Gabriella's 3 month update.

3 MONTHS

2 MONTHS

1 MONTH

my, my, my...our little munchkin has grown!  she didn't have a pediatrician appointment this month so no new stats to rave about, but as you can see, ella has grown in weight and length.  just to refresh your memory, here are her previous stats:

2 months + 1 week -  11lbs 6oz
1 month - 8lbs 7oz
day 8 - 6lbs 8oz
birth - 6lbs 10oz

sleep
still doing the bedtime bath routine but i started to give her bath earlier at 8pm.  she is out cold by 10 pm.  by the second half of her second month, ella started to sleep 6 hours.  occasionally she will wake up at the bewitching 1 am hour, but for the most part she will wake up at 4 am.  after 4 am, to the dismay of mama, ms. ella tends to cluster feed.  this means that my little girl is waking up every hour to nurse after 4 am until 7 or 8 am when she is truly awake for the day.

we went through a phase of her waking up more frequently at night which, out of pure desperation, initiated co-sleeping.  but that has since passed and our little princess is back to sleeping in her pack n play.

we don't have a nap routine during the day.  some days she naps great and other days she doesn't.  when and how did you establish a routine with your little one during the day?

food aka nursing
one thing is for certain...my girl loves to nurse!  i swear, she wouldn't mind one bit if i nursed her all day long.  she went from taking 4 oz to 6 oz, to sometimes even 7 oz at a time.  what can i say...she takes after her mama and her daddy.  we're big eaters!

we had, and are still dealing with a little set back that occurred mid month.   i introduced the bottle at 6 weeks without a problem.  then a few weeks ago, every time gabriella would take a bottle, she would accumulate so much air that she would scream and cry after 4 oz and would only stop crying after 3 or 4 loud burps.  after those burps, she would reject the bottle even though she was hungry.  feeding her with a bottle became, and still is, somewhat stressful for her and whoever ends up feeding her.  i'm stressed about this because i go back to work in a few weeks.  i've bought all kinds of bottles that is supposed to decrease air, but i haven't found one perfect one.  for now, burping her frequently during her bottle feeds seems to make it a little better.  i'll keep you posted.

temperament
overall, i would have to say gabriella is a good and happy baby.  although, she will scream bloody murder if she's hungry.  things that calm her are: burping, being in her ergo carrier, going outside, being carried face forward, car rides, baths, being in her rock n play, and playing with her "friends" on her gym mat.

milestones
cooing, smiling, and giggling are constant.  she has found her hands and likes to stuff her fists in her mouth.  she has also started drooling this month.  her head control is improving and so is her leg strength.  tummy time is hit or miss with her still, but we continue to practice.  and i think she has her father's eyesight because she tracks us and objects extremely well.

 mama update
still trying to lose the last 7 lbs without any success.  i've been jogging more but haven't gone to my boxing/kickboxing classes because of the pain in my hands.  to drop this weight, i know i have to severely cut down, or better yet, eliminate the carbs.   but since i'm breast feeding i'm hesitant to do that.  the line on my belly from pregnancy (linea nigra) has almost faded away, my skin is getting back to normal, and my hair is starting to fall out.


till next month!

Gabriella's 2 month update.

2 MONTHS

1 MONTH

here are her stats.
2 months + 1 week -  11lbs 6oz
1 month - 8lbs 7oz
day 8 - 6lbs 8oz
birth - 6lbs 10oz


sleep
we have seriously established a bedtime routine with gabriella.  i talk about it here in this post.  i'm happy to say that gabriella is a good sleeper at night.  her longest stretch of sleep is always after her bath (4 hrs, once even 5).  after that she usually wakes up every 3 hours.  throughout the day, she sleeps for about 2.5 to 3 hours at a time.  she sleeps in her pack n play by our bed and she naps just about anywhere...on our chest, her rock n play, her pack n play, or on our bed.  she has also decided she does not like to be swaddled anymore.  her arms are now free when she sleeps.

i'm ready for bed now!

food aka nursing
gabriella  eats a lot!  at around 7 weeks we introduced the bottle to her once a day, at night.  at that time, she took 3-3.5 oz easily.  she now downs 4 oz in a blink of an eye, sometimes twice in a 2 hour period.  because of her ferocious appetite, i freeze 4 oz bags now when i pump.  i consistently pump more or less 12 oz of milk a day on top of breast feeding her so i am more liberal on bottle feeding...which means more alone time for mommy!!!  unfortunately i tend to pump the most milk in the middle of the night.  so i pump when john feeds her at around 10 pm, then i pump after i breast feed her which ends up to be 3 am-ish.  after that i pump once or twice more in the morning after feeding her.  then, i don't pump again until 10 pm unless we give her a bottle in the afternoon.

temperament
gabriella continues to be a very good baby.  her most alert time of the day is in the morning.  we take advantage of this and do tummy time, play with her on her gym mat with her "animal friends", and play music for her.  the only time she gets fussy is in the evening when it's close to her bedtime routine.  other than that, she's a pretty mellow baby.  just thinking of how fussy gabriella gets close to bedtime makes me realize that john and i will have to be home early from now on to start her bedtime routine or at least be in a place where we can start it, like my in-laws house.  yikes...home by 8pm...the sacrifices we make as parents ;-)  if this isn't proof to illustrate who the new boss is at our house, then i don't know what is.  

milestones
the blank stares and non focused gazes are no more!  we have cooing and occasional smiles, although she has always smiled and giggled when she sleeps.  she tracks and turns her head when we move and talk to her.  she has pretty good head control, but we're still working on strengthening her legs.  she found her hands earlier this month and likes to suck on them...if we let her.  we can tell she wants to communicate with us.  i can't wait to see what she does next month.

mama update
overall i feel pretty good.  i'm still tired which makes me lazy, which means my workouts are nonexistent except for maybe 2 times this month.  i could be better with my diet, but when you're home all day in pajamas who really wants to eat healthy.  pass me the cookies and chips, lol.  despite the occasional indulgences, i've broke the 10lb hurdle!  i have 7lbs left to go to get back to my pre-baby weight.  i do need to tone and i would like to lose an extra 5lbs.

we are headed to san diego and los angeles tomorrow.  once i get back, i told myself that i need to start working out...or at least start doing planks and push ups.  when did you start working out post baby?

Gabriella's 1 month update.

yes i know, this post is super duper late.  just in time for her 2 month update. lol.

i should really title this post the eat, sleep, and poop month because pretty much that describes our first month with our little munch.

let's start off with her stats.

1 month - 8lbs 7oz
day 8 - 6lbs 8oz
birth - 6lbs 10oz

as you can see breast milk does a body good.  gabriella gained a whole 2 pounds in less than a month.  it was solid proof that breast feeding was going just fine.

gabriella was so puffy the first few weeks.  her eyes were so swollen she couldn't open them all the way.  and her sweet little eyelashes were not yet discovered.  you can also see she was quite jaundice.

here, you can see john holding ella near the sunlight to help lower the bilirubin that's causing her jaundice.

it wasn't long until ella's puffiness started to subside and her features started popping out.  like her long beautiful eyelashes!

she slept quite a bit and woke up every 3 hours, most of the time on the dot all on her own to eat.  when she was going through her growth spurts her feeds increased in frequency to every 2 hours.  that was really tough on mommy.  but those every 2 hour feeds only lasted a day...thank goodness.  other than that, she was a very good baby.  once she was fed, burped, and changed, she slept good in her pack n play by our bed at night.

there were moments of wakefulness.

here we have gabriella at her 1 month doctor's appointment.  she got her second hepatitis B shot that day and took it like a champ.  look how tiny she is!

and this is our "official" 1 month picture of her.  we're doing a 12 month photo project to show how much our little munch grows her first year of life.

just in case you were wondering, i thought i'd share with you what was going on with me during that first month.  just so you know, i'm in the middle of writing a post about my postpartum experience.

as far as my weight, once i delivered gabriella, i only lost a disappointing 4 lbs.  i still looked 6 months pregnant the first 2 weeks.  after those first 2 weeks, my weight started to drop drastically.  breast feeding helped and i was sweating like a pig when i would sleep.  i guess that was the way my body was getting rid of the excess water.  before i knew it i had lost 15 lbs of the 25 i had gained throughout my pregnancy.  by the end of the first month, my mid section was still flabby and i noticed that my back had gotten wider.  i didn't get any stretch marks but my linea negra was still very prominent.  one good thing that happened was my skin finally, after a long 9 months of pimples and scarring, started to clear up and my scars started to lighten.  do you know the saying, "when you are having a girl, she steals your beauty"?  well, i am convinced that was the case with ms. ella.  after all, i may be biased, but she is one darn beautiful baby.