When Stella Wakes Up

I think my favorite thing in the world is Stella just after she has had a good sleep. She wakes up cooing and smiling. She has this extremely cheesy, funny looking morning smile combined with stretching and looking all around.

Sometimes she does this funny little side to side head movement, as if she is looking for something or isn’t quite awake yet. She is such a little scraggle muffin in the morning with her scraggly hair, little snorts, and squishy facial expressions. I just love it!

Sometimes we find her with her legs straight up in the air:

A few weeks ago she decided that she actually likes taking naps in her crib. Before she would just fall asleep randomly in her bouncer or in my arms, but now she takes quite regular naps in her crib.

However, she is still perfectly happy to sleep on the go if the situation requires it.

Or catching a nap in a random place like on the couch.

However, the one place she struggles to sleep is church. Last Sunday she was screaming and I knew that she just needed to fall asleep, but she just wouldn’t give in and fall asleep. I can usually temporarily get her to stop crying by taking her outside, so I took her out to the grass and laid her on her changing mat in the shade and she instantly fell asleep. I sat out there with her until it got kind of windy and then I was able to transfer her inside.

Sometimes she likes to lay on her back with arms and legs spread open, but lately she has started turning to the side and flinging one little leg over the other and covering her eyes with her arms. She starts to assume this position almost as soon as she is set down in the crib. I wish I had a picture of her with her hands over her eyes. Its so cute.

Sometimes I let her take a nap in her diaper because it gets so hot and she HATES being hot.

One of these times I heard her talking to herself over the monitor. I grabbed the camera and walked in the room quietly. She didn’t know I was in there filming her at first. I love how she is content to just lay in her crib and play with her toes and babble to her self.

Love that girl!

More Smiles

I meant to put this video in the previous post. I guess it didn’t work. It’s just some more cute Stella smiles. She is so cute and smiley in the last part, but then it kind of turns into a mix of smiling and whining. It melts my heart when she does that. It’s like she wants to whine and then she realizes that she is actually really happy and it turns into a half whine half laugh.

Sweet Smiles

Stella has been all smiles lately. Unless she is ready for a nap or hungry, she is pretty much always smiling. My favorite thing in the world is walking in her room in the morning because she is so extra smiley after a good long sleep (yes, she is sleeping through the night!)

In the picture below, Stella was laying on the floor outside the bathroom smiling up at me while I put my makeup on.

In her Sunday best:

Rosy cheeks from chewing on the frozen teething ring. Yes, I think she may be teething. I’m not 100% sure because I don’t know exactly what to look for, but she has two little white bumps that look kind of little teeth about to break through and she drools buckets and chews on everything. Just under 3 months seems much to early to be teething! I guess time will tell.

Not a smile, but I just had to show you her other common expression: Blowing Spit Bubbles!

Still in PJ’s with bed head, but oh so happy:

Hamming it up

Ipad fun

I came across these pictures that Benjamin and I took when we were messing around with his mom’s Ipad back in March.

The one of Stella is kind of creepy, but it still cracks me up every time I see it:

You guessed it….more Stella!

Stella has continued to grow and change over the past month. I can’t believe how fast she has grown. She is 8 weeks now. She weighs 12 pounds 9 ounces and is 24.41 inches. She went to the doctor yesterday and got a clean bill of health. We were so happy about that. When she was born the doctor noticed that she had a “hip click” and at one month her hip was a little lax still. So last Friday she got an ultra sound on her hip to rule out any problems like hip dysplasia. I was so nervous that she would have to be in a big uncomfortable brace (that’s how they treat hip dysplasia) for the next four months. We were so happy to hear that her hips are strong and normal!

And can you guess who we were rooting for during March madness?

Stella’s reaction when Ohio State lost:

Benjamin has been studying at a library close to our house. The library is also located right in front of a park with a nice walking trail. So, Stella and I have met Benjamin to bring him some food and go on a walk. Stella really enjoys going on adventures.

Stella has also been smiling a lot lately. We have had a hard time getting a picture of her cute grin. This is as close as we got:

But I did manage to  get a couple smiles on video:

 

Stella loves napping on her belly during the day. I only let her nap that way when I am right next to her. She still struggles to take consistent naps during the day, but she is a great sleeper at night. She goes right down in her crib and sleeps between 6 and 8 hours. Then she wakes up to eat as usually sleeps until around 7 in the morning.

We were happy to have some visitors. My co-worker from the shoe store I used to work at came over and made us dinner. His grandparents lived in Italy, so he cooked us his family’s Italian tomato sauce and pasta. It was delicious! We love Ron. He was such a great friend to me at the shoe store. He is a podiatrist and he made me orthotics, gave Benjamin a bunch of really nice shoes that he wasn’t wearing anymore, and was always helping me out at the store. He lives across the street from us and we enjoyed having him over.

My other old co-worker, Shelly, paid us a visit. Shelly is probably one of my most favorite people in the world. She was such a good friend to me at the shoe store. She got Stella the cutest little outfits and the bouncy chair that we can’t live with out. Stella was pretty crabby when Shelly was visiting, but we still loved getting to see her.

Life is good!

Glamor Shots

We took some more glamor shots of our little Stella. I feel a little like Cam on Modern Family, always dressing up my daughter in crazy outfits and taking pictures of her.

 

My sister in-law Kylie made this beautiful crocheted yellow blanket for Stella.

One of Benjamin’s teachers at school made the cute hat and booties for her.

And my friend and one of Benjamin’s classmates, Joanna, made this adorable flower headband for her.

Ok, now let take a silly one:

I have to give all the credit to Benjamin for this photo shoot. I was actually in the shower while he (with the help of his mother) set it all up and got Stella calmed down and sleeping so sweetly. He took all the pictures and was so patient. Oh, and don’t worry, we had a space heater making the room nice and toasty before undressing her.