Thursday, April 30, 2009

Happy 1 month birthday, Chanson









Above are a few pics from Easter (4/12) that I forgot to post. Aria had so much fun dying Easter eggs, and I think Chanson looks just sooo handsome in his Easter outfit ;-) ... and one of Aria that I just love ;-)




I cannot believe it's been a month since Chanson was born! WOW time is flying!






Chanson is doing great! As of Monday, April 27th, he weighed 9 lbs 9 oz and about 22 inches (we took the length measurement, so not sure how accurate that is ;-). He's a growing boy! He has baby eczema, just like Aria had... but it's clearing up from the cream they gave us. He is still sleeping great, and just is a calm, angel baby. He likes tummy time, and does well with holding up his head. I need to take a pic so you can see ;-) He can now fit into his 0-3 month clothes, but can still get into some of his bigger NB stuff, as well. He wears a size 1 diaper, but, we can still get the NB size on him. They're small, but we have some left and want to use them. He smiles a LOT in his sleep, and has smiled quite a bit awake, too. He smiled at Grampa today ;-) As he gets chubbier, his dimple gets more pronounced. You know I'm a sucker for dimples! I don't think I've ever mentioned, but his hair is red! I wonder if it will stay that way or turn blonde. My mom has auburn hair, and her dad had auburn hair, so we'll see. I really think his eyes will be green like mine. I can see green in them when I look at them from the side.






Aria is still loving her little brother! She is still kissing and hugging him every chance she gets.






I keep meaning to tell you all an Aria story, and keep forgetting (or maybe I've already told you and should look back at posts... I have SERIOUS baby brain these days!). When we drive in Matt's truck, it's really bumpy. When I was pregnant, the bumps would make me wince every time there was a big (or even semi-big) one. Speed bumps were the worst! So, one day (I was probably 8 months preggo), as we went over a bump, Aria got a very concerned look on her face and said "ohhhh" and then she patted me on the arm and said "Mama, you OK? Belly hurt?" I couldn't believe that she could tell by my reaction to bumps that it hurt... and that it hurt my belly. I reassured her that Yes, I was OK, and thank you for asking. Every time we'd run over a bump she would ask "Mama, you OK?" and pat my arm. She started asking everyone else in the car if they were OK, too. She still does this, even though I'm not pregnant anymore. I thought it was sweet that she was so sensitive to me!






Aria is now doing better at filling in the small words in sentences so she is using more complete sentences now. So, where she used to say "paper broken half" she now says "The paper is broken in half" or "the paper broken in half" (sometimes she gets them all, sometimes not).






There are a few things she says that crack me up every time. She does a game where she pretends to be scared of Ziggy... and she screams, runs up to me, and says "Mama ! Ziggy get me! (pause) Long time!" She says the "long time" part really fast. I have NO idea what this means, or where it is coming from, but she says it allll the time. She also calls Cookies "oak-ies". She has been saying AWESOME (with big emphasis) a lot lately.






Hmmm what else? She is completely in love with our friend, Chris (Miajenn's daddy/hubby... MiaJenn is the joint name that Aria made up for Mia (her friend) and Jenn (Mia's Mama). Whenver I tell Aria that we are going to see Miajenn, she gets excited ... and then says "and Chris, too!?!" Matthew and I were going through the letters with her the other day, and saying B sounds like buh, buh, like Bubbles, and Bee and Big and Bug. M sounds like mmmmm like Milk, and Mama, and Mia, and Mooo and Aria said "and Chris, too??" Anything that includes Mia must also include Chris, right?






The other day, I cleaned out Aria's crib to wash her blankets and boppy. As I was putting her comforters back into her crib (I stack them all up so it's soft where she lays) she kept asking me to stop. She didn't want the comforters back in her crib? Ok... Then I put her boppy in there, and she wanted me to stop... OK, interesting. THEN I started to put her stuffed animals and dolls back in, and she didn't want them in there, either. I then put Aria in the crib, and started handing her her favorite animals. She'd throw them out of the crib. I thought to myself "great! now what is she going to play with as she falls asleep, and when she wakes up?" She would play with her animals every day before falling asleep at nap and night. I finally gave up, and left, thinking she'd call me wanting her animals back in there. Well, I was listening to her on the baby monitor, and she was playing - as usual. I thought WHAT is she playing with?? Her crib is empty! She ended up playing for TWO HOURS that night. I went in there at one point bc I started to think she was actually talking to someone... but of course no one was there. She was just laying in her crib... talking away. This was probably 5 days ago, and each time she goes to sleep and wakes up, she plays... with nothing in her crib. I thought it was interesting... she must have a great imagination!



I almost forgot to mention.... she can finally do a sommersault all by herself ;-)


Did I tell you how much I love my babies?????












Pictures from Mia

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Thursday, April 23, 2009

Fiddling around

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Good times!


I think the last 2 weeks have been the best 2 weeks yet! Aria loves her baby brother, I feel great, Matthew has been wonderful, and baby Chanson is the most calm (sleepy ;-) and sweet baby I could ever imagine.

Chanson had his 2 week appointment, and he is doing so well! He weighs 7 lbs 15 ozs (as of April 13th) and is 20.5 inches long. That is 25% for weight, and 50% for height. This is how he's lost and gained:

Monday 03/30/09 - birth day! 7 lbs 10 oz
Wednesday 4/1/9 - 7 lbs 3 oz
Thursday 4/2/9 - 6 lbs 12 oz
Saturday 4/4/9 - 6 lbs 15 oz
Thursday 4/9/9 - 7 lbs 10 oz
Monday 4/13/9 - 7 lbs 15 oz
So, in 1 week he gained almost a pound! Now if only I could lose weight at the same rate ;)

I think he will be built like his daddy. He looks just like his daddy, too, which means that Chanson also looks a lot like Aria.

Chanson stays awake about 4 hrs a day (about 1 hr - 1.5 hrs at a time). We are doing the Baby Whisperer method, which is called EASY (Eat, Activity, Sleep, and You time - in that order). That way it's not a strict schedule, but a routine. It also helps so that he doesn't rely on nursing to fall asleep, which is what happened with Aria. Chanson does great with this routine, although it's hard to wake him up sometimes. He sleeps SO well at night. Most nights I have to wake him up to feed him. He very rarely cries, even to eat. He just starts making noise. We feel extremely blessed to have such a sweet baby!

Some things I love about Chanson are his sweet baby noises. He coos a lot, and it just sounds so cute. The first few days of his life, he sounded like a tea kettle once the water is boiling. He doesn't do that anymore, but it was funny when he did.

On Daddy's birthday, Chanson laughed in his sleep. It was really funny! He hasn't laughed awake yet, though. He has smiled while awake (on 4/11/09 at Church for the 1st time).

Aria just loves her baby brother, and wants to hold him and kiss him all the time. She wants him around her all the time. They sit on the couch together (with me ;-) and watch Sesame Street together. I love that! Last night Aria sat on my lap, and Chanson sat on hers. I am just loving this time!

So, Aria is just a chatterbox these days! She talks like crazy and repeats like crazy, too. She fills in the words as I'm reading her books at night, so I started leaving out several words, to see if she would fill them in. Sure enough, she did. We were doing Hey Diddle Diddle, and when we got to the last page, I said "and the..." hoping she'd say "dish", but she said "dish ran away with the spoon".

A few other funny Aria-isms ;-)

When she does vibrato when she sings, she shakes her head really fast to make her voice "shake".

She gets really likes when everyone is together. She gets really excited and says "everybody all together!" She does this when we're together as a family, or when we have several friends all together, etc. She says it a lot - it's cute.

She loves to play ring around the rosey. She calls it Pocket Full of Posey. She only wants to play it in the office, though.

Aria keeps calling me "honey" and she calls Matthew and Chanson "sweetie". This cracks me up!

She plays a game that she made up with Mina. She gets something that resembles (to her) a suitcase and says "see ya! bye! going on a trip" and walks away. Then she comes back and says "I'm back!" She thinks this is a LOT of fun ;-) and keeps doing it over and over.

I always forget to turn off the humidifier in her room, and Matthew never does (after nap or in the am when she wakes up). Last week when I got her out of her crib, and as we were about to go down the stairs she stopped and said "oh I forgot!" and walked back into her room and shut off the humidifier. Too funny - I didn't even know she paid attention to either of us doing that, or that she'd know how to shut it off.

She and daddy have LOTS of games they play. One is called "leggies" and that is where she pumps her legs in the swing. Another is called "swing low" and she says that in a really low voice like she is singing Swing Low Sweet Chariot (which is what Daddy does during the game). He swings her back and forth over the bed, and then throws her onto the bed. She loves it! She and Daddy have a lot of fun!

She likes to pretend to take our picture. She takes Matthew's mp3 player (which she thinks is a camera) and points it at us (or the actual camera if she gets a hold of it) and says "smile!" but how she says it is "sa-MILE".

Matthew was reading her books before bed the other day, and they were reading her Bible. Matthew went over with Aria several things that she loves, and told her that God made them all. He then asked "do you know who God is" and she said "yes! Mama!" .... smart girl! haha! OK, in my defense, I never taught her that! ;-)

She likes to come up to me and say "nice to see you!" or "nice to see you, too!" I guess this is part of the going on a trip game that she plays with Mina.

I noticed awhile ago that Aria said words singular when there was 1 and plural when there was more than 1. Matthew tested it the other day (he didn't believe me ;-) and pointed at a duck and asked what it was. She said "a duck". He pointed at another, and asked again, and she said "a duck". Then he pointed at the shower curtain and said what is that? She said Ducks. She even says 1 foot and 2 feet.

I can't believe she is going to be TWO in 3 months (a little less than 3 months!!) Unbelievable. I still see her as my baby, so when she is doing all this talking and little girl stuff, I am always caught off guard.

We're going to be doing some serious potty training starting in a few weeks. Wish us luck!

I'll post some more pics later today!

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Pictures from Mia


22 pictures
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