Day 134 - Such a happy baby!!!

Reflecting on yesterday's post - I woke up this morning around 4:00 am in serious need of relief!

**Alert - going to talk about nursing...please skip next few paragraphs if you're a guy or have no interest in hearing about nursing!**

I've been trying to build up my milk supply because lately - Allie's been going through 4 bottles or bags a day while I'm at work - and I'm only pumping 3 bags. I wasn't able to get in the last pumping session at work because I kept putting it off and then it would be time to go home. So now - I have been adamant about pumping at work - every 3 hours - I'm pumping, regardless of what is going on. When I'm at home - I've been nursing Allie about every 2 hours just to build up the supply (increase demand, increase supply!) With work bringing on potential travel for up to two weeks at a time, I want to make sure Allie has plenty of stash - so I have to not only keep up with what she's going through - I have to figure out how to squeeze a few extra bags out a day to build up.

So I woke up this morning in desperate need to pump and I got about 2 1/2 bottles (equal to about 15 ounces. I was super happy because that was going to be 2 1/2 that I could add to the stash! I figured, Allie would be up around 6:00 and I would have plenty by that time...as I was getting ready to go back to sleep, I heard Allie wake up. My mom snuck her upstairs with her last night, since Brad and I went out for dinner and didn't come home until late. As much as we try to have Allie sleep in her crib, my mom does manage to sneak her upstairs 1-2 times a week.

Allie was hungry and I had nothing to give her. Welp - that meant that I was going to have to feed her with a bottle of what I just pumped. I have never given her a bottle. How would this work? Will she take a bottle from me? As I started to feed her with the bottle, I was amazed at how quickly she took to it and how well she was eating. I didn't know if the flow was coming out too fast, so when I took the bottle out to check, Allie gave me a kung fu grip around the bottle and refused to let it go! One side of me wanted to laugh hysterically because my daughter, at such a young age, is a big eater and she knows exactly what she wants. The other side of me ached - ached to know that she is now independent from me when it comes to eating.

In the back of my head, I guess I always knew that she was taking the bottle well and that she adjusted fine - I just never REALLY thought about it. Anyhow - I ended up having to hand Allie and the bottle over to my mom because I really couldn't deal with it - it made me too sad.

To all the future mothers out there - I can't express how wonderful it is to nurse. I decided to do it solely on the health benefits to the baby and I had no clue that I would build such an attachment to it. Yes - I was ridden with anxiety at how much it was going to hurt and how "National Geographic" it was going to be, but a week of pain is so worth the experience.

The older Allie gets, the more it reminds me that she is going to need me less and less. I don't know how to process that...

But - on to funner things - Allie's been getting cuter and cuter. She may be one of the happiest babies I know...but then again, I don't know that many...

Bana sent this super cute outfit that we originally had on her today that says, "These are my peeps" and it has a few cute animals on there. But, as Brad says, "She ralphed on it." We had to change her. I didn't get a picture of her with the outfit, but I will the next time she has it on.

We did manage to put this cute dress on her and Allie was too happy to pose for us!