baby and does not trust daycare. Luckily, I'm able to keep my nonjudgemental look that I learned through my counseling days. However, I think a lot about the pros and cons of daycare.

I personally cannot see myself as a stay at home mom. I wish I was a part time stay at home mom with the ability to go to work part time and stay connected to the adult world. Eric and I aren't rich enough for a live in nanny, so we're happy with daycare, even though the amount we pay per week makes us cringe.

I admit I wasn't happy with our daycare in the beginning, mainly due to administrative reasons. First, it took forever for us to get a tour and for someone to call us back. Then, the business manager didn't know how to do math. Third, it took a good two months to get a door code. Eric stated the entire time that the most important thing was Ellie's care. She was in great hands. I cannot rave enough about the teachers that take care of her.

Yesterday, I dropped Ellie off in the playroom. It's a large room where the little kids get together from other rooms to play. It's kind of like recess, but indoors. There was someone that I did not recognize, Ms. Kim. One of Ellie's daycare teachers, Miss Charlene explained to me that Ms. Kim often comes in to hold Ellie and she works with the older kids. Which explains why Ms. Kim's eyes lite up when I brought Ellie in and quickly gave Miss Charlene a boy (the newest infant) she was holding and took Ellie instead. Ellie is clearly Ms. Kim's favorite little girl. It warms my heart that Ellie can brighten the days of so many people, I know Eric and mine's for sure! Even if it's at 4:30 a.m!

He's Not Enrique Iglesias!

Ellie has found her "shrieking" voice. I knew she found it a while back ago but it went away. However, it started resurfacing a few days ago. Friday night, Ellie and I were dancing to Justin Bieber's Baby song and Eric walked in. She got so excited in my arms and she started shrieking like the girls shriek in the concert when the band comes on stage. I said to Ellie, "he's not Enrique Iglesias" and Eric took Ellie and started singing, "I can be your hero, baby. I can kiss away your tears...."

I love these moments.

Six Months Old Already!?!

Where has the time gone? I honestly don't know. Ellie has grown up so much. However, since being in daycare for the past 13 weeks I would say about 2/3 of the time there she has been sick.

I never like to bring her there sick, but, when you spend all of your maternity leave on caring for a tiny baby that doesn't leave much time for me to be away from work taking care of a sick baby. Luckily Eric is able to "work" from home and take care of her a few times.

Last week was pretty rough. On Friday night/Saturday morning she woke up at 2, 4 and 6 a.m. I told Eric that we were definetely going to take her to see the pediatrician in the morning. I called that morning and were luckily able to get a visit in at 11:45. As I suspected, the pediatrician told me there was nothing wrong with her and just to run the humidifier and give saline drops. I had a feeling she had an ear infection and because the long weekend was ahead due to Memorial Day I wanted to be sure that she was checked out.

Then this past Wednesday she had her six month wellness visit with a different pediatrician. Our regular pediatrician is on maternity leave so we welcomed a very socially awkward female pediatrician. She was nice but when she checked Ellie she said that she did in fact have an ear infection. I was so upset because on Saturday night I decided to let Ellie cry it out. I fear that she was indeed in pain and may have wanted to be comforted. Although the pediatrician assured me that there's no telling when it could have started I just felt terrible. I also wondered if we did not have a wellness exam that day, how many more days would she be suffering? So 10 days of antibiotics and another check up in two weeks.

Ellie is 26 3/4 inches long, 16 pounds and 11 ounces at her six month check up. She is in the 97% percentile in length and 75% in weight.

Eric and I debated for a while in regards to solids. We did a lot of research and there were a lot of conflicting reports in regards to this topic. Actually, there's a lot of conflicting report about everything (i.e. Baby 411 says put the child to bed earlier, they wake up later while What to Expect the First Year states put the child to bed later, they'll wake up later). We noticed at 4 months she was definitely not ready for solids because she would use her tongue to block things (i.e. a toy) which we learned was a sign she was not ready.

In regards to breastfeeding I read a lot of material that stated that once I started feeding solids my supply would decrease. Naturally with working I did not want that to happen so we decided to hold off. However, this past Saturday we gave her a serving of rice cereal which she found interesting. It was fun but now the real challenge begins tomorrow when Eric and I will make baby food for the first time.

I have been fortunate to have a boss that allows me to pump 3 times a day. I also have a wonderful coworker that helps dodge the question of "Where's Nancy?" when students can't read my sign that says "I'm currently unavailable, please return in 20 minutes." Trust me, engineering male students just don't have the maturity to know what's really going on in those 20 minutes. I've done so well so far that I have a huge freezer stash and only a few bags left to store frozen milk. Just yesterday I had to freeze 12 ounces of milk because Ellie wasn't going to get to them within seven days.

Along with food, I kind of made an executive decision to begin putting Ellie to bed earlier. We used to put her to bed at 8, but then it became 7 and now it's become 6:30. Unfortunately, this means Eric has less time to play with Ellie at night because he usually gets home around 6. Then we read a few books and I nurse then she either cries or goes to sleep since she's awake when I put her down to bed. I really hate her crying to sleep but I hear from many people that it's the best way. So I'm trying it.

At this point, we still haven't evicted Ellie out of our room. We plan to do it this weekend but I admit I'm a little nervous. We've done a lot of straightening and just need to buy black out curtains, install the doors, and curtain rods before we can move her. It'll be a challenge for all of us but we also want to let her cry it out in the middle of the night instead of having to get up and sticking a pacifier in her mouth.

I can't believe Ellie is six months old and can already do so much. I oftentimes want time to stop so I can treasure this moment a little longer.