Week 15

Hello all and welcome to Week 15,

So Estella is 15 weeks old, nearly 4 months. I can't believe she is this old already but she is still so tiny. I see all these other babies that are around her age and they all could crush her. Especially the little baby boys. They have pounds on her. A good 3-4 pounds. It's crazy. But I love my tiny baby. She can stay small for as long as she likes.

Earlier in the week I sent you all a recount of her birth. That was an incredibly long retelling. I had no idea how much I wrote until I looked it over the next day. This will be a much easier read! I'm just going to give you all a quick rundown of the highlights of Estella:

- She smiles all the time. We love it and I can't get enough of it. She is a very happy baby most of the time. She started smiling at about 5 weeks and laughing at about 10 weeks. We try to get her to laugh all the time. Eric is much better at it then I am. He seems to have the magic touch with a lot of things including naps. Eric can get her to sleep like no other. He currently has her 2 days a week and she takes 1-2 hour naps in the morning and 3-4 hour naps in the afternoon. Every once in a while she will sleep like that for me but not often enough. Eric thinks it's because she knows that I have the milk and there is too much excitement that surrounds the while milk thing.

- Poop has become a daily conversation for me and Eric. When she was first born we had to take her to the ER because she didn't poop for 5 days. The pediatric nurse said there could be a problem with her bilirubin so we to the hospital we went. She was 6 days old and we were waiting in the ER for 8 hours while they took an x-ray, felt her stomach and said she was fine. Thank goodness. But it freaked us out. The next day she pooped and Oh Boy did she make it count! To the belly button with her mess. Since then, it's all about the poop.

- She has this lower lip huge pout thing that she does that we just love. It is the cutest thing, but it only comes out when she is about the wail. We don't care, we love the lip.

- She was a nice big baby but has followed the 5-10% growth pattern since. Again, I am happy with my tiny baby.

- We are the luckiest parents in the world because Estella slept through the night since the beginning. We started with getting 5.5-6 hours a night all the way to 9 hours a night. She has had 2 bad nights where she wouldn't fall asleep and wouldn't stop crying, but that is it. She's the best!

- She was never much of a bobble-head baby. She pretty much was able to hold her head from the beginning. Of course we always held her head, but it didn't take long at all for her to be able to lift it by herself, just a week or two.

- She rolls over from belly to back and has been doing it for about a month now. Apparently she does it all the time in day care because one of the other mothers was commenting to me about it today. She hates being on her belly and has mastered rolling to her back because of it.

- Estella is just a lot of fun. Eric and I couldn't have asked for a better baby.

Now here are some interesting post-baby things about me. All the moms will understand.

- Nursing takes a toll on your energy but is great for putting your body back in shape. I am within 3 pounds of my pre-pregnancy weight but my body isn't shaped the same way. I have actually gone up a size in jeans because my belly hasn't gone back to its original size. And the skin isn't as springy as I hoped it would be. It is just going to take some time.

- I think the extra 3 pounds still on me is in my chest.

- Cracked nipples are very painful and they take forever to heal.

- However nursing is absolutely wonderful, so it's going to take a lot more then a cracked nipple to deter me.

- While pregnant your sense of smell is ridiculously acute. After you have your baby every sense is acutely tuned to the baby.

I think that's about all for this week. I'll keep you all posted on all the cool baby news. She's about 12 weeks here in the photo.

Love,
Desiree