Proliferation of Pink

The Giggle!

2011-05-31T21:35:00.001-06:00

I've been trying to capture Maya's giggle on video for a while now. I wanted a record before it disappears. I know it's probably cuter to me because I'm the mom. That's okay. It still makes me laugh every time. It's a full nine seconds of joy for me.

As a matter of explanation, this is a favorite game of Ellie's to make Maya laugh. I don't know how Ellie came up with it but it's pretty messy. She bites off a piece of paper and spits it on the floor. Maya proceeds to laugh hysterically. This is the first I've been able to catch it on video. I'm sure the laughing would have continued if she hadn't fallen over. It always does.

Who Looks Like Whom?

2011-05-20T22:16:00.000-06:00

Quite a while back I did one of the look alike things with the picture of the baby and the parents. Ellie looked equally like Eric and me.

I decided to try it with Maya to see how it worked with her.

Maya also looks equally like Mommy and Daddy. I love to hear people's opinions because it always fairly equal about who she looks like.

Because children's faces change over time I decided to see how Ellie compares to us now. The face detector they have is apparently really bad at finding Ellie's face in a picture, so the first one I could get to recognize her face is almost a year old.

Now she looks 6% more like Eric. Maybe I'll have to try it again if I can find a more recent picture of her that the site will accept.

Thirty-One to Thirty-Three Months (Eliana)

2011-05-08T00:06:00.001-06:00

So quite a while has passed since I've updated about Ellie. Where to begin? Well, Eliana seems to be getting better at pretty much everything she does. Recently Ellie has been going through what I call a speech spurt. It happens every so often and is characterized by new words, longer sentences, and a proud mama. It is highly noticeable right after she is spoken to. Ellie is an excellent parrot. It's a good thing we don't say nasty words to each other in our house. However, she did learn that the file/pumice thing used for a pedicure is a "foot grater".

We're working out issues with bedtime. Ellie used to be a stellar bedtime girl but has recently decided that bed is not something she wants to do. Two hours of putting her back to bed after she's gone down is not acceptable. We've tried what seems like everything and are still searching for the answer. Things are getting a little better, but there is still a ways to go.

Ellie loves to jump. A lot. That's nothing new. The only difference is how much more daring she in becoming. I have to watch her like a hawk at the playground so she doesn't leap off something she shouldn't. I'm hoping that her recent leap out of a shopping cart and subsequent crash to the tile floor taught her a bit more caution.

We realized not too long ago that Ellie can count to ten on her own. I don't remember teaching her that so it was pretty cool. Maybe if I actually works on the ABCs she'll be able to get those down. We were really surprised by the whole thing.Her speech is becoming more complex and her vocabulary is expanding rapidly. We've been having fun recently with Baby Signing Time videos. Right now she won't do command performances of the signs, but she will occasionally decide to add them in.

One big surprise we got recently was when Eliana started counting to ten. I haven't worked with her on that much, so it was quite the shock when she popped off with it one afternoon. Sometimes she'll just count for fun. My current project with her is to show that counting can stop before reaching ten. For example, when we were playing a game that has four balls she continued to count them over again until she reached ten. I'm hoping the concept will sink in soon. Either way, I thought it was neat thing that she counts.

Ellie's also learning ABCs. We started to sing the ABC song a few days ago and I'm surprised with what she remembers. Sesame Street helps quite a bit. I love Netflix.

We've been having fun trying to be sociable. Ellie certainly loves it. Play group is something she looks forward to every week. I think Ellie really craves time with other children. Last week we went to the park and she found a new friend there. I was a little creeped out when one of the dads at the park looked at my daughter and said, "You have one more minute before we need to go home, Eliana." It didn't take long for me to realize that Eliana's new friend was...Eliana. They'd been running around holding hands and playing. It was pretty cute.

Let's see...Ellie is still very much into princesses and pretty dresses, but not into potty training. We had another false start with that recently. She really wants to wear her princess panties, but I'm not sure she really gets it yet. I think she assumes that underwear are the same as a diaper and it won't make a mess if she goes in them. She doesn't seem to like letting it fall into her potty (I think that the problem, anyway) and seems to just let her panties catch it. Every time I put a new pair on her she wet them within a minute. I think the learning curve on potty training is pretty steep. Especially for me.

Easter was FUN!!! My in-laws got some chicks a week or so before Easter and Ellie loves them. She keeps asking to see the "beebee chicks" whenever she remembers. Eliana got in a few good egg hunts. Mostly she liked to open up the eggs. It was Mommy who wanted the stuff inside. All the pictures on this post are from Easter and its festivities, except for the one where she looks drugged/evil. We made Easter cookies that didn't turn out how we thought, but it was a good idea.

It's hard to believe that in only three more months Ellie will be three years old. How quickly time passes.

Six Months and Seven Months (Maya)

2011-04-22T21:35:00.025-06:00

I couldn't do a six month post very well because there aren't any working cameras in the house. I've also kind of lost the will to blog. That has shown with the infrequency of my posts. So now Maya is getting her first combination monthly post.

Wasn't I pregnant just a couple of weeks ago? Time flies when you're having fun, as well as when there are two children to chase. Maya is so much fun to have around. In the past two months she has become very talkative and very mobile. She can do the slapdrag with the best of them. She's just starting to get up on her toes, so I think real crawling may not be too far behind. Maya likes to babble and I like to think she's been saying "mama" off and on. Mostly she just blows raspberries and has a grand time with that.

In other physical development news, Maya is sitting up pretty well. She's fairly steady, though she still topples quite a bit. I've been looking forward to this bit of development because it will make entertaining her so much easier. I'm sure she will still prefer that I hold her, but that's just too bad. ;) The slapdrag has been a great thing for me as far as entertainment goes; she loves to do it and I love to watch it.

Maya's giggle is an elusive thing that is difficult to capture but well worth the effort. She's full of smiles, but her giggle takes a bit of coaxing to release. I'm still hoping to capture it on video. The little laugh/grunt is adorable.

Maya remains a momma's girl. I can't say I don't love it. Miss Maya is my sweetie pie. It might get a bit tiresome to have her on my hip all the time, but it's very sweet. I love that little girl.

Measurements at the doctor's office showed a slight increase in her weight percentile and a small loss in her height percentile. I'll have to get the numbers when i go back for her 9 months checkup. She's very healthy and doing well. Maya's two teeth are pretty cute and she's getting two more on top. Slowly. Maya is chewing on everything she can find, but that's fairly normal. We've just started putting her the walker. She thought that was pretty good stuff. It's nice to have another way to entertain her.

Hopefully she'll get better with sleeping through the night. We're crossing our fingers on that.

Maya is a great little eater. She sucks the food right off the spoon and asks for more. We are happy to oblige.

Before too long I'll be updating about more new things that she's doing, but for now I want my baby to just stay my baby.

No Camera!!!

2011-04-15T07:35:00.002-06:00

So I haven't posted anything of the girls recently because we're low on pictures. How can that be with two adorable girls? The answer is that the older of the adorable girls has any affinity for any "cammer" she happens to see. She has successfully broken every camera we have in the house and I need to take them in to see if they can be repaired or if I need to shell out the money for new ones. I am not happy about that. So, until I can access the pictures I did take I will leave you with the post I put on the other blog.

I've mentioned a couple of times that makeup is my new hobby. That came from a blog called Classy Cosmetics. She's such a cute girl and very sweet. Her blog is a great way to learn about techniques and products. She's also got a giveaway on this post that looks great. I've always wanted to try MAC, but it's a little pricey for me. So go to her blog, become a follower, and comment on this post that I'm the one who sent you. She really is a lot of fun. Just make sure you go there before the 17th so you can enter the giveaway, too!

Five Months (Maya)

2011-02-22T16:01:00.003-07:00

Maya is growing beautifully. She certainly gets more beautiful by the day. She is so mild and calm. Sadly, she has been kind of sick for the past couple of weeks. Maya is better now, but she had us really worried for a while. The worst it ever got was a snotty nose and a hoarse voice that scared us pretty good. It wouldn't have been so bad except that her sister has pneumonia at the same time. We didn't want to deal with that at Maya's age. After two trips to see the doctor we finally just let the sickness take it's course. Thankfully, she's just fine.

Lately I've been a little concerned that Maya has not started rolling over. Other babies I know of have rolled over and Ellie had it pretty well mastered by this age. Then I remembered how often I actually put Maya down on the floor...not so often. She can't learn to roll over if she doesn't get the opportunity. I'm working on that. She may have rolled over once when I wasn't looking, but it's also likely that her big sister was helping her.

Maya has seemed a little extra hungry and fussy lately. I was pretty sure that she was teething and I thought I could see a bit of tooth starting to come in on the bottom. Nothing came of it and I kind of let it slide and thought maybe I was wrong. Today (the day after she turned five months) I looked at her gums again and it is quite clear that she has both of her bottom front teeth coming in. I'm thinking the extra hungry was her teething. She won't take a pacifier, so Mommy gets to be the teething apparatus. That's going to change.

Maya had her first Valentine's Day this month. I don't think she really noticed or cared, but I certainly had fun. I put her and Ellie in matching red dresses and gave lots of snuggles. I just don't think it gets much sweeter than that. There will be lots more of that in the years to come. I couldn't be more excited. Next month will have St. Patrick's Day and I'm excited to put her in the little green romper Ellie wore on her first St. Patrick's Day. I love cute hand me downs.

About a week ago I introduced Maya to her feet and I think it's a love for the ages. Time spent on her back is no longer so odious as it once was. It's really fun to watch her trying to sit up to reach them better. I've included a couple of the "outtake" five month pictures showing her grabbing at her toes. There are even more on my camera that what I've posted here.

Hopefully all the discomfort of teething will end shortly and Maya will work on sleeping through the night. A mommy can hope. Either way I love this little girl to bits.

Thirty Months (Eliana)

2011-02-07T20:15:00.002-07:00

Two and a half. Sigh. My baby is growing up. Ellie may have a little sister, but she will always be my baby. In the past few weeks she has been asserting her independence more and more. Naps are becoming a thing of the past. If I put her down she just gets back up. We're working on that. It happens at night, too. She just gets out of bed less if she hasn't had a nap. I'm not ready for her to give up naps, but I'm not sure I have much choice in the matter. Maybe once it warms up and I can take her outside more she will use up enough energy to require a nap again. I can hope.

Another fun/frustrating show of independence is when Ellie gets things for herself. She will usually ask me for whatever she wants. If I'm busy I'll tell her to wait just a minute. She then asks me again two seconds later and I repeat the same answer. After the second request she just does it herself. That generally involves pulling a chair over to the counter and getting whatever she wants from there.

Ellie continues to be a great big sister. She likes to hold Maya's hand and give her kisses. She becomes very distressed if I leave Maya with anyone else. Ellie enjoys pointing out Maya's body parts and "tickling" them. It usually doesn't make Maya cry, but sometimes Ellie isn't very gentle.

Dressing up is the only way to go for Ellie. Sometimes I have to hide her dresses if I need her to wear something else. She is highly talented at stripping her clothes off and bringing me whichever dress she wants to wear. More often than not I let her wear what she wants. The pictures below are an example of that. In the last one she's wearing her dress, a pettiskirt, and one of my maternity shirts.

We love our little Ellie and look forward to all the time we have with her.

Four Months (Maya)

2011-01-23T15:54:00.003-07:00

Our little slice of heaven just turned four months old. It's been a busy month. She had her first Christmas and New Year's, as well as her first "road trip" to visit her grandparents. "Road trip" is in quotes because it was only a three hour drive. No biggie. We didn't even snap a single picture while we were there. We did, however, stuff the car so full of gear and clothing that there wasn't room for anything else.

Maya is getting really good at twisting her body around to see things, no matter what position she's in. She not rolling over yet, but she can redirect herself to get another view of the world. I'm not sure that Maya understands what she's doing just yet, but she'll get there.

She weighs 12 lb 2 oz (looks like about 25th percentile, but they told me it was closer to 50th) and is just over 25 inches long (95th percentile). It looks like she's following her sister's growth pattern.

Giggling is happening more frequently. When Maya's really amused it's almost a growl rather than a giggle and it's pretty cute. Her big sister is better at getting her to smile and laugh than anyone else. Maya is also using her voice quite a bit more. She makes the sweetest baby noises.

Maya's hair seems to be growing in much lighter than what she was born with. It happened the same way with Ellie and now I'm excited to see if she gets curls or if her hair remains straight. They both have their pros and cons.

I was interested to read back on Ellie's four month and see that the two share the same sleep problems. 2 am-6 am is a vicious time to not sleep well. For me. I don't know if either of the girls give a hoot about how Mommy sleeps. Maya isn't in the crib yet because I like the proximity of the crib to my bed. I prefer not to have to go to another room in the middle of the night.

Maya is growing well and, as always, we're happy to have her in our family.

Twenty-eight and Twenty-nine Months (Eliana)

2011-01-09T08:25:00.004-07:00

How does time pass so quickly? Ellie is growing up so quickly that it takes my breath away. It seems like I was bringing her home from the hospital yesterday and now she is a tall and agile little girl. We just started a class called Tumbling Tots. I thought it would be fun Mommy-Ellie time so she can have a bit of me for herself. She loves it. She also the tallest kid in the class. Two of the other kids are older than she is.

Ellie seems to be loving her little sister and taking more interest in her. Watching the two of the interact is probably the sweetest thing I've ever seen. No one can make Maya giggle like Ellie does...and she loves doing it. When I dropped Maya off with my friend for the first Tumbling Tots class I was surprised by Ellie's reaction. She was very distressed that I was leaving her little sister somewhere and driving off without her. Despite my reassurances that we would get Maya after class, she called out for her sister until we got into the class with all the toys. It's heartwarming watching them together.

Ellie loves all things princess and will repeat "princess...dress" whenever she sees one until she is satisfied that we have all noticed the princess and her dress. She loves putting on her pretty dresses and twirling. "Princess hair" occassionally works as my bribe to get her to let me do her hair, but she's pretty much grown out of that. We got her a singing Belle doll for Christmas and she has thoroughly loved it ever since. The picture shows her asleep in the car the day she got it.

Meals are a difficulty. I don't know why Ellie refuses to eat, but that's a pretty common scenario around our house. Meals and snacks are often refused and it's a struggle to get her to eat. Sometimes she even refuses to eat things we know she loves. Some days are good eating days and others are like yesterday,when all she ate was goldfish crackers and one bite of her grilled cheese sandwich. The doctor assures us it's normal, but I can't wait for this phase to pass. I have no idea how Ellie continues to grow. There are certain things she'll ask us for, such as cheese and chocolate milk, but we try to give her a more varied diet.

Other children are another favorite thing of Ellie's. She loves having playmates.

Most of the other things for this past month were Christmas things, so hopefully I'll be able to do a post including all of that.

Three Months (Maya)

2011-01-03T16:13:00.000-07:00

Cuter and cuter by the day. At three months she has started to look very much like her own little person. The newborn look is completely gone. Maya continues to be a chill little kid, which is great. She is starting to get a bit more fussy recently, making me worry that she's not getting enough to eat. The easy fix for that would be to give her a bottle, but she's decided that those have gone out of style. We're working on it.

The hair on top of Maya's head has grown back and we're trying to figure out if we're getting another blondie or if it's a light brown. She has the most gorgeous brown eyes and is very expressive with them.

I didn't measure Maya's height this month, but she weighs in at just over 12 pounds. That puts her (from the best I can tell) at the 50th percentile. I'll let the doctor measure her height at the next appointment.

In Maya's third month she celebrated her first Thanksgiving. We gave her an enormous bow to wear to show her Thanksgiving spirit, but she wasn't a big fan of wearing something bigger than her face.

Maya's body movements are slowly becoming more deliberate but she still has those sweet, random baby movements. Her drooling has picked up and I'm hoping that is not associated with teething. Her daddy and her sister were early teethers. There's already enough pain that goes with nursing Maya (she's...enthusiastic) that I'm not ready to add teeth to the mix.

I'm still a little sad whenever Maya reaches a new monthly age because I want to keep her as my precious little bundle of baby cuteness. My comfort is that, if she has to grow, she is growing well. Maya also loves her mommy and prefers me to anyone else. I am the one with the food, after all. She also loves her big sister and giggles beautifully when Ellie jumps for her.

Enjoying her bath

Wearing her cute new jumper

Two Months (Maya)

2010-11-22T19:01:00.001-07:00

This month has been a big one. Maya has gone from looking like a newborn to looking more like baby Maya. Her baby acne is gone (hallelujah!) and the hair I scrubbed off her head has grown back. She's starting to coo, which is a sweet accompaniment to her smiles.

Today was shot day for Maya. It continues to be very sad. Her little thigh is bruised and she's pretty cranky. The plus side is that she was weighed and measured, so I have a good idea of how she's growing. Head circumference was 75%. She weighs 10 lb 12 oz, which is 50th percentile. She hadn't eaten for four hours, so I'm curious what her weight would have been if she hadn't just finished a long nap. Maya measured 24 inches long, which is 95th percentile. She may end up taking after her sister and grow to be tall and lean. Poor girl. Insert further sarcastic comments {here}.

Beyond smiling and cooing there's not much development to report. Now we move on to pictures.

Watching a movie with big sister

I think she looks like my older brother's baby pictures in this one.

First recorded smile

Everyone has to deal with less-than-flattering pictures at some time. Maya's time has come.

First Halloween. She was the sheep to her sister's Bo Peep.

I just thought she looked cute here.

Just after messing a diaper.

In her blessing dress.

This little girl is a blast to have around!

Twenty-Seven Months (Eliana)

2010-11-05T16:05:00.002-06:00

Ellie seems to have been going through a huge development spurt (if that's the right term for it) these past few weeks. Her vocabulary is increasing and her ability to parrot words is improving, too. We told her to say "happy birthday" to her aunt Amber and, much to our surprise, she did! I'm a little worried for the future, as Ellie is learning many different words for "pee" and "poo" from Elmo's Potty Time. Today she repeated each one and now I'm just waiting to find out what inappropriate situation we'll be in when she busts out her new words. If she's at a microphone and says "dookie" I think I'll go hide under a rock until she's 18.

One new trick Ellie's working on is climbing stair with one foot per stair. It requires holding an adult hand, but nobody minds that. She really loves trying it out as we walk her up the stairs to Nursery on Sunday.

There is still no progress on the potty training front. If I suggest that she go on the potty she screams "NOOOO!!!!" and runs away. She'll sit on it fully clothed and I've even gotten her to do it without a diaper, hoping for an accidental success to show her how great it is. No luck. When she has to go she stands up, moves away from her potty and goes on the floor. A little resistant, perhaps? I guess so. Bribery still doesn't work for using the potty, though it does get her to let my style her hair.

Eliana really needs a little playmate. Her baby sister is too young to rough house with, though Ellie does like to hug and kiss Maya. Ellie loves being with other kids and I'm trying to think of ways to get her more involved with other children. In the meantime she asks to watch a "moo-ie" at every opportunity. Right now she's hung up on Cinderella. Again. That probably has to do with her obsession with princesses. I'm interested to see what she thinks of Toy Story 3.

More and more I realize what a truly beautiful child my daughter is. Just look at the pictures in the blue dress. Gorgeous. In the first one she is gently holding Maya. The next one was taken a few seconds later, when Ellie decided she was done holding her little sister and was pushing Maya off her lap. Ellie certainly keeps me on my toes.

Ellie was Little Bo Peep for Halloween this year. She rocked the costume. I wanted to make it, but there just wasn't time. My lovely and talented mother came to my rescue an finished it for me. By "finished it" I really mean "put together all the pieces I had cut out." She's my hero. Eliana go to experience trick-or-treating for the first time, though it was only on the doors at my grandma's physical rehab center and the classroom doors at the church building. She wasn't really sure what to do, but she really liked taking candy from strangers.

We love Ellie and all her energy!

Halloween 2010

2010-11-01T14:45:00.000-06:00

This was the only picture I could get of both girls in costume. As you can see from both their faces, I was not popular in that moment. Still, Little Bo Peep and her sheep were nothing less than charming and beautiful. Ellie loved her costume (she wore it for three days straight) and Maya didn't seem to care about hers one way or the other. Thankfully, my mom was able to make the Bo Peep costume. I simply didn't have time. I got to make the sheep costume, though. And Ellie's sleeves. At least I was able to contribute a little.

Friday the 29th was spent trick-or-treating at the rehab facility where my grandmother is recovering from surgery to fix her broken leg. Everyone loved their costumes. The girls' cousin Daphne was there with her mommy, Charlotte. She made the world's cutest Tinkerbell.

Saturday the 30th we went to the ward party. Trunk or treat was moved indoors Ellie enjoyed choosing her candies, but not meeting the eyes of the people giving them out. Maya was good-natured about being dragged around. We also visited my parents while Daphne and her parents were over. It's a riot to watch Ellie and Daphne together. The picture to the right shows them just before Ellie decided she didn't care to hold Daphne anymore and dropped her. It's a good thing her daddy was there to catch her.

Sunday the 31st had us at G&G Cottam's place. Maya didn't put her costume on over there, but Ellie did. She was as darling as ever, even if she did decide that the couches needed accents of chocolate to make them perfect. Sorry about that.

It was fun to have Halloween spread over three days. The girls certainly got full use out of their costumes.

Fairy Pictures

2010-10-26T15:46:00.000-06:00

I'm putting these here, as well as on Facebook, so more people can see them. I would have liked to order more of the pictures (there were some darling non-fairy newborn pictures of Maya, as well as several other great fairy shots of Ellie) but the cost was prohibitive. If I could have purchased a CD of all the pictures I would have paid through the nose for those, but I guess the photographer doesn't do that. Oh, well. These are the four prints I ordered and the low resolution files that go with them. They're very cute. I'm happy we had them done, but we won't be going back again. Enjoy.

One Month (Maya)

2010-10-21T10:03:00.000-06:00

Maya is one month old today and I'm quite heartbroken about it. With Ellie I was just so excited for her to reach all the milestones that watching her grow was a greater joy than living in the moment. Now the time is passing through my fingers so quickly that I want both of my girls to just stop growing and stay how they are forever and ever. In Maya's case, I know the newborn period is so fleeting that I don't want to miss a moment of it. But time marches on whether or not I want it to and I'm savoring every second I have with my girls.

Overall, Maya is a very chill little baby. Aside from the when she wants to eat or has gas the only time she fusses is when being changed and put in the car seat. She's not a big fan of riding in the car, either. We appreciate the quiet in the house. It's quite a change from our last experience. She does like to stick her tongue out at everyone and I think that's her way of telling us how she feels about things.

We are very surprised at Maya's head control. We've been surprised about it since her birth. She holds her head up very well and can keep it there for at least a minute at a time. Maya is tolerating tummy time and moves her head from one side to the other while she's down there. We have a little pillow that's meant to help with tummy time, but we don't really use it much. Mostly she just uses it as a ramp to push herself over and ends up with her face in the carpet and her feet kicking in the air.

Baby acne has started in earnest and it looks really painful. I put some baby Eucerin on her forehead about a week ago because her skin there looked to be chapped and peeling. That's where she has the most pimples, so I'll probably refrain from putting the Eucerin on there again. Maya is also going bald on top, giving her the look of a bald mullet. I figure she's decided to go through her awkward phase now rather than waiting until junior high.

Maya seems to like to cuddle and I'm loving it. I have a hard time putting her down. The feeling of the soft little lump of warmth in my arms is more sweet than I can stand.

Maya's eyes are officially brown. They started to change in the hospital, but now they seem irrevocably brown. I thought I would be disappointed that they weren't blue or green, but I'm really liking the brown. It's the color I was used to looking at until Eliana was born and seeing the brown is almost comforting. I do start to get silly worries that our blonde and blue-eyed Ellie was somehow switched at birth, but I know that wasn't the case.

Maya has been a wonderful addition to our little family and we're to the point that we can't imagine life without her. She is sweet and incredible and we love her to bits.

Twenty-Six Months (Eliana)

2010-10-07T15:53:00.001-06:00

Obviously the biggest news for Ellie this month is that she became a big sister! I think she loves it, though she does miss all the lap time she used to get with Mommy. She loves to kiss her sister and hold her for about two seconds. Then she pushes Maya away for a couple of seconds, then wants her back again. I guess whatever floats her boat.

I really love the picture to the left. It make me laugh to have a dark-haired set of parents and a dark-haired baby sister on one side and our little blond-haired, blue-eyed Eliana on the other. Her hair is starting to go darker and I assume she'll look just like us about the time Maya's hair falls out and starts coming in blond.

Climbing and jumping are Ellie's two favorite activities. The very best locations are the hearth and the couch. The new play place at the Towne Centre Mall is another well-loved place for climbing and jumping. We still hear "die, die!" just before she leaps off something and are wondering when she'll get around to adding the "v" into her dives. It really freaks out the people who don't know her when she yells "die!" and launches herself off of whatever she's standing on. That's an evening of entertainment all by itself.

We think Eliana is becoming a cat person. Eric and I are dog people (and plan on getting one when we own a yard to put one in) so this is distressing to us. ;) Ellie is quite obsessed with any "key cat" (kitty cat) she sees, live or animated. Happily, she is also happy to point out any dog we see or hear. She just prefers The Aristocats to 101 Dalmatians. Maybe she just prefers the French to the British. Also a cause for concern...

Another thing Ellie really loves is dancing. She really doesn't sing much, but dancing seems to be one of her loves in life. Songs with actions are the ones she likes best (normal for any kid, I suppose) and she copies the dance moves she sees. I think she gets most of her moves from George of the Jungle. She's really cute to watch. I kind of wonder if she would enjoy a dance class when she gets a little older.

Kissing remains high on Eliana's list of things she likes to do. However, short kisses aren't generally her style. With Mom and Dad Ellie seems to think that kissing is a marathon sport. She grabs our faces to pull us in and then starts in on her own chorus of "mmmmmmmmmmm" until she runs out of breath or out of kiss. The people behind us at church think it's hilarious. We agree, but it gets a little awkward to have your daughter make out with you in public.

The "limp rag" technique of avoiding doing what your parents ask is a recently learned trick. She mostly uses it on the front lawn when it's time to get in the car. She does that or climbs up on to the neighbor's porch. Ellie thinks it's a great game.

Ellie has been kind of sidelined this month as we've waited for her little sister to arrive, but she's been great. We couldn't ask for a sweeter little girl.

Two Week Appointment

2010-10-07T15:16:00.000-06:00

Maya's two weeks appointment at the doctor came around today. Everything looks good, though she hasn't quite gained back her birth weight. This has been a concern of mine, as I never produced enough breastmilk for Eliana. I've wanted to make sure that none of my other children go hungry as long as Ellie did. We'll go back in a few days to re-weigh Maya and see if she is doing any better. She doesn't look skinny or dehydrated so the doctor isn't concerned about it. Maya will often refuse to be fed more and that's a good indication to me that she's getting enough to eat. I'm okay to supplement if I need to, but I'd rather avoid that cost and hassle. The value and portability of breastmilk really can't be beat. :)

Maya Moo (now with pictures)

2010-09-24T13:39:00.001-06:00

She'll probably hate the nickname Maya Moo before long, but right now she has no control. Anyway, she arrived on Tuesday and has been a joy ever since.

The short version:

Born at 10:17 am, weighing 9 lb. 1 oz. and measuring 20.5 inches long.

The long version: (this part really is long and very informative. You have been warned.)

We went to bed at 11 pm on Monday, after a full day of discomfort after having my membranes stripped and being past my due date. Eric had told me that if I had contractions I was to wake him up with the first one rather than let him sleep until I thought it was something more. That's what I had always done in the past. I woke up at 1:28 am on Tuesday morning with a strong urge to relieve my bladder and my bowels, as well as feeling a contraction. That's pretty normal for my nightly bathroom trips. This felt a little bit different; it was like a band of pain around my lower back. I did my best to relieve myself and was very disappointed with the results and the lack of relief. I went back to bed still in pain. I did wake Eric up just to let him know.

At 1:35 I got up again to use the bathroom because the feeling was still there. Still no results in the bathroom. Eric asked about it and I told him. I started to wonder if perhaps there was something more to these bathroom trips than just a need to go. I stopped looking at the time after that.

When I got up again a few minutes later I decided it was time to utilize some comfort techniques. I tried changing to different positions we learned about in the HypnoBirthing class and that offered exactly no relief of any kind. I knew I was having contractions because the already nasty pain in my back got worse every few minutes. Until that night I had heard about back labor and had even thought I experienced some with Ellie. I was mistaken. This was constant pain and pressure without a break. Then you add contractions on top of that you've got a recipe for a miserable mommy-to-be. I also filled up the bathtub to see if that brought any measure of relief. It did not. I don't think a standard home bathtub is made to be helpful like that. There simply isn't enough water and trying to lie down in a tub while having back labor is a poor idea. The only thing that helped at all was pouring some of the warm water over my belly with a pitcher. It helped for about two minutes and I continued another few minutes before I gave up. At that point I realized that if I were to attempt an unmedicated birth while having back labor and working on two and a half hours of sleep there would be no energy left when it was time to push the baby out. I opted for sleep and comfort, instead. It turned out to be a wise decision.

After I came back in from the bath I told Eric it was probably time to call my parents. The pain was only getting worse and it wouldn't go away. He got himself ready while I laid down on the bed and focused on my breathing and relaxation. We called my parents around 2:15 and said it was go time. They drove down to our house to pick up Ellie. I continued to lay down and try to focus on breathing and relaxation with Eric. It helped a bit, but it was not a pretty picture. I'd been in enough constant pain that I'd given up trying to pull on my pants. I had to ask my mom to do it for me when she got there and Eric was switching out the car seat.

We handed Ellie over to my parents and headed to the hospital. After checking in at the desk they evaluated me and told me I was was at 5 cm and very much effaced. The nurse said that at that far along they could just take me and didn't need to do the hour-long evaluation. That was when the heavens opened and the angels began to sing. I knew I wouldn't have another hour of breathing through contractions before they shot me up. The nurse asked if I had been planning on an epidural. I said, "I am now!" Fifteen minuted later Dr. Gardner came in and stuck me with the horse needle that makes everything all better. It was glorious, I tell you. GLORIOUS!!!! That was at 3:45. At 4:10 my doctor came in and mentioned that it looked like I had received the epidural, after all. I told him I'd decided I wasn't a masochist. He did his own check to see where the baby was. He confirmed what I had expected and told me she was in posterior (sunny side up) position and still sitting up really high. That was why I had back labor. He saw that my contractions had slowed down after the epidural and asked if I wanted him to break my water to speed labor. I had planned on asking him to do it now that I was pain-free. It's awesome to be on the same page as the doctor. He broke my water and then we all tried to go to sleep while we waited for me to fully dilate.

Here's the part where the HypnoBirthing came in and the only part where it really helped. After the epidural you must have a urinary catheter. That, sadly, is just how it is. I hate the catheter. The nurse told me I shouldn't be able to feel it because of the epidural. She was wrong. It hurt and irritated and made it so I could feel the contractions again, as well as extra pressure. The only thing to do about it was to go back to the breathing and relaxation techniques to help me deal with it. Eric and I had discussed a couple of scenarios I wanted to visualize. He chose to use the beach and started to talk me through a beautiful beach with turquoise water and soft white sand. That was really nice and pretty, but it didn't do much for me until he said he was there with me. Just like that I started to be able to relax and loosen up. I pictured Ellie and Maya there with is. Eric was holding Maya, I was sitting next to him, and we were all laughing as we watched Ellie play in the water. She continued to splash around and beckoning for us to come join her ("cwon, cwon!). It was lovely. Before long I didn't feel pain and I drifted off to sleep. By the time I woke up the epidural had kicked in enough to cancel out the catheter.

At 7 am I got new nurses who delivered the news that I was complete and we could start pushing. Dr. Carn came up and we got started. They gave me instructions on how to push, which I ignored. I wanted to try the way I'd learned in class. I pushed while the doctor tried to gently turn the baby into a more favorable position. Half an hour later and I'd made almost no progress. Maya didn't want to turn and that was stopping me up. The doctor suggested half an hour of rest and descend to see if the contractions would turn Maya on their own.

At 8 am the doctor, nurse, and nursing student came back in. Maya had not turned and there wasn't a lot of progress. We worked on it again and Maya finally decided to get herself into a better position. Things moved along better after that...for a while. No one knew why it was taking so long and being so difficult. My epidural started to wear off and that was a bad thing. I was already sore up high in my abdominals from pushing, as well as from Maya pushing her feet up from the inside. The nursing student thought it was cute and fascinating how Maya's feet were right there and easy to feel. I didn't think it was cute; I thought it hurt and made it difficult to push. By that time I'd been pushing for over two hours after the break to rest and descend. I was out of gas and knew that the slow progress of the delivery was going to outlast the epidural. The doctor saw that, too and asked about using forceps. I was nodding my head before he finished offering. I know my body well enough to know what it can and can't handle. I really had nothing left. He told me the risks involved (which I already knew) and I agreed to it. The nurses grabbed to anesthesiologist to get me a redose of epidural so I could be comfortable through the forceps. He was surprised I needed it, but juiced me up, anyway. Fifteen minutes later I was feeling dandy and Dr. Carn came back in with Dr. Dayton. He'd asked Dr. Dayton to use the forceps, as Dr. Dayton is an OB and Dr. Carn is family practice. When they came in Dr. Carn pointed out to the nurses that I had "swollen a little." More on that later.

Dr. Dayton pushed around on my tummy and predicted an 8-8.5 pound baby and an easy forceps delivery. He gave me an episiotomy (which still works better for me than a tear) and slid in the baby tongs. I pushed while he pulled and the head was out in seconds. I guess Maya came with her tongue sticking out. Dr. Dayton moved out of the way and Dr. Carn helped deliver the rest of Maya. She had a very short umbilical cord (that might explain why she was reluctant to get herself out) and it wasn't long enough for him to show her to me, let alone put her on my tummy. I watched her little foot. Maya was having some trouble getting to breathing, so Dr. Carn worked on her while she was still down below my line of sight. When that didn't work well he cut the cord and they took fluid out of her lungs. They thought they should call the respiratory therapists to evaluate her and they did that. They brought Maya over for skin to skin time while they waited for the therapists to come. Maya calmed right down when Eric and I spoke to her. I let them do a quick weigh and measure. The 8-8.5 pound baby turned out to be 9 lb 1 oz. No wonder I had problems getting her out. We were all pretty surprised at her size, especially considering that her sister was 7 lb 8 oz.

The respiratory therapists got there and thought she was borderline, so they took her to the NICU to put her on the machine, just in case. Thankfully I wasn't really worried. I wasn't excited that she had to be gone for an hour, but I wanted her to breathe properly. While she was up there the nurses had me try to use the bathroom. That was pretty funny. I could hardly walk and, once I got to the bathroom, I found out what "a little swollen" means. I thought the doctor had been talking about my feet and ankles. Nope. I went to blot dry and nearly dropped the paper. I thought, "Those aren't mine! Is there a 700 lb woman down the hall who traded parts with me? Holy crap!" You know that part on the newest Star Trek movie where Kirk looks down at his crazy swollen hands and yelps? That's an adequate representation.

Anyway, it was a difficult delivery because of Maya's size, so I'm very happy I decided to get the epidural. There was almost 3 hours worth of pushing out a nine-pounder and I wouldn't have been successful without relief. Maybe it would have been different if it wasn't back labor, but we'll never know. What didn't occur to me before when I was curious about if the epidural was making my body do weird things was that I could try another epidural and see if something strange happened. Now that I know it isn't the epidural I'm sure I'll get drugged up every time. It makes me happier.

Maya is doing beautifully and we all love her to pieces. Ellie is sick, so she doesn't get to come too close, but she's totally entranced with Maya. Our newest girl is very mellow and that's a new experience for us. The video below shows Ellie meeting Maya for the first time. I haven't gotten around to editing it, so the whole thing is there for your viewing pleasure.

Non-Labor of Love

2010-09-18T15:46:00.000-06:00

Well, today's the day. Sort of. Not really. Unless something changes drastically in the next few hours. Today is Maya's due date. I never expected to get this far. Experience has told me I would go into labor early. Ellie was six whole days early and labor started all on its own. Not so with Maya. We've stripped the membranes twice and done accupressure or reflexology or whatever it is on my ankles in an attempt to get this beautiful little girl to enter the land of sunlight. No luck whatsoever.

If this were my first pregnancy I probably wouldn't be so disgruntled. I wouldn't know that I'd already delivered early or that my body is now further along than it was when I was admitted into the hospital. I'm at 4 cm dilated and 80% effaced as of four days ago. I have another appointment on Monday and we'll see where I am then. There is a fear in the back of my mind that we'll discover my cervix has decided to close up tight and my daughter has decided to make a permanent residence of my esophagus. Not a happy thought.

It has been a bit of a relief that she hasn't come yet because my doctor is out of town. He'll be back Monday for my appointment. However, at this point I almost don't care if i deliver on the side of the road. I even have stuff in the car just in case that happens.

The part that really gets me is that I got a heads up about this a week or more ago. I woke up with a feeling, almost a voice in my head, that this baby was going to be late. That's not anything I want to think about. It's irritating. You can't really plan to do anything or go anywhere because "the baby could come any time now." I've been in "the baby can come any time now" mode for the past three weeks because of what my body has been doing. It's wrought havoc on my meal planning and preparation. We have a freezer stuffed full of meals for after the baby comes. In the fridge we have milk, eggs, and half a watermelon because I don't want to spend money on food I won't be able to prepare because "the baby could come any time now."

It's also frustrating for me because the closer I've gotten to my due date and the longer I go past it, the more likely it will be that I'll need to be induced. I don't want to be induced. I've prepared for an unmedicated birth and adding Pitocin to the mix will seriously diminish my desire to skip the epidural. I really want to see if my body will freak out like it has the past two times if I don't have an epidural. It's one of those things that I should probably know because I plan on having more kids. Eventually. If I get delusional again and think that I like being pregnant.

Anyway, when I got the feeling that Maya would be coming late I had to deal with it and accept it as a possibility. I did that by telling myself that there's still some part of development she's working on and I'd better leave her to it. I'm getting to the point that I want to tell her she's had her chance and she can finish on the outside. But I don't. I still sit here and wait, letting her stay snug in her little home. But all bets are off if she still likes it in there after the 28th. If she's still in there after 10 days I'm kicking her out.

Progress

2010-09-07T17:57:00.001-06:00

At my doctor appointment last week I was overjoyed because I was dilated to 3 cm and 80% effaced. With Eliana that did not happen until I was in the hospital being evaluated for labor. All last week I expected to go into labor at any moment. I didn't. Poo. However, I got over it and decided that it would be great to hear today that I was 5 cm and could just go to the hospital if I wanted to. Well, that didn't happen. Instead, the doctor told me that my body seems to be perfectly ready for delivery, we just need contractions to get everything going.

I've been having contractions quite a bit...just not the useful ones. They have helped me learn to relax through them, but I wish Maya would let them move her down. There must be something oddly comforting about my ribs, because Ellie never wanted to move down, either.

So it looks like I'm dilated to 3+ cm (almost to 4) and am still 80% effaced. The doctor seemed to keep his fingers up there for a little while and started to push down on the baby. It's not the most pleasant experience, especially when you don't know why he won't take his fingers away. The doctor asked me if it hurt me and I said that it did. I wanted his fingers out, what else was I going to say? He asked if it hurt badly and I said, "Yeah, kinda" in a fairly exasperated tone. I really wanted his fingers out and that did the trick. What I didn't realize at the time was that he was working on stripping my membranes. We had talked about doing that at my last appointment, so it wasn't an ambush stripping. I just thought it was going to be different or that he would say something first. I had given my consent at the last appointment, so I probably should have suspected it. It wasn't until the appointment was over and we were talking about doing a more "vigorous" membrane stripping on Friday if I hadn't had the baby that it dawned on me. I asked him if that was what he had done when he asked me if it hurt and he told me it was. If I'd known that I probably would have let him keep stripping away. We'll see if we get results from it. If not, then we'll try again Friday. I'm convinced that if Maya isn't ready to come yet she'll ignore everything we do until we crack out the Pitocin. I'll have to go over my due date before we try that, I think. Pray for me; I can't wait to be done with this pregnancy.

Twenty-Five Months

2010-09-07T17:29:00.001-06:00

I always swore I would never refer to my child's age in months after she hit two, but it's just easier to do that when writing on a blog. The past month has been a bit of a blur because we've been making preparations for the next baby to come. However, we didn't totally leave off noticing the fun things Ellie does and the fun little person she is. There just aren't any pictures to share. Actually, we did get some pictures of Ellie this past month. We had a friend take some pictures for Ellie's second birthday. I wish Ellie had been a little more cooperative, but the child wanted to play in the dirt and rocks. So she did.

Ellie has turned into a little monkey, a fact that she happily admits to. Her days are spent climbing on and jumping off of and surface she can get herself onto. She has gotten better at learning that Mommy is not a jungle gym, but sometimes she just gets excited and forgets (or ignores) that rule. The couch is the ultimate play place, but Mommy and Daddy's bed serves as a great trampoline, too.

Cinderella is Ellie's favorite movie. We haven't figured out why, but she really seems to like that one. The other princess movies don't hold her interest. She calls it "Princess". She used to do that with The Little Mermaid, too.

It is still a challenge to do Ellie's hair, but I found a de-tangling spray that I hope will do the trick. Otherwise, the only thing I can do will be to continue telling her that I'm giving her "pretty princess" hair. I think she's got that one figured out.

Kissing has increased quite a bit. The funny thing is that it may not always be a sign of affection. At the very least, it's not so intimate to her as a hug. There are people she won't hug, but a kiss seems to be a suitable alternative. I don't know who raised that child. Next thing you know she'll be enjoying cheesecake and watching baseball. On purpose.

I'll have Eric go through this and come up with other things, but until then you can just enjoy the cuteness that is our Eliana.

Two Years Old

2010-08-04T13:31:00.043-06:00

Our little Ellie girl just had her second birthday. Time flies. We didn't do a huge celebration for her, but enjoyed activities in the days leading up to her birthday. On Monday we went to the Pizza Pie Cafe with my family to have a little party before my brother went in for open heart surgery. On Tuesday we went to Thanksgiving Point with Eric's mom and stepdad. We'd never been tot he Children's Discovery Garden before. It's well worth the trip, especially if you go on a day when it only costs $2. I don't know what it usually costs, but it's more than that. Eliana had so much fun splashing around in the water at the Noah's Ark place, as well as running around and looking at all the other things they had. I spent most of my time sitting while the other adults took Ellie around. On Wednesday, her real birthday, we didn't do much. Eric was at work and Ellie and I stayed home and played. We went swimming, but other than that the day passed fairly quietly. We had leftover birthday cake and let Ellie blow out the candle. She had a great time opening gifts.

Eliana continues to learn and grow and make us happy. She's fascinated with babies, which we hope will be a good thing when her little sister arrives next month.

I've heard that you can predict a child's adult height by doubling their height at two years old. If that ends up being true then we can expect Ellie to be around 5' 10" as an adult. She measured 35 inches and about 30 lb. Thankfully the doubling standard doesn't count for weight.

Curly hair seems to be a curse to our Eliana. It gets tangled pretty easily, so she doesn't let me comb it very often. When I wasn't so very pregnant I would make her sit still, but I just don't have that kind of energy. That translates into having a lot of her pictures with scratty, tangled hair. We're working on it.

Princesses are becoming even more of a fascination. I really hopes she wants to play dress up when she's older. I'l have so much fun with that.

Things continue to be much the same. Ellie is very active, which we don't understand considering the meager amount of food she eats. She loves to run and play and is very social. She's our little darling. And she likes to blow out the candle.

Start the Festivities

2010-08-02T22:14:00.000-06:00

Eliana's second birthday has started early. We did a party tonight with my family because my older brother is going in for open heart surgery tomorrow morning. I wanted to have us all together before that happened and a second birthday celebration seemed like a good reason. We went to Pizza Pie Cafe and brought a cake with us. I guess we didn't give Eliana a fork soon enough because she took matters into her own hands after we gave her the plate.

Napoleon Dance

2010-07-29T20:42:00.000-06:00

While Napoleon Dynamite may not be my all time favorite movie, I certainly don't hate it. I randomly tried it out on Ellie this afternoon, with delightful results. Don't worry, I trimmed the video short. It's less than half a minute and adorable.

Letter to My Child

2010-07-27T21:15:00.000-06:00

Dear Maya,

I am acutely aware that your aspiration is to become a boxer. It may take me a while to get used to the idea of your chosen profession, but I will be much more supportive of your decision if you stop using my cervix as your punching bag. Thanks.

I love you,
Mommy

Toddler Bed

2010-07-11T11:56:00.001-06:00

So we moved this weekend. We knew it was happening soon, but we weren't sure when. It all happened kind of suddenly. Anyway, as it was with getting rid of Eliana's bottle, so it was with taking her from crib to toddler bed. We were taking apart the crib to move, so why not just reassemble it as a toddler bed? That's what we did. We were a little worried about how Ellie would respond to sleeping in a new place in a bed that was slightly different. Would she climb out of bed and scream until she fell asleep on the floor? Would she have too much trouble with one transition to cope with another? None of the above. She climbed into the bed herself and, once we put her blanket on and turn off the light, she stayed in bed and didn't get up until we got her up. It must be noted that we put her to bed two hours late because of all the things connected with moving and that we got her up an hour early because we had to leave the house, BUT she slept well and didn't fuss at all. I guess there was nothing to worry about. I've been thinking about potty training Ellie, but figured the upcoming move and the impending arrival of her little sister would be too much for her. It probably is. Still, I can't help wondering if I'll decide it's time to potty train Ellie as soon as she runs out of this pack of diapers.

Twenty-Three Months

2010-07-05T14:57:00.000-06:00

This month has been a fun one. I've already discussed her deep and abiding love of chocolate, but there are so many more things Eliana has found a passion for recently. Much to my delight, twirling and pettiskirts are two favorite things. They go together so very well. She will often ask me to put a pettiskirt on her if she sees it in the morning. Ellie is very interested in other clothes, too, but not to the same extent. She got really excited when we bought her new jammies.

Jumping is a new talent/interest. We left Ellie overnight with her grandparents while we went to Stadium of Fire. When we came the next morning to pick her up we were greeted by a LOT of happy jumping. Enthusiasm is also shown by running all over the place. It doesn't take much to get that particular response.

Eliana is also continuing in her affections. Hugs and kisses are given often. Sometimes we don't even have to ask for them. She especially loves to give hugs while she's in a shopping cart. I'm getting to that point in pregnancy where I cannot easily give shopping cart hugs. Eric is much better with those. Ellie also loves to put her little hands on our cheeks to pull us in for a kiss. Few things are as sweet as that.

"Princess" is another new word that I take great joy in hearing. It shows that she truly is my daughter. The other day while we were swimming she recognized a princess on someone's towel and pointed it out to me. Then she said, "I princess." I had to agree with her.

Her current favorite movies are The Little Mermaid and the Toy Story movies. That's all she would watch for two solid weeks. She starting to ask for a couple of others now, but those are the most popular. Of course, we do other things than watch movies. Swimming is at the top of the list. Eliana loves to go down the slides, ride in the lazy river, walk up and down the stairs into the water, and jump around in the wading areas to make giant splashes. We used to go to the park, but the walk there has been too much of a strain recently. Maybe after Ellie's little sister comes.

We also participated in the baby contest again this year. Ellie got second place in the costume category! Go Ellie! She placed better than last year but, sadly, didn't have nearly so much fun. The lines to stand in for judging were so long that we didn't have time for anything else. I had really looked forward to having the same great time as last year, but it wasn't meant to be. That's okay. It was still fun to show her all the stuff that came in her little winner bag.

We eagerly look forward to her second birthday. It should be another great time with our little darling.

I Love My Doctor

2010-06-30T13:11:00.000-06:00

Yesterday was my 28 week appointment. I love that the people there know me, even though I'm not there much other than for my prenatal checkups and Ellie's well-baby appointments. They didn't even ask my name, they just pulled my chart for me to sign and asked where my daughter was.

My weight, blood pressure and urine sample looked good and both the nurse and the doctor seemed particularly pleased about that. My belly measured perfectly and it looks like Maya has moved to a head down position. She was still head up last time, but I wasn't worried. There was still plenty of time for her to turn. She still up high, but that hasn't bothered me. The doctor asked me if I had any other concerns or questions, so I asked him if he'd had any patients that had done hypnobirthing. I didn't give him much of a chance to answer, as I kind of steam rolled him with comments that I'm certainly not against and epidural, I just want to keep my options open. He seemed to have no problem working with whatever I choose to do. He's awesome that way. What he said to me is, "We men really have no idea exactly what it is you go through in birth, so the choice is up to you." I also talked to him about the blacking out and the claw hand that I'd had with my other deliveries. He pulled my chart out and asked me some basic questions while scribbling a few notes. When I asked about the claw hand he told me what he thought it was and gave me the medical term, which I can't remember. He said it can be caused by hyperventilation. It's highly likely that I hyperventilated with everything going on that night.

After the appointment I needed to wait another 15-20 minutes before getting my blood drawn so I could do the glucose screening. I love the phloebotomist at the office, too. I really didn't feel anything other than a tap against the inside of my elbow before the blood was drawn. I get pin pricks worse than that when I sew. They didn't call me back for a follow-up blood draw, so I guess everything is great. I just love knowing that my doctor and his staff are there for me. They always give me all the options, the pros and cons of each, and give their suggestion for my situation. Then they let me make the decision. Some people worry that a doctor will make all their decisions for them and take choice out of the equation. That's not true of my doctor. The only time he has ever come close to telling me one of the choices was not an option was when he told me there was a procedure he wouldn't perform. His reason for that was because he didn't think it was safe in my situation, so I would need another doctor to do it if that was what I wanted. I didn't, but it was nice to know he really did have my best interest at heart. I feel confident with him as my doctor.

Shift in Philosophy (long)

2010-06-27T22:28:00.000-06:00

Last night as I lay in bed thinking about how glad I am that I have a weekly record of my pregnancy with Ellie to compare to this pregnancy I realized that I have been nearly silent about this pregnancy. I guess I just thought I would start recording things about Maya after she was born. What's the reason for that? There isn't one. I've just always thought of this as Ellie's blog. I don't know that I want to start recording a weekly update. Starting at 28 weeks is a bit late, in my opinion. I will, however, say that it seems like my symptoms at this point in pregnancy are much more mild than they were last time. Heartburn has been infrequent and easily controlled. Leg cramps are minimal and can't even be called an irritation. I just flex my leg and go back to sleep. Swelling only happens at night, when I've been on my feet and my seat for too long. I can still wear all my shoes. I did buy a new ring to wear in place of my wedding. Better to wear it for a little longer and get more out of my money. The ring was only $30, but it should last me longer than the one from last pregnancy. Maya moves around less than Ellie did. That may be a difference in perception on my part (second time feeling the movements are less noticeable than the first, maybe?) or it could just be that this one is less active. She still moves often enough that I know things are okay. Those are most of the differences.

My other shift in philosophy is something I'm trying to do on my own. Because my body has done strange things during my last two deliveries (hand locking in place during the first and blacking out during the second) I've decided to see how long I can go without an epidural. I am not against the idea of getting medicinal help to cope with the pain, I just want to see how long I can put it off and if that will make a difference in my body doing strange things. If I decide I want the epidural, then I'm going for it.

The idea to do things a bit differently came from hearing that sitting in the tub is the "natural" epidural. After having had two epidurals, I don't believe that for a second. What I do believe is that sitting in the tub can help to relax the mother, making the pain a little more bearable. I don't want to give birth in the tub, but I do want to try it for a bit of pain relief. If I don't try I'll never know. Anyway, the sitting in the tub was only the initial push into getting a different mindset. Things changed a little after that.

The day after I found out I was pregnant I called Medicaid to see if I would qualify. We had regular insurance and two supplementary insurances for maternity, but were too poor to really continue to afford those. That doesn't include the other costs that the insurance doesn't quite cover. I qualified for Medicaid and cancelled the other insurances. We're covered again with Eric's work but we opted for the cheap, crappy insurance until he gets a better paying job. That was quite the tangent.

Anyway, Medicaid still covers me until 6 weeks or so after the baby is born. The downside was that the only plan available to me at the time that also covered my doctor would not allow me to deliver in the hospital that has a tub in every room. The other hospital has one room with a tub and it is reserved for those choosing to go without an epidural. My hopes were dashed. I knew I wanted both the epidural and the tub to get me through waiting until I was ready to ask for the epidural. I started vaguely considering if the tub was important enough to me to try going without the epidural. It wasn't, but I still wanted the tub. Luckily for me, the option to switch plans to the one that covered both my doctor and the hospital with a tub in every room became available again. I jumped on it and switched the very day I got the letter.

Now that the right hospital is covered I feel almost obligated to use the tub. That may be irrational, but that's how it came out in my head. Here's where the real change in my birthing philosophy comes in. Eric isn't so sure about the idea of using the tub and putting off the epidural. He really doesn't want me to hurt and I appreciate that. He's also worried that labor will progress so quickly that an epidural will be out of the question. That's a valid concern and it worries me a little, too. However, I still really want to try out the tub. I want to try it enough that I think I'm willing to risk the extra pain and discomfort if I can't get the epidural. I'm also driven, as I said before, by a burning curiosity to see if my body does weird things without the medication. When I talked to my doctor about it, he said the blacking out could have been caused by a drop in blood pressure after I had the redose of epidural. The cramped and locked hand had no explanation that I can remember. I also don't remember if that happened before or after I got the epidural with my first delivery.

I know from talking to several people who have gone through natural childbirth (planned and unplanned) that you need to be prepared if you want to have a positive experience. I figure I might as well prepare myself for that eventuality. That way I'll know what to do to be calm if I can't get the epidural or to just manage the pain until I feel like asking for one. It's win-win, right? Eric still doesn't like the idea of me being in pain (neither do I) so we'll see how we can reconcile that with my curiosity. I'm thinking hypnobirthing looks like a good way to go until I'm ready for pain meds, but I still need to look into it to see if that's really what I want to do. I guess we'll find out in about three months.

Chocutt!

2010-06-22T20:41:00.000-06:00

Well, if we'd needed any further proof that Eliana is a girl, we'd have gotten it this past week. She has learned a new word and its meaning faster than any other word to date. That word is chocutt (chocolate).

That's right; Ellie has learned the joys of chocolate. She wants it often and in abundance. Thankfully she hasn't learned the difference between quality chocolate and the cheap stuff. If she's anything like her mother that will come soon enough.

You can see from the picture that eating chocolate is a multi-sensory experience. I'm just glad she doesn't try to listen to it. There are too many creases in ears to clean out. But the car sat cover and her clothes will all need a good washing.

Eric also told me about a distressing experience for Ellie that had to do with losing her chocolate. I guess she had a piece in her hand that she dropped in the hallway. She was unable to find it on her own and started to fuss. When that didn't help she found Eric on the couch and pulled him up to follow her. Once they got to the approximate location of her chocolate she pulled his arm down so she could make his hand pat the floor to signify something was lost. Once his hand found the chocolate he understood why she was so upset. I think we have a junkie on our hands.

Twenty-Two Months

2010-06-04T17:29:00.000-06:00

As if to show her independence with a new age number, Eliana spent her 22 month mark not sleeping. She made it until we got in the car to pick Daddy up from work before she zonked out--finally. Mommy is more than a little exhausted at the moment.

Having a prenatal appointment a few days before Ellie's month marks makes it easy to ask them to weigh and measure her. She ended up at 30 pounds while fully clothed and 34 inches tall including her shoes. Last month she measured at 35 inches while stooping, so I guess we'll get a more accurate measurement in two months when she has her last well baby checkup.

Little things for the month: She loves to wear her sunglasses and hats. That was not true last summer. She still yanks off hair bows, unfortunately for her mother. Sitting politely(ish) in restaurants seems to be a good talent. I like that she doesn't throw food or screaming fits. Booster chairs are much more preferred than high chairs so we got her one at home, too. She will often ask to sit in her "chair, chair!" when she wants to eat. Another thing that goes along with eating is when she says "I drop it" after she drops something to the floor. We're working on having her not drop her food on the floor. "Thank you" is said without prompting and Eliana is getting better at saying "please", as well. Sometimes it turns into her saying, "Please! Good job." I guess you can't tell what she hears after she tells us please.

Ellie is getting very affectionate...particularly with boys. Sometimes she'll just choose a boy who happens to be in the room and hug him over and over. And over. I've had to physically pull her away when the boy gets distressed at the girl who has latched on to his chest. I don't know why Ellie seems to prefer the boys, but it certainly makes the nursery staff laugh themselves silly. She'll also hug her cousin, Daphne, to the point of Daphne's irritation. It makes me hopeful that she will be affectionate with her little sister when she comes. On the flip side of that, she also likes to step on people lying on the floor, including the 6 month old boy I watch occasionally. I'm going to have to watch Maya closely during tummy time to make sure her sister doesn't use her as a stepping stone.

My favorite hair development has been putting it in a ponytail. It's really cute, but she also looks so grown up. That part is a little sad, but I guess that's why we're continuing to have children. ;)

I would include pictures of the past month, but it looks like the only ones I have are from the zoo and posted just below this entry. But look at the previous age entry to see the pictures I'm putting up just as soon as I finish this post.

Zoo

2010-05-31T17:51:00.004-06:00

Today we went on this year's first trip to the zoo. We plan to go again before the end of the summer. Last year Ellie looked like this:

This year Ellie is older and much more independent. She didn't want to stand by the wall, so this year Ellie looks like this:

We were fairly certain she was most looking forward to seeing a monkey, as that seems to be her favorite animal of late. Actually, she says "monkey" whenever she wants to watch The Lion King or Kung Fu Panda. She'll point them out in books, too. Ellie was not disappointed and got to see several varieties. The spider monkeys performed the best for her and one went right up to the glass. That thrilled her beyond words and kept touching the glass trying to pet the monkey. There were others that we saw, including the one carrying a stuffed animal toy while swinging around. The only one Eliana was not so fond of was the orangutan. When we got the that one and pointed it out sitting in the corner Ellie looked at it and then started backing away with her hand outstretched. She didn't turn away from it, but she did seem less nervous after she had a hold of my hand.

We were also able to see the new baby elephant, Zuri. At first I didn't notice the baby there, but once I got the stroller parked she was right there. Ellie was entranced. It was nice that they were eating right then and she was able to watch them moving around. She didn't want to leave them behind when it was time to move on to the next exhibit. I just feel relieved for the mama elephant. Last time we were at the zoo she was pregnant. Seeing as elephants are pregnant for about two years, it must have been a relief to get that calf out. I'm only six months pregnant and getting sick of the sore back. But maybe I would feel better if I was always on all fours. Hmm.

More staring at monkeys.

Last year we were rained out of the bird show. We were excited to see it this year. The show did not disappoint. It was kitchy in some places, but that's part of the fun. Ellie didn't pay a lot of attention to the birds because she couldn't always see them very well. It was still cool to watch them soar down. My favorite part was when they recognized Memorial Day and all those who are serving or have served int he armed forces. That was when they dropped the flag open and brought out the bald eagle. That was really great to see. They also had donation boxes out at the end of the show for people to contribute. Any contribution was given to the bird and the bird put it in the box. Five dollars got you a picture up close to the birds. We stuck with the dollar and let Ellie hand it to the bird. I think she liked it.

It wasn't too long after the show ended that we got ready to go home. There's a playground at the zoo (I didn't know that) and Eliana really enjoyed the seesaw toy. She kept saying "again, again!" whenever we stopped it moving.

The last exhibit we stopped at was the burrow exhibit. I'm not too sure how Ellie felt about sticking her head up in the hole, but she really loved it when I did it when she was on the outside.

There was also a stop at the reptile exhibit before the bird show, but I declined to go inside. I knew it would be stinky and I needed to sit down. I'm a little sad I didn't go in because that's also where the rodents are. I guess those were Eliana's favorite part. Eric said she was mesmerized by a certain variety of squirrel (I think she was last year, too) that kept jumping around in circle. We'll be going again later this summer and I'll follow her inside then.

It was a great day and Ellie has now been napping from it for over three hours. I guess I'll wake her up before she gets too ornery and won't go to bed tonight.

Twenty and Twenty-One Months

2010-05-19T10:23:00.003-06:00

I really need to get better at keeping an actual monthly post for Ellie. I've been a bit distracted this month because of a hospital stay for my older (there would have been an actual twenty month post if not for that) and because of the new little girl on the way. She's due in September and we've decided to name her Maya. We're all very excited. It's fun to ask Ellie if she's going to have a baby sister and hear her repeat "sisser." Or I'll ask where baby Maya is and she'll thump her belly. It's cute.

Weight: fully clothed she was 29 lb, about 85th percentile.

Height: with shoes on, but ducking her head a little she was 35 inches tall. That's about 95th percentile. They say you can predict adult height by doubling the height at age 2. At the rate she's going she could easily be six feet tall.

Ellie's new favorite word is "gone." anything that is not directly in her field of vision is simply "Gone!" Use of sentences comes and goes depending on how she feels.

I've been using a bottle at her naps for the past 21 months and haven't really concerned myself about it because she wasn't really attached to it when we took it away at bed time. Well, her slow flow nipple bit the dust the other day and the fast flow goes to quickly for her to fall asleep with. Rather than buy a new slow flow nipple we decided to just take the bottle away. Turns out she was more attached than I thought. Naps were a difficulty with the fast flow. Thankfully she was asleep today when I told her the bottle was gone because it's broken. That helped her only scream for the bottle for a minute or two before crashing. That doesn't mean she hasn't been asking for it the rest of the day, but it's a start.

Other milestones of the past two months are Easter and, best of all, Daddy's graduation. The pictures of graduation that I got were pretty fuzzy, but I do have some Easter pictures.

In the Easter dress made by her Grandma Cottam.

Finishing her first Easter egg hunt with Daddy. That was fun.

In the new play dress she got in her basket.

Eighteen and Nineteen Months

2010-03-05T16:17:00.005-07:00

So I dropped the ball on an 18 month update for Eliana. It just felt like there was a lot going on and no time to organize pictures and videos on the computer. I've been working on figuring it all out and it's finally cooperating with me.

Weight: She weighed 26 lb at her 18 month doctor appointment.
Height: Also at the last doctor appointment, she was 33+ inches. I can't remember exactly what. Eliana seems to be keeping on her growth curve for height and weight.

Speech: I've lost track of her words, but the one she uses most is "hand." Any time she wants to go into another room or go up or down stairs she asks for a hand and will then lead you where she wants to go. It's pretty cute. She also asks for it whenever she sees her lotion.

Nursery has been wonderful. It was surprising to sit in with her the first week and just realize how proud of her I am. She played nice with the other kids (except for stealing their marshmallows when they weren't looking) and was plenty tough when something happened that she could have cried about. Now the problem is getting her to leave nursery. This past Sunday I took her into the hall during Sacrament meeting and we passed the nursery room. Ellie saw a dad from the other ward go in and got very upset when I wouldn't let her follow.

In an attempt to make the post short(er) I'll just tell a few things that Eliana likes to do and let the video show them.

Eliana like to draw, but not necessarily where she should. She loves being active and jumping on her zebra is a great outlet. Ellie loves her cousin Daphne. She loves giving kisses, albeit fairly slimy ones if she hasn't wiped her mouth recently. Daphne's not so sure about affection from Ellie, but she seems fascinated by her older cousin whenever she's over. Eliana loves to "die, die!" That's what she shrieks before launching herself off any particular surface. Ellie LOVES the Shrek movies. Can't get enough of them. She especially likes the music bits at the end of the first two movies. Dancing to them is one of her great pleasures. Bath time is always fun except for when I wash her hair. She really hates that part, but relishes the rest. Finally (for this post), Eliana likes to do songs with actions. Itsy, Bitsy Spider is probably her favorite, followed closely by Oh, How We Love to Stand.

We love you, Ellie!

Seventeen Months

2010-01-06T08:05:00.001-07:00

Eric gave me the Wii Fit Plus for Christmas and it does a great job of weighing Ellie, so maybe I will go back to doing it every month

Weight: Almost 24 lb.

Speech: Eliana is great at copying sounds. She loves to mimic words we say and she probably understands more than she lets on. We discovered that she knows turtle, fork, and spoon when my mom held them up and asked what they were. I wonder what other things she knows, but chooses not to sat. Ellie is getting better with animals and says dog, cat, duck, cow, chicken (chick), lion, tiger, bear, and makes a respectable attempt at horse.

Motor: Pretty much the same as last month. Eliana prefers to hold hands when she goes downstairs. This is much more preferable to diving when no one is there to catch her. Thankfully she's never tried that. Her worst habit is sticking her fingers down her throat to make herself gag. That one's yucky.

Social: We've been working with more socially acceptable behaviors for Ellie. When a friend brought her new baby over we had to teach her "soft" a lot more aggressively than we had before. That's kind of necessary when she tried to squish the baby's face. Now when she starts being none too gentle with people or objects we tell her to be soft and she ends up petting whatever it is and chanting "sot, sot". Hopefully this will work well when we start taking her to Nursery in a few weeks.

Other tidbits: Eliana has started sleeping through the night again. After we moved she spent a while waking up once or twice a night. I think now she is comfortable and has pajamas that are warm enough. Christmas was a lot of fun (see post below) and Ellie was much more active this year than last.

Christmas Fun

2010-01-05T11:20:00.003-07:00

We took Eliana to see Santa for the first time. The line to see Santa two days before Christmas is a long one, so we used the time to take pictures and figure out what we could do to keep Ellie entertained while we waited. She did pretty well considering she had to wait in line.

One big fear before actually meeting Santa was how she would react to sitting on a stranger's lap. She didn't cry, but she certainly did wiggle. Santa was a little more nervous than Ellie was. We were glad we had chosen to take pictures ourselves, rather than pay the money for professional pictures.

After we finished with Santa we wandered the mall. Eliana was allowed to run the halls a little bit. She had two favorite stores. One had a ball with a fake ferret attached to it. She was fascinated with that little rat-on-a-ball but we didn't buy one for her. Her other favorite store was for clothing, but I don't remember the name. What I do remember is that she made a beeline for the sparkly shoes and stayed there until she spotted another item of clothing for sale. You would be amazed at how quickly a one year old can empty a rack of lacy panties...several times over.

Christmas Eve was spent at Eric's Mom's house. Eliana had fun playing with her new toys and basking in the attention due to a first grandchild.

Christmas Day started at my parents' house, where Ellie seemed pleased with the haul and showed much greater accomplishment ripping open gifts than she did last year.

In the afternoon we visited with Eric's dad and had a great time there. We were all lucky enough to receive a Flip video camera and we've been having a great time with that. I haven't played with it much beyond taking videos of Ellie, but it has lots of cool features that I'm excited to take advantage of. I plan on posting some of those tomorrow, as it is too late to play with it tonight. Ellie loves the camera, too, and can't stop asking to watch the recorded videos whenever she gets the chance.

It was a wonderful Christmas and we all had a wonderful time together with family.

Sixteen Months

2009-12-09T21:18:00.001-07:00

I've given up on weighing and measuring Ellie every month and I'll just leave that part to the doctor whenever she has a well baby checkup.

The past month has been a busy one for this little girl. It included Thanksgiving, moving, getting sick, and a lot of regular development stuff.

Speech: New words happen at what seems like every day. New words for her list are: done, full, amen (so cute!), dive, snow, watch, more, cheek, chin, hair, ear, nose, eye, bonk, and a few others that aren't coming to mind at the moment.

Teeth: She's up to sixteen and I hope we can have a rest for a while.

Motor: Stairs are still a source of entertainment and development. Ellie is at the point she can hold on to the wall and go up or down stairs without sitting. However, her favorite way of getting downstairs is diving. One of us stands a few stairs down and holds out our arms. She then smiles broadly, makes her arms go spread eagle and falls forward. It's great fun but would be more appreciated by her parents if she didn't think it was a great idea to do it while standing on a chair...while our backs are turned. Sometimes we'll get a warning when she screams "die!" (dive) a moment before leaping.

Eating is another motor improvement. When we give her a fork or a spoon to eat with she tries to use it. Sometimes it works, sometimes not, but that's part of the fun.

Social: Eliana loves to play with others. She's not nervous around most people and will readily be held by them, particularly if they have cheese. She remains a very happy girl.

Other tidbits: The newest fascination is with snow. Now that we've had enough of a storm for the snow to stick all she wants to do is go outside and play in it. We bought her some boots and mittens, but I still haven't taken her out because her pants will soak right through and I'm usually sewing something for pay.

Moving was new experience for her. It's been difficult for her to get used to sleeping in a new room, but Ellie is working on it and her parents are praying for patience in the meantime. The picture below while we were in the packing process and she found daddy's cup from karate. I wasn't able to get the picture of when she had it over her nose, but the expression on her face in the one I did get is priceless. "Mommy, what's this for?"

Sleeping positions have always been fun. Her favorite is curled up on her tummy, but sometimes we get gems like the one below.

We spend a lot of time together in the sewing room. Eliana's favorite activity in the sewing room is climb up on the chair by the serger and grab loose pins (she's learned how to safely handle them). Once that's done she likes to insert said pins in the hole in the knob on top. At least the pins can't fall through the hole. I just love that the pictures look like she's taking after Mommy and Grandma.

Sadly, I can't review this month without mentioning Ellie's first real sickness. She started coughing and when it didn't go away and got more wet and more persistent I took her in to see the doctor. While there Eliana energetically explored the exam table and everything else in the room. I was sure the doctor was going to see that and tell me my kid was fine. First off he looked in her ears and said, "She's got red, bubbly ears." That didn't sound good. After listening to her lungs and saying she was wheezing (duh) he prescribed three medicines to get rid of her bronchitis. Yuck. She had a pill that needed to be crushed and mixed in with food, a liquid antibiotic, and an inhaler that she refused to use. We had to get a mask and a spacer, but there was only one way to get that kid to take her inhaler (see picture below) and that only had limited success. She's fine now, but it wasn't a good time.

Lastly, Eliana has developed a habit of putting things in places they don't go. Usually that's the bathroom and, more specifically, the bathtub. I think the only reason the olive oil didn't make it into the tub was that it was too heavy to throw over the side. The bathtub is not the go-to place when I can't find something. Works like a charm.

We can't get enough of this little girl!

Fifteen Months

2009-11-05T13:08:00.000-07:00

It's about time for another monthly update, so here you go.

Height: I'll measure later.

Weight: I'll measure that later, too.

Speech: I wrote down most of them in the last post, but there are a few amendments. Outside is now "ow-sai" and she also says "key" and "bubble" (buh-buh). I think in the last couple of days she has also learned "walk" (wah), but that may just be her copying my noises. She's really good at that. I think we're also getting sentences out of her, but I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around that. Ellie has been saying, "eye-na beebee" for a couple of weeks now. There was a while when we would ask, "who's the baby?" and get the above response from her. Last week my aunt Carolyn watched Eliana for an afternoon and heard a lot of, "eye-na go ow-sai" while Ellie pointed at the door. Then when told Eliana we were going for a walk with Aunt Carolyn she said, "eye-na go wah." This was repeated a few times so I'm certain it meant something to her. I just hope it meant what it sounded like to me.

Teeth: Fourteen and one or two more coming soon. She's getting her canines. The amount of continuous slobber she's got running down her chin is a good indicator that the next two canines will be here any day.

Motor: Ellie can negotiate the stairs on her own, but it still makes us nervous. At one point she learned to turn around and crawl down the stairs. She won't do that any more. Now she sits on the steps and scoots until her little bum falls down onto the next step. That, however, is not her favorite method. She really prefers to hold a hand and walk down like the big people do. The very best way is to have someone a few steps down to catch her when she lets herself fall forward. She will also avoid crawling upstairs if possible. Ellie likes to hold on to the wall with one hand and use it to balance herself while she hoists her leg up to stand on the step. Meals taste better is she has her own fork to stab the food with. Drawing is becoming more popular, as is throwing things to create a mess.

Social: Other children are fascinating to Eliana. She will say hi to them and walk over to get a better look at them. She hasn't figured out that they don't appreciate it when she takes the binky out of their mouth to see what tastes so good. I'm glad she doesn't like binkies or I would worry she might put them in her own mouth. Sitting on laps is another fun thing. She has enjoyed that much over the past several months. Ellie is also becoming more daring with it. Most adults don't mind. She just needs to learn it's not appropriate to sit in the lap of someone smaller than yourself (examples: a 13 month old girl at church and Eliana's 11 week old cousin). I wanted to get a picture, but even more I didn't want innocent children crushed.

Other tidbits: Wearing shoes is a favorite activity. It doesn't matter who they belong to, she thinks she should wear them. The picture shows her in Daddy's size 13 sandals.

Eliana is a stomach sleeper all the way. It makes for interesting sleeping positions. The picture below...well, we're not sure how she managed to low ride her jammies.

If she doesn't sleep on her tummy she likes to at least stick her feet through the bars of her crib. I don't know why, but I almost always find her with one or both feet through the slats.

Halloween was a bit more fun for her this year (I think). We didn't trick or treat, but we did take her to my parents' place before going to celebrate the birthday of Ellie's aunt Amber. Both Eric and I were blonde when we were little. We don't know when Eliana's hair is going to go dark, so we knew we needed to do Cinderella in the year we knew she'd be blonde.

The piano is a fun toy. Ellie has moved on from simply banging the keys to playing one note at a time (mostly). I'll start working with her after she turns 3 and see if playing the piano is something she wants to learn.

A new part of the morning routine has been adopted. When I'm just too tired (often) I get her out of the crib and bring her onto our bed. She crawls around on us for a couple of minutes before climbing down. Ellie then wanders back into her room and gets into the box of diapers. She fishes one out then brings it back into our bedroom. As soon as she gets to the bed she slaps the diaper down and says "bum!" before crawling up to be changed. It cracks me up every time.

The last video is of her rocking out in her daddy's old rocking chair. We were at Eric's brother's wedding reception that was held in his mom's backyard, hence the fancy dress.

I love this little girl so much!

New Words

2009-10-24T23:01:00.000-06:00

After Ellie turned a year old I stopped keeping track of her progress like I wanted. To very briefly sum up, she is still tall, loves to walk, is learning lots of fun new words (which I will get to soon), and continues to be the light and joy of our little family. Favorite activities include: trying to pick up the laptop, climbing, feeding herself (we're still working on getting her to use utensils, but we're not in a rush), putting on mom and dad's shoes, wiggling and squirming through church, and trying to get into the various garbage cans throughout the house. Her newest favorite activity is reading. She'll get a book off the shelf, yell "booky!", and slam it on the lap of the closest person before climbing up, herself. Her current favorite is "A Squirrel's Tale" followed closely by any of her touchy-feely books. I'm going to stop there and just include a list of words she knows and says so I have a record of it.

baby
ball (bah)
bum (we have a diaper changing song)
book ("boo" or "booky")
bottle (bah)
bow
car (kai)
cat (ta)
cookie (learned with legendary speed)
dada
dog (dah)
down
flower ("fwah", but she doesn't say it often)
hi
mama
no
outside (sai)
pin (shows you where we spend our time)
please (pwee)
pretty (also "pwee", but said while she grabs at jewelry instead of food)
shoe
sock (sah)
up
water (wah)
yeah
yucky (said while picking up a garbage can)

I think that's all of them, but I'll include more if I can think of them. She's quite the chatterbox and will hold entire conversations with us. We're all just dying to know what it all means. Unless it turns out it's back talk. Then I don't want to know.

An EllieBelly Birthday

2009-08-09T00:12:00.003-06:00

Eliana's birthday was a busy, busy day. I had no idea there was so much prep for an event that I really didn't plan. My mom was awesome to bring the food. All I did was pick up a cake and bring presents. Rather than just talk about it, here are a few pictures of the festivities.

Her special birthday outfit came together nicely. I bought the shoes for a different outfit, the top to go with a different skirt (but they clashed terribly) and the pettiskirt was made from fabric my mom had laying around. The only part that was purposely planned to go with the outfit was the maribou clippie, which I love as much as the rest of the outfit.

For dinner we just stripped her down and put her in the Bumbo. I forgot to bring the high chair. Oops. We kept her stripped for the cake. I'm not quite sure what her little expression means...

Thank you, Macey's, for the free first birthday cake! That's my favorite price.

Eliana is a very clean eater, so she didn't get a ton of cake on her. She mostly just scraped off the frosting and shoved it in her mouth. Most of the cake remained untouched. She may not have made a mess of herself (fine by me), but she rocked her little birthday hat. Notice the "1" and the fluffy embellishment. Contrary to popular belief, I did not make my daughter a dunce cap.

Dinner and cake were the appetizers before the main event: opening presents. After getting cleaned up and redressed we gathered all the gifts and let her play in them.It took a bit of coaxing to get her to open the presents, but she eventually got the hang of it. Sort of.Family pictures were the final order of the day. My dad took pictures of all of us on my side. Pretty quick here we're going to be short a person. My cute sister in law was due two days after Eliana's birthday.There were a few just for fun pictures taken. I absolutely love this one of the three of us.It's easy to see how much she loves the slide. It's great fun watching her play. It was a really fun day and I appreciate the help I had tossing it together.

The End.

Twelve Months

2009-08-07T15:19:00.005-06:00

Today was another wellbaby appointment so I saved the monthly update until I had doctor stats.

Weight: 22 lb. 8 oz. 75th percentile
Height: 30.75 inches. I knew I'd been measuring wrong. 95th percentile

We knew she was tall, but I guess I didn't realize just how tall she really was. Her weight is getting closer to being in proportion with her height. I'm just glad that, apparently, I'm feeding her enough.

Everything else at the appointment went fine. Immunizations went about as well as could be expected. She waited until the first shot was almost done before she started to cry. I didn't cry until the third shot. But, having experienced both pneumonia and whooping cough for myself, I would rather watch her get shots than deal with those diseases. After they were all done I comforted her for just a minute and decided she may as well cry in the car as the doctors office and we left. She was a champ and stopped crying before we left the clinic. Good girl. Although that didn't stop her from glaring at the poor nurse who stuck her.

Words include: hi, mama, dada, baby, bye, and pretty. "Dah!" is her universal term for everything from "dog" to "fridge".
Teeth: eight
Walking: Walking? How about running. She's getting ever closer to that. Climbing is another favorite activity that has recently started in earnest. Eliana can also pull herself up to standing now, rather than crawling to something else and using that to stand.

She understands the words she speaks, as well as: arms up, wave, clap, sit, go get it, and more. That means both "other things she understands" and "more".

Eliana loves to explore and see new things. She gets a little upset when I block off a cabinet I don't want her in, but I'm confident she'll forgive me one day.

Happy Birthday, Eliana!

2009-08-04T09:34:00.003-06:00

Ellie turns one year old today. Here she is in her pajamas, fluffy birthday clippie, and breakfast. Mommy and Daddy love you so much and are so happy to have you with us!

Dancing Queen

2009-07-16T19:59:00.003-06:00

Eliana has recently started to get a lot more interested in music. Along with this has come just about the cutest dancing I think I've ever seen. The music is the closing credits of Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, but there is plenty of other music that she will rock out to. I tried to tell Eric that she was the dancing queen by singing the chorus of the song, but he strongly objected. He and ABBA don't get along. Especially Dancing Queen. Anyway, check out her smooth moves and her awesomely curly hair. You can also see how well her walking has progressed right there at the end. She is certainly picking up speed.

Eleven Months

2009-07-04T11:07:00.002-06:00

Can you believe they held a big parade in honor of Eliana's 11 month birthday! What's that you say? It was for the Fourth of July? Ah, well, I suppose that's reason enough. Ellie was able to be in the parade with Mommy and Daddy because of the Freedom Festival baby contest. We were to wear as much red, white, and blue as possible and decorate the stroller. All my decorations came from the dollar store. I'm cheap that way. Or just poor. Take your pick.

Here's Eliana just before the parade, studying her medal. I didn't take any pictures during the parade because we were moving. My parents got pictures, though.
Wait, I was supposed to be updating about Eliana, wasn't I? When I weighed her this morning she was 21 lb. 3 oz. I tried measuring her a few days ago and she was still exactly at 28.5 inches. Her next well baby visit is next month, so hopefully I'll have more accurate numbers then. I really doubt she wishes to stop growing taller at this young age.

Accomplishments: Ellie is a star walker. She'll do that just to keep herself entertained. Right now she's working on building up speed. I'm sorry to say that she is succeeding. Really, I am sorry to say that. Nothing in the house is safe anymore.

On that same note, so is also learning to climb. She likes to climb up on our bookshelf, over Daddy's belly, and onto the back of couches. Ellie is also standing on tiptoe for a better view of things whenever she has something to hold onto.

Eliana still crawls to the nearest object to pull up on when she falls down, but is trying to do it without support. This morning she used the Wii Fit balance board to get her into standing position again. Before too long I think she'll have it figured out. Her back and legs are certainly strengthening, as Ellie can bend over or squat to pick up objects without having to fall to sitting. That certainly speeds her travels along.

Speaking is a lot of fun. She says "hi", "baby", and "mom". It's entertaining to hear her say "hi" whenever the phone rings. My dad can get her to say "hi baby" and is trying to teach her "book". Right now her attempts at that word sound like "bwish". Ellie also makes a lot of nonsense sounds.

Exploring is always of interest. In the picture below Eliana and Grandma are at the BYU Laundry sewing room. Ellie crawled under the sewing table and came up between the metal bars, like a cat or a caterpillar. She was standing, but sat down before I could get the picture.
Other developments: Ellie is really wanting to feed herself. She can put the spoon in her mouth, but hasn't figured out putting food on the spoon. She would probably do better at that if I gave her opportunities to learn it.

Teeth seven and eight pushed through, so now we need to be sure we brush those little teeth every day. She likes to play with the toothbrush, especially when we give it to her when we're brushing our own teeth.

We've gone swimming a few times and Ellie loves the water. She will usually lay flat in the water and her favorite part of the outing is walking into the water while holding on to a parent's hand.

If I come up with more things I'll write them down. For now, here is Eliana on her 11 month birthday in her decorated stroller just before going on to the parade route.

Early Independence Day

2009-07-02T22:26:00.005-06:00

Now that Eliana is getting so good at walking, she's also wanting to do other things by herself. Climbing is her favorite and she's getting a lot better at it. This concerns me, but there's not much I can do about it. Except maybe pull her off the furniture.

Ellie's most recent foray into doing things herself comes with eating. She's learning to spit and will do it when she doesn't want to eat what is offered to her. That's usually peas. Today, however, carrots were another rejected food. She never rejects carrots. I also tried giving her some beef and she wouldn't take any of that, either. At least, Eliana wouldn't take any until I dumped it out on her tray and let her feed it to herself. She has her own way of letting me know when she's ready to move on past something. The same thing happened with her binky. She just wouldn't take it anymore. Sigh...my little girl is growing up.

A Day At The Zoo

2009-07-02T21:16:00.005-06:00

A couple weeks back we took Ellie to the zoo along with Eric's mom and sister. It was a lot of fun and a lot of wet. Here are some highlights of the day.

We started out at the ape house and thought we should see how Ellie's size measures up with an orangutan's--just in case one got a little feisty. Eliana could totally take him. She's a lot more attractive, at the very least.

It was a little bright, so Ellie got to crack out her stylin' shades.

Big cats were next on the list. Ellie tamed the tiger without any trouble. And seemed to enjoy it thoroughly.

This is the small animal house, but I don't remember what she was looking at. I know Ellie really loved the Prevost squirrel. Most of the animals she just watched and studied, as pictured here.

While we were in either the small animal house or the reptile house (I can't remember which, but I do remember the stink that pervaded throughout the building) it started to pour. It rained and rained and rained. The worst part was that you have to leave strollers outside and Ellie's was soaked through. She would have had a very wet bottom through no fault of her own, so we had to get rid of the stroller. The next couple of pictures were taken while we waited for Eric and Stephanie to put the stroller in the car and grab a blanket for Ellie. Amber and I waited in the gift shop while it continued to rain.

Amber found a soft tiger for Ellie to play with, which she did most enthusiastically. She probably thought she shook the tiger's brain too much and cuddled it to make it better.

We tried to go to the bird show, but it was cancelled because of rain. Instead, we put Ellie on the merry-go-round. A great time was had by all. There's even a video. I'll bet you're excited.

Our last stop of the day was with the giraffes. Our curious little girl loves to watch and learn. We were on the second level and watching the giraffe eat. Ellie thought that was pretty cool and kept her eyes riveted on it.

We all had a great time and I think Ellie loved all the animals.

That's the End! We Hope to See You Again...Bye-bye!

2009-07-01T18:17:00.002-06:00

The title of this post is taken from the last line on every video of the Your Baby Can Read program. I took out the two words "very soon" because that is not the timing I'm looking for. Anyway, this fond farewell goes out to my breastmilk. It has officially dried up. Not that there ever much to begin with.

Summerfest Baby Contest

2009-06-14T21:40:00.003-06:00

After the Freedom Festival baby contest I decided I had enough fun that I wanted to enter Eliana in the Orem Summerfest baby contest, as well. "Everyone has a Story" was year's theme and they encouraged parents to dress their children in costume. Suggestions for costumes were favorite storybook characters or something with family stories. I had a cute flower hat I'd made for Ellie, so she became Thumbelina. I used fabric my friend Carrie gave me last year to make a baby outfit, but that I never got around to sewing. You can't see it in the picture, but I also made some really darling ballerina slippers with ribbon ties.

Once again, I went to the table to have her judged and was asked if I was putting her in the costume category. The literature I saw was very confusing and I didn't realize there was a separate costume table. Oops. After the first table (at which she was more curious than smiley) we took her to get her picture. She cooperated really well until she decided she wanted to stand up and then faceplanted into the hardwood floor. Ouch. There was more bleeding from that than I've ever seen from her. Poor kid. She was not in the best of spirits when we took her to the costume table. At least she wasn't screaming anymore. The experience was not as fun as the Freedom Festival, but I did enjoy making the costume.

Going to the awards was a bit more complicated. That happened five hours after we went in with Ellie. I parked where I thought would be close to the pavilion, only to realize very quickly that I was way off. I was already running late, so I didn't try to re-park. There was no stroller because I didn't figure I would need it and knew I would have to unpack the back of the car to get it in. I walked from State St. to 400 E, crossed the street, and then backtracked to the pavilion that was about halfway from where I started and where I crossed. I wasn't about to jaywalk Center St. with my baby on my hip. Once we arrived at the pavilion there was no one there. One of the volunteers finally told me they had moved the awards to the Senior Friendship Center because of the weather. So we booked it back over to 400 E to hear the awards given and hope to have our name drawn for one of the cool prizes. Neither happened. I had hoped Ellie would be a winner in one of the categories again, but that's okay. I had fun making her costume.

Here is the picture of her, as well as one with Eric as a little boy. I think she looks like her daddy. You may have to click on the picture to get it bigger. She certainly has his hair (the picture of me in the last post has curly hair, but it wasn't naturally that way. My mom permed it. And I let her because she told me it would make me pretty.) and his squishable cheeks. She has my hands and probably my forehead. The eye shape is his, but the color had to come from my side, even though I also have brown eyes. One way or another, she's a doll.

Unrighteous Pride

2009-06-06T19:42:00.011-06:00

The certificate pictured above was from the Freedom Festival Baby Contest in 1981. It lives in the photo album my grandmother put together just over 20 years ago. My mom took me to participate in it on my very first Fourth of July. I always thought it would be cool to do the same thing with my daughter one day. Today was that day.

I signed Eliana up for the contest in her age category, thinking I didn't have time to make a costume. I ended up making it, anyway, because I couldn't think of what she already had that I wanted her to be judged in. This dress is the fruit of my labors. The best part about it is that the only thing I had to buy for it was the silver ribbon. Everything else was leftovers from other projects. Score. The flowers in her hair and on her dress were the last two leftover from the hat I originally made to be part of the costume. With somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 flowers, I thought it was a little over the top when paired with the dress. I decided that bald babies can wear cute hats, but my little girl has lots curly blond hair and that needs some seeing. I even used some mousse on it--a first. Anyway, the outfit came together nicely (and extremely cheaply) without previous planning. Sometimes you just get lucky. In other pictures further down you'll see her awesomely cute sandals I bought at Walmart a couple of months ago with no intention of using them in a contest.

Everyone was busy today, so Eliana and I spent the late morning and early afternoon at UVU being judged and stopping by all the booths to give the poor vendors something to do. I actually did buy something that later found out I don't like, but I'm not sorry I gave him the money. That's a whole other story, but just know he was doing it to earn money for his mission, so I happily gave over the money that probably should have gone to groceries. I can't say it would have been better used as groceries because those would have just gone to waist. Yes, I spelled it like that on purpose. Although, in the end, "waste" would have been an accurate, too. Ha! Two bad puns in a row! I digress.

I chatted with a very nice lady in line for the judging ahead of me. While we were talking one of the volunteers took a look at Eliana's dress and asked if I was going to the costume judging next. I let her know I hadn't registered for it and she told me it was fine and to go, anyway. It was nap time, so Ellie was not as cooperative for the judges as I had hoped. When I finished in the age group line I went over to the costume table and, as there was no one else there at the time (there had been before), Eliana was judged immediately. They had a little flag at their table and that was a better toy for her than the other table had had. It was cute to watch her wave it. The photographer loved it, too.

I'll skip all the other details of what I did until the award ceremony/drawing because I've already been long winded. The guy announced door prize winners, some of the age categories, and more door prizes before getting to Eliana's age group. Her name wasn't called. I was, of course, a little disappointed, but not surprised. There were a lot of babies.

Fast forward to more door prizes and then the multiples and costume categories. We didn't win any door prizes, but they did call Ellie's name as third prize in the costume category! Go Ellie! I thought that was pretty good for a dress that wasn't originally meant to be a costume. And I have a really cute girl.

So now we have the option to march in the Grand Parade on the 4th of July. By "march" I mean "walk her in the stroller". I think I just might. When else am I going to get the chance to be in a big parade. Um, I mean, Ellie would have a good time strolling past everything. That's it.

Here are some pictures of me and my baby at almost exactly the same age and in our baby contest outfits. I've always wanted to see how much we look alike and this has been my best chance so far.

The picture of me below is the official picture they took for the contest. The one for Eliana won't be available until June 20, otherwise I would have put that one up.

Here's a shot of me and Eliana standing in front of the sign. She's sucking on her little medal. What a cute baby.

Ten Months

2009-06-04T21:46:00.002-06:00

This little girl just keeps getting cuter by the second. I think that may be because her hair is getting curlier, but any reason will do. This month has been a big one in terms of development and it's been really exciting for us to watch her grow.

Height: Once again, 28.5 inches. I really must be measuring wrong. She's been that tall for three months now. In two months we'll see what the doctor's office says.

Weight: 20 lbs. 5 oz.

Milestones: Teeth numbers five and six pushed through. I thought they would be a matched pair on top or bottom, but one got through on each side. The bottom tooth is on the right and the top tooth is on the left.

Eliana also perfected her crawl this month. She is now always on hands and knees rather than doing the slap-drag.

Walking has also greatly improved. Her steps are a lot more confident and she has been taking more of them. As you can see from the video, any surface taller than her knees is a potential location for pulling up. She also likes the piano.

For the past several days I've just been loving Eliana more and more. I don't know why. Whatever the reason, it is sweet to me.

Words, Words, Words

2009-05-28T21:11:00.005-06:00

Way back when I was pregnant (so it was only a year ago, but I've had a major life change since then. It seems like I've always had Eliana) I bought a program called Your Baby Can Read. I was able to get it for free because we used to sell it through Usborne and I got it with hostess incentives after a booth. Sadly, we don't sell it anymore. We've shown her the videos almost every day since she was three months old. We knew it would take a while for results to show and we haven't been particularly anxious that she hasn't shown recognition yet, but it turns out it was us who hadn't been showing recognition. The video always starts with the word "hi" and, until yesterday, I didn't know she knew it. She was in her pack n play babbling at me. It sounded a lot like "hi" and I said it back to her. As soon as I did she broke out into a huge smile and then sat down to play with her toys. She just wanted to get my attention. In the first video the program isn't playing, I am just asking her to say it.

This video has the program playing in the back, but it's kind of quiet. You can either turn it up or I can just tell you that it goes through one other word before it says "waving." I think she also has her own way to say "waving" because she repeats it several times.

I didn't get a video of her pointing to her hand when that word came up, but she did it. Until just recently I didn't think she understood a lot of words. She's been saying " mum, mum, mum" for months now, but when it started I didn't think she could know what it meant. Regardless of how it was when she first started, she knows it now. I guess you could say her first word was "mom," however, the first word I recognized was "hi." She's growing up way too fast.

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

2009-05-19T21:31:00.003-06:00

Well, tonight is another cry-it-out night. We've been lucky so far because Eliana has just gone to sleep since that first night. Not tonight. She is screaming. But she has had an eventful day.

Today was Daddy's birthday. Eliana came with me everywhere I needed to go to prepare for it and was so sweet about it. She only bothered to sleep while riding in the car, but you take what you can get. However, what little time she did sleep didn't add up to much.

Eliana had a great time being the center of attention for a very long time today. She was really playful, so I made sure to enjoy that. When we went to dinner we were surrounded by family and they can't get enough of her. The staff at the Indian restaurant we went to couldn't get enough of her, either. The owner loved playing with her and talking to her. The waiter (who did an excellent job of keeping our water glasses full) didn't seem to speak English, but enjoyed standing aside and waving at Eliana. The one woman there on the staff seemed to like playing peek-a-boo and teasing with food. When we were all done with our meal she even used a spoon to feed Eliana some of the leftover rice. The woman seemed to take great pleasure in the cuteness that is my baby. As the bill was being paid she asked to hold Eliana and we agreed. I think she wanted to keep her. Too bad. I like Eliana too well to give her away.

The screaming has stopped and she's asleep. Ah...silence. Considering all the food Eliana has had in the last couple of hours she should be zonked for a very long time. She ate rice we placed on the table for her (there was a lot), she ate her servings of cauliflower, salmon, and apples, and finished up with a biter biscuit. Her tummy has to be really full. Crap. The phone just rang and she's crying again. Note to self: keep this screaming fit in mind when you want to call someone with a baby after 8 pm. I've been enjoying not waking up with her at night.

Anyway, Eliana also got to try ice cream for the first time. She loved it, but I don't really want her to have it much (or again) until her first birthday. It's not a nice thing when the spoon is empty. Here are a couple of pictures to enjoy while the baby calms down again.

Here she is shoveling the rice we put on the table cloth for her into her mouth.

This pic is a few days old, but Eliana is really getting the hang of standing up still.

Eliana is also cutting teeth five and six. Not such a fun time for her, but this time around she's handling it much better.

So I Don't Forget

2009-05-12T22:07:00.003-06:00

Just a couple of cute things I want to record so I don't forget them.

Eliana knows how her bottle is made. If we don't have her sippy cup and want to give her water we put it in a bottle. After a couple of swallows she takes the bottle out, stares at it for a second, and then starts to shake it before she takes another drink. She continues to repeat this process until she realizes that the water will not change to formula just by shaking and pushes it away. What can I say, she's observant.

In fits and spurts, Eliana is an ultrasonic baby. When she gets really excited she makes noises so high-pitched you wouldn't think they were humanly possible. She stopped doing it for a while, but has gone back to it recently.

When I remember the other thing I wanted to write (but forgot) I'll include it.

One Night Down

2009-05-12T21:37:00.002-06:00

My in-laws offered to take Eliana for us overnight for our fifth anniversary. We happily took them up on the offer. Now we just have a bit of a concern. She won't want to sleep for them. We've tried doing the cry it out thing, but without much success. She would just scream until it was obvious that she wasn't able to stop herself. At that point we would take her out of the crib to comfort her (which usually took about 15 minutes) and then cradle her until she fell asleep. Now we're paying for it. We've been putting her to bed with a bottle for the past while and it has worked well. But what happens when there's no bottle? She screams because she really hates going to sleep.

Also, we've noticed in the past few days that Eliana is throwing tantrums. She kicks her legs and flails her arms when she gets mad that we won't let her have or do something. The cry that once meant she couldn't stop herself is now her angry cry. This is unacceptable. Now we have to train it out of her and it sucks. Tonight was the first night of being really firm about letting her cry it out. Hopefully it will take and she'll be able to calm herself to sleep before our anniversary.

Nine Months

2009-05-04T21:04:00.005-06:00

If I had decided to be silly and get pregnant directly after giving birth I would probably be holding a second baby now. Thankfully I can just focus on Eliana. She decided to celebrate nine months of life by waking up at 3, 4, and 5 am and not going back to sleep at 5. Actually, she went back to sleep shortly after I gave up at 6:15 and got out of bed to exercise. Stinker.

As for measurements, Eliana weighs 19.5 lbs (up a pound and 3 oz from last month) and measures 28.5 inches. Seeing as she measured 28.5 inches last month, I think I measured her wrong either this month or last. Weight is about the 63rd percentile and height is 75th.

As for milestones, Eliana has started standing and has taken her first few steps. She gets a little better every day. I would post those pictures now, but I already did last time. Her two top teeth came in, making the little bit of nursing I can do a bit...chafy. Is that a word? Probably not, but it fits the sensation better than other words.

Eliana's hair has started to take on a hint of curl and I hope it continues. You can see it in the picture from our last day at work. She'll get no more meals of alterations tags.
We all celebrated our first Easter together. Eliana didn't get any candy, but was a happy girl all the same.
Getting Eliana to sleep has been a bit more difficult because, combined with her lack of binky, she just hates not being awake and aware. She is a content and happy child, but she is not necessarily calm and subdued. Some days she refuses naps longer than ten minutes and just goes until she crashes.
Eliana has also decided that she wants in on our desire to get healthy and thinks the Wii Fit is her best option. It is certainly the most fun.
I also made a fun discovery on Sunday as I was ironing. Eliana watched closely as I misted the clothes I was preparing for her. I was reprimanded for what followed by everyone I told, but not for long.

Sometimes You Just Get Lucky

2009-04-24T19:59:00.004-06:00

Lately Eliana has been really enjoying cruising around and has even been improving her skills at standing up on her own. She's pretty shaky, but she can go for a couple of seconds without holding on to anything. I've been trying to get a picture or video of it for a few days now, but she has not been obliging. Today was much better, even if I didn't get one of her without holding onto or leaning on something. This was the best I could get.

It was really cute to watch Eliana reaching from the basket to the chair, so I turned on the video. I also thought a video might yield better results of standing by herself. I was right. You can hear my surprise right at the end.

She took steps! I certainly wouldn't call it walking, but I was so glad I happened to be filming at the time. Right now I am one proud mama. Not that I really had anything to do with it, but I can be well pleased with my daughter, right?

Finally, for your viewing enjoyment, here is another shot of Eliana's gummy smile. Now it just has teeth in it and she has hair.

Name Change

2009-04-19T08:36:00.005-06:00

When I changed the name of the blog from "Precious Tadpole" to "Eliana:Plugged", I felt rather clever. I came up with name during a time when she couldn't (or wouldn't) hold her binky in by herself. My main purpose in life was to be sure she always had it so she wouldn't freak out. Well, I'm not sure exactly when it happened, but the binky is history. What used to soothe her to sleep and be a fixture on her face is now thoroughly rejected. She pushes it away and yells if I try to use it to calm her. I really have no idea what happened.

This mighty life change is both good and bad. I really wish she would still take it because it would help her go to sleep during both day and night. The good part is that I won't ever have to train her off it. Maybe she'll do the same thing with a bottle. All of a sudden she's taking a cup better than she ever has, so we'll see.

Happy Easter

2009-04-12T21:55:00.002-06:00

Easter was a bit of a hurried affair, as we promised to hit all three grandparents' houses. There was pretty much just time to say hello, kiss the baby, and take many pictures of her before moving on to the next house. The ones I got that turned out the best were taken at the last house. She was pretty much done with taking pictures by then, but isn't her dress adorable? (The correct answer is, "Yes, it is adorable, but not as adorable as her!") We let her off the hook and changed her into her sleeper as soon as pictures were done so she could eat dinner and relax a little easier. She actually has a foofy dress for every Sunday in April, so next week's Easter dress is the green one. Then there's another white and pink one, as well the one she wore in her Christmas picture. There are also new, non-foofy dresses that we need to get her into before she outgrows them. It's good to be the first grandbaby. Especially when you're a girl.

Four

2009-04-08T08:28:00.003-06:00

Tooth number four erupted through Ellie's gums yesterday. She started to scream for no reason. When I picked her up I wondered if that was the cause and looked in her mouth. Sure enough, there was a little bit of tooth poking up through the surface and some of the skin still intact. Poor thing. She takes it really well, but that's gotta hurt. I tried to take a picture to have a reference of what it looks like when a tooth is just coming through, but she didn't want to.
We bought her a couple of toys to help ease her pain and suffering. And because most of the toys she has right are below her development level. Besides, who doesn't need the stacking rings and the bucket with shaped blocks?

Eight Months

2009-04-06T20:56:00.006-06:00

This month has been a fun one. Most of the new milestones have happened very recently, so we're having a lot of fun with the baby. I took it upon myself to weigh and measure her and it's a lot harder than it looks. From the best I could tell, she is 28.5 inches long and weighs 18 lb. 5 oz. Percentiles are about 89 and 60, respectively.

Eliana has been trying hard to become more independent. I love it because it frees me up a little more, but hate it because I see how quickly my baby is growing up. Her favorite way to show independence is in her mobility. She cruises in her walker, tried to stand while leaning on things, and uses the things she's leaning on for support while she walks their length (crib, couch, pack n play, etc.). She's also learning to crawl and it getting really good at the army crawl. We call it the slap-drag. See the video below. Yes, those are her cast off tights next to the walker.

Now we just need her to get more steady on her knees so she's not just hauling her body across the floor. But she's slowly working on that, too.

Eliana is a very clean eater and we had taken to not using bibs on her because she simply didn't need them. That was a blessed time. Now she wants to feed herself more and that is quite a bit more messy. We really need to get a high chair for her to eat in.

She has also become fascinated with the process of being strapped into her car seat. She used to cry when we put her in, but now she shuts up (if she was crying before) and closely observes what we're doing. She particularly likes the buckle. It's fun to watch her extend her index finger and try to press the red button. She hasn't ever gotten it to open, but she seems to have figured out that it does something.

We knew that Eliana was teething and had been for the past several weeks. I just wanted her teeth to come in already! After a few weeks of teething symptoms and no new teeth I gave up looking and figured it would be a while. The day after she turned eight months I was playing with her, while she was upside down with her mouth open, I saw the faint white line of a new tooth. When did that happen?!? So now she has cut tooth number three and I expect the fourth to erupt pretty soon.

Our Eliana remains a happy, sweet girl with a ready smile. She's at such a fun age right now and I love playing with her.

Look Alike

2009-04-02T22:08:00.003-06:00

Lots of people tell me Eliana looks just like me...or just like Eric. I put it to the test. What do you think?

Angel or Demon?

2009-04-01T22:14:00.003-06:00

Is this child an angel?

Or a demon?

The answer to that question depends entirely upon whether you ask me at 2 am or 2 pm.

Eliana's April Fool

2009-04-01T21:19:00.005-06:00

I'm not a big one for pranks on April Fool's, but I guess I played one on Ellie. It came in the form of giving her broccoli for the first time. The first fifteen seconds or so on the video is the best.

I think she prefers other foods. Just a wild guess. And, no, it really wasn't too hot. I tested it three times before I gave it to her, just to make sure. I think homemade broccoli gives her texture issues.

I haven't gotten a picture of it yet, but she's starting to get up on her knees. She's been working on it for a few weeks now and seems to be at a breakthrough. She can make a little bit of forward motion, as well as improvement on getting her little fanny in the air. She did an army crawl for the first time today. She's figured out that she will make progress toward what she wants on her tummy and will arrange her body to make that possible. The process includes spinning on her backside until she is facing the proper direction. Then she leans forward until she throws herself off balance enough to fall on her face. She learned quickly that it's best to keep your chin in the air and avoid a faceplant. Sometime after I get a picture of it I'll post what her attempt at crawling looks like. Until then, here's and older picture (about 3 weeks ago) of an attempt to get around by herself.

Another recent achievement is pulling up to standing. Last Friday (the 27th) I sat Eliana down in the crib in front of her crib toy. Before I knew it she had grabbed the top of the bar and pulled herself up to standing. I didn't know she could do that. She was very pleased with herself. We have since lowered the mattress so she doesn't launch herself out the crib because she wants to see what's on the floor. Now she is entertained for long periods of time just by standing and holding on to something. She's tried to pull up on the couch, but there's not much to grab on to. Mommy is another favorite thing to try to pull up on. It is rarely successful, as Mommy doesn't stay still for very long.Finally, the last picture is what it looks like when a baby in a walker goes on a rampage around a clothing store. Eliana liked the shirt display so well that she took one with her. I ran to grab the camera while she was playing with the shirts on the rack (very cute), but she was done by the time I got back. Oh, well.

Piggies

2009-03-20T20:59:00.002-06:00

Things are pretty much the same, so really all I have is cutie pie pictures of my sweet baby. This is St. Patrick's Day with a clearance outfit from Old Navy. I wasn't so sure I liked it, but thought it would make a great diaper bag outfit for those times when her first outfit becomes unwearable. Then I put the outfit on her and decided I'll need to shorten the sleeves so she can wear it in warm weather.

Back before the baby was born I made two little outfits with matching hats. The hats were way too big, but the little outfits were wearable. I was about to pack this little dress away and hope the hat would fit this summer, but thought I would see if the dress still fit. I figured there were a couple more wearings and I could use an elastic headband as a hatband to keep it on. It worked and the result was darling.

The same day as the dress I let her go around the store in her walker barefoot. It lets you see how clean the floor really is. Or isn't. The foot I'm holding obviously is not the one that I took a wipe to.

It's been great fun recently to put a little pigtail on top of Eliana's head and add a bow. Today I went for two. It turned out pretty cute (see picture on blog title).

Pants!

2009-03-10T21:40:00.002-06:00

Seven Months

2009-03-10T08:56:00.005-06:00

We're almost a week past Eliana's seven month mark, but it was a busy week. I had a big batch of alterations work from a new customer (I really like working from home over going to the store, but it will be a bit until I can work exclusively with my own customers) and both Eliana and I were sick.

I actually have one growth stat for her this month, even though there was no appointment scheduled with the doctor. Notice I said scheduled. We went in a day or so before her seven month day because she had been sick over the weekend. I had called in on the Friday previous because I was pretty sure I was seeing signs of thrush and wanted to nip it in the bud. On that Saturday evening we left her with a babysitter (actually, there were six of them, all belonging to my aunt Carolyn and ranging in age from 17 to 7) who she threw up on not long after we got to our lovely French dinner. That night she was congested and breathing funny. I scheduled the appointment for as early as I could get Monday morning. About five minutes after I made the appointment all her symptoms cleared up. The doctor examined her and gave her a clean bill of health. There wasn't even any thrush anymore. I like her healthy, but I prefer not to pay to see the doctor unless she's sick. She ended up being fine...until Thursday when symptoms started to return. We didn't see the doctor this time because I figured it would pass as quickly this time as last. I'm happy to report she's getting over it.

Anyway, when the nurse weighed her she was up to 17 lb. 8 oz. That's a pound and a quarter in the last month, which puts her in about the 60th percentile. That's the highest she's ever been. I haven't measured her, but maybe I will next month.

In the past month she has learned to sit up without tipping over (much) and almost pull herself up to standing in her crib. She really, really wants to. We are also about to start letting her cry a little more at night in the hopes that she'll learn to soothe herself rather than wake me up. Here are a few pictures.

She loves to chew on everything in sight. We've had to start changing her inside the crib because this is what she does on the changing table. She's chewing on the side and we're sure she's going to roll in.

She really does chew on everything. Cold metal is her favorite.

She also celebrated her first Valentine's day by hanging out with Daddy and looking cute.

Eliana started to eat vegetables and that has been a blast to watch. My favorite was when we fed her peas. Gotta love the faces.

She's working on creeping, but it's coming very slowly. She'll put her backside in the air and try to scoot. It doesn't get her very far, so she prefers to roll.

We took Eliana to see the ducks on Sunday, as well. She was more interested in the kites, but the ducks weren't very hungry, anyway.

Current Stats

2009-02-16T22:05:00.003-07:00

Actually, the stats on Ellie are now close to two weeks old. I planned on writing them down soon after the doctor appointment, but that didn't happen. Here's the quick run-down:

Weight: 16 lb. 4 oz. (about 50th percentile)
Height: 27.5 inches (about 95th percentile)
Head circumference: 42.5 cm (I think that's what it was but I'd have to look it up. Anyway, it's also about the 50th percentile)

So, she's still a tall girl, but everything else is about average. She got her shots and will now have a reprieve for another six months. I hate watching her get shots. The pattern of scream, hold breath, scream louder is sad to watch. A different nurse than usual was the one to administer the shots and she had a hard time with it. I was holding Ellie's hands to comfort/keep her busy while the nurse did her dirty work. Once she got poked the first time she started kicking up a storm. I don't blame her. Anyway, the nurse had difficulty getting her the second shot and commented on what a strong little girl she is. That's an understatement.

Aaaaaaaaaa Very Merry Half Birthday to Ellie (Six Months)

2009-02-04T21:59:00.005-07:00

Half a year. Holy crap. Eric and I can hardly believe that she has grown up so fast. I had always thought of babies as starting to be "old" when they got to six months. It's rather bittersweet to watch her grow up. I get so excited to see all of her little milestones and watch her develop. At the same time, once one has passed I know I can't stay as she is. In another six months she won't be considered a baby anymore. She'll be a toddler. Time passes so quickly when all you want to do is hold on to it a little longer. I find myself depressed any time I pack away clothes that she no longer fits. If I could keep her like this forever, I would be sorely tempted. On the flip side, it's so fulfilling to see each new stride she makes and know that great things are yet to come.

For Eliana's half birthday we went to the JCPenney portrait studio to have pictures taken. That was a great experience. They were helpful, the pictures are DARLING, and I felt like we got a kickin' deal ($51 for 10 portrait sheets of different poses, including a special 10x10 that usually costs $25 on it's own. And then my mom offered to cover $20 of the cost. Okay!). I can't wait to get the pictures back. Sadly, they are copyrighted and I can't post them. Too bad for you. But I am posting a few pictures of her in the little dress she wore. The only thing we did other than hang out at work was go to my brother's birthday party. He turned 31 today.

In the past month Eliana decided that she didn't really want to roll over, after all. Then, a few days ago, she picked it up again and is travelling quite well. Just like when I was pregnant with her, she likes to resolve things I was going to ask the doctor about just a couple of days before her appointment.
Two teeth have broken all the way through on the bottom. I can't let her chew on my finger anymore because now she bites. At least she mostly only bites my finger. She will sometimes bite me while she's eating, but not that often.

Mobility is getting better as she will roll and reposition herself until she can reach what she wants. I can also see her starting to work out that she can inch forward. She's moved a few centimeters, but she's still working on it all. It was funny to watch her put her little bum in the air to get some leverage.
Eliana is getting a teeny bit more stable with sitting on her own, She still has a weeble bottoom, but that will get better. She is ready to move on to veggies and fruits in her diet and that will mean a little more effort on my part. I'm a little curious what it will mean for her diapers, too.

Here's to another great six months. I am still under the impression that she is the cutest and most sweet tempered baby. I love her so much that it wants to jump out and it makes my moments with her golden.

A few more pics

2009-01-13T19:08:00.003-07:00

I just had to add a few more things I've gotten off my camera in the past few days. Okay, so everything is from today except for the one at the bottom. But Eliana was just so darling today in her walker and big stupid flower that I couldn't help myself.

In the walker with the wheels attached for the first time. She had a fabulous time moving herself around the sewing room at work.

She was so pleased that she made it all the way over to me that she gave me a big grin and tried to show off her tooth.

I propped her up in her crib this morning to take a picture. As soon as the camera came out this is the face she made for me.

Peek-a-boo!

She was having so much fun in her walker that I decided to capture it to show her daddy and grandparents.

Babies=cute

Bunnies=cute

Babies in bunny coats=cute explosion

Gummy Smile

2009-01-05T22:56:00.004-07:00

It's astonishing how quickly babies develop new things. On Friday I went to work while Eric watched Eliana. All day long he and Ellie played with each other and she mimicked him saying "rar, rar, rar". I am told it was very cute. She has since refused to continue the game, so I have never seen or heard her do it.

Today Eliana decided to have a new smile. I call it her gummy smile and you'll see why in the picture and on the video. I was afraid that she would stop doing it before her daddy got a chance to see it, so I broke out the camera to do my best to catch it and bring the magic home. It was amazing to me that she actually smiled on command. The picture, like many others, is fuzzy because she's such a wiggler. But you get the idea.
As it turns out, she must have been so anxious to show off those gums because she is officially teething. She has a little tooth bud breaking the surface on the bottom. One of the guys at work had to point it out to me. He was holding her and she wanted to suck on his (clean) finger. I usually only let her suck on my knuckle because my fingernails might pose a threat and I refuse to keep them shorter than the fingertips. Mean mommy. Anyway, she got a hold of his fingertip and he came back to ask me if I knew she had a tooth coming in. I couldn't feel it on my knuckle, but I certainly could when she chewed on my finger. Maybe her gummy smile was her way of saying, "Look, Mom! I have a tooth! Are you impressed?" Yes. Yes I am.

Five Months

2009-01-04T16:30:00.006-07:00

Every month I am amazed at how quickly time passes. Ellie is only a month away form being half a year old. It totally blows my mind. Here are some pictures from the past month and some of the new things she has been doing in the last month.

Started eating rice cereal (I know these are links, but I like the picture and didn't feel like loading the video of her eating cereal. Maybe later.)

Learned to keep the binky in her mouth all by herself (finally!)

Celebrated her first Christmas

Celebrated her first New Years

Rolls from both front to back and back to front

Is learning that continuing to roll gets her places (but she is thankfully still just figuring that out).

She's also getting cuter every moment, but that happens all the time.

Eliana's First Christmas

2008-12-26T23:03:00.004-07:00

It turns out I only have pictures on my camera from when we went to my parents' place. There are other pictures of Ellie that I plan on getting from my in-laws and several more from my dad.

Christmas Eve was spent at Eric's dad's house. He got off work earlier than we expected and it was great for all of us to spend more time together that evening. Eliana got to open her first present, which was a super cute outfit from her aunt Amber (see below). She enjoyed it and really loved trying to eat the paper it came in. Great-grandparents were also there and had fun passing her around.

We all (and Eliana, in particular) had an eventful day for her first Christmas. After being dressed in that super cute outfit we went to my parents' house for Christmas morning. She helped to open the present her Grandma and Grandpa Green got her: her very own Bumbo chair. She got to help open that, too.

We used the Bumbo chair at breakfast to feed her her very first solid food. She had some yummy (I assume) rice cereal mixed with a lot of breastmilk. The experience was interesting. I think she liked the taste, but she had a hard time figuring out how to swallow and most of it ended up on her bib. It also ticked her off that she was eating something, but she wasn't getting very full. Everything takes time.

As expected, the wrapping and the box were better than the present.

As we were finishing up at my parents' house we got a phone call from Eric's step dad to warn us about the snow. We decided to try, anyway, and ended up making it through the snow okay. It just took us longer than usual and Eric, his brother, and his step dad had to dig out the driveway so there was somewhere to park.

We had a great time there, too. Ellie sat on Mike's lap long enough to process her rice cereal and move it from her tummy to her diaper...and her new dress...and Mike's shirt. Sorry, Mike.

It was a long day after we finished at the Cottam house, but we still stopped by Granny's house to say hi to her and my aunt's family. Even though it was a long day she still chose to wait to go to sleep until after 11. Silly girl. I'll post more pictures when I get them. We hope you had a merry Christmas.

Another New Trick

2008-12-24T00:17:00.002-07:00

Just like any other parent, I believe my child to be exceptionally gifted. As I mentioned in my last post, Eliana has been cranking out the new tricks recently. I thought it was cute and brilliant that she mimicked the growl. As of last night, she has start to mimic another thing we do. When I got home from work last night Eric was laughing at Ellie blowing bubbles. It was precious. She came to work with me today and kept it up, but with fewer bubbles. As I watched her I realized that she was not purposely blowing bubbles. She was just blowing air through her lips and her drool got in the way. She likes it when we do the thing where you blow through limp lips and a closed jaw to make a bbbbbb sound (sorry, I can't explain it any better than that). She has not yet mastered the limp lips thing, but she spent most of the day practicing and would blow back at me when I did it to her. If I had a picture or video I would post it, but I don't. Until I'm at the other computer that I can just slide the SD card into I probably won't have new pictures. Things to look for on the horizon include Eliana's first Christmas and her first solid food. That last one is going to happen on Christmas because a little elf told me Ellie will be getting her very own Bumbo chair (not a borrowed one) from one of her grandparents. I think she'll love it.

Last Chance, New Tricks, and Cocaine

2008-12-19T23:21:00.005-07:00

I was set to make this a private blog tomorrow, but with two family parties going on I doubt it will happen. So here is your last chance. If you want an invite to the blog either email me or leave a comment. I will hopefully set it to private on Sunday or Monday.

Eliana and I had a couple of great picture days this week. She is such a smiley and happy child. Still, she's not afraid to let you know when she wants something. Here are a few of the shots I love so well.

This is just a great smile shot. Her eyes are just so blue sometimes. It's still a little freaky to me, but I love that I have a blue-eyed baby. Eric teases me that her eyes will change to brown before the six months is up. I really hope not.

In this picture I have her sitting in her borrowed Bumbo chair. She will chew on anything that she can get into her mouth, so I choose to give her a teether to gnaw on.

Another smiley picture. I had her all decked out in red bows. If you could see her feet she was wearing a pair of red mary jane shoes with bows on the toes.

In the Bumbo again. Eliana seems to have been saving up her new tricks so she could break them all out in a short amount of time. She will now turn around to see who is holding her or what she is hearing. The same holds true in the Bumbo chair. She likes to see everything that's going on around her. Eliana's other new trick is rolling from her back to her tummy. I was working on the computer this morning and turned around to see Eliana on her tummy. I hadn't put her down that way, but she certainly was when I looked. So now she is getting to where she could be mobile(ish) any day now. We're pretty sure that as soon as she figures that rolling gets her closer to things and that rolling can happen in quick succession that she will decide where she wants to go and get herself there. Her other trick is the growl. We sometimes gently growl when we play with her and she mimics that.

Tired after several hours of playing and growling. I tried to get the picture so it could be seen from my perspective and this is pretty close.

I read an article on MSN a few months back that says the reaction of a mother's brain to seeing a picture of her smiling baby is the same as the reaction of an addict's brain when they get drugs. I think I'm addicted.

Big Day

2008-12-13T21:13:00.005-07:00

First off, I'll let you know I have decided to go private with Eliana's blog so that I can post anything I want without fearing what someone may do with it. If you would like to be invited just leave me a comment. If you are sure I have your email address, just tell me. If I've never sent you an email before make sure you leave your address in the comments or email me at jascurrently@hotmail.com. If I don't know you personally but we have made some sort of contact I'll probably still invite you, just let me know how you know about the blog. I'll go private one week from today (Saturday the 20th).

Eliana had a big day of firsts today. The lesser ones include being snowed upon and seeing our Christmas tree. We only put it up today, but it's lovely. Actually, Eric surprised me and put it up while I was at my Usborne meeting. He was also doing the laundry and had cleaned the kitchen so he could put in the new fridge our landlords got for the house. I have an awesome husband. Anyway, Eliana's big milestone today was rolling over from tummy to back. Hooray! I thought it would be much longer in coming because she doesn't tolerate tummy time well and, consequently, spends more time on her back. Maybe she really will crawl someday.

I would post a picture of immediately after the roll over, but she's a little naked in the shot. Nothing but her socks. I'll post it after we go private here. I had been trying to take naked baby blackmail pictures for use when she's a pre-teen and she decided it would be more fun to be on her back than on her tummy. I don't think she's very far away from rolling to tummy from back. She already gets pretty far onto her side. She just needs to get past that arm.

Until I post the rolling over picture, here's another to keep you busy. I've been trying to get a picture of Eliana's curious face. She gets so excited to see new things that she just moves and moves. My camera doesn't take the shots very quickly (I need a better one) and it's hard to get the curious face without her moving. That's why the picture is so fuzzy. And I was holding the camera in one hand and the baby in the other. Not a successful combination.

Here's a shot of before the rolling over. He hat came down over her eyes and she didn't seem to mind. It was funny to watch her try to see through the bottom.

Four Months

2008-12-10T09:47:00.008-07:00

Eliana turned four months old on the 4th. I meant to take pictures and post about it then, but I figured I would wait until I had new height/weight stuff from the doctor. Then I forgot. I did, however, take pictures the day after she turned four months and I posted them below. For most of them she is in our borrowed Bumbo chair. She loves to lean forward in it and suck on the side. She also has fun watching the traffic go by while Mommy sews pant hems.

Giving the "whatever" face. You would think she's 13 years older than she really is.

This is her interested face. Sometime I will have to try and capture the one she gets first thing in the morning when she is ready to explore a new day.

She was checking something out here, but I don't remember what.

Eliana's new tricks in the last month include better grasping, extreme drooling, replacement of dark newborn hair with lighter baby hair, keeping her blue eyes, trying to get out of any seat she's in by straining forward or arching her back (where did she learn that?), and using her voice quite a bit. She is a charming little girl and is more and more fun every day.

Ellie has also graduated from the cradle to the crib and that gives us mixed feelings. It's good for her to get used to it, but she doesn't sleep as well at night. She used to sleep through the night occasionally, but doesn't anymore. She wakes up at least twice, but usually three or four times at night. It could be that she isn't swaddled anymore, either. However it works, she doesn't sleep well in the crib between the hours of 2 and 6 a.m. Anytime I put her down in the crib after a late night feeding she waits until I've just laid down and then decides to wake up and cry. Most of the time I'm so tired I just let her stay in the bed with us. I'm trying to get better at making her stay in the crib, because I don't want her to get used to sleeping in Mommy and Daddy's bed.

Here's Mommy and Eliana at work. You can see a few of my mission pictures (and a few of Carrie's) in the background. You can also see that my little girl looks a lot like her daddy. I think her face is mine from the nose down and Eric's above that. Her little bird legs take after her dad, too. She's a slimline baby.

Now for the doctor stats.

Height: 25 inches, which is 88th percentile.

Weight: 13 lbs. 8 oz., which is 55th percentile.

Last time she was 90th percentile for height and 49th for weight. I guess she is proportioning herself a little more. Immunizations were administered and she reacted precisely as I predicted: she screamed and stopped breathing. Poor baby. It's no fun getting poked in the leg three times. At least one of the immunizations is one that she can drink rather than get stabbed with.

To finish off, here is a video of Eliana cuteness. This morning I decided that she should have a bath without the newborn hammock that goes in her baby tub. I figured she was ready for it. Usually during bathtime she just chills in the hammock and will dangle a foot or a hand in the water while we bathe her. This was her first experience being all the way in. It was a lot of fun for her and us, although she is little miss stoneface. I also have to say here to make sure that you never leave your child unattended in the bath. That's not because I did or that anything happened, but just because when she started squirming I saw how quickly she could have had her face in the water if I wasn't watching her like a hawk. It could have happened in the time it would take to turn around and grab a towel or wash cloth that is within arms reach. Just be safe so our cute babies can be safe. Enjoy watching Eliana splash.

Born Singer

2008-11-29T18:47:00.005-07:00

We've been doing the Your Baby Can Read program with Eliana for the past several weeks. It's actually been really neat to watch her. We've decided she's brilliant, as she will vocalize in several places during the video. Sometimes she will copy the number of syllables in a word and babble them. My favorite was when the word on the video was "baby" and during the part where you repeat the word she said, "bay-ee." That hasn't happened since, but we like to think that makes her a genius. What else are a mommy and daddy supposed to think?

One really fun part of doing this program with her is watching her during the songs. She reacts particularly well to "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star". We got a video of it this morning. Eliana doesn't seem to do command performances (she knew the camera was running), so she doesn't really get going until the second verse. She usually starts much earlier than that. Isn't it cute when she sings along?

Bitty

2008-11-28T20:44:00.003-07:00

Ever since I was a teenager I've known that saying, When I'm a parent I'll never... or When I have kids they won't ever... is a formula for disaster. Famous last words. However, I feel quite confident saying I will never be like the mother in this video. And I will pay to make sure my kids have prettier teeth than that.

Movin' On Up

2008-11-25T09:21:00.006-07:00

Eliana is getting bigger every day. Thus far she has been sleeping in a bassinet next to our bed. You can get bit of an idea of size difference from the pictures. The one on the left is at one week old and the one on the right is at 16 weeks old (taken this morning). She is coming ever closer to being too big and weighing too much to sleep there anymore. Aside from that, there is a baby in Nevada to be born in December that will take over rights to the bassinet. In preparation we have been putting Eliana in the crib to sleep. She doesn't seem to mind. She has, however, taken up a new sleeping position. We usually swaddle her for the night, but haven't recently in an effort to get her used to not being swaddled. Since then she has decided the proper placement for her hands is behind her head. Eric says she looks like she is sunbathing, while I say she's striking a supermodel pose. You decide.

What Once Was Lost

2008-11-15T22:38:00.006-07:00

Well, my missing camera has returned. I thought the last place I'd had it was at my parents' house on November 1st when I hung out with them while Eric was at drill. After much searching, the camera did not present itself. Turns out I had ridden in my mom's car and the camera had fallen out of the diaper bag into the space between the seat and the door. As there are not usually passengers in her car, my mom did not quickly find the camera. Now it is back at home and I can use it to take pictures of our little Nanook.

On the side I have a poll about whether or not I should go private with this particular blog. Here is my reasoning. Earlier this week I went to a blog I used to frequent until it got a little ugly during the political season. The author is a girl I went to high school with (we'll call her S) who has very different political views than I do. I went to see what her reaction had been to Prop 8 passing in California. I had to read the comments section to find out. I guess one of the commenters (call her J) disagreed with what S had to say and told her so. S went to J's blog and made her own comments. These comments were deleted, making S upset. She then copied a picture of J's children from that blog and posted it to her own. The entry that went with it called them the saddest children in America. J was upset (obviously) that a picture of her children had been posted on the other blog and asked that it be removed. S refused to do so until the deleted comments were restored.

I know how I would react if someone copied pictures of my little girl without permission. It wouldn't be pretty. So that's why I'm wondering if I should just go private. Then I won't have to worry about it. On the other hand, I'm not sure very many people come looking here. There's a reason I post all her stuff here and don't make any comments on anyone else's blog under this username. So go vote on the poll to let me know what you think or, even better, leave a comment with your thoughts.

Oh Where, Oh Where Has My Camera Gone?

2008-11-13T07:48:00.007-07:00

I am saddened to report a loss in the family. Our dearly beloved camera went missing sometime between the 1st and 2nd of November and is presumed lost forever. Its constant presence in the diaper bag will be missed, as well as the SD card that held all the pictures. In our hour of grieving we are comforted to know that I had already copied the last of the pictures of Eliana onto Picasa before the camera passed into the unknown world. Perhaps the camera may be found again, but we are fairly certain that we will simply need to move on and find another. One with a faster shutter time. I would ask for a moment of silence out of respect for our loss, but I'll just post a few of the pictures the camera took as a memorial.

This is Eliana's nastiest diaper to date. I only took the picture as a way to show Eric that I change the yucky ones, too. This picture does not do it justice, as you can't see the back.
Eliana is looking at the mobile on her Pack N Play that we use at work. Those bears are really creepy when they are hanging over your head. At least that's what I thought when I put them over my head. I think she thinks they're creepy, too. She was nine weeks old in this picture.

Just a shot of her in her green crochet hat. I did not make it, but I did get it for free. Isn't she cute at almost 10 weeks old?Last but not least is a video of Eliana enjoying one of her many books. This video was taken when she was almost 8 weeks old. Now, seven weeks later, that onesie is really tight on her and the pants fit perfectly. How time flies. Look at all that dark hair. Most of it has fallen out now to be replaced by blonde/light brown hair. I would post a picture of her hair now, but I have no camera. Sniff.

My First Halloween

2008-11-04T08:10:00.005-07:00

Happy 3 months old to me! In the last month I have learned how to really grip things (particularly Mommy's hair, which she cut to keep my hands out of it), make more deliberate motions with my arms and legs, and support my head and back (mostly) like a champ. My baby hair is starting to fall out and is slowly being replaced by blonde hair. Mommy didn't expect a blonde-haired, blue-eyed child, but here I am! We also celebrated my first Halloween. Here are some pictures to tell you about my day.

I went to work with Mom, as usual, but didn't wear my full costume because we thought it would be too hot. We went to Walmart and picked up a ghost onesie for me to wear, instead. Mom says that as it gets colder the ghost is going to become a snowman face so I can keep wearing the onesie. I'm at work in this picture, hanging out with my buddy Keithan. He's just two and a half weeks older than me, but is still a boy. You can see my displeasure that he is touching my shoulder. Maybe in a few years, Keithan.

After work we went with Grandma Cottam and Aunt Amber to buy me a dress for family pictures in a couple of weeks. I ended up with three dresses, a winter bunting to keep me warm, and a coat for next year. Thank you, Grandma!

Once clothes shopping was done we headed over to Grandma and Grandpa Green's house to take a few pictures and let Grandma kiss my head. Mom and Dad didn't have time to put costumes together, so they improvised. Daddy used last year's costume and was Aragorn. Mommy wore her ugly Halloween dress and made her ears grow like magic. I was the cutest little leopard you ever saw.

Grandma Green made my costume for me. We were both leopards this year. Don't we look great together?

Here's another shot of Ellie the Ghost. Mom was just excited that I finally got to wear my orange bow.

After Grandma and Grandpa Green's house we went to Grandma and Grandpa Cottam's house to celebrate Aunt Amber's birthday. Mom wouldn't let me have any cake. Everyone loved my whiskers. But, honestly, who wouldn't? We took several more pictures of me, including this one where I am holding my first kill. This is my favorite toy and we call it the Ellie-phant.

That was my first Halloween. No candy for me, but maybe next year. Now, just in case you forgot how cute I am when I'm not in a costume, here are a few more shots from several days ago when I looked darling. Wait, I always look darling. At least that's what Mommy and Daddy tell me.

Holding hands with the Ellie-phant.

Cuddling with the Ellie-phant.

Teething?!?

2008-10-30T08:41:00.002-06:00

Eliana seems to have moved seamlessly from colic into teething. This past week or so has been a bit more difficult because she's been crying so much. When we were at my in-laws house on Sunday I mentioned that she has all the symptoms of teething, but that it was certainly too early. The response I got was that Eric cut his first tooth at 3 or 4 months (I can't remember which now). Like father, like daughter. She hasn't cut any teeth, but she's certainly been fussy. On the plus side, she's getting a lot better. I hope it keeps up.

Proof Positive

2008-10-27T18:10:00.003-06:00

A few weeks ago I went to visit my mom at her work. I brought the baby with me (of course) and she was much oohed and aahed over. My mom began to make up her own little tune to sing to her customers. My grandchild is cuter than your grandchild. Below is the proof that she was right.

It's a good thing she didn't have a bow in her hair when that picture was taken. Had that been the case, the world would have imploded from an overload of cuteness. That would have made Eliana very sad. The picture below says it all.

Baby Care

2008-10-18T21:29:00.007-06:00

They say that babies don't come with a book of instructions. i didn't notice any instructions tied to Eliana's ankle when she was born, so thank goodness somebody wrote some! We will never have to worry again. If you aren't quite to the baby care phase of life, you can see the pregnancy instructions here. I'm sure Eliana will be a happier baby now that I have something to guide me.

I think this way of lifting a baby might make it cry. Or something.

Parents could trip on the TV cord. Bad idea.

She hasn't warmed up on her husband to give a proper massage.

If you burn your tongue that badly you wouldn't be able to taste for days.

So that's why they call Wymount the rabbit hutches.

Mmm...hairy chest. Delicious.

Watching that would probably freak the fish out.

You know, I've heard of rubbing a finger wet with schnapps in a baby's mouth to help them sleep through the night. The whole bottle is definitely just too much.

This baby already knows his dad is a nerd. Look at his face. I love you, Eric. :)

You ever notice it's mostly the dad in the "no" picture? Hmm...

Little babies should be buckled in rear facing positions.

My dad calls this the dipstick method.

You don't know where that baby's nose has been. Wait...

Slobber on your shoes? Eeewwww!

Hooray for coach Dad!

Tossing a can in like that could break your eggs.

They must just mean the hose is a bad method in winter. Too cold.

This could potentially ruin your dryer.

Growing up I always thought this was what my mom meant when she said they put me in a dresser drawer to sleep when they went to Hawaii when I was a few months old.

Downstairs neighbors wouldn't appreciate the baby being woken in this manner.

Tagged

2008-10-16T20:36:00.002-06:00

Eliana here! My mom saw this on my aunt Charlotte's blog and tagged me so I could join in the fun.

Here are the rules: I have to answer the following questions with one word answers and one word only! Then I must pass it on to seven others.The questions are as follows:
1. Where is your cell phone? What?
2. Where is your significant other? Dreams
3. Your hair color? Brown
4. Your mother? Sleep-deprived
5. Your father? Hottie
6. Your favorite thing? Binkie
7. Your dream last night? Short
8. Your dream/goal? Solids
9. The room you're in? Living
10. Your hobby? Cooing
11. Your fear? Foodless
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? School
13. Where were you last night? Home
14. What you're not? Male
15. One of your wish-list items? Walker
16. Where you grew up? Heaven
17. The last thing you did? Sleep
18. What are you wearing? Jeans
19. Your TV? What?
20. Your pet? Daddy
21. Your computer? What?
22.Your mood? Tired
23.Missing someone? No
24. Your car? Seat
25. Something you're not wearing? Shoes
26. Favorite store? Overpriced
27. Your summer? Smooshed
28. Love someone? Family
29. Your favorite color? Pink
30. When is the last time you laughed? Learning
31. Last time you cried? Hours

I don't know seven people to tag and Mommy already did it. Daddy?

Mean Mommy

2008-10-10T21:44:00.003-06:00

I felt like a mean mommy last night. Eliana spent all weekend sucking on a bottle because I was needed at the hospital on a floor where babies are not allowed. My in-laws fed her breast milk until that ran out, then moved on to the formula. As I learned that she also needs to supplement so she gets enough food, she has been taking a bottle much more often than I had planned. The good part is that she gets enough food and will even take a bottle that is cold. The bad part is that the bottle is too easy. Most of the bottles that we have flow quickly enough that she slops milk on her chin. The milk doesn't come that easily straight from the tap. All day yesterday she was refusing the breast, even though there was plenty to be had. I'm not okay with that. I still want her to breastfeed. Last night we decided that we didn't want her to get used to just the bottle. We figured she needed to take it from me if she was going to get it. It was a huge screaming fight that broke my heart, but she finally got tired enough that she suckled and ate. In the end I'm glad we did it. She hasn't fought off the breast since. Good girl.

Below is another picture of what I subject my daughter to. She likes to suck on her binky, but still can't seem to hold it in on her own. The tape is a medical tape for sensitive skin that holds the binky in place, but doesn't hurt coming off. I also use one of those loosely knit but very stretchy headbands (the one in the profile picture) to hold the binky in place when I don't have the tape. I'm always worried someone will take offense or call child services when they see it, but mostly other moms just think I'm brilliant. I can't claim the tape as my idea (my mom did that to me when I was a baby), but I thought the headband was pretty smart.

Two Months Old

2008-10-08T21:23:00.006-06:00

Now that Eliana is two months old she actually has a couple of things she's grown out of, and I don't just mean clothes. She used to make really great faces as she stretched to wake up. Sadly, I have not been about to capture it anywhere but in my memory. But here are a couple of pictures that come as close as possible.

Her supermodel pose.

Performing the one-armed stretch. Usually she gets both going and bends her head back almost far enough to hit her backside. It looks particularly funny when she does it while you are picking her up from wherever she happens to be sleeping.

The two month well baby checkup was on Monday. She is in the 75th percentile for head circumference, is 23 inches long, and weighs 9 lb. 12 oz. That puts her in the 49th percentile for weight and the 90th for height. Everyone knew she was a slender baby and now we know why. Tall and skinny. Maybe there are some genes from her daddy, after all. Actually, Eric has second cousins or something that are close to as tall as he is and slim. That's the girls. One of the boys is 6'9". Yikes.

The blue eyes still don't seem to be going anywhere. I always wanted a child with blue eyes, but didn't figure it would happen because of the decidedly brown-eyes genes that Eric and I pass along. We have also discovered that I am probably not producing enough milk. As my presence was required at the hospital for a couple of days last week, I left Eliana with my in-laws while Eric was playing soldier for the weekend. She was a very happy girl almost the entire time and was pulling cheesy grins when Eric went to get her. She never does that for me. She can actually be kind of grumpy. Then, on Sunday, it hit me like a bolt of lightening while I was trying to feed her. I checked and, sure enough, there was no milk coming out of the feed bags. I filled a bottle with formula from the samples at the hospital (I was out of pumped milk. I had given it to the in-laws to feed her the day before) and she sucked down four ounces in no time flat. And then she grinned at me several times. So, it looks like I'll be supplementing from now on. It makes for a happier baby. On the plus side, now that I am less stressed about my dad I am producing much better and even have a little "mommy milk" saved up for whenever we need a sitter. To finish, here are a few recent pictures of the cutest baby ever.

Watching a movie with Daddy. A little fuzzy, but I thought it was cute.

A shot of her actually looking at the camera. Again, fuzzy. She is always wiggling. And I need a better camera.

This is the closest to a smile I've been able to get a picture of. The real thing is even cuter.

Adventures in Breast Feeding

2008-09-14T21:49:00.002-06:00

There isn't anything I've read or heard that says breast feeding is easy. It is quite the learning process. It started for me with putting her on the breast in the delivery room and her latching on to only the nipple. Ouch. That left me with something resembling a blood blister. The L&D nurse the tried to help me (unsuccessfully) by squishing my breasts into nothingness. All I had to show for that was another bruise. The lactation consultant was much more helpful. It has, however, continued to be a learning experience. Everyone has a breast feeding story from their experience. I had my first last week.

Ellie started to cry at work and I picked her up to feed her. I was wearing a button-front shirt and unbuttoned all but the last button and the safety pin on top. I put on my nursing cover, then picked up the baby. My hand was made wet. She had soaked through her diaper, onesie, and pants. Ellie screamed through the whole process because she expected to eat. I took her across the store to one of my coworkers. I trusted this woman to hold my baby while I washed my hands. It was on the way to the wash my hands that I realized I had never re-buttoned my shirt and was flashing everyone. Oops.

The Past Six Weeks

2008-09-14T21:22:00.003-06:00

Eliana turns 6 weeks old on Monday. Life has been so crazy while trying to adjust to the baby that I haven't had the time I hoped for to record all of Ellie's developments. Here is a basic rundown of what has happened in her short time of life.

Umbilical cord stump ("Ellie button") fell off at 8 day old.
Her favorite trick while changing her is to wet as soon as the old diaper is taken away and before the new one is put on her. She stopped that around 3 weeks old.
Ellie bends her neck and arches her back quite frequently--particularly when she is being changed or when she is waking up.
Ellie couldn't get rid of her gas through either burping or tooting. Mylicon is heaven sent.
Nights are either good or bad depending on the night. One night she's up every two hours and the next she'll sleep for 7 hours.
She is starting to hold her head up really well. I noticed it at 4.5 or 5 weeks.
Her eyes are a very pretty blue. We hope they stay that way, but aren't counting on it. They'll probably be brown like Mom and Dad's.
Ellie made the first sound close to cooing today. Very cute.
The first "real" smile was given a week or so ago as I put her in the car.
Ellie likes to scratch her face and her eyes, in particular.
She can use her legs to push herself up whatever surface she is on. She's been doing that for a while. She can also use those legs to pivot and get into a new position. She can't roll over, but she can change the wall she's looking at.
Ellie gets cuter with each passing day.

It's been a great six weeks and I love watching her grow.

Have a Seat...Forever

2008-09-02T21:42:00.003-06:00

Do you ever feel like you are tied down to a single place and there is no hope of escape? My place is the couch with a pillow on my lap and a baby on my breast. I went as long as 3 hours once. It made my backside sore. I bet you wanted to know all that. At least the baby is cute enough to make up for the soreness.

A Blessed Little Girl

2008-09-01T15:18:00.004-06:00

Yesterday was Eliana's blessing day. It was the day after my birthday, but I was actually looking forward to the blessing more than my birthday. That's probably why I spent so much of my birthday finishing up the blessing dress. My mom made the bonnet and replaced the pink rose on her shoes with a red one.

It was great and, as is to be expected, I cried through the blessing. Eliana only cried a little bit and hushed right up when they started bouncing her. We had several family and friends there. Some stayed for all three meetings and the lunch afterward, others had responsibilities in their own wards. I was glad that it wasn't the same huge party that my mission farewell and homecoming open houses were. It was much more relaxed when there were fewer people. Here are the pictures.

Little rosebud shoes

The three of us holding hands. Sweet enough to rot your teeth.

Our first family picture outside the hospital.

The way she really feels about that bonnet.

More Pics

2008-08-24T14:31:00.003-06:00

Just a couple of pictures today. I really need to take more. These are both shots with her eyes open. Apparently, she thinks the camera is something to be suspicious of in the first picture. I was unsuccessful in getting a picture of her baby panda impression. That's what she looks like when I burp her.
Just chillin' in the car seat. She LOVES it there. Usually.

First Checkup

2008-08-21T23:10:00.004-06:00

Tuesday we had the first doctor appointment for the baby. I was really excited because I wanted to know how much weight she had gained. Eliana's birth weight was 7 lbs. 8 oz. and her discharge weight (or at least the last weight I was told) was 6 lbs. 14 oz. I figured she had certainly gained her birth weight back, as she spends a heck of a lot of time feeding. She ended up weighing 7 lbs. 4 oz. The doctor said her weight was the only thing he was concerned about. She should weigh more. I've been worried that I'm not making enough milk for her. She sometimes has feedings that last an hour and wants more an hour later. The doctor said she didn't look dehydrated, but that he didn't like her weight. He told me to come in Friday to have her re-weighed.

On Friday I was a little nervous about what the outcome would be. I would rather avoid the cost and hassle of supplementing. We went in to weigh her again and (drum roll, please) she was up to 7 lbs. 10 oz. Six ounces in 3 days. Not bad. The nurse was happy and so were we.