Happy 1st Birthday, Nora!

One entire year - we've made it!  No more sleepless nights, no more nursing merry-go-around, no more brace, no more physical therapy, no more bottles or gross formula.

Nora is all fun these days - she is a great sleeper, good eater and an even more fun belly-laughing little girl!  She is trying so hard to walk, and trying even harder to "hug" the dog while conspicuously detaching his ears.  Buddy is wise to her ways and constantly puts me between him and the baby.

Nora loves to imitate people, and won't settle for eating anything other than what is being served to the adults.  It really makes you evaluate your current diet!

She has several teeth, loves to clap and wave, enjoys her baths and "figuring" things out - like where I keep the glass measuring cups.  She isn't saying a whole lot right now - just Dada, Yeah, Ball and Oh No - but the pediatrician thinks she is about to start talking because she is constantly trying to communicate.

We celebrated Nora's special day with a big party at the house - I think there was somewhere around 20 babies (including three sets of twins) in attendance in addition to parents and other friends/relatives.  She really enjoyed all the attention (can you say diva?) and ate almost her entire smash cake.  I'm beginning to understand why she is in the 75% percentile for her weight;)  Here are a few photos from her party:

At one year, she weighs 21lb, 14oz., is 29.5 inches tall, "cruises" everywhere while taking a few independent steps here and there, loves ALL food, drinks whole milk, sleeps 12 hours a night plus one morning nap, wears 12 month clothes and is generally happy all the time.  We love you, Nora!

Bad Mommy Moments

The alarm went off.  I hopped out of bed, already planning out the daily logistics of getting myself and our 11-month-old ready and out the door, off to daycare and work.  Moments later, I got a text from the daycare saying it was closed for the weather.  I peeked out the blinds, saw a few snowflakes and shrugged.  I didn't think it was that bad, but who knows?  I patiently waited for the text from the University saying that campus was closed as well.  I never got it.

I'm a first-time mom, and I take it for granted that my child is pretty good at entertaining herself.  I emailed my office to let them know that I would be working from home and assumed it wouldn't be that difficult.  I was wrong.  It turns out, I wasn't the only person who didn't want to be at home that day.

She woke up fussy.  Feeding her didn't help.  Every time I came near her, she cried.  In the moments that she was happy, the dog was busy chewing something that didn't belong to him.  By 8:30 that morning, I had to change shirts twice because of spit-up.  She insisted on holding the instructions for assembling a bed frame while I tried to guess where the parts went.  If you sleep on that bed this weekend, beware.

I have been trying to train her to take one long afternoon nap each day in lieu of both a morning and afternoon nap.  That day, I burned a hole in the clock until it was her morning nap and marched her upstairs to the crib.  Instead of keeping it to her normal hour, I decided to let her sleep as long as she wanted.  1.5 hours in, I suddenly remember that FedEx is supposed to deliver a package. As I contemplate when the delivery should occur, the dog starts howling.  FedEx was on the front porch.  Cue the baby crying.  Sigh.

I managed to make it another 1.5 hours before I laid her down for another nap.  She slept pretty hard - it must be exhausting to be that mad at your parent all day.  After her nap, I took her to the grocery store assuming she would be misbehave there as well.

She was a total angel.  She smiled at the other customers.  She held their hands. She acted adorably bashful at times.  She reached for me.  She waved to people.  She offered her toys to complete strangers.  I really didn't want to leave the grocery store out of fear that there was a magic spell within that store.

I needed that.  I needed to be reminded that she is an angel 90% of the time.  The other 10% - she is still learning, still growing, still trying to communicate in her own way that I don't understand yet.  That short trip to the grocery store was like a do-over.  We were friends again.  I didn't even mind it when JD closed the garage door on my car when I got home.  Our little girl was happy again and that's all I cared about.

And, I never want to work from home again.

FB Smocked Clothing Sales: The Good, the Bad, and the U-G-L-Y

Some say I have a problem - I say it's a skill.  I enjoy finding the best deals on smocked and monogrammed children's clothing.  A recent check in my super-secret-hide-from-my-husband email folder revealed nine shipments of children's clothing heading my way (hope he isn't reading this!).  He doesn't understand that an $80 outfit for $30 is a deal that MUST be taken advantage of, so I hope that by sharing this list with you, my friends will understand my shopping obsession on Facebook:

1. The GOOD

Smocked Threads by Cecil and Lou: Adorable clothes, great customer service.  Any time I have to email about a shipping time or an ordering mistake, I always get a prompt email back from one of the owners who is happy to work around my needs.

Kandyland Kids: Formerly Candyland Kids, they have recently branched out to FB.  I love their appliqué selection.  Their Black Friday sale was so good that I ordered five outfits, and they arrived within days.


2. The BAD

Lolly Wolly Doodle: LWD is GREAT at marketing.  Their actual product is terrible.  What you receive in the mail is vastly different in the picture - rough seams, poorly spaced monogramming and incorrect product description (if an outfit is belted, it would in fact come with belt loops, not just an accompanying sash).  On top of that, they have an extremely long shipping period.  Their customer service seems to be evolving in the right direction at least - they apologized for the longer shipping period and gave me a discount coupon.  However, the quality of their clothes is sub-par.

Smockadot Kids: I've ordered a couple of things from Smockadot Kids.  Their clothing is high in quality and their pricing is fair.  The problem?  They have terrible customer service.  I received an outfit from them with the wrong color monogram.  Their CS agent admitted that a glitch in their system caused the mistake, but they wanted me to pay $10 to fix the monogram that they admitted was their mistake.  I spoke to everyone I could with no relief.  Finally, I disputed the transaction with PayPal who refunded my money.  Instead of correcting their own mistake, they lost $38.


3. The U-G-L-Y

Smocked Tots: I ordered an outfit in October and promptly paid the invoice.  By the end of November, I still hadn't received any shipping information.  When I inquired, I received random emails - 'it's in the mail', or 'I'll refund your money as soon as the manufacturer refunds us', or 'it's in the mail and I added a bow set to apologize for the delay.' After communicating with them via FB and email, it became apparent.   I was the victim of a scam. I started reading other comments on their wall - whenever they would post an item for sale, people would leave comments asking where their orders were.  After leaving several messages on their wall, they blocked me.  I sent a few follow-up emails to no avail.  Their BBB rating is pretty low.  There is even a FB page called Smocked Tots fraud.  I filed a complaint with the BBB, but the transaction was too old for me to dispute it with my check card.

Honorable Mention:

Smocked by StellyBelly: They have, hands down, the most adorable clothing.  A friend recently suggested their site and I was very impressed.  I've ordered several bubbles from them and look forward to receiving them in the mail.

Jetterbug's Monogramming: Jetterbug's is a great combination of price and quality.  It's a local company that sells over FB, and most of the items are shipped next day.  However, for 40% of the items I have ordered, I've had to send a gentle reminder to the owner that she still needs to ship them.  She always sends them after I remind her.  I think the owner is just overwhelmed with the site's popularity.

Posh Pickle: Posh Pickle doesn't have a large inventory, but they have good prices for what little is in stock.  In fact, I ordered two outfits from the owner.  When she sent the shipping information, she said that the outfits had gone on sale after I ordered them, and she went ahead and gave me the reduced price.  Good customer service!

2013: My Monthly Retrospective

I checked this blog the other day - apparently all the witty, interesting weekly posts from yours truly since October haven't been published, so I'll cut to the chase;)

2013 was obviously a banner year for us with the birth of our daughter.  Here's a monthly highlight recap:

January:
We kicked off the year with baby showers and day care tours.

32 weeks:

February:
My college roommates, Crickett and Martha, surprised me by flying into Memphis.  We spent the weekend seeing Mary Poppins at the Orpheum, walking around Shelby Farms and catching up on our gossip;)

March:
41+ weeks pregnant and about to pop!

Baby G is a GIRL!  Say hello to Nora Renee (3/13/13 at 11:45 pm - TWENTY hours of labor):

And we took her to church for the first time for Easter at 2.5 weeks old:

April:
Our families took turns visiting Nora.  Sarah (JD's sister) flew in from Houston to meet her niece:

Megan and Emma came in for a second visit.  They all came up the weekend after she was born, but had to get back to school and work the next week.  This time, they were able to stay a bit longer over their Spring Break.

Nora officially has godparents - our friends, Brent and Stephanie!  They were so supportive of us during all of the infertility years (and ongoing).  Nora is lucky to have them!

May:
Kevin came back from Afghanistan!  Nora got to meet her Uncle Kevin for the first time.

Emma injured her finger at school and had a small procedure to reattach the tip of her finger.  We packed up the baby and drove to Georgia to go check on our girl!

June (BIG month):
Our friends Jake, Morgan and Frances visited us for a few fun days:

First (of many) lake trips with Nora:

Nora was baptized as our families watched on:

Stopped over at Millsaps College to show Nora her future campus on our way to the beach:

July:
We spent ten days in Portland, OR while JD was setting up his new OR office (this is a picture of a bike exhibit at the Oregon Museum of Art).

August:
Sold our house!  We had it on the market for less than 48 hours.  Then the contract fell through a few weeks later.  Then it sold again in 6 hours.  Holy cannoli that was a crazy time;)

We fly to Houston to see JD's sister, Sarah, and get to see her and her husband's new house!

September:
I start back to school and work, Nora starts daycare, and we move into our new house.  I proceed to throw out all of the boxes we used for moving as visual reinforcement that we are NEVER MOVING AGAIN.  Ridding the house of the 1990s landscaping is my first project;)

October:
JD finally plays disc golf with me for my birthday:

My brother is one of the top three finishers in the Pumpkin Run 5K:

November:
We fly to Georgia for Emma's 5th Birthday:

Nora's first Thanksgiving was spent with our friends the Grodskys.  Mary had just given birth to Colin less than a week before Thanksgiving, but Mary's sister, Ruth, insisted we still come over to the house. It was delicious:

December:
Wrapped up the semester as Nora turned 9 months old (my string bean has turned into my butter bean!  This girl that was once in the 5th percentile for weight is now in the 50th percentile - wow!):

5,000 Christmas parties and family events occur for Nora's first Christmas:

And, that's a wrap.  It's been an amazing year, but I have a feeling that 2014 will be even better!

Seven Months

The calendar keeps moving - I can't believe we have a seven-month-old in our house!

Nora continues to surprise us with her developing personality and milestones.  Here's a quick run-down:

CRAWLS.  That's right - our little girl started crawling somewhere around 6.5 months.  Everyday she gets faster and more agile.  Is our house baby-proofed?  Of course not.  Here's a video of her going after some dangling cords - uh oh!

Waves hello and says "Hi!".  She more or less waves at herself, but I remember when my niece did the same thing.  I think all babies start waving at themselves before they turn their little hands around.

Says "Dada."  It was hard for me to admit that - not only is she her Daddy's twin, Nora is saying his name.  Never mind the fact that I endured the 42 week pregnancy, 20 hour labor and delivery for our 7 pound, 4 ounce miracle, and then breastfed said miracle for almost 5 months.  Nada for Mama.

Works on her name in sign language.  When I was in college, I spent time volunteering for the Mississippi School for the Deaf and have a big heart for the deaf culture.  While I can no longer carry on a conversation in sign language, I'd always heard what a great tool baby sign language (Mommy, Daddy, Milk, More, All Gone, Dog, etc.) was in communicating with your baby.  In addition to teaching her basic signs, I have been hand-spelling Nora's name.  She loves to mimic me!

Back in the brace.  I know what you're thinking - that we had gotten the second opinion on her hip dysplasia and decided to take her out of the brace.  After we made that decision, I kept having this nagging feeling that we leapt too soon when we heard what we wanted to hear.  I had conversations with her physical therapist, a neighbor who is a pediatric anesthesiologist and her pediatrician who all encouraged a third opinion.  The ultimate sticking point was the fact that Nora's old pediatric orthopedic doctor wrote us a typed, three-page letter detailing the reasons why she felt that we received 'imprudent' advice from our second opinion doc.  She even attached references and articles supporting her position.  We never received the letter because it was sent to our old address - the pediatrician mentioned it to me, which is when I found out about its existence.  We decided to have her fitted for a long-term brace that Nora will wear when she sleeps until she is at least 3 or 4 years old.  Will surgery still be in her future?  Possibly, but at least we will know that we did everything we could to prevent Nora's hip operation if that happens.

Working on standing.  This is turning into the 'motor skills' blog post.  Now that Nora is crawling, I'll put an object that she wants up on the edge of the couch or something.  She will try to pull up.  If I put her in a standing position, I really don't have to support her that much while she grabs the object.

Eating more formula and food.  JD and I had wondered off and on if we were feeding Nora enough.  I had already increased her veggie baby food intake to two containers a day when her daycare workers mentioned that Nora always seemed hungry.  We increased the amount of formula she receives to 32 ounces a day (from 29 ounces), and have been feeding her real bits of food.  The other day, I gave her a few bits of my sandwich to see if she would eat any of it - she gobbled up every piece of turkey, avocado and tomato.  My girl loves to eat everything!  The highest her weight percentage has ever been was 25% for her age, so we aren't worried too much about overfeeding her at this stage.

Here is the latest photo dump:

Nora hangs out in my bathroom every morning while I get ready.  I guess she got a little tired of waiting on Mommy and passed out.

Headed to dinner with our friends to celebrate their new baby, Meredith.

One of my old co-workers, Carmen, gave me this shopping cart cover at a baby shower.  This was our first time trying it out!  So much easier than having a car seat in the basket, but it does tire her out a little bit.  I have to wedge my purse between her and the side of the cart so she can lean over and relax:)

We like to play on the floor of her closet.  Nora crawled over to the piled up bumper pads (JD won't let me use them in her crib) and the whole pile fell on top of her, much to her delight!

My mother and sister gave this to me at one of my baby showers - it's a toy that is supposed to help kids learn how to walk.  At her age, she can put the balls is specific places for the noisemaker to work.  She played with it for ten minutes before she started 'connecting the dots' and attempting to put the pieces in their similar sized holes.  So smart!  In a few months she will hopefully be pushing it around on those little baby legs!

First time playing with my Uncle John.  He's been sick off and on since this summer, and we went to visit them on my day off on Friday.  He loved Nora!

This was the first time she met my Aunt Candice, she loved hanging out with my aunt and uncle!

A pretty good idea of my mornings - Nora plays on the floor of our bathroom and spits up.  Buddy watches for the spit up and tries to lick it up before I chase him away.  Every. Morning.

Nora gets to wear the medal for being related to her Uncle Kevin, who finished first in his age range and fourth overall for the LeBonheur Pumpkin Run 5K.  Good job, Kev!

Post-bath in her Princess hooded towel.  How fitting in our house:)

Thirty ONE-derful Years

Last weekend, I celebrated my 31st birthday.  I am officially 'in my 30s'.  I told one of my doctors a few days before my birthday that I was 31, and then he corrected me and asked why I was in a rush to turn another year older?  I laughed and said that nothing makes you feel older than being a parent.  Being the father of three, he knew exactly what I was talking about.

JD planned a very special surprise day for my birthday (actually the day before):

It started out with a beautiful flower delivery - in a pumpkin!  JD always has the florist do something unique with my flowers - either the actual arrangement or the container.

Three years ago, I learned how to play disc golf during one my sessions with Leadership Germantown. I had such a good time, and have been asking JD for THREE YEARS to play disc golf with me to no avail.  He thought it looked silly, etc.  He had a babysitter come over to our house on Friday afternoon, and told me to get dressed 'casually', that we would be walking around in the woods.  I rolled my eyes, but complied.  As we left the house on foot, he was carrying a huge wrapped present.  I kept peppering him with questions about the present, but he just acted like he always carries wrapped presents on his walks.  As we got closer to the park, I realized what we were about to do - he was going to play disc golf with me!  Our neighborhood park has a really well-known 18-hole disc golf trail.  After we located the first tee box, I was allowed to unwrap my first present - two disc golf sets and a carrying case.  We played nine holes, and JD was hooked.  I enjoyed muttering phrases like "I'm going to need my putter for that," and "I can't believe I lost my driver in the water."  We are already recruiting friends to play with us:)

As we got back to the house, JD told me I had to hurry to get ready because we needed to be in East Memphis by 5:45 p.m., but wouldn't say why.  About a month or so ago, I ordered so many clothes for Nora that JD made me promise to stop for a little while.  I agreed, but kept lamenting about how much I loved dressing Nora up in unique, adorable clothes (IMO).  At 5:45, JD parked in front of one of my favorite baby boutiques in Memphis.  He said - "they close at 6 p.m., I'll buy Nora anything you pick out in the next 15 minutes"...or at least, that's what I think he said because I was already out of the car and headed for the door!  I think he underestimated my shopping abilities because about ten minutes into my 'baby shopping spree', he gave me a look and said that I had been 'most efficient.'  We had fun, and JD even picked out a few outfits.  FYI - his weakness is pink clothes for our little girl.  If I think he is wary about me buying clothes for Nora, I just have to show him something pink.  Haha!

After the baby shopping spree, he took me across the street to pick out one book from my favorite bookstore.  Of course I convinced him to purchase three;)

Then we headed downtown for dinner.  JD knows how much I love dining outdoors, so he found the perfect combo - a new restaurant with a patio!  We ate amazing things like lobster pronto pups and split a bottle of wine.  After a quick walk for ice cream, we headed home to our sweet, sleeping baby.

The next day, on my actual birthday, I got to open my other presents - a gift card from Nora to my salon (she is always pulling on my hair), a ping pong net for our recently acquired ping pong table (the previous homeowner left it for us and I love to play) and a volleyball net for pool volleyball (the new house has a pool with holes in the floor of the pool for volleyball net poles).  We spent the day running around together, getting Nora's hand print made at Itty Bitty Bella (of course I had to buy her another outfit!) and doing projects during Nora's naps.  What a fun weekend!

Second Opinion Update

Most of our friends and family are familiar with Nora's orthopedic issues from birth.  Though temporary in nature, they required many trips to the doctor and physical therapist on a weekly basis.  In a nutshell, the pediatrician who examined her at birth felt that Nora might have hip dysplasia.  It took a couple of weeks to show up on an ultrasound, but Nora was diagnosed with both hip dysplasia and torticollis.  These conditions arose from development in the womb.

Nora at birth.  Her legs appear 'twisted' and she always looked to one side.

I had a blissfully easy pregnancy with no complications.  For whatever reason, my uterus never grew large enough to accommodate her growth and she was "smushed" for the whole pregnancy.  Her hip was dislocated, dysplastic (misformed) and her neck muscles were weak on one side.  The good news was that these conditions are temporary.  The bad news was that the treatment was pretty intensive to correct these issues.  At three weeks old, she was suited up for a Wheaton-Pavlik harness and sent to physical therapy for her neck muscles.

Nora in her harness.  Don't diaper changes look like fun??

Initially, 12 weeks of treatment was prescribed with six weeks of full-time harness wear and six weeks of part-time harness wear.  However, her hip dysplasia was pretty severe warranting full-time harness wear for almost four months.  Once the follow-up ultrasounds began to show improvement, her pediatric ortho downgraded her to part-time wear, finally allowing this Mommy to put that sweet baby in all those adorable outfits!  We were fully expecting the doctor to release Nora from the harness when I took her in for a check-up last week.  Unfortunately, the doctor very casually explained that she wanted Nora to be fitted for a long-term brace that she would wear for 3-4 years at bed time.  I was pretty upset to say the least.  We really like Nora's ortho doctor, but this was completely the opposite of what I had been expecting.  My sister suggested (in a very loving, helpful way, not bossy) that I get a second opinion.  I had thought about getting a second opinion before, but it took us so long to find a pediatric ortho that was in our insurance's network that I knew seeing anyone else would be expensive. After the prescription for a long-term brace, I decided to bite the bullet and get a fresh pair of eyes on Nora.

Nora at our appointment.

The new doctor agreed with the initial diagnosis of Nora at birth - she needed the brace to stabilize that hip and capture any opportunity of normal formation due to the rapid growth of infants.  However, he felt that the hip had stabilized.  The X-rays showed that her right hip still hasn't caught up to the left hip in terms of development, but he felt that the hip socket would form more normally as she began crawling and walking.  In fact, he went in to the controversy in the pediatric orthopedic field about bracing children and treating them for orthopedic issues for which they have no symptoms or complications but might have issues when they are adults.  Nothing we had done for Nora up until this point hampered her development, he just didn't feel that extended brace wear was necessary. He said that a third of pediatric orthos would tell us to brace Nora until she was 5, a third of them would say to brace her until she refused to wear it, and a third of the doctors would tell us to take the brace off.  There just wasn't enough science to justify either approach once the hip stabilized.  So, we made the decision.  No more brace for Nora!  We will miss her sweet pediatric ortho she has seen every week since birth because we will schedule her annual follow-ups with the new doctor, but it had to be done.  Next week, she should be released from physical therapy for her torticollis treatment.  Everything is really coming together for our little girl - she will be crawling before we know it!