Almost 4 months

The time is passing quickly! I've been back to work for well over a month now and things have been pretty hectic. Trying to juggle a crazy schedule and an infant has been challenging - mostly tiring. I'm responsible for the daily daycare pickup and drop off, which makes things interesting. I had to be at work at the crack of dawn one day this week, so Darren managed to be responsible for daycare and the teachers said that he did great! We have a pretty good routine these days. She wakes up about once a night to eat. I get her up around 6 and we listen to the baby cds my mom got her while we get ready to leave. Our morning interactions are the best - she's full of energy and ready to play. It'd be pretty funny to be a fly on the wall in our house though. I'm sure it's ridiculous to the outside observer how Darren and I sing and dance to "This Old Man" while getting dressed. She likes it though and that's what's important. :) We're home by 6:30 and then we have an hour together before Darren gives her a bath. Obviously we don't have much time together during the workweek, so the weekends have become more important to us.

Newlyn has full head control now and is pretty active. She wiggles around all the time so I really have to watch her. This morning, when I went in her room to check on her, she was lying perpendicular in her crib! She's almost rolling over onto her tummy - I think she'll accomplish that in the next week or so. The daycare teachers think she's going to be an early talker because she's already trying so hard to get noise out. If I say "ahh-goo" to her, she says it back to me immediately. She has another few sounds that she can imitate easily. We're working on some basic words and signing, but obviously it's too early for her to really get them.

She really likes daycare and it's pretty cool to hear about what she does during the day with the other babies. I haven't been able to go feed her at lunchtime very often, but she's doing great and I really like having the extra adult time during the day. I haven't taken too many lunch breaks, but when I have, it's been really nice to have some alone time. I think that the absence during the day makes our time at night more special. She's always very happy to see us in the evenings. Her daycare couldn't possibly be any more perfect, so we're happy all around.

We're excited about the holidays, but probably going to lay low until that point. Darren and I don't have the energy to leave Pittsburgh on the weekends and it's hard to interrupt her schedule. We want to get out and do some hiking, but it's been really rainy on the weekends. We're hoping for good weather next weekend because most likely, we'll be in for the season after that.

Here's the baby last weekend. She's getting big...about 15.5 lbs and pushing 25 inches.