My 1st Valentine's Day

                                                                             

Happy Valentine's Day!!  

FINALLY caught up!

Now that I am finally caught up on my saved/work in progress posts, I certainly hope to stay up to date from now on.

I think I need to find a weekly idea (like Jennifer's five for fridays) to help keep me going.

I will be investigating what to do for that.... until then, I will do my best to not fall behind again!

4 Months

I am 4 months old already!  It seems like only yesterday we were bringing you home from the hospital.  It's amazing how quickly time flies!     

        

My 4 Month Stats:

-Height: 24.25 inches (51%)

-Weight: 12 lbs 12 oz (32%)    

-Head Circumference: 40.8 (46%)

Hannah is such a sweet, little lady, she brightens up our lives so much!  She is truly a wonderful baby girl.  Always happy, smiling, content with her surroundings.  Rarely do we have a cranky, fussy baby.  Although it seems that stranger anxiety has set in a little bit.  Hannah certainly recognizes when a different person comes around her.  There are a few whimpers/cries, but then she will start to open up to them (for the most part).  Although her eye does follow mom or dad when they leave the room, wondering "Are you gonna leave me alone with this person?  Cause if so, I'm not gonna be okay with that yet?"  

Hannah continues to do really well with her sleep/eat/nap schedule.  Although most people don't seem to agree with the fact that we put Hannah on a schedule as opposed to "letting it just happen", John and I have found this to be so much easier for all of us.  Hannah is so very predictable with eating and sleeping that we are able to go and do things with great ease.  

Hannah has been sleeping great.  Since Christmas night, she has been sleeping straight through the night!  It has been wonderful!!  She peeps here and there, but she hasn't been waking up wanting to eat, she just stirs and falls back to sleep.  We are so thankful that she is a good sleeper and hope that doesn't change.  

Now, a little update on the snuggie situation.... we successfully eliminated it all together!  I was going to try to not use the snuggie with her naps first, but one day just decided to go cold turkey altogether.  After reading about other moms' snuggie stories online, I decided that cold turkey seemed like the best way to go.  The first day/night was definitely different, but she made it through with a few shorter naps and a very restless night's sleep.  The first week without was a little challenging, but nothing our sweet girl couldn't handle.  Now I swear she sleeps better than before, if you can believe that!  

Hannah is squealing so much!  She gets so happy and will just scream in delight.  This has lasted for up to an hour at times.  She has a very tiny giggle right now, I can't wait until it will become a full-fledged laugh.  We are so close, I can feel it!!  

As far as her movement, we have tackled rolling over from her belly to her back.  She had been so close a few times to making the roll from her back to her belly, but she just can't figure out what to do with her legs/hips.  Soon enough though.  Also, we have been doing so much more sitting up lately.  Although she is so wobbly, that if we put her on her own, she topples over pretty quickly.  But its amazing to see how far she has come already!  

such a sweet baby girl

are we done with these pictures yet, I'm tired of smiling

Now onto our pediatrician appointment.... so after Hannah got weighed, the nurse insisted she was too small and we had to start rice cereal immediately!  She was actually a little rude about it making it seem like we don't feed our child.  She even told us to wake her up in the night and have her eat then too.  Umm...NO, why would we want to do that?!  We asked the NP what she thought when she came in to see us, and she said we could wait if we wanted to.  Of course John and I were a little frustrated with the discord between the staff there.  But ultimately we both agreed that we have to be comfortable with our decision and will do what is best for our own child.

What are some of your thoughts on starting cereal?  When did you begin?  How did it work with nursing?

I will probably take Hannah into my work and weight her around 5months to see where she is.  Until then we wait for our next appointment at 6 months to see where our little lovebug stands!

Happy New Year 2012

Ringing in the new year was certainly very different than any other year we've ever had.  BUT in a great way!  Spending the day with our beautiful daughter is always a gift that we treasure.  

We spent the day at our house hanging out and playing.  John's brother and girlfriend came over and made US dinner, which was very nice.  Hannah went to bed at her usual time of 8:30ish, and John and I enjoyed a few adult beverages and relaxation!  After his brother left, John and I spent time together talking and reminiscing over the past year.  We watched the ball drop alone together and couldn't have asked for a more perfect evening.  

We are both pretty excited to see what 2012 holds for our family!

                                                            

HAPPY NEW YEARS TO EVERYONE!  

Love, the LaMacchia's

Hannah's First Christmas

Since I am a little behind in writing about Christmas, this post will be dedicated to more pictures/captions and little notes.

Overall, Hannah had a wonderful Christmas.  We certainly enjoyed our first family Christmas together with her.  She was enthralled with seeing the fireplace lit up more than any gift, noisy wrapping paper, or singing toy.  We could have put her in front of that fire all day and she would have been happy.

On the hunt for the perfect tree

Mommy and Hannah staying warm

  The hunt for our Christmas tree.....

We went early in December so we could have enough time to enjoy the tree being up.  It was a rather warm, snowy day, perfect to get our tree.  Of course Hannah snoozed the whole time, but it was fun carrying her around to find the right one.  Both John and I can't wait until next year when she will (hopefully) be awake and walking around the tree farm with us.    

Looks like we found a winner! 

Lets bring it home

Our 1st Family tree outing

 

Hannah posing with Santa Clause.  She was enjoying his company this day :)

playing with Santa

    

Decorating my first tree

Helping Daddy with decorations

Decorating our Christmas tree was so much fun!  Hannah sat and watched us fussing over where the ornaments should go.  She enjoyed seeing the lights sparkle on the tree and happily layed next to us in her boppy smiling away!  

SNOW baby! 

1st Christmas Tree

How can Santa say no to this face?!

my first Christmas

our first family Christmas

reading Twas the Night Before Christmas

loved the book! 

In John's family, they always read the Night Before Christmas on Christmas Eve, and John really wanted to make that a new tradition of our own.  Hannah loves being read to and really enjoyed the pictures in this book.  Hopefully this will be something she comes to enjoy every year.

so excited! 

Playing in the wrapping paper :)

mommy and daddy's favorite gift this year 

     

Christmas morning

My 1St Christmas

     

Our happy family 

3 Months old

I'm 3 months old today!  So much have changed in our lives the past 3 months, its been unbelievable!  

No stats to give you this month.  We didn't have a 3 month check-up this time, so stay tuned for my 4 month stats.  

                               

I'm sitting up like such a big girl

Look at me!  So tall

 

Hannah is such a happy baby, she is such a gem!  Rarely does she have a breakdown and for the most part, she is not a fussy baby.  When she's tired, that's another story!  (But what baby isn't unhappy when they are sleepy)  It seems that around 6-6:30pm she wants to fuss as the sleepy-ness kicks in.  She normally takes a little cat nap for about 15-20 minutes here before she's down for the night.

Hannah has been on a pretty good schedule for eating and sleeping.  We wake her around 7:45 to start the day.  She nurses at 8,  has a playful period for about an hour and a half, then takes about an hour and 15 min nap (or so) before her next feeding.  She eats every 3 hours.  At the end of her day, 8pm, she eats, and then is asleep by about 8:30pm.  On the nights that I work, she seems to give John a run for his money, but eventually she caves in and falls asleep.  And if my mother-in-law is putting her to bed, she seems to do rather well for her.  Hannah sleeps pretty good. During the night she will wake occasionally with a little cry or squeal, but then she's right back to sleep.  She typically wakes between 3-5am for a feeding, then its right back to sleep until we're waking her to start the day.  That middle of the night feed has been rough for John when I have to work. Where Hannah normally falls right back to sleep when I nurse her, she really cries and is upset after the bottle is empty.  Of course, what baby doesn't like to fall back to sleep nursing with their mama, but this is part of the not-so-fun facts of working the night shift.

We did have a stretch around Christmas where Hannah slept through the entire night!  Those were a few glorious nights of sleep!  But if she sleeps the whole night, or wakes once to feed, we are certainly pleased with how things have been going.

Hannah does like to sleep in a tight wrapped snuggie.  Although John is more concerned about it then I am, he thinks we should be breaking her of this habit.  I, on the other hand, feel like its fine because she sleeps well all bundled up.  Without the snuggie, she doesn't sleep good at all.  I keep telling him we can break this once she becomes much  more aware of what her hands and arms are doing.  Time will tell where this takes us!

Hannah is doing a lot of cooing and squealing.  She wants to let out a giggle, but just can't form it yet.  She is doing so much better with her tummy time and sitting up in the bumbo.  She can go for stretches of up to about 10 minutes on her tummy and in the bumbo before she's had enough.  She takes a little break on her back, then can go right back to squealing and playing on her belly.  She loves her blanket that Lauren made because the pink/green/black flowers made her happy.

Hannah is so aware of her surroundings, it amazes me how alert and observant she is.  I love watching her look around and see her eyes light up when she finds something she enjoys.  She loves sitting in her vibrating seat and playing with a hanging elephant, lion, and turtle.  She loves laying on her back, kicking her legs around, and thrashing her arms about.  She is quite the active baby!

She has become pretty good with rolling around.  She will roll from side-to-side and it looks like she is so close to rolling over to her belly.  She has rolled over a few times now from her belly to back!  What a fun thing to see.  

Whatcha lookin at?!

I can do this by myself..

Peek-a-boo!

Look at those baby blue eyes!!  At this point we're thinking they are here to stay.  I read that around 3-4 months they will start to darken up, but I'm thinking blue it is!  Now we just need a little more hair to grow... if only that sprouted up as quick as her nails grow!  

All smiles from the LaMacchia's this month!!!  

Back to work....

My first night back to work came rather quickly.  12 weeks of maternity leave seemed to have flown by so fast!  I certainly was NOT ready for that.  

It was a wonderful 12 weeks to be home with my little girl.  Even though it breaks my heart to go back to work, I know this is something that I want to do.  I love my job, I love having the chance to help others, and most of all, it feels great to contribute to our family.  

It was certainly sad to be leaving this sweet little face behind... 

Being back at work will be a huge adjustment for all of us, but it will all work out.  It will give me a chance to have some away time and talk with adults for a change!  Plus, Hannah can have some one-on-one time with her dad while I'm away.