The Happiest Baby On The Block

Katie and I finally watched "The Happiest Baby On The Block" DVD last night. It was recommended by the nurse who taught our "baby" class and a lactation consultant. The St. Louis Public Libraries did not have the DVD in their system, but Katie's mother was able to obtain it for us through her library network. After Katie's mom watched it and gave us a glowing report, we were eager to find out how to have the happiest baby in this sector of the universe. I'm sure baby Wookies are pretty happy as they live in the lush wroshyr forests of the beautiful planet Kashyyyk. It has been a long time since I have played any Star Wars Battlefront games.

Ever since our little Wookie was born (she has a lot of hair, c'mon!), we were convinced that she was one of those few babies who refused to be completely swaddled. While we were in the hospital and adjusting to the first few weeks at home, she would scream and wiggle until her arms were free or we released our little bird from her cage. I'm sure she will use that analogy in a decade. Well, we stopped swaddling her completely. Sophia has been somewhat cantankerous lately, constantly fidjeting, waking herself up repeatedly during the night, and waking up whenever we would put her down. We were hoping our movie would remedy the situation.

As we watched the DVD last night, we realized we had given up on swaddling too soon and learned a number of new techniques to pacify and relax our little girl. After our movie time, we tried the techniques mentioned in the DVD and Sophia was soothed immediately. We swaddled her tight and followed the rest of the "program." We were amazed and still are. The developer of this approach and his methods are truly genius. If you have a baby and have not seen this, rent it, now. You, yes you, dear reader, rent it. Unless you are the baby whisperer already.

Good science demands replication of experiments. Last night's experiments confirmed our initial hypotheses and we are anxiously awaiting the collecting of data tonight. The pictures below depict little Sophia Grace sound asleep, comfortably and tightly swaddled. I swaddled her, positioned her at her preferred side angle, swung her for a few minutes, and she was out! Using the methods introduced by the DVD, we can soothe the wildest screams and squirms in minutes.
We already knew some of the information and had developed or stumbled upon our own techniques, but the DVD was immensely helpful.

Swaddle-Side/Stomach Position-Shush-Swing-Suck=Boojah!

What a cute little girl!

Our Little Pumpkin

Today we went to Rombach's pumpkin patch! It's in the area I grew up and I have a lot of fun memories of going there as a kid, so I wanted to start sharing the memories with my daughter. Sophie wasn't so sure about this adventure with Mom and Dad. She definitely wasn't the happiest pumpkin in the patch. I can't blame her, though, we were pretty unrelenting in trying to get a cute picture of her amongst the pumpkins. Here are some of the shots we got.

Sophie propped up against some pumpkins. Check out her cute pumpkin socks. Her bib reads "My first Halloween."

Propped up in a new way...still not happy.

Here's the dialog that occurred before the picture above:
Dad says: "Let's put her on top of a giant flat pumpkin."
Mom says: "What? Just lay her down all sprawled out?"
Dad says: "Sure. Why not?"
Mom thinks: This is really going to tick her off and won't be very cute.

Turns out...it was cute. Funny and cute.

Personally, I think this is the best shot we got all day.

The family.

Beauty Sleep

Sophie is getting more fun every day. She's finally responsive to us and is smiling more and more! Morning is my favorite time with her. I love how happy and giggly she is right after she wakes up. It's just so sweet!

Lots of people ask how she's sleeping, so I thought I'd answer it on the blog, too. She does great at night. Once she goes down anywhere between 8pm and 11pm, she'll sleep really well between feedings, and usually only wakes up once during the night. Some nights she'll go 5 or 6 hours between feedings, but usually it's 3 or 4 hours. Overall, she's letting me get rest and I don't really feel overly tired most days. That said, I am looking forward to her sleeping through the night for the first time.

We started using our cloth diapers last week. It was recommended to start using them when she reached 8lbs, and she was 9 lbs 5 ounces at her 4 week appointment on Oct. 6th, so we figured it was time. It's going great so far! They're still a little big, but she's doing well with them and doesn't seem to mind. These aren't just any cloth diaper. Forget the whole "pre-folds" that you have to pin together and put a cover over. Oh no. These are some serious diapers. They work just like disposables, but you don't dispose of them. You just take out the insert and wash them. I highly recommend them if you're considering using cloth. Go here to find out more!

I took this picture today:

She's snoozing in her diaper with the magic pacifier. I think I've created a monster with that thing. We try not to use it too often, but we've been relying on it more and more these days. It just works so well when she's tired and can't stop crying in order to fall asleep. Oh well. We'll probably pay the price later, but for now it sure is helpful.

With that aside...isn't she stinking cute?! Check out the rolls on that tummy of hers! She's gaining weight like a champ!

(P.S. Yes...we usually do put clothes on her. Today just seemed like a good day to go topless!)

All You Need Is Love

One thing is for sure...our little girl is loved! She will never be without people to coo over her and bathe her with smooches. And really, what more does she need? Okay...maybe a little food and a diaper change every now and then, but some good lovin' is equally essential!

Both of our families dote on her, but this post is a shout out to Matt's side of the family. Here are some pictures of her adoring fans:

Uncle Mitchell

Uncle Peter

Great-Grandpa Meyr

Great-Grandma Meyr

For some reason I don't have any pictures of Aunt Joy on our camera...so we'll remedy that very soon and get her picture posted! When Uncle Nathan comes for a visit, we'll get a few shots with him, too!

Sweet Sophie

Sorry for the delay about the pictures that my friend, Erin, took last week. They turned out to be SO cute! Much to my chagrin, however, little Sophie didn't want to sleep, so Erin suggested coming back again to try to get those sleeping baby pics that I wanted so much. I felt so silly going back, but I'm really glad I did, because they are adorable!! Erin is SO creative with her photography and I love all of the pictures she got of our family.

Go here to see the pictures from last week's photo shoot. The event code is: Sophia
Go here to see the additional photos that Erin took of her yesterday.

Thank you, Erin, for being so willing to have me back to get those shots! You're the best!

Pictures

I was telling Matt the other day that I just don't feel like any of the pictures we have taken show how cute Sophia really is. What's the saying? "They don't give her justice." Something like that. Niner.

Anyway, I'm hoping today will change all of that and I'll get to show you some stinkin' cute pictures of sweet Sophie. A good friend of ours, Erin, is a photographer and she's going to do a shoot with our little girl in a few hours. I'm SOOO excited! Erin is great and her pictures always turn out so adorable! (Check out her photos and art work here.) I just hope Sophie cooperates so that we can get those adorable naked sleeping baby pics.

Until then, here are some more pictures of our little Sophie taken by Matt and myself.

The classic "sleeping on daddy's chest" picture.

Snoozing with her arms stretched above her head. I totally do that when I'm conked out.

Her froggie outfit. The feet are little frog faces. So cute.

A proud dad

It is fitting that my first post on our blog occurs after the birth of our first-born child, Sophia Grace. I didn't plan for it to occur at this time, but I'm joyful it has.

We named her Sophia, which means "wisdom" in Greek, as our hearts were won over by wisdom literature in the Old Testament. Wisdom and Folly are personified in the book of Proverbs, both calling out in the sixth chapter, "Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!" Both "women" have something to give to those who respond to their calls, yet the delights and eventual path of the partakers are vastly different. Wisdom leads to life; the path of Folly leads to death.

In Proverbs 8:35-36, wisdom says "For whoever finds me finds life and obtains favor from the Lord, but he who fails to find me injures himself: all who hate me love death."

All who hate wisdom love death!

When God redeemed my life in 2001, I was in great need of wisdom. I still am. I had some friends from college who were attending Greentree Community Church and I started going with them. I was blessed to join the church and a community of believers who invested in me and took a lot of their time and energy to help me grow in my faith and wisdom. Amidst many blunders on my part as others were compassionate, faithful, and gentle in their correction and guidance, my heart was drawn to the wisdom literature of the Old Testament. I am in debt to many of you who read this post.

I rejoiced as I read Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, etc., gaining practical wisdom and insight. It became far easier for me to make decisions in life, obey the leading of the Holy Spirit, and know that my life had intention and direction. I try to read a chapter of Proverbs every morning. The thirty-one chapters match well with the typical thirty or thirty-one days in a month.

The name Sophia won our hearts as we began praying for her and journaling to her long before she was born.

I pray that Sophia grows to know the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
I pray that Sophia's life is marked by wisdom, that she makes decisions in obedience to the Lord.
I pray that she is a blessing to others, living in such a way that others are drawn or called to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus, the risen Lord.

We decided to give her the middle name "Grace" because we thought it sounded beautiful with "Sophia" and it reminds us, and hopefully her someday, of the undeserved, yet freely given, mercy we have received from God, our Father. I was a little slow in accepting the name because we have very dear friends, who we consider family, whose recently adopted daughter was given the name Grace when she came into the family. Anyway, this past week I grew to treasure the name. Great timing, right?




Baby girl and daddy's hand.


My wife has been an amazing mom to our little girl. I am so proud to be her husband. The Lord has richly blessed me.