Bella's due date has finally arrived!

Yep, you heard me. Today is Bella's due date! And she is NINE WEEKS OLD!!! That is still totally crazy to me! This is one of Ava's (semi-creepy!) looking dolls dressed up in Bella's preemie onesies that were TOO BIG when she was born! (For some reason, my pictures are looking blurry on the blog, which is really irritating. I'm not sure why, but you should be able to click on the picture and see it non-blurry if you want).


She is doing SO well- I couldn't ask for anything more from her. It was a week ago today that we started the transition to breast feeding, and I'm happy to say that she hasn't had to supplement with milk from a bottle since this past weekend!! She did (and is still doing) really well with the transition. There's really only 2 issues- one is that she's been eating a little more often with the nursing cause she wants to sleep instead of eat (flash backs to Ava are coming back), so she sometimes doesn't get a full feeding. And because of that, I have to nurse more often and I am T-I-R-E-D!! Nine weeks of waking ever 3 hours is really starting to catch up to me...my eyes are burning as I type! .....I should totally be sleeping now...

Here's some pics of a tired Bella- I hear ya, girl!
The other issue we have is that she doesn't like to OPEN her mouth enough quite yet...she was used to those little bottle nipples. And, not to talk too much about my boobs- but, HELLO!, there ain't nothin' little about these things! So, we're still working on that whole open-wide thing!

She had her 2 month checkup and got her first round of immunizations. Five shots and an oral vaccine. (Sniff). She cried. LOUD! But, thankfully, she is a seriously tough cookie and it was pretty short lived. At her appt, she weighed 6lbs 6oz, but I weighed her again yesterday and she was 6lbs, 10.5oz!! She's gaining weight, nice and steady! Her doctor is happy with her weight gain (it has been a gain of about 0.5 oz/day since birth, on average). We just gotta keep those ounces coming! :) But, check out her cheeks!! They're getting so chubby! ...Okay, maybe not quite chubby, but they're getting there!
Ava is still pretty wonderful with her! She's constantly wanting to touch and love on her. (Although, outside of big sister duty, Ava has apparently hit the TERRIBLE THREES....but that's for another post)!!!
But, let me tell you, the girl can entertain herself! Which is totally AWESOME!!! Here she is immersed in one of her many books!
Oh, I remember the hold-the-baby-while-you-study days!
A sweet little pucker. This reminded me of Ava's "monkey face" when she was little! Well, it's bedtime, folks! I should be able to sleep for at least another hour before she wakes again....ugh. I think I can, I think I can...

Leave me a comment and say hello!! :)

Got Milk?

So, as most of you know, I've been pumping breast milk since Bella was born because she has been unable to nurse efficiently due to her prematurity. And you probably also know that we had to buy a new deep freezer to store all the milk because it was taking over the regular freezer!

Weeeeelllll..............we have a little problem. Now the deep freezer is full. Kinda crazy, huh? And maybe a little disturbing. ;) Although, I think it's a great problem to have...it's kinda like having too much gold! Not really possible. :) We had to reorganize it in order to get it all to fit! These pictures are from 2 weeks ago, so now I've filled more than 2 more crates...ridiculous. :) Yet awesome.


Now, the regular freezer is filling up once more...but hopefully I'll be pumping much less in the next 1-2 weeks. I've had a plan in place (thank you SO much for the experienced advice of my cousin, Megan, who went through something very similar with her little girl 8 years ago!) to slowly transition Bella to nursing from me instead of drinking from the bottle.

To make a long story short, I've been using different types of nipples on the bottle- different levels of flow- to wean her from something very high flow and easy to drink to something very low flow in which case she has to work a little harder to get the milk (more like nursing). So, we're in the last week of almost all bottle feeds and will (hopefully!!) be transitioning to almost all nursing in the next 1-2 weeks. She's 7 weeks old today, and my due date is still 2 weeks away. Hopefully, by around her due date, we'll be just about transitioned to nursing- at which point I can cut WAY down on the pumping...hopefully to none at all until I go back to work in December! Hence, my freezer problem solution! :) We'll see if it works!

At 7 weeks old, Bella has broken the SIX POUND mark! She was 6 lbs-even when we weighed her yesterday! YAY!! She's doing great! Here she is hanging out with Michee.
And chillin' with Daddy. She looks JUST like Patrick, but hopefully, her head wont be as big as his! ;) No offense, honey. :)
Here's Ava waiting to "pet" Bella. For the most part, Ava does a GREAT job keeping herself entertained while I tend to Bella. She still absolutely loves playing with her dollhouse. Notice the exact lining up of the family members....can anyone say OCD?!
Well, that's it for now! I'll keep you posted on any changes! Otherwise, we're doing great!

6 Weeks Today!!

Can you even believe that Bella is SIX WEEKS OLD?!?! Today is also exactly 2 weeks that she's been home with us! And the really amazing thing is that she's still not supposed to be here for 3 more weeks!!! That is completely insane to me. And she's just so perfect. And everything works. And we are incredibly blessed. :)

She's really doing great- the monitor hasn't gone off for the past few days. She's had 4 "episodes" of bradycardia since she's been home, but none since Monday. We'll go back to the doctor tomorrow for another check just to make sure things are still good. We have a scale here at home, and when I weighed her today, she was 5lbs 9oz! She's almost gained 2 pounds from her lowest weight (which was 3lbs 12oz)! Most 6 week old babies are WELL over 5 lbs, but not my munchkin. :) She's getting there, though! She's doing great with eating, and I have a plan of action already in place to get her to transition from the bottle to 100% nursing. I'll keep you posted on that one...but still need lots of prayers for help with that. :)

Ava still is very good with her...and very gentle. She's still totally obsessed with hand sanitizer and uses Bella as an excuse to get her hands on the stuff all the time!Other than that, things have stayed about the same. I'm a bit tired, but Ava goes to school Wednesday through Friday, so on those days, I can usually squeeze nap in. Which is total heaven! Last Friday night, I was already looking forward to my Wednesday nap. (Which didn't actually happen since I had a doc appt that day....oh well. I got one today, though, and it was all I thought it would be and more! :)

Catching a snooze on Mommy.

Does she look like her Daddy or WHAT?!?!?

A little less like Daddy, and a little more like Bella with that big ol' bow!
So, that's the update for now! Hope all is well out there!!