Auntie Tami comes to visit!

Last weekend we were able to spend some time with Tami! She drove down from NorCal to hang out with her littlest niece. Though it was a quick visit, it was wonderful to be with family all the same. We didn't do much...just sat around and spent time together. It was lovely! I'm pretty sure that Kaylee is in love with her Auntie Tami (see picture below!) Thanks for coming, Tam! It was so fun!

7 Hour Miracle

When you put a baby down to bed at 7pm and enjoy a quiet night with your husband, it's great.

When you fall asleep at 10:30pm expecting to start your normal middle of the night wakings, it's alright.

But when you wake up at 5:30am to a singing baby and realize you've had more sleep than you have in a looong time, it's a MIRACLE!

Hooray for Babywise! Hooray for support groups and message boards! But most of all, Praise the Lord for this beautiful little baby!

Blessed by Silence

Here I am! Reporting to you from Day 2 of the helmet adventure. I have been reading (as I find time) through the Psalms and today was Psalm 94. Let me give some background first...

The first night of Kaylee's helmet being on (Wednesday night) she woke up once an hour. I checked on her each time to make sure that everything was okay with the helmet adjustments. I could only imagine the discomfort the poor little girl was experiencing. Then for the rest of the day (Thursday) she did not nap...at all! Okay, I am exaggerating, she DID take a 20 minute nap in my arms at about 3pm when I had declared defeat. Nick and I are strong believers in the concepts of Babywise which states that you can have a peaceful baby sleeping through the night by 6-8weeks of age. We implemented BW as soon as we got home from the hospital and lo and behold our angel slept through the night at 7 weeks! Praise the Lord! Since then, she's been doing alright with it. I have not wanted to be so strict with a schedule that we couldn't do anything, and she kept up the sleeping through the night, so all was well. Then she turned 4months old. Kaylee started waking up 2, 3, and sometimes 4 times per night and her naps started becoming few and far between. So what do I do? Get discouraged and practically throw out the problem solving concepts of the book I once swore by. Thinking back I'm saying to myself "Jeanne-Marie, is this how you are going to be as a mom? Give up when it gets tough?" Ugh! So anyway, back to yesterday...

I joined about four different "support groups" online for other mom's who are going through their kids wearing helmets, along with trying to implement the concepts from Babywise. I posted my "letter of defeat" and this morning was greeted with TONS of support, encouragement and advice from lots of other Mommy's. What I was most surprised about was my miraculous renewed energy and stamina to take on the day. It is a testimony to prayer, because last night, my final cry out to the Lord was "renew me, restore me, give me patience for tomorrow."

So I come to you this morning, not with a baby girl that is suddenly sleeping or on her schedule, but a realization that God's promises are true and in my first "feelings of failure" as a mom, this is what He tells us in His word:

Unless the Lord had helped me, I would soon have settled in the silence of the grave. I cried out, “I am slipping!” but your unfailing love, O Lord, supported me. When doubts filled my mind, your comfort gave me renewed hope and cheer.
Psalm 94:17-19

And now I sit here typing this, because Kaylee, after crying it out for an hour, is finally asleep. Praise God for the silence, if only for a quick moment.

Happy Helmets!

Today we went to pick up Kaylee's DOC Band! All in all, I would have to say that it was a successful trip with tons of answers to prayer. Mostly, we were praying that the transition from no helmet to helmet 23 hours a day would go smoothly. Some babies tend to have a rough time adjusting to life inside the helmet and we were praying for this to NOT be the case with Kaylee. During our appointment, they brought in the band and put in on Kaylee. Then they left us for about 30 minutes to see how she would adjust to it and also to be able to see where they needed to make any adjustments. After about an hour of going back and forth with directions on caring for it, for Kaylee and some fitting adjustments, we were on our way home. Our sweet little pumpkin fell asleep with the band on in the car on the way home. When we got home, it was just back to life as normal. Right now, she is fast asleep and hasn't made a peep since I put her down. Praise God for this even tempered little angel!

So now, it's just taking care of Kaylee and her helmet with a bath every night and continuous monitoring of skin irritations or "red spots" on her head. If all goes well, we should be done right around the New Year. If all goes even better than that, we could possibly have it taken off sooner!

For more details on what Plagiocephaly is, if you are really curious, visit http://www.cranialtech.com/ and check it out. Oh, and just for fun, we are taking suggestions on how we should decorate it. Leave a comment with your ideas! And as always, thank you for all your love, support and encouragement. It means the world to us!

RAAAR!

Happy Halloween!! I couldn't resist using today as an excuse to dress up my real life doll. :-) Here's our little lion cub!

DOC Band coming soon!

First off, to update everyone, Kaylee IS going to be getting a DOC Band. I am doing fine with it and her Daddy is the strongest man I know. The people at Cranial Tech are wonderful. They took us through a variety of different scenarios that included the life with the band and also life without. My favorite part of the appointment came afterwards when we received copies of her "mug shots." Seriously, that's what they are. I feel like all we need to do is photoshop in a little black box with a random number on it and we've got America's first baby criminal. :-) We went in on Friday for her DSI (digital surface imaging) appointment. Kaylee say like a little angel while 25 different cameras take pictures of her head. Did I mention that in order to get accurate images, she wore a sock-like head piece that made her look like a bank robber? Perhaps the crime occurs after the mug shots for babies. Hee hee. Bad Mommy moment-I forgot the camera! Ugh. I would have loved to post the picture of her as the masked bandit. I was amazed at how calm she remained while the stocking mask was on her face. Not a whimper out of this girl! On November 5th we go back in to have the band placed and fit onto Kaylee's head. Then it's just a waiting game! 8-10 weeks is what they say for Kaylee in the helmet. Not bad in the grand scheme of things. We are praying that her head grows quickly so that she does not have to wear it longer than that. Selfishly, I would like it to be 6-8 weeks, but I know that even 10-12 weeks will feel like a blink of an eye later on. I think that's about it...so enjoy a quick giggle...because I sure did. Here are her mug shots. When you look at them, I think that the top right picture best shows her "a-symmetry" in her ears. See how the left side is so much lower than the right? Poor little baby...her expression in this picture gets me every time! :-)

WANTED: Kaylee Marie Grewe

If you have seen this baby, please call for reward.

Pumpkins and Pastizzis

Over the past few weeks, since I last wrote on this blog, many things have taken place. I will save the DOC Band update for later, because Nick has to fix our scanner. I want to post pictures with it.

SO...that leaves us with this past weekend. We were blessed to have Kaylee's Nana (Nick's Mom) come down from Santa Clara to visit for the weekend. Something I have been hearing about since before we were married was how amazing these things called pastizzis were. That's right - say it out loud - PAH-stit-sees! They are a maltese tradition that Lynn passed down to us this weekend. Homemade phyllo dough, ricotta cheese filling, another batch of homemade phyllo dough with spinach & ground sirloin filling. All I can say is that they were delicious and well worth the time that it took to make them. Kaylee had a blast hanging out with her Nana and learned so many new things. She got a bath from Nana (and didn't cry at all!), she hung out with her while I went and got my nails done (compliments of Nana), she went shopping and got the most adorable outfit ever! But the biggest deal (to me) is that she took her "big girl" pacifier from Nana for the first time! We are slowly transitioning out of the big blue hospital pacifier into the more traditional look. :-) With me, she would just gag everytime I tried to give it to her. Not with Nana! She took it like a pro. Here are just a few pictures from her visit.

Nana teaches Kaylee how to make Pastizzi

Teaching us how to roll the dough

Our first batch all by ourselves!

The next big thing was Kaylee's first trip to the Pumpkin Patch! I just LOVE pumpkin seeds and I couldn't wait any longer. So Garyn, Nate, the Kraus House and the Grewe Crew all went to find some pumpkins. Lucky for us, there was a really adorable baby pumpkin just waiting for us! Anne Geddes, eat you heart out!

And they let us take this little pumpkin home for free! :-)

DOC Bands?

Well, I'm here to let you know Kaylee is still tall and skinny! We had her 4 month check up on Monday and everything is going great. She is a whopping 11.8 pounds (1.8lbs in two months) and 25 1/4 inches tall! Dr. Sanford told us that she should be ready for her modeling career soon. On a different note, we also got the reccomendation to go get her head shape evaluated at a place called Cranial Tech, Inc. It seems that because of the torticollis (her head always looking left), she has developed a flat head on the left side. It would be purely cosmetic at this point to get a DOC Band aka Baby Helmet IF it were just her head. Unfortunately, her face is not symetrical either. This means that the flat head is a little more serious than cosmetic. So...next Thursday we are going to get her evaluated and possibly fitted for a cute little helmet. :-/

I (JM) have mixed emotions. Obviously, we are going to do what's best for Kaylee and I would much rather deal with her in a helmet now than resenting me at 16 when she finds out we could have fixed it. It's just hard to...well...it's just hard. So please pray for our appointment on Thursday. That the severity of her head shape is not too bad and that we would only have to have her wear a helmet (if at all) for 2 months vs. 6-9 months. And for me, just pray that God would continue to work on me as a Mommy, and that the sneaky fleshly vanity that I have for Kaylee would be eliminated.

Most recent shot of our little angel...

Thrones

Here's Kaylee in her Great Grand Papa's chair...

...but since it was a little big, she ended up getting her own Kaylee-sized throne.

Kaylee's new trick...

This is Kaylee's new strategy for getting me (NICK) wrapped around her finger. Once that lip shoots out, I'm done.

Burger Night

'Nuff said

Where does the time go?

I know, I know, it's been forever since we've posted ANYTHING new. A lot has been happening around the Grewe house lately. I am going to let Nick post the videos, because I have no idea how to do it. But I can do pictures! Let's see...

1. Kaylee is now officially 3-months-old. She is cooing, singing, smiling and ALMOST laughing. Her favorite time to talk and smile is when Auntie Garyn comes over and sings the ABC song. Something about her Auntie is just the funniest thing in the world. Here is my favorite smiling girl.

2. Kaylee has a new best friend! Tobin Kraus started coming over during the day to play. Jessica is a trooper and had to complete one more year of teaching, so Nick and I decided to open up our home as a temporary daycare for him! It's been lots of fun watching the two of them discover each other. Mostly, Tobin and Sydney play because of their schedules being different.

3. We celebrated our 3rd Anniversary on August 26th! Thanks to Amy, we had a beautiful stay up in Newport Beach for 3 days! Yes, we brought Kaylee. No, we didn't bring Sydney. We spent most of our time relaxing by the pool, cruising Fashion Island and spending time together. We did so much relaxing that we didn't take a single picture! OOPS!

That's all for now. I promise we have the cutest videos and Nick thinks he can get them up by Sunday.

Baby Bootcamp!

After receiving wise counsel from my good friend Valerie, I decided to re-evaluate Kaylee's daytime sleep routine. When Babywise says that the average time to have "waketime" at 12-weeks old is around 45-60 minutes, they fail to mention that it INCLUDES eating time! So I have been doubling up on the time she should be awake which totally makes sense as to why she wasn't napping without her swing or bouncy seat! ~sigh~

So this week, we started Baby Bootcamp! I'm praying for strength, endurance and patience as I let my little girl cry it out in her crib. Day 1 - Perfect! She went straight down and stayed sleeping for her whole nap! Day 2 - She started figuring out that she was being trained and had to put up a bit of a fight. But she stayed down most of her naps. Day 3 - Daddy participated! I had a church staff meeting, so Nick did the feeding, changing, playing and napping! She tried to pull the "Daddy's little girl" card on him, but he did great! She was in her crib when I got home! Day 4 (today) - She went on a nice long walk with Granny and Pops and only cried for about 10 minutes for her most recent nap. She is getting better! My hope is that after this week, she will have more of a routine to count on and we will have a happier baby!

She is still sleeping through the night, so I'm thrilled. And when she wakes up in the morning, she smiles at us when she sees us. So all in all, it's been a great week!

(Kisses from Sydney)

DR. VISIT UPDATE
Kaylee went to the doctor for a check up. She weighs 10.0 pounds and is growing very healthy and strong. Dr. Sanford said that she is on track to being a tall & thin little lady. Hooray!

Multi-Cultural Day, Part 2

Well, it's official! Kaylee has been swimming! Yesterday, we spent the day with Sara, Helen & Jillian at their house up in Murrietta. It was a wonderful day for us girls to catch up and watch these little girls get to know each other. There is something about getting together to have our daughters get to know each other that never stops tripping me out. Helen, Sara and I have been friends since highschool and the fact that we are now getting together so our DAUGHTERS can meet is just insane to me. Aren't we still in highschool? Can we really all be this old? ~sigh~ I know that most people reading this that are older & wiser than I am are rolling their eyes or laughing at me...but it's still a new experience for me. So I continue to TRIP OUT!

Anyway, some updates since the last "Multi-Cultural Day" are:

Kaylee seems to be catching up in size to Jillian. The gap between them is beginning to shrink. Although, Jillian is still very much the older & wiser friend. :-) After all, she has experienced a lot more life than Kaylee has.

Facial Expressions

It's totally fascinating to me when Kaylee develops a new expression. Right from the get go she had her super concentrated look where she'd draw down her eyebrows, squeeze her lips together, and just concentrate...





But the best expression (and most recent), besides her most famous AUDIO expression, is the smiling. It's funny because whenever she smiles, we're like, "what the heck did we just do to make her smile?" So then we try to do everything we did in the last 30 seconds to try to make her smile again. In actuality I think she's figured out a way to get us to start acting strange...not that we needed a kid for that...

I have no excuse...

I was going to try and think of something to say like, "Oh this is just some random picture that randomly ended up in our pictures" or "here is an 'update' picture"... and even though it's all true, I really just think it's cute. Yes, I'm one of THOSE parents!
-NICK

Feast Night

So this is from July 3rd, when Jeanne-Marie's family was in town from New York. Rick, her dad, mentioned that he'd like to cook for the Home Fellowship (Bible Study Group) that night... even though I said there were like 20 people in the group (there were about 30 at the house that night!!). Nevertheless, Rick pulled off a gourmet meal for 30 people... I'm getting hungry just thinking about it! And then, it was perfect, after dinner we heard explosions outside which turned out to be fireworks.

Me Oh My! Milestones!

Kaylee is 8-weeks old and developing more and more everyday. She has been cooing all week and as of yesterday, I can confidently say that we've seen her first "social smile." When laying on her mat for playtime, I get really close to her face and the conversation goes a little bit like this:

"Kaylee, can you say Daaaaddddeeee?"

~Kaylee opens her mouth, moves her tongue around~ (warming up!)

"Kaylee, say Daaaaaddddeeee!" (Good thing nobody can see or hear me doing this! I feel silly!)

~Kaylee "coos" back~ (success!)

Now, just like any Grandma will say that the gas smile was a real smile, I say that the coo in response to me talking to her is Kaylee actually trying to say Daddy! Don't burst my bubble, I really believe she's talking back! :-)

As for smiling, it's still pretty random. But when Nick speaks to Kaylee, that's when the smiles come out the most. I don't know for sure, but it looks like we are experiencing the beginning of a very beautiful Daddy/Daughter relationship. She is SUCH a Daddy's girl already! ~sigh~ I think she actually gets that from her Mommy.

We don't have pictures or video of this yet, but I'll try to get some up soon.

Blessed

The past two days have been a little more tough than usual. My Dad, Smom and the kids went back to NY on Wednesday and Kaylee is either going through a growth spurt or missing them as much as I do. The result of a week long vacation/visit with family is a sweet baby girl that does not want to sleep...at all. She'd rather cry...and cry...and cry...and cry just a little bit more. Short of choosing baby Benadryl to calm her down, I submitted to the swing. And now I'm blessed with this beautiful sleeping baby to my right while the "Praise Baby collection" plays softly on the computer. God bless the people who thought of turning regular worship songs into lullabies and God bless my parents who bought the whole pack of them for us! Anyway, as she sleeps soundly in her swing I had a moment to rejoice in the things that God has blessed me with.

It immediately brought me to last night at Bible Study. Our home was filled with the usual people who make it our "home" and Nick was teaching on Mark 9:30-32. He asked each of us to look at the way we respond to situations that prove to be challenging. As we did that, I couldn't help but see that the Holy Spirit had taken over and now, my husband had willingly allowed the Spirit to use him to speak to our group. By the end of the night, I couldn't help but thank the Lord for all He has given our family. Oh, what a proud wife I was, to see my husband using his gifts as a teacher to help others draw closer to God. ~sigh~

So today, as I am more exhausted, more frusterated and more confused on how to make Kaylee's world more comfortable, at least I can rest in the confidence I have that I am truly blessed!

Thank you, Lord for...

*A husband who seeks You in all he does and who responds to the Spirit's call in his life.

*A beautiful & healthy baby girl who continues to grow everyday!

*A family who supports us in everything we do.

*A group of friends who are more than just good friends...they really are family.

With time to reflect on things that I am thankful for, how could I not share it?

New York meets San Diego

This past week, our New York family came out to meet Kaylee for the first time. We have had a packed week of fun activities! Sea World on the 4th of July, trips to the beach, trips to the pool and the most fun of all...hanging out at home together doing nothing at all. It's been wonderful having family here and we will be sad to say good-bye tonight. Here are a few pictures to recap their stay with us.

To infinity, and.... well, y'know.

So one day we noticed a black metallic pod lined with chrome on our doorstep. Having received a mysterious object the week before, we found a slot in the pod that matched the object shape. When we put the two together the top opened up! Tendrils of mist rolled out as the top slid aside, and inside the pod, we found.... well, just look at the picture.

Actually, I came across this picture when sorting through our camera. This is the hearing test they do at the hospital. Yeah, I know it's not a new pic, but a fun one at least!

Before / After

I couldn't resist this...




<----- Before

After ----->

By the way, notice how the dog has her paw on JM's belly. Who says dogs don't know what's up when women are pregnant?

Multi-Cultural Day

Jillian, one of Kaylee's first friends, came over to visit with her mom, Helen Spafford. The first time they hung out, the moms forgot to take pictures, so this time they snapped a few. Man, we thought Kaylee was a little whitey, but I guess there's some olive/tan complexion in there after all! [Kaylee and Jillian]
["One of my first friends!"]

One of my favorite pics so far

I've called this picture "The Last Tic-Tac"... for whatever reason, that was the first thought that entered my mind when I saw this picture.

That pink blanket is actually kind of a like a straight jacket with velcro on both sides so that she stays swaddled... yeah, see that arm? She's a regular Houdini!

My Girls

The other night we were just winding down after a busy day of doing nothing... well, okay, we were taking care of a new baby all day... drinking coffee... y'know, "day off" type of stuff. Anyway, the dog jumps up on the couch and lays down awkwardly on the armrest and the Boppee. I look over to see what she's up to and she turns around a couple of times and then positions herself so as to snuggle up to Kaylee.

So when people ask how the dog is doing with all of this change, I can safely say that I think Sydney is handling it just fine.

Bath Time II

Here are a few of the follow up pictures from bath #1. Yeah, there was a little bit of crying, but in the end at least she smelled better (not that she stunk). It's funny, because now she likes taking baths. Now if only could get her to enjoy going down for a nap a little bit better...

Bath Time!

So, after a couple days we figured we should give her a bath. It's not that she stunk, it just seemed like the right thing to do. Check out the hoarse crying... yeah, now she's got way more power in them lungs.

Fresh out of the oven

Here is probably the earliest video that we'll let you watch of Kaylee... I think this is the next morning. It's funny to see now because she's not actually "winky" like that anymore.

Birth Announcement

Kaylee is about 3 1/2 weeks old today and so we're going to literally have to pummel this blog site with a bunch of pictures and videos in order to catch up. So bear with us as we rush to get everything uploaded.

A good place to start is with the Birth Announcement. As you can hopefully see at the bottom, she was born at 7:46 PM on May 24th, weighing in at 6,7, and 19" tall.

Even though she was a couple weeks ahead of schedule, she was in no hurry to join us "on the other side," taking nearly 22 hours of labor time. All props to JM who endured the whole process without an epidural or any kind of pain medication. She won't brag about it, but I can! That's right!

If you're interested in seeing more pictures, you can check out (and order prints) from this link:
https://www.collages.net/ConsumerSite/GuestLogin.aspx?eventcode=340768

Never thought we'd be bloggers...

Okay, so I'm guessing everyone's first blog is something stupid like what I'm writing all because they don't want to have a blank blog, and at the same time they have nothing to say. That's me right now. I'm writing this in the little spare time that I have.

So that's all folks, ttfn, and all of that.

-Nick