So our precious little Aylin turned 6 months old this past Wednesday (8/19/2009) and to celebrate: she got 4 shots. She did extraordinarily well. Much better than either her dad or I expected. Cried only for a minute or two, and then let mommy and daddy snuggle and settle her down. She weighed in at 14 lbs, 7oz, 25 (and almost a 1/2!) inches long, and a 17 inch head. She's pretty well established herself in the 25th percentile. She was 25th for weight and length, and between 25 - 50 for head. So far we do not have any teeth... yet (Thank Goodness, says her momma!).
She has such an amazing personality. She is almost always happy, and loves learning and figuring things out. You can see all the activity going on in her little head while she's sitting there contemplating. She loves her jumparoo that her Grandma Jeanne got her. She'll play for hours in that thing and not get bored. She's rolling over front to back, and back to front... But only to her right. She'll roll all the way across the living room floor, we'll turn her around and she'll roll back. She also loves to play in her highchair with toys on the tray. Especially her keys which she can BANG BANG BANG! on the tray. So exciting! She enjoys being active, doesn't really like to sit and snuggle unless she's actually sleepy or not feeling quite right. We are certain as soon as she figures her legs out she's going to go straight to running and we'll have a little red-headed Tasmanian devil swirling through our home!
She loves her solid foods. Some we eat excitedly, others we just put up with. We have now tried: Squash, Sweet Potatoes, Carrots, Sweat Pea's, Green Beans, Apples, Banana's, Peaches, Pears, Sweet Potatoes & Corn, Apples/Bananas/Strawberries (mixed), in addition to our rice cereal. The green veggies are what she tolerates, but doesn't get excited about, and anything with apples in it and peaches we wink our eye and make a face because it's tart! But I think our favorites are the Sweet Potatoes, Carrots, and Sweet Potatoes & Corn, we also love Pears and Bananas. Starting on the solid foods has been quite an adventure.
She's jabbering lots these days, and has figured out sounds like: dadada, mmmmmba, aaaahhhh, aaallla, nienienie! (when we're mad). We haven't quite figured out mama yet, but she did make a combination of noises this morning and in there I heard a "mommy"! She laughs a lot, and we can't help but to laugh back.
We've managed to fall into a pretty regular schedule these days, and we sleep pretty good. She still wakes up around 2 a.m. and needs a passy re-inserted, and sometimes it takes more than once before she's back down. So good long stretches of sleep for mommy is still elusive. But I think it won't be long before we are able to sleep all night long. It's also pretty fun for mom and dad to wake up to a happy sweet, chattering little girl through the monitor on the weekends.
She has what we call her "happy legs". When she's excited, her legs get to kicking! More often than not, they are going. Can't keep socks on the kid to save her life! But there are worse things I am sure.
We have also (we think) outgrown our reflux. We haven't had the clear spitting problem since shortly after we started on solid foods (which is normal). So after this last doctor's visit he recommended that we try taking her off of the reflux meds for at least a week (to be sure they are out of her system) and see how she does. If she's spitting, but not seeming unhappy or uncomfortable about it then we stay off. But if she's unhappy and uncomfortable then we'll go back on the meds until she's 12 months. So here's to hoping she doesn't need the meds any more! We should know by next Friday if we'll need to keep her on the meds until 12 months.
Aside from -- and in spite of -- our major mishap at daycare last week; we are still a sweet, happy, healthy, growing baby girl who loves life.
A 6 months photo shoot will follow later today! (-=
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
Thank you.
I would guess that most of you have been following along on Facebook or Twitter as we've vented about our misadventures with Aylin's daycare this week, but in case you haven't, a quick recap is in order (if you know the whole story, you can skip past the break):
____________
On Wednesday, a new staffer in Aylin's room at ABC Happy Kids daycare in Bentonville fed her breastmilk from another mother. Many of you know that there is some risk that infections like HIV or hepatitis can be transmitted through breastmilk. The "ew" factor aside, the incident put my daughter's health at risk. It was a stupid mistake, for which they'll never have an excuse that will satisfy me. It was a mistake that left another little girl short on milk, which is how we ultimately found out. The other mother -- a friend and co-worker to Kristina -- called us Wednesday night to tell us what happened. As it turns out, one of the nursery workers tried to tell the director she thought she'd screwed up. After talking about it, though, the director helped her decide she hadn't screwed up, so they didn't mention it to us that night.
At any rate, both sets of parents knew by Thursday morning what had actually happened. The primary staff member in the nursery told Kristina, when she found out, "I think I'm going to be sick...". The daycare immediately put in place some new controls to make sure it didn't happen again. The director agreed to meet with us that afternoon at 4:45, to go over the incident and, she said, sign an incident report. She didn't show until we were leaving, because we'd waited 25 minutes, and that was 10 minutes longer than I usually give anybody but my sister. We had to take Aylin home.
I emailed the President and CEO of ABC Happy Kids, Dr. Nguyen, M.D., early this morning, but have gotten no response. I spoke to a woman from the Arkansas Division of Child Care and Early Development late this afternoon, who assured me that they were "taking this very seriously", and would be conducting an investigation next week, including visiting the daycare and talking to personnel there. Kristina spoke to the other mother, who offered to provide the results of her most recent blood work, showing her to be negative for HIV and hepatitis. She confirmed with nurses from our pediatrician's office and from her OB/GYN's office that those results would be recent enough for our purposes. The nurses also told her that, though the risk of infection was extremely low, we were absolutely doing the right thing by making sure Aylin hadn't been exposed.
We met the daycare director this afternoon when we picked up Aylin. Her attitude was professional, cordial, but cold. She took the dressing down I gave her with silent attention. But, neither Kristina nor I left the meeting feeling as if she was actually sorry for how they'd endangered my daughter's health. She said the right words, but it felt like her only remorse was for having been caught. When we asked her about signing an incident report, she acted like she didn't know what we were talking about. We told her that, while we didn't want to put Aylin through the hardship of transitioning to a different facility, they had a long way to go to regain our trust, and we came home.
Time will tell...
____________
I was thinking about these last 48 hours on my way home this afternoon, beginning to frame this blog post in my mind. The support we've gotten from so many of our friends has been of great encouragement to us. The silence from some quarters, a very small group, but one much closer to home, has been telling. The contrast between the two groups, disquieting.
Those of you who know me well have often heard me refer to the distinction the Spanish language makes between cognitive knowing (saber) and the deeper, soul-level, experiential knowing (conocer). It's a failing of the English language that continues to fascinate me, and is instructional here again. Before this week, I knew in my mind (saber) how fragile the life of a child can be, but I'd never come to know (conocer) that in such personal terms. Over the course of an hour or so Wednesday night, my cognition crystallized into experience; I knew that my daughter's health had been endangered, and that both frightened and enraged me.
As so often happens to parents, I caught a glimpse of the Father's love for each of His children. I understood a little better the lengths to which He was willing to go to protect them.
I'm sure there are a few who feel like we're over-reacting. Aylin wasn't harmed in the end. We still have the same happy little redhead we brought home from the hospital. In those terms, we certainly haven't experienced frailty like so many other parents do. There but by the grace of God go we. But I'll let that take nothing away from the new reality in which I find myself operating, or the greater ownership I've taken of my role as father and protector.
Kristina and I cannot express enough gratitude to those of you who've prayed for us, who've expressed your shock and dismay with us, who've offered advice and who've offered to kick somebody's butt for us. Maybe it was just a close call; maybe we'll forget about it in a few years. But we look at things through new eyes tonight, and many of you are shining brightly in that view. Thank you. Grace and peace to you all.
____________
On Wednesday, a new staffer in Aylin's room at ABC Happy Kids daycare in Bentonville fed her breastmilk from another mother. Many of you know that there is some risk that infections like HIV or hepatitis can be transmitted through breastmilk. The "ew" factor aside, the incident put my daughter's health at risk. It was a stupid mistake, for which they'll never have an excuse that will satisfy me. It was a mistake that left another little girl short on milk, which is how we ultimately found out. The other mother -- a friend and co-worker to Kristina -- called us Wednesday night to tell us what happened. As it turns out, one of the nursery workers tried to tell the director she thought she'd screwed up. After talking about it, though, the director helped her decide she hadn't screwed up, so they didn't mention it to us that night.
At any rate, both sets of parents knew by Thursday morning what had actually happened. The primary staff member in the nursery told Kristina, when she found out, "I think I'm going to be sick...". The daycare immediately put in place some new controls to make sure it didn't happen again. The director agreed to meet with us that afternoon at 4:45, to go over the incident and, she said, sign an incident report. She didn't show until we were leaving, because we'd waited 25 minutes, and that was 10 minutes longer than I usually give anybody but my sister. We had to take Aylin home.
I emailed the President and CEO of ABC Happy Kids, Dr. Nguyen, M.D., early this morning, but have gotten no response. I spoke to a woman from the Arkansas Division of Child Care and Early Development late this afternoon, who assured me that they were "taking this very seriously", and would be conducting an investigation next week, including visiting the daycare and talking to personnel there. Kristina spoke to the other mother, who offered to provide the results of her most recent blood work, showing her to be negative for HIV and hepatitis. She confirmed with nurses from our pediatrician's office and from her OB/GYN's office that those results would be recent enough for our purposes. The nurses also told her that, though the risk of infection was extremely low, we were absolutely doing the right thing by making sure Aylin hadn't been exposed.
We met the daycare director this afternoon when we picked up Aylin. Her attitude was professional, cordial, but cold. She took the dressing down I gave her with silent attention. But, neither Kristina nor I left the meeting feeling as if she was actually sorry for how they'd endangered my daughter's health. She said the right words, but it felt like her only remorse was for having been caught. When we asked her about signing an incident report, she acted like she didn't know what we were talking about. We told her that, while we didn't want to put Aylin through the hardship of transitioning to a different facility, they had a long way to go to regain our trust, and we came home.
Time will tell...
____________
I was thinking about these last 48 hours on my way home this afternoon, beginning to frame this blog post in my mind. The support we've gotten from so many of our friends has been of great encouragement to us. The silence from some quarters, a very small group, but one much closer to home, has been telling. The contrast between the two groups, disquieting.
Those of you who know me well have often heard me refer to the distinction the Spanish language makes between cognitive knowing (saber) and the deeper, soul-level, experiential knowing (conocer). It's a failing of the English language that continues to fascinate me, and is instructional here again. Before this week, I knew in my mind (saber) how fragile the life of a child can be, but I'd never come to know (conocer) that in such personal terms. Over the course of an hour or so Wednesday night, my cognition crystallized into experience; I knew that my daughter's health had been endangered, and that both frightened and enraged me.
As so often happens to parents, I caught a glimpse of the Father's love for each of His children. I understood a little better the lengths to which He was willing to go to protect them.
I'm sure there are a few who feel like we're over-reacting. Aylin wasn't harmed in the end. We still have the same happy little redhead we brought home from the hospital. In those terms, we certainly haven't experienced frailty like so many other parents do. There but by the grace of God go we. But I'll let that take nothing away from the new reality in which I find myself operating, or the greater ownership I've taken of my role as father and protector.
Kristina and I cannot express enough gratitude to those of you who've prayed for us, who've expressed your shock and dismay with us, who've offered advice and who've offered to kick somebody's butt for us. Maybe it was just a close call; maybe we'll forget about it in a few years. But we look at things through new eyes tonight, and many of you are shining brightly in that view. Thank you. Grace and peace to you all.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Aylin and Bebo
It's been a while since we posted anything, and I have some new tools at my disposal, so I thought I'd play a bit with some video editing... Let us know how it works!
It's not a recent video, obviously. Just the first one I stumbled onto.
jeff
It's not a recent video, obviously. Just the first one I stumbled onto.
jeff
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Aylin 4 Months
Wow, so it's been a really long time since we've posted an actual blog... Oops!
So it's hard to believe that Aylin is now 4 months old! It doesn't seem like that much time has passed. She is getting so big so fast! We have her check up and shots this coming Thursday. So we'll know exactly how much she's gained. I can't wait for that part... the shots I could do without. (-=
The transition back to work went relatively well. The first week was obviously the hardest. But got progressively better (except for her catching all the bugs going around). She is now on a pretty good schedule for a daytime routine. The ladies at the daycare just love her to pieces (Who can blame 'em!). She's the good kid in class! The first day of dropping her off was the hardest day of my life! Leaving my sweet little baby was the worst thing for me at that time. I cried all day. But I got through it. It was good to find out that she did so well, and that she was one of the good babies that didn't cry all day. Since then she has just charmed their socks off. It's hard for me to believe though that she has now been in day care for as long as she was home with me. )-= But again she does really well and that eases my mind. I also go to see her every day on my lunch break and I nurse her. It's nice to get away from the office and the craziness and see my baby girl every day. I am very thankful that we found such a great facility that is so close to where I work. It only takes me about 7 minutes to get there when traffic is good.
She's holding her head up and enjoys sitting up (although not on her own yet). She likes to sit in her highchair in the living room next to daddy's recliner and chat with us. She's constantly jabbering. I just love listening to her. On the morning when she's awake during the car ride to school and she decides to talk to momma I always turn the stereo off and chat with my baby girl. She absolutely LOVES her bath time, she just about soaked momma the other night with all of her splashing. She had all 4 limbs going like crazy and was squealing. It was great. We are still doing the BumGenius cloth diapers. Those are going great. Daycare uses them with no problems. I bring in enough every day for the day, and leave a wet bag for them to put them in and then I bring them home every night. We have enough to get us through about 2 days at a time, so I'm usually washing diapers every other night. But it's not difficult I just have to start them as soon as I get home so we can get through the 2 wash cycles and the dryer before it's time for bed. She has recently started cuddling things. She's not picky, It can be a blanket, her pooh blankie Uncle Bradley got her, her bib or a burp cloth. lol just as long as she's got something to snuggle with. They told me that during the day at daycare sometimes she'll pull her bib over her face when she's sleepy and if they flip it down, she'll pull it back up again. (-= She's started laughing too, and loves it when daddy holds her above his head. She especially loves it when she's up high and she gets to drool on daddy's face! She is also on the verge of rolling over. Just can’t quite figure out how to move her shoulder. But gets her legs and hips all the way over. She hates being on her belly though, so I’m not sure how well the rolling over will work out once she does figure it out!
The last few months have been so amazing watching her budding personality take form. This kid stuff is pretty amazing, and I wouldn't trade it for ANYTHING.
Here are a few recent pics of our sweetheart: Aylin
So it's hard to believe that Aylin is now 4 months old! It doesn't seem like that much time has passed. She is getting so big so fast! We have her check up and shots this coming Thursday. So we'll know exactly how much she's gained. I can't wait for that part... the shots I could do without. (-=
The transition back to work went relatively well. The first week was obviously the hardest. But got progressively better (except for her catching all the bugs going around). She is now on a pretty good schedule for a daytime routine. The ladies at the daycare just love her to pieces (Who can blame 'em!). She's the good kid in class! The first day of dropping her off was the hardest day of my life! Leaving my sweet little baby was the worst thing for me at that time. I cried all day. But I got through it. It was good to find out that she did so well, and that she was one of the good babies that didn't cry all day. Since then she has just charmed their socks off. It's hard for me to believe though that she has now been in day care for as long as she was home with me. )-= But again she does really well and that eases my mind. I also go to see her every day on my lunch break and I nurse her. It's nice to get away from the office and the craziness and see my baby girl every day. I am very thankful that we found such a great facility that is so close to where I work. It only takes me about 7 minutes to get there when traffic is good.
She's holding her head up and enjoys sitting up (although not on her own yet). She likes to sit in her highchair in the living room next to daddy's recliner and chat with us. She's constantly jabbering. I just love listening to her. On the morning when she's awake during the car ride to school and she decides to talk to momma I always turn the stereo off and chat with my baby girl. She absolutely LOVES her bath time, she just about soaked momma the other night with all of her splashing. She had all 4 limbs going like crazy and was squealing. It was great. We are still doing the BumGenius cloth diapers. Those are going great. Daycare uses them with no problems. I bring in enough every day for the day, and leave a wet bag for them to put them in and then I bring them home every night. We have enough to get us through about 2 days at a time, so I'm usually washing diapers every other night. But it's not difficult I just have to start them as soon as I get home so we can get through the 2 wash cycles and the dryer before it's time for bed. She has recently started cuddling things. She's not picky, It can be a blanket, her pooh blankie Uncle Bradley got her, her bib or a burp cloth. lol just as long as she's got something to snuggle with. They told me that during the day at daycare sometimes she'll pull her bib over her face when she's sleepy and if they flip it down, she'll pull it back up again. (-= She's started laughing too, and loves it when daddy holds her above his head. She especially loves it when she's up high and she gets to drool on daddy's face! She is also on the verge of rolling over. Just can’t quite figure out how to move her shoulder. But gets her legs and hips all the way over. She hates being on her belly though, so I’m not sure how well the rolling over will work out once she does figure it out!
The last few months have been so amazing watching her budding personality take form. This kid stuff is pretty amazing, and I wouldn't trade it for ANYTHING.
Here are a few recent pics of our sweetheart: Aylin
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Saturday, April 25, 2009
A couple of cute videos...
These are both from today. Teena shot the first one of Aylin right after she woke up from her nap this afternoon. I shot the other one this evening.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
6 Weeks and counting
So sweet little Aylin is now 6 going on 7 weeks old. On Monday we made a trip to the pediatrician's office because of her upset tummy. She was diagnosed with mild to moderate GER or acid reflux. The dr. put her on infant zantac and told us to try it for a week to 10 days to see if it helps. If not, then I am to go on a no dairy diet for 2 weeks. We've had good and bad days since she's been on the zantac. But mostly good. We're going to see it through the weekend, and see where we are at on Monday. But I really hope to have this all worked out before I go back to work...
... Speaking of, that clock is quickly ticking away. And I find myself frustrated with the small amount of time I have left to spend at home with my sweet girl. Especially when a lot of those days here lately have been spent with an upset baby because of her acid reflux. I know that going back to work is going to absolutely kill me. How can I leave my sweet little girl with people that don't even know her or us for the majority of the day! Then I start thinking about all of the wonderful things I am going to miss while I am at work, and it makes me so SO sad! I took Aylin up to the office on Thursday. I had my 6 week check up (everything is great, and relatively back to "normal"), so I figured we'd drop in and see everyone. But that just left me feeling overwhelmed about what I am going to be walking back in to. And on top of that what I will be missing while I am being miserable at work. I guess I'm letting it swarm on me a bit, and I need to step back and take a breath. But that's just really hard for me to do right now. I just hope that the zantac does the trick and that I can have more sweet days then frustrating ones before I go back to work.
Back to happy things! Miss Aylin has been smiling at us for a few weeks now. She's been thinking about giving us a little laugh now and again. But not quite yet. Just a little caugh excited type noise mostly. It was pretty special the other evening: Jeff had come home from work and she was asleep in the swing. His recliner is directly across the living room from her swing. She started to wake up and he said "well hello little one" and suddenly her eyes were wide and she gave him the biggest smile I'd seen yet! It was awesome to see her recognize him like that and be so happy that daddy was home.
... Speaking of, that clock is quickly ticking away. And I find myself frustrated with the small amount of time I have left to spend at home with my sweet girl. Especially when a lot of those days here lately have been spent with an upset baby because of her acid reflux. I know that going back to work is going to absolutely kill me. How can I leave my sweet little girl with people that don't even know her or us for the majority of the day! Then I start thinking about all of the wonderful things I am going to miss while I am at work, and it makes me so SO sad! I took Aylin up to the office on Thursday. I had my 6 week check up (everything is great, and relatively back to "normal"), so I figured we'd drop in and see everyone. But that just left me feeling overwhelmed about what I am going to be walking back in to. And on top of that what I will be missing while I am being miserable at work. I guess I'm letting it swarm on me a bit, and I need to step back and take a breath. But that's just really hard for me to do right now. I just hope that the zantac does the trick and that I can have more sweet days then frustrating ones before I go back to work.
Back to happy things! Miss Aylin has been smiling at us for a few weeks now. She's been thinking about giving us a little laugh now and again. But not quite yet. Just a little caugh excited type noise mostly. It was pretty special the other evening: Jeff had come home from work and she was asleep in the swing. His recliner is directly across the living room from her swing. She started to wake up and he said "well hello little one" and suddenly her eyes were wide and she gave him the biggest smile I'd seen yet! It was awesome to see her recognize him like that and be so happy that daddy was home.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)