Samantha is 6 weeks old already?!

My how time flies when you're having fun...or when all you do is breastfeed, change diapers, and sleep occasionally. So I am exaggerating (a little). We've actually done quite a lot, especially in the last few weeks. I've started taking Samantha for walk/runs a few times a week, and we've been shopping a few times as well. The biggest adventure, though, has to be the 2 days of work in Santa Clara last week.

Since the other new employees in my rotation program started last week, my manager had asked that I come in for 2 days during the week to meet them and partake in some of the orientation activities. Of course he asked me this when I was about 5 months pregnant, and not knowing any better, I agreed. Luckily my mother in law was able to come help us take care of Samantha since she does not have her first immunization shots and can't (or shouldn't) go to day care yet. The trip actually went fairly well, considering.

We started working with Samantha to take a bottle several weeks ago and she was a pro at it by the time we needed to go to Santa Clara. I have also been pumping for several weeks to start stockpiling some milk, so we were all set from a feeding standpoint. I flew down to Santa Clara on the company commuter plane on Tuesday morning, and Lawrence, his mom, and Samantha drove down Tuesday afternoon after work.

When I checked into the hotel, they upgraded me to an executive suite since they had a large party checking in that was taking all the 2-bed rooms. The suites only have 1 queen bed and a sofa bed, so I was worried my mother in law would have a horrible night sleeping, and after killing my mom's back with our futon at home, I really didn't want to ruin another grandmother's back! The suite did come with a fridge, though, which came in handy for the milk supply. As it turned out, the suite was perfect for us. My mother in law said the sofa bed was perfectly comfortable and she liked that there were divider doors between the sofa part of the room and the queen bed area. We were able to set up Samantha's pack and play in the queen bed area where we were sleeping and still had plenty of room to walk around. The downside - hearing Samantha's noises all night long! She is a very noisy baby and this trip reminded me why we moved her to her own room at home so early! Next time I'm doing what Lawrence did - wearing earplugs :)

The best part of the room, though, was the vanity mirror in the queen bedroom. Samantha LOVED it! We used it as a changing table and she would just laugh and stare at herself the whole time she was up there. It was so cute! Here's a picture.
The work part wasn't too bad except for the lack of sleep on Wednesday. I was able to pump milk in the mom's room and store it in the freezer. We actually came home with more milk than we brought! We did have a bit of a scare on Wednesday when I thought someone had taken my pump supplies from the room at work, but it turned out I had brought them home in one of the gift bags I got at work and then accidentally traded bags with one of the other employees who had brought me back to the hotel after work on Tuesday. Once I figured it out, we got the pump supplies back and it was no big deal. I'll just blame my forgetfulness on mommy brain :)

Samantha is doing great. She is really starting to interact with us and smiles a lot more often now (even when she's not dirtying a diaper). She sometimes swings her arms at the hanging toys on her play mat and bouncer. Here's a little video of her dancing (or trying to).


Her neck muscles are getting really strong - she can hold her head straight up for several seconds at a time when sitting on our laps. Her legs are getting strong, too. When we do tummy time on the play mat, if I put my hand up flat against her feet, she will push off and scoot across the mat. She hasn't quite figured out how to get her legs and feet underneath her yet, but she's working on it. She also loves bath time.
The next trick is figuring out how to get her on a schedule and sleep through the night. Her current m.o. is to go to sleep around 9pm and then we try to wake her for a "dream feed" around 10:30, but she is usually too sleepy to take more than a few ounces. Then she gets up again sometime between midnight and 3am and again at 5 or 5:30. I'd like to get the waketime to 6:30 or 7 and drop the 5ish feeding, but I can't seem to get her there. Even if I feed her until she won't take anymore at 3am, she still wakes up about 2 and a half hours later. I know she CAN go 4 or 5 hours without eating, but it seems her internal alarm clock is set to 5-something. I've even tried a pacifier to see if she'll go back to sleep for an hour, but she spits it out and cries after 15 minutes or so. Hopefully over the next few weeks we can inch that wake time out and also maybe get a few nights of 6+ hours of straight sleep.