1 Month old!

Our baby girl Elliana is 1 month old (yesterday)!  I know that people always say that the time flies and they grow so fast, but man they weren't exaggerating!  I really can't believe it's been a month since I've given birth.  (I still haven't written down my birth story and still do plan to do that)  The first two weeks after she was born were really a blur for me, not sure about Michael, and then the 3rd week my mom was here with us, which always goes by too fast, and then last week was kind of another blur again trying to figure things out on my own every day.

I really had no idea how demanding a little tiny person could be!  I mean, I knew she'd need to eat often, every couple of hours, and that I wouldn't get much sleep, but I guess I just wasn't prepared for exactly how little else I would be able to do during those few non-feeding moments, especially the first couple of weeks, and the feeling of being a human feeding machine--though I am happy that I can feed her conveniently what she needs (after a LOT of work to get that going well).  Although she was sleeping more the first couple weeks, mostly just waking up to eat, now she's up more during the day (sometimes MUCH too long! she really fights going to sleep during the day), but she does still sleep pretty well at night--3 to 4 hour increments (which is amazing after getting only 45 minutes between feedings the first week and then 1 or 2 hrs of sleep at a time the next week).

Being a mother is really an amazing blessing, but MAN is it hard work!!  I honestly feel like I haven't spent a lot of time sitting and reflecting on it because I barely have time to catch my breath sometimes.  It can be so very frustrating when she is screaming and crying and we have no idea how to get her to fall asleep because she is overtired, but it is all worth it once she finally goes to sleep and is just a peaceful little angel.  :)

Sometimes I still can't believe that Michael and I are parents and that we somehow produced this amazingly adorable little girl!  We have been given an awesome gift and responsibility by God and every day I try to remember to thank Him for it as well as ask for wisdom to be able to raise her well, and I pray for her to come to know Him one day.  Every day I talk to Elliana and I try to remember to tell her about Jesus and that one day she will get to know him and that is why she is here.  It is something that is very easy to forget to do with all of the chaos that goes on right now, but I hope that when she is older, she will remember Michael and I telling her about Jesus and bringing her up to know her Savior.

Here are some photos I took yesterday of her.  I made a little 1 month sign to put on her shirt but it was too big so I just had to kind of set it on her.  You can also see she lost the pants after getting frustrated and taking a break from photos for a while.

These first two were from a shot I was taking

 to say Happy Birthday to my mom.

   

 

Sort of holding up the sign!

Here she is at 6 days old with the bunny                      

(it is 19 inches, just slightly longer than                      

she was at birth--18.9 inches)                                       

Now she is longer than the bunny!! 

 I tried to measure her with my tape 

and estimated 20.5 inches.

I thought maybe I could get some cute shots of her sleeping but she did not nap at ALL yesterday!  She's going through a growth spurt because the past few days she has been eating increasingly often, from every 3 hrs normally to 2 and then the past couple of days every hour or less and refusing to go to sleep besides the times that she falls asleep while she is eating.  That is exhausting and sort of puts me into this Twilight Zone kind of feeling, like it's never going to end and all that will ever happen is she will eat and cry!  Its amazing what kinds of things run through your head and you start to believe when you are sleep-deprived and listening to a baby cry.

Today was already getting better, praise God!  She is still eating a lot but not quite every hour, and she actually fell asleep for a couple of hours when I put her in the Ergo carrier, which was a huge relief because I could actually walk around the house and do some picking up, drying my hair, etc.  I am hoping that this is a magic cure for us. :)

Well, a fun milestone just happened today--Elliana has realized that she can grab things with her hands!!  We gave her a bath and we usually get the little washcloth wet and lay it on her chest to keep her warm, and she grabbed the washcloth in her hand and would not let go! Then, Michael put her on her playmat and she started kicking and grabbing for the different hanging toys on the play mat.  It's amazing what she can do it a matter of days!

Here are some photos of her on the playmat:

 Here is a video of her on the playmat, and hitting things with her hands!

She can also lift her head and turn it from facing one direction to the opposite when she is laying on her tummy.  She has done it a few times but when I tried to actually video it, she got tired and gave up. :)

I guess that's all for now!  Can't wait to see what the next month holds. :)

--Leslie