4 Months

Four months old.  Wow.  Each month that goes by I am just amazed at how fast time flies.  Everyone always tells you "Enjoy this time, it goes by fast!"  I always smile and say "Oh I know, I can't believe she is this big already," but what I am really thinking is "Ummm I know please stop reminding me because I want time to stop!"  Being a parent is still awesome and I love having her as my precious daughter.  She is so much fun.  Doing all new things as a family is different than what we were used to but I sure enjoy it all.

Weight: 15.2 lbs, in the 90th percentile

Length: 25 1/4 inches, in the 90th percentile

Favorite Toy: Anything she can put in her mouth.  She got a little monkey for Christmas and Chris named her Chewy because the first thing she did was put it straight in her mouth and start gnawing on it. 

Favorite Food: Formula

Favorite Game: She loves when we pretend to nibble on her toes.  She loves when I dance with her.  We twirl around like crazy, bounce, make funny noises together, dip her.  She loves it all.  She is so fascinated by the dogs now and of course Maggie, our female dog, loves the attention.  She constantly tried to lick her and when she succeeds we get the cutest little laughs from Brielle.

Sleeping Habits: She was sleeping through the night and then her mouth started bothering her and she would wake up during the night.  We left her sound machine at Chris' mom's house also over Christmas so we tried other things at night to make noise or play music, nothing worked as well as the sound machine we had before.  When Chris' mom mailed us her machine she started sleeping better.

New Skills:She is giving us big laughs now, not just giggles.  Each day it is more and more.  She is holding toys a lot better and pulling everything to her mouth which has been kind of nice because she can chew on them instead of me holding everything in her mouth for her to chew on.  She can sit up here and there for about 15 to 20 minutes at a time.  She sat up almost the whole majority of her 4 month photo shoot.  When she is laying on her back at an angle she sits up straight from the laying down position.  You would think she would have a nice flat stomach as much as she does it.  ; )  She can just about roll over from her back to her stomach and rolls over from her tummy to her back a lot more now but has been doing that for quite awhile now.

Size of Clothes: 3 month to 6 month size.  Size 2 diapers but we have found a few more size 1 that we are finishing up.

  

Teething Baby and Sleepless Nights

For all the fun things being a parent brings to your life it also brings some not so fun things as well.  I guess it is kind of like getting married, you love your spouse with all you have but you have to love the little things that drive you bonkers as well.  That's how I feel about being a mother.  Brielle is my world, my everything, my future and I wouldn't want any of that to ever change but in the middle of the night when her poor mouth is hurting her so much she cries and is restless it is difficult to 'Love" that.  When you rock back and forth so many times your tummy is sore the next day (not that I am complaining because hey, what a great way to work out and not really mean to), when you sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" so many times your brain went numb and you can't remember the words, when your husband snores really loud right at the time you finally get the baby to sleep in their bed and now you have to start all over, when you give up and just bring them to bed with you because sleeping in your arms is really what they want anyway so when you wake up in the morning you are so stiff your arm wont really move is when you know you are enjoying the "not so fun" with the new parenting job.  Poor girl has been teething for well over a month now and still no little buds have surfaced through the tissue.  She is able to hold toys and bring them to her mouth now where as a month ago she really wasn't able to do that.  A friend told me about all natural Teething Tablets and they seem to be helping.  When we first started giving them to her she was unsure of why we doing it and was fussy when we placed them in her mouth.  Now when she sees the bottle of Teething Tablets and our fingers coming towards her mouth with the small dissolvable pills she opens up for us and seems to enjoy it.  Maybe she is used to the taste (if there is any) or maybe they really do help and she somewhat understands that.  She is starting to learn cause and effect with simple things so you never know.  She has a little Sofie but it is still hot her favorite thing for teething.  I think her mouth is still a little small so she usually chews on her fingers, hands or her Monkey who was named, Chewy, by Chris since as soon as she received said monkey she just started gnawing on her.  Oh to go through this at such a young age has not been easy.  One of her favorite things is when we rub her pacifier on her gums back and forth and it squeaks.  We usually get cute smiles when we do this.  She doesn't really seem to like her pacifiers to suck on but rather to chew on them constantly while we hold them for her.  Hopefully as she gets older it will get a little better when she can sit up on her own and play more with toys that she can chew on.