In God's Grace

Holly's baptism was held on December 4th with both sets of grandparents in attendance, and her aunts, uncles and cousins from my side of the family. Unfortunately, her auntie, uncle and cousin on Pat's side were unable to attend, but were there in our hearts.

She was well received by the congregation and I know she'll be in good Hands always. God bless my darling little angel!

Thanksgiving Shenanigans

Holly's first Thanksgiving was a fun experience! She mostly slept, ate and watched football - much like the adults in the family! She'll fit in just fine. :)

For the past few weeks we've been giving Holly a teaspoon of rice cereal mixed in with an ounce of formula prior to bed. Last night we introduced her to the spoon! We prepared some rice cereal for her in a bowl (the consistency of thin gruel) and she loved it! She would cry when I didn't get the food in her mouth fast enough. Obviously we have some more practice ahead of us with eating from a spoon, but I have every confidence that she'll get the hang of it quickly. Unfortunately, there were no pictures or video of this milestone, but sometime this week we'll record it.

Holly's continuing to sleep well for us at night. Ideally, we'd like for her bedtime to be between the 8:00 and 8:30 time frame, but she's a stubborn munchkin and will fight us the whole time and finally collapse into sleep around 9:00, 9:30 or 10:00. She'll get anywhere between six and nine hours of sleep, which is something we definitely do not complain about. Last night she was in bed by 9:00 and slept in until almost 6:00 this morning. I don't know if it was the cereal, the breast milk at 8:30 (after fighting sleep for the previous 45 minutes) or she was just that tired, but we liked it. Here's hoping for more nights like that!

I did manage to record a video of Holly playing under our Christmas tree. She absolutely adores the lights and she happily laid under our tree for a good hour or so last night.

2 Month Check-Up

Little Miss Holly doesn't seem to be so little anymore! She went in for her 2-month appointment yesterday and weighed in at 12 pounds 6 ounces putting her in the 90th percentile for weight. She's also 23-1/4 inches long which is in the 80th percentile for length! She's a growing baby and happy, too! She's cooing and smiling up a storm. We see a lot of smiles early in the morning, but she'll still smile quite a bit throughout the day, too.

We don't have any results back on her ultrasound yet. The radiologist who came in during her appointment was Indian and had an extremely thick accent and he was very difficult for us to understand clearly. What we were able to take away from that appointment is that she has a shallow hip socket on the right side. What that means, we're not sure. Unfortunately, the results were not sent to Holly's pediatrician, so we have longer to wait until we find out more about the ultrasound appointment.

In other news, all of Holly's plumbing works beautifully and there was never any doubt in my mind (although there was some concern in Pat's). Her plumbing works so well that we had her second blowout this evening. Our comforter is currently taking up residence with Holly's sleeper suit, onesie and changing pad cover in the washer. Holly herself got the benefit of being washed off under the tub's faucet. Needless to say, she was a happy little girl and smiling like crazy! Ahhh, the joys of parenthood! :)

Happy "Holly"ween!

Happy "Holly"ween! Our little pumpkin can thank her father for that creative greeting. He was playing with her one morning while she was wearing her "Baby's 1st Halloween" onesie and instead of spelling H-a-l-l-o-w-e-e-n, he replaced the 'a' with an 'o' and the 'o' with a 'y.' He is the most adorable first-time father I've ever seen as I watch him come up with the most random and crazy things to say to his daughter. I love it and him! Holly is very lucky to have him as a daddy and I can't wait until she's old enough to go running to him with big hugs and kisses and telling him how much she loves him. For now, I settle for when I watch her face light up with a big smile as she sees or hears him. :)

Last night Pat and I took her to the Family Fun Night that my work puts on annually for the children and their families. It was kind of like her big debut to all my students and their parents and I had so much fun introducing her to everyone. She was very intent on everything going on around her and then about halfway through she gave up the ghost and fell asleep. I'm always impressed with how well children can sleep through anything. It was loud and noisy in the gym and yet she was sound asleep - until she wet her diaper, at which point she was quite vocal about wanting to go home and get changed!

Holly also got to meet C, who was the one who had nicknamed her "Biscuit." He even had a gift for her (thanks, C!), which she took full advantage of in bed this morning:

Snapshots

Loving on Daddy!













Happy Halloween from Lisa. Pat nicknamed the feetsies "Dallas" and "Bailey." I'm not sure which foot is which. ;)



















Out with the laundry, perhaps?

Another milestone

Last night was the first night Holly slept entirely through the night! She fell asleep around 10:00 PM, made a few noises around 3:30, but did not wake up until 5:00 AM. I am so proud of my little one! However, I know my excitement will be short-lived because she's sleeping away the morning today AND we're making a 2-1/2 hour drive later this evening. Ha! Definitely won't be sleeping through the night tonight.

Tomorrow we will be taking her to Children's Hospital for the ultrasound on her hips. Here's hoping they tell us that her alignment is perfect and we have nothing to worry about!

Seriously, already?!

Holly is 5 weeks old and I put her on her belly for some tummy time. She was on her belly for maybe a minute before she decided that was most definitely not where she wanted to be!

Progress?

It's only 9:02, but we've had an interesting morning so far! I was up at 6:30 with Holly to get her in the shower with me while I still had Pat's help. This was the first time she showered with me and she loved it! Once she was out, I quickly finished mine because she was demanding food. She also pooped on her towel. Strike one!

Pat changed her, I fed her and we were good to go. Or so I thought. I dug out my Halloween shirts from last year and discovered they still fit! Score! And then Holly spits up on one, so to the hamper it goes. Strike two!

Then she's hanging out quite happily in her bouncer and I hear the tell-tale gurgle-bubble of another change in pants coming. She's talking away, looking around everywhere and basically having a grand old time in her bouncer. She's not crying or in any way distressed by the activity in her diaper (which is unusual). I go to take her out and she's had a blow out! I feel like we've had our first milestone in diaper changing now. I'm all too familiar with blow outs considering the number of years I've worked with children in diapers and so with her I took it all in stride. I suspect that if Pat had been home, he'd be having a flashback to when our nephew B was younger and it came burbling out the back of his pants.

So I'm currently running a load of laundry that consists of my jeans, Holly's onesie, the towel from earlier this morning and the bouncer cover. Strike three! I truly think that Holly was conspiring to get back into the bath tub, because I just stripped her and cleaned her under the tub's faucet. She, of course, had an awesome time back in the water.