Elizabeth

Thought I'd better do an update on our lovely girl.

Since her surgery, she is like a different baby. She sleeps during the day, IN HER COT, for up to an hour at a time, compared to thirty minutes in the motorised swing. She puts herself to sleep about 8 times out of 10, instead of needing to be fed to sleep all the time.

She has started rolling onto her tummy and reaching out for things in front of her. She loves talking and has huge conversations with herself while waiting for one of her slaves to attend to her.





Her little nose and mouth look amazing. She needs to wear her nasal stent for another couple of months, but it doesn't bother her.

She is feeding well and frequently (compared to a lot of babies). We switched her from her cleft palate teat to a regular teat as she was guzzling her feeds in 30 seconds flat. I am expressing 4 times a day and this yields approximately 800-1100mL of milk.

We have been trying to breastfeed, but the more I try, the more disheartened I feel. She attaches really easily, but refuses to suck and will just push away. I will keep trying but I don't know for how long.

She is just such a joy and always has a smile for anyone who passes into her line of sight. It's hard to imagine the dark days of her first three months. There were days when I truly felt that I was a failure, and I couldn't see any light at the end of the tunnel. I'm so glad she has turned a corner and I am able to enjoy being her mummy.

Playing football with Daddy at the Gold Coast United family fun day.


First face painting experience!


I love this pic!


Bumbo-ing around.

Mmmm, the BEST bolognese sauce ever. I put all the vegies in the food processor to make them really tiny. I used garlic, onion, cauliflower, zucchini and carrot. There is enough for 6 meals for the four of us.

Showing off her new nose. It looks better and better every day.


My precious girl modelling Gran's knits.


Handsome boy. I bought this beanie for him last winter and he's always refused to wear it...until the other day when I said in a mega chirpy voice, "Look, it's got a bunny tail on top!" (a pompom).


Another day at Dreamworld.

Our week

DH has had all of this week off, and it's been great having him home.

On Sunday we went to Ikea and got two more Billy bookcases (we already had 4 of them *rolls eyes*)- one for David's models, which seem to be multiplying at an alarming rate, and one for my fabric and sewing gear. Fitting them into the car was interesting and involved moving Jimmy's car seat to the other side, taking the bookcases out of the boxes, DH tripping over a concrete thing with his arms and legs flailing, and me sitting in the kiddie seat with my knees under my chin.

On Tuesday it was MIL's birthday so we went out for lunch at the casino. We gave MIL a Wii Fit which she is very excited about!


On Wednesday Elizabeth cried all day while DH made a new set of steps for the back deck. While doing so, he looked underneath the pavers on the other steps in the backyard and discovered about 10 toads under each one. This particular step had 22 toads hibernating under it. It was so unbelievably gross yet hilariously funny that I had to take photos.



Yesterday we went to Dreamworld- we took advantage of a really good offer they have at the moment for a pass that goes until the end of next July. We figure we can just go there for a couple of hours on a Sunday every few weeks, and it will be a good way for me to stop Tiff from being bored in the school holidays. Jimmy has never been to a theme park before and he was very awed by it all- he barely said two words the whole day, which is highly unusual for him! He loved all the animals, especially the tigers. I told him that the tigers were my favourite, and he said, "That's MY tigers!".