Smiling Amaya--2 months old today!

Just wanted to post some pictures of our little girl, who's turning 2 Months old today! She's starting to fill out and finally fitting snugly into her newborn clothes. She's also starting to smile a lot more often and we just love watching her smile up at us!

 

 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year..2010!

Christmas was even more of a blast this year than last! With the addition of Amaya and Alex really starting to talk to show excitement over gifts, we had a great holiday and I hope you did too! Alex did quite well on Christmas, with several gifts from Santa and lots from relatives of course, and little Amaya didn't do half bad herself. His big present this year was a Fisher Price  remote control train set. The boy loves, loves lobes,"choo choos" and he was shaking when he opened it. He plays with it first upon waking and it's the first thing he runs to when he comes home from daycare everyday. He's so cute with it too. He'll watch it go around the track and he'll say really loud, "Choo choo! All aboard!" LOL. We are guessing he heard that on TV or maybe it was in a book I read to him. Either way, it's adorable. Amaya's big gift from us (and keep in mind, Amaya is a newborn, so we didn't get her anything extravagent) was some girly velcro toys to attach to her carrier. Alex's were very boyish and kind of wore down from traveling so much, so we got her some purple flowers and hearts to play with. The kids also were very spoiled by their Aunts, Uncles, Grand-parents and Great-Grandparents. The only issue we had was where to store everything without me going nuts over the clutter! So we purchased a 9-cube storage system with some canvas boxes to store the toys and put it in place of the train table we used to have in the living room. I am very happy with it, and as son as I get around to taking a picture of it, I post it for all to see. My long-term plan is to turn the 4th bedroom downstairs into a playroom, but I probably won't get to start that project until Spring Break in April. New Year's Eve was also very fun this year. We went to Maria's house and had a little party with all of the wild kids. We played some very interesting games of bingo, ate some delicious food, nd then made it back before the ball dropped for bedtime! LOL. Then Abe and I played boggle until the ball dropped and vowed that our New Year's resolution is no babies in 2010, since 2008 and 2009 brought us our current little blessings. Hope you all had a great one, and good luck going back to work for us all--especially me!

Our tree after Santa came on Christmas Eve..with our best present of all in front!

Alex waiting patiently to tear into those presents!

Opening his train!

Amaya is getting her diaper changed while Alex is checking out how his train works

Julia on the little mermaid ride-on we got her

Our beautiful little girl--almost 2 months old!

Amaya with her Great-Grandma Glenrose

Alex loves his Pappy

The kids and their nana

Our new storage area in the living room..I love it!

CRAZY snowfall!

Yesterday, the storm of the season hit us. We ended up with about 2 feet of snow in all. Alex went outside for a total of about 15 mintes before he grew really tired of the cold and the wind and actually ran to our door wanting to go back inside. I can't say I blame the poor boy. It was beyond freezing and the snow was almost up to his chest! So we spent most of the day inside, playing and watching good ole TV all day. He actually grew so bored of his toys and being inside the house that we gave him a small Christmas present early! LOL. Amaya spent the entire day inside and chilled in her swing for a few minutes while we let her brother experience the "great outdoors" and let her Daddy attempt to shovel. Now we're just hanging around, and planning what Christmas shopping still needs to be done. Hopefully, we will be able to do some shopping tomorrow. We will see! Enjoy some of our photos in the snow!

Abe and Alex in the snow

Up to his waist by noon yesterday

Pointing at the snow with his tongue out

Alex standing on our walkway with Abe shoveling in the background

Miss Amaya hanging out on her playmat during all of the excitement

Amaya's First Smiles!

A babys first "real" smile is the best thing in the world, isn't it? After 5 weeks of dipaers changes, pumping in the middle of the night, and 3 AM feedings and rocking back to sleep session, Amaya finally smiled back at me last night. I was up late feeidng her and rocking her in her room, trying to get her back to sleep around 1 AM, and she just looked up and smiled a couple times before drifting off to sleep . This morning I was able to catch her precious smile on camera, so enjoy these first cute smiles. I know we are!

 

Christmas Portraits

Just wanted to share some of our Christmas portraits. They're mostly of Amaya. Like I said in the last post, Alex did not want to cooperate! Oh well, there's always next year? :)

Holiday Craziness and the Unpredictable Toddler

Alex will be entering the phase notoriously known as the "terrible twos" in about 3 months. We all know that. And anyone who has children knows why this lovely stage of childhood development gets the famous title. We have seen signs of "terrible two" coming for quite awhile now though, and I am here to say, the terrible twos could be extended to include pretty much all of toddlerhood, starting with about 12 Months. So with all of the craziness lately surrounding Thanksgiving and preparing for Christmas, Alex has been a little crazy with a capital C. Throw in a brand new baby sister, and you get some interesting moments around here. He has generally been much better than we expected with the addition of Amaya to our family, but with all of the traveling lately and shopping and decorating, we have had our share of more tantrums and break downs than usual. We attempted to get Christmas pictures done today, and we're grateful to get one of Alex with the family. After that he was done, and w expected that would happen, so we didn't push. Thus we have Christmas pics of Amaya, but none of Alex. LOL. Oh well..there's always next year, though some have said age 3 is worse than age 2..oh boy.

Amaya's First Holiday--Thanksgiving! She is posing with the foam turkey her brother made at daycare! :)

Alex posing in front of our Christmas tree

Amaya relaxing in her bouncer..her due date was Sunday. Instead, she turned 3 weeks old on Saturday!

Alex's first carousel ride with Daddy at Festival of Trees in Timonium.

Me and Amaya (in my moby wrap). I love this thing and she seems to as well!

Giving me a silly smile before bed. He usually spends the first 15 minutes of wearing these pajamas pointing at all of thr balls and telling me what they are. LOL.

 

Adjusting...

The question we are getting a lot these days is "How is Alex adjusting to his new baby sister?" Well to answer that question--he has good days and bad days, but he is generally doing better than we expected. He's only 20 months old, and still pretty non-verbal, so we weren't sure how his lack of communication skills would affect this adjustment period, seeing that he can;t express himself very well yet. But he is doing pretty well. He does notice the baby, and recognizes that "baby" is what she is. He will pint to her and say "baby" over and over. He also has an interest in touching her hands and patting her head, though sometimes he gets a little rough when showing her love and we have to remind him to be gentle. At bedtime, he looks for her several times before going to sleep by looking over the bedside to peek into her bassinet. It's really cute to watch him want to interact with her. That being said, we have had some more tantrums lately, and I am thinking it's probably due to the changes he is going through with his new sister. He is doing things like not wanting to take his hat and jacket off when he gets home, and then throwing a major screaming tantrum when we make him. He also has been playing around mre before bed and not wanting to go to sleep. He usually goes to sleep around 8, but tonight it was around 9 before he finally settled down enough to drift off. He mainly sings to himself or talks to himself instead of laying down and sleeping. We've also seen more issues with him not wanting Abe to leave him at daycare. This doesn't happen every morning, but has happened a few times more recently. All in all I would say he's "adjusting" fine--as good as could be expected for a 20 month old. Amaya's "adjusting" to us as well. She's growing some finally and can now wear newborn diapers instead of preemie ones. She's defintelystill in preemie clothes and we keep washing the same 5 outfits because we don't want to go out and buy a bunch of stuff she may not wear for long. Her eating has really picked up and I feel like she'll hit a growth spurt before long. She also lost her umbilical cord stump this morning, so I was able to give her first bath, which she absolutely hated. The girl does NOT like to be cold. She's a pretty easy going little baby. She doesn't even cry at night when she's hungry. She kind of whimpers and I'm a very light sleeper, so I always wake up. I ahve to wake up and pump every two hours anyway, so I always check to see if she's awake and hungry. I'll be excited to take her to her 2 week well visit on Nov. 23rd to see if she is up to 6 lbs. by then or not.