Isabella is now 11 weeks old and growing like a weed! I never thought I would make it this far without completely losing my marbles, but I have. It's been taxing on us as a family, but Scott is doing a great job helping out where he can and certainly carrying the financial burden until I go back to work at the beginning on November. We start the morning off with waking up to precious coo-ing coming from the bassinet right next to my side of the bed. Sometimes she will let out a loud "Ahhhhh!" just to let us know that she's ready to get out of bed. We feed her a bottle, change her and begin the morning the only way we know how, by relishing every moment with our angel. Scott goes out and walks Otis while I feed Izzy. He gets ready for work and Izzy and I start our morning with the Today show. We play for about an hour or so on her playmat as well as in my lap. She loves it when I hold her under her arms and let her stand on her feet and bounce around in my lap. She's one strong little baby! She jumps up and down like she's on a trampoline and I let her wear herself out.
She takes her morning nap around 10 or 10:30 and will usually stay asleep for about an hour in her swing. The entire time she naps, she hums to herself in her sleep and often opens just one eye to make sure I'm right there. If she catches me in the kitchen, all hell breaks loose and she screams until I put her pacifier back in and off she drifts back into baby slumber.
She's eating 4 ounces on average now every 2 to 3 hours and sometimes she'll surprise us and inhale up to 7 ounces in one feeding. She's still on her acid reflux meds which is just liquid Zantac and she gets this twice a day every 12 hours. I also have to give her gas drops at least once a day that help relieve her trapped gas, poor angel. It's so funny when she's baking a little something in her diaper for us. She makes the most hilarious faces and grunts like a little old man. She toots very loudly during these little sessions and that's how we know that it's time to start moving towards the stash of diapers and wipes.
Overall, she does pretty well with me during the day. She starts daycare, however, on 10/31 and I'm worried that they'll just leave her to cry by herself and they won't comfort her the way we do. I know that she eventually has to learn how to soothe herself, but she's a very attention-hungry little princess and can sometimes be downright high maintenance. It's going to kill me having to leave her there on her first day, but I have to do it. Until we win the lottery, we have no other choice but to both work. We like having nice things and in order to do that, we gotta work for it!
I've been preparing her daycare bag and I soooo want to find a way to stick a little camera or recorder in there to keep an ear on my baby, but I know I can't do that. She'll only be in daycare Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays from 9-4 and then my mom will go pick her up and keep her at her place until I get off work at 6. We've been working on a schedule and a routine for her and it seems to be working fairly well. I have her bathed and dressed for bed no later than 8 and asleep by 9. It may seem late for some people, but for us getting off work so late and Scott not getting home from work until 8, it works for us. He may only get to spend an hour with her in the evenings, but I bet it's his most precious and cherished hour of his day.
At night she falls asleep around 9, like I said, and she wakes back up some time around 4 for a bottle and doesn't wake back up until she's ready to get up for the day around 7:30. Every now and then, she has a bad night where she's not feeling well with either gas or reflux and she's up a few more times in between. Those make for really tough days the next day for mommy since Scott has to work the next day and can't get up with her. He does, however, give me a night off every week (on Monday nights) where he is off the next day and it allows me to sleep all through the night uninterrupted. I really hope that things keep going the way they have been. It's frustrating at times and totally exhausting, but so very worth it when she looks at us and smiles that half-cocked little Popeye smile and giggles!!
Little Isabella is being baptized next Saturday morning and will officially be a Coptic Orthodox Christian. I chose her baptism saint today with my mother, after some research. I chose Saint Demiana who was martyred and would not forsake her Christianity for the promise of a better life. She was tortured as a child and a young adult and was finally killed along with her friends. Each person that's baptized in our church must choose a Coptic saint as their patron saint and so her baptism name will be Isabella Demiana Evan Scarborough!
I will update next week after the baptism and post some photos then!
