2 months!

little nilly nora turned two months old this week, and how more appropriate to celebrate her 2 month birthday by a visit to the doctor and some immunizations! :)

{scene from the doctor's office:}

nurse: "well she must look like her daddy because she looks nothing like you!"
me: "yeah, pretty much. if i didn't personally give birth to this baby myself, i wouldn't think she's even mine."

and that's the truth. but she's cute though. like her dad. ;-) so i'll keep her.

so turns out our little girl's head isn't as gigantic as i imagined it to be. i used to tease chris all the time that she had his "big giant head," but now it looks like i can't really do that anymore. turns out, her head's a rather normal size. however, as far as everything else goes, she's definitely in the "big giant" category. she's in the 95th percentile for height, and 83rd percentile in weight for her age; which explains why she's busted out of the clothes in which she should be fitting and is, instead, wearing 3-month old size clothes. but this works for me for a couple of reasons:

a) the more nora eats, the less calories i have to burn off
b) lifting and carrying a 12lb baby around all the time is totally helping me see a return in arm definition.

of course, as far as the shots were concerned, she didn't quite like those all that much- poor baby. as sad as it was, it had to be done. i had the opportunity to study most all of the diseases for which she was immunized back when i took microbiology. after learning what i did in that class, there is no way i'd let my child go without getting vaccinated. even though she had to endure a few boo-boos for it.

2 month old nora, stylin' with her bugs bunny bandaids on her legs from gettin' shots.

so far, it seems like nora is developing a bit of a personality. like, a rather high maintenance sort of personality. she seems to want a lot of attention all the time or else. chris refers to her as "princess nora" and has a special "throne hold" for when she is particularly fussy- whereby he carries her around and around the apartment, narrating as he goes. example:

"and this room is the bathroom! it has a bunch of mirrors and lights!... you like that? hmm? ... no? you don't? ok then. on to the next room..."

and so on, and so forth.

that's the hold i'm talking about.

when she's not too busy fussing, she does actually smile. she actually squeaked out a few laughs the other day. a welcome (albeit brief) respite from her usual agitation. i'm thinkin she'll be a whole lot happier once she can move around on her own- she's been able to hold her head up and steady for a while now so she can check out what's going on around her; she's doing all she can to roll over (she's almost got it down); and during "tummy time" she's already doing push-ups and trying to scoot. all a little early, i know, but she's chris's daughter- she's got places to go and things to do! i have a sneaky feeling that this child might give me a run for my money here in the future... we will have to see. :)

 

 

 

 

the month of april.

so this april has basically been a blur of sleepless nights, changing diapers and doing baby laundry and it doesnt seem like there's been time for much else. but of the things that happened this month there are these:

chris is on a new schedule- after over a year and a half of working on the day shift, he decided to switch it up a bit and work the swing shift- which goes from 5pm to appx 2am. therefore, he gets home around 3:30am and sleeps until noon. he likes it. i think it's weird.

chris has another birthday- another one?! how old is this guy anyways? answer: 16. just kidding. he's 28. he only acts like a teenager occassionally. since i have oodles of time for reflection and contemplation when i sit and feed the baby a dozen times a day, i figured i could probably put a little bit more thought into his present than the prior years when i was working and schooling. therefore, i hid his gifts and made him go find them by means of a treasure hunt. he liked it, and i was amused. a win-win.

on daddy's birthday. nora is actually asleep. daddy is being silly.

easter- chris totally got the hook-ups from the easter bunny this year. i did not. i think that's because the easter bunny knows i'm currently on chocolate restriction for the time being. but the easter bunny did get infant gas relief drops for nora, because she's been a really angry, gassy baby as of late. so that was good (writing about one's self in the thrid person is awkward. so is pretending to be the easter bunny. no one really puts that one in marriage and parenting books.) anyways, since i didn't go to church that day since i'm still sheltering my baby from large crowds of potentially sick people, the highlight of my easter sunday was spending the whole afternoon and easter dinner with my family. unfortunately, chris had to work that day/night so he couldn't come. but it was wonderful nonetheless.

six week mark- for me. technically, you're considered "recovered from childbirth" at six weeks... HA! "recovered from childbirth" as if you're back to your old, normal self again after that amount of time. not so. it just means that you're given the go ahead to do normal stuff again like running, and ab workouts, and chilling out in a jacuzzi. realistically though, my figure hasn't fully recovered from pregnancy- i've still got a pesky 10lbs hanging around that i'd rather not be there and am no where close to fitting back into my old size 4 jeans. at this point, i'm actually wondering if i'll ever fit back into my old clothes again... but what's life without a good challange, right? at least i can work out again- i've got my therapy back. ;-)

nora can smile- circa the middle of the month. like the type of smile where she looks at your face, and opens her mouth into a giant, toothless grin. CUTEST. THING. EVER! the past few days she's even cooed a bit. nothing beats hanging out with a happy baby (especially when you know what she's like when she's not so happy).

she's exactly a month old in this picture. this was a "she's smiling again, hurry up and get the picture" cell phone camera shot. awesome.