The Daily Kate Update

Kate and I have really been getting into a routine lately, and it's great. I've always wanted to make sure that I spend the most quality time with her that I can, and that desire was just reinforced when we learned on Monday that we had lost one of our co-workers to cancer. :( She hadn't actually worked in the office for about a year, since she was on medical leave, but we all still cared about her and got together occasionally. In fact, we were supposed to get together for lunch last Thursday, but she had to cancel as she wasn't feeling well, and by Saturday, she was gone :( Kate and I (and a bunch of my co-workers, of course!) went to her "Celebration of Life" on Wednesday and I was just reminded how very lucky I am to be married to my soulmate, have a wonderful, beautiful, amazing daughter, supportive parents and family whom I love very much, and great friends. I don't ever want to miss out on anything because I'm thinking, "Oh, I should be cleaning the house," or "Oh, I should be doing work right now," even though it's work that I can do later. I want to enjoy every minute with Kate; she's growing up so fast!

So I've really tried to get into a (flexible) routine lately so that I can get (almost) all my work done when she's sleeping, so that when she's awake, we can just have fun and be together. Here it is (and the reason I'm writing this all out is because I also use this blog as a journal--I actually plan to print it out in book form someday--so I want to remember all the little details about when Kate was a baby. I promise I won't be offended if this bores you and you just want to skip to the pictures ;D)

6:30 am Kate wakes up (kind of, hehe) and wants to nurse, so I bring her into bed with us and feed her. I love this time in the morning, just laying in bed with the sun streaming through our windows, cuddling with my little girl. Also, I would like to publicly thank her for only waking up once during the night now; she usually wakes up at 2:30 or so to eat, but other than that, she is silent from about 9:30 pm to 6:30 am. Well, silent is really a relative term; she is a very LOUD sleeper with all her grunting and whatnot! But I really am much more rested than many new moms, and I consider myself lucky.

6:45 am I shower and get ready for the day. If Dan is still in bed, I leave Kate in with him. If he's up himself, I put her back in her bassinet. Even though she can't roll yet, I'd hate to step out of the shower and find that today is the day she decided to acquire that particular skill!

7:30 am Kate wakes up for real now, so I bring her downstairs and let her play on her activity mat while I answer work emails and update my magazines' websites. This is work that I pretty much *have* to get done first thing, since who wants to read about news hours after it's happened? I sit on the couch and work on my laptop so that I can see Kate squirming and wiggling around on her mat. She loves that thing, and she's fascinated by the two butterflies that we (well, I) named Mango and Snocone. I know, not the greatest names in the world, but one is orange and the color of a mango, and the other one is the same purple as Tracy's wallet that she always says makes her want a grape snocone, so that's how we came up with their names. Plus, Kate always gets excited when I say, "Do you want to hang out with Mango and Snocone?" It's cute. :)

8:00/8:15 am By now, Kate's attention span on her activity mat is pretty much spent (you can only hit the rattle and stare at Mango and Snocone so many times, you know) and I've completed all the urgent work I have to do for the day, so I take Kate upstairs to get her dressed for the day. Then we read a book together (yesterday it was "Hello, Is this Grandma?" given to me by, you guessed it, my mom :D) and sometimes a second book too, if she's up for it. She LOVES books; it's so cute.

After reading, we'll play with some of her toys. We just started playing with one of those toys where you hit the button and the character (like a dog or cat) pops up. It took Kate awhile to get it, but once she realized that SHE was the one making it go.... oh, man, you should have seen her smile.

9:45 am Now she's getting tired again (apparently our playtime is exhausting!) and wants to eat, so we sit in bed as I nurse her and read to her from one of my books (experts say it's good for you to read them anything, not just children's books, so Kate is currently listening to me read the historical fiction novel The White Queen. It's a great book--thanks, Mom!)

Afterward, she falls asleep for about an hour, so I take that time to do some more work and pack up my laptop, since I have to stop in at the office for about an hour (I normally don't go in the mornings, since Kate is usually awake at that time--she takes her "big" nap in the afternoon--so I normally go in sometime after 12, but I had to go in before lunch because we have a magazine going to print on Monday, and yesterday morning is when I had access to a mac to get stuff done).

10:30 am We leave for the office, and by the time we get there at 10:45, Kate's awake, but luckily quite happy. Everyone in my office loves her, and they get so excited when she comes in. While I'm working, I just lay a blanket out on the floor, and she wiggles around for awhile and coos.

12 pm Kate and I work until about noon, when we leave to go have lunch with my friend Meghan (who, by the way, just found out she's having a GIRL in September! I'm so excited; we'll have so much fun with our daughters!). Kate always falls asleep around this time for her long afternoon nap, so she is asleep the whole time we're at the Great Dane.

1:30 pm We get home, and Kate's still sleeping, so I take this time to do some more work. I got a big website project done, which was good, and I finished up right as Kate woke up. Perfect timing!

3:30 pm Kate's awake now, and it's a fairly nice day out (cloudy, but warm) so we walk down to the mailbox to mail some more of her birth announcements, and then we take the long way home so I can get some exercise. She loves going on walks, and I talk to her about all the things we see. I can tell her little brain is just soaking up everything, even if she doesn't understand what I'm saying.

5:00 pm We get back from our walk and play together on her activity mat. She smiles so big when I spin the butterflies around or make them talk in funny voices.

5:30 pm Dan gets home, and we go to Woodmans to get stuff for dinner. When we get back, Kate's a little crabby, so I walk around the house with her to calm her down while Dan makes dinner, and then he takes his turn holding her so I can eat.

7:00 pm She falls asleep again for a brief catnap, so I can finish up all the work I had for the day, which is nice.

8:00 pm I wake her up, so that she'll still go to bed at her usual time of 9:30, and Dan holds her and plays with her as we watch The Office.

8:30 pm Bath time! She LOVES taking baths, even though we don't do it every day, because I don't want to dry out her skin. So she loves it when she gets to take a bath in her whale tub! She smiles at me so big when I sing to her as I bathe her. She is so sweet; I just love her.

9:00 pm She gets out of the bath and we get her ready for bed. I put her PJs on and nurse her as I read some more of The White Queen. She falls asleep as I read (around 9:20), so I put her in her bassinet and go to bed myself.

Obviously, this routine doesn't always work (for example, we had to go into the office today from 9 until 11, to finish up the magazine that is going out on Monday), but probably 75% of the time, this is our routine. In fact, like I said, on the two or so days I go into the office, I usually go sometime in the afternoon when she's sleeping, so we have even more playtime together in the morning when she's awake. I absolutely love my life--I don't think I've ever been this happy.

I'm sure I've said this before, but I feel so incredibly lucky to be able to keep my job, which I truly enjoy, and bring in a decent income while still spending as much quality time with my daughter as possible (because while I like being an editor, being a stay at home mom is my dream job). Sure, our house isn't quite as picked up as I'd like it to be, but that's ok. I never want to look back on this time and think, "Well, Kate's babyhood flew by because I was too busy cleaning, but at least my house was presentable!" Nope, I want to look back and think, "Oh, man, our house was pretty messy when Kate was little, but I have so many great memories of all the things I did instead of cleaning, like reading to her, playing with her, etc."

Ok, enough of my journaling, and onto what you probably really wanted to see... the pictures!

So sweet!

Remember this bear? We got it for our baby shower, and we take a picture of her by it each month so we can see how she's grown. We took one at two weeks, one at a month and a half, and then these yesterday at 3 months (I forgot to get one at the two and a half mark; oh well, we'll just start again with three months).

What a smiler! Too bad her shirt is kind of hiding it!

Almost a laugh!

My little girl is getting so big! Just look at her compared to when she was a month and a half:

and when she was two weeks! AGH! Where does time go?

"Just a few more pictures, Mama, ok?"

"Whew; spending quality time with Mama is fun, but tiring!"

After her bath...

"Whatchoo lookin' at?"

We had a great Mother's Day celebration. Kate let us sleep in until 9:30 (I never thought 9:30 would be considered sleeping in!) and then Dan made me breakfast. Since it was pretty nice out, we went on a walk after breakfast, and that was a lot of fun. We then went to a late lunch/early dinner at Outback with Tracy, Dan, Kirsti and Rori. Now we're just hanging out at home, enjoying my first mother's day as a mom. :) I feel so very lucky to have a beautiful, amazing daughter and a wonderful, loving mother of my own; I am very blessed. :)

On her tummy...

We bought this thing called a "Sleepy Wrap" and Kate loves it! She always wants to be held, and this allows me to have her on me, but have my hands free to do things like housework, work, or blogging ;)

So cozy...

Right before we went on our walk; I was addressing Kate's birth announcements

The flowers Dan bought me for Mother's Day; so pretty!

My mom sent me this beautiful mini-rose bush as something to have to commemorate my first mother's day as a mom; we're going to plant this in our front garden, and then take it with us when we move to a house (hopefully in a couple years!)

Outside the Outback; we're squinting into the sun, which is why I look a little weird :) Kate is wearing the dress my mom got her for a baby gift, and that she wore to her baby shower.