Missin' Daddy

This past week Daniel went to the Dominican Republic with The Rock (our youth minstry) to work with an orphanage. Before he left, Sienna tried to convince him to stay. Or she was going to go with him...

Sienna and I decide to keep busy so we wouldn't notice as much that Daddy was gone. But we still noticed...:) We had a chance to visit a lot of friends last week...We met Lisa, baby Emma, Allison & baby Keira for lunch at Reston Town Center. We also visited Angie and her two girls (Julie and Kendall) and the following day we saw Kelly and her son, River. I thought I got a good shot of Sienna, Julie and Kendall, but maybe I got distracted. I know I got my camera out, but apparently that is as far as I got. But I got a few cute pics of Sienna and River.

Throughout the week, we also got to hang out with Kailea H., Jen S., Jen C., The Adkins, The Thompsons & Grandma & Grandpa M. One day we spent the whole day at Grandma & Grandpa's - here is Sienna on her temporary bed :)


Finally, we picked up Daniel on Wednesday. He had a great time, but he missed us! Grandma bought this outfit for Sienna, and we thought it was perfect for picking up Daddy from the airport....




Grandpa M. gave me some pictures from one of our trips to the Eastern Shore & I scanned them in. Check them out under the "June" blog...

July

We are closing in on 6 months - I can't believe it! Sienna has more personality every day. She laughs often, specially at Daddy & the games he plays with her. She still isn't too interested in reading books together (don't tell Grandma!) but we still read them occasionally. We bought her an Exersaucer which has been really fun. We call it her "office" because she looks so serious as she moves from one activity to another. It is really hilarious. It has been good for her (already strangely strong) legs...she is learning to stand on the flat part of her feet instead of her tippy toes or the side of her foot. We are also trying to learn to sit up but we usually fall over...


We are getting better at sitting, but Sienna is much more interested in standing. Sometimes I think she is going to walk before she sits up...! She found her feet this month too, so she spends a significant amount of time playing with them!

This month she has been sleeping through the night more although she seems to wake up because she is uncomfortable from the teething process. Whenever she has a bad night like that I think for sure when I wake up she will have finally cut a tooth, but it hasn't happen yet. That's ok - there are plenty of things to drool on and to put in our mouth for the time being...

We had a busy week last week. We had a picnic at Burke Lake Park with her friend Emma and we also went on a 5 mile walk. It was really fun but SO hot. She also had a chance to go to the pool with her "girlfriends"...Caroline, Corban & Charis this week. (Maybe we were supposed to spell our daughter's name with a "C"!?) It was the second time she has been in a pool and she LOVES the water. We tried to get a nice shot with her and Caroline, but she kept pulling her hair...

June

It seems that Sienna started the teething process in May/June. I am not really sure when exactly it started because it didn't occur to me that babies started teething so young. I also didn't know that they can start teeth and not actually get a tooth for several months! Yikes...Regardless, Daniel guessed that she might be teething and lo and behold, she had all the symptoms. Enter excessive drool.

We were able to take another trip to the Eastern Shore again this month. The weather was beautiful and Grandma & Grandpa M. have done a great job decorating and furnishing the cabin - it looks great! Here are some pictures that Grandpa M. took of the trip...


This month Sienna learned to roll over on her tummy. This seemed like a good thing, but she didn't know how to flip back over. Even worse, she didn't even realize that she could lay her head down. So, she would roll over with her arms down to her side and cry. So we started practicing rolling onto her back and she figured it out after about 2 weeks. So it was an eventful month.

The other news is that she is back to sleeping better at night, and I believe it is all because...TA DA...The crib is done!!!! Daniel made it himself from scratch. (I think that term is for baking, not carpentry but you know what I mean). It is beautiful and she loves sleeping in it :)

May

In May Sienna decided she missed her Mommy at night and decided to get up hourly between 1am and 7am. I am pretty sure I enjoyed motherhood that month but I barely remember it. LOL - actually, May was really fun for many reasons...

First of all, Sienna started to laugh this month. It is the best sound in the world! When she laughs it changes her whole face - she smiles and her eyes light up...so cute. Daniel gets her to laugh more than I do - they have lots of fun together...

Also, I had my first Mother's Day! Daniel made a reservation for breakfast at Brion's Grille - they have the BEST breakfast buffet. So we celebrated Mother's Day with the Storm's (pregnant with their first baby) the Young's (they have a baby girl a month younger than Sienna) and the Paganini's (they have 2 girls and they are Super-Parents!). It was really fun and DELICIOUS.

We also traveled to Charlotte for Memorial Day weekend. It was a crazy weekend because we got to see both Daniel's family (including Jarod & Lisa who were in town) and my family who were having a family reunion at Uncle Steve & Aunt Linda's. Sienna got to go on her first boat ride with the Greco's and she got to meet the rest of her family (including her 2nd cousins!) with the DeMay's...It was a great weekend!

April

In April Sienna decided she was over sleeping in the bassinett, so we moved her into her Pack 'n Play (Daniel was still putting the finishing touches on the crib) and put it in her bedroom. Where she slept. By herself. At night. She handled it a lot better than we did.

She slept well, sleeping most of the night only waking once to eat. However, Daniel and I took turns checking on her several times a night to be sure she was breathing and to be sure that a crazy person didn't come through the locked doors, break into the house, get past our Pitbull, sneak into the nursery and steal Sienna...or something equally logical.

Sienna also made her second trip to Long Island. We stayed with Uncle Rich & Aunt Anne, had a fun lunch with Aunt T at the Club and got to see her Great Grandpa again.

This month she also started to look more like a baby instead of an infant and she started to hold onto small toys if you hand them to her. Her favorite thing was her Boppy bouncy-chair that doesn't bounce very much, but it vibrates and plays music so it kept her entertained!

Our camera broke this month, so we had limited photos :(. But here are a few in her favor chair and a cute shot of her at The Rock for "Need for Speed" night.

March

During her second month, she was more awake more often (during the day AND at night!) and she was much more alert. She smiled for the first time and for the weeks to come we tried different things that would make her smile, but now she does it all the time. She celebrated her first St. Patrick's Day and she got all dressed up for a photo shoot for her Irish side of the family. Her Grandpa John Henry and Aunt Jesse came to visit AND her Aunt Caroline and Uncle Jeff visted in March, so it was a fun & busy month. Also, she spent Easter in Terra Nova South, Grandma & Grandpa M.'s cabin on the Eastern Shore.

Sienna's Story

At 8:30pm on January 30 I was at The Rock and I was feeling a little funny. It was still 3 weeks before my due date, but after a few minutes, I thought I should head home - I suspected my water had broken. I asked one of our volunteers, Shannon, to tell my co-workers that I had left. She was concerned about me, so she drove me home. I called the doctor and explained how I was feeling and they suggested that I go to Labor & Delivery at the hospital to be checked out. I called Daniel and told him what the doctor said. By the time Shannon and I arrived, Daniel had thrown pretty much everything he could think of in a suitcase. Clearly we weren't ready for an early delivery... :)

The nurse, Megan (who was AWESOME), confirmed that my water had broken and I was dilated 1 centimeter. The baby was coming that night. (I was excited and terrified out of my mind.) We started calling our families and friends the news and Jessie & Lee came right over. Jessie stayed with me while Daniel & Lee ran home to get the rest of the things we needed.

I was able to sleep most of the night. I woke up a few times in the early morning as the contractions were getting stronger. At 6:30am I was 4 centimeter and they decided to give me petosin. At this point Megan went home and a new nurse started her shift. Her name was Joanie and she was not quite as awesome. But that's ok. They gave me the petosin and that wasn't very fun. The contractions were getting quite painful and I asked for a epidural. As it turned out, in the half hour that I was given the petosin, I went from 4 centimeter to 10. So much for the epidural...! The nurse had to call the doctor who was at her office in Sterling. She rushed over & Daniel called my family (who were already on their way) that they should hurry up! Dave, Dad & Mom were all coming from directions and are stuck in their own particular area of DC traffic. The doctor arrived shortly after 7:30 and our baby girl arrived at 8:29am. Within minutes, Dave arrived, then Mom and then Dad...

Welcome Baby Sienna Layne Wright...

February

Sienna slept most of her first month. She even slept through the night a few times, which worried us a bit so we barely enjoyed it, lol. Even so, she did a few fun things - she had her first Valentine's Day dinner with lots of friends and traveled to Long Island to meet the DeMay family. She had lots of visitors too. We took her out a few times, but it was COLD and she was too small for regular baby clothes so we had to double wrap her in blankets when we left the house. She was SO tiny!

January

JANUARY

My baby shower was on January 20. As it turned out, we were cutting things a little close...
The Saturday before Sienna surprised us, I went out to dinner with the girls for Danielle's birthday. I wish you could see the rest of my belly but it wouldn't fit in the photo.