11 weeks - 10/25/11

Bob, Christina and Kellan came to visit us on Saturday.  They hadn't seen Natalie in a while so they were excited.  We walked up to the school playground so that Kellan could play a bit.  We had fun.  Jean and Dan came down later and we all went out for Chinese.  Natalie had a good time getting passed around to everyone. 

Not much else has happened this week.  Natalie is 11 weeks and is as beautiful as ever.  She is smiling tons and talking like crazy.  She is doing really well at daycare.  This week has been a little crazy for her again.  Poor thing can't get into a good schedule.  I am hoping that after this week, it will get better.  Tuesday, she got to daycare earlier than normal and didn't get to see mom all day.  Wednesday she went to daycare late.  Tomorrow will be a short day.  We'll get through it.

She has been really good despite it all. 

I got a smile this time. 

She was really sleepy tonight.

Getting even more tired.  This is a new thing as well - rubbing the eyes.

This was a cute shot with her hand up by her face and her mouth kind of crooked.  My little cutie!

One last yawn before she takes a little snooze.

I took a video of her in the seat about to fall asleep but for some reason it isn't working.  Hopefully I can get it to work and put it on here later.
Chris, Rocky and I are doing well.  Natalie is awesome as you can see. 
Hopefully this finds all out there well.

10 weeks 10/18/11

When we went to Scituate to visit Brian and Kirsten, we took the camera with us in hopes of taking pictures.  None were taken with that camera and we left it at their house.  Not so good.  They found it amongst their boxes and decided to drop it off on their way to Newfound Lake to close up their lake house for the winter.  It was really nice of them to do that as it is not really on their way.  It was good to see them though.  Kirsten is due this coming week and she is really excited. 

I also didn't realize Chris took some pictures of Natalie before we left.  If you notice this is the same dress that we brought her home in.  Notice anything different?

Just had to add this in.  Sometimes she does not really like the car seat but once you start moving her she calms right down.  She is even cute whe she is crying. 

We had gotten a small bath tub from the hospital that Chris was giving her a bath in.  I did not like to do it as you basically had to hold her the whole time and she is a slippery little sucker once you get her all lathered up and wet.  One day when he was giving her a bath, we noticed that the bath tub was cracking on the sides because she was too big for it, so Chris went out and bought the pink sparkly tub.  It is actually called this.  It has a sling in it that she can lay in while we give her a bath.  It is super easy and mom can give her a bath now.  We actually had one bath time where there was absolutely no crying involved.  It was amazing.  She just looks at you so intently.  I think she really likes it.  One night when I gave her a bath, she was falling asleep in it.  It must be really comfortable.

So, my baby turned 10 weeks this week.  We decided to do something different with the photos.  We have her in her favorite seat instead.  It is much easier this way as she doesn't fall over.  She is getting really good at keeping her head up.  She is smiling a ton at you and loves to look at everything.  Her new favorite thing is staring at the refrigerator. 

On this photo shoot that we did, we couldn't quite get her to smile long enough for us to snap the photo.  But I thought this sequence of photos were really cute.  Sometimes when you go into kiss her face, she opens her mouth.  It is really cute. 

Missy, Cheriene & Maddie, Paula & David, Nancy and me
Natalie got cut off in the picture.  Oh well, she was sleeping.

Last Sunday we went participated in the breast cancer walk in down town Dover.  I have walked with the same group for the last few years.  We are known as Cash for Cleavage.  This year I wasn't actively looking for donations because of just having her but I still really wanted to participate.  So we headed downtown with Paula and her son David and walked with the group.  She was really good in the stroller.  She didn't fuss at all.  David was a huge help and pushed the stroller for me a lot of the way.  We had a good day for the walk.  Dover raised over $100,000.  Next year, I will do a lot better.

Friday, Natalie had her 2 month appointment.  She got weighed, her length measured, and her head circumference measured.  She is 12.9 lbs which is the 85th percentile.  She is 23 inches long which is the 75th percentile.  Her head measures 40.5cm which is the 90th percentile.  She has a BIG head.  She also got 2 shots and one oral vaccine.  She was really good.  The doctor thinks she is doing really well.  Here she is right before Dad and her left for the doctors. 

Also, yesterday was Chris' first full day with her.  She slept a lot in the afternoon, probably due to the shots.  She didn't really cry that much after she got them.  I had bought infant tylenol for her to take but she didn't need it.  She was more upset about the fact that she was laying down when the nurse did the shots.  I am so proud that she was sooo good. 

I don't have a lot of photos of just me and her so I was trying to angle the camera in a good way to take a picture and I realized I was taking a video.  She sneezes so it is really cute.  Also, you can hear Call of Duty in the background.  Nice.

We are doing well.  We had a bit of a rough week but our schedules were all wacky.  That won't happen very often and we should pretty much be back to normal this week. Rocky is doing well.  We try to give him as much love and attention as possible as we know it is hard being second fiddle to his baby sister. 

Hope all are well.

9 weeks 10/11/11

Last weekend we went to visit our friends Brian and Kirsten and their new house.  It is located in Scituate, MA.  They are due in a couple of weeks to have a baby boy.  Natalie had another stellar ride down there and back.  If you notice in the picture below, this is the dress she came home from the hospital in.  She fits in it now.  So we were hanging out on their deck and our friend Tanya was holding her.  She was a bit fussy and all of sudden she made this face:

It had to be the funniest thing we have ever seen.  She has done it before but not so prominently.  She has done it a few times since.  This kid really knows how to tug at the heart strings.  Don't you just want to give her a hug. 

Sunday, while dad was out playing disc golf, mom and Natalie and Rocky hung out.  It was really nice outside, so we sat on the deck.  The dog really liked that because he loves any chance to sit in the sun.  Natalie started on the table but as you can see the sun started creeping over.  I decided to put her on the floor in the shade.  Rocky was already there.  They were so cute, I had to get a shot of that.

So my beautiful baby turned 9 weeks last week.  She is doing really well.  This past week Dad has been off to Pennsylvania, so I was a single mom for the week.  We missed Dad so much.  We have been face timed every night so he could see his little girl.  One night all she did was yawn.  She was tired.   Mom is tired from the week too.  But dad came back on Thursday night from Pennsylvania even though he had to travel to New York the next day.  His boss asked if he wanted to get a hotel room near where they would be working and they would pick him up on the way, and he said no.  He wanted to go home and spend some quality time with his daughter.  How sweet!!  My mother also came up because she babysat for Natalie on Friday.  She and Natalie had a blast.   

She started off with a leapard print onesie but spit up all over it hence the pink pink ensemble.

So here are her 9 week photos.  I got her smiling again.  She has been smiling like crazy now.  She really focuses on your face and when you smile she smiles back.  It makes my heart skip a beat every time.  That will never get old.  She had another good week at day care.  We are really fortunate to have found Shannon.  She is great with the kids.  She mentioned another family had their youngest child in a center from 3-6 months and he was sick all the time with some pretty nasty stuff.  She was taking a lot of time off of work because of it and decided to switch him over to Shannon's.  He hasn't really been sick since. That is good to hear. 

Next week is her 2 month appointment.  I am thinking she is going to be doing well as she is getting heavier and heavier by the day.  My unofficial weight check last Monday was 12.2lbs.  Yikes!! She is in the next size diaper and some of the 3 month clothing is getting tight.  We are thinking in the next couple of weeks that she will be moving up to her own room.  She has only been waking me up once at night to nurse so I think I can handle going up stairs once.  She will be a big girl then.  Guess we will have to clean the mess up there. 

Hope this finds you all well. 

8 weeks 10/4/11

I cannot believe that my beautiful baby is 8 weeks.  Where did the time go?  She is getting way more alert and is smiling a lot more now.  She loves her mama and when I come around, she usually gives me a great big smile.  The first pic, Chris was taking the photo, and she gave him a big toothy (if she had teeth) grin.  Sooo cute!!! 
She has been doing really well.  We were going through a bit of a growth spurt the last week or so.  She was fussy a lot at night.  She has gotten a little better.

Her favorite seat in her favorite position.  She will pass out in this thing. 
Mommy really got her moneys worth on this one.

We had a busy week.  Last week I had a couple of doctor's appts to go to and she did really well through those.  She even took a bottle for me at one of them.  I have heard that doesn't happen too much. The pic below is her hanging out waiting for the appointment with me. 

 After the appointment we headed up to Rochester to visit my old co workers.  I really wanted to see a bunch of people that I had talked to while I was pregnant.  They always asked me how I was doing so I decided to visit them.  They all thought she was great and couldn't get over the amount of hair and how big she was.  She was a big hit there. 

On Saturday; Bob, Christina and Kellan came over and we walked downtown to Apple Harvest Day.  They had a ton of vendors and a large kids area with bouncy houses and a petting zoo.  Kellan was not so sure about the bouncy houses at first but he got into it.  His aunty Cara helped him out by sitting on it and bouncing him.  He was laughing it up with me. 

Saturday night, Chris and I decided to go on a date.  Aunt Christina and Grandma Jean babysat Natalie so that we could go out to dinner at the Ellacoya Barn and Grille.  She was good for them which was nice.  We had a really good time and some really good food. 

Sunday was a busy day for Ms. Natalie.  She went disc golfing in the morning with dad and then went to Hampton Beach to visit her grandparents.  They are camping for the week.  Here is the third time that Grandpa Billy has held her and he did a really good job. 

Then came Monday.  It was my first day back at work since I had her.  It went ok.  I think it was good to be able to start off with Grandma Jean.  She was sleeping when I left that morning so that was nice.  I came to visit at lunch time but that went way too fast.  Tuesday was our first day at day care.  She is going to an in-home day care right here in Dover.  I can also go visit at lunch time.  Both Chris and I went Tuesday morning to drop her off.  It was a little hard for me to leave her but about mid morning we got this photo from Shannon. That was really nice to see. 

Somebody's sleepy!

These 2 are from today.  She is pretty happy in the bouncy seat she has at there.  She is eating well for Shannon. 
 

She's always got those hands going. 

This is her in a baby sleeping bag outside.  The other kids are playing outside while she naps. 

Sunday night she only woke up once during the night which was nice before my first day.  Last night she went 9 hours between feedings.  I got a full 5 hours of sleep.  I am not sure the last time I had that.  I think it all has to do with the growth spurt that she is going through.  Hopefully we will get back to a routine.  Although once we do, she probably will have another growth spurt and we will have to try all over again.

It has been a while since we had a photo of Rocky.  This is him trying to get himself small enough to fit on my crappy pillow.  He is too cute.  We have got to make sure to give him lots of love becuase he is doing sooo well with Natalie.  Best dog ever.