Life According to Jake, Christina & Lizzy.

Lizzy now has 2 teeth! Her 2 lower, central incisors have come through! It wasn't the most pleasant experience for Lizzy or mommy, but I think we made it through just fine. She went through a period of about a week where she was fussy. We only had 1 really fussy night, in which she woke up every 2 hours. This experience did almost give mommy a heart attack. One morning, Lizzy was sitting on the floor and playing with her toys. She started crying, so I went to check on her. I noticed some blood around her mouth! Seeing blood coming from your baby's mouth is enough to give any mommy a minor heart attack. I looked in her mouth and saw a teeny, tiny, little white tooth cutting through. I had no idea that teething could make a baby bleed! Now I know. Hopefully the rest of her teeth don't give us too much trouble! :)

Elizabeth is now 6 months old! I thought I would talk a little bit about her growth and development. Right now, she weighs 18lbs 8oz and is 26.5 inches long. That puts her in the 90th percentile for her weight and the 75th percentile for her height. She's getting so big!

During this past month, she has gotten really good at sitting up without support. She will still occasionally wobble and fall over, but that doesn't happen too often. We always make sure there is a soft pillow behind her though.

She has also started scooting around while laying on her back. She scoots along her head while pushing with her legs. I hope this doesn't cause her to lose any hair! I'm thinking crawling won't be too far away!

About a week ago, Lizzy cut her first tooth. One of her lower central incisors broke through her gums. The second one quickly followed. At first you could only feel them, but now you can see them! She keeps rubbing her fingers against them and chewing on things.

Lizzy is a very happy baby. She is always smiling, giggling, laughing, and talking. She LOVES attention. She always tries to get people to talk to her whenever we are out. She also loves to grab everything; people's faces, Sophie's fur, toys, food off of your plate (if you aren't looking), etc. She has also started "dancing" to music. She rocks back and forth and bounces. Peek-a-boo has also become one of her favorite games.

It definitely doesn't feel like 6 months have passed, but they have! I'm sure these next 6 will fly by as well! Before we know it, she'll already be a year old. Crazy! I'm excited to experience so many more things with her. :)

It has definitely been way too long since I last signed into my Blogger account. I thought it was about time for an update.

Lizzy just experienced her first Halloween last week. She dressed up as Princess Leia. I thought it was fitting because she is in love with Star Wars. I think the brightness of the lightsabers, blasters, and explosions is what makes her so interested in it. We couldn't spend too much money on her costume. Rent is expensive. Student loans are expensive. Jake's car needed some repairs. Jake doesn't have a job. Teachers don't make much money. So, needless to say, we didn't have money budgeted for a Halloween costume for Lizzy. I thought I would try to make it myself. Here are some pictures of how it turned out. I was pretty happy with the result. :)

I don't have much motivation to pack things right now, so I thought I would take some time to blog about our new, little, adventure we are about to embark on. After living in our 1 bedroom apartment for a year, we are going to be moving about 5 miles away to a 2 bedroom apartment. I thought I would take some time and reminisce about the things that have happened during our year here.

1) This is the first place Jake and I ever lived together. We moved here right after we got married. After having most of our relationship be a long distance one, it was nice to be able to be together. :)
2) On October 22nd, we found out we were pregnant! (Hence the need to move)
3) One day, we were chased by random dogs running around the inside of our building. Jake had to hold them back while Sophie (our dog) and I ran to our place. We made it safely into our apartment, but the dogs kept scratching, sniffing, and growling at our door.

Ceiling caving in

The hole that was left

4) In January, our ceiling caved in. It took them about 4-5 days to fix it. I was 5.5 months pregnant and Jake was in Atlanta for a conference. We had to have a big fan called "The Tornado" in our living room to dry out the area before they fixed it. I ended up staying at my parents' house because our place was way too cold.
5) Around 2am on May 7th, I woke up with contractions that were about 7 minutes apart. Elizabeth was born at 9:58pm later that day. :)

We're excited to be moving to a bigger place and making new memories there with our daughter. :) Hopefully we won't have this ceiling cave in! ;)

What is a swaddle you might ask? Well, it's a lifesaver for many parents, especially us! Swaddling is the art of snugly wrapping your baby in a blanket for warmth and security. It can keep him/her from being disturbed by his/her own startle reflex, and it may even help him/her stay warm and toasty for the first few days of life until his/her internal thermostat kicks in. Most importantly it can help to calm your baby because it reminds the baby of life back in the womb.

We have also learned that, in addition to helping your baby sleep longer, the swaddle can teach you that your baby is secretly a little Houdini. We started off swaddling Elizabeth in blankets...but she quickly learned how to get out of them. She learned that if she kicks out the bottom, the whole swaddle falls apart rather easily.

We decided to bring out the "heavy artillery". We were given a Halo Sleep Sack. It swaddles the baby with VELCRO! Whoohoo! It's pretty much like a baby straight jacket. When I first wrapped Elizabeth in it, I turned to her and said, "Hah! Let's see you get out of that!"

She slept pretty well, but after about 4 hours, she decided to bust out of her Sleep Sack like the Incredible Hulk. Nothing can contain our little escape artist, Elizabeth! I can't imagine the fun-filled things she has in store for us as she grows up! hehe :)

After much excitement and anticipation, our daughter, Elizabeth Grace arrived May 7, 2010 at 9:58pm. She weighed 7lbs 12oz and was 20.5 inches long. She sure is precious. :)

She is almost 2 months old right now and I'm finally getting around to blogging about it and sending out birth announcements. hehe. Babies make life busy! Babies also make mommies sleepy! I haven't slept longer than 4 straight hours in over 2 months! It's so worth it though. :)

I had a pretty good birthing experience. I highly recommend NOT getting an epidural. I had read that babies born to mothers that had epidurals are less alert and some have a hard time figuring out how to nurse. I didn't want that to happen to my daughter. We made it through labor and delivery just fine. I discovered that your body has its own natural 'painkillers' that it releases. It's really pretty amazing. Afterward, even though I was exhausted from my 20 hour labor, I felt really good. It was like a sense of a major accomplishment mixed with all of the endorphins from labor. hehe. I felt like I could do anything! I would definitely do it again. :)

Matthew 6:25-34      Do Not Worry

 ²⁵"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? ²⁶Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? ²⁷Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?  ²⁸"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. ²⁹Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. ³⁰If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? ³¹So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' ³²For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. ³³But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ³⁴Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Jake and I have been attending a bible study that takes place on Tuesday nights. For one night, we all decided to pick a bible passage/verse that has been speaking to us lately. Matthew 6:25-34 is what I had picked. The reason why I picked it is because I am a worrier. I worry about everything. I know that worrying doesn't help at all, but I still do it. 

One thing that I had been worrying about lately was provision for the baby. Babies need lots of stuff and most of it isn't cheap. We needed a crib, a pack & play, a car seat, a stroller, a swing, a 2nd car seat base for my car, a high chair, etc. Those things alone could be added up to be well over $500. Being a teacher, I don't make much money. I don't get paid for my maternity leave. Jake also still hasn't been able to find a meteorology job and he has student loans we are paying off. I was worried about where we would get the money to buy all of these things. Well, thankfully, most of them were given to us during baby showers. Jake's parents bought us the pack & play. His aunt gave us the crib they used with their daughter. My parents bought us the car seat/stroller and my bible study ladies chipped in and got us the swing. We only needed the 2nd car seat base and the high chair.  

I figured that I shouldn't worry about not having those 2 last items. We wouldn't be really needing them until she was a little older. Maybe our financial situation would change by then. I decided to not worry about it. Things would be taken care of. Here is the best part...


Friday was my last day at school. I decided to start my maternity leave a week before my due date so I could get some extra rest. It was just getting really hard to function at school. My friends in the math department wanted to buy Pizza Hut pizza for lunch and have a little "going away" party for me. Jake stopped by school and joined in on the party as well. They told me to meet in another teacher's classroom when the lunch bell rang. When I walked in, not only was there pizza, but presents! I definitely wasn't expecting ANY presents. I opened them. The first was the high chair! The second was the car seat base! I then opened the card and these gifts weren't just from the math department, but they were also from my friends in other departments. The card had around 20 signatures on it. I was so touched by the generosity of the people that I work with. It was really great. Not only did I feel so much love from my co-workers, but I also felt so loved by God. He was really taking care of me, Jake, and the baby. He provided us with everything that we needed. :)

 

    It's been quite some time since Jake and I posted on our blog. I thought that we needed to do a little updating. :) Lately we have been busy! I am almost 38 weeks pregnant. Our little girl can arrive any day now! We're getting excited!! Our past month or so has consisted of baby showers, organizing all of the baby's stuff into our tiny 1 bedroom apartment, doctor's appointments, interviews with pediatricians, putting together stuff for the baby, washing her clothes, packing the hospital bag, etc. Whew! So much to do! I thought I would share a few pictures of our preparations for the baby.


Her swing.

A little teddy bear on her swing