5 Weeks-Maddie the Grouch

If I had to describe Madeline in two words this week, they would be: Fussy Pants.  If she's not busy sleeping or eating, she's busy being miserable.

Luckily, she's not the cry at the top of her lungs for hours type.  Instead, she is the cry in ear-piercing short bursts while grunting, groaning, and wiggling for hours kind.

She doesn't seem to know what to do with herself yet.  If she's awake, she thinks she should be eating, but then she eats too much and spits up bucket loads of curdled milk all over her Momma.  (Gross.) The poor girl also gets gassy and hiccup-y all the time...that would make me fussy too.  She just can't seem to get comfortable.  Sad.

In other news, she's developing by leaps and bounds.  In between bouts of crying, she's smiling now.  Not just gassy, was-that-really-a-smile? smiles.  I mean real smiles!  She likes it when I stand her up on my lap so that she can look around the room.  That usually makes her smile.  When I congratulate her with "Good girl!!  What a big girl!!" in an annoying, high-pitched momma voice she also likes to smile.  She opens her mouth wide and wrinkles her nose up like she's up to no good.  It's my favorite thing that she does.

She's extremely curious about the world around her, which is another reason I think she gets so fussy.  She seems frustrated by the fact that all she can do is slump around like a slug.  In her desperation to see the sights, she's learned some new tricks.  She can support herself on her forearms and hold her head up for a few seconds at a time.  AND, although it was probably a complete accident, she flipped herself over from her tummy to her back once.  I swear, homegirl is going to get up and walk across the room by the end of the month.  Then she's going to ask to borrow the car and break her curfew while she carouses with the bad baby from down the hall.


But first?  First, she needs to stop fussing because it drives her Momma bananas. It's hard watching your daughter be miserable without being able to do anything about it.  And when I get frustrated, I start to fuss.  (Like mother, like daughter, eh?) Which means that when Eric gets home from work, he has two fussing redheads to deal with.  That's a sad world for Daddy, but luckily he has lots of experience dealing with fussy redheads.  

I'm going to nervously chew on my hand because I'm very confused
as to why I'm on my tummy instead of my back.  

Okay, here we go.  Let's do this thing!  

Phew, this is hard work!

Almost there! 

I'm doing it!  I can see the Dizzy Cat!  

Okay, I give up! Too hard. Back to crying.