Maya got all dressed in green for St Pat’s day and probably got pinched anyway (it’s the cheeks).

Maya’s First St Pats – 4 months old

Last night, we took Maya to a game night that friends of our host on a monthly basis. We tried this out a couple months ago, and essentially she either cried or slept the entire time. What a difference two months makes (go figure). She was downright charming this time, looking around, smiling, letting people hold her. We’ll have to get her out of the house more. We don’t want her to be an antisocial hermit like her parents.

The important thing about this game night though is that we made the Smitten Kitchen Irish Car Bomb cupcakes. This was a special request from Sean, and he doesn’t make too many, so I spent a couple of my precious hours making cupcakes for him. The cake part of these cupcakes is Chocolate Stout Cake made with Guinness. They’re filled with irish whiskey-laced ganache and topped with Baileys buttercream frosting. I don’t care too much about the ganache or the frosting, but that cake, oh my gawd. It was so moist, and the chocolate had a pleasant bitter edge from the beer. I’m already thinking about baking a cake, and we haven’t even worked our way through all the cupcakes yet.

Maya on the changing pad – 4 months old

Completely unrelated to St Pat’s … I know this is odd, but one of Maya’s favorite places to be is on her changing pad which is currently located on a bathroom counter where she can look in the mirror. She spends a lot of time grinning at and talking to the baby in the mirror. Add to that the joy of being footloose and pants-free, and you have a very happy baby.

Wow, it’s been nearly two months since we’ve last posted. A lot has happened in that time.

Maya in stripes – 3 1/2 months old

I started back to work on February 11th. I feel very fortunate that I was able to take twelve weeks off with Maya. I think the time was good for both of us, and I was able to learn a few things. The first of these is that taking care of a baby, while intensely rewarding, is hard. For instance, I learned that my decision-making ability plummets with diminished sleep. I also discovered that I have a hard time processing things rationally when she’s crying. Sean will be talking to me, and the words are in no way sticking in my head because my baby is crying and my brain has short-circuited to fix it-fix it-fix it. I also re-learned that I do like having my engineering job – that taking care of Maya full-time is not the path for me.

Instead, since I work from home and Sean often works from home as well, we’ve hired a nanny. A nice lady named Anna comes to the house every weekday to watch Maya. It’s great because Anna obviously adores children, and she shows up rested and ready to play and work with Maya on things like tummy time, napping, and sitting up in her Bumbo chair. If I need to during the day, I can have a five or ten minute visit with the baby to get my fix and then get back to work. So far, it seems to be working out well.

Maya’s learned a few new tricks, naturally. She is very consistently rolling from her tummy to her back (though to her intense frustration, she hasn’t figured out how to go from her back to her tummy yet). She’s been talking her own little baby language complete with great big squeaks and gasps for a while now. Her smiles are now given freely and often. And just this week, she’s finally discovered that she has hands and is batting at and grabbing things a bit.

One of her best new tricks has been sleeping in her crib in her own room.

For the first few months, we had her sleeping in a pack-and-play at the foot of our bed. It was nice for us to be able to monitor her, and it made dealing with night-time feedings easier.

The transition started around mid- to late February when she decided she was all done being swaddled, a development that resulted in several nights of really bad sleep for all of us as her free arms and legs startled her awake over and over again. She eventually figured out how to calm herself down and would sleep a little more consistently, but every little grunt and thump she made would wake me up.

Anna had been working to get her sleeping in her crib during daytime naps. On March 1st, we put her in her crib for bedtime, and she tolerated it pretty well. She’s been sleeping in her own room ever since. More often than not, she still wakes up a few times a night, but we’re making forward progress. She hasn’t had more than a few night feedings since early February. We’ve had a couple nights here and there where she slept all night. And we have had a few nights where waiting five or ten minutes resulted in her putting herself back to sleep. She’s figuring things out, and while I think we have a ways to go, she’s doing really well.

It turns out that while I’m pretty ambivalent about buying clothes for myself, I really enjoy buying things for Maya. Sean has been the primary baby-stuff buyer so far, but I’m starting to participate more. We got her a very cute little Valentine’s day outfit, and we did have it on her on the actual holiday. These pictures were all taken on March 3rd though.

There’s also a cute knit outfit that she’s essentially grown out of now that we wanted to get pictures of. A word to prospective parents or those buying gifts for them – avoid outfits with a ton of buttons for little babies. They don’t really have the patience for having seven tiny buttons buttoned at every diaper change.

Tomorrow Maya is two months old. The past two months have been very fast-slow. Day in and day out, we feel every minute of every hour it seems. Then suddenly two months have passed.

Maya in blue jeans, 7 weeks old

I was on the phone with the insurance company today trying to work through various hospital claims, and I referred to Maya as my daughter. My. Daughter. While we’ve been doing the job for two months, I don’t think Sean or I are entirely used to our new identity as parents yet.

Maya is doing very well. At her two month check up, she was deemed to be “caught up” size-wise from her early arrival, and she took her vaccinations like a champ – a very unhappy, vocal champ, mind you.

A short while ago, we decided to try out blue jeans on the baby for the first time. The tiny blue jeans are cute in and of themselves. Maya in the tiny blue jeans is almost too much to bear. For the record, the top she’s wearing was part of her coming home from the hospital outfit. It took her a little while to grow into it, and now she’s nearly grown out of it!

We had a very quiet Christmas, just Maya, Sean, and me. It was a little sad not being around our families for the holidays, but the relative stillness was nice (and probably necessary).

Here are a few snapshots from that day. As you can see, Maya slept through most of it. She received some really fun gifts. Among them were Good Night Moon as read by her Grammy and Grandpa Schmidt and a Raggedy Ann doll from Lolli and Pop Woods. The giant turtle that Lolli crocheted for Maya has so far seen more action from the cats – Velvet in particular enjoys napping on it. I’m sure Maya will grow into it quickly though.

Sean has been practicing posing Maya for various Christmas-centric photos. Below are some of our favorites. Happy Holidays, everyone!

Maya on Christmas Eve, 5 weeks old

On December 18th, Maya was one month old. On December 19th, she was due to be born. Today, December 20th, we took her to see the pediatrician for her one month check up.

Maya – 6 days old – with Mom and Dad

When Maya was born, she weighed 5 pounds, 8 ounces. She was down to 5 pounds, 1 ounce when we left the hospital (a perfectly normal and expected weight loss). Today she weighed 7 pounds, 9.5 ounces. She’s grown from 19 to 21.5 inches long. Her doctor is very happy with her progress, and of course, so are we. We now have his blessing to let her sleep through the night if she’s willing.

We’re a bit behind on posting pictures. This set of photos are ones that Aunt Darci took when she visited over Thanksgiving. Maya is six days old in these pictures.

Plans are funny things.

We had a plan to finish all the construction projects in the house by the end of November. We had a plan to acquire all the remaining baby goods over the Thanksgiving weekend. We had bought some new maternity clothes and planned to take pre-baby Sean+April photos in early December. It turns out that the baby and my body had other plans.

On Sunday November 18th, after an intense four hour labor, Maya Renée Woods was born at 7:18 in the morning. She was about a month ahead of her due date, weighed 5 pounds, 8 ounces, and was 19 inches long.

Once the initial shock of Maya showing up early wore off and the worry over potential preterm issues was put to rest, we settled into learning how to properly care for her. Like any new parents, we have a ridiculous amount to learn, but so far we’ve managed to keep her happy and well. And of course, we are completely taken with her. We couldn’t be more pleased that we get to enjoy her for an extra month.

The only real issue we’ve encountered with Maya is jaundice. She had to stay an extra day in the hospital receiving phototherapy treatment to try and clear some of the excess bilirubin from her body. At her first visit to the pediatrician, her bilirubin levels were again high, so we rented a light blanket and started her back on phototherapy. As of this past Monday morning, her values were down. Unless something changes, it seems like the jaundice is something we can put behind us.

Maya the Glowworm – Wrapped in her phototherapy blanket

Sean has wanted to take pictures, but we’ve both been pretty busy (and sleep deprived) trying to catch up with our early baby. For now, here are the photos that were taken at the hospital when Maya was one day old. (Aunt Darci has also taken a very cute series of photos, which we’ll post once we are able.)

Last weekend, my parents hauled all the loot from our baby shower down from Missouri to Texas. While they were here, we drove down to San Antonio and wandered around the Spanish Missions for a while. The day was beautiful and the pace was leisurely. Since it was so close to Halloween and Dia de los Muertos, I couldn’t resist wearing my skeleton shirt. I love it, but I often can’t find a good occasion to wear it.

Mission San Jose, San Antonio, TX – October 27th, 32-33 weeks

An update on “the diabetus” … my blood sugar so far has been pretty easy to control. I have only had to make dietary changes and monitor my blood sugar. In fact, since my glucose levels have been solid, I don’t even have to monitor quite as tightly as I had initially (meaning I prick my finger twice a day instead of five times a day). We’ve been repeatedly assured that this is still considered a low risk pregnancy and that if things stay the way they are, our treatment during pregnancy, labor, and delivery will remain unchanged.

Greetings from Austin – October 6, 29-30 weeks

We’ve been really fortunate. Given my age, I was a little worried about how I would handle pregnancy. Really and truly, it hasn’t been that bad. There’s some heartburn and fatigue, but generally, I feel fine. At 20 weeks our ultrasound looked good, and the baby has been active, routinely nudging at me off and on throughout the day. At every appointment, my stats have been consistently good. All that to say that we’ve gotten really used to the idea that I was going to have a nice, uncomplicated pregnancy. This past week, we were introduced to our first complication.

I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. (Please read more here if you’re interested.) I didn’t even see this one coming. My diet is generally good, and while my exercising has been a bit inconsistent, it’s not been bad. My weight prior to pregnancy was normal, and my gain so far has been good. Prior to this, my blood sugars have always been decidedly normal. I went into the glucose tolerance test believing it was a formality. I had borderline numbers on the 1-hour test, so I took the 3-hour test. I didn’t fail by much, but fail I did.

The good news is that hopefully I can control it with diet and exercise, and we’ll go back to enjoying an otherwise uncomplicated pregnancy. I’m told that if I can keep my blood sugar within acceptable levels, there’s no reason for us to change how we manage the rest of the pregnancy or labor and delivery. If I can keep my blood sugar in line, the baby should be healthy and normally sized when she’s born. Also, it’s most likely that this will go away once I’m not pregnant anymore.

I have decided not to go into the bad news, because most of it shouldn’t be relevant. I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to keep this under control and that everyone will come out healthy and happy at the end. If nothing else, this will force us to be a little more aware of how we’re composing meals and what the ramifications of our lazy takeout nights are.

My step-mother Carol pointed out recently that I hadn’t posted pictures in a while. I have a few “belly pictures” from the last month or so. Yesterday, we decided to take this show on the road. We went to a place in Austin called Graffiti Park and took a few photos. Plus, as seen above, we couldn’t resist taking a photo in front of the “Greetings from Austin” painting that graces all the tourist literature.

August 20, 22-23 weeks

September 9, 25-26 weeks

Graffiti Park – October 6, 29-30 weeks

Graffiti Park – October 6th, 29-30 weeks

It should come as no surprise to anyone that knows us that food is an important part of our lives. I love to cook, and we both love to eat. It would make me happy if we could raise a kid who was willing to eat lots of different things and also understood that not all her food comes in pre-packaged, highly processed form. In an effort to educate myself on how that might be accomplished, I recently read French Kids Eat Everything, by Karen Le Billon.

It is not my intention to write a full review of this book. Instead, I’d like to make note of some of the things I found interesting.

In this book, Le Billon proposes 10 food rules that are meant to help raise happy, healthy eaters. Some of these seem like they might be good advice for the rest of us as well. The need to offer a variety of foods and cook whole foods as much as possible has already been on my mind.

One thing I found interesting though is that the French believe that teaching a kid how to eat is as important as teaching grammar or math. They consider it the parents’ job to ensure that their child knows how to eat properly. The parents, not the kids, are in charge of deciding what will be eaten and when, and contrary to what seems to be the norm these days, snacking is kept to a minimum or eliminated altogether. It’s okay to feel hungry between meals; it helps kids to learn to listen to their bodies, to understand when they need food and when they do not.

Early in their budding eating careers, kids are offered a variety of foods, to the point of having pureed “soups” thinned and served in their bottles. If something is pushed away a time or two, the parents simply keep offering the foods noting that the child just hasn’t tasted it enough to like it yet. They’re training their children’s palates. I personally don’t know if I will have the patience for that, but it’s an interesting notion regardless.

Offering treats as a reward or withholding food as punishment is simply not done. Eating is not to be considered an emotional affair. Meals have a logical progression: first the salad, then the main course, then the dessert. Instead of threatening to not serve dessert to convince a kid to eat his vegetables, it’s simply not possible to serve dessert till through with the main course.

Families eat together in France, and they converse at the table, generally taking their time to get through a meal. Food is not mere fuel. It is enjoyed and discussed, lingered over. Le Billon points out that it’s not just eating that the kids who share a meal with grown-ups are learning, it’s also the art of conversation, what the news of the day is, how to disagree without being offensive, how to be polite. They’re learning to enjoy the meal. Also, taking things slowly and savoring their food allows them time to realize they’re full before they’re completely, gluttonously stuffed.

I want to try some of these things out and see if we can raise our kid to be a good eater. Those who are already parents are probably laughing at me right now, and I’m sure I’ll learn the hard way that she may sometimes have a stronger will than I do. For now though, I’m going to stick with the notion that we are in charge of making sure she learns how to eat well. We’ll just see how it goes.

Sean and I have been together long enough to have known many firsts together. Of course, there are the standards: first date, first kiss, first time we met each other’s parents. Then there are the April-Sean specific things: first time we networked our computers, first time we adopted a cat, first time we cured our own bacon. And there are all those scary grown-up firsts: first real jobs, first car we had to secure a loan to pay for, first house. And again, we’re embarking on a new experience – our first kid.

For those who don’t already know, we’re having a girl. She’s due to arrive on December 19th. Neither of us had much interest in trying to time pregnancy in any particular way, and it seemed to work out ok. I’m very happy that I don’t have to deal with the third trimester unpleasantness at the same time we’re dealing with the summer in Texas unpleasantness. However, we’re both anticipating that she’ll be about 6 days late so that everyone who’s interacting with me while I’m all vulnerable and in labor will be super pissed that they’re working on Christmas.

I’m now convinced that there’s no such thing as an easy pregnancy. That said, I’ve been pretty lucky so far. Yeah, I was queasy and more tired that I’d have believed possible through the second half of the first trimester, but I never actually vomited, so it could be worse. My boobs ached something fierce until maybe a few weeks ago. I didn’t really have any heartburn till maybe around 19 weeks, and now it seems the heartburn and reflux are making up for lost time. The round ligament pain has been intermittently crappy, but that’s all to be expected. Really, the worst thing for me has been the limitations on my diet, and if that’s what I’m complaining about, it really isn’t all that bad.

As of today we’re somewhere between 22 and 23 weeks along, which means I’m solidly pregnant-looking at this point. Several of our out of town family and friends have requested pregnant-April photos, so here you go.

The blue jeans apparatus hasn’t worked in quite a while. This picture was taken on June 22nd, and I don’t think it held up much beyond that.

June 22, 14-15 weeks

Here are two photos of me in various stages of pregnancy. Apologies for the quality on the first one; it was just a quick iphone snapshot so my silly sister Rachel could see if I looked pregnant yet.

July 28, 19-20 weeks

For the second one, Sean tried a little harder. He promises to take more soon. I promise to try to be patient and let him.

I think we all know that I’m not the real show here though. Here are some of our ultrasound images. The first image is from our first appointment on May 9th where she was verified to be the right size to be at about 8 weeks gestation. The rest are from our 20 week appointment on July 31st, where we learned that all her parts are in the right places and that she’s a girl. At that appointment, they estimated that she weighed about 11 ounces, and her heart rate was about 150 bpm.

Somewhere around December, we’ll start experiencing a whole new batch of firsts. Hopefully, we’ll have the mental fortitude to document some of them here.