Riley visits

We decided to get a Christmas tree. And I am glad we did. It did help with the Christmas spirit and it also encouraged me to get the Christmas presents wrapped before Christmas Eve, which is quite unusual.

But this post is not just about the Christmas tree. I wanted to share some of the Miller visit. Kristi, Wes, and their 3 1/2 month old daughter Riley came to visit. They are living in Chicago right now while Wes is going to a program there for a year. They are due to return next June. Kristi and I were pregnant together which was quite fun. We were able to groan, moan, complain, sympathize and go to prenatal yoga with each other. Neither of us was particularly fond of being pregnant and we wallowed in our misery together. Good times.

They were in Chicago when Ella was born as well as when Riley was born, so unfortunately we were not there for each other's births. Say-lave. But in light of that, we are sure that our daughters will be BFFs forever. We will force them to.....They WILL love each other. As you can see, they already do.

Having two babies in the house is fun. It is even more fun to have two such different babies in the house. It is even more fun to have such different babies in the house and to know that there will not always be two babies in the house.

Ella and Riley are about as different as they come. Riley is above the 99th percentile for her height and weight. She sleeps well and generally likes to just hang out and watch the most fascinating, entertaining, and captivating thing that we like to call life. Ella on the other hand is around the 25th percentile. She is almost constantly in motion and not only wants to see what is going on, but wants to be intimately involved in all around her. Which also means she gets tired quickly and tends to get over stimulated. Riley is 7 weeks younger than Ella and so naturally she is not quite as far along with her development. But it is funny because she is so much bigger than Ella, you expect her to be doing more. Like getting up and walking.

We had a great snow storm the day after they arrived. We haven't had one like it in about 10 years. They brought Chicago with them.

We of course had to bundle up the babies and take them out in the snow. Don't they look like they are having fun?

Okay, maybe we were being a little bit selfish, but look, Ella is catching a snowflake on her tongue!

Kristi and I did go back out in the snow, leaving the babes in the nice warm house with the daddys. We ran, we played, we made snow angels, we made snow food, and then we had to go back inside to get some real food. Got to keep the calories up to keep producing milk for those babies.

We had a big breakfast on Sunday morning with some friends. All people within walking distance because most people were still snowed in. Good food, good company.

Wes has already returned to Chicago and Kristi and Riley are leaving on Wednesday. And the holiday visits will continue when Jackie and Keegan arrive on Thursday. Ella is very much looking forward to seeing her Grandma Jackie as she has not seen her since she was 8 weeks old. I am sure many more pictures will be coming soon of that visit.

Christmas Spirit

It is that time of year. Christmas time. I was looking around our house and realizing, we don't have any Christmas decorations except for the two stuffed animals that I bought a few weeks ago at the Goodwill outlet store. If you don't know what the Goodwill outlet store is, then let me inform you. It is the coolest thing on the planet. Really. They have bins of clothes and stuff that is sold by the pound. Yep, that is right, by the pound. $1.50 per pound to be exact. You can get a lot of clothes under a pound. And stuffed animals too. So, I thought, what the heck, why not spend 75 cents and get a little Christmas spirit. But now that the Christmas season is truly upon us, my two Goodwill stuffed animals seem a little sparse. I thought that maybe we had some other decorations and so I journeyed up into the attic to take a looksee at what we have. Only Christmas tree ornaments and accouterments. You see, we decided not to get a Christmas tree this year. We decided that Ella would be too young to care and we are busily trying to pay off medical bills from the rather long, arduous birth (that story will be coming later) and just can't quite justify shelling out 40 bucks for a decoration. Well, I was sitting around the house feeling a little sad about the lack of Christmas cheer in our humble abode. Christmas music can only take you so far. And I had a genius idea. I would go over to my parents house with Ella and we would help trim their tree. Genius. We are going to be there Christmas day anyway. So yesterday, I bundled up my little bundle of joy and we set off to Clyde, NC. And voile!, Christmas spirit!

My mom, dad, little brothers, Ella and I all helped to trim the tree although Ella preferred eating the branches.

So, it feels a little more like Christmas, but our house is still looking awfully Christmasy sparse. I don't know, should we get a tree? Will Ella look back one day and say, "hey, why didn't we have a tree for my first Christmas?" What do you think?

And I have to just post this picture. Uncle Joel playing with Ella while she is in my lap. Funny.

Rolling

Ella has started rolling over. She started rolling from her back to her stomach yesterday. Of course it was while I was at work and she was with her Nana. We now have a slightly more mobile child. Where did our baby go? They grow up so fast!

Acupuncture

Yep, it is true. We have given ourselves over to Eastern medicine. Well, not entirely, but I decided to take Ella to see an acupuncturist yesterday. Not having very much experience with acupuncture myself and being a practitioner of Western medicine, I am of course just a wee bit skeptical. But, I know that many people swear by acupuncture to ease many different types of ailments. In fact, if you have it, they can pretty much claim to help it. So, in light of Ella's sleep issues, I thought, "why not?" I am willing to try anything. And they don't actually stick needles into your baby. They use a practice called shonni-shin treatments and Tuina massage without the use of needles. There is a community clinic on Mondays at The Women's Wellness and Education Center for only $25 for the initial visit and $20 for follow up visits. And you even get to make appointments so you don't have to sit around and wait forever. I was taking Ella in for sleep problems and digestive problems and of course, wouldn't you know it, I actually had to wake her up from a nap to get to our appointment on time. Seemed a little counter productive. Oh well. The acupuncturist, Natalie Allard, was actually very down to earth, very nice, and offered plenty of practical advice to help with the sleeping problems. She spent a large amount of time with us and the nice thing about alternative medicine practitioners is that they really listen and take many aspects of the problem into consideration, not just focusing on the main problem. After talking for a while, she performed the gentle technique which Ella found quite harmless and may have even enjoyed. And the results? Well, of course it is hard to know for sure, but she went to sleep on the first attempt last night and although she woke a number of times, she was easy to get back to sleep which is unusual. There were no inconsolable crying fits. And tonight, the same pattern so far. But is is only 8:20 PM. Who knows what the rest of the evening may hold in store for us. But I am hopeful and encouraged. There is definitely an improvement. Coincidence? Maybe. But I am willing to give it another shot next Monday. I don't really care why she is sleeping better, I just care that she is. And maybe I would try acupuncture for myself at some later time for some future problem. Who knows? It has been around for a very long time. There might be something to it.

Date Night #2

So, tonight Eli and I had date night #2. All day we spent trying to figure out how to work it out to go see a matinee movie. (We also tried to arrange it last weekend so we could go). We didn't care what movie we were going to see, we just wanted to sit in a movie theatre together and zone out watching some overpriced, overdone flick in uncomfortable chairs. Just like we used to. But of course this time it had to be in the middle of the day because Ella still needs so much attention from mommy in the evening hours. So, after about 20 phone calls and arranging things, we decided to drop Ella off at her Aunt Joanna's new house (she moved in 2 days ago) so we could try to catch the 4:05 showing of "The Men Who Stare at Goats". Ella must have known we were trying to organize to get out to have some fun without her because she decided not to take naps today. So of course we were late getting over to her house. We had to make some stops first, and when we got there, there were some family members there that are in town visiting my folks that I haven't seen in about 16 years, give or take. That took a few minutes. We kept glancing at our watches, watching our chances to go see a movie slipping through our fingers. Not going to happen this weekend either we began realizing. But grasping for some opportunity to have some alone time without baby, we decided to slip out for an early dinner. We said our goodbye's, handed over Ella to her doting aunt and away we went, feeling just a little apprehensive due to the fact that Ella was running on about 45 minutes total nap time today after a pretty restless night. In case you are wondering, it is not easy to find a place to eat dinner at 4:45 on a Sunday evening in Asheville. We checked a few places and ended up at Papas and Beer on Tunnel Rd. Always a good choice. We had one adult beverage and just a little bit of adult conversation and were back to pick up our baby by 6 pm. We were informed that she was quite a good little girl, but of course as soon as she saw us she began crying, remembering she was tired and maybe just a little hungry for some "milkies". So, we still haven't gotten out to see a movie, but we did have a successful date albeit just a little bit early for dinner. I guess there is always next weekend....

Updates

This entry will be about the newest and latest updates. I have spent most of my entries on recounting specific accounts of adventures in Ella land. But I know that some of you might just like some of the fun facts of Ella (and Eli and I)'s development.

Ella is going on 5 months old. She loves to laugh and almost always has her tongue sticking out of her mouth.

Ella LOVES the dogs. I think she takes after me in this regard. When I was a baby and young child, my mom said that I was quite the animal fan. I still am, obviously, since we live with 2 dogs, 2 Chihuahuas, and 1 cat. As you may have noticed, I did not say 4 dogs and 1 cat because the Chihuahuas deserve a category all their own. They are kind of in between dogs, cats (they use a litter box), prairie dogs (they love to get into trouble and burrow deep under covers), and yes, I will say it, rats (of course because of their size and their propensity to have little hair.). The dogs share the mutual affection. They love Ella. They love to give her sloppy kisses (we are always running interference). She in turn loves to pat them, grab their fur, ears, whiskers, and of course try to shove it all into her mouth. The chihuahuas mostly tolerate her presence. They liked her better when she was a bump wrapped up in a blanket that could not grab and flail. Oh well. The cat, he thinks she is just fine. No real feelings one way or another. He does tolerate her grabbing fistfuls of fur, ears and skin quite well and I think just likes the attention as he usually gets little of it because all the other ones demand so much.

Ella still sleeps in her Amby hammock at night and most of her naps. You can read about the hammock here. She is still not a great sleeper and we are afraid to rock the boat if you know what I mean. Occasionally we put her into her awesome, beautiful, hand built crib that her Grandpa made her for her naps, but invariably she wakes sooner than if she were in her hammock. I am sure we will transition her at some point before she graduates from high school. She does love to play in the crib though!

People say Ella has found her thumb. I guess it was lost for the first few months. But lately, she thinks it is pretty cool and often has it stuck in her mouth. Either that or her big toe. I guess she likes the first digits of her extremities. I haven't been able to get a picture of it yet because every time I take out the camera she becomes a ham for the camera starts smiling and laughing. Silly kid.

She definitely recognizes those that she is familiar with and when baby daddy comes home from work, or when I come home from work, her whole face lights up and she gets this look on her face that just about melts your heart and turns your insides into pudding.

When she wakes up from naps, or in the morning, (if she has slept enough), she has this most adorable expression on her face. It says, "wow, that was a great sleep. I am so refreshed! What new thing can I explore and learn about now? The world is such a fun and interesting place!" Yep, I get all that from one expression. Really.

She loves to look at books. Turning the pages (usually backwards) and touching them. I think she is going to be reader. I hope anyway.

It is hard to get a good video of Ella in all her glory because when the camera comes out, she gets so distracted by it, she forgets what cute thing she was doing. But here is a little taste of what delicious experiences we have with our babe.

Click here to to link to youtube.

I am still dairy free. At least my diet is. I am producing ample quantities of dairy. I am getting used to it, but it is hard when people bring tasty treats into work and I can't partake. Even when they know I am not ingesting cow's milk, they still bring treats with butter or other milk fat in them. They have great intentions. But to most people, when you tell them you are going dairy free, they think: milk, ice-cream, obvious dairy. They don't think about that little, teensy weensy bit of dairy in the milk chocolate in the cookie. Oh well. It is worth it. Ella has no more blood in her poo and has obviously much less GI distress. The day you find out you are pregnant, the sacrifices start and I have this strange feeling that the sacrifices probably won't ever end. It is a good thing it is worth it. The joys far outweigh the piddly sacrifices. I mean, who needs sleep and dairy anyway?

Anyhoo, that about sums it up. I remember a little bit of panic the first couple weeks after Ella was born. What have we done? Our lives are changed forever! I miss how simple life used to be! But now, I can't imagine life without her. My life feels so much fuller, meaningful, and magical since she came into our lives. Rock on Ella!