You're leaving the baby behind...right?!

Last Friday I came home from work to find a sweet little card from my husband with an anniversary surprise: We were headed to Portland (our favorite city) for our 2 year wedding anniversary! An over night trip....by ourselves...without Vienna........ Would I go for it?! He wasn't sure, poor guy. He'd been planning and coordinating the details with my mom for a month and a half, to make sure I'd be comfortable with our little get-a-way. My first reaction was "WOOHOO! FUN!" and then I asked if we could just look for a hotel in Olympia that we could stay at for the night. Like the sweetheart he is, agreed and said I could start looking. But I decided against it. It was ONLY an hour or so away, my mom was going to stay AT our house so Vienna would have all her goods...*sigh* I needed to be strong.

So for all of last week, I talked myself into be really excited. I was looking forward to Saturday ALL week...of course a little piece of me didn't want to leave Vienna behind, but I know that Taylor and I both needed some time to ourselves. All I kept talking about all week was how I was looking forward to sleeping ALL night! :-) haha Taylor kept making fun of me as that isn't necessarily what he had in mind- LOL

My mom arrived yesterday, we gave her the loooooong list of instructions of how to care for a baby overnight (as if she had never had children before) gave our Miss a kiss and headed to Ptown.

Nana & Vienna sleepover!

Headed to Portland!

Secret: Taylor didn't want to leave Vienna behind...he said "When we get back, she'll be walking!" She really has been growing up so fast lately! Rolling over, sitting up, standing, sleeping in her own room....ugh!

I called the hotel earlier in the week and asked to add the romance package to our room. Champagne and chocolates...yummm!

At the hotel lounge picking up our complimentary beer/wine!

When we walked into the lounge to redeem our complimentary beverages, there was a giant group of gals there all dolled up with a bachelorette. In honor of celebrating OUR anniversary and reminiscing about our special day, I suggested we order her a shot. The bartender took it over to her, told her it was from us and she was SO excited! LOL It was cute. When Taylor went to redeem his last coupon for a beer the bartender upgraded the size for free! Woot for Taylor!

Arriving at the Rogue- our favorite (more pics babe?!)

Taster Tray: Juniper PA, Mocha Porter, Chocolate Stout and Irish Lager

Tryin' the Mocha Porter



Sexy!

Chocolate Stout...Yum!



Taylor's new van!



Taylor's pizza and my halibut and chips! So delicious!

Bacon Maple Ale: Taylor wanted to try it but because there are real bits of bacon in it, they can't have it on tap- so he bought a bottle to bring home- sounds disgusting! I loved the pink bottle!

Love Birds

Getting ready to face time with Vienna

I'm so thankful to have facetime! How did parents ever go without it?! I feel so fortunate to have the technologies we have today...We were able to say good night to our sweet face-to-face! Amazing! Unfortunately once we were done, I had a bit of a melt-down and just wanted to go home. Taylor convinced me to stay..but it was tough! Who knew it'd be so difficult to be away from our Sweetums?!

Missing Vienna and PO'd Taylor was taking a picture of me CRYING! HAHA

We rented 21 Jump Street but I fell asleep probably 20 minutes into it. It was absolutely amazing to get such SOUND sleep! It was just what the doctor ordered for this Mama.
     Side note/confession: I was sooooo lazy and sleeping soooooo good that when I woke up in the middle of the night, I couldn't sleep on my side or stomach because of some extreme engorgement: I didn't even care. I just slept on my back and didn't pump (except once when we got to the hotel). Boy oh boy did I regret that at 8am! Just call me Dolly...but Dolly in tears! I found relief after pumping 15 ounces! Ouchie!!

Check-out was at 1pm, but we decided we wanted to be HOME by 1pm so I could feed Vienna instead of Nana giving her a breast milk bottle. We hit up breakfast at the hotel which was a buffet style. We (Taylor) took some of EVERYTHING! It was "free" so why the heck not?! We both had pretty good stomach aches from all the junk we ate over our 24 hour vacation- but what's vacation without junk food!?



Forget continental breakfasts! Bring on the buffet/cafeteria style breakfast of champions!

We were really impressed with the breakfast- for how cheap the room was, we really scored on the amenities!

Our first overnighter without Vienna was so fabulous! We had such a nice time being husband and wife instead of mommy and daddy. We both are in love with being mommy and daddy, but we were reminded of roles as husband and wife and the importance of maintaining those roles.

A big thanks to Nana for taking care of Vienna! We are so grateful!

Happy Anniversary (tomorrow) to my sweet husband! I love you more and more each day and am so thankful you chose ME to be your wife. Thank you for the much needed R&R and for our sweet baby girl. We truly have it all!!!

Friday, August 13th, 2010



Lesson Learned

Remember this beautiful piece of furniture Vienna's Daddy made her?

Well, thanks to Mommy, she only sleeps in the crib during nap time. At night, she slept in her bassinet in our bedroom, RIGHT next to me so I could over-stress about every sound and movement. Sounds fabulous right?! Each time Taylor would insist on having her sleep in her room, I would protest that it was going to be too much work and I would sleep even worse. Come to find out, I was...yes, I hate to say it, WRONG!

Last weekend we had Vienna sleep in her nursery overnight, for the first time. I moved the bassinet into her room right next to the crib, as I thought she might need to slowly work into sleeping in her room. Her sleep patterns stayed the same, so I felt this was a great transition. Finally ONE for mom. :-)

I came home from work yesterday to find the bassinet in the garage. I knew, it was time. Time for our big girl to sleep IN her crib, IN her room, all the time, even night time. I know many parents who had their little ones in their cribs the first night, week or month home from the hospital. I just couldn't do it! I wanted to, but just didn't feel strong enough. Until last night. I put on my big girl panties and at bed time, I laid her in the beautiful crib....

How did it go??

To my surprise, I slept FABULOUSlY and Miss Vienna only woke up ONCE after sleeping 5 hours straight before needing to eat. (She usually only goes 3 hours) She slept fabulously as well! Sure, every night won't be like last night, but I felt like a giant success this morning!

So, my lesson learned? Babies are fine in their nurseries!!! It seems so silly and simple, but I needed to learn this lesson. I can still go in and check on her as much as possible, and although the monitor still shares the sounds of her movements, my brain is able to turn off and actually catch some zzz's without having her movement sounds RIGHT next to me. My brain knows to wake up when she vocalizes a sound instead of rolling around.

I'm almost embarrass to post this, but I feel so proud to have finally accomplished this, I HAD to share! (Even if I sound like a pansie mommy!)

Watch out Baby J #2! Mommy is learning...kind of quick! ;-)

USA takes GOLD!

If there was an event in the Olympics for rolling over to grab for books and toys, Vienna would take GOLD for certain! She's been rolling over intermittently for a while now, but as of last night, she no longer HATES tummy time and rolls over to her belly as often as possible. Not only to grab for toys, but to scratch whatever surface is beneath her...listening and feeling the textile below.

Can you believe she is 5 months? I sure can't. But I can say that this has been a fun month! Although it's bittersweet that she's becoming more and more independent, it's so much fun to watch her advance and grow.

Some highlights of 4-5 months:

She really started JUMPING in her jumperoo: She can't get enough of her jumperoo! She stands in it, spins around, grabs for ALL of the toys....unlike last month where she just sucked on the front of it and could barely touch the ground!
Laughing outloud- yes she's laughed before, but not like this. Taylor was poking her with some sort of tool, in her belly, and she could not help but to giggle and giggle each time he did it. Toward the end of her 4th month, if either of us ran with Alli in the yard and Alli chased and/or barked, Vienna would laugh from the pit of her stomach. SOOO precious! Taylor and I took turns holding her and running with the dog, just to experience her laughing.
      *Isn't it incredible that babies have a sense of humor? I'm so in awe of this innate characteristic!

Coughing- she has discovered how to cough and get a ton of attention from her Daddy. Each time she coughs Daddy always says ,"OHHHH, are YOU okaaay??" very concerned like. It's so sweet!

Vienna took her first dip in the pool. She was NOT a fan. I think we decided she's not a fan of the pool water because although it's a heated pool at Grams', her bathtub water is super warm so she's been a little spoiled. Cold water just ain't her cup of tea. One of the pool days, with Kylee and Melissa, Vienna slept. Yes, she slept while I was walking her around the pool. Perhaps a coping mechanism since she really wasn't enjoying the whole "swim" time situation.

She found her tootsies! She cannot get enough of sucking on her cute little toes! Daddy has to hold off on pedicures for a bit now!

Began pulling herself up from sitting to standing, while holding onto Daddy's fingers

Participated in her first 8K walk/race with her Daddy!

Daddy and Vienna walked the 8K and Mommy ran her first half marathon

Vienna Loves:

chewing anything and everything!
sucking on mom's shoulder
drinking water from our glasses and her sippy cup
grabbing for and holding anything we have
talking, talking and talking
laughing
smiling
meeting new people: she gets so excited to meet new people and kicks her legs like crazy!
reaching for everything
showers and baths
sitting in her bumbo seat

Really, what doesn't she love?! She is such a happy baby. We are truly so blessed to have such a sweet little angel enriching our lives. Although I still remember what life was like without her, I can't imagine not having her to love and adore each day. Miss V is our everything!