Blankie!

Will this one be it...her favorite blankie? We all had one and most of us probably had good memories of lugging our blankies around with us as little ones. Bryan and I both have ours still...no we don't sleep with our blankies now, but they are in our special keepsake boxes :) Grace has a bunch of blankets, both big and small, but she is still trying to figure out which one will be "the one." She actually got this as a gift from her aunts and uncles that stopped by last weekend, so I am sure they will be glad to see her enjoying it so much. One of the pictures also shows that she is sucking her little thumb...wonder where she gets that from? ;)

Grace is 4 months old!

I am pretty sure I start every monthly milestone with this, but I will say it again...I can't believe our little girl is already 4 months old! Bryan and I were reminiscing about when Grace was a newborn...he apparently forgot the first week we brought her home. I definitely did not! It is crazy to see how much a baby changes in just a few short months. Gracie's personality is starting to show. She is a genuinely happy and calm baby. Grace is pretty much happy all the time unless she is overtired or hungry. We think that Grace is beginning the early stages of teething(which was confirmed at our appt.) with all the drooling and chewing on the fingers going on and her tummy is still trying to get used to having formula...so those two things bring on some crankiness, but other than that she is happy as a clam!

Grace's 4 month appointment also happened to be today. She got 2 shots and 1 oral vaccine. The doctor was pleased with her sleeping schedule and gave us the go ahead to start cereal and prunes (more on that to follow!) She also said that it looks like Grace might be an early teether, which we were kind of wondering about since she has been doing a lot of drooling and gnawing on her fingers.
Here are her stats:
Weight: 12lbs 1 oz (20th%)
Length: 24 1/4 in. (50th%)


Just this past weekend she is now trying to roll from her back to stomach. Grace will lay in her play yard and arch herself back so she can see what is behind her and that leads her to almost rolling over. She just can't figure out how to get her arm out from underneath her to complete the roll. It doesn't seem to frustrate her though...she seems to like this new adventure and does it over and over again.

Grace is becoming very observant. When Grace is burping during a feeding she keeps her eye on the bottle as it sits on the table. She wants that bottle back in her mouth immediately! Grace is also watching Bryan and I like crazy now. When we get up and walk away from her she turns her head and follows us as much as she can. She especially follows her daddy and when Bryan is in the room Grace's eyes are on him the entire time. Grace is also starting to watch us as we eat, which is a sign that she is ready for some solids...bring on the cereal!

Speaking of cereal....tonight Grace had her first taste of solids and she loved it! Since she has been having some tummy issues the doctor suggested trying oatmeal cereal and some prunes. This is what she will be getting once a day along with all her bottles until she is 5 months, which is when the doctor gave us the go ahead to introduce other fruits and veggies. Grace didn't make any funny faces when trying her foods tonight. It was more like...this is great, give me more! She finished all of it and was pretty messy when all was said and done. Now that Gracie is wanting to grab onto everything she was constantly wanting to grab the spoon, which made feeding time a little more challenging.

Getting a little messier...

Taking a little break...

All done! Time for a bath!


Grace continues to surprise and amaze us each day and we look forward to seeing what month number 4 brings upon us! We love you Gracie!

Grace thinks Uncle Jim is so comfy!

This afternoon Bryan's family (Uncle Jim, Aunt Lauri, Aunt Judy, Uncle Tim, and Uncle Jack) came over for a visit. I think this was the most people that we have had over at one time since Grace has been born, but we managed. It was nice of them to bring over lunch from Panera, some dessert and another gift for Grace(she is so loved and spoiled by her family). Grace was up most of the time and did well with everyone holding her. She took especially well to Uncle Jim (as you can see from the picture) and loved cuddling up next to him. Thanks for lunch and for the nice visit!

Meeting Baby Cohen

Today Grace and I got out of the house for a little bit and headed over to my friend Joelle's house. Joelle had her second baby, Cohen, in December and we were finally able to meet him! The pictures aren't the greatest, but Grace and Cohen are about the same size. He actually is probably a little bit bigger! We had a short little visit since all 3 kids needed to nap,but it was nice to meet Cohen and share some Mommy stories with Joelle.

Myla, who just turned 2, wanted to join in on the picture taking. And yes, she is wearing her swimsuit. It is a new birthday present and she didn't want to take it off. Myla is ready for summer...as I am sure we all are!

Here are some pictures from the other day of Gracie. It is hard to get a picture of her these days without her hands in her mouth!

Happy Valentine's Day!

These are my flowers from my Daddy. I love him so much!

Reading my book from Mommy and Daddy!

Yes, Jeffrey I will be your Valentine! Gracie's friend Jeffrey sent her a Valentine with his picture in it. He also asked if Grace would be his Valentine.

Sitting so nice for my pictures


What Mama?

Wait...my hands can do more than just go in my mouth?

Over the past week Miss Gracie has realized that her hands can do many things besides going in her mouth like...pulling mommy's hair, open and close, help hold her bottle, and grasping onto her toys. She loves to just lay in her play yard and grab onto her toys (as you can see from the pictures). Even if she is crying and wants to be held she will still be holding onto those toys,which makes it more difficult to pick her up because she wont let go! We love seeing these little milestones :)

Happy Birthday Papa!

On Friday was my Dad's Birthday and we went over to my parent's house yesterday afternoon to celebrate. Because Grace's bedtime is between 6-6:30 we planned to have an early dinner so that we could be home in time for Grace to go night night. We had a nice family dinner of Chinese food and some yummy cake that my mom made. I think that this was the first time where Grace was awake the entire time at my parent's house...oh how she is growing up :)
And I think my dad is in mid smile here because we were all trying to say Grace's name to get her to look at the camera...she probably thought we were nuts.

Blizzard 2011

Well for once the weather forecast was right! At about 2pm yesterday the Blizzard seemed to start out by us. Luckily Bryan took the day off yesterday too and considering what happened on Lake Shore Drive, he made a GOOD choice. All of the anticipation kind of got us excited, but once the howling winds started my excitement went away. All of our patio furniture was blowing over so Bryan went out and threw it on the lawn so it would stop slamming up against our house. All night I could hear the wind and as I was feeding Grace at 1:30am it was still very intense. We woke up this morning to what all of you woke up to...SNOW and LOTS of it! I wanted to be a part of this action so Bryan waited until Grace took a nap so I could go out there with him and help shoveling. The moment we opened the garage it was very surreal. We have never seen that much snow in our lives! It was definitely a neighborhood event. All of our neighbors seemed to come out at the same time to start digging out. About 20 minutes in shoveling we realized that this would take HOURS, luckily we have a wonderful neighbor with a snow blower who came over and did his magic while Bryan and I tried to do as much as we could shoveling. After our driveway was done Bryan went over with our neighbor Scott to help another neighbor across the street. It really was neighbors helping neighbors! I think the funniest thing I saw today was this morning before the streets were plowed people were riding up and down the streets in their snowmobiles. You don't see that very often! We did take Grace out very quick for a picture. This is after all historic!

This is pretty much how Grace spent her day...hanging out and sucking on her fingers.

Grace's 3 month photo shoot...

Yesterday my mom and I took Grace to get her 3 month milestone pictures at Picture People. I was a little nervous about whether or not she would cooperate, but she did SUCH a great job! If she was old enough we would have taken her out for ice cream afterward :) These pictures are really starting to show her personality and how much of a sweet little baby our little Gracie girl is.