One more picture. :)

and new trick.  Eliza can sit up for a few seconds now!

She's a little bent over, but look, Mom, no hands!

Happy Halloween (or, we win the cutest baby award!)

Ok, so we are just a little biased.  But, Eliza rocked Halloween 2011.

Part 1:  Dressed for dinner with Justin Beiber and Selena Gomez (a.k.a. Craig & Rachael)

Told you she rocked it.

Part 2: Dressed as a ballerina for the daycare Halloween parade.

So much fun with Miss Sylvia!

Working on her stance.  First position?

Taking a ride outside on the parade!

Playing with her friends

Unfortunately we couldn't be at the parade ourselves due to work, but thanks to Miss Sylvia and Miss Lindsey we got lots of pictures!

Part 3: Dressed as a skeleton to pass out candy to all the neighborhood kids!  Thanks to Melissa and Jake for Eliza's super cute bib and hat!

Finally, Eliza is starting to become mobile in her own little ways.  We are no longer going to be able to leave her alone, even for a second.  If so, this might happen:

Side note: she didn't fall, you can see Gary's hand.  She actually "sat" like this for a minute or so, just hanging out--literally.

And it's only a matter of time before this little one is crawling!  Heaven help us!  :)

I hope you all had as fun a Halloween as we did!  

21 Weeks!

Today Eliza is 21 weeks, and wow is she amazing!  We love her so much and watching her change and develop every day is an amazing gift.  Today, her daycare had a fashion show with all the kids and a bake sale to raise money for United Way.  We can't take off work for the Halloween costume parade so we decided to go to the fashion show!  We dressed Eliza up in a pretty Naartjie outfit and her new boots.  She got to work the runway!

When we got home, it only seemed appropriate to have a little photo shoot on our new deck!

We can't wait to experience Eliza's first Halloween and ours in an actual neighborhood!  We're going to buy candy this weekend and are excited to pass out candy to the neighborhood kids.  We'll be sure to share on the blog!  Happy weekend!

Raspberries

A couple of weeks ago, Eliza started mimicking Daddy making raspberry sounds and it was the funniest thing ever.  She's still at it, and we just had to share.  Listen carefully, because Eliza even makes the "ah" sound before hand, just like Daddy does!  (that's new, she didn't do that a couple weeks ago).

Eliza goes Vintage

This weekend Eliza went vintage, that is, she wore two of Mommy's baby outfits!

Velour one-piece with birdie

Don't I look pretty in my ruffled peter pan collar?

Sweater two-piece with flowers.  So sweet.

Sleeping beauty!

20 Weeks!

Eliza is 20 weeks today!  She has been our adorable, fun, and near-perfect baby now for half-as-long as she was inside Mommy's tummy.  Wow!

Eliza is really figuring out her toys and we do our best not to move the parts for her.  She really enjoys her bounce play gym (she still can't quite bounce):

Last Saturday, Eliza went to her first ever football game (cousin Quinn's third-grade all-star game, he did awesome!!).  It was a bit chilly. Thankfully, friend Lois was nice enough to loan Eliza her gloves!

What are these things?

Eliza Scissors-hands

Happy Weekend!

Happy Thursday (almost Friday!)

In an attempt to be a better blogger, here's a random dose of Eliza-cuteness!

Tummy time!

Full of giggles!

Eliza has been rolling over sporadically for over a month now (belly to back and back to belly), but she is consistently rolling from back to belly now!  She's going to be mobile before we know it!

We'll be back with a 20 week post soon, complete with a new video to share.  Until then!

Weekend Warriors

Remember back before we had a baby? We had built a house?  With all the baby talk around here, I thought I'd take a post to update on new happenings at the new digs.

Gary and his dad have been weekend warriors lately building an awesome deck in our backyard.

Getting the support system installed.

Joists complete.

My first walk on the deck, two boards deep.

My handsome guy.

Nearly complete.

Rocking on our new deck.

Doing the finishing work.

One set of stairs.

It's still missing the railing and a built-in bench, but it's completely up to code and completed by Gary and Ron!  It's about 17.5 x 16 ft with angled corners.  It's massive and pretty amazing.  We hope this rainy weather passes and that we get to enjoy the deck before it gets too cold!

Oh, and here's our first attempt at decorating our front porch!

Work in progress.

And if you made it all the way to the bottom of this post, you deserve a treat!  

I thought shirts went on my body?

Still a teenager...Happy 19 weeks!

This week Eliza has experienced extended time with Mommy and Daddy. On Monday, we reaped the benefit of Christopher Columbus’s second greatest contribution to the Western World (first, was the discovery of America; second, was the day off from work in his honor). My Dad and I worked on the deck for most of Monday and for half a day on Wednesday. The floor of the deck would be done for now if not for some pesky rain showers.

Abby also took Eliza to see Dr. Bensi and the doctor was very happy with Eliza’s progress. We successfully transformed our string bean into a chickpea: Eliza weighed in at 12 pounds. She gained almost an ounce a day. Which doesn’t sound like much, but if I gained weight at a similar rate, I would have gone from 160 pounds to almost 170 pounds in twelve days!

In the early morning on Wednesday we could hear Eliza wheezing while she slept and sounded as if she was suffering from severe upper respiratory congestion. When she finally awoke both of us immediately noticed she was more of a hot box than normal. Her under-the-arm temperature confirmed a slight fever. So I stayed home with Eliza and Abby went to work. Abby later took Eliza to see Dr. Bensi again. Eliza had the croup accompanied by a nasty cough. She also could not hit the high notes whenever she talked/squealed.

Eliza has not been to day care since Tuesday and has been taking a steroid twice day. She is almost back to her playful and joyous self. Her nasty cough remains, yet its frequency has diminished. But all in all she is much better. It’s been great to be around her all day; however, I wish it were under different circumstances (in any event, it is certainly better than working).

Standing and bouncing has also been a source of amusement for Eliza. But she isn't quite tall enough for the bouncy chair/standing thing, so we have to supplement it with a blanket (note: that is a Valpo Law sweatshirt blanket we each received when we graduated...totally worth the price of tuition).

Have a great weekend!

18 Weeks Old!

This past Friday, Eliza turned 18 weeks!  She has definitely filled out this week with the new eating and medicine regimen.  We can feel that she is heavier, too.  This week Eliza has also started cooing and gabbing SO loud!  She has also started mimicking Daddy and his raspberry sounds.  She loves to make raspberry sounds!  Eliza is also still very observant and we love her intense gazes.  We can't believe how fast she's developing!

4 Months Old!

Age:  4 months!

Weight: 11lbs 5oz.  4th percentile.  She's our little string bean (but we're trying to turn her into a little chick pea...more on that below!)

Length: 25in.  Around the 50-60th percentile.

Size: All over the place.  0-3, 3, 3-6 onesies.  3-6 pants in length, and in sleepers.

Teeth: It's so early, but she seems to be really chewing and working on her gums.

Sleeping: She is still sleeping through the night!  We generally have to wake her up in the mornings!

Eating: I was way to generous last month when I said 30 oz of breast milk--it was probably more like 24-27 oz.  We're trying to increase that.  She's still eating breast milk, but now we have to add rice cereal in bottles (more on that below).

Movement: Eliza loves to kick and pull on her toes while on her back!  She also is able to do this scoot thing from her back (basically a half roll then changing directions).

Milestones: Big laughs!!  Holding her own bottle and putting it in her mouth!

Favorite Toys:  Her new Lamaze brand pull-toy.  Her puppy mini-blanket.

 Dislikes: Getting strapped into her carseat.

Words/sounds: Not too many consonants yet, but she does try to imitate funny noises!


We had Eliza's 4 month well child visit a few days ago.  Mommy and Daddy had a gut feeling Eliza wasn't gaining much weight, and we were right.  The Dr. is a little concerned about her low weight gain (while there is no goal weight, the goal is to gain one pound per month and generally babies double their birth weight by 4-5 months).  Eliza didn't hit the goal of 2 pounds gained since her 2 month visit.  We all suspect the issue is spitting up.  So, to help solve those problems, we are adding rice cereal to bottles in order to help her keep the milk down.  We've also got her on liquid baby prilosec.  So far it seems to be helping as she's spitting up less!  We will have a weight check next week to see if we've got some weight gain---to see if our string bean is turning into a round little chick pea!  :)  


In good news, Eliza is developing amazingly!  Her head (brain) is growing at a steady rate.  She amazes us every day with her hand-eye coordination and strength.  As I type, Eliza is stealing Daddy's nose and mouth!  She's a grabby baby!

Eliza's Baptism

Gary and I really wanted Eliza to be baptized in the church in which we were married, and where I was baptized and confirmed.  This morning, we were in Rochester at our home church, Grace United Methodist, for Eliza's baptism.  We were also able to take communion.  All in all, it was a very special morning for our family.