6 Months!

Now that school is done and my life is a lot more relaxed, I thought it would be a great time for another post!

Paisley is 6 months old now! It's gone by so fast! It feels like it's only been a month! I've gotten so used to changing diapers, washing clothes, and soothing her that it easy now. I love her more every day!

However, since it's been so long since I posted I had better rewind  pretty far and go over all the major things that have happened.

Paisley has always been such a good baby and I am proud to be her mama. She doesn't fuss much, she's never really spit up much, and every major transition has gone pretty smoothly. Not long after Paisley was born she started sleeping most nights. Not sleeping through the night but she would only wake up to eat and then usually go right back to sleep. But once the sun was up, she was up too! Sometimes it was difficult to get her to fall asleep in her bassinet because she preferred sleeping in our bed with us (and because I would fall asleep while feeding her and wake up a few hours later and she'd be hungry again...) but even though we loved snuggling with her we tried to get her to sleep in her bassinet when we could. 

Paisley's first time in her crib.

Paisley loved the wrap!

She did go through a phase at about 2 months when she cried often, but mostly in the evenings which happened to be the best for me because Myles would be home and we could take turns soothing her. 

This year we did Christmas morning in our home with just our little family. It was modest, but fun! We got most of Paisley opening her presents on video so we can remember it forever. Then soon after opening gifts we rushed over to Fiona's house and went to church with my family. she had such a pretty Christmas dress! 

The day after Christmas was her baby blessing. We did a small gathering in our church building (not a sacrament meeting) and gave her a blessing with family present. We chose the day after Christmas because my family was in town for the holiday and we didn't want them to have to make a separate trip. After the blessing we had refreshments and took some pictures. My mom and mom-in law have those pictures. If I can get my hands on them I'll post them. Myles family stayed for a little while and Paisley loved spending time with all her Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, and Grandparents while they were here. I think she liked the attention!

For her first Valentines day I got Paisley a cute little outfit and a new book to read to her about God's love for his children. She likes books but she mostly just chews on them. Although for a while she enjoyed turning the pages! When she was 3 1/2 months she started rolling over. Once she got the hang of that, we couldn't get her to stop! Any time we would lay her down on her back she would roll onto her tummy. Then it wasn't long before she learned to roll the other way too! It was her favorite method of travel.

When Paisley turned 4 months old we made a whole bunch of changes all at once. First, we started putting her in her crib in the nursery to sleep. This meant letting her "cry it out" to get to sleep. After only a few nights of crying she started going to sleep by herself very well.  We started this because our pediatrician said it was time. As soon as she started sleeping in the nursery she started sleeping for longer periods of time at night- at least 5 hours. She also started sucking her thumb! I guess since she didn't have me to give her her pacifier every 2 minutes she needed to find something else to suck on to soothe herself. We also had to provide her first bottle of formula when she was 4 months old. I had so much going on with school and taking care of her that I failed to pump enough milk to feed her while I was at school. Myles said she loved the formula which is good because it made it easy for us, but I was a little sad because I wanted her to prefer my milk. I sort of regret starting her on formula because since then I have had a few struggles producing all the milk she needs. I'm hoping my supply will build up again soon.

Now she is 6 months old and she is sleeping 7+ hour stretches at night, getting up onto her hands and knees, rolling/scooting around the house, putting everything she can reach in her mouth, sitting up without support (for short periods of time) and smiling at everyone who talks to her! Everyone loves her and I don't blame them. She is the cutest!

Paisley I love you so much and I can't believe how much you've grown! You are so strong and smart, you amaze me every day! You mean so much to me and I hope I can be the mother you deserve. You make me so happy, and I hope I can extend that happiness back to you. I love you!

Paisley One Month Old

Yes, she does get angry!

I Love Being a Mom!

Life with Paisley is great! She is the CUTEST little girl in the whole universe! And I'm not just saying that because I'm her mom. :) I'm so glad I get to stay home with her all day. I do take a few shifts a week at work and Myles watches her while I'm gone, but for the most part, I'm a stay-at-home Mom now. I'm glad for the time at work because I do go a little crazy after a while of not leaving the house so it's relieving to be able to leave for a few hours.
When Paisley was about 2 weeks she rolled over twice from her tummy to her back! She hasn't done it since then and I think it's because she's put on a few pounds and her muscles haven't developed fast enough to keep up. But we'll keep putting her on her tummy and hopefully she will roll over again soon!
She is a very strong baby! She can hold her head up fairly well and she can push herself up with her legs as long as someone is holding her.
When Paisley smiles, the whole world stops to look. It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen and it makes me so happy inside! She has cute little dimples and I have no idea where she got them. Myles is so good at making her smile, and I'm getting the hang of it too. She just needs to be in the right mood.

We found out that she will go to sleep without being held if she is in a swing. But soon after we made this discovery, our used swing broke. :( But we borrowed another from my sister. My life is much easier when she will fall asleep somewhere besides in my arms. Although sometimes I like to hold her anyway. :)

Paisley went to the emergency room this week. :( Right around midnight she got a fever so we called our pediatrician's night call nurse and she said to definitely take her in right away. We hate the ER, but if we hadn't gone and anything bad happened to Paisley that could have been prevented I couldn't live with myself. So we got and of course her fever had already gone down by the time we checked in. It took all night to get all the tests done to make sure she was ok and of course everything came back normal. When they put her IV in and tok it out she didn't even make a face! She was so perfect it was amazing! She cried a tiny bit with the catheter they gave her to get a urine sample, and she cried the most when they sucked the mucus out of her nose. But she was really an angel the whole time. I have such a good baby girl! So we came home and Myles ate some food and then left for his last day of finals. Crazy!

Paisley with the IV in her arm. She was tired. Sorry it's bad quality I took it on my phone.

I love my baby girl so much!

Paisley's first Thanksgiving.

How Hypnobirthing Helped Me Have a Natural Birth

In preparation for my birth I took Hypnobirthing classes. Many of my pregnant friends have said they wanted to hear how Hypnobirthing worked for me so I thought I'd share.
Firstly, I felt empowered while I was taking the classes because I learned more about my body and specifically how it works during pregnancy and birth. Knowledge is power! Once I learned how my muscles and bones would be working with my baby during birth the whole idea seemed a lot less scary. I also grew to appreciate how amazing my body is, and I knew my body was literally created by God for this purpose. I am made to give birth!
In addition to learning about the body, we also learned about our minds and the power they have over our bodies. We explored the power this gives us and how it can help us during birth. To do this, we used breathing techniques, relaxation, and self-hypnosis to focus on relaxing muscles in our bodies and minimize pain. I practiced this every night while going to sleep, and it helped me to sleep better. I think this practice is what helped me to effectively relax my face and abdomen during my contractions and it relieved a lot of the pain.
Also, in my post about Paisley's birth I mentioned that I took one drug in the hopes that it would significantly dull the pain and help me get some sleep. I was looking for an easy way to take a break from all the work I was putting in and get some rest because I was exhausted! Unfortunately, the drug did nothing for me except perhaps make me more drowsy. The reason I bring this up is because I believe that using a relaxation script would have been more effective and produced better results than the drug I took. towards the beginning of my labor, I did use a script to help me relax and I felt much more rejuvenated after that exercise than I did after taking the drug. If I had continued this practice during my labor I believe I would not have felt I needed a drug.
Finally, Hypnobirthing helped me know what birth experience I wanted, and taught me the things I could do to get that experience. This included things like writing birth preferences, and getting the support you need to be successful. My experience would have been much more difficult if not for the support of my doula/big sister Fiona and my husband Myles. They were so supportive and encouraging from day one! It was wonderful to have a big sister who had been there to whom I could go with questions, and Myles was so encouraging, he made me believe I could do anything! I cannot thank them enough for the role they played in my birth experience.

And that is how Hypnobirthing helped me have a natural birth. Let me know if you have any questions!