Professional Pics

Here are a few samples of some of the professional pictures we had taken today at Portrait Innovations. Beth did okay- she smiled a little bit but was overall just really tired. We did get a few good ones, though. :-)

2 months old!

Beth had her two month doctor visit on Tuesday- she checked in at a whopping 12 lbs 4 oz and 23 inches! She's right about average (50-75%) in all of her growth charts- I'm so proud of my big girl! He said she looks very healthy and couldn't get over how happy she was during the appointment. Her next appointment will be when she's 4 months old, to check again on her growth.

The stroller hasn't gotten here yet, thanks to a glitch at Babies R Us... I called them and they had to cancel my original order and offered free shipping on my next purchase, so I re-ordered the stroller and had it 2-day UPS Expressed to our house. :-) It should be here tomorrow, and THEN we can finally start walking around our neighborhood on all of the cool hike and bike trails.

Yesterday I took Beth to my old office to meet my former coworkers. It made me realize how much I missed working, but on the other hand how I couldn't imagine leaving my baby girl to go back to work. I would have had to leave her 3 weeks ago... Right when she is starting to smile big and be more interactive with me and the world. It was nice to see everyone and they, of course, loved Beth. :-)

Last night we had a major MAJOR breakthrough- Beth put herself to sleep. In her bassinett. Without me or DH in the room! The past 4 or 5 nights she'd been sleeping in her bassinett, next to our bed (before she slept next to me) and only last night did I lay her in there and walk away. There was no fussing, no crying, just a bit of babbling as she fell asleep and STAYED asleep. She woke up around 3 to nurse, and I put her back in and she went right back to sleep. That happened again at 5 and 7. I'm so ecstatic that she's doing this on her own, but part of me misses sleeping next to my girl! Today I pressed my luck and put her down for a nap. She protested for about 2 minutes, I gave her the pacifier and she fell asleep again! Which is where she is right now, so I can come update the blog. :-) I feel so incredibly blessed. I realize this might not, and probably won't last forever, but I am going to take advantage of the fact that she's self-soothing and enjoy it while it's here!

A new stage

Happy! A diaper change!
Extreme closeup!
What we've been seeing a lot this week... Pouting and crying!

Taking a (very!) relaxing nap on daddy.
Blowing bubbles!


This week Beth has begun to scream. It's lovely! Actually just in the past couple of days she's been very fussy with both of us, refusing to just let us sit down and hold her... She must be carried around. She really likes it when Daddy carries her though, which is nice for me to have a bit of a break! The good news is though is that she's starting to fall asleep on her own at night. We'll all get in bed (she sleeps with us!) and I'll lay her down after she's nursed and she'll babble on for a bit with her nuk (pacifier) and fall asleep. No mommy required (except to stick the nuk back in when it falls out). I'm hoping this will remain a good habit and eventually become a daytime nap habit too. I tried today to put her down after she fell asleep in my arms and she woke up... So I tried again. And again. And again. I gave up after the 4th time because by then she was wide awake! I'll keep trying. I love holding her while she sleeps, but I know she's got to learn to sleep without me or DH holding her so I can get stuff done! She's also started blowing bubbles when she's sitting contently in her bouncy chair, she reminds me of a little sand crab!

Tummy time!

Baby's First Valentine's Day

Talking
Taking a ride on Daddy!
Enjoying her bouncer chair.
Not enjoying tummy time very much.




Today Beth is 7 weeks old! This week we did two big things: ordered a stroller and some cloth diapers! Actually we went stroller shopping one day but as it turns out, the Toys R Us here is run by a bunch of morons so we came home empty-handed. The good news is after messing with display strollers at Toys R Us and Target, reading reviews on epinion.com, and talking to a LOT of people about strollers, I finally decided to order one off Babies R Us.com since they were having a sale. :-) I was hoping it would be here by now but it's not, so I'll post a picture when I do the next update!

I also ordered some cloth diapers from naturalbums.com. The diapers are bumGenius! brand- which are supposed to be some of the best out there. These come highly recommended to me by other women who cloth diaper their babies. I just ordered a 3 pack to get us started since DH is still unsure about the whole cloth diapering thing, but I'm sure he'll get used to it! In the long run, it will be a major money saver, not to mention we won't be creating that much more trash. The kind of diapers we ordered are one-size, meaning that they will grow with Beth so we don't have to keep buying different sizes. And they're made very well so they should last us through another baby!

6 weeks old already

diaper changes are fun!
pushing herself up on the boppy


the new thing... this was supposed to be the "spitting it out" picture...


It's hard for me to believe. She's moving from the "newborn" to the "infant" stage... She's starting to look less like a newborn to me, especially after reviewing the past week's worth of photos!

It's been a big week. Miss Bethany has discovered she has lungs. And she isn't afraid to use them either- wow that girl can shriek! Sometimes it's random but also whenever she's the slightest bit displeased.

We also took the leap and gave her a pacifier. I was having serious reservations about giving her one but finally realized that maybe I wasn't meeting one of her needs so I'm trying to view it as something that's beneficial to her. The funny story is that the first time I put it in her mouth, she made a sour face and spit it out(I was so happy!) so I grabbed the camera to take a picture of her spitting it out and stuck it in her mouth again... She kept it in! Little toot.

We also had an incident at the mall this week. I was shopping and had her in her sling and she started going to town making a dirty diaper. It was so loud another customer laughed and made a joke about it. Shortly after I felt something warm on me, through the sling, so I hightailed it to the ladies room. Umm yeah, she had exlpoded through her diaper and all in her bodysuit (it was a footed onesie)and I'm pretty sure nothing was in her diaper. It was everywhere else though (including her feet, not sure how that happened). So I wipe her down with diaper wipes and reach for her spare onesie I keep in the diaper bag... Yeah, not there. I debated putting her back in the nasty outfit or going naked. Naked won. I took her to Macys (closest store) and grabbed an outfit off the rack and brought it to check out. By this time Beth was angry that I had her back in the pouch (she had only a diaper on!) so she was screaming at the top of her newly-discovered lungs. I was so flustered I asked the lady if I could just put it on her right there at the checkout and she helped me get Beth dressed, then I hurried back to the ladies room to nurse her and de-stress myself. It's funny now but not so much while it was happening.

Today I had my six week OB checkup and it was weird going back with the baby outside of me this time, lol. I'm healthy and properly healed, but he's got me taking some iron suppliments because I was and still am pretty anemic. I am also only 3 lbs above my pre-pregnancy weight, which was nice to hear since I was prepared to see a much worse number and am struggling with body image issues right now. Having a baby changes lots and as well as you prepare yourself for changes, you just can't know what to expect until you're there.

Beth's 5th Week

Beth and Vegas
In the first piece of clothing she ever owned, given to her by her Grandma and Grandpaul!


Ok I know it's almost her 6 week birthday but it's hard for me to get online sometimes!

I feel like the past few days she's really "grown up" a lot. She spends a lot more time recently with her eyes wide open, taking in the world. She's taken an interest in her mobiles, which means she's been more content just laying in her crib looking around and listening to music (Baby Einstein CDs or the lullaby the mobile plays). She's also starting to enjoy her swing a little bit more since she likes to look at that mobile now. Today I found out from out friends that she's probably ready, or will soon be ready for a Bumbo seat very soon. These, I hear, are great. :-)

I have my 6 week checkup with my OB this week, which means I should get the okay to begin exercising again. I don't plan on joining a gym because I'm not ready to leave my Beth alone yet (!) but I do plan on buying a stroller and taking her on walks once the weather gets a bit nicer.

Photo Shoot

Here are some pictures I took of Miss Beth on her one month birthday (yesterday). I realized I didn't get any good shots of just her on her baptism day so I put the dress back on her and took a whole lot of pictures, and a few came out really great. The blue gown was her "party dress" that she wore at the housewarming party! These are DH's favorite pics.

Today Beth has slept a LOT. I'm hoping it's a growth spurt and I HOPE she sleeps well tonight since she's slept pretty much most of the day...

A video...

I'm testin this out...

Big smiles!

Today our Beth is 4 weeks old, and to go with her big girl age is her big girl smiles! Our little girl has smiled before, but they were all involuntary smiles... Today we got her to smile back at us! I was sweet talking her and smiling wide at her this afternoon, and she smiled back! And she did the same with her daddy when he got home from work... I grabbed the camera and got a few pictures.





She also got a swing yesterday, it's a Fisher Price Rainforest cradle swing. She hasn't really taken to it yet, but it's only been one day. Hopefully she'll learn to love it, or maybe it will help her fall asleep in the evening!

Baptism!

My family
Proud parents!
In her slip, getting ready!


Miss Bethany Grace was baptized on January 21 at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic church. Her godparents were her Aunt Jenny and her Uncle Josh. She did sooooo well! She slept through the entire service, including when the holy water was poured over her head, and woke up at the very end- just in time for pictures! We had an after-party at our house with friends and family, and she slept through most of that as well, and didn't mind being passed on from guest to guest (although Mommy must admit she was a bit worried about germs!). The gown she was baptized in was the same gown that I, my sister, my mom and my uncles were baptized in, and the hat she wore was the same hat my grandmother was baptized in, so it was very special to us. All in all we had a great day, although we were VERY tired by the time everyone left. The excellent news is Bethany went to sleep around 10:15, and completely skipped over her usual fussy time in the evening! We hadn't been to sleep that early in a looooong time!

Thanks to everyone who came! It was really nice being able to see everyone, although at parties it's hard to spend one-on-one time with everyone, so I hope we can all follow through with our "let's get together soon!" plans!

Sling

Today we got our sling! Beth seems to enjoy it very much. We went to someone's house, were fitted and taught how to properly and safely use the pouch, and then we met DH for lunch and hit the mall. I shopped! I needed a few items for my newly-post partum body and a new pair of shoes with some Christmas money. (I've also discovered pregnancy didn't make my foot grow at all. How nice!) Here's a picture of Beth enjoying her sling. I believe she enjoyed it so much because she slept the entire time she was in it- I only had to take her off a few times to try on clothes and then popped her back in and she was asleep again. It's sooo nice to have two hands again!

The other picture is of her stuffing her first finger into her mouth...I guess she missed the memo that the nickname is "thumbsucker" and not "fingersucker". Cuteness.

3 weeks old!

Tak
Already! It's amazing how time is flying!

We've had some big milestones in the past few days. Well, big for us! First off, on Sunday, Beth attended mass with us (my first time to go since she was born) and she slept through the entire thing! It was very nice. Although it was still hard to pay attention since she's just so darn cute when she sleeps! Anyways, she was so good during mass that DH and I decided to go for Mexican food- an after-church tradition. She did very very well there, although she was awake. We had our first nursing in public experience, at which I think I did well but could have done better (there was no flashing!). We very much enjoyed the food, although I didn't get to cram as many chips in my mouth as I would have liked.

Yesterday something fantastic happened. Her umbilical cord stump fell off! That thing was getting so gross. I noticed some blood on her clothes and checked- it was hanging by a thread so I let it be. Then about 20 minutes later I noticed it wasn't there anymore... DH later found it on the floor in our bedroom! Soooo nasty.

2 weeks

Bethany had a good second week... Well, we're working on our third week now but I update when I can. :-) We had special visitors from New York- my best friend Julie and her husband, Zeke, came to town and stopped in to meet the newest family member! Of course, they thought she was the prettiest creature alive! We also visited our next door neighbors, who have a 2 month old, and Beth and he enjoyed not noticing each other since they're too little to care! It'll be fun when they're older and can play with each other though! She's also been having some rough nights- she really wakes up around 10 or 11 pm and gets very fussy and has a hard time nursing and calming down... Last night she and I were up till about 2 am. It's difficult when this happens but it's nice that she's back to her normal self in the morning and she and I can sleep until noon if we want! Beth has amazing neck control, I'm not sure if all 2.5 week olds can hold their necks up for as long as she can, but she really picks her head up and looks around when I have her laying on my chest! She really likes to look at our blinds- I read that it's the light contrast that interests her so much.

I'm feeling much better, a little tired of being home so much but that's hopefully about to change. I feel like my body is mostly healed, although some things will never be the same! I haven't stepped on a scale yet but I feel so tiny, I guess it's because I can lean over now and tie my own shoes! Next week Beth and I are going to meet someone and be fitted for some slings and a pouch, so once we get used to those then we're going to trek to the mall so I can buy some much-needed nursing clothes and meet DH at work to show off his little princess. :-) I'm thinking I should also buy a stroller at some point!

A week from tomorrow is Bethany's baptism. DH and I are preparing our house to have visitors over, today he did a bunch of yard work and at some point I'd like to hang stuff up on the walls in our house. Bethany will wear the same baptism dress that I wore and that my mother wore on her baptism (assuming she fits in it! Haven't tried it on yet...). Kind of neat, I think.

1 and 1/2 weeks old

One week old!
One day old!

Our girl is almost 2 weeks old, it's amazing how quickly time flies. I'm sorry I haven't been able to get online to update my blog, it's kind of hard to type with one hand while the other hand is holding the baby! In fact, all of my online time has pretty much been cut down to almost zero, so if it takes me time to respond to emails or Facebook messages, that's why!

Beth had her one week pediatrician appointment last Wednesday and she did great. She gained a whopping 13 ounces (usually they're down or still at their birth weight) and everything else looked good! You can really tell she's gained the weight- she's going to be a super chunk!

DH and I looooove just spending time looking at her. She's starting to lose her hair, but she's still b e a u t i f u l! She's such a good baby, too, her sleep schedule is a bit different than what DH and I are used to, but I'm quickly adjusting. :-)

I plan on posting pictures on this blog instead of starting a new blog, cause I just don't have time to set something new up. I hope everyone continues to check up on us and our beautiful girl!